After seeing the prototypes of these figures with the troopers armed with Spencer repeating carbines and Blakeslee boxes I thought: Wow! Those are cool. I have to have them. Price is secondary in my thoughts. Why did I think that? Because no manufacturer had ever depicted ACW Union Cavalry with those great carbines and cartridge boxes. How original...how cool. But FL made a decision that after being corrected that that combination was inappropriate for July 1863 during the Battle of Gettysburg, that if any person with a knowledge of the Civil War would know that Spencers and Blakeslee boxes did not appear on the battlefield until late 1863, early 1864. So they re did the troops to be armed with Sharps Carbines and conventional cartridge boxes. The problem with depicting a line to match a specific campaign which is what FL's Civil War rollouts are all about is that the prototypes had to be changed for the figurines to be historically accurate. Those prototypes were cool...wish he would have rolled them out. You don't see the Afrika Korps in North Africa circa 1942 armed with MP 44's or Germans marching to the Marne circa 1914 armed with Bergmann MP 18's so the Spencers are not appropriate but I would sure like for Matt to roll those prototypes out for purchase.