Merry Christmas to one and all

 

 

 

 As another year passes by, I reflect on the hobby from a personal point of view. It started out that I played games and painted toy soldiers so they looked better on the table when we did so. I rushed my paint jobs to get them on the table sometimes, a "that'll do" attitude sometimes kicking in at midnight the night before a big game. This year I have not played a single game (unless you count the occasions the youngest has made us fill the table with models and make the rules up as we go along), last year I squeezed in one game with the Brother in Law. Part of that may be due to the dreaded "C" as we call it in our house, but also life changes. People are busier with life, the weeks fly by. Regular wargames seem to be the reserve of the young or the retirees of the hobby, us in the middle roll dice when we can. I take more time with my painting these days and paint models that I have no idea what I would use them for in any kind of wargame. Painting is my stress release now, I take the decision that if I am not enjoying painting something, it gets put to one side for the time being and I move on to something else. Maybe in the new year I will make an effort to get some more games in.

I don't have anything new to show you right now as I have been furiously building and undercoating ready for the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. This will certainly encourage me to increase my output for the next couple of months, there are 101 contributors this year, so although I will be posting there, I will still be posting summary updates here if I remember as well.

Christmas will be a quiet affair with family as I am sure it probably is for most people this year. My buddies and I normally get together for some beers but we sensibly just had some beers over Zoom to keep our families that we will be seeing safe. I did have a mooch around Games Workshop (I still don't call their shops Warhammer, force of habit) and wondered whether to get something for the youngest for Christmas as he is showing an interest and is actually rather talented for his age at painting. In the end though I decided that part of the fun is choosing the models yourself, so maybe a trip in the new year with some Christmas money is in order.

So, as I have nothing to new to show, below is a photo dump from my camera reel of some favourites. I hope you have a lovely peaceful Christmas with friends or loved ones and Santa brings you the plastic or lead you deserve. Stay safe and remember to look out for one another.

 

 

More Stargrave Plastics

The Stargrave Plastics continue. It seems like an endless pile of plastic for me to play about with various combinations. I decided to try and make some of them have matching uniforms so I could use them in a slightly larger skirmish like the forthcoming Xenos Rampant rules (can't wait till they arrive next year.) So I have gone for what looks like a budget knock off Empire Storm Trooper look. The wash on the white of their armour has a gloss look to it that makes then look nice and plasticky. They have a real 90's Rogue Trader look to them too, especially the two in cool shades. (Remember when all 28mm sci-fi and modern models wore shades?)

I had fun with this guy making a jetpack from my bits box. Shame in the photo he looks cross eyed!

It's been fun trying out some new random colours. There is a danger normally when I paint to stick to various shades of brown, especially in historical or fantasy models. I've been loving throwing some brighter colours on models, it's not all grimdark in my sci fi.

The chap on the left has a maul from my bits box (I think it is Frostgrave), the chap in the middle has stolen his gun arms from the Great Escape Games cowboys sprue. If you look at the weapons in a lot of early sci fi movies, a lot of them are basically disarmed real guns with tin foil and plumbing parts glued to them.

The guy on the left reminds me of Taserface from Guardians of the Galaxy, the guy on the right looks like he has stepped off the set of a seventies Doctor Who or Blakes Seven.

I found myself taking another brave leap in my online hobbying world and signed myself up to the analogue painting challenge. A group of hobbyists from around the world all sharing their progress in the hobby by a very clever point scoring system and league table created by a generous chap called Curt. It's all friendly competition and more about beating your own target than each other (unless you want it to be). I have set myself a (hopefully) achievable target of 500 points with no aim at all of getting the highest score. I think if I just don't get the lowest score at the end I'll be happy. The chaps from the Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy podcast take part which is where I first heard about the challenge, bemoaning about their progress each year. The challenge starts December 20th but you can have your models built and primed beforehand, so all my Salute purchases are being put together this month in preparation. (Completely against my normal instincts of only preparing a few models at a time before painting them, see previous post.)

Finally, one of my dear wargaming friends is off on an Antipodean adventure this month so I had to say goodbye. Not before he very generously gave me a case full of models he couldn't take with him, so my leadpile has no danger of running out any time soon! He shall be sorely missed (I wouldn't know the Illustrious Opponent if it were not for him) Not least because he has been an encouraging hobby buddy, but also a dear friend. However I'm sure the Internet will keep us in touch.