2014 - What Happened?

Well, 2014 is just about over and I feel I've regressed and accomplished very little on the hobby front compared to the goals I set for myself at the start of the year.  Oh, well...we do this for fun, so I'm certainly not going to lose any sleep over it!

2014 was a busy year for gaming at least as I got in more games than 2013, so I do consider that an accomplishment.

Late in the year I also had a major philosophical change in my gaming perspective.  After thinking long and hard about it, I decided to switch scales for the bulk of my ancients, medieval and renaissance gaming from 25/28mm to 15mm.  I had armies in both scales, and the games I played most often, Hail Caesar and Might of Arms, just play better in 15mm than in 25/28mm IMO...largely due to the size of the tables that are available locally.  I also have limited storage space and can easily fit 2-3 15mm armies in the space that it takes to store a single 25/28mm army.  As a result of this decision, I've spent a lot of time trading and selling and buying figures with good results IMO.  2015 will be focused on getting the 15mm armies I've acquired up to playable condition as many are a combination of painted and unpainted figures at the moment.

I'm not entirely done with 28mm.  I still have 3 forces in that scale for SAGA, 2 for Bolt Action (though the Poles I have are unpainted), and of course I kept my 28mm ACW collection as I enjoy the big battles we have using Black Powder. 

So, that's what's happened this year for the most part...next up will be the "crystal ball" edition for 2015...I hope I have some glass cleaner and can do a better job on predicting than I did in 2014!

GITD 2010 Terrain Progress Report 2: Rohan

Well, here are some pieces that will likely be on the Rohan table I'm doing for GITD 2010. The great thing about these pieces is they can work for a wide variety of settings...I'm sure some will end up on the table when doing 28mm ACW as well as 28mm WWII Eastern Front! So, here's what I have so far:

Fences by Pegasus Hobbies, but I repainted them to fit in with the rest of the terrain. The bridge is from JR Miniatures. The sheds (there are actually 2) are from Old Glory and they have lift off roofs. The watering troughs are also Old Glory. I'm not sure where the well is from; it is resin and I've had it for a long time and I finally had a reason to paint it up.

Here are 2 Old Glory houses. These come from their Russian building range. As you can see the roofs lift off. The doors are metal and the buildings are resin. I tried to get the doors so they could open, but they it was impossible for me to do so...the combination of the size & weight of the door, the place to drill for rare earth magnets or pins, and the relatively thin resin at the bottom of the door defeated my feable modeling skills. So the doors are glued in...deal with it!

Here's a closer picture of one of the houses.

And a closer picture of the second house.

And here's a barn from Old Glory. It is similar to the house, but with a staw roof. I have 2 of these as well because they came in a set along with the shed and some large log walls that I will be painting up after the tournament. This is a little shiney because I had just gotten done putting a coat of spray polyeurothane on it. It will be dulcoted once it dries for a nice flat look.

The last pieces of terrain I have to finish off for the Rohan table are some woods...I'll put some pictures up once I finish them off.

GITD 2010 Terrain Progress Report 1: Osgiliath

Well I've actually been doing pretty good with the terrain I've been working on for GITD 2010. Here's the Hirst Arts piece that I won last year for the Osgiliath table I did. Thanks again to Tim K. for putting it together for me. I did some light rubble on it. It will make a good addition to the Osgiliath table for this years tournament! Once I finish off the pieces for the Rohan settlement I'm doing for this year, I'm going to figure out how I'm going to rearrange the Osgiliath table.

A New Year - 2010 resolutions?

Well, the New Year and New Decade is here and though I haven't been updating this blog much I have actually been doing some gaming related activities. I had a target date of December 31st to finish off my Uruk-Hai scout army for LOTR, but I'm going to be a little behind on that...maybe this weekend...the reason I'm mostly behind is that I decided to do up another box of Warg Riders that I won at the Gathering In the Desert Primer event. So here's my "plan" (subject to change at any time, of course!) for 2010:

1-Finish the Uruk scouts for LOTR: I plan on taking pics and posting them next weekend.

2-Do a bunch of buildings from Old Glory and JR Miniatures, along with some accessories from Pegasus and a piece from Hirst Arts; I want to get this done by the end of January or so because I'll need this stuff for a couple of tables I'm supplying for the Gathering in the Desert.

3-Touch up and rebase a bunch of 15mm Napoleonics I got in a trade. I traded off a 25mm Early Imperial Roman army for these troops since some of the local guys have started playing Napoleon's Battles and Shako II. I'll likely trade/sell off the Russians I got so I can expand the French and Poles I have.

4-Finish up the 15mm DAK trucks for my FOW army.

5-Finally finish up the chariots for my 25mm Mitanni army for WAB.

6-Get some figures suitable for 40k Stormtroopers to add to my Daemonhunter Army.

7-Start on a Warhammer Fantasy Army: I have a large number of Dwarf Wars figures that I can proxy as either an Orc army or an Empire army based on how they are armed, but lately I've been thinking of starting either a Skaven or a Dark Elf army instead.

8-Start on another 40k army: I have my Grey Knights and I think I will start off by adding IGuard and Space Marine allies with possibly expanding these to full blown armies in the future. I'm also interested in Eldar and Dark Eldar though too...

9-Finish off and base up a 15mm Marian Roman army that was painted by Philgreg painters in Sri Lanka. This is for Might of Arms...a good game which I hope to play more of this year.

10-Commit to one "new" game...I'm thinking this will be Uncharted Seas, but we'll see.

That's all for now...hopefully I'll have the time (once my son's basketball season is over with at least) to update the blog more frequently.

Happy New Year!
Tom