Time to assess my projects. I want to decide if I can take on anything new. Many of the people I play Monsterpocalypse with are long time Warmachine fans. Their enthusiasm for the game is infectious. Playing so much Monsterpocalypse helps me realize that I don’t have enough games with regular opponents.Heavy Gear is one, but I haven’t enjoyed playing it as much as I had hoped. I have too many games where I’m working in a vacuum. This is a danger of historical games.

I cannot blame historical games alone. I tend not to finish my projects. Even at a slow pace I could have easily finished a large Warhammer 40k army. It was my first miniature wargame. It is the model that all others have followed. I borrowed a friend’s copy of White Dwarf. My friend didn’t play. I think he’d “inherited” two issues from another friend who had moved away, just as I “inherited” them from him, and whoever has the issue I’m missing “inherited” it from me. No one I knew played. I have never had luck recruiting friends to play. Those I recruit are never as enthusiastic as I would like.

The Ottawa Miniatures Gamers club was an excellent change from this pattern. Here were people as enthusiastic towards miniatures gaming as I am. However, historical gamers are fractured. Everybody in a Warhammer 40k club plays the same game. OMG was more about collecting and painting the miniatures needed for a specific scenario and then running it at the club. The only game that was wildly played was DBA, a game I soon found I disliked intensely. Not only did I dislike the mechanics, the attitude behind the game — how few miniatures you could get away with in your army — was contrary to everything I love about wargaming.

Now I realize that picking projects that appeal to me and finding people to play after isn’t always the right choice. I realize that it’s okay to compromise and play a game that isn’t one I would pick on my own in order to find active and enthusiastic opponents. This realization lead to a wild moment of thinking I was going to collect a Warmachine, Flames of War, and DBA army all at once. That insanity has passed. I’ve emerged with a clearer view of what I want to accomplish in my hobby. Part of that is assessing what projects I wish to pursue, something I haven’t done since last April. It feels just like yesterday. Nothing much has moved on my painting table in the past year. Time to get a move on.

The first thing I did was classify my projects based on whether I plan on building a gaming army, or I just wanted to scratch a painting itch.

Some people prefer to paint. Some people prefer to game. I like both, but I’ve been mostly painting. I’ve advocated modeling projects, but I’ve lost sight of the concept. My 1812 project was originally a modeling project. I wanted to paint a big battalion of Napoleonic soldiers. I didn’t want to get involved in a long term project. During my research the project got bigger in my mind. Suddenly I was painting both sides to the Battle of Queenston Heights in two scales. I always let projects mature. My first thoughts rarely match my end thoughts, or I waffle between different approaches. It’s back to being a modeling project now.

Modeling projects are simpler affairs. They take less time to complete. I paint a figure, or a unit, and I’m done. I have two in progress, Warhammer FB Orcs and Dork Tower miniatures for TMP. Once they are done I’m not entitled to paint anything more for them. There’s no guilt, just the pleasure of painting something for the fun of it. Sometimes I forget that. I put myself on the hook for more. While classifying my projects I made sure I was clear what project was what.

Next I looked at what projects I wanted to finish or add to. I have a painted army for Heavy Gear but I’m not anxious to play right now. I could add more units. I have unpainted miniatures for the game. I wouldn’t have to buy anything more. Still, I’m not excited by the project, so why force it? I’m excited about playing Warmachine, so it goes near the top of the list. War of the Ring, GW’s new massed battle game set in the Lord of the Rings world, while I don’t have any immediate plans to play, is really appealing. Plus I can start small, expanding the Lord of the Rings miniatures I have for the skirmish game.

I’m also not ready to abandon my Field of Glory plans, although I again don’t have any opponents lined up. It’s another game where I’m blazing my own trail. Those at the OMG that are interested in it are collecting armies in 15mm. I, on the other hand, prefer 28mm. Here is an interesting situation where I know I want to do something, but the project isn’t ready yet. I’ve painted some Romans, but I’m also interested in Dark Ages. Do I do both, or only one? Which one? Perhaps I should do Dark Ages in 15mm so I can play at the club. This project needs to mature in my mind. I’ll paint what I have and then put it on the back burner.

So, I am ready. Here are my hobby plans for the next little bit. I am trying to alternate between painting miniatures I own and painting new miniatures in order to reduce my store of miniatures.

• Finish painting Orcs.
• Warmachine Khador Battle Box — it’s enough to start playing.
• Romans — they’re already on my workbench.
• Aragorn and Theoden Box — I’m thinking Rohan vs. Isenguard for War of the Ring, so a mounted Aragorn and Theoden, plus three Warg Riders would make a good start, and I already own the box.
• Khador ‘Jack — to expand my Warmachine army.
• The rest of the Fellowship — More of the skirmish game, but I already own the models.

The order may change. I’m trying to paint in the evenings again, but won’t be buying any new miniatures until I complete my move. If I finish the Orcs I may skip ahead to the Romans. I hate seeing miniatures sitting on my workbench. Somewhere in there I should paint the last three Dork Tower miniatures.

Tyler

I now have 140 figures to paint, instead of the 128 from just the last post. Where did they extra twelve figures come from? In Field of Glory you have the option to base Medium Foot three or four figures to a base. Initially I was planning on three figures per base, to present a difference between Heavy and Medium Foot. However, Heavy Foot has a shallow base depth of 20mm, while Medium Foot has a standard base depth of 30mm. I’m still considering where this extra depth will come from. I could center the figures, leaving 5mm to front and back. I could place them near the backs of the base and have some interesting groundwork leading up to the figures. This has been done by many wargamers and looks fantastic. It occurs to me, however, that this would leave a gap between the Medium Foot and whatever opponent they are up against in close combat. If I put the gap at the back of the base the soldiers will appear to be right in their opponent’s face yet retain the separation between ranks that show them to be Medium Foot instead of Heavy. Once I get some miniatures in hand I’ll re-evaluate. It may be having the figures toe the front of the base will prevent them for attaining base-to-base contact with their foe.

Meanwhile I am looking for some good books on Roman history. I want to have both Roman and Celtic armies, but am trying to figure out when Early Imperial Romans and Celts fought. Sure, the British and Germans could be considered Celts and the figures useful for representing them, but I want to get a more detailed understanding of the period. I’ll be hitting the library as a recent rash of purchases — three D&D core books, three adventures, the new edition of Heavy Gear: Blitz! — have all bothered my wife considering my previous vow to buy no more books. Our apartment is very small and space is critical. So out comes the library card. Fortunately I can order books on the internet and have them delivered to my local branch, making it easier to get the books I need.

I also need to figure out what the heck “Separately deployed Legionary Lanciarii” are. They are listed in the sample army I plan to chose but the text doesn’t really describe them. From the very small amount of information Google has provided me on the subject I think they may be later than the period I am planning to play. Hopefully the history book I will find will go into detail about the different troop types in the Roman army. I doubt it, if the 1812 books I’ve read are any guide I will get more information on politics and social pressures of the period than descriptions of the wars and warriors I am interested in. Recommendations are welcome.

Tyler

Yesterday I picked up another companion book for Field of Glory, this time Legions Triumphant: Imperial Rome at War in order to create an army list for my Early Imperial Roman Legionaries from Warlord Games. I’m still not 100% set on Warlord Games, but Wargames Factory has a hard row to hoe to overcome the lead Warlord Games has built. Meanwhile I sat down and worked out an army list for a Principate Army.

When I say worked out, I mean used the sample 600 point list provided in the book. Since I’ve only pointed four bases of miniatures for Field of Glory I don’t have any experience with the game, and ancients wargaming in general. Sure, I could pick an army for myself, but I’m guessing the sample list is balanced, representative of the army, and contains no major flaws. Once I have completed the army and played with it a few times I may have my own ideas on army composition. At that time it shouldn’t hard to add a few new units and customize it how I like.

• CinC is a Field Commander. I will be basing all commanders on round bases as little vignettes.
• Sub-commanders are also both Field Commanders.
• Four battlegroups, four bases each of Legionaries.
• One battlegroup of Legionary Lanciarii, four bases. Not sure what they are, will have to wiki it and eventually get some research material.
• Auxiliary Foot, two battlegroups of four bases. Can be either Medium Foot or Heavy Foot, depending on your research. More on that later.
• One battlegroup of four bases of Auxiliary Cavalry.
• Four bases in one battlegroup of Equites Sagittarri. I wonder if they are related to the colony from Battlestar Galactica?
• One battlegroup of six bases of slingers

All told that is 10 battlegroups, 46 bases and 144 miniatures, including fortified camp and commanders. In Olley Painting Points, that’s 176 points. So far, I have 16 Olley Painting Points painted, leaving 160 to go.

As you can tell from the above list I’m not sure what all the units I will be painting are. This is one of the things I love about historical wargaming — learning new things. I wish, though, that Osprey would include different information in their army books. It’s not hard to find general histories like those presented in this book, but it is harder to find specific information about unit types. I’d much rather have a brief description of each unit type and how they fought. Even worse, the book says that historians disagree as to whether Auxiliary Foot would have been considered medium or heavy foot. It would be nice if they had given a hint of which one to choose for those that aren’t familiar with the arguments either way. Something to the order of, “although historians disagree, we tend towards medium foot.” It would go a long way to making the army lists more approachable for new players, something that Field of Glory declares as a design goal.

Tyler

Here we go, starting in on the new style of blog posts. For the longest time I’ve been using this website less as a blog and more as a regular website with WordPress as my content management system. The other day I complained about lack of traffic. Instead of complaining and doing nothing I’m changing things up. Hopefully the increase in updates will show a similar increase in traffic.

I am sure that there are more than a few of you reading this and saying that traffic shouldn’t be the primary reason for creating this site. While that is true to an extent, if I didn’t care about traffic why spend the time and energy putting this online when I could easily create a project journal in Microsoft Onenote. I do have project journals that I find useful, but I also want to show off and share my hobby with others. All bloggers are in some way exhibitionists with enough of an ego to think other people will care about what they have to say. Most, like myself, were probably inspired by similar sites. We know people want to read this sort of thing because we want to read this sort of thing.

The very tempting Assault on Black Reach Starter Set.

Just a quick note: I am aware that the images on the top-left are skewed. This was part of the site redesign and I need to recreate all of the images. At the same time I’ll add some more. Otherwise, any feedback is much appreciated.

Current Projects

Speaking of projects, I’ve recently been rethinking the projects on my workbench. I’ve written about this before. I’m the kind of wargamer known as the Butterfly. Manly. The butterfly flits from project to project and generally shows the attention span of a gnat. As an example, I picked up a White Dwarf for the first time in forever. A podcast I was listening to mentioned that GW was focusing more on painting and modelling in White Dwarf. The theory was that this is to compete with games like AT43 by promoting the hobby sides of the game as a selling feature. A good idea, and the type of articles I felt I was missing when I stopped reading the magazine. I happened to be at Chapters and decided to take a look at the magazine. When I picked it up my mind was immediately made to give the issue a try. It wasn’t the cover, but the physical feel of the issue. White Dwarf #28 comes with two sample miniatures from the Assault on Black Reach game; a Space Marine Terminator and an Ork Nob. Sold!

I’ve enjoyed reading through it and realized something very important about myself. No-one is ever an ex-GW Fanboy. The recovering process, like that of alcoholism¹, is ongoing. As I read about the new release I thought that it might be fun to pick it up. After all, I am not the wargamer I was when I first played GW games. The last boxed set I purchased was Starship Troopers, and I’ve painted all the miniatures from that box. Perfect rationalization for buying a new boxed set. Nevermind all the other projects I should finish first, nevermind that I’ve decided to avoid GW products in favour of all the other excellent wargames that are much more affordable. I must have it. It must be mine!.

Then reason started to creep into my thought process. I purchased a large set of Space Marines years ago that I never painted. I have a couple of Tactical Squads, an Assault Squad, a Bike Squad, a Captain, Librarian and Chaplain on Bike, a Landspeeder and Predator tank all waiting to be painted. That’s enough for a decent starter army at least.

This boxed set almost ended my relationship with my wife before it even got started. In a fit of oxygen deprivation at a GW Store auction I spent all of my money on it, not realizing it would leave me too broke to even take my wife, then new girlfriend, out for her birthday.

Even this small level of madness passed; a display of awesome wargamer willpower. I already have enough on my plate that thinking of adding something new at this point is a bit premature. However, it’s not like I have so many projects that I can never add anything new. Which got me to think about what projects I do have on the go. Being a wargamer butterfly, this seems to change day by day as new projects grab my interest and old ones are temporarily forgotten. Here are the projects in the order I plan to tackle them. Remember, for me, a project is something like painting a wargaming unit, not a whole army. Right now I don’t get to play much, so painting an army is less of a priority than painting something interesting and different.

• TMP Article: This is a short project. I am painting some miniatures for The Miniatures Page. I’ll link to the workbench article when it is finished.
• Warlord Games Romans: I painted 16 Warlord Games Romans for a Battlesgames article. I haven’t heard if it’s been accepted yet, but I still have the remainder of the box remaining. Instead of packing them away I am going to finish painting them to create a complete unit. Unfortunately I won’t be able to describe how they were painted for a while, if ever, because of the magazine article.
• Warhammer Fantasy Orcs: Remember when I was painting these guys? I stopped before they were finished in order to paint the above Romans for a deadline. Once I start painting them I’ll actually be able to get some more WIP images on the site. I started painting this to encourage a friend to paint his Tomb Kings. He hasn’t even started so I doubt I’ll be playing with him. Meanwhile, one of my Magic and D&D players, an ex-Assistant Manager of a local GW store, has started painting again after a hiatus. He’s doing up some Warhammer Chaos figures, giving me a reason to continue and perhaps expand this fun project.
• Heavy Gear Blitz! Army: While the army is complete, I still have plenty of Gears to paint to increase the size and give me more options. Now that my current job means I’ll always have weekends off I can consider playing this game regularly. Actually playing a game is a great incentive for painting.
• 1812 Project: This project has been on the backburner for a long while. I need to take some pictures of my miniatures in terrain and paint some new figures. It’s something that I’m interested in, but it is a long-term project and not something I expect to be able to play anytime soon. Sometimes I get the urge to move faster on it and painting up a unit will scratch that itch.
• Field of Glory: Although I’ll have a unit of Early Imperial Romans based for Field of Glory soon, I’m still undecided on what army I want to collect. Although I started with a lot of enthusiasm, much like my 1812 project, I despair of ever finishing it.
• Warhammer 40K Space Marines: Will this become a project, or will the urge fade by the time I clear my workbench? I certainly plan to paint the Terminator and Nob as soon as possible.
• Necromunda: Some of my friends still idly talkk of starting a new Necromunda campaign. They’ve been away from wargames for a long while and I wonder how much is nostalgia, and how much serious plans.
• Warmaster Ancients: Another Ancients wargame where I’m not set on which army I want to paint. I’m not sure if I’m going to ever return to this.
• Warmaster: I’ve painted two armies, not sure if I’ll ever add to them.
• Battlefleet Gothic: Another old friend is talking about returning to this game. While I have fond memories of playing it, I sometimes think I’d rather find a similar game and use some of the awesome Ninja Magic miniatures. They have their own rule system too, hmm. Oh no, another project!

Well, so much for more frequent, quick blog posts. This one has turned into a monster. Once again, feedback is much appreciated. Please do me a favour and take the time to leave a comment. It’s simple and easy, no login required.

Tyler

1) I am not seriously comparing purchasing hobby products to the disease of alcoholism. Buying GW products is never romanticized in movies or tv. Seriously though, I’m just goofing.

Rise of Rome: Republican Rome at War is the first companion for Osprey/Slitherine’s Field of Glory ancients wargame.

Rise of Rome is the first companion for Osprey and Slitherine’s Field of Glory wargame. The companion focuses mainly on army lists, with enough potted history to break up the large number of lists for the various forces covered in the book. Interestingly, there are more enemies of Rome than Roman army lists in the book.

The book claims that it is complete with Army Lists, Historical Overviews and Maps. I wouldn’t call the selection of maps complete by any stretch, most notably a map of the kingdoms the book covers. There are two maps: the Siege of Alesia and the Battle of Trebbia. Neither are explained in the surrounding text or captioned. The Siege of Alesia is mentioned simply as the culmination of Gaius Julius Caesar’s conquest of the Gauls. The Battle of Trebbia is noteworthy because the book says Hannibal’s elephants all died following it.

Let it not be said that the book fails in its goal, which is to provide army lists for use with the Field of Glory wargame. It does this well. I mentioned that it contains more lists of enemies than it does for Rome. This is a very good thing, as the authors focuses more on a time frame and geography rather than a single nation. If you want to fight a battle around the Mediterranean in the time of Republican Rome you will find an army list to help you out. The lists are clear by Field of Glory standards and are organized by the game line’s signature sidebar.

Like the main rulebook, the companion features many pictures of painted miniatures as well as reprinted plates from past Osprey titles in full colour throughout. There is also an index which performs a similar function to the table of contents in the front, due to each army taking up only 3-6 pages. However, the maps and illustrations are included in the index, if they were ever needed for reference.

The lack of actual historical information is the book’s main failing, though completely excusable and expected. Undoubtedly there are many references available for gamers looking for more information. To pad the book with more detail would have diluted its purpose. However, a better direction may have been to include more details about the troops and less condensed histories. Realistically, for the intents and purposes of fielding a Pontic army, I care more about what a Thureophoroi looked and fought like – the better to find suitable miniatures – than I do about the history of the Pontic people. Personally, I find it much easier to find histories than descriptions of soldiers and equipment.

Weighed objectively, this is a minor quibble over a book which fulfils its stated purpose with style. It is very easy to fill the book with descriptions of soldiers, their equipment, tactics, histories, battles until the point where the book is so bloated it no longer provides an easy reference and must be split into separate volumes each costing $22.95 CAN MSRP. I would rather have all the lists I need for a specific period in a single book rather than a library of books which each merely amount to a page or two of tables.

I say the book is well worth purchasing for all Field of Glory players interested in the period. It gives comprehensive lists for Rome, its allies and enemies.

I am not an expert in this period, but based on the Themed Tournaments appendix, the following lists are missing from the book: Thracian, Syracusan, Galatian, Hellenistic Greek, Ancient British and Early German. I imagine that this is because they are better covered in other books, notably Immortal Fire: The Ancient Greeks at War and Legions Triumphant: Imperial Rome at War. The Field of Glory website lists which armies each book covers.

Next week, more Warhammer Orcs.

Tyler

Field of Glory Cover. By Osprey Publishing. Cheeky recycling tip #4: Make images from previous articles new by adding cheeky recycling tips.

Now that I’ve had a chance to read my copy of Field of Glory I thought that it might be a good time to share my thoughts on it. This review is not based on playtesting. The closest I’ve come to playing the game is to run a few test combats using playing cards at my desk at work.

Field of Glory is a new game produced by Osprey Publishing and Slitherine Software and written by Richard Bodley Scott, Simon Hall and Terry Shaw. It is intended for Ancient and Medieval Wargaming in 15 to 28mm scale. The book claims it can be used for any scale, though many seem to think 15mm will be the tournament standard.

The game is played using Battle Groups comprised of multiple stands of miniatures. Casualty removal, a small portion of the rules, is done by stand. All stands are of a constant width, 40mm for 10-15mm, 60mm for 25-28mm. Depth depends on the type of base, but is acknowledged as not being very important. The most important rule for basing is that everything follows the same standard, with depths adjustable to accommodate larger miniatures.

The turn is UGO-IGO, with a number of phases where both players are involved. Players have indicated that there is less down-time for inactive players than in other games. Interestingly, there are two distinct combat phases separated by a movement phase. The first, the Impact Phase, is where the effects of the charge are modelled. Numbers are less important, since it only represents the initial contact. After a movement phase where bases can be funnelled into combat, but not new combats initiated, there is a second combat phase. Hear, numbers make a bigger difference, as well as small differences in weaponry.

With two combat phases, shooting inevitably takes a back seat to the melee. This reflects the writer’s opinions on the effects of shooting in ancient warfare. I, personally, tend to agree. If shooting where that effective, than combat would have looked more like Horse and Musket with bow and arrow, rather than what it is currently accepted to be.

Combat is relatively bloodless, dependant more on breaking your opponent’s morale. This, again, is one of those things I feel is self-evident from the descriptions of the battle. Just read how many warriors fought, how many died, and realize that most of the casualties occurred when a unit broke. Yes, men died, and there are casualties in the game, though it isn’t likely that a large unit will simply evaporate through casualties after a few rounds of combat. However, apply force to the right area of an opponent’s line and you may cause their whole army to rout.

Command and control is handled by command bases moving independently about the battlefield. They can be used in a number of different ways, from helping to ensure that a battle group is able to move where it needs to move, reinforcing the morale of wavering sections, or jumping right in and getting their hands dirty in the front line. It is a balance of competing priorities. Commanders fighting in the front line can’t do much to bolster a battle group floundering in another section of the battlefield.

I haven’t had a chance to play yet. I’m sure regular readers of my blog will not be overly surprised by that admission. My conclusions are based on reading other gamer’s battle reports, and from reading the rules carefully a couple of times. There have been rule systems which I felt had really innovative mechanics. For example: The Face of Battle is a WWII skirmish game where each soldiers is given a number of cards based on their abilities. The cards are included in one deck per side, with players drawing a card and taking actions with the soldier revealed simultaneously. There was much I liked about that game, but in the end, I felt I was playing a rule mechanic with a WWII theme.

Field of Glory, while having strong mechanics that I look forward to exploring, seems very focused on creating a playable game of ancients. When I think what I can do with the rules, what scenarios and types of game I’d like to play, I don’t see the rules getting in the way. The rules serve the game, not the other way around.

The rules are definitely more expensive than warrants picking up a copy on a whim. I would, however, definitely recommend them for someone looking for a good first historical wargame as many army sets are being released by various miniature manufacturers in order to cash in on the rules popularity. With an attractive, well written and illustrated set of rules, I can see a new player easily getting into the rule set if they happen to pick it up off the shelf of their local Chapters, one of the stated goals of the writers.

Experienced gamers will more than likely know someone who has a copy and will have little trouble giving the rules a shot using their existing army. I doubt they would regret making the effort.

Tyler

Field of Glory Cover. By Osprey Publishing.

Crap, it’s happening again. I am being seduced by another project. Most people in the wargaming world have noted the release of Field of Glory by Osprey Publishing. It is certainly getting a lot of press, and I think deservedly so. It is a well made product which will definitely act as an introduction to wargaming for a lot of people.

I haven’t had a chance to pick it up, but I plan to shortly. When I do, I will write a full review, probably proxying GW’s Warmaster figures. From what I hear, as long as base depths are consistent, it doesn’t matter if they are deeper than they should be.

I don’t know what scale I’ll be using. I love 10mm and have a whole bunch of Baccus 6mm I received as a “sample.” While I prefer 10mm, I cannot look a gift horse in the mouth. On the other hand, I keep seeing pictures of multi-based 25-8mm figures by the likes of David Imrie and Phil Olley. I think, with companies like Wargames Factory and Warlord Games making hard plastic 28mm Romans the temptation is certainly there. I wonder why there are two companies suddenly in production of multipart hard plastic Romans. It seems weird, and I will always have a little niggle in the back of my mind until I actually see their product released. More likely than a vapourware conspiracy, this is merely two companies with similar plans: a line of hard plastic multipart historic miniatures. Why Romans? Have you never read an article on Ancients wargaming where people do not complain about too many Romans. It’s like GW deciding to use Space Marines in their starter boxes – a real no brainer. Right now, I am leaning more towards Warlord Games. They have images of painted miniatures on their website, as well as a sprue scan.

Baccus 6mm Romans based for Warmaster

Evaluating Projects

I’d mentioned last week that I was going to take some time to evaluate my ongoing projects. I’ve done this before on the blog (scroll down), but it’s time to do it again. For starters, I’ve completed a few projects since the last evaluation. As I mentioned last week, taking stock is important for getting the most out of your hobby.

It is simply too easy to flit from period to period, from scale to scale, and army to army like the proverbial wargames butterfly. At the end of a year of this all that is left is a pile of unpainted lead with nothing to show for it other than a lighter wallet. Which, of course, means that the next time you want something it’ll be harder to justify, harder to feel good about. That pile of lead will haunt you like a silver-grey ghost, reminding you that, although buying those miniatures seems like great fun right now, they give you no pleasure sitting lonely and cold in a pile of abandoned soldiers.

Favorite game of a future US President?

Model! Paint! Play! This the hobby of wargaming. Buying less and painting more. Having more painted. Doesn’t that sound good? Buying some miniatures because they will be fun to paint, then having fun painting them? Everything in your life is improved, global warming is reversed to the point where people looking for things to do inside to avoid the July blizzards flock to the hobby in droves, inspired by articles you wrote about your exploits painting and gaming with miniatures. Meanwhile, peace on earth is declared after a doubles team of the American and Iranian presidents lose a lighthearted game of GorkaMorka to Robin Williams and Sean Penn.

Plastic cement-induced hallucinations aside, I know I am happier when I am on top of my projects. The feeling I get when I complete a project is heady and worth the effort. The fun I have looking at new projects, virtually guilt-free, is almost as enjoyable as the act of starting the projects themselves.

Field of Glory

Here is a project in the initial planning stages. It is wide open at this point, and will probably stay that way for a bit of time. I really enjoy this time and do try to draw it out as much as possible, no matter how much my inner wargamer screams, “Buy! Buy! Consume!” My enthusiasm is high, but that is nothing new. Most new things cause enthusiasm. I call it Ooooh, Shiney! Syndrome. Just now. I made it up.

I have moved from wildly ambitious plans of painting multiple armies in multiple scales simultaneously to my rather more realistic idea of painting a single Battle Group before moving on to the next. I find that, once the heady days at the beginning of a project start to pass, it just isn’t possible to keep up the energy to tackle some huge project. Much better, for me, to pick an army, make a list of what units I want and paint a single one. After that, I can paint the next. Because painting is one of the reasons I enjoy this hobby, it doesn’t matter if, two or three units in, I get distracted by another project for a while. I can still look at what I have accomplished and feel good about it.

For me, it is easy to evaluate projects in that way. Do I have something on my painting table for this project? Yes, then finish it. Do I have unpainted miniatures that I purchased for this project? Yes, then start those. Otherwise, buy something and start work on it immediately. The more time passes between something new arriving and me getting the chance to actually work on it, the more likely it won’t ever get touched. So far, this discipline has helped keep my backlog low. I attach no commitment to anything. Only when I’m ready for the next stage do I make a purchase, and this helps keep me centered and on track.

Speaking of on track. Next week I hope to conclude the sculpting on my Orc head. I hope to get some work on it today, in fact. After that, start painting and perhaps by the time I’m finished, the plastic Romans will be released and I can pick up a few and paint.

Tyler