#workbenchWednesday 21/03/18

That time again then.  Workbench is relatively quiet, just 2 minis on it at the moment.

Reaper Bones - you get what you pay for, right?

Now, I have a tonne of Reaper Bones, the original ones, all of the first Kickstarter and some of the second.  Let's be honest, they aren't amazing.  Now, don't get me wrong, the price is fine, but the material leaves a lot to be desired, like, I'd rather have 10% of these minis in metal, than a pile waist high that I'll probably never touch.  The clean up isn't fun, the fact they move when painting them isn't fun, and the fact they can still be "sticky" years after priming them isn't fun.  Still hasn't stopped me considering the newer Frost Giants for Blood Eagle though.  Seriously though, I'm not really a fan of the Bones material, it's way down the list for preferred mediums for me, alongside Chinese hard plastic and just above the original Finecast.  Having said that, I've noticed that some of them seem a lot firmer than others, and the Griffon's wings seem a lot firmer than the body.  The Wolf wasn't too bad, so, hopefully I can get these done without hating them too much, and maybe work on more stuff from the pile.

The Griffon is intended for Dragon Rampant and I had planned on putting a spare Conquest Knight onto it, to represent a flying Hero type, then realised that I had used him for my Mounted Warlord for Saga, so that can wait until I get another box, which I need to fill out a unit of Mounted Warriors, as I'm only using the bodies without chainmail.  Hell, Bones are cheap right, I could just grab another Griffon too...  The Wolf is planned for a Blood Eagle Jotun Warband, so will be painted to match the bluish fur I've used on my Frostgrave minis.  I had considered doing him kinda polar bear colours, but I'll save that for if/when I get some suitable bear miniatures.  Pretty sure he can also pull double duty in IHMN Gothic, Empire of the Dead, Witchfinder General, or any of the other Gothic style rules I have.  Both are on round lipped bases naturally as they just look better, the Wolf is 50mm and the Griffon is 65mm, which I found Stateside.


So, what was I up to prior to this point?

Thursday and Friday was spent finishing off the Levy unit for my Saga Normans.  I kept the grey cloth more muted on them in the end, seems to have worked.

12 model units.  Fun.  I could have 3pts of Hearthguard in the same time...

What a difference a day makes.

Really pleased with how these guys turned out.  Pleased enough that I would consider building the rest of the box to give me another unit.  Not immediately, but at some point.

Saturday was given over to the necessary evil of adding basing texture to the growing pile of assembled miniatures I had going on.   The remainder of the Frostgrave Barbarians box, half the Cultists, a few more Soldiers, another Wizard and Apprentice, the Oathmark Dwarf metals and 4 plastics, the new Dracula's America Werewolves, a Faceless Horror, the Lucid Eye Corelocks, a pair of Foundry Elven Revenants (Vampires) plus the Bones figures I am currently working on.

All your base are textured by us.

Sunday, I started cleaning up some Warmahordes minis, turns out when you run events, you are the main person to ask to borrow minis from...  So, a unit of Farrow Valkyries, a Circle Orboros Blackclad Wayfarer Solo and Woldwarden Heavy Warbeast hit the table.  Plus I dunked a part painted Celestial Fulcrum Battle Engine I picked up in a trade into some Tesco All Purpose Value Cleaner to get rid of the naff brown and black primer.  Hit 11 weeks of #hobbystreak today as well, so was feeling pretty good about things.

Honestly not a chocolate cake.

Monday.   Hmmmm.   Monday was a bit of a lost cause.  See, I spent 4 hours in A&E overnight after picking up a concussion at work, so, between painkillers and dozing on and off, whilst being wide awake and exhausted at the same time, I didn't get anything done.  Thankfully I had my arranged game of Frostgrave at the club to carry me over.  Then that got cancelled due to a family emergency on my opponent's side, but, I managed to get in on a pick up game of Zombicide Rue Morgue, so, managed to add to both my board games played and new opponents played tally for the year.

I mean, that's not even a lot of Zombies.

We played 7 survivors vs. the horde, and ultimately escaped intact, with only one Survivor wounded.  It was touch and go for a while after we cleared our way to the escape zone, but the Abomination spawned behind us, and we had to double back to take it out.  We had a choice of areas to engage the horde, and settled on one with good firing lines, but further from the escape, and risked the chance of the Abomination respawning whilst we made a break for it.  Thankfully, that didn't happen, and we escaped safely.  Was a good game with Sarah, Martin and Stephen.

Tuesday, still wasn't feeling 100% so wasn't in the mood for painting, and couldn't really focus on any one thing.  I did get both the Bones figures hand primed, and then started my normal procrastination/organisation thing of re-arranging the cabinets in the games room.  It;s something I tend to do when I am at a loss for how to progress, a way of "controlling the chaos" if you will, imposing some sort of order onto 1001 projects.  It does prompt some crazy ideas however, like, "I should inventory my entire miniatures collection" and that sort of nonsense.  I dunno, sometimes there is a sense of despair, that I won't ever get around to painting all these cool minis that I want to paint, and always add more to the pile.  It's oppressive in a way, and is sometimes a sharp reminder of the ceaseless advance of time...

And on that gloomy note, I did take some shots of the cabinets once I'd moved things to where I want them, more or less, there is still some stuff to change, but for the moment, my newer and current projects have moved up from floor level, and it looks a lot better to me, as there are more painted minis on display when you walk into the room.  The top row is all my Warmahordes stuff, the next row is mainly "army level" games, along with Sarah's Menoth and Mike's Farrow whilst I finish them off.  The third row is mainly Skirmish level games, and the bottom layer is the hidden assembled and part painted minis.  Here's a selection of some of them -

Guildball Butchers.  Awaiting the final 3 figures.

Saga Normans.  8pts painted plus Warlord options.  Still need to add Crossbows.

Mike's Farrow army.  Just a few Razorboars and Carver to add.

Frostgrave stuff, plus Broken Legions and Rocks.

Death Guard starter.  Awaiting reinforcements.

Copplestone 15mm Hordes of the Things Picts.  Over 24pts, reinforcements incoming.

Living Circle Orboros stuff for Hordes.

Gremlins for Malifaux.  Plus a Guild dude I need to finish that box and punt it.

Microworld 6mm Beastmen.  Based for Warmaster.  Over 2000pts.  Needs more Chariots.

Construct Circle Orboros stuff for Hordes.  Needs more clump foliage.

Well, that's all for now folks, hopefully head is cleared up now and can get back to being productive over the next week.

Cheers,

John

We will, we will, rock you!

So, punny title aside, what's with the unscheduled post you may be asking?

Well, alongside getting stuff done, it occurred to me that, having mainly played Warmahordes for the last few years, I have almost exclusively been using 2d terrain.  Now, don't get me wrong, it is ideal for a precise and competitive wargame such as Warmachine, but, for someone that mainly became involved in the hobby due to the aesthetics, it lacks a certain visual imagery.  There are multiple sets of very nice mouse mat style 2d terrain packs available, but for my own events, I was using mdf shapes, colour primed, with a basic outline of terrain on it, alongside the text denoting what it was.  Fit for purpose, and functional, especially when you have a number of tables to set up, but just not visually appealing to the casual passer-by.

So, I figured it was time to add some scenery to my collection.  By that, I mean painted stuff, not hidden boxes of untouched plastic and resin.

Way back in the mists of time (the late 80's, for the uninitiated) terrain was either scratch built or repurposed from model railway stores.  The issue there is that, the former tends to look rubbish when you don't really know what you are doing, and the latter seems like a bad idea when you have limited funds and those are earmarked for more shiny models.  I'm sure most people of a certain age will remember water towers made from old bean tins or juice cans (and flying tanks made from deodorant bottles.  SURE you do...) and slightly later than that, good old Games Workshop, in their big box games (2nd edition 40k, 4th edition WHFB) started putting out card-stock buildings, and more followed in various expansions and in the pages of White Dwarf.

Nevermind 2D terrain, 2D models used to be a thing...

Whilst relatively simple to put together, they suffered the problems of being all shiny, and well, flat looking.  Yeah, there were ways to emboss them, car mesh for leaded windows, matchstick windowsills and so on, but, nothing like the stuff that was appearing in magazines, that people who had much more experience than my 9 year old self could manage...  We made do with them back then, it's not like they looked out of place alongside the massed ranks of unpainted or primed troops.

So, fast forward over the years, and it was still the same, despite hard plastic terrain appearing, and really taking battlefields to the next level, the funds almost always went towards filling the lead pile, rather than enhancing the battlefield.  That's not to say that I didn't buy any terrain, just that, like the majority of the backlog, I didn't do anything with it.

The last few days ( gets there eventually by way of a huge ramble) I grabbed the Tiny World's Rocky Outcrops Resin Scenery Set that I had had lying about for a number of years and set to work, figuring, I've painted numerous Wolds for my Circle Orboros army, rocks are obviously the easiest and quickest place to start.  Despite being scaled purely for 15mm, I also grabbed the remains of the Copplestone Casting's Hidden Lairs pack that I had used for my Hordes of the Things Stronghold..

There are 8 pieces in the Tiny World's set, although, I originally only found 7 of them, and had to quickly go back and paint up the last one, luckily they had already been washed, sanded and primed. 


So, how did I go about it?   Basic technique is (all colours are Army Painter)

1.  After washing and sanding, prime with Uniform Grey.

2.  Paint earth areas Leather Brown.

3. Cover entire thing with Strong Tone wash.

4.  Over/drybrush rock with Uniform Grey.

5. Drybrush rock with Ash Grey.

6.  Over/drybrush earth with Leather Brown.

7.  Drybrush entire thing with Skeleton Bone.

8. Apply Anti-shine Matt Varnish (I brushed it on, but you could easily spray it)

With that, the rocky outcrops are pretty much done, it isn't time or labour intensive, and only requires some basic work to really improve the final look.

I use a combination of mininatur/siflor grass tufts and mossy patches, alongside 2 shades of clump foliage that I picked up in a model railway store to finish off the pieces, using the colours that correspond to the majority of my painted models.

The Rock of (not) Ages.

 The only extra steps with the Copplestone pieces are a final layer of Skeleton Bone on the skulls on them, and painting the entrance interiors with Necromancer Cloak.  Only a couple of bits of clump foliage to represent bushes for the smaller scale, and some dead static grass to match my Warmaster and Hordes of the Things forces.

Not sure if I'd rather have based them up, rather than being stand alone.

And that, is basically it.  I used to do a more detailed process of painting rock, involving various green washes, but I didn't really think it was necessary here, this was essentially just a quick project between other ones.  One thing I have been asked about is using Bone to drybrush the rocks, and I've found that, in combination with the Strong wash, it adds a more natural look to them, and avoids the harsh contrast of a dark wash and just grey drybrushing.



Final thoughts on this little side project is that, mostly being devoid of skulls (mentioning no names) these pieces are scale agnostic, and I can see myself getting use out of them with my 6mm, 15m and 28-30mm figures.  The Copplestone pieces will probably be limited to 6-15mm gaming, as a 15mm Human skull is probably a good 6mm Ogre skull.  The smaller pieces will provide basic cover and obstructions at larger scales, and should prove to be impassable areas when I go down to 6mm.  I've added a number of images for scale with  6mm, 15mm and a couple of various sizes of 30mm scale figures for comparison.

6mm Beastmen (Microworld Games) - 15mm Picts (Copplestone Castings)

15mm Picts - 30mm Baldur the Stonesoul (Privateer Press)

Megalith (50mm base) - Baldur (30mm base)

Large Cave or Tunnel Entrance?

Savage badgers around here...

So, that's it really, just a little distraction for myself between projects that has given me a number of scenery pieces to kickstart my collection (of painted stuff), and they are generic enough that I can see myself using them for multiple game systems.  As little more than giant rocks, they will fit in with both fantastic and historical games, and will break up the flat expanse of table.   It is definitely a project that anyone could attempt, and, even if you don't want to spring for resin pieces, you could get a very similar result with rocks out the garden stuck in some polyfilla.  Oh, we are back to the late 80's again...


It would be remiss of me to only have one stone based pun in this article considering the amount of typing, so I'll leave you with the words of Primal Scream frontman Bobby Gillespie -

"Get yer rocks off, get yer rocks off honey, paint 'em now-now, get 'em on the table*"


Cheers Bobby, obviously advocating getting that terrain painted since 1994.




*editted for effect.  Obviously.

#workbenchwednesday 01/02/17

So, I did good keeping this updated last month, and hope to do so for the remainder of the year, if not beyond.

Having finished the Circle models, I've got a few Saga models up next.

The 2 units of mounted hearthguard have been drilled and glued to paperclips for priming off of their horses, and I've started with a colour primer of Platemail metal, followed by a Dark tone wash.  The skin has been blocked in with Tanned Flesh.  Once all the other details are blocked in, I'll give them an all over wash with Dark Tone, then highlight and layer up.

The Horses have been primed Leather Brown, basically because it's easier to paint the horse another colour and the basework is already done, and the texture has been washed with Strong tone.

The 2nd unit of Warriors was also primed Leather brown and hit with the Strong wash, and the skin was blocked in.  The plan is to drybrush Leather Brown over the bases, followed by Skeleton Bone, then re-do the rims Leather Brown.  That is how I do the majority of my bases these days.  It also gets the messy drybrushing out of the way before painting really begins.

Yesterday's review post got me thinking though, with 16 hobby resolutions, which is basically crossing off 4 every 3 months to keep on target.  Some, like keeping the Games room tidy or Ironmanning the PP forum painting challenge are obviously end of the year things, whilst others can be completed much sooner.  So, highlighters in hand, I set about provisionally planning how I would break them down over the year.

January - March - Finish the Microworld Beastmen, Paint a Gargossal, Play 6 new Opponents, Go to 2 Shows or Conventions.

York and SmogCon cover the latter two, and hopefully I can find the time to get a Gargantuan painted before then.  Then it's just a case of finishing off the beastmen and getting started on the next things.

April - June - Run a 2 day event, play 6 different boardgames, Place at Welsh Masters, Finish 6pts of Saga.

Well, the Saga stuff is halway done already, with more on the paint station so that's a big plus, Welsh masters and my event are in April and May, and the Boardgames breaks down to 1 a month.

July - September - Konflict '47, Warband Dark Elves, 20 Frostgrave figures, 2 Hordes Battle boxes.

OK, so, errrrr, basically this was all the choices that were left that after the first 8, and working out what 4 I couldn't tick off until the end of the year...

October - December - Tidy Games Room, Keep Butcher's Guild fully painted, Transfer Paints to Dropper Bottles, PP Forum Ironman status.

As above, mostly stuff I won't know I've done until the end of the year.

#workbenchwednesday 04/01/17

(Originally posted 4 Jan 2017, 22:32)

OK, so, already beaten last years record by writing 2 blog posts this year...

Came up in a facebook discussion this morning, with everyone showing of their freshly cleaned (or not) workstations, and it was suggested that people post a picture once a week to show the steady decline into chaos, or productivity (YMMV) Figured it was a pretty good idea, especially to help me maintain some semblance of organised chaos, and maybe push me towards clearing stuff and keeping this updated.

So, how's it looking?

Pretty snazzy huh?  The figure on the cutting mat is no longer there as he will be winging his way to Germany as part of a Warmahordes Press Gang Secret Santa, so that just leaves the figures to the left.

First up is my Microworld Beastmen for 6mm Warmaster.  All in there are 2 units of Chariots, a unit of Dragon Ogres (points sink), a unit of Minotaurs, a unit of Herdkin and a Doombull and Wargor character stand.  17 elements all in, and 785 points, which is enough, should I get it all painted, to take me to over 2000 points.

Finally, there are a couple of unfinished Circle models, Kaya2 and Laris, and the new Ghetorix resculpt, which are part of one of the lists I used at Scottish Masters last year (I switched to the army at 3am the morning of the event).  Getting these done would not only cover my PP forum painting requirement, but also means I would be only one model away from having the full 75pt list fully painted.  That model in question is the Druid Wilder warlock attachment, and she is currently awaiting primer.

Hoping to do an hour or so before hitting the hay tonight, and once the kids ship out to school in the morning I am free for the rest of the day to start assembling some of the models for the year and doing some painting.

Fresh Start

Originally posted - posted 14 Mar 2016, 00:53


 So, I go through bursts of hobby... I dunno, despair, and have so many projects and things on the go at any one time that when I do find time to get on with them, I feel overwhelmed and just sit and play videogames...

Spent all of last year just painting Farrow mainly for HORDES, and have nearly filled out the entire line in painted models, and I played a few competitive games and tournaments and did alright.  Figured I should look towards getting a few starters painted up for different systems to branch out a bit.  Success so far as I finished up all my Butcher's Guild for Guildball and a full warband for Frostgrave.

Next up is probably a demon themed warband for Ronin/Daisho/A Fistful of Kung-Fu, and some Conquest Normans for SAGA that might get expanded into a Lion/Dragon Rampant army.

Also made a start on some 6mm Beastmen from Microworld Games for playing Warmaster in that scale.

Fresh(er) Start - 2017 Hobby Bingo Resolutions

ORIGINALLY POSTED - 3 Jan 2017, 17:41 

Here goes with the obligatory January update, your one post for the year and all that...

Actually, I am going to try and keep this updated semi Regularly, hopefully at least once a month, whilst still tinkering away at making the site look a bit nicer and getting more pictures up.

This post was prompted by a Hobby Resolution Image that was floating about on Instagram from hobbyvices where he was looking for people to share the #hobbyresolution2017 (I think that counts) and it kinda mixed in my head with someone else who had posted up a Hobby Bingo sheet for the previous year.  So I floated the idea with Brushchewer about doing something similar.

I figured 16 various things, spread across Painting, Gaming and Hobby would be good (we both chose different amounts) and quickly set about working mine out.  Ultimately, mine ended up being mostly painting related (10 choices) then split evenly between gaming and hobby ( 3 a piece)

I'll List them here with a bit of explanation towards each, and keep them updated on the Homepage once I've worked out all the lists and what is actually done.

2017 Hobby Resolutions

1 - Build and paint a 1500 point German Force for Konflict '47.  in 15mm.

I've had a bunch of Plastic Soldier Company and Battlefront Germans lying around for a few years now, from when a few guys at the clubs I went to were all over Flames of War.  I never got beyond building and modding a few tanks before they moved onto something else, so that was as far as that project went.  So, general love of werewolves, and having a bit of an interest in Weird War, I was very interested in Konflict '47, especially as I had been following Clockwork Goblin when they were producing the 15mm versions.  Talking to my Erstwhile partner in 15mm Crime, I figured I may as well get some of the stuff painted up.  I've worked out a preliminary 1000pt list, but will take it up to 1500 or so, as I didn't add a tank.

2 - Continue painting Microworld Beastmen for 6mm Warmaster to hit 2000+ points.

Warmaster was a game I really enjoyed back when it was released, and despite never playing much, I've always had a soft spot for it.  Despite owning both an official Chaos army and the Copplestone 'Honestly not Lord of the Rings' Orc army, I decided to go for 6mm as I had fallen in love with the models from MicroWorld Games and it was a lot cheaper than starting a new Ebay army.  I settled for Beastmen (although both Demons and Wood Elves were tempting) and got a fair amount painted up last year in a couple of sessions.  Currently sitting at about 1400pts painted, and I hope to get the army to at least 2000pts, which I can hit by finishing the units and characters that I had already started.

3 - Paint one of the 6 WARMACHINE Colossals or HORDES Gargantuans I have in my Backlog.

Imagine Mt. Everest.  Made of Lead...

So between the various factions I collect (read: Most) I have ended up with 6 (at current count) Gargossal models.  All of which are unassembled.  I would like to change that, and get at least one of them built and painted this year.  Current though is that it will be a WoldWrath for my new Circle Orboros army, But it might be the Storm Raptor (also Circle) or Mountain King (Trollbloods).  May even be the 7th one I get...

4 - Maintain a relatively tidy and clear games room.

Pretty Straight Forward.  Once everything starts getting cluttered it becomes a real drain on my hobby mojo.  The table becomes a dumping ground for boxes, cases and figures, and it then stops me wanting to play (as I have to clear it...)  I also immediately feel more settled when it is clear and that helps productivity.  Managed to clear my desk and the tabletop yesterday.  Cleaned out my painting mug, washed my pallet.  Was tempted to wash my painting towel, but I think it is now more paint and glue than fabric, and that is all that would survive a wash.  May just invest in a new one.,

5 - Maintain Butcher's Guild being fully painted.

Seeing as it was one of the few Game Systems that I actually had Fully Painted for a while, I figure I had better keep on top of at least one team, it is currently only 3 figures to paint to get them back there, and I have another 2-3 teams to deal with after that.  Fully Painted straight out the window...

6 - Organise and run a two day Warmahordes event,

So part of being a PressGanger is getting new blood into Warmahordes, and the other part is keeping them there with various events.  I've been running a 4-weekly Steamroller, mainly at Common Ground Games in Stirling, and I really want to put on a big two day event, as I've been to a fair few and have always enjoyed them from a Player Perspective.  I have a venue and date set up for this already, it's just a case of getting it all planned out and sorted now,

7 - Play 6 different Board Games.

Kinda self explanatory this one.  Now I've spent a fair bit of cash on various kickstarters, mainly miniature related ones, and that has included a lot of board games.  Beyond organising them, and spending even more cash buying card sleeves, I haven't really done anything else with them.  We had a kinda impromptu weekend gaming session early last year when my friend Mark was over from Northern Ireland around March, but that was really it. Fast forward to the last couple of weeks, and I managed to get Brushchewer,  Jimboba and Duffy together to play Bloodrage at CGG, which was a blast.  So, yeah, play 6 different boardgames at least once, hopefully more.  I know Bloodrage and Battlelore 2nd edition are going to be part of that, probably Zombicide, and seeing as she bought me Star Wars Imperial Assault and B-Sieged for Christmas, I figure I better play those too.  (once suitably sleeved)

8 - Paint a Dark Elf army for Warband in 15mm. 

I've painted up 3 Blighthaven warbands now for Paul at Ral Partha Europe and have amassed sizeable forces of Beastmen, Elves and various other models.  I absolutely love these sculpts, they are, in my opinion, some of the best 15mm available despite being more that 20 years old.  Seeing as Jimboba is fielding his Celts, I figured I would do something a little different for a new army, rather than the Copplestone Northlanders I had been working on.  I picked up Pendraken's Warband rules a while back, along with a Taurian army pack, but I immediately looked into switching to 15mm for this over 10mm.  I got some sabots made up at War Bases so that I could use individually based 15mm models to play, and still have them able to pull double-duty for skirmish games.  Turns out that the list I have planed for Warband will cover me for Dragon Rampant once I add a Dragon.  Go figure.

9 - Place in the top half (or at least top 2 thirds) at Welsh Masters for Warmahordes in May.

Again, pretty self explanatory.  Went to Welsh Masters last year, had a blast, want to do the same again this year, and place a bit higher than I did with MKii Thornfall.  Top half of the table would be great, but I'd settle for anywhere in the top two thirds.

10 - Transfer my flip-top paint collection to dropper bottles.

Some of my paints are old.  Like, 15 years old or more, and recently I've had a few of my Foundry paints lid's shatter when opening them.  I have the complete collection, so that's a lot of paint.  Add the P3 line to that, as well as the newer GW line, and that's even more.  Now, most of the little nubbins on the flip tops are breaking anyway, so, 400 dropper bottles from Ebay and a bunch of little funnels are waiting for me to begin what is surely going to be a messy and tedious task.

11 - Paint 4-6pts of Normans for SAGA for the Falkirk District Wargames Club Campaign.

So Tim is running a SAGA campaign at the club, and I figured I would join in last year when it kicked off in a bid to play new people and learn a new game.  And clear some of my unpainted backlog...  The Campaign petered out after the first round or so due to various real life events, but is scheduled to start up again this year.  I am using the Conquest Games plastic Normans for my force, and aim to have 6 points done, hopefully with a few points of extra options.

12 - Play 6 New Opponents.

Again, self explanatory.   Get out the house, stop being a recluse and play games versus new faces..

13 - Go to 2 Gaming Shows or Conventions.

Similar to the above, just something to force me to get out of the house once in a while.  Between Nightshift and kids, free weekends are a luxury, and never seem to coincide with anything exciting.  Already booked in for SmogCon in February, so that's a big one.  Sadly I'll miss our clubs show (Carronade) this year as it clashes with Welsh Masters, so hopefully I can either get down to York for Varpartnak or one of the other Scottish shows.

14 - Paint 20 Random Frostgrave Figures.

Frostgrave really took off at FDWC, probably because most folk had a variety of old models to shoe into a warband (and trigger random basing OCD...) and I got pretty much all of the original Kickstarter.  Did I mention I am a huge Copplestone fan?  I painted up an Enchanter Warband (Witch and Necromancer were close choices) and both the standard and Cult Barbarians.  Added enough models to have a starting warband, and that is as far as it got.  Total games played 0.  But at least I can say that my warband has won more painting awards than it has won games, right?  I want to chip away at some of the Frostgrave drawer, probably because it is full, and just to give me some random stuff to work on.  The 20 figures I have chosen (at the moment) include the Apeman from Empire of the Dead, and the Demon gang from A Fistful of Kung-Fu, as both should fit in pretty well.  I like getting double duty from models these days (even if I continue to buy the official ones too) and the Demons should be a good choice to work in AFoKF, Daisho, Ronin and Frostgrave.  I will do a seperate blog post detail the 20 figures and why I chose them.

15 - Finish the Privateer Press Forum Painting challenge with Ironman Status (10+ pts painted every calendar month)

For the last two years I have participated in the "A Tale of Warmachine/Hordes 20xx" on the official Privateer Press Forum.  The general idea is to paint 10+ points a month (MKiii) or a Warlock or Warcaster.   You are allowed two gap months by playing a get out of painting free card, which can also be won back by painting 20+ points in a single month after that.  There was a list of various titles and achievements listed somewhere, and one of those was the Ironman award, for completing all 12 months without using a GooP card.  I've managed it for 2 years, so aiming for a third.  Should be alright with my 2 new battleboxes, a colossal or gargantuan, and adding to my Circle army.

16 - Paint 2 new Warmahordes Battle boxes for demoing.

This one is relatively easy, and also contributes to number 15.  I have a number of starter battle boxes painted up already over MKii and MKIII, and I figured that I might as well go for Trollbloods and Skorne as they are the last 2 Hordes boxes I need to do, and are also the ones included in the 2 player starter box.  Although both 0pt choices in game, that gives me 2 Warlocks and probably 3-4 months of stuff to complete for the Forum Challenge.

So, yeah, That is pretty much it for my goals in 2017.  Obviously I'll get distracted at some point, but I hope to use this as a guide to focus myself a bit.  I'll hopefully update soon with progress, or you'll be waiting until 2018 for the next post...