Paint it or Punt it

I knew that coming in to this project I was going to have to provide myself with numbers to confirm/deny what I think I’ve done towards it. That’s just how my brain works. It is too easy to tell yourself that you are making progress without actually doing it. For example I like to think that I’m good at getting rid of things that aren’t being played however after counting everything I own I realised that I haven’t been for the last few years!

Part of January was taken up doing an stocktake of every model in the flat and sorting them into two piles – Painting (keeping) or Punting (selling). I downloaded a spreadsheet designed by Rodge back when he did his 100% Painted Challenge. As the goal of this project is ultimately to get to 100% painted by the end of next year, the functionality of it is perfect for what I’m looking for.

I’m actually embarrassed by these numbers – I knew I hadn’t painted much over the last few years but this is daft! I have a lot of models that are built and part painted but apparently getting a model to “completed” is a problem for me.

I found a box of mixed minis after I had inputted everything to the numbers will actually be a little different but only by maybe a half dozen models.

To get into the Painted column, a model has to be painted to at least tabletop standard and properly based.

Obviously the main two ways to get to 100% are to paint more or sell things that are unpainted. Of what’s here, more than half are marked to go.

Once I did the stocktake I made the mistake of putting everything back in the cupboard to tidy the place up and then have done nothing with them all since 🙂 I caught myself two days ago mentally justifying keeping the Kings of War dwarves and realised I need to get back on track. In the last 24 hours I’ve put 10+ listings up on eBay (inc the dwarves) and it’s feeling better already.

Now to get on with the painting side of the project!

Very short post for this one. Normally I’m not bothered about changing board game components, I don’t paint the minis and I don’t buy the expensive MDF inserts for storage.

Recently I’ve finally had the chance to play Mansions of Madness with some friends having only played it solo before. It is such a great game and has totally won me over to app assisted games in general. I’m not sure yet I feel I’ve got my money’s worth out of the core box and I’m dubious that I will but for now I’m keeping hold of it.

My biggest problem with the game is that the bases for the minis are absolutely hideous. They are these big black square things that have a ton of wasted space and just block the beautiful artwork on the boards below. I’m unlikely to paint the minis but I do have a bunch of acrylic bases bought for a long dead project.

Initially I stuck them down with plastic glue but the hold was a little soft for my tastes. I’ve redone them with superglue but if that doesn’t hold I’ll go back and pin them.

On the whole, I’m much happier with how they look. The PC minis are all bases on neat grey rounds out of the box so I’m leaving those be. This was an hour’s work whilst watching Mandalorian so it was an evening entirely well spent.

[I’m continuing to have problems uploading to the site with anything other than Edge so posts will be done in batches for the time being]

The Clone Wars Core box for Legion arrived about ten days ago and my Normie friend an I sat down one evening to introduce the Build step of an army. He’d picked the Clone half of the box so all his minis came off sprue and in baggies. The droid half of the box is all on sprue

Now the Normie is quite a tense guy and this was his first experience trying precision with super glue. Despite the volume of swearing, he actually seemed to enjoy it. I don’t think if I had plunked a whole 800 point army in front of him the reaction would have been the same but within a few hours he had his side finished

The droid half of the box took more time and was a bit of a bugger to put together. Honestly FFG why does every B1 head come in two parts???

I’ve still got the droiekas to make but everything else is now built and primed, waiting for the next chance to meet up and start the painting lessons. Unfortunately that may be some time given that the Normie is trapped in Yorkshire because of Ciara!

Two of my hobby pledges for the year revolve around getting friends into minis games and having a bunch of terrain made for the flat. With the restocking of Clone Wars starter boxes for Legion being available for a matter of hours, my Pathfinder GM and I are splitting it and starting him in the hobby of painting. I’ll be taking droids and he’ll be embarking on the hobby by painting white clone armour.

A few weeks back I saw a post on the Zorpazorp Facebook group about someone having done a Legion conversion of the Battle Companies rules for Middle Earth SBG and knew immediately this was how we’d start. He’s an RPer and the idea of building a handful of minis and watching them level up during a squad focus narrative campaign would be a great way to bridge.

I have sci fi terrain from when I played Infinity but it is a bit clean and cyberpunk for most Star Wars worlds. I’ll spend some time on it soon to grubby it up a bit and we’ll definitely get some use out of it.

I wanted something special to roll out for this though and the battle of Geonosis is just too perfect to not use. The table has to be done cheaply because, even though we’re getting past the longest January of all time, February is an expensive month of birthdays in my family. Looking around I have some insulation foam left over from another project I’m working on and I have a piece of 1” thick upholstery foam from a long forgotten cosplay project that has been bundled up like a cocaine drop for years.

I stopped at this point because the next stage is plucking the foam and sanding the towers which I can’t face the mess of tonight! I won’t be able to do anything tomorrow but hopefully I’ll have more progress to show on Thursday.

I painted up the Pelennor Fields box set last year and, though I’m not the best painter, I’m proud of how they turned out. Now they sit in a box in a cupboard and I haven’t seen them in months.

If I want to paint more, feeling motivated is obviously going to be hugely important. Part of that can come from posting here and playing games with painted armies but I honestly think that seeing my work and allowing myself the thoroughly unScottish emotion of pride in my own efforts will have the most influence.

I asked on the Toptable Gaming facebook group about display cabinets and got told that the standard is from Ikea. Fast forward a few weeks and here we go…

No models in it yet but I am happy with it so far. I was told that there are eBay sellers who carry more shelves but I think I’ll stick with the three for right now. The Motivation Box is also the only piece of furniture in the flat that is secured to the wall because there will be a cat on it within hours ?

Next up is not actually something that goes in the case but it is proper hobby.

Went round to a friend’s for a bit of hobby time this afternoon and took a couple of rangers along with me. I’m not sure what my final colour scheme will be for them. Part of me says paint them differently because they are for battle companies which is about the individuals but ultimately they are to be part of a larger army so I’d like uniformity.

For colours, I looked to the movies for some inspiration

For today I tested two different schemes. I think I prefer the first one but I might add in some of the blue on some of them. Perhaps keep all the cloaks the same but vary the rest of the clothing and armour. I also might use a duller green and keep this tone for my Fellowship of the Ring.

I also got to try out my friend’s Contrast Black Templar on a warrior but I forgot to take a photo. I liked the overall look though it will take practice if I want to use it on the shields as well.

I have been having real problems with this post for some reason but it looks like the problem has been Firefox related. Switched browsers and all seems to be okay now

Next bit of actual painting (or at least prep for it!) instead of just organising and the first box on the Hobby Bingo (Start a Battle Company). I hit up the Edinburgh chat to see if anyone is interested in having a Battle Companies campaign and got enough people in to make it worth while reading the book finally ?

My MESBG collection was inflated last year by a steal off eBay. I picked up 125 Gondor models for £40. There are 31 in a broken state that I’ll need to go back through at some point and see what can be repaired or what is getting put into the bits box. There are a couple of heroes, and 5 of metal rangers but the rest are basic warriors. Everything has some level of paint on it but I’d like to strip them all and start over. They seemed like an obvious pick for the new battle company – Osgiliath starts with two warriors with shield and spear, two with shield and sword and two rangers. I decided to strip some extras of each as well as some archers as they are a potential reinforcement.

It’s been a quiet week here because it’s been a hellish week in the real world. Stuff happened at work that sucks and I’m signed off for the next two weeks and under medical instruction to “do things that make me happy”.

Obviously the first choice was to stocktake my collection and start a spreadsheet ?

This is the vast majority of my collection. Everything has been gone through, sorted into “keep” (on the right) and “punt” (on the left) and I’ve taken note of what’s on sprue, assembled or painted. The numbers will get put into the spreadsheet tomorrow.

As expected, more than half is going. I was keen to see what remains and how likely it was I could paint it all in a year. I’m still not sure. There’s currently 449 minis to be painted. That includes 31 that need to be sorted to see if they can be saved or are only good for bits and 48 that may still move to the Punt It pile.

The Punt It pile is currently sitting at 705. Looking at it, I guess one of my biggest habits to try and change going forward is if going into a new game, don’t buy a full army, start small and build up.

Tomorrow’s post will be a little less about the grand plan and more about the next mini project and the first challenge in the MESBG Hobby Bingo.