1.    What’s in your reading pile at the moment (podcasts totally count as reading in time-poor 2018 BTW)

Since Mr. Pratchett is dead, my Shadowrun and Star Wars collections being nearly completed I’m all out of books. So my reading pile is literally empty. Even with counting podcasts because I usually have them heard the day they are out.

2.    Prompted by the antics of @mage last week, have you ever considered an ‘iron hobby’ challenge where you set yourself a short deadline to churn out a lot of hobby output? If you were going to attempt one, what goals would you set yourself? What rules would you put in place?

I did so three times but not only I. There is a german hobby blog/magazine (a smaller more hobby version of Beasts of War) called Magabotato and they do a Paintathon.  Paintathon being a butchered word for painting marathon. The goal is to paint 42 miniatures in one month. 42 because a marathon is 42 km in length and the month is usually July. In 2017 I did some Chaos Space Marines. See all painting Stages here. In 2018 I went with old school Space Orks but since this year was so friggn hot painting was a lot less fun. See results here. Since a lot of participants had trouble with the heat we did a second paintathon in Orktober but I didn’t have a single project this time but kept to SW:L. Those results had bee seen here 😉 The only rule for the Paintathon is: have fun. 42 is a goal but not mandatory. Some stay below and other blow way past that because they are painting machines. Sample pictures of past Paintathons:

3.    Are bespoke miniatures your thing or do you prefer large quantities of homothetic plastic minis?

Could you rephrase that question please? I always thought that I’m quite good at English but I really can’t make any sense from that. Sorry.

Hobby Pledge

As stated in my Temple Ruins project I got a new set of Modular Dungeon parts so I’m thinking on “what to do” with it.

@rayzryr thanks, that is a relieve 😉

No worries @sundancer ?

Why did I log on after a twelve hour night and before going to bed! I’ll be back later you merry band of… uh…. chazwozzers!

me brain tired

@mage you silly sleep-deprived sausage!

@sundancer 42 seems like a good number to me. 42. Almost seems… meaningful. In an important, valuable to life kind of way…

Good work on your Orks and Chaos from previous paintathons too!

My Mantic Orcs are done. I just went ahead, essentially dry-brushing all over the miniatures with Olive Oil. They’re a little oily now, but I expect that some of that will dry out. Tomorrow I’ll go over them with some paper towel to remove any left over.

Pic’s or it didn’t happen!! (Same pics as I posted in the Orctober thread though, soz!)

I’m currently re-reading Feet of Clay by Saint Pratchett. We gave him a sainthood right? After that I may go through American Vampire 3-7.

For hobby marathons I use my handy painting handle, cures all kind of ills.

I of course prefer bespoke models even in rank and file but I’m far too lazy to do much about it. GeeDubya plastic kits are great for it as you get so many options.

I’m not planning on any painting this week but I am playing some 40k tomorrow. Been a while since I had the Deathguard out. I’ve even managed to get my Gellerpox Infected into my list. Also, as my opponent is running Grey Knights I’ve made sure to bring some demons.

1) Just finished reading The Labyrinth Index, latest in Charles Stross’ increasingly apocalyptic Laundry series, got through the final volume of The Greatcoats series by Ian de Castlemere via my Audible account (already used this months credit – Realmslayer, the Brian Blessed-voiced adventures of Gotrek Gurnnison in the Age of Sigmar…), volume 74 of Bleach- the  long running Shonen manga series that if nothing else always looked achingly cool. The reading pile otherwise is a bit expansive to list here, but I have books 2 & 3 of Paul Cornwell’s Shadow Police I want to finally get through. podcasts? Currently listening to the latest Roboskullcast, a retrospective of Robotech from along-time fan and someone new to the franchise, Limited Insertion- an Infinity rules podcast in sub-30 minute episodes, Chain Attack – supposedly a WarmaHordes batrep podcast but I listen mainly for the banter, Mayacast – a much longer magazine format Infinity podcast. those should get me through a good chunk of painting tomorrow 🙂

2) Given I don’t get to paint much during the week I try to do something like this most weekends, setting aside one day just for hobby  with set goals to work through. I have tried for more hard &fast targets if painting over a longer period, say if I have a long weekend or a week off, maybe taking a few days or setting a target for the end of the week.

3) I’m a bit of both. Trying to find suitable replacements for the minis in my Warhammer Quest set (Classic Edition) is what brought me back to the hobby after getting burned out by the rapid shift from 4th to 5th to 6th editions of 40k. Being directed to the likes of Mierce Miniatures, Tercio Creativo and their ilk, and the sort of finely crafted minis they came up with reignited my passion for the hobby, really distilled when I discovered Infinity, and entire game utilizing gorgeous bespoke minis but in metal not resin or plastic, some thing they remain committed to. And I still like finding minis from companies that can make great heroes for larger armies that are more mass-produced (see my 200+ IG army and many, many space marines…). Hells, a good chunk of the kickstarters I’ve backed have been for new and interesting minis that I can find uses for. In the last few weeks alone I’ve gotten female versions of all four Imperial Assassins, and Indigo ford from Twisted, a superb steampunky-take on a gender-bent Indiana Jones. no idea yet what I’ll use her for but i’m sure something will come me 🙂

Now, hobby. I got my next batch of 40k Conquest issues this week so am building the Librarian as a member of the Deathwatch from the Raptors chapter. Going to try and finish building him during tomorrows Weekender show, and hopefully get him primed up. Then I want to take a look at those Wolves again, thinking a black wash down the centreline of the fur should do the job then I can apply a drybrush. also got something to experiment with – had the latest Assetdrop supplies box arrive as well this week, and it included three of Superdork’s colourshift paints. I fancy trying them on the energy blades of my Deathwatch, so will post some WIPs of those as I’m intriqued to see how they work…..