The Final Push - Lawnor approaches 100% painted

Models remaining:
Batch: 0, Normal: 2, Luxury: 7, Modular: 0, Bits Box: 3, Terrain sets: 11, To Ship: 80+

So where were we?

• Finish off my Kingdom Death campaign.  I only had 9 fights to go
• Start playing Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion
• Paint the high parts of the walls on the stairs I couldn’t reach before, but now I have a roller on a stick
• If there’s time, repaint the hand rail and skirtings too
• Put the final touches on the The Walking Dead minis I almost had done
• Start and finish any other mini painting project
• If there’s time, paint up my Mantic walls
• Visit my friends for a weekend of regular Gloomhaven
• Make my first Vegan Pasta bake – Stuff didn’t arrive
• Rearrange my room to install monitor shelf

Ah yes….

Friday 21st October

I spent at least an hour backing up my campaign and tidying up.  When the board was packed away there was a definite silhouette around it made out of rubber dust from all the changes to the character sheets.  I packed up and put Gloomhaven JotL in its place, but opted not to start today.  Back to working on the orks for the rest of the day.

At least that was the plan.  It turns out I hadn’t successfully smoothed out the sharp edges of those puddle bases with PVA glue and I couldn’t tell until I’d painted over it.  This needed to be fixed otherwise the crackle paint would crackle in the shape of that puddle and be obvious.  I applied a wash over whatever I’d just painted and then put some liquid putty on the bases, and then needed to leave it alone for a while to dry enough to be safe to handle.  i thought I’d give it 10 minutes by tidying my room enough to install the monitor shelf later.  However, once I got started I didn’t stop.

The shelf is great.  It has no legs holding it up.  It clips to the back of the desk with some vice grips, meaning there’s no legs stopping me sliding a tray of minis under it.  however, the desk already in place has an extra support beam in the way of the grips so I had to move around everything in my room to swap the place of 2 boxed in desks before I could fit the shelf.  It took a few hours and forced me to do some cleaning, tidying, and reorganising, but it’s done.  I then got back to work on the Orks.  I was sure to apply the crackle paint to them before bed.  It can have a very long drying time, sometimes days when put on thick and the pot is fresh.

• Rearrange my room to install monitor shelf

Saturday 22nd October

Time to start Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Wild.  First I applied a wash over the orks bases.  it’s juts bases and varnish at this stage.  The tutorial is 5 missions long, which grow in length and gain rules as they go.  I’ve been playing the main game for a few years now so I knew what to expect.  It says to play with 2 characters when playing solo, but where’s the fun in that?  I’m using all 4.  I got 4 games in before retiring to my painting for the evening, where I drybrushed the Orks, and then glues on some flock.  With that done, I cleaned up the mold lines on my Mantic walls, and glued on the corner pieces.

• Start playing Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion

Sunday 23rd October

I started the day by varnishing the orks, and then moved on to priming the walls.  I was using an airbrush, but it still had some long drying times.  Once I hit those, I went back to playing a few rounds of Gloomhaven, before applying another coat.  Across the day I got the Orks finished, and the walls primed and two more games of Gloomhaven done, taking me out of the tutorial section and in to the main game.  There are only 25 missions in the box and I don’t think you can do all of them.  I expect to have this finished before Christmas.

• Start and finish any other mini painting project

As of Sunday evening what had I achieved of my goals?

• Finish off my Kingdom Death campaign.  I only had 9 fights to go
• Start playing Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion
• Paint the high parts of the walls on the stairs I couldn’t reach before, but now I have a roller on a stick
• Put the final touches on the The Walking Dead minis I almost had done
• Start and finish any other mini painting project
• Visit my friends for a weekend of regular Gloomhaven
• Make my first Vegan Pasta bake – Stuff didn’t arrive
• Rearrange my room to install monitor shelf
• If there’s time, repaint the hand rail and skirtings too
• If there’s time, paint up my Mantic walls

I failed on the pasta bake because of stock shortages.  I didn’t get to the skirtings because of bad weather and laziness.  I’ve started work on the Mantic walls.  I’ve had a good week off, which, as always, was too short.  I’ve achieved everything I seriously thought I might, except the pasta.  Most importantly of all, I’ve resisted buying new models and continue to whittle down my backlog.  The Kingdom Death expansions and my Aeon Trespass kickstarter are both apparently already in ships, both due for arrival early to mid November, so should both be in my hands very soon.  They’ll rule my paint queue for the next year so I should show some restraint and not buy more plastic I don’t need before they arrive.