Operation Completed

Sooooo. Many of us are hoarders. Some are bad, others are worse. I was so bad I use to use space in a factory I own to hide my collection as much from myself as my wife.

At the end of 2016 I took stock of what I owned and realized so much of my stuff was still on the sprues or even worse, assembled and unpainted that I am unlikely to ever get through it all. But then again, that attitude never get anyone anywhere.

Where to start? Well, I started by cataloguing what I owned. There is some really old stuff here. I decided that I would start with the starter sets, or complete games.

Here’s the list; Heroquest, Advanced Heroquest, Warhammer Quest, Man O’ War, Dread Fleet, Space Crusade, Advanced Space Crusade, Necromunda 1st ed, Space Hulk 1st and 3rd Edition, 40K 5th,6th and 8th editions, Burning of Prospero, Betrayal at Calth, Mighty Empires 1st & 2nd Ed, Warhammer 5th to 8th eds,  Warhammer Age of Sigmar 1st Ed,  Shade Spire, Blood Rage, Rising Sun, Conan, Mythic Pantheon, Massive Darkness, Zombicide Black Plague, Zombicide Green Horde, Descent, Runewars, Dark Age starter set, Flames of War El Alamein, Fallout (boardgame), Imperial Assault, Mice and Mystics and Stuffed Fables.

There’s also many, many armies sitting in tubs unstarted or at best half finished. What I really needed to do was stop buying miniatures. What I did was bought 50% of a gaming store in Australia. Ironically that helped. It’s amazing how being part of the industry can slow down your collecting.

Then, I started painting. The plan was start a box set. Finish it, move on the next. That sucked. So I start a set, get half way through, start another set, then go back and finish the first set, start another set, get half way though and go back and finish the second set and so on.

So here was my first project. A few decades late but still fresh in my mind, Heroquest

Having finished Heroquest it seemed logical to move on to Advanced Heroquest

Next was Dreadfleet.  Great models but very average game. It certainly wasn’t Man O’War.

After loads and loads of fiddly boats I went to a newer game with a low model count, Shadespire. Gee wizz this game is good! Great models too. Having never painted an AoS model before (but with hundreds of Warhammer models) it was like a trip down memory lane. John poo-pooed my unadventurous Sigmarites colour scheme on a hobby hang out but I liked it. Some scars run pretty deep……

This was big. It was my first real kickstarter and nearly broke me. The mountain of plastic was glorious. The Game was fantastic! These models begged, NAY, DEMANDED to be painted. They were legion, but Odin was with me.

And the plastic just seemed to keep coming…… This was truly a hobby Ragnarok

still more….

The fall out from such a high model count was I was buckled and exhausted . A low model count project was required. Fall Out the board game was very accommodating.

I was playing Kings of War. I had plenty of painted armies. I decided to paint some flagellants. When I say some I mean 100. I tried batch painting. It was soul destroying. I couldn’t even find the will to finish their bases. I have issues….

Low model count. That was the sweet spot. Saga is an excellent game and I had many warbands. Hmmm, what to paint? Anglo Saxons/Danes. What’s the difference? One stabs you with a spear, the other one kills you with an axe.

I was loving Shadespire. I didn’t want to break the painting rhythm so I did some Duardim? Duadin? Dwarves. I did Dwarves. The nappy wearing slayers

GW brought out a campaign and one of the characters was a lunatic woman hell bent on killing and crippling men by the dozen. I think I nearly married her some years ago

All the whilst I was painting other things a game called to me. It’s siren song could only be denied for so long. So I set forth on a long and arduous quest. A Warhammer Quest if you will. I also found an extra set of characters in the box! This project is ongoing with Orcs and then goblins, etc.

I really liked these models. So did the guys on XLBS. They are excellently sculpted and look and do what it says on the box!

AoS 2nd Ed was released and I still haven’t played a game. Decided to start on the Chaos guys in the 1st Ed box. Blood Reavers done. Blood Warriors next.

I know I said Blood Warriors were next. I lied. I lied like Littlefinger.

I just wanted to know what they looked like with paint on them. They look good…..

When you play a game of thrones, you paint or roll die.

So I started the Burning of Prospero set. Space Wolves first. Having never painted Horus Heresy era marines before I’m going to stick to the basics. Once these guys are finished I’ll go onto the Sisters of Silence

So I final got around to doing the Space Wolf character Bjorn Fell-hand from the Burning of Prospero set. I followed him up with the Sisters. The Custodes are next from that set

After leaving this set untouched for years I finally broke the seal and tried my hand at the Terminators. To be perfectly honest, they were boring to paint and I didn’t feel the love at all. Personally I blame the Space Hulk project OTT did (I have several editions of that game somewhere…..).