2013 And Other Tosh!

 

 

OK the year is not quite up but after yesterday I can unofficially call time, if you missed last orders then I guess your not on your own. Today I will just deal with the wargameing aspect, leaving the blogging for another day.

 

So why am I calling time, after all we have another two days to the end of the year and given the world did not end a few days ago I really have no reason to be premature. Well actually I do and it's Lee's fault. As you may be aware I went over to Lee's to give the Nap rules a good going over. We also wanted to talk exactly where we are going with the 6mm Naps and to be honest tying Lee down to exactly what you plan to do is a bit like knitting with fog! It took the best part of two hours to finally come up with a plan for the coming six months and a rough idea for the next two years. All is subject to change but at this point Lee is focusing on finishing the British to the point he can fight the battle of Waterloo and possibly his original plan of Vitoria though this will need Spanish and Portuguese forces adding as well so looks to be later in the year. Whilst finishing off his British Lee intends to start on the much larger scale of building the Russian army to fight Borodino, the target of my original French army. His long term plan is of course to own large armies of ALL the principle nations involved in the Napoleonic Wars and he has a plan how to do this, but that's a tale for Lee to tell if he so wishes. So onto me.

 

6mm Napoleonic.

The aim for 2012 was to start building the French army for the Russian 1812 campaign. This was going rather well and the army pack I bought at Derby the year before has been completed with many extra packs since. I also painted up all my Irregular units. However in July I changed direction deciding to go for the campaigns in Spain and so started to work on Frances allies. I have purchased buildings for central Europe and Russia, all are now painted and for Spain all of which still require painting.

 

The aim for 2013 will still include painting up the buildings and fleshing out the French allies but now I will be looking at extending the forces beyond Spain. I will be targeting a manageable OoB for Borodino (again). The Prussians will remain for the time being exactly as they are, but new units that I may add to their force will be based to my rules.

 

Sell my Irregular French to fund the expansion of the French.

 

Finalise the 6mm Rules.

 

Later Achaemenid Persian 15mm Army.

2012 Paint up a couple of units of Persian cavalry and add more Hoplites. Total failure, not until Derby did I even buy the last of the figures for the cavalry and the Hoplites I do have never got to the table.

 

2013 Paint up the figures that I own whilst this does not give me the maximum Persian Cavalry under FoG rules it should be enough. I plan to get this done within the Painting Challenge. The Hoplites should be done within 2013 and I may yet buy even more but have no plans to do so.

 

Macedonian 15mm Armies.

2012 plan was to paint up enough options to field any of the various Macedonian armies. Whilst I don't have every option for every army I can now field most options over the most attractive armies.

 

2013 may see these armies tinkered with some more but my main aim is to actually get at least six games in with them.

 

Later Seleucid 15mm Army.

2012 paint up most of the options for this army and get a few games in. Well only a few options remain unpainted and all are owned. Unfortunately I have failed to get any games in at all with them. I was given this army just over a year ago with the majority unpainted. I have yet to paint up most of the pike that came with the army as I can sub in the Macedonian pike as I can with a fair part of the army.

 

2013 finish off the last options and also paint up the rest of the figures that came with it.

 

Goblin/Orc Army 15mm.

Given to me at the same time as the Seleucid's but has always been on the back burner and had no set goal for 2012.

 

2013 nothing changes, these will get started if I either run out of other figures or I want a change. I would like to paint them up but so many other projects are more interesting to me.

 

Numidian Army 20mm.

2012 get it painted up and try to get games in. Well I nearly managed to build the army up, just technically one unit of Roman Light Cavalry to go. Given how close it is to being finished I could have got a game or two in as it stands.

 

2013 aim has changed totally. Get the army finished before Triples and get it on the Bring and Buy so it will never see the table in my ownership. It will be priced to sell as I want the space more than the money.

 

Principate Roman 15mm.

2012 originally no plans as I was given it part way through 2012. I would have liked to get it started before the end of the year and whilst I have made up a couple of units it has really been more so  can use the Seleucid army (camels and cataphracts) though the artillery crews are just Roman.

 

2013 will be the year of the Roman. I plan to get this army started during the Painting Challenge whilst also working on the Seleucid and by the time Donnington comes round to either have already ordered more figures or get them at Derby.

 

ASL Sniper Reminders.

2012 these had to carry the load regarding funding new purchases and consumables. This they certainly did.

 

2013 will see the logical conclusion to this project. Yes I will continue to sell the odd one but I really don't see this helping too much with keeping lead on the table. However I plan to expand the idea into 15mm 3D sniper counters.

 

English Civil War 15mm.

2012 was to see the expansion and replacement of this army. Most of the Essex 15mm I had bought painted I wanted to sell and buy Matchlock Miniatures to replace them. I have indeed sold three regiments and painted up a matchlock regiment I owned. I have re-based for FoG:R a fair few regiments but far less than I had planned. This project floundered as I then went for 6mm.

 

2013 needs to see the finishing of the rebasing and then playing a few games. I also have a regiment that I plan to paint up. Once all this is done I either mothball the figures, sell them off or if the rules work out to play well for the ECW then keep it in play and continue to replace regiments I don't like.

 

ECW 6mm.

Mid 2012 saw the change to 6mm from 15mm. I had a campaign drawn up that would use figures from both 15mm and 6mm as well as GM moderated battles. This was fairly ambitious to get both the 15mm rebased and rules understood whilst also painting up a 6mm army from scratch and finding rules that worked. In the end none of it happened, I have a few regiments painted but that's it.

 

2013 will see further progress on the 6mm army. I hope to average at least one regiment a month through this year. If Lee starts to paint up his army I would increase output greatly. I may well still do this as I have enough units unpainted to field two small armies. By the end of the year I would like to see at least one battle with these figures.

 

Advanced Squad Leader.

2012 continue to play often and increase my win loss ratio. March saw the start of the first PBeM league which I joined hoping to win more games than I lost. The  first year had 3 rounds and I lost the first game but won the last two. My win loss remains a respectable level though I don't think I have increased the win percentage. Number of games have fallen by over 30% but I am OK with that.

 

2013. Win at least three games out of the four in the PBeM tournament though this could be a bit steep as I am likely to be paired against tough opposition in year two. I actually expect to play less games this year than last but hope to get in 60 games, a drop of more than 10%. Two reasons, I expect to play in two campaigns possibly three this coming year and that playing ASL still takes far too much out of me when I do it FTF or live VASL against good opposition.

 

Figure Gaming.

2012 saw more gaming than 2011 but less than I expected. Lee was working away a lot and we ended 2012 as we started. A game every two to three weeks but most of the other nine months saw a couple of games in total. Matt and I have started to play and have not done too bad but less than I would have liked but he is now clear to go as his wargames room is now free to use again. Barry, well despite the fact both of us had a fair bit of free time we did not manage as many games as I would have expected. Now I doubt we will play another game as since our last rather unpleasant game he fell off the radar.

 

2013, playing games is still fun so I hope to play more. Yes a game takes it out of me, yesterday was a full day though I sat down for most of it I was still up at 4.30 AM and awake from 3.30. The good news is that I am getting better but it's very slow progress. Hopefully I will be able to get back to work sometime before Summer and if so it will kill off any chance to play for awhile as working will be more than enough to tire me out. Once I get used to it though I will be sure to fit games in around it. No way will I have a job again that sees me working the hours I did or working away all week, I just don't have the body to cope with that anymore.

 

Painting Challenge.

2011-2012 saw me finish 11th out of 24ish. I also painted up more figures during that time period than I had done at any time prior to entering the challenge. Clearly that was a big success. However post challenge I actually increased my rate.

 

2012-2013. I set my target a fair bit above my previous years total but the real challenge was wanting to finish in the top ten this year. That's tougher as we now have 47 painters taking part. I purposely started up with painting the 20mm figures as I would get the best points to ease of painting out of all the figures I have n hand to paint. Here on in I will have to work harder for my points but already I am thinking my target is too low and may well submit a revised score. My first place spot is temporary but it's sure felt good.

 

Wargameing Neutral.

2012 has been a great year on the surface. I have only used money on the hobby that I managed to get out of it. First up the sniper reminders. 2011 saw more money spent on this than recovered so taking the costs from that year into account I did little more than clear the cost. Add in the sundries I have bought but not brought into play and I would say I am down a little. Also keeping me on the gain side has been Birthday and Christmas money which have helped fund the paint rack and the twin daylight lamp. Two items that I would never have afforded without such funding but both have helped improve my painting and speed up my work. Selling figures on e-bay has helped out a great deal but there is a limit to what I have to sell.

 

2013 will see my continue to work inside the limit. This year more than ever as money is just far too tight for me to spend anything that has not come from self funding. I have had Christmas money this year which will see me through to end of March at least whilst the Sniper Reminders will help me buy the replacement pints, brushes and a few more figures. I am fortunate that through the generous gifts of the three armies from late 2011 and 2012 that I still have so much to paint on hand. I also will be painting figures up for friends this year that again means I won't have to be buying much in the way of lead. Mostly any purchases will be further 28mm WWII for the reminders, some 15mm to try out the 3D snipers and 6mm Naps as I will need more but these are self funding through the Irregulars I will sell. Warbases will be the other supplier that I will need to buy from but you get a lot of MDF for your coin. No doubt 2013 will be leaner than 2012 but I start the year just needing more bases and fresh brushes but I have the funds to cover such requirements.

 

Conclusion.

I recon I did rather well in 2012. I played more and painted much more and set against that the pain caused through playing is acceptable as long as I don't play often and best of all no sign of burnout through so much painting. I tend to paint most mornings and again a bit of an evening and this really helps with pain management and more importantly helps reduce the effects of fatigue. 2013 looks to be brighter long term though as I recover my health and treatment becomes less invasive I can see a rather ironic dip in my hobby time.