Current Gaming Projects

Thursday, January 9, 2014

A Year in Review: 2013

Well another year has pass and I am still getting older…

I am still working long hours every week, but this project has been better than most and I have been only averaging 60 hours a week for most of 2013. 

I finally paid off my mini-SUV earlier in the year and I am increasing my payments on my house to try to get it paid off in just 10 years in total.  I hate being in debt to anyone.

I worked in two different states in 2013, Georgia and South Carolina.  I got to see some of the Civil War sites during some of my time off in both of them.  I also got to see a 150th anniversary Civil War reenactment for Marshall, MO. 

I went to GenCon for the first time in ten years and got to play in some fun RPG games and attend some good seminars, especially on the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Unfortunately, I was not able to attend any other gaming conventions, which is normal anyways.

I played in several fun WW2 miniature games put on by Steve H & Curtis T back in St. Louis.  I also played in a two modern Shipwreck games while I was in Savannah, GA, with Christian & James (Click on their names to see their blogs).  Plus, I ran two 10mm Vietnam games in 2013!  One was with TFL’s Charlie Don’t Surf and the other was with Battlefront’s Tour of Duty.  Personally, I prefer CDS, but ToD is simpler and would be good for people whom hate the friction element of war.  I will probably use CDS for a select group of gamers and ToD for conventions (if I go to any!) or with gamers outside of my CDS circle.

I violated my “No more 28mm projects” promise by backing the Winter War Kickstarter.  I still have not received my first shipment of figures as of now, but should be seeing them in the next month or so.  I will stand strong and not back the upcoming Kickstarter for 28mm WW2 Balkans by the same company for my own sanity, other than a token dollar or two to show my support to idea. 

I have read several books (I didn’t keep track of how many) over the year on various topics.  Those topics varied from hardboiled detective fiction, to the Civil War in Louisiana, then the personal accounts of mercenaries in the Congo during the ‘60s, and finally with the Finns standing against the Soviets during the Winter War.

Finally, I made several (actually, quite a few) commitments for 2013 on my blog either in Dec. ’12 or early Jan. ’13.  So I going to go through the list below, needless to say, I failed in most of them.

Personal:

Lose 30-50 lbs by Jan. 1, ’14:  Failed – I did lose some more weight over the first half of the year, but I gained almost all of it back by the end of the year.  I am still lighter than a year ago, but not by much.

Join an orienteering society as part of losing weight:  Failed – I did looked in to it and found a society at home, but there were none near where I am working at which where I really need them to be located.  So I tabled it for next year, depending on where my next project takes me.

Paint my bedroom white:  Done

Add additional book cases to my bedroom/library:  Done by adding three more cases

Inventory/catalog books in my collection:  Not complete, but mostly done (75-85% complete)

Make list of which books I want to sell and start selling:  Failed, but did give a couple books away

Install display cases for my miniatures in my bedroom: Incomplete, one case is up and filled.  Another case is ready to go up next time I am home.  But I am still waiting for the handcrafted, custom case to be finished that will hold the bigger items.

Gaming Related:

Clear out my gaming area in the basement for table space to game on:  Failed, but most of major steps have been done.  I have the repair work done on one wall, including having an outlet installed; bought more shelving units for the area; bought more storage boxes that stack nicely (unlike most of the ones I had before); and bought two more tables.  I now have the storage boxes on shelves and out of the walkway.  Also, I now have all four 2’x4’ tables up to give me a 4’x8’ gaming surface, with room to move around the table and chairs, plus I have overhead lighting for gaming.  But, as of right now, I still have a bunch of crap (unpainted miniatures) spread out on the tables as part of my reducing lead mountain.  I also have several items of furniture that needs to be thrown out so to have a clear path to the gaming area, so those two items is pretty much what is holding me up from having games in my basement. 

Inventory and starting selling off “Lead Mountain”: Failed, but I just started on this at the beginning of December. My emphasis will be on inventorying and selling off my 15mm WW2 first that is not part of my forces that I am keeping (see below).  I already made a nice size dent in inventorying the Germans stuff that is to be sold off.   I also traded off my 15mm WW1 Middle East project (see below).

15mm WW2 projects:  Failed, but I did finally get the ball rolling on sorting through my US stuff to get most of a US infantry company together to be painted (still missing the 60mm teams; I got them, just need to find them).  I asked Steve H to paint them in between his Germans & Russians.  They will be based for Flames of War as that seems to be the most popular system and TFL’s IABSM has no basing size.  I still have to go through the rest of my US stuff to down size that to only having platoon sized elements for support to my infantry company.  I located most of my German paratroopers, which will be one of the other company size forces that I am keeping.  It appears that I have a little over a platoon, plus support, so I will need to pick up some more to have a full company. I plan to use them against my US company in Normandy or for Operation Sea Lion.  With that note, I also located most of my early war British and Home Guard forces.  It looks like I have almost two platoons, but I have a ton of improvised armored vehicles for Operation Sea Lion from SDD.  Matter of fact, I think I have too much improvised armored vehicles and might be selling some of them off.  So I will need to buy a few more items for that company.

15mm WW1 Middle East project:  Failed, but I came to the realization that I not be able to do this project with all of my projects.  As I still had not invested too much into it, I decided to completely abandon it and I traded them off.

20mm Falklands project: Partial failure; I did get more figures painted by Northumberland Painting Service and got more terrain (including Steve H painting me up some rock formations), but I did not get a game in this year.  Some figures need touch up paint, which I still have to do.

10mm Falklands project:  Failed; I have pretty much everything that I need now to do Battalion size games (1 stand = 1 platoon), but they are still unpainted or based

1/6000 Falklands naval project: Failed;  I have all of the ships for the Argentine navy and the Royal Navy, plus the Chilean navy, but I was not happy with my original basing.  So I just recently order clear bases to mount the ships on and still have to paint everything pass them being primed.  I am also now debating on whether to go to 1/3000 to see the ships better, but I really am not convinced that everything is available like the 1/6000 line.

20mm Zombie project:  Done; my 2013 goal was only to get them painted, which was done by Northumberland Painting Service. 

20mm Anarchy in the UK project: Partial failure; I made several commitments to this project, and some got completed.  1) More figures painted: Done by Northumberland Painting Service; 2) Add more buildings: Done as I built some more Metcalfe buildings; 3) Get more civilian vehicles: Failed, I did however just renewed my club membership for Oxford diecast cars; 4) Get more BW Models: Failed, I really need to get jumping on this as they are closing shop for good soon; 5) Decided which rules to use for  the project: Failed, but did read through the various rules sets, but did not playtest any of them to find what works well with on the board.  I did however narrowed down the individual skirmish games to Two Hour Wargames, Flying Lead, Savage Worlds’ Showdown, 7TV, and Geezers, Shut It!  For platoon size actions, I am sticking with TFL’s Chain of Command

20mm Post Apocalyptic project: Partial success, since I only planned to have it started and get a small force painted by Northumberland Painting Service.  Right now, I have been getting various foot figures done.

15mm French & Indian War project: Failed, as I never got them sent off to be painted nor did I get another game in

15mm Congo War project: Partial success, as I was only thinking about doing it as a non-primary project.  I have a number of African rebels painted and rebased, but the bases have not been worked on.

1/300 Pentomic project: Fail, but this was to be a non-primary project and only to be done if I felt like it, so the fact that I didn’t do anything does not bother me.

15mm Ridgeway project: Fail, but this was also a non-primary project.  I still have to read “Ridgeway: The American Fenian Invasion and the 1866 Battle that Made Canada” by Peter Vronsky, first so I can redo all of my figures to have the correct uniforms and flags.  I need to do this before the 150th anniversary.

Stay tune, next entry should be my 2014 commitments!

Sapper

1 comment:

lrqan said...

Hey old chap I thought you did very well considering the amount that you attempted. Hope you have a good 2014, catch up to you in the aether.