Sprue Cutters Union January 2016! - Sticking point...

Greetings Wargamers and Hobbyists, and welcome once more to the Eternal Wargamer blog. This month, the members of the illustrious Sprue Cutters Union have been asked to talk about a varied discombobulation that must plague us all from time to time:

At what point of the build do you tend to stall?

Well now, here is a question that could have a multitude of answers, but I will stick to the spirit of the topic and think about just which bit of a project it is that causes me to bog down and flounder. And what is the answer? Honestly, I would say there are two points in a project that might inhibit progress. The first is right at the beginning.

In recent years I have made it an essential part of my builds to prepare model components properly, which means removing all the parts carefully from the sprues, and cleaning them up by scraping and removing mould lines and other imperfections. This is a mind numbing process which takes about as much time as the assembly of the kit, so bearing in mind that the majority of my hobbying takes place in my hour lunch at work on weekdays, on a box of twenty miniatures I have added about a week to my project time.

The benefits to cleaning up the parts like this are significant when you look at a finished model that was cleaned up first to one that wasn't - visible mould lines, or nubs of plastic or metal where they shouldn't be, un-drilled gun barrels etc, compared to a miniature that has none of these blemishes for me to be bothered by for years to come or for other people to kindly suggest should have been removed before assembly and painting. I am now what I would consider to be an experienced modeller - that doesn't mean I am a good modeller, just that I have been doing this for some considerable time, and have picked up a few tricks, and so naturally I am going to use the techniques I have picked up.

So where is the stall point? It's before I even take the shrink wrap off the box, because I know that when I do, the project, like every project these days, starts with the job I dislike the most...

There is one other factor that causes my projects to stall, but it isn't related to the kits or the work involved, it is related to the amount of time I have to spend on hobbying, and the impact of this is far more pronounced. Unfortunately the job I do can be quite demanding, which means that occasionally I either don't have time to take a lunch break away from the desk, or I am off-site altogether for the day and don't have the usual hobbying accoutrements with me to work on my project, and this has in the past cost me several hours of hobby time. This alone has a double impact on my projects, because not only do I lose actual available hobby time, I also find that my brain can be too fried to even contemplate concentrating on a modelling project.

I never like stalling on a project, and I have found that the more a project stalls, the harder it can be to get back into good routines and pick it back up again - it's important to get back on the horse and crack on with a job, because nobody else is going to do it for you. I guess this is why some people have additional motivating factors, like deadlines for finishing an army so that it can be used at an event that you have committed to or, in my case, a painting target to be reached before the end of the year.

I have found that another great motivator to help you keep going is a little bit of friendly rivalry, and so periodically at our club on online on forums I have run one of my 'Hobby Survivor Series' events, which are just a bit of fun to try and keep people painting and building where, left to their own devices may lost the motivation to continue weeks earlier. Suffice to say that the premise is that all participants have to post progress photos of their project every third day throughout the Series, and anyone that misses the posting deadline or has failed to make progress is out.

Those that successfully post every posting day until the end (typically a Series is 20 posting days long) are allowed to post a badge in their forum signature that tells everyone that they are a Hobby Survivor. If everyone drops out before the end, the Last Man (or woman) Standing is allowed to add a special 'extra' to their Survivors Badge to indicate this achievement, and anyone that fails to make it to the end is open to a little ribbing from the rest of the group. This is all in jest however, and those that do drop out are always keen for the Series to end and the next one to start.

Anyway, those are the things that cause my projects to stall, and a little bit about an initiative I have found works very well for keeping myself and others motivated. I look forward to reading what my compatriots have said about their project stalls, to see whether they are different to my own.


Until next time, thanks for reading...

The Eternal Wargamer's New Year Message

Greetings Wargamers and Hobbyists. Here we are at the brink of a whole new year; but what has the old year taught me, as it limps wounded into the night?

 

I think that this year has been one of great change in our hobby, and much of that change at least in my neck of the woods has been a result of the metamorphosis of the Warhammer game into Age of Sigmar, which although it retains much of the branding and model range of Warhammer (The Game of Fantasy Battles), the game rules and the setting are almost unrecognisable. This wasn’t a revamp or new edition of the established game, it was an fundamental re-imagining, like a wriggling Nurgle blessed maggot into a bloated Plague Drone.

 

I won’t say too much about the change over from WFB to AoS, because it has already been said, and at great length, by a great many people. We have talked about the few core rules, the boat loads of Warscrolls, the endless re-basing and the various pros and cons of the new game. What the change did do for me was open the door to new gaming experiences. In the past year I have ventured beyond the once adamant borders of the Games Workshop realms into the wider gaming world beyond.

 

I have taken an interest in Mantic’s Kings of War game, and played it using the free rules, with plans to pick up the rulebook proper, especially now that they have released army lists to support those collections escaping the Old World. I have also backed a Kickstarter for Dropfleet Commander, which is something else that is new to me, but I am a sucker for cool space ship games. Also, there now resides on my shelf a copy of the Frostgrave rulebook, for which I intend to gather a Warband at the start of the new year – once I can lay my smoking paint brush to one side and take a break from painting for some assembly.

More than that, I have spent time reinvigorating older games and models in my collection, which I thought at various points may never see the light of day or the thrill of battle again. I have played Man O’ War (!), I have re-gathered my Warhammer Quest set, now ready to venture into the darkness below with my son, and there are rumours of unrest in the Underhive of Necromunda. Another spaceship game, Battlefleet Gothic, is one I intend to get playing again very soon. As I said in my post only last week, I have organised my models, gathered the accoutrements of gaming and generated ship damage record cards for every vessel in my collection.

 

So what else have I done in the hobby this year? Well I did get back to gaming, after getting in only a couple of games until about October, when my wife’s Thursday night dance class moved to Wednesdays and allowed me to get back to the club and play, which was a joy indeed! I also managed to get a fair bit of painting done.

 

My goal (for those who remember to this time last year and my 2015 Hobby Resolution), was to get 250 miniatures painted to a tabletop standard (and I know this means different things to different people), and if I hadn’t been able to return to club gaming in the latter part of the year, I would have beaten that goal comfortably, however as hobby time began to once more be taken up with list building and rules refreshers, my total at the end of the year stands at 219 completed miniatures, with another 15 only a few hours away from being done. I may have fallen short of my target, but having painted 377% of what I managed in 2014, I think I can live with that. I think next year the target will be a more modest 200.

 

The other thing I have done this year is to blog more, on this site, guesting over on Creative Twilight, and also taking part in a revived Sprue Cutter’s Union, which is going great guns, although we have taken a break for the festive season. Long may it continue.

 

I have done a great many things in the hobby this year, and expanded my gaming horizons, but what did I learn? I think I learned that the hobby is what we make it. Even when presented with what seems like too great a challenge to overcome, and our gaming world is turned upside and inside out, with a little time and effort we can achieve anything, make any game work, make any event fun.

 

There is a whole world of games out there my friends. Go forth and forge your own narrative. May I wish you all a fun, peaceful and prosperous New Year. Let’s make 2016 a good year. #EnjoyAllTheGames

 

Happy New Year, and thanks for reading.

War Among the Stars - A return to Battlefleet Gothic

Howdy fellow wargamers and hobbyists, and welcome to another quick intro to an article guesting over on Creative Twilight about a game that is close to my heart, and one I have always enjoyed: Battlefleet Gothic.

Whether it is the fluff on the Gothic War itself, or Abbadon's 13th Black Crusade, or even the naval encounters around Armageddon during Ghazghkhull's third invasion of that benighted world, the thrill of major space battles in the 40K universe has always grabbed my attention, and it is my wish to get some of the guys at my local club interested in playing this fantastic game, especially now that Games Workshop is in some way going to reinstate and hopefully support their specialist games range again.

May I present, 'War Among the Stars'.


Thanks for reading.


P.S. - as an aid to finding the ship cards I am generating, I will post Dropbox links to them all here - if you check back from time to time you will find I am adding PDFs for more fleets. Let me know if you have any preferences for which fleet you want next.

Also, I will slowly be expanding the documents here, like the Imperial Rulebook cards to eventually include all Imperial Navy ships. No knowing how long this will take at the moment though, because time flows strangely in the warp...

Main Rulebook Imperial
Main Rulebook Chaos
Adeptus Astartes
Main Rulebook Eldar
Dark Eldar
Tyranids
Necrons
Orks

The Best Laid Plans of Mice and Miniature Modellers - SCU November

Greetings Wargamers and Hobbyists, to what in our neck of the woods is a rather gusty morning in the East Midlands. I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date...

Oh the irony. The November topic for the Sprue Cutters Union is a question about planning projects within our hobby, and as I probably consider this hobby blog an extension of my wider modelling and gaming hobby, the lateness of this post going up should speak for itself!

“Do you plan and prepare for every step of your

build’s process or do you wing it as you go?”

Well now, here we are on December 5th. The cut off for the topic submission should really have been the last day of November, so why am I bothering to write this at all after I have missed the date? There are a couple of reasons really. First, I want to support what I believe is a great project and community endeavour in the Sprue Cutters Union, and secondly, I am determined not to miss any posts since the return of the group project. It is a great driver for thinking about the hobby, and for making sure my blog doesn't go too long without some kind of offering to the hobby world. I am also hoping that Jon hasn't already typed up the November SCU roll call yet...

And what is the answer to this month's topic question? Here is the irony. I plan every project in some detail. I have to, because I am a wargamer. Let me explain. Anyone not versed in the world of miniature wargaming may well not be aware of how things work, but at least for the games I play, list building is an integral part of the hobby.

List Building 

This is the bit where we decide which units we will include in a force for a game we are going to play, and this includes deciding what equipment a unit will go into battle with. This decision making process begins not at the point where we agree to fight a battle against our opponent, but way back before that, when our group of models are still on the sprue, or even still on the store web page.

                           

Although it is not always strictly applied (it pays to be accommodating in what is primarily a social hobby), it is a generally held standard to try and adhere to the rule of WYSIWYG in the world of miniature wargaming, which stands for 'What You See Is What You Get'. This simply means that the model you put on the table is equipped with the weapons and wargear that you have included in your 'army list'. This is because many units in many different games include options for different weapons, which determine what the capabilities of that unit are on the battlefield.

We want the model our opponent sees from across the table to represent the model in our list as accurately as possible, because this can affect their decision making process when they are planning how to tackle that unit. It is entirely likely that there are instances on gaming tables across the globe where a discussion has to be had at some stage in a game to clarify what a model is and what it is equipped with, because a different decision would have been taken by an opposing player had the model been 'WYSIWYG'.

In practice, this means that we have to read and understand what the model can do in game terms, and the role we want it to fill in the army before we even cut the first sprue, so in this respect there is certainly planning required for every build, apart from the odd one here and there were a unit doesn't have a diverse array of weapons options and only has the one set up. Special or Unique units are an example of this, as they tend to represent a well know model or character in the game setting, and their equipment is pre-determined and does not vary. Other than that pretty much every model has options.

Autobots, transform!

Now that we have laid out the planning that is required just to be able to build a unit, there is a further and slightly more advanced stage of planning that I have come to include in my model building as widely as I can, and it is something that tackles the question of what to when you need a model that you have built to perform a different role in a game.

You don't want to put a model on the table that doesn't represent the weapons you need the model to use in the game, but at the same time, the weapons you have built the model with are not suitable for dealing with the opponent in your planned game. Perhaps you need that tank that is set up for anti-armour duties to take on a close support role, providing a greater volume of fire to take on a horde of infantry models. 

A powerful shot from a weapon like a Lascannon may vaporise one Ork Boy per turn, and you have three Lascannons on your Predator Annihilator, but that won't help when the enemy unit has thirty models, including a leader with a Power Klaw (a giant hydraulic can opener), and Rokkit Launchers that can punch through your armour. You really need Heavy Bolters or perhaps even Heavy Flamers to really spread out the anti-personnel goodness.

There are two options for using different weapons on a model. Number one is that you simply let you opponent know before the game begins that the model is armed with different weapons to those depicted, and generally this won't be frowned on too much, but the option I have come to prefer is option two: magnetise the kit.

Magnetising a model involves building magnets into some of the components (typically weapons), so that they are held in place by the magnets while playing, but can be swapped out for alternative parts for the next game.

When it works, this is a cool and beneficial technique, but if it is one you have never tried before, then it pays to do a little research before you try it. There are a few different kinds of magnets, but generally the the size and shape are more important than the type, and you also need to consider carefully where the magnets need to be placed, and how. Sometimes there isn't anywhere to fit the magnets on one part of the model - there is a big space where we wish the manufacturer had included a nice magnet shaped recess - and so we have to improvise and build in our own support for the magnet.

I won't go too deeply into the process for magnetising kits, because I have posted a 'beginners guide' based on my own experiences on this very blog. Suffice to say that Magnetising requires a fair amount of planning before you start the build, so you can be clear on which parts need magnets, what size and how many you need to use, how you will fit them, and which parts of the model can be assembled and glued. Click below to read more.

Magnetising for Beginners

I could go on and talk about how sometimes we need to plan whether to paint certain parts of a model before we assemble it, because there are some places you just can't get a brush to once the model is glued together, and a half dozen other things as well, but I think that is quite enough to be going on with for this month.

There won't be another Sprue Cutters Union topic now until January, as we all take a break for Christmas, but I will surely be posting something else before the closing of the year, because I need to give you all an update on how far I got with my painting challenge for the year...

Until then, thanks for reading.

Gaming Renaissance!

Howdy there fellow Wargamers and Hobbyists, and welcome once more to the Eternal Wargamer blog. Today I bring you a further article guesting over on Creative Twilight all about my recent gaming activity which has resulted from the months of upheaval we have all experienced after the loss of Warhammer Fantasy and the arrival of Age of Sigmar...

Follow the yellow brick road, follow the yellow brick road...


Thanks for reading.

Sprue Cutters Union October Topic

Greetings Wargamers and Hobbyists, and welcome to the October post for the Sprue Cutters Union topic, which perhaps should be entitled 'Working to close deadlines and only getting the post finished at the last moment', but in actual fact is about which aspects of miniature modelling projects are the most important to us...

This months hobby topic put to the Union is:

We all get lazy at times but let’s face it, there are areas of this hobby that modellers cannot get skimpy. Whether it’s a part of the assembly process, a finishing technique, or a particular tool, what do you think are the essential aspects you cannot afford to cut corners on during a build? What are your imperatives?

Though, as I know you are probably aware by now, I am a miniature wargamer as well as modeller, I do like the occasional post that I can answer from a purely modelling perspective, and this may be one of those topics. Maybe. Perhaps. Not sure if I can take that big a step away from wargaming to be honest. 

Corners, and the cutting of them. Let's start there. I imagine the same applies to scale modellers as it does to miniature wargamers, but when we get into this hobby, whatever age we are when we pop our first shrink wrap on a box of metal or plastic (or resin - for those that way inclined), we all have to start somewhere, and that place is invariably 'at the beginning'. The beginning can be a daunting place, because on one hand we have an internet full of amazing finished builds and armies, and what look like complex and very technical skills and processes being demonstrated, and on the other we have us, and our complete lack of the experience necessary to make much sense out of what we are seeing at anything more than a rudimentary level, at least at first. 

Imagine then (and I am sure many of you don't have to imagine, because you were there) what starting out in this hobby was like before the internet and before access to all those tutorial videos and blog articles. Unless you had Yoda, or Mr Miagi to coach you to greatness, you would have had to do the same as most of us, and work a lot of things out as you went along. You clip, you unintentionally break things, you glue (sometimes your fingers - and I know some of you still manage this feat of chemical engineering. You know who you are), you paint, you play with your toy soldiers - transported to war in a shoe box. We learn.

Fast forward twenty odd years, (I am not old, I am not old) and I have learned a great many things. I have learned to paint to an acceptable standard (in my opinion), I am able to assemble complex kits, using pins and magnets and modelling putty, and I am able to use a variety of basing techniques. And the most important thing I have learned that allows me to achieve a fair standard of finished product? The thing I think is worth spending that extra time on, despite the piece of my soul that is consumed every time I do it? Preparation...

When we are young and inexperienced, without even knowing we are doing it, we cut corners on modelling projects. We cut components off sprues, we glue them together. When we look at those same models years later when we have achieved a greater level of proficiency, we think 'crikey, I wish I had scraped off all those mould lines'. 'Why are there all these gaps?' 'Why does he hold that gun at such a strange angle?'

As we gain more experience and get better at what we do, we cut fewer corners. In a way, I think that is what it is to be a decent modeller, and the best modellers cut no corners at all. It is only in the last couple of years or so I have come to understand the value of taking the time to make sure that every piece I clip from a sprue is neatly filed and cleaned where it needs to be, and has all the mould lines scraped away. 

Not only does this make a big visual and psychological difference when it comes to painting the assembled model, because we have nice smooth surfaces to paint which are free of unwanted protrusions, but because we file all the joint faces there are no unsightly gaps either. We have a better quality of model to work on, which in turn may make us want to make an even better job of the paintwork than we may otherwise have done if we felt like the model didn't warrant that extra attention. It will also avoid the oft read comments from well meaning fellow hobbyists when we post photos of our work on the internet for feedback - 'Great paint job mate, but it would look much better without the mould lines'.

The result, despite the extra effort required in the preparation, is a better standard of finished product. It may add a week to a project when I am working on a unit of twenty models, because I spend the first four or five days filing and scraping every piece before I even think about reaching for the glue, but in the end I think it is worth it. I want to achieve the best standard I can, and that starts with good preparation.

As always, thanks for reading...

Into the Maelstrom: First Taste of Maelstrom Missions

Howdy Wargamers and Hobbyists.

Another article for you which is guesting on the Creative Twilight blog, my initial 'hot out of the hot zone' impressions and thoughts about my first game using the Maelstrom Missions and Objective Cards.

I hope it makes for interesting reading. Here is 'Into the Maelstrom'.

Thanks for reading.