2019 Hobby Goals and Ideas - Recap

2019 is just about in the books so it is time to look back and see just how bad I was at predicting the future.  This time I will include the original text for ease of reference.  If you want read my 2019 Goals in their natural habitat, feel free.

Age of Sigmar

"I have really been enjoying this game for the last 6 months and I really hope to keep this one going in 2019.  My Nighthaunt army is painted to about 1600 points and I only have a few models left to paint.  I will be buying a few more things for this army this year.  I would like to get this up to a point where I can do 2000 point games with some options.

I plan to paint the Stormcast half of the Soul Wars set this year. I also have a few Stormcast models to finish up.  I don't really have plans to buy anything for the army this year but if I start playing it that might change.  If I paint everything I have I should be right around 2000 points which is right where I want to be.

I have several models for Blade of Khorne collected and I would like to make progress of getting this painted this year.  If I can get the battle tome and the war scrolls for the army that would make playing it that much easier.  I think I have about 1000 points of models so there is some room for purchases for this.  I am planning for this to be my Chaos faction for AoS but I must admit I might be tempted to dump it for a Beast of Chaos army if the right opportunity came along.

I would like to add a destruction faction to my collection this year.  The new Night Goblins look really good but it is not really my style.  I really hope one or more of my friends goes with them as they look like they would be fun to play against.  I am really leaning in the direction of the Beastclaw Raiders for this project.  They are just amazing models and the army would be really different from my other AoS armies."

This mostly worked out.  I did manage to get in 7 games of AoS this year, which I think is pretty good.  I painted some Stormcast miniatures but fell very far short of the goal of painting the entire Soul Wars half.  I painted one unit of my Blades of Khorne.  I did not make much in the way of purchases for this game this year and certainly I did not start anything new.  This was the third most played game for me this year, so podium finish for AoS.

Warhammer 40,000

"This game did not see much table time last year and I need to change that for 2019.  I did purchase the new Ork Codex last year and I ordered some base adapters to bring my Orks up to date.  This will likely be my first and main effort for the year.  My Space Marines and IG will likely stay on the shelf this year.  Any new purchases this year will likely be for my Orks but I must admit that the new Genestealer Cult models coming out are going to be tempting."

I started the year pretty strong with 40k by starting my rebasing project for my Orks.  I got about 40 models rebased and then the interest faded.  I have since decided to retire 40K again.  I did manage to get in one game back in February, and while fun, it was not enough to keep the interest up.  

Kill Team

"I bought the starter box set late last year but I have yet to play.  I would like to give this a try this year but I am a little worried that the support for the game will dry up.  GW has already said there will be new stuff for Kill Team this year so this might have some legs.  This will mainly depend of if my friends have any interest in trying it as well.  I do plan to get the Rogue Trader expansion this year."

Kill Team was the big winner this year.  This turned out to be the most played game for me this year at 12 games (and maybe more tonight).  This was also a top game for purchases this year.  I managed to acquire four of the sector sets (I still would like to find the missing two or is it three?). I bought the Commanders and Elites rules as well as the 2019 annual.  I bought three of the Kill Team sets - Orks, Genestealer Cults and Adeptus Mechanicus.  I bought an AdMec character too.  I did get the Rouge Trader set but I have not built mine yet.  We did manage to play several games of RT using Tim's fully painted set.  This was a big surprise this year and, looking back, I wish I have invested more time in painting and building models for this game.  Mostly I used my existing Orks collection and only base coated the terrain.  It deserved a better effort.

Necromunda Underhive

"This game had a great year in 2018 with my group and I would like to keep the momentum going.  I am little unsure what GW plans for this game going forward and there seems to be almost nothing in the way of rumors.  I hope they continue with the new model releases in 2019 but it might be more like how Blood Bowl is handled.  If we see 2 new factions this year I would be happy and maybe even a little surprised.  My gut is telling be we might only see a few more Forge World characters and beast models and that's about it.  No matter what happens I want to keep playing this game.  I want to build a second gang this year and if I get really motivated maybe a third.  I would like to finish painting my walls and doors for Zone Mortalis games and build a cool Sector Mechanicus table.  There is lots of potential with this game this year."

In yet another example of how crappy I am at predicting the future, Necromunda was really a non-starter in 2019.  I played only one game.  I did manage a few purchases but failed to keep up with what turned out to be a pretty heavy release schedule for this game this year.  I did not build or paint ANYTHING for this game in 2019 which is a shocker.  The main reason for this failure is Kill Team.  Necromunda is an excellent game and I do love it but it really only works as a campaign game.  Pick-up style games just don't give the right feel.  Kill Team, however, works really well as a pick-up game and so we found that game easier to get a game in for.  Necromunda might have seen more time on the table if I could have found one more player.  Three people is not enough for a proper campaign.

20th Century Games

"There is a lot of stuff I want to do in 2019 for games set in 20thC conflicts.  First up will be the new Great War version from Battlefront/Osprey.  This will be the v4 update for the period and will include a new army, Belgians, as well as son new troop types like cavalry.  I have greatly enjoyed our WWI games and Osprey seems to be handling their contribution to the v4 transition very well.  I am optimistic about this.  At the least I will get the rules."

This turned out pretty much as I expected for 2019.  I got the rules and several of the card sets.  I made a few purchases during the big sale a few weeks back.  We did not play this game at all this year and I did not build or paint anything.  It is not dead and for that I am grateful. 

"2019 will be a very interesting year for WWII games.  I think Bolt Action will be a big resurgence this year with me and my friends.  I would like to get some games going for the Pacific and for Market Garden.  For Market Garden I will need to update my German collection and I might even consider an SS force (I have NEVER had a desire for SS but the MG campaign book is very good and I would like to play through it)." 

This was a very good year for Bolt Action.  I got in abut 6 games, which I think is pretty good, and I managed to paint 71 models for the game. I painted lots of my backlog of Germans including some motorcycles and cavalry.  I also painted some support weapons for my US Marines.  I painted some tanks for my friend Tom that will be useful for Market Garden.  As for MG, nothing really happened with this.  The idea is still alive.  Pacific was the main setting for our games this year.  I have really love playing these games with my Marines.  All in all a great year for this game.  Maybe the best one yet.

"For 15mm gaming I think that Flames of War will be back on the table.  I still don't see it being anywhere near as popular as it once was but we all have large collections and we would like to use them.  I did acquire a lot of the Battlegroup books and I would like to find a way to incorporate this excellent game into line up.  I have been toying with the idea of using Battlefront's firestorm Market Garden campaign game but play the actual battles with any one of three sets of rules - Bolt Action, Flames of War or Battle group.  I actually have Market Garden books for all three systems.  This might be overly ambitious but we will see."

Flames of War made a strong recovery this year with me and my friends.  This was the second most played game of the year for me at 11 games. It was also a big focus of my painting this year with 56 models painted (and 12 more that will be finished today).  I did assembly and prep work on nearly 350 more models for this game including a huge Soviet collection that I have had for years.  Most of our games were mid-war North Africa and I saw the return of my 8th Army British to the table after several years in retirement.  The addition of several of the new Battlefront plastic Grants made the difference. This year marked the first games for mid-war eastern front that we have played outside of events.  This is a theater that I have always loved but, due to limited collections, rarely got played.  That changed this year.

Sadly, Battlegroup was a real bust this year.  In fact, I should never have worried about acquiring the rules as it clear now this game will not see the table.  Time for the sale pile.

"Fate of a Nation must get played this year!  It has been about 2 years since I last had my Israelis on the table and that is too long.  A major goal will be to update this army into a Centurion/Sh'ot centered force.  Once that is done I want to build a Jordanian M48 force."

Fate of a Nation is another success for the year.  I completed the upgrade of my Israelis with the addition of 5 Sh'ot tanks.  I acquired a few more models to expand the army even further (some are on back order for BF so who knows when they will show up).  I played a couple of games with the enhanced army and won both against hoards of Soviet tanks.  

"TANKS and TANKS The Modern Age would be cool to get on the table this year.  I didn't do much with this last year.  I feel like TMA is very likely to get me into Team Yankee this year.  The new World War III: Team Yankee coming out this year will be tempting."

Not much to see here, sadly. I played one game of TANKS this year.  We tried playing the game on a full 4x6 table rather than the usual 2x2.  The game actually played even better on the large table and was very fun.  But that is as far as this went.  With the return of FoW to the line-up there was not real point in this game.

Black Powder/Horse and Musket

"I have no major plan for this kind of gaming for 2019.  My ACW collection for Black Powder is very large and not missing much.  I might get some cavalry painted this year.  It would be cool to revisit the idea we had last year of smaller point matched games set in Jackson's Valley campaign.  Last year I purchased "Brave Hearts Trembled Regimental Wargame Scenarios for the Battle of Antietam" by Brad Butkovich.  This is a really nice book that could inspire me to plan another large Black Powder game.  I have no plans yet but time will tell.  Joe and I will continue to slowly paint forces for Napoleonics.  I think if I get another couple battalions of French and another commander we will be able to play a small battle.  That would be amazing."

Black Powder did not make it to the table this year.  I really didn't think it would.  I purchased a couple of guns for ACW but did not paint or assemble anything for this period.  The Napoleonic period was much more fruitful.  I painted some Swiss for the French forces and three battalions of Russians.  I still have tons of models to build and paint for the period but I made some good progress this year.

"I need to dig through my ACW leftovers and find about 20 skirmishing Unions soldiers and paint them up for Fistful of Lead - Horse and Musket.  Some ACW skirmish games would be a lot of fun and something different from an Old West shootout."

Tim and I did get in one ACW skirmish this year using the Fistful of Lead rules.  It was fun but nothing much came out of the idea.  I did not paint any figures for this either.

Board Games

"Now that I have both sides of the Speed Freeks game painted I want to play it.  I might have to recruit the family for this.  A few games of this would be a win.  My Warhammer Quest Silver Tower set needs to get painted and played this year.  Our one attempt to play it few a little flat.  We can do better.  I would like to get the Blackstone Fortress game this year and give it a try.  Warhammer Underworlds will get played but I don't see myself spending any more money on it.  I have both starter sets and one expansion so I have 5 factions.  This will keep me busy for a while.   I need to get Tim to run more old school Quest games this year and also some Space Hulk games."

This area of gaming was a bit mixed.  Board games are a bit of an issue for me.  They take just as much investment in time and money as miniature games but since they generally require more people to play they are actually harder to setup.  Warhammer Quest of all varieties was a bust this year.  So was Space Hulk.  Warhammer Underworlds got a lot of table time early in the year but faded.  In fact it was tied with AoS as the third most played game for me.  The fade of AoS and WHU seemed to be linked as they both faded at the same time.  I did get in a couple of games of Speed Freeks and they were great fun as usual.  Blackstone Fortress was a bright spot in the area for 2019.  Tim and I played a couple of test games and then we got Tom to play for a more proper session.  We had a great time and really should have played more.

Final Thoughts

2019 was a good year for the hobby.  I played a lot of games, spent a lot of money, and had a great time.  I made some new friends, mostly online but some in person.  The blog is still alive though this was not a big year for posts.  My Twitter activity is increasing mostly because it is easier to do from my phone.  I still had a lot of variation in the games that I played but this year most were one-off games rather than real lack of focus.  This is a good trend.


Models Assembled in 2019 (includes cleaning and prepping metal figures):

15mm FoaN - 6 (5 tanks, 1 half-track)

15mm FoW - 345 (50 tanks, 4 rocket trucks, 6 guns)

28mm WWII - 40 (5 tanks)

28mm ACW - 8

28mm Napoleonic - 101

Terrain - 36 (Mekboy Workshop, Kill Team)

Warhammer 40K - 52

Age of Sigmar - 58

Total - 719

40K Rebasing Project

Ork Characters - 2

Ork Nobz - 25

Ork Lootas - 13

Total - 40

Figures painted in 2019:

15mm WWII - 68 (26 tanks)

15mm Arab-Israeli 5 (5 tanks)

28mm WWII - 71 (6 Tanks, 2 guns, 9 Cavalry, 7 Motorcycles)

28mm Napoleonic - 96

Age of Sigmar - 33 (1 endless spell)

Terrain - 22 (AoS Objectives, Arcane Ruins)

Total - 295

Game Record in 2019:

Age of Sigmar 3-4-0

Bolt Action 4-2-0

Cruel Seas 1-1-0

Fate of a Nation 2-0-0

Fistful of Lead 0-1-0

Flames of War 2-9-0

Gaslands 0-1-0

Kill Team 2-9-1

Necromunda Underhive 0-1-0

Speed Freeks 1-1-0

TANKS 1-0-0

Warhammer 40,000 0-1-0

Warhammer Underworlds 2-2-3

Bolt Action US Marine Support Teams

I finally finished the last models for my US Marine collection for Bolt Action.  We have the 75mm pack howitzer which will get lots of table time.  Next we have the M3 37mm anti-tank gun.  I doubt this will get used much at all.  It s not a good value so generally the bazooka is a better bet.  Besides, so far Japanese tanks have been pretty scares in our games.  Finally we have 2 M1917 .30 cal mmg teams.  With the US rule allowing multiple mmgs I am sure these guys will be in the thick of the fighting.

Pz Kmpf B-2(f) for Bolt Action

This is Warlord Game's French Char B-1 bis plastic model built as the German Flammpanzer Pz Kmpf B-2(f).  This is the later version of the flammpanzer.  This kit is very nice but it is a little tricky to build this version.  This one is for my friend, Tom.  I think I will get one to build for my early war French army.

Comment Moderation

After 13 years of running this blog I have finally had to resort to full comment moderation.  SPAM posts have just taken over.  The goid news is, aside from a couple close friends, no one comments on my blog posts so the impact should be minimal.

On a side note this post is a bit of a test for the updated Blogger app for Android.  The old version completely stopped working for me months ago.  I hope this one works. 

German Assault Gun Battery for Bolt Action

About a year ago I made a paint for trade deal with my friend Tom. I then promptly put it off as only I can do.  The guilt has finally caught up with me and I am trying hard to get this all done before Christmas.  This phase are some Warlord Games Stug IIIG kits.  I built two as Stug and one as a Stuh 42.  This is a really nice kit and produces a really good gaming piece.  I may have to get one for myself.

British M3 Grant Squadron

Wow!  It has been 4 months since I last post anything here.  Amazing.  I have been very active in the hobby but I have just not been producing much content.  I have built lots of models lately but I have not finished many projects.

This time we have a British M3 Grant Squadron, or company as I call it, comprised of the HQ and three troops, or platoons.  These are 15mm plastic models from Battlefront Miniature for Flames of War.  This was part of an impulse purchase back in October and I was inspired to get them assembled and painted.  They have already seen action in three battles but, sadly, have not yet been victorious.

Israeli P'lugah Tan'kim continued

A few years ago I built an Israeli tank company for Fate of a Nation when it first came out.  This original project was centered on M50 and M51 Shermans with Sho't as a support.  Those first game were fun but I quickly discovered that the Sherman force was just not viable.  Most of the Israeli stuff was WAY too expensive points wise to be competitive. My primary opponent had Jordanians.  Jordanians lacked all the bells and whistles of the Israelis but there stuff was cheap and plentiful and very dangerous.  Fast forward to today and we have a new version of Fate of a Nation based on the Flames of War version 4 rules and 100 point system.  With this new version my old Israeli army was in need of an update.  My old army was about half the size needed for a standard game.  This gave me an opportunity to add more Sho't tanks to the force and give it much more punch.  I bought the new Jordanian starter set which gets you 5 Centurions which can be build as the Israeli Sho't version.

With these 5 additional tanks I now  have enough Sho't to build a formation of these tough tanks.  This will now be the backbone of my army.

Seven Sho't tanks come in at 63 point which is nearly 2/3 the entire points for the army.  Fortunately, everything else I have is supper cheap which will allow me to run a second formation of Shermans and still have lots of points left for support units.

I still need to get a few additional models to fully flesh the army out to 100 points but I am very close.  I actually think 100 point games might be too big for this period.  This army is heavily themed on the 6 Day War but my friends seems to be moving more towards the Yom Kippur War which means tougher Soviet tanks.  This may force me to look at adding Magach 6 tanks to stay in the fight.

US Armored Rifle Platoon for Flames of War

I have been slowly getting back into Flames of War.  My friends and I have recently played a few games of v4 using the new army points/cards/lists.  These games have been fun and it has been nice to get my collection back on the table.  For a very long time I have wanted to add armored rifle platoons to my US forces.  About 5 years ago I built the half tracks for this unit but I never got back to the infantry.  I have fixed that and discovered I have enough unpainted to do an entire company so that has been added to the project list.

These figures are the old Battlefront metal figures.  They are technically the late war set but with the new v4 concept it turns out the mid-war and late war units are now identical.  The half tracks are plastic models from Plastic Soldier Company and I have a separate post about these.

1st Battalion, Little Russia Grenadier Regiment

I am making good progress this spring on my long neglected Napoleonic project.  This time we have the 1st battalion of the Little Russia grenadier regiment.  To be honest, I had not set out to model this particular unit so I really have no idea if this looks 'correct' in terms of uniform.  It is the Little Russia regiment because Warlord kindly included flags in the box for this unit.

When I started my Russians I really knew nothing about Napoleonic Russians - how to configure the units, how to paint the uniforms, what are the flags all about?  Part of the joy of historical wargaming is the research and discovery of a new period or topic. 

Needless to say I have been doing a lot of research all-be-it on the internet.  Since I have been working on grenadiers that has been my main focus.  These figures are painted in the 1809-14 style with the old style shako and large plume.  I painted the jackets more inline with my understanding of the 1812 uniform (1812 being my area of interest for this project) with the red collars, cuffs and turnbacks.  The earlier uniforms used the red turnbacks but the collars and cuffs would have been the color of the Inspectorate (basically a region) that the unit was raised from.  In the case of this unit I think the cuffs and collars would have been pink to match the color in the flags.

FOr this unit I really have no idea if it ever wore this combination of uniform traits or not.  I am not even sure a unit could have retained the old style shako but been issued the new red and green jackets.  The amount of variation I found in my research leads me to believe it is plausible. 

Another area of confusion is how to structure the units.  I play Black Powder and these rules really don't get into how a unit should be built or appear just how many figures it has and what troop classification it is.  That should make things a little easier, or so I thought.  Since a grenadier battalion has different in-game stats it is important to be able to easily identify the unit on the table.  This battalion, with its large dramatic plumes will be easy to spot.  The trouble comes with the 3rd battalion (also know as the 2nd line battalion) which I have yet to model and paint.  I am leaning in the direction of building a unit just like this one but that would deviate from the history a bit. 

It turns out that a Russian grenadier regiment was not comprise solely or entirely of grenadiers.  They also contained fusiliers, which were the equivalent of the line regiment's musketeers. Basically regular soldiers. Prior to 1812 the regiment would have had a first battalion comprised on grenadiers just as I have modeled here.  The 3rd battalion would have been entirely fusiliers without the tall plumes.  This is likely to cause some confusion in game terms.  It gets more complicated for grenadiers in 1812 and beyond.  The unit structure at that time was basically identical to the structure for the line regiments - 2 companies of grenadiers, 4 companies of fusiliers/musketeers.  This certainly would make identification of grenadier regiments difficult on the table.  Quite the problem - units that look more like the historical counter parts or units that are easy to identify on the table.

Since I am much more a gamer than a button counting Napoleonic simulator I will go with easier to identify on the table.  This means that my grenadiers will all get the tall plume regardless of the style of shako or which battalion they represent.  This might send some purists into a tailspin but I think it will make the games more manageable and fun.  Besides, the grenadiers look cool so it will be neat to have a bunch of units running around.

As a final disclaimer, I really don't know much about this topic.  I am sure I have goofed some of this up but I am sure I will keep learning.

US M3 Lee Platoon

I played another game of proper Flames of War v4 over the weekend.  This time I pulled out my Tunisian US tank company.  I have not played this army for a couple of years so it was nice to get is back on the table.  I took this three tank M3 Lee platoon for the first time but I needed to paint it.  For the game I just had the base colors on it.  It performed well in the game and so I thought it deserved to be finished.  These have been sadly sitting in my to-do pile for a few years.  I painted them based on a tank from the 13th armored regiment, 1st armored division in Tunisia in early 1943.  I am not sure how accurate my reference material is but I like the look of them.

Pavlovsk Grenadier Regiment

With my Napoleonic French at a usable point I decided to switch to Russians.  I am starting with grenadiers and the first unit is the Pavlovsk Grenadier regiment.  This is the first and the third battalions and the figures are all Warlord Games 28mm.  These are nice figures and are very easy to paint.

1st battalion front 

1st battalion rear

1st battalion command

3rd battalion front

3rd battalion rear

3rd battalion command

Comments

Long ago, when I first started this blog, Blogger would automatically email me whenever someone posted a comment on one of my posts.  I came to rely on this heavily as a way to filter off the SPAM and to reply to anyone who have a legitimate comment.  Over the years the number of comments I received dropped as people moved away from following blogs and onto social media.  This drop in comments hid a change that Blogger made.  At some point it stopped sending me notifications of comments.  Recently I have noticed this but I lazily ignored it.  I figured I would get to it.  Today I got to it and I found a bit of a mess.  First, I missed a BUNCH of legitimate comments and for this I am truly sorry.  I don't want it to seem like I am ignoring people as that is not what is happening.  I have always been a bit slow on relies but I never intended to never reply.  The other issue is I now have an infestation of comment SPAM I was not aware of.  Starting today I will begin a review of all my posts and clean up the crap and reply to those I have missed.

Stormcast Eternals Castigators

I painted a small unit of Castigators for my Stormcast army.  These are the models that come in the Soul Wars set.  It is a little frustrating that this is not a 'legal' size unit for pitched battle games.  These are purchased in groups of three for pitched battles so you need one more or leave two at home.  Oh well.  This seems to be the way of building armies from the starter sets.

These add a much needed ranged combat capability for my Stormcast army but in their first game I was not impressed.  They are really designed to go against Nighthaunt armies (shocking) and are just marginally useful against others.  I will pick up the easy build box at some point so I can feild either 2 units of three or one unit of six.

The new Sacrosanct style Stormcast Eternal models are not my favorite.  With the Soul Wars release and the appearance of the Sacrosanct models we now have Stormcast models with more robes such.  What I like about the Stormcast models is the armor and now they are covering most of it up.

Everblaze Comet

I painted my first army specific Endless Spell for Age of Sigmar.  This is the Everblaze Comet for the Stormcast Eternals.  My friend, Randy, used one against me in a game last year and it was very effective.  I knew it would be a must have for my army.  I used it for the first time last weekend and it did well.  I need to be very careful in how I use it as it is not a predatory spell so it cannot be moved.

This model was super easy to build and paint.  It only has three pieces including the cool molded base.  I painted and flocked it in a couple of hours.

Khorne Bloodreavers

It has been a couple months since I have finished any painting projects.  I have been busy working on several things I just haven't finished anything until now.  This is my first unit of Bloodreavers for my Age of Sigmar Blades of Khorne army.  My collection for this army consists mostly of figures from AoS v1 starter set.  These figures are from that set.  They are actually pretty nice figures.  In game terms these guys are meat shields.  These were painted to tabletop standards and as usual look better in person (and arms length away).