Hobby Goals 2017

Well 2016 wasn't a particularly productive year in the hobby for me (being an all-round bad year for many), though in the last few months of it some painting and modelling did get done in the form of some Warmachine miniatures and my Flesh-eaters, respectively. With the start of 2017 (after an incredibly busy January) I have decided to take stock of my current hobby situation and actually write down what I am doing, rather than just having a nebulous idea of what projects I am working on in my head. This is largely for posterity and I look forward to seeing how successful I have been at achieving these things by the end of the year!

Earl Grymtyde of Gravenport
Currently a permanent feature of my desk telling me to get on and do some painting

Current

These are my current main projects which I am working on and should hopefully feature most prominently on the blog if this year goes as planned. These are listed roughly in the order of priority I have given them though is subject to change:

- Flesh-eater Courts - This is my current lead project with loads still to do. The fact that practically everything is WIP right now is why they haven't appeared on the blog yet beyond my Mournghoul. I am hoping to visit them in the next few weeks and get some troops done to put on the blog.

- Witch-Hunters - My old force of Sisters of Battle and Inquisitorial stuff has undergone a few dozen different iterations over the years and with the release of Saint Celestine and rumours of plastic Battle Sisters on the horizon I have decided to re-paint and re-vamp this army. More on this coming soon.

Test scheme for my Battle Sisters

- Lich Warband - My brother and I are working on a skirmish project for which I am building a small force centred around a character who has appeared in several projects of mine. Originally being my first Dungeons and Dragons character: the Sun Elf necromancer Avrilar Amalith, self-proclaimed Lord of Corbalan and Dark-Lich, is finally getting a small army to boss around. This project is very WIP at the moment but is slowly going places.

- Menoth - I am continuing to work on my Menites whom I unfortunately didn't manage to finish before Christmas. In fact I have elected to take a small break from them and focus instead on the three projects listed above as I wont have the opportunity to battle with them until Easter anyway.

Ongoing

I also have a few ongoing projects which I am working on intermittently. These are admittedly projects I have started and not finished due to fatigue or getting sidetracked, mostly being army re-painting and other stuff that keeps getting put on the back burner. These aren't listed in any particular order.

- Tomb Kings - I am in the middle of re-painting this army for display purposes, other things however keep getting in the way of me moving beyond base colours. Painting the whole army in stages as well is exhausting. Painting all the gold on 100+ miniatures takes a long time and is quite an insane thing to undertake now that I think about it. 

- Imperial Guard - I am also in the middle of re-painting this army to sit alongside my Sisters of Battle. They are on hiatus for now while I work on my Witch-Hunters. I am currently entertaining notions of breaking this army up a bit and returning it to its roots as allies to my main Witch-Hunting force. Possibly converting some superfluous miniatures into a Necromunda war band if I ever get around to it. 

- Kingdom Death - I have a backlog of various KD models I have picked up over the past two years. I use these miniatures to experiment with different painting styles so I usually only work on them when I feel like breaking up batch painting. Something that hasn't happened a lot this past year as I haven't really been painting at all!

3 WIP minis I am working on at the moment

- Misc. Age of Sigmar stuff - I have some random Elves and some Sisters of Sigmar I would like to do something with, even if they just end up as small war bands that sit alongside my main Death Alliance stuff. Will just have to wait and see what happens with them.

Possible

These are ideas that I have had, but possess no current plans to pursue. I have written them down in rough order of how likely I am to actually do them though it is unlikely any of them will get done while I still have ongoing projects.

- Tzeentch - I have been thinking of re-basing my chaos army onto round bases and picking up some the new Arcanites. The new Lord of Change in particular is making it really hard not to want to, especially the Kairos Fateweaver configuration. My main problem is that my current AoS army is still in the works with several miniatures I still need to buy bases for.

I need this in my life!

- Adeptus Mechanicus - Always loved the miniatures and I will be getting Belisarius Cawl in the box with Saint Celestine so he may end up with some friends at some point depending on if I decide to re-visit Tzeentch or not.

- Space Marines - I have a small force of Dark Angels Space Marines I am not particularly happy with who might receive some attention. Have been thinking about repainting them as Blood Angels and adding some of the miniatures from that range I really like. Depends on how my other Imperial projects go. 

- Blood bowl - for a long while now I have contemplated putting together a team, most likely of Dark Elves. While this would be a relatively low-cost project I always seem to have other things going on.

- Infinity - I have been considering this for quite some time. I was going to pick up an ALEPH starter box a few years ago but got distracted by Warmachine instead. If my other projects are a success I might start nearer the end of this year.

- Sisters of Silence - I absolutely love the miniatures and I am not sure whether to just add a squad to my Witch Hunters or if I should actually start a small 30k force of them. I suppose it depends on if Forge World announce any plans to expand on them in a meaningful way like they are doing with Custodes.

If Forge World could make these that would be fantastic

- Busts/large scale figures - I have often fancied trying out painting resin busts or larger scale miniatures. Alas, the smaller stuff always seems to win my wallet.

- Historical - As a student of history and a miniature war gamer I probably ought to have done something that combines the two by now, even if it is just a handful of English Civil War regiments.

So those are my current thoughts on what I am doing and thinking of doing in the hobby this year. As ever projects I want to do or have abandoned in favour of shiny new stuff outweighs what I am actually working on at the moment. While this is the final year of my undergraduate degree I am on top of my work (in some places well ahead) and I hope this should free up some time to paint the ever-increasing stack of unpainted miniatures I own. 

Every hobbyist I have met has a habit of stacking up a lot of projects, unpainted miniatures, and unfulfilled ideas. I hope to burn through as many of mine as possible in 2017 which is already shaping up to be an interesting year in the world of miniature wargaming. 

This year I am hoping to try out some new things, improve my painting skills, and have a lot of fun with some unusual modelling projects. I plan on putting much of this on the blog to help motivate me and I hope those of you who are following enjoy what I put out. 

- Doombringer