Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, to one and all!

Traditionally, a time for reflection on the year past, and looking forward to what the new year may bring...

However, I don't actually feel like doing a review as such, but prefer to think about plans for this year...

After the end of year frustration and disillusionment I felt with Flames of War back in December, and then enjoying the The Hobbit movie, I feel my focus has shifted significantly for the year ahead...

I have not had a game in about a month now, and my Jekyll & Hyde styled alter ego; "Mr Grumpy", has not been seen here abouts for the same time period, and frankly I haven't missed it, or him...

'Mr Grumpy' -  thankfully not seen for one month!

What I have been doing is plodding along with ongoing terrain projects for Empire of the Dead; the base board and Corner Tavern. I would have got further on with the base board etching, but manged to drop my Dremel, snapping the end off the 0.8mm etching tool (105), and of course my local suppliers are out of stock, and with the festive season still in full swing, their suppliers are still out of action. I managed to find one online and ordered that but am still awaiting delivery...

The Corner Tavern has had its windows put in and bottom layer net curtains added...

And along with terrain I have had Curts painting challenge to keep me pottering on with the paintbrush... but must admit I am just going steady and not rushing anything, and am just working on items mostly for the themed fortnightly entries, which has been a little refreshing, digging out old figures that probably would never have got painted otherwise... and yet I get to score some decent points - feels a bit like cheating but hey, they're the rules!

Some MDF 'off-cuts', from the 5mm MDF sheet used to make the Victorian base board and under games-table storage units, have been pressed to good DIY use too, making a utensil organiser for the main kitchen drawer, and thus earned me some brownie points from SWMBO, so that has been a fun little project over the couple of New Years Stat Hol days... the paintbrush has also been lashed round the house too here and there, sprucing things up in time for fathers visit later this month... jeez, its like a visit from the Queen... I always recall that Billy Connolly sketch where he joked the Queen thinks the world smells like fresh paint... as there's always a bloke with a paintbrush, and tin of paint, frantically lashing away 20' in front of her ;-)

So things have been busy in general in Bowman Towers, but with little outward hobby output...

I did mention The Hobbit above, and have found time to enjoy starting the campaign scenarios from the The Fall of the Necromancer(FOTN) LOTR SBG supplement, with my son. This has put my recently(ish) made bottle brush trees I made to good use along with the lichen clumps I recently bought, and we have had fun with orcs, spiders, bats and wargs doing battle with wood elves defending Mirkwood.

Fall of the Necromancer - nicely in theme with current Hobbit movie

Enjoying this simple gaming with my son has been wonderful, and has motivated me to continue this skirmish game with him for the coming year, and beyond. We'll throw in some EotD too for variety...

My son also starts 'Big School', this year so more home organising has been in order, sorting him a desk for his room, putting up shelves and tidying and sorting; more conducive to studies. Big School is also going to mean school fees, which will dent my available hobby budget significantly, and this has made me realise, the simple answer to hobby nirvana this year, will be to dive into the lead mountain, and paint up the hundreds of LOTR miniatures I have stock-piled over the years... and thus be able to play more of the various scenarios from the LOTR SBG Source and Journey books with him...

So that's the plan:

Clear the painting table of current items scheduled for Curt's Painting Challenge; Some FoW stuff for completeness sake, all the Requiem EotD figures, and the dwarves of the The Hobbit starter set.

And then crack on with the LOTR/Hobbit lead/plastic pile... first up from the lead pile may be some Castellans I need for the FOTN campaign games... wonderfully creepy looking figures...

If I feel so inclined I may break out some of the figures that are backlogged also, for Black Powder duty; Perry ACW and Naps, and some Wargames Factory SYW stuff... I have so  much stuff awaiting paint its not funny, so 2014 will be a year of buying little and painting lots, I hope!

I will continue my terrain projects including more Victorian buildings for my city-scape, and I am also feeling inclined to make some LOTR terrain, both Hobbiton hobbit holes and Dol Guldur fortress/ruins... I quite like the look of a lot of the digitised terrain that appears in the Battle for MiddleEarth series of computer games, so may use some of that for inspiration too... I might even finally get my Mumak painted!

I will indulge these in no fixed order as whim takes me... less pressure that way...

I hope also, that in my fortnights summer hols here at end of Jan, I'll be able to get down to Wellington and grab some of that dry-ice to try out the foggy board effect...

Hope you all have a good 2014 and enjoy whatever gaming, painting and terrain modelling you like doing best!