Goodbye 2021 and Hello 2022!

Happy New Year, one and all!

2021 saw a lot more painting than I have done in many years - in part due to finally kicking off the WWI Southern Front painting and in part due to starting preparation for the who-could-have-predicted VSF Venusian campaign. 

The former went from 0 to about 40 figures and the latter a more modest 0 to 20 figures.

One of my goals for 2021 was to finish the white coated Russians for my colonial collection. I did so, and that collection is essentially complete as far as I am concerned. It was a small project that started in June of 2017 as a possible VSF project before morphing into a "What if?" collection for The Great Game.

That final transformation was solidified by my finishing listening to  The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia early in 2021.

A photo from "The Khan's Gambit", posted March 1, 2021

I managed to play a good many games last year, including my Fictional Citadel campaign which spanned four real world months and 10 games. All of those were played out using Bob Cordery's The Portable Wargame

photo from "Fictional Citadel : July 6, 1943 PanGermania clashes with the 3rd Soviet Guard Rifle Division", posted September 3, 2021

 Other miniature rules played this year included Panzer Kids Deluxe, Trench Hammer, Crossfire (finally!), Disposable Hero/Coffin for Seven Brothers, One Hour Skirmish Wargames, One Hour Wargames, Fistful of Lead : Bigger Battles, GASLIGHT, VSF Fubar, and Wings of Glory WWI.

I am clearly not a slave to any one publisher's games!

A photo from "Somewhere in France, 1944 - Panzer Kids!"  posted March 14, 2021

I had a goal to play one board game a month in 2021, and while that did not happen, I did play far more than previous years.

Games included several Advanced Squad Leader Starter Kit #1 scenarios (some more than once), Long Range Desert Group, Pavlov's House (played 3 or 4 times), Enemy Coast Ahead : The Doolittle Raid, and Battle for Moscow (easily played half a dozen times if not more).

Discovering Vassal at the end of the year allowed me to sneak in a late ASLSK game and gave hope that I might play Burning Mountains in 2022.

A photo from "Three Solo Boardgames", posted August 6, 2021

On the blog, I posted 83 times. That's not my highest but felt like a comfortable amount, given everything else in life. Indeed, in 2022, I plan to dial that back a little.

So, speaking of 2022...

My primary goals for the year: 

• Play 1 toy soldiers game per month
  
• Play 1 board game per month (not even a wargame necessarily)
  
• Get at least one Venusian force with options ready for the table
• Bring each WWI force up to three "companies" (H.M.G. suggests 8 figure Bersaglieri and 9 figure Austrian) and 2 MG bases.

Odds are high that Venusian force that gets kitted out first is the lizard folk.

Finally, as mentioned, I will try to post a tiny bit less here. 

There are two reasons. 

The first is that I try to comment on different blogs weekly but, when I have to use my time to write a post, it reduces how much time I have to read and respond to posts by other bloggers. Less writing of my own posts, the more time I can read and respond to other posts. To me that is an essential part of being a member of this community and I want to do it more.

 

The second reason is that I am making a push to expand my guitar teaching this year and that takes up what would be hobby time. Less hobby time, less activity to write about.

 

And so, without further ado,  Happy 2022! (or at least Not Terrible 2022!)