Happy New Year!

 Happy New Year, one and all!

This is my favorite time of year on the wargaming blogs - I love reading year end reviews and reading about plans/predictions/possible ideas for the coming year. 

Robot wooden soldiers. Clothes-pin dolls, popsicle sticks, toothpicks, pom-poms.

Not coincidentally, I also like doing that kind of post myself. In a change of approach, rather than pepper this post with pics of games from throughout 2022, I am posting pictures of the forces involved in the holiday game - their close-ups if you will.

I had a fairly minimal plan for 2022.  How did I do?

Play 1 toy soldiers game per month

Well, I played at least one figure game each month, save one, but in some months, I played several. So, I'll call it a goal met!

It also seems that I played no less than 15 different sets of rules. Some of the only once mind, but still. The standout "discoveries" for me were Age of Fantasy and Age of Heroes (used for the Christmas game).

The Rats! Air-dry clay, popsicle sticks, tooth pics, pipe cleaner. 

Play 1 board game per month (not even a wargame necessarily)

Board gaming started strong and then dropped off. Not for lack of interest, but there's only so much time in the day.

Get at least one Venusian force with options ready for the table

I completed my Venusian lizard force which I can field with either the Triceratops with howdah or with a Spinosaurus or Tyrannosaurus with beast-master. Of course, I love this force more than anything else I have in my collection and want to give them a few options more,

My Tanitians almost made it before my painting mojo up and left. Five figures remain. If I had an orange paint that didn't require half-a-dozen or more coats to cover black (like for touch-ups when I overpaint), they would be done. None-the-less, they are still functional as Dark Elves, for Age of Fantasy and even won the round-robin.

My French Foreign Legion force also almost made it but is one figure short of my initial goal for the project - they need a hero/leader figure. 

Clara. She began life as a Disney Little Bo Peep figure from Dollar Tree that I had picked up with the belief that I would find a use for her. A paint conversion and craft foam to turn her outfit into a holiday dress was all it took to finally get her into a game.

Bring each WWI force up to three "companies" (H.M.G. suggests 8 figure Bersaglieri and 9 figure Austrian) and 2 MG bases.

This project has always had a moving goal post.  I reached the three companies/2 MG goal, if you count 6 figures as a company. Which I decided part-way through the year that I do.  While I am quite happy with where I'm at figure-wise, it's easy to justify painting a handful of figures more on each side yet.

Post less, Comment more

I started the year with this in mind and did indeed cut back on my posting and increased my commenting. However, with my dad's passing, I really doubled-down on this goal.

I am fortunate and grateful for the readers I have, many of whom comment. I am the kind of person who would write whether anyone read it or not - indeed before I had my first blog, I had notebooks and then a Google Doc, of my gaming ramblings. That said, it's always uplifting to receive comments and to feel like you're having a conversation with like-minded hobbyists and not just shouting into the wind.

I am trying to pay-it-forward if you will.

Now, I don't track how much I comment (that just seems crass), but I know that it is far more than I have in the past. I have also upped my participation in forums I read, whether a simple thumbs up on a post of someone's figures or an actual comment when I have something to contribute in regards to a question.

This is now part of how I approach the hobby.    

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So, all said and done, not a bad showing. 

The figures the players chose for the holiday game. Yes, the fox is smoking a cigar (splinter of popsicle stick). I imagined the fox as Hannibal from the A-Team when I made it. The deer is obviously a plastic toy, the rifles are Toy Soldiers of San Diego The figures, except the deer, are air dry clay.

However, going into 2023, I am avoiding any kind of commitment or plan. Not that I've ever felt bound by these things, but I think, for 2023, I'm going to just say, that as of today, this is what I'm feeling is likely.

Not to say I haven't put a lot of thought into it - I've been writing this post for weeks now. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that whatever I do this year, I want to game more and worry less about painting. I'm in a good spot for that, as most of my collections are in a game-able state. 

Evil Industrialist (Sir Topham Hatt) and conductor (both are prepaints, by Ertl). Iron Golem Nutcracker (wooden craft kit nutcracker)

What I do paint, should bring something new to the table - pun absolutely intended - not just more of the same (for example, I could use some more Austiran and Italian regular rifle bases, just in case, but that doesn't give me anything new). Thinking of the games I want to play, here is what I foresee working on:

WWI Southern Front:

Objective: Add on-table air power to Italy and Austria and give the Italians the ability to field cavalry sufficient for One Hour Wargames force lists.

• 1/48 Nieuport 17
• 1/48 Albatross D.III
  
• 3 Italian cavalry (2 would be plenty, but the third allows for a cavalry leader figure for Trench Hammer)

WWII PTO:

I have not really used these figures at all in many years and want to get the back on the table and with one of my favorite rules sets.

Objective: Give the USMC support weapons to allow both sides to field either attacker or defender for Dick Bryant's small Crossfire scenarios. 

• 1/72 USMC MG team (2 figures)
  
• 1/72 USMC mortar team (2 figures)
  
• 1/72 USMC Forward observer (1 figure)
• 1/72 USMC bazooka figure (1 figure)
  

The figures the players didn't choose. The beaver with the flamethrower was a popular option but in the end no one chose it. I am most happy with the owl - both the yes and the look of feathers. Air dry clay, pipe cleaner, Toy Soldiers of Sand Diego Thompson.

Weird World War I:

Objective:  Play a game of WWWI set on the Western Front

• 4 WWI 1/35 French (finish them)

Fantasy: 

Objective: Give my lizards options for how to deploy archers. 

• 4 Lizard archers
  

Objective: Play Blitz Bowl

• Skaven and Reavers Blitz Bowl Teams (12 figures total) - Blitz Bowl? GW? What? I'll discuss in a future post, probably.

These are wooden "mother" peg dolls. They were the zombie like cyborg workers in the warehouse for the holiday game. They are based on the drones from The Black Hole (Disney, 1979, one of my favorite movies when I was a kid).

The above also gives you an idea of the kinds of games I am thinking about playing. What's not listed there, but could be under Fantasy, is a D&D 5e campaign. 

I'll be running the Starter Set campaign, Lost Mine of Phandelver, for family and friends (the same as the participants in the holiday game) as we all want to learn 5e - primarily out of curiosity but also because that's what the kids play at my son's school, and he's expressed an interest. This will kick off in late January.

If it goes well and we like it, the other DM in the group may run the Essentials Set adventure or a homebrew or who knows, and I'll get a chance to run a PC - it's been a few years!

***

I hope you all have a wonderful New Year and you're able to get in some hobby time and games, even if it's not as much as you'd ideally like. 

And if you can't, maybe just read some blog posts now and again, visit the forums (I like Lead Adventure and Little Wars Revisited), read some history, read Lone Warrior or one of the other gaming journals. Watch movies and documentaries.

Whatever you do, you are still a part of the hobby.

Happy New Year!

(As a bonus, here's a recent picture of Peppermint, cone-free, enjoying the sun and the grass, and loving life)