Needing a little direction

Here’s a bit of a “State of the State/housecleaning” address. 

*No hobby progress, so ignore this post if you’ve no interest.*

My hobby has been sorely lacking in direction of late. Recently, my efforts to paint a “bit of this” and a “bit of that” really hasn’t been satisfying my needs and I’ve been feeling somewhat in a hobby “Limbo”.

Well bugger that lark. Things need changing up around here.

In a previous post I mentioned that I have a large number of unfinished projects, these are in part due to a hobbyist’s nasty dose of “Shiny-itis” - Constantly getting distracted by new things and setting old unfinished projects aside in lieu. This utter lack of self-discipline is a rot in a hobbyist’s core and I’ve decided to set that nonsense aside and finish stuff.

O Inquisimunda.... How have I allowed you to lay idle so?

My number one game to paint for and play (And by “play” I mean, the maybe 3 times this year that I’ve been able to so far…) has been Bolt Action. I’d begun my dalliance into this fun beer’n’pretzels WW2 wargame with my Late War Winter Soviets and I’ve almost gotten to the point of being able to call my whole collection that mystical target of “Fully Painted”. (It’s true, it’s true.) With only:

1x Medic

2x Anti-Tank Rifle teams

1x Light Mortar Team

and the remainder (8 figs) of my Winter Vets boxed set to paint I’m so bloody close to being done with my current collection.

Old pic of my Soviets, though now missing recent additions like my newly painted Stuart and now finished half-track. 

Once I’d chosen the Soviets as my primary force, I knew that I’d want to be able to offer games at my house for mates to play so went and purchased the entirety of a matching Winter themed Late War German force. Thus far I’ve only painted up my Hetzer Tank Hunter and the NCO of a Heer squad for them. What’s left are:

1x Lieutenant+Adjutant

10-man SS squad (Warlord Games SS-Charlamagne minis)

10-man Heer squad (Warlord Games Winter Heer minis - The NCO is painted as mentioned above.)

10-man Volks Grenadiers (Warlord Games plastics)

1x Medic (Warlord Games Winter)

1x MG42 Medium MG team (Warlord Games Winter)

1x Panzerschreck team (Warlord Games Winter)

1x Sdkfz 251/1D Half Track transport (Warlord Games plastic kit)

All of these are primed and based and just sat waiting for me to paint them. I’ve avoided getting back to them mainly due to having never painted WW2 Germans before and being irrationally intimidated by the prospect of painting Camo uniforms. Silly really.

Hetzer keeps Hetzin'. 

The last part of this Winter project is the table itself. No point in my mind to start collecting Winter themed armies for home play and not have a likewise themed table to play on. So I bought a large piece of white felt, snowy trees from China and some lovely Eastern Front buildings by CharlieFoxtrotModels to use as terrain.

This being the 1^st of August, that gives me five months to get this all painted and ready for gaming and will give me the chance to call my Winter shenanigans DONE. (And feel like I got something completed for once.) And there you have it – a self-imposed deadline and some much needed direction for my hobby, call it a "pledge" of sorts. Wish me luck!

(Now I just need to find someone to buy all my 15mm Flame of War Commonwealth to make room in my display case for all these Winter projects…)