The Year That Was 2023. Well, At Least The Hobby Part

Well it is that time again, to review my year as far as hobbying goes anyway. It was a satisfying year overall, attended 3 conventions (helped organize one), and gamed fairly regularly, at least a couple times a month. I am really looking forward to the coming year and all the gaming opportunities and challenges it will bring.

So lets take a look at my goals for 2023 and see how I did.

Complete my Mexican American War project.

Finish all my 20mm WW2 and SCW that I have on hand. This will allow me to evaluate what I may need, to complete the SCW anyway. 

Start my Italian wars 15mm stuff. I have a Spanish/Imperialist army based for Gush. This project will see me rebasing those for Impetvs, and getting started on the large bag of figs I have for the period.

Continue the WSS project, probably completing the French.

Paint 1/2 of my troops for Albuera. I have had these for a few years now, I want to get them going. 

Complete my Sea Peoples army in 15mm and possibly my Persian army as well.

Paint my Last Alliance army for MESBG 

Paint two forces for Pikeman's Lament

Start my Mythic Greeks. I have the Bones 5 pack, plus a nice group of Amazons (Wargames Factory, RGD, and a few Lucid Eye) I'm also anxious to paint my Charon I just got from Reaper.

Finish all my 4Ground Terrain (I had some, and bought a bunch during their closing sale.) In fact I have already started and I am almost done with my Norse buildings. Working on the last one now. That will leave the Japanese and the Pirate buildings to finish.

Rework my AWI project to Fire & Fury, rebase and evaluate what may be needed to get me where I want to be.

Start playing some ASLSK

Game 1-2 times a month and, attend at least 2 conventions.

That was quite the wish list, though I think I did pretty good overall.

I did not complete my Mexican War project. I got most of my Mexicans done, just a bit of militia, artillery and supply wagons remain. My US Militia has been started and after them I have little left for the US other than generals, artillery and wagons. I do have a boatload of casualty figures to do up for disorder markers. 

I was able to paint up all the 20mm WW2 and SCW I had on hand, even a few random WW2 guys I found a couple weeks ago. I do need a few items to round out several of the armies but, I can pick those up next year sometime. The SCW is done for the most part. I did pick up a huge lot of painted figures I need to go through. Probably keep a few to repaint and use, most will be sold most likely.

I did manage to sort through my Italian wars stuff, I have rebased what I could, and ordered some additional figures to complete units. This was brought on by my Pavia project I am planning for 2025. I will have 2 Landsknecht pike blocks to paint so I'll need all the time I can get. I do have the rest of the figures that need painting lined up in the queue for this next year.

I had to set my WSS project aside for a bit. I have come to the realization that I will not be able to source enough figures from the Editions Brokaw range to complete it. So, I will need to figure out where to draw the line and what figures to use going forward, quite probably Minifig.

While I did finish my Prussian 3rd Corps for the 100 days, I did not progress any further into my Peninsular War figures. I will be starting those in a couple weeks though.

I did complete my Sea Peoples army. No Persians though.

I did not start my last alliance army, nor anything for Pikemans Lament. Once I started playing SAGA, that really took up that space. In its place were Vikings, and Greeks.

Nor did I start the Mythic Greeks

I did get all my Norse buildings assembled, but that was as far as I got with the 4Ground stuff.

My AWI project is just getting started. I have a spread sheet done, now I can catalog what I have done, and what I need to finish. 

Did not get into any ASL games

I did game at least once a month, if not twice or more, and attended three conventions. Count that one done.

With all that said, what do I want to accomplish in 2024?

I think I gave myself a bit too much last year to complete, so I'll go a little lighter this time.

Complete my Mexican American War Project

Complete my Last Alliance Army

Complete the figures that I have on hand for the Peninsular War

Complete all my 20mm vehicle kits

Get all the painting done for Pavia so I can start playtesting the scenario

Complete all my 28mm Japanese terrain for the samurai

Paint one 15mm ancient army

Complete the AWI project

Start my 15mm project for the '45

Start my 10mm 1864/70 project.

I'm sure I'll squeeze in some other things as well. Maybe a SAGA army or two we will certainly see. I think this list is doable. Of course I will maintain my gaming frequency as well as organizing events for HAHMGS. 2024 should be a fun year of gaming that is for sure.

On the painting front, I had a very successful year. I finished up 2235 figures for the year, almost as many as last year. If I had painted during my vacation, and the time I was working on convention stuff, I would have surpassed last year. Gives me something to shoot for in'24. The breakdown on painting was as follows;

107 15mm Napoleonics

150 28mm Ancient Greeks

12 misc 28mm

179 20mm WW2

242 15mm SYW

588 15mm Ancients

567 20mm Spanish Civil War

390 15mm Mexican American War

Quite happy with that production. I imagine I'll be able to maintain that next year as well..

That is all I have for now. I'll have an update for Pavia in a couple weeks. I hope you all are having a great holiday season, and I wish you all a Happy New Year!

Painting Update - December 2023

 It has been a few months since I last posted a painting update. Believe me, I have been painting quite a bit. Basing has been the hold up. Lots going on over the last few months and getting things based has been an issue. But, here is a nice grouping of stuff.

First off we have some WAS/SYW figures

The top 5 pics are all Hanoverians, represents a good portion of what I need. I still need to get more but that will be later next year. Last pic is Brunswick, with some odds and ends Brits above them. This was pretty much the last of what I had on hand. I'll reevaluate the project and figure out what I need to finish in '24.

These next items I only weathered, I did not paint them.

I got these 1/72 scale tanks on eBay from a seller in Hong Kong. They are pre-painted, but require some limited assembly. A little weathering, and they are ready for action. I did scrounge up some 20mm Japanese tank crew for the SP Gun, again from eBay. They were mostly in poses you would see outside the vehicle but I made them work.

\Next up some ancient Greeks

Ok they are mostly Greeks. There was a handful of Roman Velites as well.  Those are Victrix, as are the peltasts. The cavalry are from Warlord games.  I really like painting the Victrix stuff. Their sculpting makes it easy to get a great result. The shields are all Little Big Men Studios. The only real downside to the plastic figs is cleaning up mold lines. The Warlord cavalry are pretty nice overall, easy to paint, etc. Only downer is the fragility of the pose with the horses front legs in the air. They are very fragile from side to side. Probably will need to do some sort of support soon. These guys have been getting some use in our local SAGA league. 

I was finally able to get to my Spanish Civil War project this fall as well.

Assault Guards

Moroccans

Moroccans

Guardia Civil

Guardia Civil

Nationalists

Nationalists

This is about half  to a third of what I have painted of these particular groups. Not sure how many pictures of the same pose are needed so I just did some samplings. These are all 20mm figures from HPC. I had been collecting everything I could get my hands on, and recently landed a nice group of painted ones, and then another larger group of painted figs. I need to sort through those and figure out what I am keeping. I do need Italians, and some Assault Guards so I can do the other uniform variants for them. I got so many, I ended up selling my Minairons figures and going just with these guys. I still have my Minairons vehicles though, and I'll probably pick up a few artillery pieces as well.

That is it for this time. I have sveral more planned posts so I am thinking I can keep up a bi-weekly rate of posting. Hope you all found this interesting!

Till next time.

A Tour of the American Southwest

 Back in early October I took a couple weeks to drive through the American Southwest on my way to and from my mother's house in Southern California. I knew I had some boxes there that were left behind when I moved to KC so I thought I'd make a trip out of it.  And here it is!

The first stop along the way was Dodge City. It is a very touristy spot but, the Boot Hill Museum holds some really great items.

It is definitely worth the visit. The next stop was a sleeping stop in Clayton NM. I did a search to see what might be around, and came up with a couple things. First, just about 30 minutes out of town was the Clayton Lake State Park, and home of dinosaur tracks. This was really cool to see.

They were all filled with water from the rain the night before. probably makes them stand out more for photos anyway.

Then, back in town was the gravesite of the notorious outlaw Black Jack Ketchum. Unlucky is probably more like it. He got the date wrong for the train holdup and showed up by himself to rob the train. The gang had attempted it the week before I think it was. Anyway, the conductor was ready, and gave ole Black Jack a load of buckshot, severely wounding and unhorsing him. The posse found him lying by the tracks. Took him to jail in Clayton, tried him and sentenced him to hang. Unfortunately for Black Jack, they had never had a hanging in Clayton so no one really knew what to do. The hangman made the rope too long, and when he was dropped, it pulled off his head. I guess it was a quicker death than it would have been.

Heading out from Clayton I was on the way to Pecos National Historical Park when I saw a sign for Ft Union. Built prior to the Civil War to suppress the Apache, it was the gathering place for Union Forces before they marched into New Mexico to meet the Confederate threat from Texas. So I took the 20 minute drive off the interstate to see what was there. The fort is all ruins, being built of adobe for the most part, and abandoned in the late 1800s. But, it was a really cool stop regardless. 

The two pics above show the remains of the Civil War era redoubt

The jail was the only non-adobe structure

The best preserved adobe structure is the hospital

Then it was on to Pecos National Historical Park. Pecos is home to the ruins of the old spanish mission, and the ruins of the Pecos Pueblo.  Definitely worth a visit. The ruins of the mission were one of the landmarks along the Santa Fe trail for those travelling west. 

The second thing to see at this park is the Glorieta Pass battlefield, or a portion thereof. There are some good hiking trails, and some good signage. Unfotunately, there are so many trees that the battlefield sightlines are impossible to see. And envisioning the battle was near impossible. I guess they do have tours from the main visitors center, which is a mile or two from the battlefield portion. Most of the preserved battlefield sits on what was known as artillery hill.

The battlefield as it looked back then

The next day was the Painted Desert/Petrified Forest for some cool scenery and some unexpected historical items pueblo ruins and pictographs

Lots of stunning views to go with the many pictographs and the pueblo ruins.

After this it was the Grand Canyon

A few days at moms then a return through Utah stopping at Bryce Canyon

Canyonlands, which is a stunning park, and a must see in my opinion,.

And Arches

Ran into a big snowstorm crossing the Rockies, so I cancelled the planned drive up Pike's Peak. By the time I got out of Denver I was too tired and tired of driving to check out Sand Creek, or Ft Hays Kansas the next day. I just wanted to get home. Maybe next year. I kind of have in my mind a Yellowstone, Rosebud Creek, Little Bighorn, Mt Rushmore circuit. We will see how that goes.

Next weekend I'll get a painting post up. I have several planned, just gotta do 'em.