Hobby Lookback 2022
Filed Under: Hobby
2022 was a good hobby year. Let’s attempt to piece it together.
January
Battle in Balin’s Tomb. Not, it turned out, a very good game, but fun for a half hour of nostalgic action.
I began the year painting some Middle-Earth miniatures from the Battle in Balin’s Tomb box. Read all about it here.
Then I painted some elves.
Then, at long last, I painted the mighty Warhammer Fortress. Has it seen the table yet? No. I also scratch-built a few bits of terrain, including some steps to go with the Fortress.
I painted up my glorious Secret Santa gift – a squig sleigh!
February
Lady Olynder, ghost mum
Into February I continued my scratch-building kick with more rocks and hills and basic stuff like that.
I also had a go at making ladders, platforms and walkways out of bits of sprue. This was quite successful really, although I didn’t finish and paint any of the results. It would be a good way to add to a Warcry board.
I painted up an Ophidian Archway, which I am now giving a base, because I think it’ll look better.
Back on the Nighthaunt after a year, I built and painted up 5 Hexwraiths, 5 more Hexwraiths (actually Black Knights painted to look ghostly because I couldn’t handle the thought of building any more Hexwraiths), Kurdoss Valentian and Lady Olynder. It felt good to return to the army and the colour scheme I love so much.
Later in the year Nighthaunt got a (mostly) good new book. I’ve enjoyed my games with the ghosts since it came out.
March
1990s-era Dark Elf Warriors. Some of these models may be older than myself.
I worked on some more Darkling Covens (Dark Elf) models for my Cities of Sigmar army, including 5 old metal Black Guard. I love these guys.
Around this time I tried playing in the Edinburgh and Lothian Gamers (ELG)’s AoS league down at Red Dice Games. I brought my fluffy Cities army (3 Steam Tanks and a shitload of aelves) to three General’s Handbook 2021 Pitched Battles and got completely stomped in all of them. I knew what I was getting into, but still… not the best time I’ve had playing the game.
I’m currently swithering on joining 2023’s first-quarter AoS league, which is at least pitched as a somewhat more casual affair, with Contest of Generals (the Matched Play battlepack from the Core Book) as the default game type. I should do it, right?
April
Kainan’s Reapers, sans Kainan himself
I painted a couple of Underworlds warbands: Kainan’s Reapers, the Ossiarch Bonereapers warband; and Hedkrakka’s Madmob, the Bonesplitterz (Savage Orruks) warband. I’m not sure I like how the Bonesplitterz turned out, might be worth revisiting the capes and cloaks at least.
I made a couple of rubble sections to go with my Warhammer Fortress. In the unlikely event that I actually ever play a game with it, these will replace the wall sections when they get destroyed by siege weapons.
I painted up a bunch more Garden of Morr terrain, and even scratch-built a bunch of cute little flat pieces of graveyard terrain, using up some Renedra gravestones and plastic flagstones I had lying around. Some of them warped a bit, unfortunately, but are perfectly useable.
May
Wight King
I painted a Wight King and a Necromancer. These were perfect low-cost impulse purchases. They make a cute couple. I continued the dark-blue and purple theme I set upon with my Cursed City miniatures, but this time with snow to match some Skeleton Warriors (and the Sepulchral Guard) I painted a while before.
Continuing the undead theme, I painted up the Crimson Court, a Underwords warband consisting of 4 cool-as-hell vampires. I started with the same blue-shadows basecoat as with the other undead but painted their armour red because, well, “crimson” is right there in the name. Think it turned out ok, although I think there could be stronger highlights across all the non-metallic parts of the models.
June
Firchlis, the Boreal Tempest
I received a Stardrake cheap and pre-built (including magnetized rider options!) from a fellow Rollmodel, and painted that up. This was one of the biggest models I’ve ever painted, and quite a big project. Very pleased with it. One day she might even get to play.
I also painted a Frostgrave Lich and Apprentice, and a Thaumaturge Apprentice.
July
TTCombat Ruins, nicely based
I made some upgrades to some old terrain. I added some nice pennants to my watchtower and an optional base. (I think I might give it a non-optional base, because it looks inseparable from it now.)
I stuck my old TTCombat ruins on bases, which makes them look so much better.
And I made some optional bases for my Azyrite Ruins. I ended up not liking these, and intend to try again someday.
I painted a Frostgrave Thaumaturge and 15 assorted Frostgrave soldiers, cultists and barbarians. These are intended for use in Frostgrave, Magewinds and general purpose fantasy gaming.
August
Horns of Hashut
I painted the Spire Tyrants, a Warcry warband, in a Heresy-era World Eaters-inspired colour scheme. I’d like to paint more AoS Chaos things in this scheme.
Then Warcry 2nd Edition dropped, with the Heart of Ghur boxset. I sold the Rotmire Creed warband to Kara and painted up the Horns of Hashut myself.
Warcry was already Games Workshop’s best game, but 2nd Edition was a great update. They made some welcome tweaks to the existing rules, added Reactions (which definitely change the game in an interesting and mostly-better way), and updated the rules for all pre-existing models useable in the game and stuck them all in one big book. Most of the old content is compatible, or at least adaptable. I’ve played lots of games of Warcry in the latter half of this year and enjoyed all of them.
With the boxset came a lot of “Gnarlwood” terrain. I had fun painting these, and I think they look great (I painted the trees red, as if they are made from flesh), but frankly I can’t give the terrain a good review. It’s hard to assemble and crap for actually playing the game, in two ways:
- Verticality is fun in Warcry, and this terrain doesn’t provide enough of it. The old terrain had big flat rooftop areas for models to climb up onto and spread out on, which was great. With this stuff, you’re constantly struggling to fit things on the tiny platforms and rope bridges. Also climbing models up onto the platforms feels a lot stranger than climbing up a vertical wall.
- Good luck trying to move your models without accidentally snagging a tree branch. (I actually sawed the treetops off and magnetized the trunks so they’re removable, but this isn’t possible with all the trees they’re releasing as part of this “season”.)
It quite put me off the idea of buying the 2nd boxset, even though I adore both warbands. It looks cool, though.
September
Orc fleet
I did my damnedest to spruce up some old Saurus Warriors so I’d be happy putting them on the table in games of Warcry. I think I’ve had these guys since I was like 14? They were one of the first things I painted when getting into the hobby finally back in 2017, and it showed.
At a meetup in the summer my friend Luke very kindly dumped his built-but-unpainted Kings of War Armada starter set on me, because he didn’t think he’d ever want to paint it. So I painted up the Orc half and made inroads into the Basilean (read: goody-two-shoes humans) half.
October
Basilean fleet
I finished off the Basilean fleet. I have yet to play a game of Armada…
I “shipped” Magewinds, my own skirmish game, by setting up the website. After a year plus of serious development – design, testing, iteration – it felt glorious to see it out the door. There is, however, much more to be done.
I bought some Renedra ruins, identifying that they’d be perfect for a Magewinds-sized battlefield, and painted them up quickly.
I also painted up a Megadroth Remains, to go with my Gnarlwood terrain.
November
Mordheim Freelance Knight
I got a cheap (£10!) Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur from a friend and built and painted it up. Building it was kind of a nightmare – I had to magnetize the base and place it vertically on a radiator so it would set without having a permanent forward lean. Even aiming for a very simple paint job it was a challenge, with too many difficult crevices to get into with the brush.
The rules for actually using “Incarnates” are only available in the Thondia book, which I haven’t picked up yet. I don’t know if it would fit into any of my armies anyway.
I painted up a Mordheim freelance knight model, for use in Magewinds, and a Reaper dark elf priest too. And also a cute little fox Kara got me!
I built and painted a Chimera, going for a fancy purple and blue scheme.
And I finally painted Elathain’s Soulraid, completing my collection of Underworlds warbands up to the end of the Direchasm season. I completed them in time to take them to the RMRO in December, where I played a couple of games with them which really rekindled my interest in Underworlds.
I painted some Moria Goblins I had lying around. I kinda want to try out the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game with a Moria army in 2023.
December
Fungoid Cave-Shaman
I painted a nice wee Gitmob Grot Shaman I picked up at Knightly Games earlier in the year. He’s been out of production since 2019, so it felt like finding a rare gem amongst the shelves. He can join my already-great number of Madcap Shamans in my Gloomspite Gitz collection.
I also painted a Fungoid Cave-Shaman, probably one of the best grot models GW have put out since AoS started, and a squad of Sneaky Snufflers, adorable mushroom-finding squigs and their handlers.
I finished up the year making inroads into Kings of War with a small Ogre army. The addition of “Ambush” – a low-points game mode intended for quick and/or introductory battles – in the latest book made me feel like now was a good time to jump in, so I found someone to play with locally, chose an army (the brand-new plastic ogre kit made that easy) and got to work. We’re hoping to have our first 750-point game early in the new year.
At this point all I need to do is multi-base the 4 ogre regiments I’ve just finished painting (I’m waiting for the bases to arrive); acquire, build and paint a regiment of goblins (they fit perfectly in the remaining 80 points, and I could not resist an opportunity to try painting some of Mantic’s goblins); then I’ll be ready to play!
All in all, a good hobby year. I even accomplished some of my goals and stuck to some of my resolutions. I’m not sure what I’ll spend the remaining days of it doing. Perhaps even… not hobbying? – but I’m not sure I know how to do that anymore…