Painting toy soldiers for games you never play with friends you dont have!!

The title to this post comes form a chat I had with a fellow blogger it was said to him by an ex-partner during a heated conversation. It is something that has stuck with me as it cut so close to the truth, I enter my 45th year and my last regular wargaming was as a teenager, so can I call myself a wargamer...
It is tough to admit but I don't make friends easily, I can safely say that my two best friends are my wife Liz and my Dad Paul. I'm not fussed about this as I have a great life, it just means that playing wargames for me is tough, I am not a one for solo gaming, for me playing wargames was always more about who is round the table then whats on the table.

My Dad retired a few years ago and threw himself back into wargames so I have been mainly painting stuff for him the play with, this has been great for keeping my painting focus. I guess that I am really a painter who would like to play more. This brings me to why a have resurrected this blog after so long in the wilderness. It is for me to get my ideas and plans in print, I always find painting to a target brings the best out of me. If along the way I gain readers and share tips that can help all well and good but that will not be my goal.
I have been a very blessed person over the last few years with my personal finances in a very nice place I have been able to pick a job that leans more towards a great work/life balance than wealth gathering. I have a great job that is Mon-Fri 9-5 this hopefully will let me try and find a local games club where I can put the painting/gaming back into balance too. I have also been able to build up an impressive collection of games/figures that will keep my busy for many a year.

In 2017 my daughter moved out and the now spare room has become a hobby room for me and my wife one side holds all my wargames/boardgames stuff and the other side holds my wife's sewing knitting and dolls house stuff. it gave me chance to build my own painting desk, I raised the desk level so I can paint without ending up hunched over.

another big plus for me has been the explosion in figure based board games I started with Zombicide for my 40th Birthday and have built up an impressive array of board games just waiting for my attention. I guess this is where this blog will come in as I plan in 2018 to work on completing these games. I have two local wargames clubs to try out and will look for boardgames clubs too. I have several GW boardgames that go back to my youth and the peak (so far) of my wargaming which I am keen to get my brush into.

This blog is going to be where I put my plans and results, so where do I plan to start. I have been painting Zulu war figures for playing the era in skirmish so I have to finish these but I want to make a start on my board games, oddly I want to start with the last one bought as I know my Dad is keen too, so I will be sticking together and painting the figures for GW's Necromunda.

Gaming wise I will be looking at attending the local wargames clubs before the end of January.

January goals

1. Stick together necromunda figures and terrain
2. Attend at least one wargames club session
3. Play at least one game (wargame or boardgame)
4. Finish Colonial Zulu's

Happy new year, and bluring the lines

First post of the year so can I wish all readers a happy new year may 2017 bring you plenty of hobby time. For me I plan to get back gaming in 2017 and push my painting skills. To which end I wanted to talk about how I see my hobby and the painting involved.
As I see it as a painting wargamer (e.g I paint more than game) Military Modelling and wargames are either end of the same hobby. For wargames you want plenty of well painted miniatures but these are to be viewed from arms length on a table top. But military modelling is all about making the figures look lifelike and the top painters in this field can make figures look alive. This is a very time heavy way of painting figures can take weeks to complete with the top painters spending hours on maybe a single blend. I have tried this style and find it very tough to be spending as long on one figure as I would spend painting a whole unit of even and army of wargames figures. Its not that I do not like to spend that amount of time, just that hobby time is finite and I still love to play wargames (or new era board games) and want/ need  to paint figures for them
check out the top models on Cool Mini or not for 2016
And a few of my own attempts at Military Modelling style painting

I am at heart a wargames painter I excel in this style of work I have a method of painting that while effective is quick enough that painting an army will not take me years. My style for wargames is a simple one best summed up as Face's and Base's. You put extra effort into painting the flesh this gives the figures a great focal point, the rest of the figure can be done is basic colour with minimal highlights you then put extra effort into making the base work as stunning as you can. For me this is the best pay off between getting the army onto the table top and making the figures look great the base is visible form all angles and gives a great first impression and when the figures are looking at closer the well painted flesh will draw the viewers eye and give a impression of higher detail than you have actually put on the model. Below are my latest figures for the Sudan wars which show my face's and base's style (these would be add to a Sabot for the full base effect)

But in the last few years (maybe decade) the biggest growth in wargames has been in skirmish games. games that may only involve a few figures or a squad on each side. For me this is a chance to blur the lines between the two end of my hobby, I still want figures to play with but if I only need to paint a dozen of more figure to get a playable force I can put a few more hours into each figure to make them a bit more of a display piece. To this end I have a few projects that I will be giving this extra level of detail to namely my 40mm Napoleonic figures to play Sharp Practise my newest era Modern Special forces playing the Spectre rules set and maybe some WW2 SAS below are the first figures form my 40mm Napoleonic and my Modern stuff.

Christmas Swag and 1st Entry to winter challenge

So here I am starting my third winter challenge, it seemed fitting that this forms my return to the hobby when it was into the first month of the forth challenge when I fell out of love with painting and gaming. I am already staggered with the output of (to me) new challengers and I look forward to getting to know the people behind this talent.

not changed much just the hair has slipped

 In the spirit of returning my first entry throws back to a young James who in 1989 was all about the GW and Warhammer, I had been one of the kids who watch the channel four NFL show so when GW released and game based on football but set in the Warhammer world I was sold. I played Blood bowl with a human team for a good year or two and if exams had not got in the way I would probably have been one of those who kept the game alive as a cult classic since. But while I did not play BB again I did keep the passion so after a commission opened my eyes to the vast collection of BB miniatures from other companies I started to collect them with a view to one day restarting. 

My Christmas Day haul

Giving yourself only 5 days to complete your Dad’s Christmas present with no plan B might seem mad to some but anyone who watched my output in my first Winter challenge will know I work best with tight a schedule.

I love the character in these figures the faces are the real star of the sculpts, the team consists of 2 throwers 2 blitzes 2 Black Orc Blockers and 8 linemen. All the numbers are free hand and the base has colour mark so indicate the position.

I continue to work on other figures ready for my second entry been working on some fantastic 40mm Rifles.