Too... Many... Projects...

Over the last few days I've tried to be good and spend as much spare time as I can afford painting figures. But this afternoon I sat back and realised I had actually been working on lots of different ones, a few figures at a time, instead of my main one at the moment. Part of this is due to getting distracted. Whenever I think of a set of rules I would like to play a game with, or worse, a new set I have just got, I always end up rummaging around to see what I can paint next. If I had actually spent all of my painting time on one thing I would probably have at least finished something properly this weekend. As it is, I still have a table full of half complete projects!

 Normans!

This is the one thing I should have been concentrating on... I guess knowing I didn't have a game of Saga at the club next week meant I felt I could put off finishing my Norman warband, but that should not be an excuse. I've base painted the 8 crossbowmen and they are ready for dipping. In the background are 13 horses for my knights and warlord. I'm fairly sure I could have completed everything if I had just remained focused!

Pirates!
 

I recently got my copy of "And a Bottle of Rum" by Two Hour Wargames in the post and am really keen to try it. While I could just dive in and play with the pirates I've got, I want to go for the 'full experience' which means I'd like some soldiers, civilians, smugglers, natives etc. Part of what is good about THW rules is that there are several markers representing a chance of an unknown encounter on the table at the start and I want to have some kind of surprise to it rather than just getting 'more pirates' each time. So I am going to hit eBay later to fund this! But that isn't what this picture is about. I have a lot of Old Glory pirates, which are fair enough, but not dripping with character, and decided they might be an efficient way to put together a 'ghost pirate' option for if I want a supernatural element to my games. The chap pictured above is a go at painting 'ghostly' colours. I think it might work okay, especially if there is a group of 4 or 5 of them.

Zombies!

 The figures I was waiting for from 15mm.co.uk arrived safe and sound, so I wanted to waste no time in painting the 'Mad Axeman' for my zombie games. It'll be interesting to play a couple of games with him and see what happens...

 I had also ordered a zombie hoard (well, a pack of 16) at the same time. Now, while these are supposed to be fantasy/medieval zombies, I think they work just fine when you paint them up in 'modern' colours. And as they are pretty generic looking, it makes them easy to paint. I got the above finished today no problem. There are only 11 pictured above as I am keeping 5 for a Hoards of the Things element.

Rooting around in my 'zombie box file' I realised that I had a lot of half finished figures. So I picked an armed civilian and a couple of government agents and finished them off. The government agents, especially, will be interesting for the Mad Axeman to encounter! All of these figures have not had their bases finished as I am going to buy some of the easy, no, I mean lazy, coloured sand from The Army Painter. I get so bored painting grey urban bases!

Hoards!

One of the joys of HotT is that you only need a few figures to get a new element together. This makes it perfect for working on a few figures while I am waiting for other stuff to dry. So I was able to complete an undead bone giant and two units of death knights. With the addition of a few more elements, I'll have a fair sized undead/chaos army ready to go. Which brings me to...

The Tray!

Precariously balanced on a pile of boxes is my Dark Dwarf army from Irregular Miniatures and also several bags of unpainted 15mm figures which represent the start of projects I have hardly mentioned on this blog! Sigh....

Naboo!

Well, between all the above going on and various other commitments, I didn't even get a chance to play a game of The Queen's Gambit, which a friend had generously lent me. But I did get to set it up on Friday! Unfortunately it is now Sunday evening and I really should put it away again...

Now what?!

This has all got me thinking... Hang on, no, let's start again, because 'thinking' is actually part of the problem! When I am happily working away in the man-cave, I'll be mulling things over and getting new ideas as I paint. And it is this which leads me to take a break from whatever I am doing and paint just a few figures for another project. I think what I need is a more focused approach. A target. I should be saying to myself: "Right, if you paint this group of figures over the next few days, that will be enough to play an interesting game of [insert name here]." After all, I certainly don't enjoy the painting side of things as much as the playing. Knowing what I need to paint and how that will actually work in terms of a scenario for a game should keep me both motivated and able to produce something I can actually use, rather than an assortment of figures for various games... at least, that's the idea...

I think I'll have to test that out and see what happens....