Seasons Greetings from Farpoint!

 Hi!

Well Christmas is almost upon us and following that a three week enforced holiday for me!

Before the festive shenanigans begin, I wanted to take a quick peek back at the year to see how I got on with all things hobby related.

First off, to date I've painted 139 assorted figures, scenic gubbins and whatnot in every scale from 2mm to 28mm and above so from that perspective it's been a productive year, primarily driven by my three months of lockdown in March to June. This is an improvement over 2019's total which is fab!

I'm really pleased to have made a bit of a bash at my Rusty Robots project that has been well and truly on the back burner for almost a decade now as work has kind of taken up much of my spare time so it was really great to finally see some figures and scenery make an appearance.

I also got some Mechs built to play some Battletech using my own SD sort of style which was fun but ultimately frustrated by a series of badly sculpted infantry that required chucking. Hopefully I'll get back to them in the future and flesh out a couple of lances...

Meanwhile, my fantasy Land Ironclads trundled slowly on and I pretty much finished my Dwarves for the time being and introduced the Vongola City State to the selection of forces I can field. I really need to take a week or two to finish everything up for this project but have as usual galavanted off on a tangent more than once!

Speaking of which, my War of Ashes saw me add a bunch of Kuld but I still need to make more of the voracious little eating machines to give me a proper force. Maybe I'll get around to it during this lockdown if I get my other challenges done first...

I also managed to paint up the entirety of the original Deadloque box for Flintloque, something I never thought I'd do as I'm fairly sure that in the 28 years I've been gaming I've never completed any boxed set before!

Next up, looking at my gaming progress, I managed to play 21 games using six different systems which is also an improvement on last year but it felt like I could have done more, especially if I could just knuckle down and finish off a force or two rather than gadding off on a tangent every five minutes.

This brings me to my mini plan for 2021!

First and foremost, I really, really want to get my Rusty Robots done so plan to concentrate on getting a starter gang for each of the tribes done and a bunch of random civilians, scenery and denizens of The Scrapyard made.

The plan is to get sculpting whenever I can to build as many of the little guys as I can and then paint whatever of them catch my fancy so that I don't bore myself with doing all the same stuff. This may mean a bit of an eclectic mix of odds and sods making an appearance but it can't be helped and if I can put together enough stuff, I can start playing some games which will see rumbles in The Scrapyard making their appearance here which should be fun!

I forsee needing to invest in a hot wire cutter soon to make lots of blocky terrain but it will come in handy for lots of other bits and bobs when I get around to my other plans for the year...

I've got so many things I'd like to do given the time and I figure a three week lockdown will give me a chance to make a bit of a start on them!

It's not all going to be Rusty Robots though this year! I also have set myself the challenge of painting my way through the original Flintloque box too so will need to get cracking to get the 15 figures done and if possible try out a game or two!

Back in the mid 90's after leaving the GW hobby, I stumbled upon Flintloque and have a hankering to paint some more of the chunky little chaps so will be making a bit of an attempt to start putting the collection back together. My buying approach back then was to pick up whatever blister pack appealed to me so I had a very mixed collection with Elves, Goblins, Orcs, Dwarves and all manner of odds and ends but it somehow fitted with the game and I am keen to revisit the joys of Valon and it's assorted races. 

The need to play Flintloque isn't as great as to just enjoy the experience of painting the figures and every so often plonk what I have on the table for a bit of a RPG lite sort of scenario driven wander around the edges of the wars of Mordred.

Lastly (for now at least!) there's Leviathan. It's a project I've repeatedly picked up and put down over the years but never really stopped obsessing about so I figure I'd best use 2021 to finally get it out of my system and work on a monthly challenge I've set myself. I want to paint at least one figure, be it resin or metal from the range every month and see what I end 2021 with. 

I'm not sure if I can bring myself to use the metal figures from the range as they are massive but after painting the resin Dragonbane rider and being pleasantly surprised by just how good it was, I may try using an entirely original figure approach (for the most part as the old Heartbreaker range has lots of goodies that complement the concept!). 

I've no idea how things will turn out with all these options but I look forward to having a go and who knows, the Boar Company may yet ride again with new allies, old foes and more sculpts to boot!

Folks may notice that smaller scale projects are absent from my 2021 plan at the moment. I have found myself somewhat indifferent to 15mm and 6mm for a while now but feel that if the right inspiration struck, I'd have a great time painting those scales again but we shall have to see what next year brings. 

I'll be taking Christmas day off and then starting up my Lockdown 2.0 daily project log for at least three weeks and will see how I get on.

In the meantime, All the best and hope you and yours have a fantastic Christmas and wonderful new year!

Richard