2014 - By The Numbers

Every year I stop to take a look at my numbers with just to see how my performance was over the year in Warhammer.

Every year I try to get 52 games in which would account for 1 game a week.  This is how I try to justify the cost of my hobby. I figure if I were to actually get a game in a week then the massive amount of cash I’ve dropped into this hobby over the years I will not have gone too far afoul.  Now, that said this never happens.  I’ve been keeping track for 5 years and only once have I actually hit the 52.  That said this is actually the furthest year I’ve been from the number with only 40 games played.

I also like to keep track of my overall Win/Loss/Draw percentages.  This is the first year that my Win percentage has fallen under my Loss 21 games of my 40 games resulting in a loss.  Only a single Draw, and then 18 games in the Win category.  That’s 45% Win, 53% Loss and 3% Drawn.  The only other year that my games resulted in a lower than 50% Win rate was back in 2011 when I actually had a tie between my Win/Loss at 17 games apiece.  So this tells me that I played less and apparently got worse.

I also keep track of this all by armies that I played.  This year I played:
12 games with Dwarfs
4 with Skaven
20 with Empire
4 with Orcs & Goblins

Having played ½ of my games with my Empire army I’m not super shocked that my win percentage with them was over 50% of their own games with 11 wins, 8 losses and my single draw of the year.  I lost 3 of my 4 games with Skaven, 8 of 12 with Dwarfs and 2 of the 4 with O&G. 
Two of my Skaven games were lost in Triumph & Treachery games of Warhammer which makes me feel a little better as T&T really has the ability to mess with an army by making things work so differently from a standard game of Warhammer.  The Dwarf book I never really did get a good grasp on and the O&G I only played for a mini campaign that Chuck and I did and right afterward sold the army.

2015 - The Resolutions!

Oh dear it’s the time of year again; the time when we evaluate the failed resolutions of the previous year and come up with some more for ourselves to probably fail at.  It seems a grim outlook on the situation but it often is the correct one.  I don't think I've ever in my life managed to nail all of my resolutions and I assume I will continue that streak into 2016, but for now let's look back on the successes and failures from 2014.

First let us take a moment to go over my 2014 resolutions.

-Buy no more than 5 new Board Games-
I bought 4 games.  I also traded for 2 more but since trading involves getting rid of a game I won’t be counting that against me.  Only 4 is a success for me and even more so the fact that the games I did get seem to be a hit with everyone who has played them.

-Participate in the local X-Wing League or run Season 3 of The Waaagh Cast Cup Blood Bowl League-
Our local X-Wing league died pretty much as soon as the last one ended resulting in no 2nd season of the league.  It sucks, but I take consolation hat I didn’t invest further than Wave 3 at least.  I've debated selling my stuff but I think it’s still a worthwhile game to keep at the level I have for random one off games.  The Blood Bowl League also did not make it back into rotation this year.  I enjoyed running the League but my old PC, while it can run the game is getting awfully sluggish and out of date.  I’d like to say maybe I’ll get a new one and run the league but honestly I don’t have a whole lot of motivation to play Blood Bowl right now so running it is even less likely.

-Play four games of Warhammer using supplemental rules-
I'd like to say with certainty that this was completed.  I know for a fact I've played at least four games using Triumph & Treachery and I know also that I've squeezed in at least two or so using Storm of Magic (at least the Scrolls of Binding part).  Heck, Chuck and I played a game just a few weeks ago using the Legions of Chaos and Lore of Undeath rules which I'm going to go ahead and put under the supplemental category.

-Complete my Skaven Army-
Well I made a very specific list of models I wanted to complete for this last year and out of those models I failed to complete only 1.  However! I also added a model that wasn't on the list and required a lot more effort on my part in both the converting and painting.  I dropped the Ratling Gun and added a Verminlord.  Not to mention I painted up the Bell and Rat Ogre pieces and got my Plague Furnace worked up to the point where I can swap in and out as I want.  I count this as a successful completion of a goal.

New Year - New Frontier!

New year and new project!

I’m so excited today to announce the release of Issue #1 of The Waaagh Cast Quarterly!

This is something I’d started working on in the new year of 2014 but after two months of work with layout programs and everything else I finally gave up on.  However towards the end of 2014 my interest in the project was renewed and I slapped it together and forced my way through it.  Of course it was created primarily in Microsoft Word which is not a layout program and so it unquestionably has a more newsletter look than magazine look but it definitely has everything I wanted in it.

I feel at just shy of 30 pages it definitely has some good weight to it for a fan produced e-zine.  Battle Reports, Army Displays, Terrain Build and my personal favorite piece is the cardboard punch-out type article.  I really missed the days when White Dwarfs included add-ons for your games in the form of punch out rules/tokens/buildings and absolutely had a vision of using this stuff when I started working on it so long ago.

I hope that you all enjoy the magazine and encourage you to spread it around your army forums that your part of, or amongst your friends and e-mail circles.  Hopefully it will receive a good reception and I’ll have plenty of people help put the next and future issues together.  The goal is to release an issue quarterly and since I managed to get this out on the 1st of January I’ll be aiming for April 1st.  If you want to help make sure to get into contact with me!

Download the .pdf at the link below!

The Waaagh Cast Quarterly .pdf 5.46MB

Full Stop...

Yup, in case you haven't guessed it my hobby has ground to a full stop lately.  That includes the podcast.  This has nothing to do with lack of motivation but more lack of time.  The holidays are hectic for everyone but combined with both of my sons in scouting and the other family activities of my usual cohort of friends that record the show with me we not only missed Novembers show, but Decembers as well.  Apologies intrepid listeners.

I've continued grinding on though with my painting quest as of late.  I've completed an Orc Blood Bowl team, and am furiously working on the Humans.  These are just the base sets, but I was impressed with how well the Orcs held up considering their age.  I bought, assembled and painted two Great Eagles.  Finished my 5th ed. Marauder Giant as well as a Dragon and Rider.  Did some Freehand Banners on the Empire as well as finishing a unit of Handguns, Halberds and Knights.  Also the last of my Dwarfs in my Ironbreakers.  Most of this can be seen in my Twitter feed so go there and check out the photo's! https://twitter.com/Waaaghcast/media

I plan to be back with a show in early January that I'll probably end up recording sometime in mid December.  At least that's the plan.  Stupid holidays...

The race is on!

As is often the case with those in our hobby we often do our best work (or at least fastest) when deadlines are looming ahead.  Be it last minute painting in the week or even night before a tournament to slamming an entirely new army together in a specific amount of time for some kind of hobby challenge or article.  We’ve all been guilty of just stacking our projects up on top of eachother until we’ve lost track of what it was we were trying to do and things slip off to the wayside to be forgotten for months or even years.

With the new house/game room and a new army to tickle my fancy I’ve really been on the hobby horse lately and now I’ve decided to drive myself towards a goal by year end.  I could simply say to finish as many projects as I can, but that leaves too much open to chance of me slipping off track.  While finishing as many unfinished projects is certainly a goal in its own, I’ve also decided to drive myself to get the 3 armies I have painted up to 4,000 point legal lists using the current game rules.  This isn’t too difficult as I’ve already got well past 3,000 painted for most of the armies but sometimes it’s that final drive that’s the hardest.

As it happens I’ve already finished my Skaven army to this level having painted the Verminlord last month.  My Dwarfs are actually already able to be fielded at 4,000 which is why they are on the back burner with my collection only currently having 21 unpainted models.  My Empire need the most work.  While I can do 3,000 with what I have, the place the army lacks is the ability to hit the 25% core requirement.  To fix this I’m adding a second unit of 10 Handgunners, 2 Handgunner Champiosn with Long Rifles and a unit of 25 Halberdiers to the list.  Also I’m painting a unit of 5 Reiksguard Knights to use as a chaff blocker.

Since I have my Empire out and on the table I’ve also decided to spruce some things up.  The army was a secondhand army when I got it and while I’ve fixed it up as much as I can and it looks pretty good now, I’ve been trying to find ways to improve its appearance scores.  The paint scheme is pretty basic and the conversion work is super simple which aren’t earning me too many points.  The basing does fine and the theme and display are good so that really only left me one place to try and earn an extra point or two and that was in the ‘freehand’ category.  Now, I should say that I nearly have palsy as bad as I shake, but I decided to give it a go.  Especially since my Empire is old and the banners are the large flat open ones from the older edition models.  You can see the results above.  I have 3 banners in the army with this look and then I have a unit of Knights Panther and Demi-gryphon/Crocodiles which I haven’t decided on what to do yet. Eventually I’ll get to that too.

That’s all I have.  Just a little plug about what I’m working on.
Hobby on fellow readers.  Hobby on.