Well it’s a new year … and I feel somewhat revived in my hobby outlook. After a year of getting my head back into focus, I have some clear gaming and hobby goals for me to focus on.
Last year my “resolutions” if you can call them that … well pretty much were static. I didn’t get much movement on what to do about choices and what games to play. I didn’t get much time to play and I had little ambition to actually play some games. My hope around this time last year was to get a handle on my hobby life and make some choices about how to get back to a fun and relaxing hobby time.
The main thing I did over the past year was to think about how to move forward – beyond my gaming malaise. I didn’t play much at all last year… aside from Arena Rex and a handful of Dark-Age. I did paint and work on terrain and things… other than actual playing the games though. I cut back some of the collecting. This was also a goal… at least while I was trying to get a handle on my gaming. I was also hoping to sell off some things gathering dust … which I did very little as well. Mostly because I was unsure in what direction I was ready to go.
At several times last year I just felt that I was in a fog – or just paralyzed about the state of my hobby. But over the fall and some of my winter break from work — I got to thinking pretty clearly about my gaming hobby future. This is a unorganized list of what I came up with… a set of targets – or points to focus on.
- Play needs to be a set goal, with direct action take to ensure I get to the gaming table. I set a new years gaming resolution to play games — all kinds to get the juices flowing in my hobby. And when I have played some games I can better focus on direction. My goal is weekly gaming or board gaming.
- Complete and stop collecting new things for games I am not playing or planning to play in the reasonable foreseeable future (next month or so). This would include Kickstarters … I must have more than “that looks cool” as a reason to join in on one. If it is a board game I have to be able to use the mini’s for other things. And with board games – I have to be able to play them with my family… so fun for the non geeks lol.
- Finish my project of having a minimum of two factions painted for most games. I started last year with getting Dark-Age to that point so I can show and tell the game to prospective players. I need to jump in and do the same thing for Infinity and 40k. I have collected the models – I need to get some things based painted at least.
- Figure out my hobby “Roadblocks” … list them and find ways to get those roadblocks removed. Currently my hobby painting area is piled high … so high I cannot paint or work on anything. It will take me days to clean this up… before I can actually get back to work on my hobbies. One mental roadblock to this is my plans to remodel my hobby room/area. So I need to actually get moving on the remodel. I have started collecting materials to move forward with that. Hopefully before spring I will be somewhere with that.
- Other projects outside of hobby — need to get resolved with the same effort as what I plan to do with my hobby projects. The main item on this list is the Yurt… which I also plan to work on and get done before this summer. Doing is will require me to schedule time to actually work on it.
OK – that’s roughly my ideas that I need to work further on. If I can get past some of the old projects – clear my plate – then I can de-clutter my mind on things – and think about things in new ways. That’s the hope at least.
When we first moved into the yurt we had to do a lot of purging of STUFF – and this is kinda the same thing. Do you NEED it or do you WANT it… do you USE it? Compartmentalize each – then weigh the pros and cons… then make decisions. Sure hobby stuff is all wants … and no needs. But you can still weight them on a use or want to use scale.
So, I came up with Do Play / Want to play for games… with an idea of the future – WILL I play (get the chance to play it). If I want something … I need to actually use it. If I can’t justify things in my hobby with that criteria then I really need to justify why I have it. If I can’t justify having it – then I need to purge it. I have made some piles of stuff I will be selling or gifting away already. I plan to do more in the next month or so as I make space to move forward with my hobby room remodel.
With all this in my head – I am moving forward with things. So far I am feeling pretty good about “the plan”. I have already joined a 40k league to facilitate actual play of games. The release of 8th edition of 40k – with all the glowing reviews really rejuvenated my feelings toward 40k. And with one game under my belt I am really happy to be playing 40k again.
I thought about the league as soon as I saw it announced on the club website. I hadn’t played 8th ed yet — but I have watched tons of you tube demos and “learn to play” videos. And I have played nearly every version of 40k since 1990 lol. I figured I could learn on the fly. This fit right in with my hobby/gaming resolution – I had no reason to not join in.
I set up a “teaching game” with a friend at the club, and this week I had my first game of 8th ed. And I am so far happy with how 8th plays. It was really nice to be back at the table tossing dice and moving my minis around.
I had picked up the craftworld codex… and then I just picked the models I had painted and ready to fit a decent list together. My best option seemed to be my old Wraith-wall list from a couple years ago. It was a fairly simple list – and I think pretty easy to play (not lots of options with 30 wraith guard lol).
The Wraithseer’s D-Cannon is really nasty … love it.
The Wraithseer is pretty tough – but the Bonesinger still healed them up.
I got ballsy and charged a demon prince with Jain Zar… surprisingly she didn’t die in the first round of combat. She even took 5 or so wounds on him!
We ran out of time to finish the game – we called it a draw. But if it went to long I am sure I would have lost. But it was a good learning game … we took our time and really discussed the new wrinkles in 8th edition. I am really jazzed to play next week.
-d
