2021 Review

As 2021 draws to a close and we go hurtling into 2022 with frightening speed, its time for my usual look back at my hobby year and forward at the year ahead. It's always nice to do these kinds of posts as it gives me a chance to see how far I've come in the last 12 months, as well as giving me the opportunity to gather my thoughts on where I'm going 

2021 has been an odd, but overall pretty good year hobby wise. Despite starting the year in lockdown, I managed to fit in a ton of games as things opened again, across a decent range of systems. 40k and Titanicus seem to have become my main focus, as well as a good amount of Middle Earth of course. It's been really excellent reconnecting with gaming friends who I've been separated from by the pandemic. My main source of socialisation has always been through gaming, so it's really made quite a difference to my mental health to have that back. Last year was really quite rough on me, even if I didn't realise it at the time. I'm certainly feeling a lot more grounded now I have that social outlet back in my life. 

That reconnection and the fact that games are actually being played has meant that I actually painted far more this year than I did even last year where we spent most of it in lockdown. Gaming and events has always been an excellent motivator for getting stuff done!

I can't help but be pretty impressed with that level of output tbh. I've been ridiculously productive and I feel my quality is going up all the time as well. My two best painted awards felt pretty good too! I'm actually shocked that I got best painted twice in rapid succession. I really don't think the armies which won were that impressive tbh, but I guess I've mastered the knack of making armies look good from about two feet away! 

I've got another Middle Earth event next week (assuming we don't get whacked by restrictions), so I'll have to see if I can get a hat trick!

Unfortunately for my backlog, a lot of the painting I've gotten done hasn't actually been from my existing projects, which means that shockingly I'm still in negative figures for my painting points! The big one was when I started Orks in the summer, which ballooned my total to ridiculous levels quite quickly, as well as the various other bits and pieces I picked up across the year. Anyone keeping an eye on my painting points would have seen them zigzig across the negative numbers quite drastically as I desperately tried to wrestle it under control! 

That's why I want to spent at least the early part of 2022 focusing on working on my existing projects. I'm sick of the endless fight against my backlog, so I'm going to be trying not to buy anything new for a few months. My big goal of the year is to get to the point where I have a fully painted force for every system I play, so I can only game with painted models. In turn, that should allow me to be strict with getting stuff painted before I play them. We'll see how that goes, but I think it's a pretty good goal to have. 

With that in mind, I've actually started 2022 o a really positive note. I've been sprucing up and adding to my Mirkwood Elves which I took to Shaun's event at the start of 2020.

That seems so long ago now. Covid really has warped my sense of time. Anyway, I decided to add a few highlights to my existing models and make them pop a bit more, ready for the event I'm attending next weekend. 

It certainly worked! I've absolutely fallen in love how they look now and it's making me want to go back and revisit the non Ranger elements of my Mirkwood army and bring them up to this level, plus actually finish the bits I lost interest in before. I have a bunch of armoured Elves I need to do, plus five different versions of Thrandui which have sat on my desk for longer than I even want to think about. 

I guess that's going to be my next project after turning my attention to sprucing up my Corsairs for this weekend as well, but tbh I'm not as fussed about those. It's nice to get my new year hobby off to a roaring start though.

Anyway, I've rambled enough for now. Happy New Year to you all and I hope your year is full of happy hobbying. I'll catch you all soon!