So, what projects are you guys working on for 2022?

[Raynor]

(01-08-2022 02:34 PM)Raynor Wrote:  Great questions!

Do you plan to paint the minis from one of your favourite games?

Yes! I'm currently working of finishing up the last unfinished bits of Project Elite, which I intially painted as a way to prep for tackling aToE. I tried a minimalist paint method that I wanted to use for Nemesis, but the vibe just doesn't match the rest of the set, so I'm having to redo a lot and experiment far more than I anticipated. I'll just say now that Red is a highly questionable base primer color... Don't think I'll ever do that again.

I also started working on Last Night on Earth to break up the pace, and that's been fun. Between LNoE and Zombicide I've got a lot of zombies to fill the time when I need a break from trying to exercise my creativity muscles. Not looking to treat this like a big project. For some reason, painting low stakes zombie hordes and humans with a defined color pallet is less stressful than complex looking alien bosses..

Nemesis should be arriving in a month or two, which is the next big project. I actually really like the Sundrop/Zenithal priming style they offered for the game and want to see if I can imitate it while adding some small details here and there to bring the minis to life Aaron Lovejoy did a Zenithal Priming tutorial over on the Flying frog YouTube channel, and it looks pretty straightforward, which was the only way I was able to convince myself to pass on Sundropping despite the cost

Those are my immediate plans for the year. Cthulu Death May Die is my next big project like A Touch of Evil, where I really don't want to screw anything up. No time line on when I'm going to tackle it though.

Are you planning on getting a new game this year you've had your eye on for a while

I'm actually pretty happy with my collection right now. Got some Kickstarter games coming in to keep me occupied.

Are you going to create custom scenarios, characters, villains or cards for your games?
Probably not.

Are you going to try and get through/sell off some of the pile of shame (mountain of plastic minis)
Yeah looking to split off about 1/3rd of my collection (about 15 games). 2021 was pretty eye opening year of gaming for me. I have a lot of old games I've found I just played out and don't need anymore as well as many new games I tried that I just need to let go and be thankful I got to try them.

Are you going to play/learn a new game you haven't got around to yet?
Scythe and Viticulture top of the list. I was on a really good clip for playing games then my schedule changed up and these two have been sitting for 6 months untouched.

An update on how the year's going so far.

I finished Project Elite! Quite happy with it. I tried a red base coat, to match the original Red color of the bosses, and it was a real struggle, but I'm all right with the final results. I do plan on trying to avoid that color as a base coat in the future though

I ended up buying some "Speed Paints" and tried to test them on my Zombicide horde from 2E, but really didn't like it, and that ended up with me just painting the entire horde along with the Abominations. (The paints are solid and have great uses but I couldn't use them the way I was imagining) None of the heroes have been even primed yet, which is the opposite of how I usually approach this type of project. It's funny because Zombicide wasn't even remotely close to the top of my project list, but it sort of snuck in and I'm quite happy with it.

After that I did a quick run through the 10 heroines in Twisted Fables, which was enormously satisfying. The game used minis slightly scaled up from the usual 32mm size we see in a lot of games, and that proved to be incredibly rewarding to paint. Ironically though, I finished painting and promptly realized I am not sure I want to keep the game itself. It's been fun but I'm not a fan of deckbuilders, and even the great theme isn't enough to overcome the mechanics hurdle. Haven't sent it out the door yet, but we'll see.

I never made it to Scythe or Viticulture. Viticulture recently hit the purge shelf and passed on from my collection. I enjoy the occasional Euro, but I had to recognize despite the rave reviews, I just mainly want to play thematic games like A Touch of Evil. I held on to Scythe. Still hoping to make a push to get that to the table. The art and theme is still really cool. I did end up playing Calico, which we bought last Gen-Con, and we really really liked it. It's sticking around in the permanent collection. Great puzzle game with incredible production.

I think the big surprise for the year has been Middara. It's an expensive game, but a friend has it and I liked it enough to pick it up when it showed up for like 70% off in a local exchange group. We all got really sick this summer, starting with Covid and then a lot of other terrible crud, so we ended up using the fact that we both had this to start playing it long distance. We'd each set up, and then talk through our turns using a camera, when needed, to verify positioning. I don't think I would have ever justified buying it full price with the minimal exposure I'd had, but getting a chance to really dive into it has proven the game's really good.

It's kind of an odd one, feeling like a solid Dungeon Crawler mixed with a lightweight novel. The game has an anime art style with an incredibly vibrant color palette which has proven to be a ton of fun to paint. It's really far from my favorite type of game, but the experience has been among my favorite this year. The closest thing I have to it in my own collection is Shadows of Brimstone, what with Characters leveling and acquiring items over many sessions of play being a key factor in the fun. I just don't do many campaign games I guess. This one has proven a delight though.

Nemesis showed up. Haven't gotten a chance to paint it yet. Cthulu Death May Die continues to see more play than most of my game collection, and since paint project usually side line a game for a while, I've been loathe to start that process.

Hope the rest of you Zombies are enjoying the year so far! Here's to playing great games, and working through exciting projects for your table! Cheers!