"What are your Back Burner projects?" Topic

Something you're kind of, sort of interested in doing, but never quite got into it beyond buying a pack of figures?

Top of my list (🙄) would be the Pemmican Wars. I already have Plains Indians, backwoodsmen, Coureurs de Bois, etc.
I just need to get some Swiss in British service. The main thing holding me up (🙄) is Métis in appropriate 1815 costume, as seen in images on line. Ling robe, top hat, etc. I hope nobody makes them, because I would be doomed.

As I've said before, way back in the 1980s, I was buying Prussian figures to make Hessians. I mused that it might be nice to do 25mm (that's how long ago it was!) SYW Austrians. That never happened. But then, I had a flea market gift/discovery of ~100 Grenzers and hussars. Never say never. I'm into Hungarians now. And drafting Hessians into the Prussian army.

So. What are your "Maybe someday in the future" projects?

SYW skirmish. I bought the figures from alte Fritz- the superb Minden range- and even got some painted up.

One day……

15mm Fantasy: I've had the figures (and bought more) since the late 90's

Imagination Pre-dreadnought campaign.I just like the ships.

British Imperial Mars using Mythic Commander rules.
Imagination war of the Pacific.

Copy that McKinstry…..Imagination Pre-dreadnought campaign. I just like the ships.

Some Russo Japanese war action too. In 1/700 if possible since that is the scale we use for WW2 naval battles old style on the patio tile seascape.

(1) 6mm AWI. Picked up a lot of (unpainted) figures in a job lot, but I'd need a ton of militia to do it right.
(2) Cheap mass battle WW2 in 6mm. Bought hundreds of A&A generic tanks, AT and artillery, but not much lock on cheap microscale armored cars and infantry.
(3) Horse & musket RISK figure armies. Lots of RISK figures, but I need some 3D printer willing to mass produce Napoleonic heavy cav and SYW hussars and light infantry to match.

Let's be honest. What I actually want is to paint someone else's 25mm or larger figures cheap. 6mm and smaller doesn't really scratch the "paint something" itch, and if I buy and paint my own, I have to find storage space or sell them at a loss.

18th century Imaginations, LOTR, Russian Civl War, Pony Wars, the Balkan Wars, WW I Austro-Hungarian invasion of Serbia… I forgot SF.

Massive armies of Ogre/GEV elements that need to be assembled and painted
Helm's Deep in 10mm
Romans vs Dacians in 6mm
Siege of Minas Tirith/Battle of Pelennor Fields in 10mm (I even have elephants to convert).
Spacefleets to paint
Star Trek ships to paint

More LOTR!

Napoleonics.

I have all the miniatures I need to play, and half of them painted, but never had the collection on the table. There's always something I'd rather be working on.

All of them. Until I get distracted by something (probably around May).

Everything that I have purchased and "planned" to do but never quite fully finished anthing. The closest I have completed is 1. 28mm pirates. I need to build some jungle terrain, otherwise it is finished. Hopefully this summer.
2. 28mm cowboys are close but I need to paint my US Cavalry and all of my Native Americans and teepees. Hopefully I can finish them this spring.
3. 28mm medieval/crusades – this one I would like to get a good chunk done this year.
That is my top 3. Otherwise the list is too long. Good topic and it helped me to narrow down my targets. Thanks John the OFM for helping me make a realistic list.

John;
I have some figures for you to (finish) painting into Swiss.

Renegade 28mm Napoleonic British Infantry.

You can have them. They are surplus to my requirements.

I'll try to get up for the game later in the month.

Eric

N-gauge AWI
N-gauge Ancients
12/15mm Napoleonic Imaginations
N-gauge ACW
N-gauge US v. French 1866
15mm 1930's Armor
20mm Medievals
28mm Darkest Africa and other colonials
Various Fantasy

Not in any order of priority and not including ongoing Napoleonics work.

@epturner
Oh, great. Thanks.

I once had a dream of "The Island".
It would be an island, of course, with a bunch of 25mm horse and musket nations. We could have campaigns, one off battles, general shenanigans and so forth.
Nobody else joined in.
I had bought all of the Copplestone SYW Freikorps range Cossacks for a dollar a pack at a flea market. We shall not such sales again, I'm afraid. I also picked up all the Foundry Landsknecht ogres too, same price.
I painted them up, but lack of local interest rendered them expendable.
Now, I could use the Cossacks.
That'll teach me not to sell stuff, I'm afraid.

During the past two years I have sold off at least 200 pounds of back burner projects. I still have a few remaining:
1) Battle of Britain in 1/300 for CY6
2) Fleshing out my WW II 15mm for 1940 France and Belgium
3) 28mm sci-fi, somewhere far far away. Far enough away to avoid space wizards wielding laser swords

1) Making more science fiction AFVs out of dead computer mice, and similar trash-bashing projects. I have plenty of trash. I just need a bit of quiet time to turn it into things.

2) Painting and assembling various 25mm and 28mm science fiction troopers (acquired over time for free or almost free) for use in the Traveller universe.

Tribal warfare in Kenya. Someone made figures for it back in the1990s I think it was the editor of Miniature Wargames.

Mau Mau revolt, haven't found any figures I liked.

The'98 in Ireland. Not sure I could control my purchases to keep from getting out of hand.

Mexican Intervention. Again purchases would get out of hand.

I bought all the Blue Moon ECW packs and formed them into huge 32 man units over 8 bases. Almost finished one unit ere I became distracted with other things.

My projects are like islands; I sail away and explore other projects then flit back and again to do this and that before moving on again.

I was going to try to make a list, but it's late and I don't want nightmares tonight.

"Shiny!"
That's the enemy.

1--finish basing+painting the three dozen spaceships on my minis table

2--finish testing+writing up rules for SW podracing

15th Century Byzantine--Over the years, this has fluctuated from really big armies with several hundred figures to a skirmish set up based on some of the things Sphrantzes wrote about.

War of 1812--the 1814 campaign and naval on the Great Lakes. Mulling over Perry plastics for the British and Canadians, but I would have to convert figures or buy metal for the Americans.

Mexican American War--with a concentration on the young officers who would be leading divisions, corps, and armies 18 years later.

Greco-Turkish naval, 1897--I have the Houston Turkish ships, but they were designed for the war with Russia in the 1870s and would need updating. I have only one Greek ship I scratch built. I have an excellent book on the Ottoman Navy with information like "the starboard secondary gun on ship A damaged its recoil system several years earlier and it was not useable." I'd love to have something like that for the Greeks, but the best I have is that they apparently stocked up on ammunition ten years earlier, hadn't bought any since, so some guns would have ammunition limits.

If an interesting set of rules and some nice figures showed up for WWI, I could be tempted. My grandfather (along with Harry Truman and Sherman Potter) served in the 35th Infantry Division, and it would be a way to remember him. More so than the campaign in East Africa, which could also be interesting.

When I win the lottery and have unlimited money to pay to have figures painted, I would like SYW imagination armies.

Grelber

Two imaginations in the mid-1850's that had formed a decade earlier when a single tiny Germanic state broke into halves and now the agricultural (and aristocratic) one wants to forcibly reunite with the industrial (and semi-republican) one. I have the forces in 15mm and half of them painted, but…

If someone in our group would do the Mexican American War, I would paint the San Patricios. That's highly unlikely. 😄

Rome versus Barbarians -- Caesarian and Early Imperial eras. (currently working on it!).

Greco-Persian Wars -- have armies lying around for this since the 1980s, have added to the pile since, but yet to do anything much with it.

King Phillip's War -- done at skirmish level with a Sword & the Flame rules variant.

French Foreign Legion and the Rif War, 1920s. Or FFL 1920s in darkest Africa against slavers. Have the figures for all these but only a small number painted.

More PULP and GANGSTER skirmish-level action! I have figures, just no opponents.

Gulp. Napoleonics! I started collecting 20mm plastic armies for the French, French allies, and the Anglo-Allies (1815) with a group some years back, then the interest and effort on their part waned, and I got stalled out myself after painting up the Brunswick corps and some British regiments and some command figures. Maybe I'll get back to this someday? More likely, I will peter out and the lot will have to be resold.

The Alamo: this is sort of on the backburner at present, but I do have my mission model, a Texian army, and 2/3rds of the historical Mexican assault force painted up and ready for play. 20mm plastics. (Went on the cheap again.) I want to complete this and then craft some rules for the historical battle and not just the Weird War Tales scenarios I have attempted in the past, where Santa Anna enlists legions of the Undead and other necromancer arts to flesh out his army.

I'm not sure this counts, but I'm in the slow process of painting up all the playing pieces for the War of the Rings boardgame (plus some expansions). Only completed the Elves, Dwarves, and Rohan forces yet, so far to go. Was once front burner, lately moved to the back burner.

Amazons galore. More High Fantasy units in general. More Pulp units.

15mm WW1 Austrians. I've had a box of figures for years, I just need more artillery and infantry and to actually paint them…

My proper back burner projects are mostly terrain. I have a half-built "Welsh" castle, and a half-built promontory with cliff faces and a "dungeon" inside.

The other big one is 20mm WW2.

1066, again!

A Very BBC British Civil War, 1979 in 20mm
Have "rebels" – painted
Have Army – half of them painted
Civilian vehicles – done
Army vehicles – some (enough?) done
Terrain – done

But it never seems to come together….

Battle of Pinkie
Bought some TAG figures, waited for the key English cavalry type, a Demilancer, a dozen years later and this still hasn't turned up..

India and Afghanistan – have MWWBKs forces for 1840 Afghanistan, The Mutiny, other forces for 1881 Afghanistan But I need to finish off

Top 2:
* Imperial Skies
* Irish Confederate Wars

You know, I've reached the point at which, if I could rent an opponent, it would be a better use of my wargaming funds than more miniatures. But I'm afraid posting an ad at the nearby university would be misinterpreted.

@John

Funny you should mention Mex-Am War, they are in the painting queue.

Probably will use Gettysburg Soldiers rules. Six stands or so to the battalion. Or I will do The Portable Wargame and a stand will be a battalion…

I'll talk with you when I next come up about the project.

Eric

"We are the San Patricios
A brave and gallant band"
🎼🎶🎶🎶

Great Northern War. I've got figures in two scales but never played a game using my own figures.

English Civil War. I and a mate have been talking about it for nearing a decade, but I haven't actually bought any lead yet.

Hohenstaufen Sicilian. I have most else that's needed, painted or unpainted, but haven't found anything I'm quite happy with for the Saracen archers.

Massive armies of Ogre/GEV elements that need to be assembled and painted

I had this exact same problem for more than 2 decades, but I managed to get this one off the backburner last year.

I collected all the SJG Ogre models as they were released, and over 2 decades built a collection of the "little" tanks and infantry from other manufacturers (some kitbashed), but I just never quite got around to gaming with any of it. At the end of 2022 when the pound-to-dollar conversion rate crashed, I bought enough Hexon to cover a 6'x16' table (plus mountains and hills and singles), which solved my terrain problem in one step. Last year I picked a local convention which is mostly RPG and sci fi players and ran an Ogre game there. I'm doing that again this year, and trying to make that an annual tradition. Every year I make a scenario that requires one more thing I haven't yet finished painting/crafting, and add that to the game. Last year I made roads and farm fields and forests; this year I'm going to try to add towns and modular streams. In a few years I should have all the bits I need for the game painted, labeled, terrained, and ready to play.

- Ix

What if Germany managed to negotiate WW1 end not as a loser and was able to keep her BBs and BCs. How would WW2 war at sea be different?

…but I'd need a ton of militia to do it right.

You got that part right, rp!
Yeah. I'm running into that with my brand new unexpected SYW project. Grenzers and Hussars aren't enough! I "had to" buy Austrian artillery, 4 Osprey books, including Honours of War, Hungarian musketeers and grenadiers, more Grenzers, etc.
And I'm planning on getting some Austrian dragoons, Prussian Bosniak lancers, etc.
At least my Hessians can plausibly pose as Prussians.

Moral of the story is to never get enough stuff that you just have to "finish" a project, at least to the point where you can put on a game.