"Unexpected new Project! What’s your excuse?" Topic

This one started strangely.
A friend made his usual killing at the flea market at Historicon. He did his usual Obi-Wan "you don't want to take this box home with you…" finger wave.
"I don't want to take this box home with me…"
SOLD!

So, at our next game he handed me about 100 things that I GUESSED were SYW Austrian Grenzers, Pandours (I still don't know the difference…) and horseless Hussars.
Google search ensued. So I grabbed a few Osprey-ish books.
Searching Noble Knight got me more, that looked like they were painted by the same guy.
Suddenly, I'm searching for "28mm SYW Austrian flags", and artillery.
"I had better get some Austrian Regulars!" Old Glory.

Then an ad here on TMP turned up a box of 100 SYW Austrian Germans, 100 Hungarians and 100 Hussars. Plus odds and ends.

We're still a few months short of a year anniversary, and suddenly I have almost 500 SYW Austrians to paint and base.

What the heck happened???
I now have more lead to shield my basement wall from hostile foreign nukes.

Oh, and I have 2"x1" laser cut bases coming in Saturday.

For the sake of cosmic balance, I finished a project today – I got started on it all the way back in 2013.

My new project is WWI naval. It is something that I had put off for a number of years.

I have a new resin printer on the way. I am planning on 3d printing the ships. Bought a copy of Jutland, 3 ospreys and 3 sets of stl's to test print. Still trying to figure out a scale that I want to use.

Not as bad as John's jump into SYW. I did something similar last year. Celts and Romans.

Some decade I hope to finish a project.

Sometimes it is as simple as someone releasing figures. Eureka has 28mm Tlingit on the near horizon. I have already read several books on the subject, and I have a book on Clothing in colonial Russian America. Perry has plenty of Napoleonic Russians that will fit right in. So…

Mine is a new old project

Got a bunch of the old RAFM Riel Rebellion miniatures probably about 25 years ago – then last year I came into a whole bunch more of them so I am now painting up about 100 Canadian militia from the 1880s – nice figs and colourful uniforms at least – not to mention some interesting units like the 90th Winnipeg Rifles (now the Royal Winnipeg Rifles) aka The Little Black Devils

It wasn't even on my radar. I did see some references to it here and elsewhere, and I never looked in to it. Until a buddy of mine asked me if I would be interested in picking up a faction, and then to join in a campaign. Without investigating I said "sure!".
And now I have a painted warband for Trench Crusade. I am currently working on painting up reinforcements and some mercenaries. I am very grateful that my buddy printed the figures, and I have enjoyed customizing and painting them.
Sometimes you never know what might pop up.

My excuse is that I'm a weak willed tissue paper tiger.
I now own MORE 28mm Quar. And I haven't even started the stuff I bought 10+ years ago when they were metal. :(

Is "I felt like it" an … excuse?

Some decade I hope to finish a project.

😢 Oh, that is so profound! God be with you, my brother!

Usually, a good history book. But sometimes it's just some nice figures, and once or twice it's been an intriguing set of rules.

Last year I bought Midgard Heroic Battles because I liked the look of it. I'd already had a few Normans and Scots I'd bought for Saga, and some Saxons and Vikings given to me by my late brother. So I HAD to have four dark ages armies for Midgard. With the help of ebay, Warbases and Crusader minis, I'm on my way.

(A similar thing happened a few years ago with Dragon Rampant – I'd already had a Dark Elves army, but HAD to have an Orc army to oppose them)

A friend gave me a few packs of Warfare League of
Augsburg figures. He said he changed his mind about the project and wanted to get rid of the figures before he got in to deep. I painted them for King William's War.

Then I was at a one day con in NJ and a guy was selling off his collection of Warfare figures. The price was extremely low. He said he had too many other things going on and just wanted them gone so not painting them would not be weighing on his mind. 179 figures Prime based and with movement trays.

Not a period that I had seriously considered but I knew I had to help my fellow wargamers out of their predicament.

About a third of the second group have been painted, I'll need more cavalry😂

My only excuse is a good deal on a batch of figures on eBay.

Funny enough, one of my recent projects was when I was on the fence about selling off an old collection of RalPartha/Grenadier Japanese. After much deliberation, I decided to keep them and add quite a few more figures to the armies.

Well, if you paint assembly line style, applying simple block techniques, followed by a dark wash. you can reduce your painting time, per figure, to 5-10 minutes. It will get them table-ready, quickly. On the tabletop, they will look fine sealed in a matte clear coat.

You can also employ inexpensive acrylic brush tipped paint pens. These are faster than a brush, and they will likely reduce your block painting time to five minutes per figure!

Alternatively, you could employ Army Painter Contrast Paints, which achieve even better results, clocking in around five minutes painting time, per figure.

LOL! Obviously, painting is the culprit stopping you from getting these figures onto the tabletop. If you can loosen up your paint quality requirements, you can get these projects finished. Lowered paint standards = finished armies; unyielding paint standards = unfinished projects begun decades in the past and still unfinished… Cheers!

Oooh….shiny! Need I say more?

Decided to play the Barrow of the Frost King for the Warrior Heroes solo fantasy game, so I found my Draugr figures (now sold by Gripping Beast), some old Skyrim "Call to Arms" Nord tomb terrain and off we go!

Bought a magazine with a "free" sprue of Epic Gauls. Now have about 40 sprues of Gauls, Romans, Spanish, Italian Alllies and Cartgaginian. Shoukd keep me busy for a year or two!