A BLANK is built on Hope

Hello people,...person?


It's been a bit busy in the real world the last couple of months and the club has had to close for the summer due to local road-works limiting accessibility. This meant about a month without any games......sad face :(


The last couple of weeks I've been getting myself back out to events and this Bank Holiday Monday was Armada at Marquee Models in Harlow. It was a field of six, five from the club plus another gaming acquaintance so fantastically casual.


With X-Wing I don't fly Terrorist (Rebellion), partly to focus myself and more because I LOVE the Scum. Mmmm......Boba Fett..... With Armada I initially continued the theme, picking up a very good deal on E-Bay for the nucleus of an Imperial fleet. A good mate then donated me his entire, rather dusty, Armada stockpile which gave me three cores plus extras :)


Having learnt the game with the might of the Imperial Navy it was only a matter of time until I made the spin to the other side of the coin......but I don't fly Terrorist...


Then Rogue One happened, which for myself at least has saved Star Wars canon from Disney shmaltz, and another option became apparent. Saw Gerrera and his band of freedom fighters appealed to me hugely and also gave me the scope for a particularly rag tag fleet. I've really enjoyed the painting project and the ability to be less formulaic.


So, knowing that Monday would be super casual I took a small ship Freedom Fighter list as a learning day. I definitely learnt a lot, though relatively painfully, across three games. Game 1 is was happy with, Game 2 went horribly wrong, Game 3 was my habit of pushing past the envelope to establish where the limits are.


I came away with a set of alt art Assault Proton Torpedoes, some acrylic Objective Counters and a better of appreciation of what not to do with a Freedom Fighter fleet, speaking of which;

The LONG walk....

Hello peeps,

Yes it's been a while, almost a year in fact......
I tap away in a slightly guilty manner as the hiatus was long, unannounced and primarily down to burnout on my part. I've primarily used the blog to fuel and track my hobby in a somewhat symbiotic manner. As the Hobby dialled back a bit I found that I had less to say, of value or otherwise, and was becoming rather repetitive. Less fun for everyone involved ;]


The Ugly;
Looking back it came down to a couple of things;
1. X-Wing Burnout: After Nationals last year I ended up badly burnt out and sub-consciously took a big step away into Armada which was new, shiny, fun to discover and also gave me one of my prime hobby motivators; painting.
2. Real Life: a (good) move at work meant my most finite hobby resource, time, became a bit more squeezed. As such the blog slipped down the priorities as well as in relevance. Needing to make the most of my hobby time made it more valuable and as such I needed the blog push less.


The Bad;
During my blogging wilderness I also ended up violating The Order of Three adding Armada and Destiny to the mix. Armada has stuck where Destiny has dropped away.


In honesty I was always wary of Destiny as a CCG and so it has proved, though I've managed to limit the damage and properly consign it as a side game. I've got enough to put a couple of half decent decks together and that's enough for me as a fun, pick-up side game. Nothing more than that.....
Armada meanwhile has established itself as a staple with considerable investment made into a substantial Imperial fleet, with a burgeoning Saw Gerrera Seperatist fleet (I don't fly terrorist) massing near Jedha. I've really enjoyed the learning curve and the more tactical style of play. It's been my preferred game of much of the last 6 to 9 months with a gaming community just as good as X-Wing.


The Good:
In short I've still been playing games on a regular basis as well as painting stuff, on a slightly less regular basis. Having been through the cycle before, though rarely for this long, my X-Wing mojo has pretty much returned. I finally got back to "competitive" X-Wing this Saturday at Warboar, as much as a field of 13 primarily casual players is "competitive". I had fun and went 2-2, which is pretty much where I stepped out.


The remaining headline is that I've recently invested in 40K 8th.........
Yep, I've gone there, but then so have the majority of the club so that's guaranteed games. In honesty


I've always had a squishy spot for Plague Marines and I couldn't resist. It's a long term hobby project and IF it all goes south I know that I can get a good return via E-Bay or the like.
As I said at the start sometime a go I found that I had less to say, of value or otherwise, and was becoming rather repetitive. It feels like I now have the ability to remedy that. Brace yourself for a flurry of update posts but after that I'll be aiming at a post a week as something practically manageable.


Back in the saddle and pretty happy about it :)