2018 Year in Review

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(This is super late.  I drafted most of this in early January, got distracted.)

I saw someone say something to the effect that that 2018 was a rough decade.  I have a hard time disagreeing with that.

Despite that, 2018 was A Year of Infinity for me.  I ran my first Infinity tournament at Huzzah and, thanks to a lot of help, it was a huge success!  On the basis of that success, I continued running those tournaments on a quarterly basis and upsize one of them into a full-fledged Dire States event.   I played in something like a dozen tournaments and even did some traveling for one.  That’s pretty cool.

It’s also the first time I helped out with NOVA Open Charitable Foundation.  I’m very selfish about NOVA – it’s the only big gaming convention I get to go to, so my time there is for me… but I can certainly spend a little time outside of it helping out.  I ended up helping out with two off-season auctions.

Year In Review

  • In January, I continued working on my Infinity table, which ultimately took several months to do.  I blew through a Necromunda gang in very little time, which was refreshing… even though I’ve yet to do anything with them play-wise.
  • Feburary had my first Infinity tournament at Huzzah and, I think, finished my Xi Guan table.
  • March was Madicon, of course. I helped out painting some Varangian Guard for NOCF.  I also started making my own tokens and wrote what I think was a pretty helpful article about it.
  • April was more Infinity painting.  I started on Yu Jing.
  • May was my second tournament, just as successful as the first one.
  • In June I painted up a St Isaac force for Dark Age because there was going to be a DA event.  I wasn’t able to make it to that, though, and I ended up giving it to NOCF to auction off.  (Black Friday had me repurchase the same models.)
  • In July I gave Age of Sigmar an honest try.  I bought and built a bunch of Nighthaunts and really worked through the book.  I’ve yet to play with the models, though, and I still find the setting bland-to-bad.  I tried.  I really, really did.
  • I crammed painting most of the ISS sectorial into August, in plans of running them at NOVA.  We did a NOVA prep tournament, which was small for us, but that was expected.
  • September was NOVA, of course.  I did better here than I expected, but it’s still a rough field. I spent literally the rest of the month painting Adeptus Titanicus.
  • The Mid-Atlantic Infinity Travel Team drove to Michigan in October for the Michigan GT.  It was a blast… but I might still be recovering.
  • November was a blur: I painted a bunch of mercs, and played in my second Baltimore Brawl.
  • December kind of didn’t happen. I moved around the furniture in my hobby room, which was disruptive, and did a ton of travel, which was also disruptive.  In the end, I painted nothing. In the end, I pretty much just played video games.  I did run a quarterly on my birthday, though.

Hobby Charts

2018 was productive: I’m not surprised that it was less productive than 2016 & 2017, but I got a lot done in it.

As usual, I did more building than painting.  That’s not likely to change, as I’ve gotten into a routine of painting for a few hours in the early evening and then building models while I watch TV with my wife.

No surprise here: a crapton of Infinity.

Goals

2018 Goals

My 2018 goals were light: the standard three.

  • Finish, Paint – Success. I finished a Warsenal table, dang near anything I could need for the ISS sectorial, everything else I might need for the Corregidor sectorial, a couple of small project for NOCF, a Necromunda gang that’s yet to see action, and all of the Adeptus Titanicus models I picked up.  I’ve been in a really healthy place where I take on a handy-sized project, work it, then move on to the next one.  That’s where I want to be.On the other hand, I built an AoS army that I’m not likely to make any headway on any time soon.  I’ve picked up a disconcerting amount of A Song of Ice and Fire models that will stay bare plastic.
  • Compete – Success. I’ve been playing a lot of Infinity.  I’d like to play more, but I’ve been getting a lot of games in and have been having a blast.  This is the first year in a long time that I haven’t entered anything into a painting contest, though.  This continues to feel like a healthy choice, however.

I feel less driven to do specific things.  It’s hard for me to project what I’ll be working on 6 months from now, and the games I’m playing don’t really call for that.    I’m going to leave the standard three in place for 2019, but that’s it.

  • Finish
  • Paint
  • Compete