2021: A Gaming Year in Review

 We’re almost to the end of another year.  As with most everyone else, it’s been an odd year, and not at all what I would have planned.

First a few numbers: According to my log, I was in 28 miniatures games this year, a combination of refereeing, playing and solo games.  I finished painting 160 miniatures, which were (as usual) scattered over seven projects (and sub-projects).  These included individually based 25mm Prince August fantasy figures, 54mm Russian flats, vintage 25mm Minifigs MEs for a Tolkien game, figures for a Stargrave crew, 1/72 fantasy/medieval figures for the Portable Fantasy Campaign, 1/72 historical Bronze Age figures for DBA, and a small group of 25mm Ral Partha orcs for miscellaneous fantasy work.

The year started still under stay-at-home mandates, for the most part, so I set up a few remote games. I was vaccinated in April and ready to get back to some face-to-face gaming.  The HAWKs started meeting again in late May or early June (my first meeting was in June).   All of the early year conventions were cancelled, although we did have a virtual ScrumCon in April.  Gen Con eventually made the decision to reschedule from August to September, which put it on a week that I was already committed to a major work event.  As it turned out, Barrage in September was my sole live convention for the year.  

January NQSYW Remote Game

Things got busy as the year drew to a close, and it looks like my last logged miniatures game will be the Stargrave game we had on the 30th of October.  On the other hand, I managed to finish an average of one (plus) miniature per day for September, October, November, and December, so the end of the year was good for painting.

Ups and Downs  

The “ups” for the year included a return to face-to-face gaming, a (solo) game played entirely with stuff built or painted during lockdown, a few games for the 1/72 scale solo fantasy campaign, a fair amount of painting done, and getting involved in a D&D5e game run by fellow HAWKs member Kurt Schlegel.   

The “downs” for the year include buying three new projects (1/72 DBA Dark Ages, 54mm Russian flat medieval/fantasy, and 54mm English Civil War) when my goal was zero, not firing up the melting pot and casting anything, not painting anything for the Not Quite Seven Years War, not finishing a DBA Bronze Age army, and doing no work toward getting a formal NQSYW campaign on the table.

54mm ECW cached for the future

I could have blogged a bit more, commented on other people’s blogs, played a few more solo games, gotten my own D&D revival game on the table, and done more toward miniatures campaigns.

However, under the circumstances, I’ll close out the record books, and call it a good year.  

Thoughts about 2022 objectives will hopefully be done soon…