Unexpected Reinforcements

It's been a long time since I acquired a significant second-hand bundle of models, and I wouldn't normally jump on the blog and talk about it. However, this is a bit of a special occasion. A gentleman turned up at the club, wanting to offload his Warhammer models that he no longer had any use for. He talked a little about the sort of stuff he had, but I wasn't really prepared for what would be there once it was all laid out.

This is an Orc and Goblin army that was clearly a labour of love over an extended period. There are models in here from 3rd edition all the way through 8th. There are a few different basing styles, which may reflect refinements over time, or maybe some of the models had more than one owner. The vast majority of the models are Citadel and Marauder in origin, however a few others have slipped on, most notably an entire regiment of unfortunate-looking Orc archers.

Anyway, I haven't done a great job of lighting this stuff for photos, but hopefully these are enough to give a fair impression of what I have acquired...

Many thousands of points of Orcs and Goblins. 

Time Flies (and More Confessions of a Hoarder)

Sorry my updates have been so sporadic recently. We're currently in the process of moving house. Or rather, we moved almost 2 weeks ago, but the renovation work on the new place is not yet finished and so we're currently living in a state of chaos. The room where all my miniatures will be living is still receiving finishing touches and I don't yet have a working painting setup. Most of my models are still packed away (as is my good camera somewhere)...

Help! Someone locked us in here and we can't get out!

Drawers stuffed full of stuff that will need to find a new home once I'm set up.

And this is where it's all meant to end up. Most of my painted models are still in those cases in the first picture, but I think there may actually be room for them all in the new display cabinets. Note that most of these cupboards still need handles, and I think I'm going to have to add some lighting too.

Anyway, with no real spare time for gaming, my models in a confused state and my paint station not yet properly established, it's not really surprising that the blog updates have been a bit thin. Hopefully we'll break the back of it soon and normal service can resume. Whatever that is...

In the meantime, I was looking back at some of my older posts and realised that it won't be long until the Hoodling's Hole celebrates its 5th birthday! Hard to believe, really. A lot can happen in 5 years, and one of the things I was looking at was this post: Confessions of a Hoarder. The post included a rough list of my armies and where they were at in terms of battle readiness (ie paintedness). The list is now obviously out of date, so I looked at a few numbers.

Adding Insurance

It's no secret that Warhammer is an expensive hobby. A little while back my wife and I were discussing something like this when the topic of insurance came up. Our house and contents insurance does include a item in it for my Warhammer stuff, but it's a pretty nebulous item with a very, very vague estimate of value. If we were to actually have a fire or very thorough robbery and I lost it all, I have no idea what would happen next. Nor do I even know whether it would cause a problem with the insurer when the time to claim came around. Would they suddenly question how I could possibly have a toy soldier collection with a value equal to that of a small new car? How could I then prove the matter?

We came to the conclusion that I probably needed to do something in terms of photographing and itemising the collection in order to back up any insurance claims should the need arise (and assuming I actually survived the shock of such a loss). To that end I started pulling some of my stuff out and taking photos, so that things could be identified. I didn't get to the end, but I did manage to cover a couple of armies, and it's a start.

So... This is what it looks like when I pull all my painted stuff out at once. Or at least, it did back in April when I was doing this. There are a few more things to add to the tally now.

Another full army shot

It's become a habit for me to take a photo every 6 months or so of my Empire army, to show how it has progressed. It's been about 6 months since the last shot, so I figured it was time once more, as the new year approaches.

Unfortunately the photo is not exactly a work of art. I was about to pack up the army into cases so that I could move it in preparation for the Hel Fenn game, and was a bit pressed for time. I still hope to get better at shots like this, but I really need to give myself more time if I want things to turn out properly. The green in the corners is me blotting out all the junk I had sitting in the background...

My Empire army, which is getting pretty big by now.

Confessions of a Hoarder

I am a hoarder. I like having the option to play large games with my armies, and having a good choice of what to use in smaller games. As a result my armies tend to be quite large. Unfortunately I am not an especially prolific painter, so my collection of unpainted models is sadly more impressive than those that are painted. At last count my armies stood roughly thus (I'll try to get some photos up later):

• 12,000pts High Elves (maybe 6K painted)
• 15,000pts Orcs and Goblins (8K painted)
• 8,000pts Wood Elves (5K painted)
• 8,000pts Empire (3K painted)
• 8,000pts Dwarfs (2.5K painted)
• 5,000pts Ogre Kingdoms (3K painted)
• 8,000pts Bretonnians (pretty much unpainted)
• 4,000pts Dark Elves (pretty much unpainted)

Add to that rather silly tally an unpainted Eldar army and a whole lot of unpainted Battlemechs, and my lack of responsibility should be apparent. Maybe having a blog will help this...

I think my hoarding tendencies stem from when I first got involved in the hobby. I was a school kid with no real income, so my collection of models was small and largely driven by birthday and Christmas gifts. My friend and I would gaze in wonder at the large painted armies inside White Dwarf magazines, and dream of the day when we could field such fabulous forces. Such wild dreams as "imagine having one of every unit in your army", and being able to field "huge" regiments of 20 models. These things were beyond our reach and there was something magical about even imagining having such vast resources.

Eventually I got a job and it didn't take me long to splurge on a lot of the things I could never afford before. I bought that Silver Helm unit I had always wanted. And a decent number of Swordmasters. And a chariot. It was quite exciting at the time, and it probably changed the way I played the game. My armies were no longer dictated by the strict limitations of my available models - I had choice.

But something else changed too. It was about this time that my collection of unpainted models started to take on a life of its own. Up until that point, my trickle of incoming models could be matched by my enthusiasm to get them painted, and the bare metal was kept to a minimum. However, with the sudden influx of models that having an income brought, I could no longer keep up. I also wonder if this had the double effect of denting my enthusiasm for painting - having a large pile of unpainted stuff in front of me made the task far more daunting. It is hard to lavish attention on a single model when you know there are so many others waiting (this is still a problem for me today). I had a girlfriend by this point, too - so my time was not as unlimited as it might have previously seemed.

Shortly after these events, I also inherited a large, unpainted army of orcs and goblins from a friend who realised he was not going to use them, and the problem started to spread. Not only could I not keep up with my growing number of High Elves and Wood Elves, but there was another whole army on the scene. The task of painting all these models seemed impossible, and maybe I just sort of gave up at this point.

Like most gamers, I have made various resolutions to paint what I have before buying more, but I have never been able to take such things seriously. My collection having grown to 8 armies, and the availability of cheap second-hand models in some stores and on the internet, has rendered any such thoughts comical.

Perhaps you have heard the old saying that a gamer dies if he paints every last model he owns. From this perspective at least, my immortality seems assured...