2021 in Review

ThisLast year didn't go the way that I might have planned which is becoming a trend, it seems. I didn't expect to be working from home for another year among other things, and certainly didn't expect to paint quite so many minis. I still don't miss my terrible commute and am not looking forward to going back to the office. Anyway.

Gaming

Not much going on in video gaming this year though I have run two simultaneous RPGs for most of the year. Most of my campaigns of late have been going at around the 9-10 month range which is still a good long time so probably another two will end nextthis year. I've been revamping my sci-fi game so maybe we'll get back to that sometime soon. Also in RPGs, my in-person game has been fully painted for the first time and I totally see why people insist on playing fully painted now.

Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries ***** (2019)

I've saidtyped at least a few times here that Battletech is one of the few things that I have nostalgia for. Now that I'm thinking about it, a strange number of the things I have nostalgia for came from FASA who were big in the 90s. That probably isn't a coincidence. Anyway, I've played many of these over the years and this installment does not disappoint. For all the hours I put into it, ~120 hours sez Steam, blowing up mechs and walking through buildings never got old. I've now played through various campaigns most of three times and still fire it up occasionally whenever I need stompy mech on mech action. Will we see painted Battletech minis in 2022? Watch and see.

Dwarf Fortress ***** (2006)

I playrun Dwarf Fortress every few years to see what's changed and I'm pretty sure I've talked about that here before. I still hesitate to call it a game but it's still endlessly amusing and at the end of thislast year, I fired it up again to see what's changed. Answer: not as much as I'd expected but that didn't make it any less enjoyable. Probably I'll keep up this tradition as long as I'm able and if I haven't said this before: there are things that happen in Dwarf Fortress that will never be done in any other game.

Gardening

I'm bad about picking up new hobbies on a semi-regular basis. This year I picked up gardening for reasons I still don't entirely understand. It's been hard but interesting and sadly I didn't think to take any pictures. I learned two very important things: 1) dirt is expensive, 2) you don't have to plant every tomato seed in the pouch. I had more than 30 tomato plants many of which ended up at around 12 feet. I gave a pile of them away and the heat killed more than a few of them and I still had more than 30 plants. When they were in full swing I was easily getting two bowls of cherry tomatoes every day. I love tomatoes probably more than the next person, but that's a lot even for me. Luckily, nextthis year I'll be prepared with more varied recipes and possibly other growable incredients.

Painting

This year I broke another major milestone. I painted more than 370 figs which means on average I completed more than one per day. They certainly weren't all winners but either way that's a pretty serious accomplishment, especially since I don't play army games. I'm pretty sure this is a top N% kind of accomplishment, especially for a non-pro and non-commission painter, but don't really have a feel for what's normal in this space.

Pretty sure I noted it somewhere in one of those batches' writeups but I do find utility in doing them even if I might not particularly enjoy them. Previously I got pretty significant speed gains. This time around I'm only seeing minor speed gains, possibly because I've already exhausted the easy stuff, but I am seeing quality gains. I didn't snap pictures, but the Frostgrave Soldiers in week 51 are a significant upgrade from the first ten when you sit them side by side. That's a delta of, I dunno, 800 or so figs in about three years.

I'm also seeing a pretty significant increase in quality over the year. I've suspected this having completed so many figures, but it's pretty clear when you line them up. I've regarded Kyeh (the mage gal throwing the wave) as one of my top pieces but in the high quality lineup, she's clearly lackluster. Similarly, while I still think the chaos toad holding a fireball is good, it is nowhere near the two Artisan Guild prints in the front row with him. In both cases there are hundreds of figs between the two points with all the learnings that come with them.

The second milestone is perhaps less significant but not the less in stature. In the waning days in 2021, I finished a pot of miniature paint. I didn't think to take a picture of it so you'll just have to take my word for it, but it was one of my vintage pots of Reaper paints, Linen. I've used this color to do a lot of highlighting and a lot of drybrushing. In fact, the majority of the drybrushing I've done across a large swath of my painted figs was done with this pot so it's not all that surprising that it was the first to go. And, yes, I harvested the metal skull agitator.

Fin

So that was 2021 in a nutshell. I'd say on the whole it was better than 2020 but that's not a particularly high bar to clear, now is it? Will 2022 be better still? Gosh, I hope so. Let's find out!