Hail Caesar Dark Ages Game

 

...because after all, I didn't paint all these Vikings and Saxons for nothing.

"Hi!  We're Vikings.  We're here to take your stuff."

Hail Caesar Dark Ages

Over the Labor Day weekend (first weekend in Sept here in Ah-merica) there was a game convention called Pacificon.  Which I didn't go to because I am big loser and too poor right now.  I hate being poor, but it's kinda my own fault because I blew all my hobby money on limited  edition DVDs  of all 5 seasons of "I dream of Jeanie."  

Too sexy because she always calls him master...

So instead I invited some other losers who weren't going to the convention either, to my place so we can suck less together.  And for a chance to get all these Dark Ages troops of mine on the table. 

I have a couple of rules for Dark Ages mass battles that I like but am not really in love with any of them.  Just haven't found my 'Go-to" rule set yet.  They're like women you date in college but you know that you're not gonna marry.  These being Sword and Spear and Hail Caesar.  Other contenders are Impetus (which I found hard to read/understand and haven't tried) and Triumph (liked what I read but haven't tried).  I selected Hail Caesar for a game that's really good at moving blocks of infantry and rolling lots of dice.  Mr. CG and Mr. AS took the roles of the dastardly Vikings while I took the noble Saxons.  

Setting Up

My morning set up was super rushed and chaotic as my wife was busy cleaning because her parents were coming over, and all of them were going out with the kids while I stayed home and played miniatures.  Which is of course super nice all around but it did mean I had to set up the game with added 'assistance' of little helping hands....

Actually daughter #1 and Son #2 were quite content to sit on a coach and watch TV.
Son #3 however was quite ...helpful...

I set up a 6x10 foot table; figuring that was big enough to hold all the troops and still allow for some room to move around.  There are two important tricks to setting up a good Dark Ages mass battle.  ONE: resist the tempting temptation of just lining all the units end to end on each side and have at it.  While it is historical (almost all Dark Ages battles are just that) it's not very exciting to play.  TWO: Allow enough room for the players to line their troops end to end and have at it because it's exciting and it's what everyone expects and what else you gonna do where the primary formation is the shieldwall....  it's a paradox.

Game On

The game had 3 players so I split the Vikings into 4 divisions; 2 for each player.  The Saxons are in 3 divisions controlled by me. 

In this scenario:  The Vikings are in the process of leading a loot train from a village back to their longships.  There is 1 Viking division on the table to start and must keep 1 unit with the loot train in order keep the 4 units; livestock, slaves, ale cart, and food.  The train needs to be ordered to move toward the boats and will move 6" each turn if successful.  The train only ever gets 1 move and if a blunder is rolled the would-be slaves will fight the guards.  The other Viking divisions are off exploring the countryside..

The Saxons have shown up to put a stop to this.  1 division starts on the table edge.  Vikings have the first turn...  

Every turn after the first each side gets a division entering the table...

With my friends arriving and family leaving all at the same time I did NOT have my usual quiet before the storm to take pictures of the table right after set up.  So we join the game in progress...

Saxons at the bottom of the picture.
Viking to the right and ahead.
Off in the distance the loot train is moving toward the longships.

Same scene; different angle.

Another Saxon division enters from the long table edge.

.

Whole table so far.

Get into Shieldwall!
Vikings in lower left and right side (Viking archers on the hill)

ANYWAYS; I'm playing, running the game, as well eating pizza and drinking to much coffee so there is no blow by blow of the game.  Divisions enter and fights break out and the soon..

.. the whole table table looks like this.

Same scene, from the other side of the table.

Saxons and Vikings on a Collision course.

Same scene but just behind the Vikings.

If you got the idea that during the game I would suddenly think "hey, I haven't taken any pictures in awhile..." *Click-click-click-click* Ok, back to the game."        You would be correct. 

Yay!  Dark Ages

Time for some random pictures:

Can you tell who is who?
No you can't.  Because everyone is harry and smelly in the Dark Ages.

Enough pics though.  Lookit, I played a game.  You get the idea.  On a side note: I think every picture has some gamer junk in it (dice, tape measure, paper or some such) making me the lamest wargaming blogger ever.

Things Learned, Things Remembered

I haven't played Hail Caesar in at least 5 years and the rules came out in 2014 (what?  really?  Daaaamnnn time flies.)  and I liked the rules way more than I remembered.  Some memories are still accurate in that I don't love the orders system and I think the best experience is to have more than 1 division to command as we did here; so than when a division blows it's first roll and does NOTHING you're just not sitting there watching but move onto the next division.  There is a fun risk versus reward aspect in the orders phase and combat is a fun bucket of dice fest. Here's an example of a sentence you say in combat: "My Thegns have 7 dice in combat that hit on a  3+ because I charged, add in 2 dice for the attached leader for 9 dice at 3+ (rolls), that's 6 hits so far; these two supporting Ceorls have 3 dice each that hit on a 4+ (rolls); that's 3 more hits for a total of 9, so you need 9 saves of..."

I did really like the shieldwall rule from the dark ages supplement which helped make the lines crashing into each other a more grinding pushing shoving affair.  

One big thing I learned from feedback is that I should label the units in some way.  It's my collection so I can instantly recognize a Saxon Thegn unit from a Viking Hirdmen from a Ceorl from a Bondi but CG and AS said they couldn't.  I'm assuming this is because all the painted miniatures just looked too awesome.  

The scenario also needs some tweaking here and there but I'll leave that to another time.  Overall a successful day and a good dusting off of the rules.  And it felt good to get this collection on the table after a long time.  I'd almost forgotten how much I like the Dark Ages. 

Another game of Hail Caesar is scheduled for later in the month.  WHAAAT???  2 games in one month??!!  That's crazy!  Who am I?  The King of Wargaming? 

Thanks for Reading

Double thanks for writing a comment.

Till next time.

1:7000 Star Trek TNG Ships

 

Oh man, I have been de-PRESSED lately.  

Maybe it's all the inflation?  Maybe it's all the shrinkflation? Maybe it's the weeks of over 100 degree temperatures?   Maybe it's the paradox that who you love most in the whole world is your wife and children but being with wife and children is such a grind.

It's probably the nicotine with-drawls.  

Let's forget our troubles and talk about fictional starships. I like saying fictional starships because it implies that there are real starships but I'm just talking about the fictional ones.  Like if I said let's talk about fictional WWII aircraft carries.  

There was a lot of public demand for Star Trek in the comments of my previous post...OK only two people but I assume that they spoke for the silent masses.  

But Sir.. This blog usually about historical gaming..
"I SAID MAKE IT SO!"

1:7000 Star Trek

As discussed previously (hit the Star trek label for previous posts) I've been gearing up for some starship flying, shield frying, torpedo torching and phaser...phasering?...  Star trek combat. 

A whole new genre for me, and here are my first attempts at painting star ships...

(be kind, I have a fragile ego and really shouldn't be allowed online without adult supervision)

Saber Class

  I started with the two saber class ships because these were gonna be my testing / practicing miniatures.  Having never painted starships before I didn't know how they would come out.  And only super-cool-die-hard-trek-nerds are even gonna know what a saber class is.  I certainly had never seen, nor heard of one before I started looking closely at star trek ships. But now I am also a super cool star trek nerd and know all about them.  Us Star trek nerds get all the chicks. (I will bet you good money that there are WAY more women at Star Trek conventions than there are at Miniature Wargaming conventions, so whose the bigger nerd?)  

Sabers are small ships in the universe; I think of it as being equivalent
 to a frigate in Sailing ships terms. 

These ships are from Armadillo Miniatures on Shapeways.  2 things: The details on the ship were small, as to be expected as the ships are kinda small.  Even big ships are kinda small at the 1:7000 scale with smaller details, so these shups which are supposed to be small can be excused. 

For a sense of size, here are the ships next to a 25mm round base

But also the details were kinda soft and I swear some disappeared after I primed the model and put the base coat on. Oh well.  At this scale it's more about creating the impression of stuff (like just putting a bit of white where you think a window would look good).

As a bonus because they are small you can paint one up in a night pretty quick  

Excelsior Class

In the Star trek (extremely muddled) timeline the Excelsior class ship is the replacement for the ol' Constitution class ship that Kirk had in the TOS series.  I think this ship shows up around the time of "The Search for Spock."  But the ship class sticks around basically forever and males appearances in ST:TNG and DS9.   Since I'm treating my Star Trek like Sailing ships of the line but in SPAAAACCE (which is fine because ST is basically Hornblower but in SPAAAACCE) I'm gonna see this ship as the 74 gun-3rd rate of Star Trek.  It's the work horse and it's everywhere.  I'll need 10 more.

The Enterprise B was a ship of this class.

Here's that 25mm base again.
What is a base is doing in space, I'll never know.

This ship was also from Armadillo Miniatures as the Saber class above.  The nice thing about the  Armadillo store is that ships are correctly labeled what they are in the fiction which makes them easy to find.

Ambassador Class

I think this ship basically just exists as a stepping stone between the Excelsior class and Galaxy class of TNG.  Someone at the studio said "We need an old Enterprise but not like the movie old, just kinda old, you know what I mean right?  Not like your mom old but her younger sister who is the sassy Aunt and never had kids and took good care of herself.  Like medium old."  

I think this ship showed up in one episode of TNG.  However for gaming purposes the idea of a class of ship that fits in-between the Excelsior and the Galaxy like a 2nd rater is appealing.

The Enterprise C was of this class; for that one episode. 

This miniature is from Halcyon Shipyards and is called the 'SF Diplomatic cruiser.'  You're just supposed to know what it is.    I found the details on it very crisp and solid making it much easier to paint than the ships from Armadillo;  But that might be an unfair comparison though as this ship is larger than the previous ones shown and represents a higher tech level in the ST universe AND is based on a TV show that had a higher budget / better special affects than movies that came out in the 70s and 80s.  

Galaxy Class

Also known as 'My Enterprise' because this is the one from TNG that I can fondly remember watching with my family as a youngish kid.  When I think of Star Trek and Enterprise this is the ship I think of with Picard as the captain.  This one hits the Nostalgia button.  It's also known as the Enterprise D.

This is also from Halcyon Shipyards and is called the "SF exploration cruiser.'  It is expensive at $50 for a little  3" by 3" piece of plastic, those are like GW prices, but it's a freaking awesome model and looks the part even with my terrible paint job.  I figure $50 for the best flagship in the universe wasn't so bad.  Course now I want another one...

Pew pew pew! or whatever sounds phasers make.

Whole fleet

Even though the ships are from 2 different manufactures I think they scale together really well.  It's obvious that the Galaxy is really big and the Saber is small; but both are big and small enough to be miniatures that look cool and fit on a 6x5 table.  They're a;l supposed to be 1:7000 scale but we all know that miniature makers are not too concerned about getting the scale exactly right.  I've also discovered that Starships paint up pretty quickly and are actually kinda easy so even a terrible painter like myself can get decent looking results.  It makes me think that if I put some effort into it I could paint every ship I have rather quickly...

Aren't you a good looking fleet?
But where did the second Saber go?

or I could paint every ship if it weren't for the stupid flights stands....

An Exciting Discussion about Flight Stands.

I've never had to mess around with flight stands before.  I find them frustrating. 

I got my flight stands from Litko as I really couldn't think of anywhere else to get them and Litko always does a nice product.  As the ships all have different shapes and sizes; in order to get them to stay on the flight peg I decided to use my favorite force in nature: magnetism.   The Force of Attraction; and as my own personal magnetism has declined over the years (none of us is as attractive as we used to be) I purchased some Rare Earth magnets (also known as Neodymium magnets).

The idea was simple: 1 magnet goes underneath the ship and the other on top of the flight stand.  Rare Earth Magnets are supposed to be strong so that should stop the ship from spinning 'round right round like a record baby right round right round' on the flight stand.  Another bonus of the ships from Armadillo is that if you get the Attack Wing mounting hole there's an obvious place to put the magnet.

Here's an exciting picture of a Klingon ship with a magnet.
let's just gaze at it for awhile shall we....

Through experimentation (that should read-'through messing up several times and wasting materials with ships toppling over and lots of swearing) I learned that a 3mm (or 1/8 inch) magnet, conveniently the same size as the flight peg, is strong enough to hold ships the size of the Excelsior on down.  Larger ships need a 5mm magnet.  I also learned that if you drop a 3mm magnet on the carpet it is GONE forever.

And you would think that it would be a simple process to get the polarity right.  There was more than a couple of times that when I went to put the ship on the flight stand instead of the satisfying 'click' of the magnets pulling together I felt the force of repulsion.  Like how the wife repels me out of the bedroom when I eat too many beans.

I also discovered, and I should of seen this one coming, that bigger ships need a big heavy base to make them bottom heavy (like most women over 35 and wargamers that I know) to be stable.  

Like so...
Big ol' Klingon ship yet to be painted (or is it just cloaked?)
 needs a big ol' base.
And why are there so many details on the bottom of the ship?
whose gonna see that?

I originally wanted hex bases to match my space mat with hex, but I couldn't figure out how to make the hex heavy enough, so just used a big washer.  Setting phasers to "being nit picky;" I just don't like the look of the hex on the washer.  I also didn't like how the small ships that didn't need a washer had a hex base and the larger ones a circle; because I like consistency.  This needs rethinking and this means starting all over. Spaceships are LAME.

Suggestions are welcome.

Oh there's that other Saber...
When I pulled this miniature off the flight stand to take the picture next to the 25mm round,
the magnet on the bottom on the ship came off and stayed on the magnet on the flight stand.
Another lame complication.

But this pic does provide proof that I did paint the underneath of the all the ships,
not that anyone will ever see it.
except when it's broken.

This Blog is All Paint and No Play

Not true.  Well sometimes true.  But I recently happened to have David over (from the blog Lazgunpacker) for another game of Klingon Armada.  David brought his awesome ships and I contributed with my new space mat with 2" hexes from Cigar Box Battle Mats (as seen in all the photos above) and food in order to not be a total free loader.

I once again took command of the glorious and righteous Federation,
and was provided this BEAST of a ship; the Dreadnaught.  
Which I got destroyed in 4 turns.

That's not bad photography or a lemonade stain,
the mat has a large yellow dust cloud in the middle.

That's a lot of Klingons

The notorious Klingons won this one; though we told my children that it was a tie just so their father could save some face...They're still young enough to think that their dad knows and is good at everything...

Klingon Armada is growing on me more and more.  The mechanics are great; its just the weird Star Trek-ish setting it has that throws me off.  It's kinda cool when your ships launch a bunch of missiles (even though missiles in space is kinda dumb) that slam into the bad guys but it's kinda annoying when they do the same to you....    That and the really ugly Klingon ships.  

David's ships are great looking! I just don't love the design of the D7, (especially when there are 4 of them firing powered up disrupters at close range...) it looks like a snapping turtle with a hat on, and since all Klingon ships look like the D7....

Beam Me Up

Enough of this space nonsense.  The big takeaways from this post is that space ships are cool, flight stands are lame, and I have upped my star trek cred making me legit on the streets on the holodeck.

Till next time.

Thanks for reading.

Double thanks for writing a comment.

100/100 GOOOOAAALLL!

But first; a one act play:

Begin Scene: 

Kids are asleep, wife is in bed playing on her phone, probably looking at Etsy.

Enter Stewart (me), the hero of the story.

Me: "guess what I just finished doing?"

Wife: "You filled out those forms so our daughter can go to school next week?"

Me. "nope"

Wife: "you fixed the broken toilet in the downstairs bathroom?"

Me: "nut-uh."

Wife: "You fixed the lock on the garage side door so someone can't sneak in and murder us in our sleep?"

Me: "You watch too many murder shows.  No! WAY more important than any of that.. I just finished 100. 

Dark ages.

Miniatures."

(brief pause)

Wife: "Get in this bed RIGHT NOW."

Me: "Oh yeah! Whose your big daddy miniature wargaming painter.."

Wife: "Whoa,- that was weird.  Never mind, you can get out now and go fill out those forms like I asked you to."

End Scene

100 / 100

To recap: back in January I set a goal for myself to paint 100 dark ages miniatures (Vikings and Saxons) and to paint only dark ages miniatures until 100 were done.  Mainly to get out of a hobby funk and to make my dark ages mass battle games juuussstt a little more mass.  I thought it'd be a fun experiment to see how long it would take. 

8 months is the answer; because today is the day.  There was no real deadline for the project other than I didn't want it to take all year because for me, that would of been depressing.  I was shooting for late September / early Oct at the latest.  So I'm ahead of schedule.  I am a rock star.  But a the kind of rock star that comes out early and not the kind that is over an hour late to the stage in order to make an entrance.  Don't they know that people had to hire babysitters???!!

It's feels nice to complete a goal you set for yourself.  I feel that after 40 there are so few life goals left to accomplish because everything has been done...

Get married? Check

Know the joy of having children: Check, check, check, check

Know the heartache of having children: check

Start a career: check

Get really good at said career: check

Plateau in said career and get really bored and now just do it for the money: check.

Buy a house: check.

Engage in a never ending battle of breaking and fixing the house: Check

And so on.  Basically my life goals these days are 'don't die' and 'don't go broke' and 'try to have some fun before you die and go broke.' 

Where was I?.....Oh yeah miniatures.  100 of them.  Now I know that 100 is a pretty amazing number to have done... whaddya mean other people do it all the time?  

Actually I am well aware that for some folks 100 is not a big deal and they paint that many miniatures or more a month easy-peasy.  And I know that others would be hard pressed to paint 100 miniatures a year.   And I know others that have foolishly painted 6mm troops or smaller and I don't even know how many of those would even count as 1 miniature or how one sees them in the first place....

The one thing that they all have in common is that they all paint better than I do. 

Whether 100 is a lot or a little doesn't matter.  It was a goal and I did it and it feels good to achieve something. 

Last of the 100.

The final 12 heroes of the hour.
2 more Berserkers
8 Generic skirmishers with spears and no shield
1 Saxon cross bearer
1 female civilian.

Now for The traditional closer ups to see the amazingly average painting...

I'm not not sure I needed more Berserkers, but these miniatures tickled me
because they are both mostly naked and wearing animal skins.
Like in some HeMan and the Masters of the Universe cosplay.

Skirmisher gonna skirmish
(Shake it off)

I'm gonna call this the 'Super-Duper Christ Cross Banner Bearer.'
It will provide bonuses to Christian units.

And 1 female civilian who looks rather annoyed.
"Shouldn't you be doing chores instead of painting miniatures?"

FAILURE and Excitement

The miniatures of the '100 effort' (as I'm going to call it from now on) consisted of:

20 Saxon Ceorls (on two big battle bases / movement trays)

20 Saxon Thegns (on two big battle bases / movement trays)

Saxon Leader base (w/ 3 miniatures)

20 Viking Bondi (on two big battle bases / movement trays)

20 Viking Hird (on two big battle bases / movement trays)

Viking leader base (w/ 3 miniatures) (see the pattern there)

4 Viking Berserkers

8 Generic skirmishers (they have no loyalty)

1 Saxon Super Duper Christ Cross bearer

1 generic peasant.

Now the naturally epic thing to do would be to show some pic of all 100, and this where I do the epic fail.  I didn't really keep track of where I put the newly painted miniatures inside the storage tubs; just kinda placed them in there higgledy piggledy.    And since they all look basically the same and I can't remember which is which; 'that skunk has sprayed the stink' as they say.

Lots of people say that; it's another way of saying that ship has sailed or the opportunity has passed.  Well people say that over where I live.  Ok, it's only me that says that.  But it will catch on.

And I figure if a a pic of  100 miniatures was gonna be fun, then showing off the WHOLE collection of Saxons and Vikings would be WAY more exciting.  Maybe even 5 times more exciting.

Plus now would be a good time to take an inventory of what I have; Being a visual person it helps to see it all laid out. I set up a table in the living room while the wife watched TV.  It was a show about murder.

All the Vikings and Saxons

All the Vikings and Saxons at an Artistic slant angle.

A quick Tally reveals that there are just over 500 miniatures on the table.
So it was 5 times more exciting.  I'm a blogging genius.

The 100 effort basically added 8 trays (4 Viking and 4 Saxon), 2 leaders, and some various bits to the collection; moving it from 'small mass battle' to 'medium sized mass battle.'  Could probably keep 4 players interested.  

A Date to the Dance

These miniatures will have their official debut on  Veteran's Day Weekend here in the United States which is November 11th.  When there will be not one, not three, but two local conventions.  These being Vet Con and Conquest Sac.

(couldn't find a banner for Vet con, but here is a Linkidy-link)

Feel free to hop on an airplane and come down here just for the privilege of gaming with me. 

Actually these local conventions tend to be small to medium sized affairs, and these will be the FIRST I attend post COVID.  I want to see local conventions succeed so that they stick around so I'm volunteering to host several games.  Usually at conventions I am known as the ACW guy due to my long standing love affair with the ACW (I love you ACW, yes I do, whose the prettiest war?  you are!) and putting on games of Regimental Fire and Fury; which everyone loves and I am greatly respected for (if I do say so myself).  BUT I didn't spend 8 months painting dark ages miniatures for nothing!  So Mass battle Dark Ages games it will be.

The plan is to attend one convention Thursday and Friday and the other Saturday and Sunday netting me a 4 day weekend of gaming and no children.  The no children part is key.

Endings are Beginnings 

Of new endings.  Now that 100 effort has ended and I am allowed to paint other stuff.. I'll have a look see at what is lying around here.  But first I gotta clean up my hobby desk...

Such a Disaster after 8 months of painting nonstop
except for those times when I actually stopped.

and second I'll end this post.  

Thanks for Reading.

Double Thanks for writing a comment.

Till next time.  

88/100 almost there

Look-it, I painted some Vikings.

LOLOLOLOL, I'll go get my sandwich.

But first:

Thanks to everyone who left a comment on my BIG 5 YEAR POST.  It definitely generated a lot of comments, WAY more than I thought.  It was the most fun I'd had on the internet while keeping my pants on.  Moreover; it proves that you'll never get if you don't ask.   Inspired,  I asked the wife for a little something special for my 5 years of bloggings.  That was a hard NO but the exception proves the rule....

Especial Thanks to the folks who wrote me a a little 5 year bump on their blogs.  The idea being that anyone who comments on your blog (and you probably comment on their blog) might enjoy reading and commenting on this one; and I of course would return the favor and then We All Would Have More Fun. Stroking my delicate teenage girl ego is only of secondary importance.  

Time will tell if the experiment worked.  I've added a bunch of people to my blog roll (the main way I keep track of blogs) so next time they post I'll write something and we'll see if  over time we become best blogging buddies.  Or maybe we'll just sporadically write comments when something strikes a cord.  And no big deal if nothing happens.  It's like we all met at a party for friends of friends with friends.  Hopefully I didn't miss anyone.  

Now that I garnered all this attention like a histrionic Reality TV persona; I feel this pressure to make this PB&J post the best damn PB&J ever (if there can be such thing).  Such a set up for the fall, because all I have are these barely adequately painted Vikings....

88/100

Today, 12 more Vikings are ready to take the whale road to distant parts and different peoples to beat them up and take their stuff.  Vikings really were kinda jerks.  Lucky for them history loves a bad boy.

Heroes of the hour.
10 Viking Bondi (complete with movement tray) and 2 Berserker types.

Now for some close ups.  Just so that you can actually see the miniatures, not because the painting is all that ah-mazing.

Just like leaders are always waving their swords in the air,
it's a rule that Berserkers are either covered in animal pelts or naked.
I know which one I would choose.

These two kinda look like they just finished some good drugs.

These two are brothers who had a falling out over a woman.
The left one is hoping the right one dies so he can snatch the helmet.

Some glorious Foundry miniatures with their characteristic fabulous beards.

I've already warned my wife that it's a rule that every man at least once
has to grow their beard out COMPLETELY.  As in Viking / ACW / LOTR dwarf style
and that she can expect such fabulousness from me one day.

No need to show the rest of the miniatures.  You get the idea.  You have your own miniatures so you know how it goes.

Easy Terrain Bonus

4Ground kits are pretty easy to make, even if they do say on the package "This kit is Complexity 3."  I got these Dark Ages houses recently. 

"Our House,
is a very very very fine house.
With two cats in the yard
Life used to be so hard...."

Now that song will be stuck in your head.  But only the chorus, because that's the only part anyone knows.

 

These were especially easy because they were just given to me by my friend Mr. PC.  Basically threw them at me from his car while yelling "TAKE THESE SUCKER!" and there was the squealing of tires and the smell of burnt rubber. 

Because Mr. PC is at the stage in a miniature wargamer's life where he has more stuff than storage space, and I reap the rewards.  Especially since all my dark age buildings are 4ground, so these fit right in.

Almost There in the End

Only 12 more miniatures to go, to get my self imposed target goal of 100 painted dark ages miniatures.  I keep getting closer and closer the the end of this long trench but the end never seems to come fast enough; and I feel like this guy from Star Wars..

WHAT???!! A Star Wars meme in a Dark Ages post??
I respect NO boundaries.

So it's an exciting time at the paint table these nights, I have the whole seat but I only need the edge.  I'm rushing the bedtime routine with the kids, practically throwing them into bed saying "Go to sleep already!!! Daddy has some painting to do.  Read your own damn bedtime story!!"  

Or something to that effect.  

Maybe I'll get that something special from the wife after I paint 100 miniatures; because I am full of achievements.   

Thanks for Reading.

Double Thanks for writing a comment.

Till next time.

The 5 Year Bump

 This Blog of Terrible Loss is 5 years old this month.  Happy blogging birthday.  Let's talk about Blogging in general and what you can get me in specific. 

Ok, so it's not quite talking.  I'll type and you'll read but try to hear my voice in your head as you do and it will feel like talking.  I sound like a combination of Darth Vader and PeeWee Herman.

5 Years of This Nonsense

So I've been doing this for 5 years now which officially makes me an expert and perhaps, the best blogger ever.  I mean suuuure some blogs will post more often with better content and with less typos; but how many of them have a fun title like mine?     

All of them?  Are you sure?....Ok, never mind that last bit then.  but I'm still an expert. Because I say so.

The problem with blogging is that the vast majority of blog posts are what I have come to call 'look-it posts.'  As in "Look it, I painted something."  or "Look it, I played a game."  or "Look it, I bought something."  These posts are the peanut butter and jelly of blog posts; meaning that it's an easy stable that everybody eats when there is nothing better (or no time to cook).  Even in my own blog there are mainly Look-It posts.  And Look-It posts, like peanut butter and jelly, are boring.

-Wait! that's obviously an inflammatory statement meant to raise engagement in what is otherwise boring text.  Read on, I'm going somewhere with this.

The reason there are so many mundane Look-it posts on a wargaming blogs is that it's reflective of what we do 90% of the time.  Buying things, painting them, and then playing with them.  And this not a bad thing, as it indicates a healthy hobby life.  

But every once in a while, we do something really cool.  We put on that BIG game, we do a cool terrain tutorial, we write a scenario, do a excellent wargame review, or we write a hit song about our love of goldfish crackers or something like that.  These are some of the better blog posts because they demonstrate something, and are inherently more interesting.  These posts provide to the online community because the posts are informational and/or inspirational; becoming a resource for others.  Posts like these are what drew me to blogs in the first place.  

I'm happy that I've done a couple of these over the years.  These posts also tend to get found more in google searches because they offer something that people are a looking for.  Over the last 5 years my top 5 most viewed posts are:

Clash of Spears Review  written in August 2020

DIY Wargame Mat written in August 2017

Forest tutorial written in August 2020

DIY Wargaming Roads written in July 2018

ACW Rule Reviews written in  Feb 2021

-The pattern? In-depth terrain construction and thoughts about wargaming rules.  Obviously no one in the wider internet really cares that I painted 10 Viking miniatures to a reasonable table standard. 

These type of posts take a lot of effort to do.   The projects are large and the posts take forever to write. To continue our food analogy; these posts are the fancy meals, the Thanksgiving Dinner of blog posts.  And I'm proud of those posts (and others like them, there are a few).  They are entertaining, informative, and make me look good; if I do say so myself.   

The kicker is: If my blog only had fancy meal posts the it might be a good resource, but blogging would not be very much fun.  As anyone who has made Thanksgiving Dinner (or any big fancy meal for a lot of people) can attest; It's a LOT of work, there is often swearing involved, usually a minor burn, and crying children.  All for the glorious presentation on the table and the meal is over in 40 mins with nothing left over but dirty dishes and general feeling of being dissatisfied.  And a tummy ache.

When I started blogging, I envisioned mostly doing fancy meal posts but quickly realized that if I stuck to those types of posts alone, there really wouldn't be much here.  There would be long periods of inactivity and no one would be able to tell if the blog was 'active' or gone 'dormant.'   It would be a nice resource for folks, but there wouldn't be much interaction.  

And to be fair, It's not like any of those top 5 posts are jaw dropping-ly good.  I'm not really an expert in anything and all my posts take the tone of  "if this mook can do it, then you can to and probably better."  The only thing that I am consistently good at is falling asleep in bed at night while my wife talks to me.  I do it ALL the time.  

I've said before that without some interaction, blogging would be too much like shouting into the void.

So I started to post more often on the mundane stuff.  The stuff I did 90% of the time.  It was easier for the blog to be 'active' (for me; 2-3 posts a months is about right).  Number of followers grew; currently at 93.  I never really know what that number signifies other than somebody liked something enough to click on the button.  Number of Blogging buddies grew and interaction increased and blogging was fun.  Turns out folks like Peanut Butter and Jelly.  Turns out I like Peanut Butter and Jelly.

As long as it's grape jelly, maybe strawberry.  Anything else is GROSS.  My wife likes raspberry and it's constant source of friction in my house.

Because We All Like PB&J

A Loooooong time ago, before my life was dominated by children, I used to be a part of some wargaming clubs.  More over, I used to actually GO to the club meetings.  2 or 3 times a months really.  Not only would we play some games but people would bring their newly painted miniatures to show off and get ohs and awes.  If meeting in a game store people would make purchases and temp others to do the same.  While playing in one game you could wander over to people playing in another and gab for a bit.  You get the idea.

I'm still part of clubs but much more of a sideline / periphery member.  I hardly ever go to any meetings.  I'm more like a fun guest star and not in the regular cast; I'm the third in the threesome.
In a lot of ways, blogging has become my on-line club.  Especially with the little network of Best Blogging Buddies where we consistently follow each others blogs by writing comments.  There are about 10 people who regularly write a comment on any piece of shit post that I write; and I routinely write comments on their posts which are works of art.  

With some of these guys; we've been doing this for YEARS.  years I say.   There's around 10 additional people who occasionally write a comment  on this blog when something strikes a cord or when life allows.  Therefore most of my posts have around 20 -30 ish comments on them (10-ish people writing a message and me replying.  I always reply, it's just good manners).  
I think this is GREAT fun and provides that interaction that I no longer get from real life (for hobbys anyway).  

I'm not trying to say that this is a LOT or a LITTLE. I see plenty of other blogs that get way more comments and actually see scores of blogs that get waaaay less.  What I'm trying to say is that blogging has become a fun way to get little wargaming-themed bursts of Dopamine from nice people; because all comments are positive (all comments I write are meant to be positive).  I've never had anyone write a comment  saying something like 'your painting sucks and your terrain is trash and you should feel bad because your life is bad!"

Plus, when you follow someone's blog for awhile you do get a kinda-sorta sense of who they are as a real person; and over time they become less like strangers on the internet but more like online pen pals.  On line club members who are sharing some fun hobby stuff.  So when they post "hey look-it, I did this thing" My first thought is "Cool bro.  Nice job.  Your hobby stuff is aces and thanks for sharing."  because Peanut Butter and jelly is not boring depending on who you eat it with.  It's not the food, it's the company.  It's not boring at all.

So to sum up; I've learned that there are basically two kinds of posts in the miniature wargaming blogging world --  RESOURCE posts that tend to get more views and LOOK-IT posts that tend to get more comments.  Any blog that can do both is probably on the right track for super blog stardom (if that's a thing). Look-it posts are much easier to do so tend to get more of them.  

But more importantly THANKS everyone who takes the time to interact, even sporadically.  I really appreciate it and more over, enjoy it.  I hope you also enjoy my lame attempts to be funny and interact on your blog.  

That'd Be A Good Place to Wrap up the Post

But I won't!  Keep it going keep it going!  It's my goal that this will be the ONLY blog post you read tonight.  Or Skim.  or just laugh at the silly memes I pulled from the internet. 

5 Years is a significant mile stone.  Now that we've talked about blogging in general lets bring up the uncomfortable subject of gifts, and what YOU can get me in specific....

You can write me a comment of course!  I just talked about how I liked them.  Just a line to say "nice job so far on this terrible blog.'  even if you haven't done so in a long time.  go on, do it.  Like and Subscribe, ring the bell, and that BS.

Or, if you really want to go above and beyond for this big occasion; write me a blog bump.  

A blog bump is when you use your blog to highlight someone else's blog.  So that your audience can be directed over here to my blog and I CAN STEAL THEM.  

But maybe that will increase the exposure of this Terrible Blog and I'll get a few more folks leaving comments regularly which will mean I'll leave comments on their posts and we'll all get a little more interaction.  Which should increase the fun for everyone. But don't feel like you have to,  

--I don't want to come across that I am chasing comments or likes.  I do care a little bit as I just said I think it's fun; but I don't care so much that I'm up late at night worrying about my view count.  I also don't have any ads or monetary investment in this blog or some strange youtube-ish algorithm that I need to face.  But I will say that MOST of the people that have become Best Blogging Buddies / Online Club Members are the ones I have found mentioned on someone's blog I was already following.  The post went "hey check out so and so blog because he is ONE OF US."  And so I do.  I write a comment like "Hi, I wandered over here from X's blog.  Nice place you got here."  and they would reply "welcome to my parlor Fly" and so it begins.   

Now It's Really Time to Stop

I agree.  Thanks for sticking with this long wall of text.  I hope it was thought provoking and entertaining.  I'll be back *soon* to say 'look-it, I painted some Vikings.'  

Thanks for reading.

Double thanks for writing a comment.

Triple thanks if you do the BUMP.  Be sure to let me know so I send you flowers.