Quarter 1 Week 1 Update: We’re Just Normal Men

We’re just innocent men. Hello there! Welcome to year 3,  quarter 1, week 1 of Hammer the Backlog, my weekly warhammer mini painting, accountability and productivity blog in which I attempt to paint half a lifetime’s worth of “collected” tabletop wargaming minis. You join me this week at the start of a brand new year and new quarter, with a brand new (1996 is brand new right?) set of minis to paint.

Each week I will update you on the project’s progress by taking a look at the accountability scorecard, the models painted this week, any issues that have popped up, and any other bits and bobs.

Let’s start, as always, with the scorecard and the progress on the targets.

SCORECARD

Starting each year off, as nature intended, with a fully green scorecard. To be honest, at this stage of the project, if I wasn’t starting each quarter with greens, there would be some serious questions about motivation to be answered!

So five models painted, and in record time I might add, what with them being models that I was eyeing enviously while I was finishing my Dark Angels last quarter.

Before we get too deep into this quarter, let’s take a look at our two quarterly targets, or rocks, and break them down with the SMART methodology.

Since I had the annual planning and first quarter target setting session last week, I already know what this quarter’s targets are going to be.

1. 5th Edition Metals painted, photographed and online
2. Dark Vengeance “Learn to Play” played and filmed

Both targets have the completion date of Thursday 12th of September 2024.

Remembering that all of our targets must be SMART:

Specific

Measurable

Achievable

Relevant

Timebound

Let’s take a look at the targets!

Specific – Unlike previous quarters, with a unified army theme, this quarter is unified by being most of my remaining 5th edition unpainted metals. They are: Vespero’s Vendetta (5 points), Brazanga’s Besiegers (6 points), Golgfag’s Ogres (10 points), 5 Kroxigors (10 points), Slann Mage priest on palanquin with 4 temple guard (15 points), the Birdmen of Catrazza (10 points). That’s pretty specific!

Measurable – photographed and online

Achievable – 56 Hammer the Backlog Points (History shows I can do 65 in a quarter!)

Relevant – It’s a blog about painting models!

Timebound – by the 12th of September 2023

Looks pretty smart to me! The observant among you will notice that I have set a target of only 56, while being capable of 65. At roughly 5 points a week, allowing for a 2 week holiday that would be 13 weeks, giving me time to get everything done as long as I do the 6 points of Brazanga’s Besiegers in a single week and don’t get distracted.. And if I don’t think I can get them done, that would take the Achievable out of SMART. Not very SMRT, is it?

The second target, or meta target if you prefer, is to get the Dark Vengeance starter set game played and recorded. I have already hit on two issues with this idea, both of which have been added to the weekly issues list. 

The first, and perhaps the most pressing, is that I can’t find my copy of the Dark Vengeance booklet anywhere. I’m not entirely sure I didn’t recycle it at some stage. If I can’t find it this weekend, it might be off to ebay for a second hand copy, or the hunt for a pdf.

The second issue, which may be the much bigger one actually, is that I spent all of that effort last year putting my Dark Vengeance set on industrial bases, but I don’t actually have an industrial board to play on and record on. I don’t think I have the time, space or skills to build an industrial board in the time I have this quarter, so I might have to beg, borrow or steal a set up from someone.

THIS WEEK’S MODELS

So, for this week’s models we have 5 more of my most repainted models of all time. I think this might be my 4th time painting this specific set of five models! For whatever reason, anytime I get it in my head to try our a new paint stripping system and paint some old models up, these guys go back in the drink!

But, this will be the last time; they are not getting painted again. I’m pretty happy with how they turned out, with the rich red cloaks providing a really nice touch of colour both to the relatively simple models, but also to my fairly naturally toned Dogs of War overall.

I was tempted to go with my new favourite paint, Siggy-V Bee (aka sigvald burgundy) rather than the traditional red, but in the end I was more interested in them being a bit coherent with the rest of my dogs of war.

They were deceptively simple to paint, especially compared to the last 6 months of trim and detail covered space marines. With, broadly speaking, only black clothes, red capes, white britches, pale skins, metals and golds to paint.

The capes and swords were definitely the highlights for me.

The elephant in the room this week was that Verspero himself was not quite complete. Sadly his duelling dagger arm was lost to the pile of bits long ago, just like Pizzaro’s arm last year. In the end I decided to borrow an off-hand dagger arm from an old empire kit, probably the free company. It’s not quite the same style of clothing, or even really a duelling dagger, but beggars can’t be choosers.I think I might prefer the slightly more open pose this arm gives him.

MOTIVATION STATION

One of the joys of converting my garage last year and buying myself a 2 metre long work bench is that I have space to work with that many other hobbyists probably don’t have. I have decided to work with that a little bit by getting my existing Dogs of War models out and having them ranked up on display while I work through this quarter’s targets. Every little bit of motivation helps, and I find looking at a painted army actually growing before your eyes week after week is much more motivating than looking at grey models, staring blankly at you, wondering when it will be their time.

YEAR THREE PLANNING

As always, this blog is also a video series. You can watch the Year 3 Planning Session and Quarter 1 Target setting by clicking on the video below.

Thanks for reading this one, you are the best eggs!