Reflection 2009

2009 was good year for miniatures gaming, with me personally and for the hobby as whole, while it had its up and downs. Public gaming seems on the rise and I am finding more and more people of all stripes interested in hobby. I just wanted to note my personal reflections on my own doings as well as my reflections on the larger goings on.

Personal:

On Hobbying

Similar output to 2008 in terms of volume, but I found myself more concerned with Terrain and new tables than actually building and painting new figures. While I did start and finish a whole bunch of models for some skirmish games (LotR, LotHS)with corresponding terrain. I didn't make much headway into getting some other larger projects completed. Lack of focus, or just basically too many projects to work on led me to some serious procrastination. Part of being able to continue to finish great stuff in the hobby is about managing your discipline. Discipline makes you a better painter and modeler..now I'm not saying be a slave to your hobby but discipline will give you better results, more self satisfaction and can spill over into other positive aspects of your life which is never a bad thing (kind of like how playing D&D in 7th grade gave me a college level vocabulary..I'm sure I am not alone in that respect with readers here)
Admittedly I was short in the discipline department this year, while I'm sure alot of it had to do with stress from my business, which is again- odd, as toiling away in the basement is my primary stress reliever. Either way no regrets on anything I did or didn't do on the hobby front in 09'.

On Gaming

I played more than ever in 2009, almost on a weekly basis and with the half dozen tournaments I prepared for and played, it probably averaged out to a couple games a week. Most of this was Warhammer Fantasy, but I got a good number of Lord of the Ring and Legend of High Seas games in with a few others in here and there..even a session of board games or two. Playing more is definitely great..hosting my own club night at my place has been great too..we dont always get the best turnout (like we did at the store) but it's created a great venue for a bunch of us to play more and that's always a good thing.

On Blogging

Again the blog had a great year, I doubled my daily views and broke 100k hits in 2009. Wargaming blogs have really exploded in 2009, places like Bell of Lost souls and From the Warp..are great sources of information. I don't try to do what those guys do. Plastic Legions is primarily about my own hobby pursuits and interests..I wish I could offer more content, like Ron does or even a constant steam of info to the news feed like the crew at BoLS does..but I just don't have time. While sometimes I even get privy to advanced GW info, it just not worth posting because of the flak you take from idiots. As a result alot of my Blog is personal reference for me and my pals, but please continue to expect as much news as I can post as well as my personal hobby updates on various projects and coverage of my favorite events. I look back at the Blog in 2009, and think well I wish I got this or that posted or maybe a tutorial..so it's definitely my goal to provide the best content I can.


In General

The Hobby-

Looking back on 2009 it look liked a great year for wargaming.Games Workshops continual dominance of the industry with their constant approach to recruit new players seems to be working well. The combination of constant new product and licensing deals with its IP's to video games and now movies seems more successful than ever. I'm as excited as the next guy to see what they put out this year. Even more exciting however is the success of the other manufactures putting quality low cost plastic models as more business try to compete for GW's dollars..this ups the ante for GW in the product department..competition is a good thing.


On Gaming-

Overall gaming is one area where I look back at 2009 with some trepidation. While Tournaments seem more attended than ever, GW's pulling out of direct involvement in now all but one yearly public event just doesn't sit well. Regionally there are many different opinions on what makes a good event and what doesn't. Unfortunately I see a pretty big cross section of players trying to move public events away from traditional hobbyists type events over to straight gamers or even power gamers who want to game for cash/prizes at the expense of the hobby. Obviously if you read anything I wrote this year you know I dont see this a good thing. This problem is exacerbated by a really poor set of Indy GT rules which means it's the wild west out there for 09-10' when it comes to events. Players just need to pick and choose what they want in an event and attend what works for them and if nothing does just host your own. All this choice is by no means a bad thing, but GW's involvement in a standard set of GT rules for independent tournaments that actually promoted it's 20+ years of focus on the hobby would be a better thing.

On the Blog Community

Blogging was huge in 2009, I expect the same thing year. having this kind of public communication about the hobby worldwide is something we shouldn't take for granted, especially when most would have figured it as fantasy as recently as 5 years ago. I got turned on to a ton of great blogs this year, I hope to get meet or even play with some of you this at Adepticon!...anyway, just some random thoughts..Happy New Year people!.