10 Years

Ten years ago this week we got a new computer. It’s an imac. Don’t ask me what version. The computer it replaced was one of the original imacs (You know one of THESE). I think we’d had it 8 years at that point.

That original imac was getting super slow at doing stuff because it was clogged up with programs and stuff it just couldn’t run and navigating the internet was painful as it took forever to load every website. Some wouldn’t ever load.

So we got a new one.

With the new ability to navigate the interwebs I decided it was high time to start a blog – to reach out to my fellow game nerds and hopefully inspire others as others had inspired me with theirs. So ten years ago on this day (20 December 2006) I started this blog.

I’m still using that same computer.

Ten year old imac is starting to have the same troubles the original one did – slow to load certain websites. Every month there are new ones that I can’t load at all. Haven’t been able to look at Fantasy Flight Games website for a year now. Gmail now only loads the "BAsic HTML Version". At the beginning of the summer the MEC started giving me this when I tried to go there:

Smart asses…

I am loath to get a new one. Amanda has a slightly newer one that her and the kids are using. I don’t like the new photo program – it doesn’t have the same function as the one on this computer – how does THAT work!? A newer program on a newer computer can’t do the things I like being able to do on my old one!?

Also this computer has a 10 year old versions of Adobe Photoshop, InDesign, and Illustrator. I use them once a month or so. Apparently you can’t even load those on to new computers – you have to pay monthly fee to use them online..?! Is that right?! Ugh…. I don’t’ use them that much, but I do use them once in a while and it will be a super pain in the ass not having them. Not being able to edit photos in the same way…

Anyway… This was meant to be a celebration of 10 years of blogging and a little look back, but instead it’s turned into a whiney rant about computers and the annoyance of having to buy a new one every decade.

I should have got on this earlier, so here are a few random highlights of the last ten years.

In those ten years I managed to crank out 1475 posts. (Damn… if I’d only cranked out 25 more this could have been the 1500th post!). just before the 6th anniversary of the blog I posted my 1000th post: A Bit About Me, which itself was a bit of a retrospective of all the gaming I’d done over the years (so I guess I don’t need to cover that again…).

One month after I I started this blog I announced the Original Plan for the Vimy Project. You could almost say that this blog has simply been a chronicle of that mad hair-brained scheme – and all the distractions I faced… (if there are more distractions than work on the project, can you really say you’re still working on it..?)
 While trying to think of what I was going to write for this post I got to looking at the Blog labels (over on the left there) and considering how much of the blog was devoted to which subjects. I should point out the blog post labels aren’t necessarily the best indicator of how many post there are on a particular topic sometimes posts on a given topic might fall under two labels and I know sometimes I might both, but other times I may have only used one or the other…. At this point, though, I’m not going to go through 1475 posts to make sure they are all accurately labeled!!

Of the 1475 posts over the last 10 years at least 875 of those posts fell under the label Painting Update, which are just posts showing off what I’d managed to paint since I last posted stuff. I think the next more prevalent were Hordes of the Things (at 184) and DBA (at 127), which makes sense as I played a LOT of HotT and DBA (and painted a lot of miniatures for those games) – especially in the earlier years… but not-so-much lately. I was surpeised to notice WW2 was at 140 – especially since Flames of War is at 3, Blitzkrieg Commmander is at 28, Bolt Action is at 14 - but after thinking about it a bit I realized a lot of those would have been painting updates on all the 28mm WW2 figures I’ve painted and were at first used for Savage Worlds.

Savage Worlds is currently at  91, which I also found a bit surprising – because in 2008 I started a whole separate blog (Savage Timmy’s Playhouse) devoted just to Savage Worlds gaming – I did this because a lot of my Savage Wrolds gaming was getting more RPG-ish than tabletop miniature wargaming and, at the time, I wanted to keep this blog, just about the miniatures… That has changed as and this blog has become more of a generic gaming blog (there are 32 posts with the Board Games label – indeed there are a number of labels now for specific board games. I don’t really post about ALL the board games I play… but I do sometimes.

125 posts have the Great War label, but only 35 have the Contemptible Little Armies, which had been my “go to” game for most of the Great War gaming I’ve done. So most of those posts are probably just of painted miniatures. There are 60 posts with the Vimy label.

There are 113 posts with the Fantasy label. This is a good example of where I’ve used a label sometimes or started using it after a time ut not all posts about fantasy have been given this label. As mentioned above Hordes of the Things - a fantasy game - has 184 posts devoted to it… yet Fantasy only ended up on 113 and a bunch of those would also be on the 48 posts with the Song of Blades and Heroes or the 36 with Frostgrave label – and 20 posts have the  Dragon Rampant label – and I’ve only played the game twice.

Cold War Commander Cold War Commander (50) and Savage Worlds Modern Ops (18), and more recent ones would be Force on Force(19).

Sci-Fi accounts for only 54. 41 posts have the 40K label – I know most of those are painting, becaue I’m pretty sure I’ve only actually played 2 games of 40K in the last 25 years… and both of those were in the last year! Future War Commander has 17 posts – so clearly not ALL Sci-Fi related posts were getting that label…

Samurai have 60 posts devoted to them, though it should have been labeled Feudal japan as I’m sure not all of those were just about Samurai… Although Feudal japan may not have been the most appropriate either as I’ll bet some of those Samurai posts were also about Legend of the Five Rings…

There are also 59 posts relating to Taking Stock of all my toys – the latest being last months count of ALL my 28mm figures (Stocktaking 2016)

There are at least 56 posts about Ancients - 34 on Ancient Greece, 14 on Ancient Egypt, and 28 on Romans… which doesn’t quite add up either…

Seven Years War comes in at 41, Terrain at 29, and I was a little surprised to discover there are actually more posts about

Zulus (34) than Zombies (34)!?

Other stats of interest...

Blogger has really only been tracking my stats since 2010, but for most of those last 6 years my blog has been getting, on average, about 12000 hits – something screwy has been going on since the spring because they went WAAAAAY up in May, June and July – that can’t actually be humans checking – especially considering there was nothing overwhelmingly exciting and new on the blog at that time.

Some of the most popular posts continue to be The DPM painting tutorial, A Ranger and a Mage Walk into a Forest…, 28mm Moderns Complete, and Vietnam in 28mm… I’m not sure how Odds and Extras and Other Minor Distractions, Long Weekend and Assorted Great War Canadians, Beavers, Brigade Staff and Trench Mortars, or More Medieval Stuff and Blathering About What to DO Next?! ended up with so many hits…? Or how they surpassed some of the other big hits of the past like Quest for the Skull Sword, or 10th Annual Wargaming birthday Bash – Ronin Report, or The Dark Ages DBA Campaign…?

The following spring I set up a Board Game Geek Account and I’ve been tracking game plays ever since. Looking back at the games played in the last 10 years, I have pleyd the following Miniature War Games:

232 games of Savage Worlds.

113 games of Hordes of the Things

68 games of De Bellis Antiquitatis

43 games of Song of Blades and Heroes

33 games of Ronin: Skirmish Wargames in the Age of the Samurai

21 games of Frostgrave

16 games of Force on Force and another 16 games of Ambush Z

14 games of Cold War Commander

10 games of Blitzkrieg commander

9 games of Ever Victorious Armies

4 games of 40K

4 games of Bolt Action

4 games of Fear and Faith

3 games of Modern Ops

3 games of Black Powder

3 games of X-Wing

2 games of Flames of War

2 games of Dragon Rampant

1 game of AK-47 Republic, Broken Legions, Canvas Eagles, Dystopian Wars, Flying Lead, Flashing Steel, Future War Commander, Fleet Action Imminent, Fast Play Grand Armee, and Lion Rampant

Some games may not have been tracked… I’m sure I’ve played a few games of Wargaming 19th Century Europe in there… Or maybe I just missed them when copying and pasting stuff…? (not going to bother listing all the board games… go to the hyertextified-link above if you want to see those too…).

Well that’s enough blathering… I think I should just stop now. I’ll finish up by saying the most rewarding part of the whole experience has been, as I originally set out to do, connect with other game nerds out there. I can’t tell you how much I’ve appreciated every comment that people have been so kind enough to take the time and post. You guys are all awesome! Thanks for a great 10 years. Hopefully I’ll be boring you with another retrospective in another 10.

 If you've got a moment how about drop me a line below and remind me how long you've been following the blog and what your favourite post was so far!

Thanks again!

A Bit About Me

(As if this blog isn’t already all about me…)

Just about six years ago I started this blog. Now, according to Blogger, this is the 1000^th post (assuming I haven’t deleted any along the way… which I might have… I can’t remember…). Since Blogger started keeping stats for me in July of 2008 There have been nearly 350,000 pages views and there are now nearly 400 public followers (Really!? Who ARE all of you!?). For the record, the most popular pages have been A Ranger and a Mage Walk into a Forest… (with 1678 hits -1200 of them were in the first couple days of posting it. I have no idea why it got so many… Someone, somewhere with a LOT more followers must have linked to it), The DPM Painting Tutorial (with 1639 hits  - I’d really like to do more stuff like this… it’s just so… time consuming!?), Vietnam in 28mm (with 1204 hits), the very out of date (and no longer “complete”) 28mm Moderns Complete! (with 955 hits), and King of the Hill (with 520 hits).

Anyway, it’s been a lot of fun sharing my hobby with you all and I greatly appreciate all the feedback, comments, and encouragement.

This year I turned forty. I celebrated by hosting a DBA Campaign - something I’ve wanted to do for over twenty years. AT this point I’ve been gaming with miniatures for nearly 30 years.

It all started with a few Ral Partha fantasy minis for D&D. It was the minis that drew me to the game. Not so much the monsters but the medieval-looking knights in armour. The first actual miniature wargame rules I owned was Battlesystem for AD&D – though I never was actually able to play it, really. I think I soloed a few games with the cardboard counters that came with the game. I was never able to convince anyone else to play the game with me or amass enough minis to make a unit. But it has always been a megalomaniac dream of mine to play a character that (or run a campaign wherein characters) starts off as lowly men-at-arms or whatever and rises to commanding armies and carve out a kingdom by their own hand…

Later I picked up a handful of sci-fi figures and modern-ish figures for Traveller and Top Secret. I always wanted to track down a copy of Striker, but was never able to.

The first real miniature battle game I bought and started building armies for was Warhammer Fantasy Battle (3^rd Edition). I had Orcs at first (mostly Ral Partha – this was before anyone really cared who made your minis and other manufacturers minis were even pictured in the WFB books!). Later I built an Empire Army (which was mostly Citadel historical minis) and then a Bretonnian army.

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)

The earliest pictoral evidence of my hobby, circa 1989. Teh original photos are actually in black and white - I didn't do that in an image editing program to make it look "old". I was taking a Journalism class in high school and we did a photography section and shot B&W film. That's my first "real" historical unit. An Indian colonial unit. Looks like some Naval Brigade with them. Probably Ral Partha. I'd started building units hoping to play some colonial actions using The Soldier's Companion from GDW's Space 1889.



Some GW townscape buildings in the background. Some Rafm British...



My painting desk looking about as messy then as it does now. Some things never change. Old School Land Raider.... Minifigs Zulus... Paranois Robots... Call of Cthulhu Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath... British Camel Corps... Many of those I still have. Some I wish I still had.



I think there's some Blood Bowl guys in there too... Adeptus Titanicus Titans.... DArk Future Cars... Polly S and Ral Partha paints... 

I had a stab at running a few campaigns – mostly they fizzled very shortly after starting, mostly due to guys who were much cleverer than me at figuring out how to break the point system contained in that initial volume. None of the books that followed (Warhammer Armies, Realms of Chaos, etc.) seemed to help… By the time the Fourth Edition came out (the first boxed set with plastic minis) I was ready to pack it in.



That's Mikey K in the background, so his elves must be on the table. This may have been during the last attempt I made to run a WFB campaign - using the original Mighty Empires - we shared a border with Jay V's undead realm.



My Bretonnians readying for some epic battle against Jay's undead.



Me and the Bretonnians in John Burt's basement. 

Along the way I’d played a lot of Blood Bowl (2^nd Edition) and Battletech - which I had a lot of painted minis for. I also picked up a lot of Rafm’s French and Indian Wars figures, and some Wargames Foundry English Civil War figures, and later a few colonial minis, but was never able to find anyone interested in playing such things with me so I didn’t do much with them… 

I think we played some Retinue for a bit with our warhamer figures (which worked out as mine most of mine by this time were Wargames Foundry Medieval/100 Years War figures…). We also played a bit of Rogue Trader with whatever we had… While I did have a handful of Eldar and Space Marines, I also remember games involving Egyptian colonials and fantasy figures…

Then DBA came out. this was the first historical game I was able to get other people excited about. Probably because it required so few figures to be painted. The first army I built was a Later Achemenid Persian army for a planned Alexander the Great Campaign. My friend Cory picked up Scythians, Mikey K, I think, had Thracians, John was to do the Greeks… I can’t remember who was doing the Macedonians…? Jay…? And maybe Tod D. was going to do Indians? I think I was the only one that ever fully painted an army. I played a fair few games with Cory and Mike – with their bare metal armies (I think Cory eventually painted a few of his…). I know John BOUGHT a few figures for his army… but never took them out of the packs…

At some point Cory, Mike and I replaced our armies with 15mm versions… and picked up a few others… and then everybody went their separate ways. I didn’t do much gaming for a few years. No one to game with – or at least no one with an opposing army.

Somewhere in there, half a lifetime ago now,  I joined the army…

A leaner meaner Tim, 20 years ago, attempting to strike a heropic warrior pose, or something... 

That's me in that NBCD suit.



Me again, some days later, less enthusiastic about living in a bunny suit for days...



Hero Pose of me and my camouflaged truck.


20 May 1992 Wainwright, Alberta - I fell asleep some time in the morning. I think it was the first time I'd slept in days. It was bitterly cold and had been pissing down rain for I don't know how long. fell asleep listening to the pitter patter of rain on the canvas above me... I woke up some hours later and the pitter patter had stopped  and I thought to myself "Thank goodness for that" I opened the tent to the scene above. I may have screamed....

Around the turn of the millennium I got back into gaming – building some new DBA armies and this time building two (and later more) opposing armies, so I’d never be left high and dry if an opponent moved away… not that I HAD any opponents. I picked up a few other odd things here and there. Tried out Stargrunt II and Dirtside II. I played the latter with homemade tanks made of bits of wood and toothpick or finishing nails. Both of which I really liked, but again, could never find players. I always wanted to try out  Full Thrust - but was never able to track down a copy.

Then I met John Bertolini by chance. I was working in a magazine store and he came in a bought a copy of Miniature Wargames – which usually, at the end of each month, I stripped off the cover and took home for myself!? Finally I’d found someone else whose primary interest was HISTORICAL miniature gaming! We played some Russo-Japanese War games with rules he’d just made up.



These are actually some pictures John's wife Amy took of our very first game. We are using some of John's fabulous collection of homemade Russo-Japanese War figures.



John took the Russians and I took the Japanese. I think I scared the willies out of him (and I'm sure he was wondering if he'd invited a madman into his house) as every time I had a remotely successful dice roll I threw my hands up in the air and yelled "BANZAI!!!" (I think I'd recently read Keiji Nakazawa's Barefoot Gen).



Japanese cavalry advancing to the front in column! 

I have no idea who won... as is the case with most games I've played with John. Dice were rolled. Fun was had. I got to yell "BANZAI!!"

We tried some Seven Years War games using something based on DBA. We’ve since played more than a few games of Ever Victorious Armies and Contemptible Little Armies and more games that he’s made up.

Later I dragged him out to play some WW2 games a long with another new friend, “Other Tim” (Tim Miller), then owner of Reader’s Bookshop Saskatoon. We tried out a number of different WW2 games (first with 20mm/1:72 plastic, and later 15mm): Tactical Commander, a Warhammer 40K WW2 variant, WRG’s Armour and Infantry, some super simple skirmish rules published in an old Wargames Illustrated, Crossfire, and finally Flames of War.

I ended up running a few Flames of War leagues before burning out and tiring of the warhammer style play… and around that time I started this blog… You can go back and read the blog to see what sort of shenanigans I’ve been up to since.

Hmmmm… this has turned into a History of Tim’s Gaming Shenanigans… originally when I sat down to type this I’d thought I do more of a What I Do When I’m Not Painting Toys and Playing Games….

So when I’m not painting toys and playing games and blogging about it I’m an artist and a dad. I’m also a bike riding fool. There’s blog about that nonsense too, if you haven’t found them:

Tim’s Art Blog

Tim’d Bike Blog

But given how much I get around to posting on those blogs, it is pretty clear what my one true passion is…

I also have a separate blog for Savage Worlds:

Savage Timmy’s Playhouse

Sometimes I’m not entirely sure why I have a separate blog for that. I think it’s because I was planning to chronicle role-playing campaigns there and wanted to keep THIS blog strictly about Miniature Wargaming. The lines between “role-playing” and “miniature wargaming” have always been pretty fuzzy for me though… I’ve always used miniatures in my role-playing games and I’ve always maintained that the very best miniature wargames are when the players are “role-playing” the commander of the troops on the table (rather than a lawyer representing them in a case to determine a BEST WINNER!).

I’ve done many other things in my life. I’ve worked in a few game stores The Wizard’s Corner (Saskatoon’s first game store) and later Collector’s Edge. I worked in a magazine shop (Empire Magazines) and a record store (Vinyl Diner CDs and Records). I’ve also worked as a security guard, a bike courier, an army reserve radio operator, a carpenter, a bicycle mechanic…

I briefly attended university on two occasions. First majoring in Physics, the second time Studio Art. I never completed a degree. Meh. 

Um…. Is there anything else you want to know? Ask now! Or should I just shut up and get on with the posting of more pictures of toys and battle reports?

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

I thought I’d clear off the game table and do a bit of a stock taking and post pictures of my entire collection as it stands right now… Stay tuned for that! I’ve also been working on some new cheap and nasty modern buildings for modern skirmish gamin’ - Force on Force, Superheroes, Zombies, whatever…