2012: Goals and Reflections

Traditionally, people make resolutions for the New Year; resolutions that they quite often forget about or cast aside within a few months or even weeks. I have been guilty on this on more than a few occasions, so instead of making some grandiose resolution, I have decided to instead set modest goals for myself in 2012; hobby goals that are not so grand in scale or scope that they will overwhelm me with their immensity or discourage me with their complexity.

Many of these goals are based off of my 2011 hobby experiences; experiences which were for the most part extremely educational and often enlightening about my own shortcomings and tendencies as a gamer. Since returning to the hobby two years ago, I have used this blog to track my experiences and it has been a great asset toward recording and reflecting upon those tendencies. Moving forward I am hoping to learn from my past experiences to better focus me both as a gamer and as a hobbyist. To that aim, I have come up with the following list of goals for 2012.

Goal 1 – Paint up a 2000 point Tyranid army. I have already started on this goal and next Monday I will have some pictures of my completed Genestealers up on the Blog. This is my “big” goal for 2012 for the simple fact that I have not painted an entire army since 1999/2000. The last army I completely painted was my 3^rd Edition Foot Eldar army…

…needless to say that was a long time ago.

I really like the story and theme of Tyranids, so this army is more of a hobby project for me that it is a competitive build. That is not to say that I do not think Tyranids are competitive, because I do think they can be competitive in the hands of a competent general. In my humble opinion, the competitiveness of Tyranids has been greatly aided by the surge of new Codices; Codices that have shaken up the meta due to their own strengths and shortcomings. Blackmoor has a great segment about this on 40KUK, Episode 36 in which he discuss the strengths of current armies making older codices more viable once again, due to weaknesses within the army limiting plasma and melta.

My goal to paint up a 2000 point Tyranid army is being greatly aided by the fact that a group of local players have decided to run an escalation league at the FLGS, Thou Shalt Game. I attempted to paint up an army for the Independent Characters Hobby Challenge, but that ended up being a big failure as I really was not into painting a Daemon army at the time – due to the fact I really felt I had short changed my Tyranid army……unfinished business and all such things. Anyways, I have gotten a wee bit of painting mojo right now, which I think is enough to paint my initial 140 model Tyranid army……sounds scarier now that I say that out loud!

Anyways, I have already jumped in with two feet and I have gotten my first 6 Genestealers painted up (2 were test models and will be chucked). I have a lot of models to go just for January/February commitments, but I am actually excited this time, so wish me luck on this goal. Like I said, I am going on more than 10 years since I painted an entire army and I have intelligently selected a horde army for my first go…

Goal 2 – Play in at least 2 Grand Tournaments, preferably 3 Grand Tournament. Last year I had planned on playing in two Grand Tournaments but real life intervened and I had to axe that plan. I did manage to play in The Bay Area Open, coming in 20^th with my Deathwing army. I managed to make only the first day of another tournament, so I am not counting that as going to a tournament.

Goal 3 – Play more intelligently and competitively. One of the good things about recording your games with video is you have irrefutable evidence of your tendencies, habits, and mistakes; evidence that you can not deny because it is right in front of you, and in color……often with your own voice. Anyways, these visual records coupled with my most recent beating at the hands of Blackmoor showed me how far I have to go if I really want to compete competitively at tournaments. Additionally, this goal plays directly into goal 2; so it has a nice tie in going for it. Having played (and lost) to some really good player, I realized that there was no one think I could do to improve my game play on the table top; instead, I needed to take a more holistic approach, that started at the basics and moved forward from there. So, I made a list of things I am going to do to start this process on the right path.

(1)            Competitive Force – Instead of taking an all terminator Deathwing because it is fun (which it is) and good at bashing stuff, I need to play an army that is more balance/competitive.

(2)            Play with Patience – Having played and watched some of the top players, I have noticed that they tend to play the opposite of my “balls-to-the-wall” aggressive style. Moving into 2012, I need to adopt a more counter-punch style of play if I am going to be more successful.

(3)            Play with the mission in mind – Tying into both 2 and 3, this means taking a force that can actually actively participate in all phases of the game. The game has a movement, shooting, and assault phase, I really need to incorporate an army that doesn’t sacrifice mobility for resilience, or shooting for assault; my army needs to be able to participate in all three phases of the game, each game turn.

To this end, I will be playing my Green Knights this year…more on them tomorrow.

Goal 4 – Near the end of the year once I have completed my Tyranids, I would really like to spend some time adding some serious terrain to my Desert Board Collection. While the board already has more than enough terrain for one little table, I would really like to add some variety so we can mix and match the table up more from game to game.

Goal 5 – Learn to play Malifaux! Our little group is getting into Malifaux after initially flirting with the idea more than a year ago.  The game interests me, so I am hoping we can make it a change of pace game to 40K.

Well, that is it…

…now to see how well I manage to stay on task.