As regular readers of this blog and listeners of Soulstone Train will know, I'm not exactly known for making good life choices. In recent weeks I have made things very difficult for myself due to one such choice (at least for once it didn't involve midgets and bacon grease). Before I get ahead of myself, let's have a flashback to November.
At the start of November I decided to embark on an eight month long hobby journey leading up to a 40k tournament in July. The tournament in question was Summer Solstice, York Garrison's main 40k tournament of the year. The plan was to paint my chosen army (Eldar) over that period and attend the tournament. The army requirement for the tourney was 1,850 points and after four months, I'd painted a total of seven models worth 263 points. Due to work pressures and extremely limited hobby time, back in January I decided to switch my painting target to Solstice 2015.
Fast forward to last week, it was announced at the club night that tickets were on sale. Being fully aware of my frankly dismal painting progress, a couple of club regulars started asking me if I'd be entering. I politely informed them that if it were not for the painting requirement, I would gladly enter. Sadly, that backfired worse than a 3am kebab when I was informed by tournament organiser Pete that I could borrow one of his armies. I figured I could learn the rules in that time (Baby Jake plays it, how hard can it be?!) so happily accepted.
When making that decision, I seemed to forget one key fact. I am a hobbyist.
Most gamers would gladly put one of Pete's armies on the table, they're nicely painted but have one major flaw, they're not painted by me. I'm not sure if this tweak is specific to me or not but if I'm using painted models, I want them to be painted by me and therein lies the problem.
I have agreed to play at the tourney and am actually looking forward to it, I just need to find an 1,850 point army painted by me. As we have already established that doesn't currently exist, that leaves me up a certain creek without a paddle.
I have done some list bashing based on the models I own and have sorted out a provisional list for the tourney. Will I get it painted in time? Maybe, the model count is pretty low. Will it be competitive? Hell no, it's based on what I vaguely remember from 20 years ago and what'll be quick to paint.
Solstice is in York on 26-27 July, full details are available on the Garrison website (yorkgarrison.co.uk). Tickets are normally £35 including lunches but until the end of April there's a discounted price of £30.
On a side note, due to scheduling issues there'll be no SST episode this month. We've tried to sort out a recording in the last couple of weeks but the rare gaps in my work schedule have not been when others have been free. Fear not, there will be an episode recorded the first week in April and, as I'm not at work that week, there's a good chance it may be a long overdue drunk episode!
