Sunday, 3 September 2017

A Tale of 1 Warden pt. 2: Terms and conditions apply


Just for once it might actually benefit me to go into a project with a plan. That usually doesn't work for me but given that the whole point of this project is to work at a schedule and prescribed goals it might help to decide a few things before beginning. Also, I had forgotten what absolute nightmares the Men-At-Arms models were to build so I need a short break.

September Goals

Okay, so I have forty-nine models to paint this month and, as of today, exactly four weeks to paint them. Considering that's well above my usual speed I need to break this down into smaller tasks. I've got four weeks, sixteen archers, twenty halberdiers, four stands of defensive stakes, eight knights and one Pegasus Knight.

So, the goal for each week will be half a unit of peasants and two Knights Of The Realm.

Bretonnian Units Beyond The Tale

Obviously not a consideration this month, I've got a whole Battalion to do. However, after that the targets are a little more forgiving. Next month's goal is a single unit of infantry or cavalry and if, say, I choose to do a nice little unit of Mounted Yeomen (for which I have seen an awesome conversion online) I could probably polish that off in a week.

So, I've decided to treat the later goals as more of a bare minimum for the month. I will not work on anything else for the Tale until the month's goal is reached but once that's done I'll branch out a little. At the very least I need more characters than the one “mighty hero” who'll be my Month Four project. There's a compulsory Battle Standard Bearer, for a start.

Other Projects During The Tale

Okay, so I am definitely not going to be able to paint just Bretonnians for five months. What I can do is continue last month's work and concentrate on completing more half-finished miniatures. Also, I'll only be working on one of these things to the side at a time. No big sprawl of additional models on my painting table: just the Bretonnian project of the moment and one other thing to give me a little variety without sacrificing my focus.

The absolute only new things I will start whilst this Tale is ongoing is new Death Guard stuff because I've waited too long for them to be an army with an actual product range to put them on hold for five months.

Telling The Tale

I need to write background for this army. Bretonnians are an army who are all about their heroes and I really want to explore that. I have an idea to make the core characters (my general, BSB, some of the Damsels, maybe) members of the same family and have the army be the standing garrison of a particular holdfast rather than a crusading force. I don't doubt they'll end up going on a crusade or two but I want to establish the characters by writing some stories just about them before having them interact (read: beat the stuffing out of) my friends' characters.

Right, now back to trying to hold those halberds in those awful concave joins long enough for the glue to actually take...

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