Miniatures - March/April Planning

I have been doing my usual "this and that" as far as hobby related things go, making a little progress on various projects but with no real goal in mind. Over the next 4 to 6 weeks, I plan to actually focus on a few specific tasks, and have some goals that I would like to see substantially completed by the end of April. Some of them are related to moving along a couple of projects that have lain mostly dormant for way too long, and a few are more spring cleaning oriented so I can get some things off the work bench and be able to move forward on new things. If I don't get past some of these tedious tasks, I may well stay bogged down forever...

Decision Making and purchasing:

• I have blogged previously about my ongoing indecision about what to do with Napoleonics, and the ongoing quest for a set of rules that I like and am comfortable settling on. I really like From Valmy to Waterloo, but they are intricate, time consuming, and not a set of rules that we can use with some of the more casual gamers in our little group. Games where I am the only one who knows the rules are problematic. LaSalle was fun enough when we played it, but it seemed exceedingly generic to me, and despite enjoying the game or two we had of it, I have no overwhelming interest in going back to it. Leo's suggestion, to be able to at least be playing Nappy's before we die, is to just bite the bullet and get Age of Eagles, the Fire and Fury derivation. At least we know this can be played by the group we have. Shako also looks promising. Ultimately, I need to settle on a basing scheme that works for what we are likely to be playing, stick to it, and consolidate the figures I have into that scheme. At this point, that seems to be leaning pretty strongly to four 15mm figs in a block on a 3/4 inch by 1 inch base. Artillery and cavalry as I have them based now will work for just about any system. Litko base order to follow.
• Figure out what my next painting order will be to ship off to Sri Lanka. That way I will know what figures I need to order, if any.
• Decide whether I want to do anything for skirmish basing. This would be re-using or potentially painting new figures for either Saga or Chris Parker's skirmish rules that he has under development. Order bases with the Napoleonics base order if I decide to do this.
• Order the Seven Years War flags that I will need for my completed Austrians and pending Prussians. Flag Dude flags of course....

Basing:

• The 15mm Crusades project has languished for well over a year because of the decision I made to rebase my armies on Impetus style bases as opposed to WRG style basing. I stripped enough figures off the existing bases to make the armies unusable, but bogged down in the magnitude (and boredom) of the effort. I need to strip all figures off the old bases and make at least some progress toward rebasing enough figures to be able to do a small game. Having usable armies should provide the needed boost to keep going, or at least make it so that the lack of progress isn't completely crippling.
• Flock bases. I have several trays of completed figures that are based and have had the bases painted, but have not gotten their final dullcote and then flocking. This is a tedious task, but it will allow me to put the darned figures away finally and check them off the "in progress" list.

Buildings and Terrain:

• I have a dozen or so new large Woodland Scenics trees that need to be based (they are too big to stand up on their own). Cut bases, glue, paint, flock.
• I began making a series of terrain pieces that could be used as either hedgerows for 15mm WW2 or hedges for 25mm figs. There are about 10 pieces substantially done and another fifteen of so that have just been started. These can be knocked out quickly. Priming, sand gluing, painting, foliage cluster gluing, final flocking of the edges.
• A dozen or so buildings for various 15mm periods have been either primed or started. These are easy to paint with layered wet-brushing/dry-brushing and should also be able to be knocked out quickly.

So that's the plan. Let's see how it goes... This list should be whittled down by the end of March, and complete or substantially complete by the end of April.