Saturday, May 28, 2016

Marital bliss and Gaming 101...

As I sit here writing this, my fingers hurt...my toes hurt...my legs and arms hurt.  In fact, I pretty much hurt from my toes to my neck.  You see, I spent the day buying painted armies, playing a game on a non-game day with my buddies, or spending quiet time painting my minis by myself.  Yep, I said "or".  How did I get so sore, and why did I say "or", you may ask?  Listen well, young padawan...I have some sage advice for any gamer with a wife or girlfriend that doesn't "understand" your gaming needs and our hobby overall. 

Happy wife, happy life.

It's trite, it's cliché, it's sappy...and it's darned good advice.  Took me quite a while to get it right, but I figured it out and now I have a loving, happy wife who gives me all of the above when I really need them...not all at once, mind you, but at some time or another. 

Why am I so sore, then, and how does it relate to making my wife happy and getting my gaming needs fulfilled?  Because a few months ago I took a patch of woods just next to our driveway, cleared it of shrubs and trees, and this morning started on this project:
 
Not sure what that is?  It could be a man-cave.  Might be a 300-plus figure 15mm Napoleonic French army.  Could even be an army that I haven't even seen or bought yet.  Because that picture above, after about 8 hours of tiring, hot, dirty labor of love, turned into this:
 

Gamers come in many different flavors: you've got your casual gamer, who may or may not own any figures and doesn't have a designated game night.  There's the gamer who probably has one or two armies, plays only one or two rules sets, and has game days but they are maybe once a month or less.  I'm more at the other end of the scale from these...after 40 years of gaming historical miniatures I am still finding new periods and scales to get into, and have more freakin' minis than I can even remember (not true...I remember each and every one by their little lead face and made-up name...just being dramatic!), and I can be dragged whole-heartedly into buying a new army as simply as someone saying "hey, wouldn't it be cool to do the South American wars of independence?"  So I spent today totally dedicated to busting my butt, sweating like a dog, and hurting tonight like I climbed Mt. Everest, because I finally figured out that this:
 
EQUALS THIS:
 
Your welcome.
 
 

4 comments:

  1. Well said my fiend. I've learned the lesson too...

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  2. Yes, a valuable lesson for us all! You've created a mighty structure. What are you keeping out? I have a 'happy wife' landscaping project waiting patiently in the yard at the moment. I must take your sagely advice and get the heck out there this weekend!

    By the way, "it'd be cool to do the South American wars of independence!"

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  3. Land or naval? Oh, what the heck, let's do both! Alan, we live in the country on 7 acres so we have lots of wildlife that would love Linda's garden. Deer, skunk, rabbits, racoon, possum...have had them all through here!

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  4. Rob, my next naval scratch build will focus on the Huáscar and Esmeralda - possibly in 1:1200, so definitely starting off with the naval (I have some Tumbling Dice 1:2400 models I can start with (if I ever get to finishing the paint job!). The land conflict really captures my imagination too. Possibly in 6mm - although that's on the 'to do' list! So many projects ....

    Possums and flying foxes (fruit bats) are our main uninvited guests (although very welcome, of course). I used to work on a strawberry farm that had a huge issue with Deer creeping out of the nearby forest and eating the plants. Sounds fantastic - nice sized property you have there!

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