Wednesday, December 31, 2025

Looking Back at 2025

2025 was not a great year for me, personally... But in the grand scheme of things, my troubles seemed pretty small and inconsequential compared to [gestures vaguely about] EVERYTHING ELSE GOING ON IN THE WORLD?! 

I tried to maintain a positive tone on this blog and keep it a safe place, free of most of the bullshit...so... maybe I'll just leave it at that... and talk about some of the positive things that happened this year...like playing some games and painting some toys...

GAMES

Well I did play games this year... According to Board Game Geek, I played:

  • Warhammer Quest: Cursed City x35
  • Warhammer Age Of Sigmar (Fourth Edition): Core Rules x32
  • Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound x15
  • Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Champions Trading Card Game x12
  • Bolt Action: Third Edition x10
  • Advanced Song of Blades and Heroes x5
  • Five Men at Kursk WW2 Skirmish Warfare x3
  • Five Men in Normandy .30 Cal edition x2
  • FiveCore Pulp Adventure x2
  • Patchwork x2
  • Pergola x2
  • Warhammer 40,000 (Tenth Edition) x2
  • Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Crypt Hunters x2
  • Lost Patrol x1
  • Warhammer Quest: Darkwater x1

I played 126 games this year. There were fifteen different games I played. 


Warahmmer Quest

Cursed City

By far the most played game this year was Warhammer Quest: Cursed City. For most of the year, Amanda, Finnnegan and myself were playing almost every week. The first campaign took nearly thirty missions to complete. We took a short break while Amanada and Morgan went on a trip to England in the summer (and I got the last things painted up for the next campaign). At the end of the summer, we started in on a second campaign; Night Wars. We have a few more missions to finish up - three if we're lucky and don't fail in any of the missions

Darkwater

the new Warhammer Quest was released at the beginning of December and I started working on painting the miniatures right away hoping to be done them all by the time we were done playing Cursed City. In the end we didn't finish up Cursed City, but we did play kind of a trial game of Darkwater just before the end of the year. 


Warhammer Age of Sigmar

The next most played game was Warhammer Age of Sigmar. I'd played a fair bit in 2024, first with Spearhead and then a couple of larger games trying to start up a Path to Glory campaign... but then that kind of fizzled for a bit...? I can't really say why...? (because I can't remember! not because it's a secret and I'd have to kill you if I told you...)  

Over the summer I had a renewed interest in trying to get all the Spearhead Armies I'd acquired painted and got playing with them again.

In the end I played SEVENTEEN games of Age of Sigmar Spearhead (and finished painting FOUR more Spearhead armies)!

I even got Amanda playing Age of Sigmar! First Spearhead and then regular Age of Sigmar - with the Sylvaneth army! We even started a small Path to Glory campaign (Methervale Campaign) initially using the Ascension Path to Glory rules from the Core Rulebook, but then incorporating most of the rules from Blighted Wilds - as kind of a trial run. We are gearing up to start a full Blighted Wilds campaign in the new year... 

Nearer to the end of the year, around the same time I was starting the campaign with Amanda, a few of the members of the AoS-YXE Discord I ran got excited about running a Ravaged Cost Path to Glory campaign, so I joined in that as well! I also thought of those as a practice run for a longer Blighted Wilds. campaign in the new year! We sped through the campaign, finishing it up just a little over a week before the end of the year. I ended up playing eleven games in that campaign. 

Between Spearhead and Path to Glory, I got in THIRTY-FIVE games!? 


Soulbound

I did get in more than a few games of Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound this year. 

I started the year carrying on with TWO campaigns I'd started in 2024 - one online, the other in person. Both kind of fizzled out in March after too many sessions were cancelled and I lost interest. 

Over the summer I got a new campaign (What We Do in the Realm of Shadows) going. By the fall it had slowed to once every three weeks as one of the principal players (Orion) got a new job that took her out of town for two of every three weeks. 

I played fifteen games of Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound this year! 


Campaign for Ravensflight

In between the two Soulbound campaigns, I ran another role-playing lite, tabletop miniature adventure campaign I called the Campaign for Ravensflight. It was kind of inspired by Five Leagues from the Borderlands, but I used Song of Blades and Heroes to play out the encounters and tried to work in a little role-playing. It was a LOT of fun and I'd hoped it would have run a lot longer... but in the fourth session things went sideways and it was pretty much a TPK situation... 

We'd talked about continuing the narrative with a different group (of dwarves!)... but that never got off the ground. I'd love to do something like this again. 


Bolt Action

I think the most surprising and unexpected twist was a renewed interest in World War Two - which let to picking up the new edition of Bolt Action and playing ten games of that! 


Five Core

I played a few games based on the Five Core game engine. I ran a solo game and a few game-mastered games of Five Men in Normandy/Five Men at Kursk and also a couple of games of the Five Core Pulp Adventure. 


Other Games 

I played seven other board and card games? 

I'd expected there'd be more in this last week of the year between Xmas and New Years when we usually get together with friends we haven't seen for a while and play some board games we haven't played for a while... but that kind of didn't happen this year... At least, not so much as it has in previous years where we often had couples or groups coming every day to play games?! 

There were two non-warhammer related boardgames I did play; Patchwork and Pergola... 

I did get in a couple games of Crypt Hunters and Lost Patrol (both, technically, MORE Warhammer games... but Board Games!!). 

Also we started playing Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Champions (a Trading Card Game that was produced under license by Play Fusion back in... 2018...? It is no longer published or supported... so, if you do some snooping, packs and starters can be found for reasonable prices (people just getting rid of dead stock)... though some can be found for completely UNREASONABLE prices!? I'm guessing because people think it's an out-of-print sought-after "collectable" and... while they are indeed out of print, I'm not so sure about any of those other descriptors!) 

This is definitely a LOT FEWER board games than I've played any year over the last decade or so... and overall a lot more miniature games have been played - which is okay. Honestly, this is starting to feel like a miniature wargaming blog again!? I do miss playing board games, though... and some of the people I used to play board games with!


MINIATURES

In addition to an increase in playing miniature games (and likely BECAUSE of the increase in playing miniature war games) a lot more miniature PAINTING happened than the last few years... 

TOTAL NUMBERS

2025 Totals

PAINTED

28mm Foot: 438

28mm Mounted/Beasties: 17

28mm Vehicles/Monsters: 11

28mm Endless Spells: 7

28mm Terrain Bits: 16

>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<

PURCHASED/ACQUIRED

28mm Foot: 479

28mm Mounted/Beasties: 17

28mm Vehicles: 27

28mm Terrain Bits and Endless Spells: 37

>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

DISPOSALS (Traded/Sold)

28mm Foot (unpainted): 94

28mm Vehicles (unpainted): 2

The main metric I use for considering how well I'm doing at things is the 28mm foot - as they are BY FAR the most numerous of all the things I collect and paint. I felt like I was doing pretty good in the 28mm foot category this year - for a good chunk of the year I was "in the black" - having painted more than I'd purchased... but that all came apart in the final Quarter when I bought the Shudderblight Cyst Battleforce box for the growing Maggotkin of Nurgle force... then the Outcast Spitegrove Battleforce box for the Sylvaneth army... THEN Warhammer Underworlds: Darkwater!? Those three, alone, added over 100 28mm foot to the tally! 

Other categories... varied... 

I painted up more mounted (and smaller beasties) than I purchased, chipping away at the pile of opportunity. 

I purchased more vehicles (and larger beasties) than I finished up - largely due to a large ebay order of a PILE of WW2 tanks that were insanely inexpensive and the three large tree peoples bought in the last month for Amanda's Sylvaneth army 

I bought more endless spells and terrain bits than I managed to finish off... probably largely due to buying the Malign Sorcery box - with 17 Endless Spell miniatures - which, if I'm being honest, I bought for ONE of those miniatures... sure, I can use some of those other endless spells with some of my other armies, but they're armies I've not been actively using, so I haven' really had much motivation to assemble and paint many! 

It has been nearly a DECADE since I've been "in the black" (i.e. painted MORE miniatures than I purchased! I really thought I was going to pull it off again this year... then the new Warhammer Quest kind of happened... and the Sylvaneth Battleforce Box... 

Anyway, at least I painted more than I have for the last few years. In fact the last time I painted over 400 miniatures in a year was 2019! In fact, I painted more this year than the last three years COMBINED!! 

Most of this breaks down into two categories; World War Two and Age of Sigmar (plus a few random odd extra things...) 


World War Two

As mentioned above, this was the most unexpected thing to happen this year... It was precipitated by my trading away a PILE of American WW2 miniatures to my friend Orion... and then ended up playing a lot of games with her in the first quarter... and that lead to some reorganizing of forces and finishing off a bunch that were partly done... I ended up buying WAY MORE than I got painted, though... and then the game kind of fizzled after just a few months... 

What I painted.... 

28mm WW2 Foot

28mm WW2 Vehicles

I addition to painting new things to finish up forces, I also started re-basing large numbers of WW2 forces - removing them from old heavy washers I'd based everything on in the past (the weight of which are starting to distort my plastic storage drawers!) and basing them on plastic bases (other collections I've also started basing on wooden discs... but I kind of prefer the plastic ones now... 

I did create a number of new pages on this blog to have a place to show off all the completed armies as I finished them off. 

WW2 - USMC Raiders (PTO)

WW2 - Italy

WW2 - 8th Army in North Africa

WW2 - Afrika Korps

WW2 Chindits and Gurkhas

Though none of these are ENTIRELY completed... I still have a few things for ALL of these forces to finish up... and I have a bunch more forces I need to make galleries for! 


Age of Sigmar

After the First Quarter, I (almost) exclusively painted stuff for games set in the Age of Sigmar - whether it was the Warhammer Age of Sigmar tabletop miniatures war game or Warhammer Quest or Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound (the role-playing game) 

SPEARHEADS

In 2024, I'd managed to acquire EIGHT full Spearhead armies (Skaven Gnawfeast Pack, Stormcast Eternal Vigilant Brotherhood, Hedonites of Slaanesh Blades of the Lurid Dream, Blades of Khorne Bloodbound Gore Pilgrims, Sylvaneth Bitterbark Copse, Soulblight Gravelords Bloodcrave Hunt, Daughters of Khaine Heartflayer Troupe, and Slaves to Darkness Darkoath Raiders)!? In addition to this, I had elements of a few others (but I'd need to pick up a unit or two for each... Lumineth Realmlords Glittering Phalanx and Disciples of Tzeentch Fluxblade Coven). Only three of those were painted in 2024 (Hedonites of Slaanesh, Blades of Khorne, and Sylvaneth). 

So I started 2025 with eight full Spearhead forces (plus elements of two more), three of which were painted... 

In the summer when I started painting and playing Age of Sigmar again. As new Spearhead forces were released with Battletomes,  I realized I had elements of a few MORE Spearhead armies - lacking only a unit or hero or unit and hero to make up a few of the new Spearhead forces (Nighthaunt Cursed Shacklehorde and Blades of Khorne Fangs of the Blood God). 

Over the summer I got two armies finished up...

Fangs of the Blood God - Blades of Khorne Spearhead force. 

Anvils of the Heldenhammer Vigilant Brotherhood - Stormcast Eternals Spearhead force (this came with the Skaventide box)

In the fall I bought two more full Spearhead Armies (Maggotkin of Nurgle Bleak Host and Helsmiths of Hashut... one of which I painted...

Maggotkin of Nurgle Bleak Host


Nighthaunt Cursed Shacklehorde 

So as the year draws to a close I find myself in the possession of FOURTEEN Spearhead armies, SEVEN of which are fully painted! 

I also started a separate page on this blog to post pictures of the completed spearheads, keep track of the status of each the others, and post links to all the games that were played with each force:

Age of Sigmar - Spearhead Armies


In addition to Spearhead armies, I've been working to bring some of those forces up to full 1000-2000 point armies to play larger games! 


Blades of Khorne!

The Fourth Edition Blades of Khorne Battletome was released over the summer and that (and the thought of playing Warhammer 40,000 with Khorne Daemons) prompted me to start working on my Blades of Khorne again. This was the first force I worked up to a full playable force for both Paths to Glory and as potentially a 2000 point matched play force! I have no interest in Matched Play... but I COULD play it... 

All the Blades of Khorne, so far! 

This adds up to about 2500 points worth of stuff! 

You can see all the pics of individual units and characters and a number o  breakdowns of some different forces that could be fielded with this on the gallery page:

Age of Sigmar - Blades of Khorne

I still have a number of Blood Warriors (10) and Bloodreavers (30) I could paint up at some point (and two of the endless spells MANIFESTATIONS I could finish off). But otherwise everything I need for this is DONE! 


Sylvaneth

The Sylvaneth I have been working on because Amanda expressed an interest in playing them - which I am extremely pleased with (largely because these are FAR easier to paint than the Daughters of Khaine I originally thought she might like to play!!). This year I finished painting the stuff I had - the Awakened Wyldwoods and some Tree-Revenants and Spite-Revenants. Then I picked up their endless spells, a unit of Gossamid Archers, a used Treelord Ancient, and this years Battleforce box - the Outcast Spitegrove! 

Painted so far 

Amanda has been using them in the small campaign the two of use have been playing  (Methervale Campaign) and will hopefully continue to play them in the Blighted Wylds campaign! 


Maggotkin of Nurgle

Whereas the Khorne and Sylvaneth forces above were building on things I already had started in 2024, this was a completely NEW THIS YEAR kind of thing... 

Painted so far (less the Warhammer Quest: Darkwater miniatures that can be used in this force!) 


Nighthaunt

I have a small but growing force of Nighthaunts. I have only a few left to finish all the stuff I have. I did manage to finish up enough for a starter Path to Glory army and the Cursed Shacklehorde spearhead,


Stormcast Eternals

I finished painting the Vigilant Brotherhood Spearhead force... and that went easily enough that it, for a brief moment, inspired me to buy a few more units (used ones, at half price) and build up a bit of a force. I only managed to paint two additional Knight-Questors, though... so it isn't much more of a force just yet. 

(I do have a lot of other Stormcast Eternals - enough for a starter Path to Glory force in the previous edition, but it is made up entirely of Warhammer Underworlds warbands that, for the most part, are no longer playable in the game, having passed into "legends"...)


Other Forces

I have a few other forces for Age of Sigmar... but didn't get much done on them this year... Hedonites of Slaanesh probably have over 2000 points worth of stuff painted... I have well over 2000 points worth of Slaves to Darkness... but most of it needs to be assembled and/or painted, but I didn't feel much motivation to work on much of that this year... (other than the Chaos Sorceress on Daemonic Steed). I have the beginnings of Lumineth and Disciples of Tzeentch and a smattering of stuff that could be used in a Cities of Sigmar army... 


Warhammer Quest

There were still a few things I needed to finish for Warhammer Quest: Cursed City - Night Wars campaign that I finished up in the summer... 

Togilius the Chamberlain was the last figure I needed for the initial campaign in Warhammer Quest: Cursed City. I didn't finish him off until the heroes were at a level that they might actually encounter him. 

As the first campaign drew to a close, I finished painting the few things I still needed for the sequel campaign Night Wars, including Carmilla du Sang, Vampire Lord, the Fell Bats, and Radukar the Beast! 

Then there was Warhammer Quest: Darkwater! I rushed to try and get enough of them painted to try and play a shortened version of Act I with some friends on 30 December... in the end all I got done were the Mire Kelpies, four Heroes (Edmark Valoran, Bren Tylis, Inara Sion, and Drolf Ironhead), Shaman Foulhoof, Gelgus Pust and  Mulgoth the Cleaver, and three Blight-Templars... I'd really hoped I'd at least get the Pestigors done... alas... 


Role-Playing Games

There were a few Age of Sigmar miniatures that were specifically painted up for the Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Soulbound Role-Playing Game. The Arkanaut Company and Minstrel and Pilgrim were all painted as crew and passengers on the Kharadrom Airship; Grungni’s Face! 

Later, I acquired, converted, and painted up a Wight King to use as Sir Renmould of Sylum Field - Finnegan's character for the What We Do in the Realm of Shadows campaign 

I painted a handful of things for the Campaign for Ravensflight - mostly Finnegan's miniatures, including a few Dwarves that we'd planned to use in a sequel campaign... that we planned but never got to playing. 


What did YOU get up to over the last year? 

What was your gaming highlight of the year? 

What was your favourite miniature that you painted?

What was the biggest surprise? 

Let me know in the comments!!




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