Man Cave or should I say Hobby Space?

Now that presentation is out of the way, let's post about the place where it all happens, the place where I will most likely spend quite a few sleepless nights to take this project to fruition: my own hobby man cave!

Those photos are from a year ago, when we had recently moved to our current house. Everything looks tidy and perfect. Lots of Games Workshop on the shelves and quite a lot of space yet in the room. That is not a proper man cave. It needs some chaos and madness thrown in with just enough order into the chaos to allow you to find the right tools and colours while you are working. 

Fast forward a year and let's see how it looks... Warning!

Posting the current mess on the Internet could cause injury (to me). Click Publish and hope for the best!

So, now the Warmachine models have taken over the shelf space, the table is full of tools, paints, brushes and all sorts of stuff and even some models in different stages of assembly. Better lighting, more paints, more models, new airbrush, more chaos... fun times.

Another addition is a secondary working area for my miss but I tend to invade that space all the time when I am working alone. I reckon that (specially after posting it publicly) another tidy up session is coming soon which is not a bad thing at all I guess.

Enough for now, in the next entry I will be (finally) showing some painted models. If this blog is going to show the painting progress of the army I guess that means that I also need to set a goal. As I still don't have the details of the tournaments regarding point size limit of the armies, format and all of that I cannot have a detailed list of models to use but I will try to focus on what I feel is more likely to be used.

Some final thoughts... if it is shared with my girlfriend is it still a man cave? Pound on that.

A New Beginning

The first step is the hardest, or so the saying goes. I guess it is worth getting the basics out of the way so Hi!

Who am I?

I'm Fran, a gamer originally from Spain that currently lives in the UK. My interests include but are not limited to wargaming, miniature painting, roleplaying, video games, computers, cats, metal music, sci-fi, fantasy... all that in no particular order.

I have always loved games of any sort. Growing up loving Lego, military models and reading 'Choose your Own Adventure' books among other sci-fi and fantasy literature certainly has lead me down this path. I have been roleplaying (mostly Dungeons & Dragons but have played tens of different games) for over 25 years now. I loved videogames since I saw the first one and was fascinated by the technology. I always dreamed of becoming a Game Developer and I have fulfilled at least half that dream. I am a (software) Developer so I guess that I had to add the Games part as my hobby to be complete.

Wait a moment, so... why English if you are Spanish?

Personal preference, number of potential readers, current environment, challenging myself,... pick your poison. All those reasons and more to a certain extent.

What is this blog about?

This blog will be my personal space, in which I will be posting mostly about my interests and hobbies. My intention is to use it as motivation and to track my progress with painting and gaming. At the moment I am mostly interested in Warmachine/Hordes from Privateer Press. I am painting my Khador force to attend Smogcon next February. It is still six months until the event but if I don't start painting at a reasonable pace it won't be finished in time, and that is where this blog will help (hopefully).

What about the URL?

Kyamsil? It's just my online persona. It's the name of a character in a fantasy novel I started working on ages ago. Writing was not my forte so I ditched the project after having only a few pages but the name stuck with me. It was unique enough as to be available in most services and forums so that's the reason.

What is Smogcon again?

It is the biggest European gaming convention dedicated to Privateer Press games, mostly those set in the fictional world of the Iron Kingdoms. A full weekend of non-stop gaming with several tournaments, painting competitions and other geek fun activities. It's going to be my first big full weekend wargaming convention so I am quite excited about it.

Have you been playing Warmachine/Hordes for long?

I have been playing this game only from the beginning of the year but learning fast thanks to the Wessex Wyverns gaming club. I switched to it from Warhammer 40000 after playing that game almost exclusively for over 10 years.

10 years of 40k sounds expensive... What happened?

Yes, huge investment in time and money, that's for sure.

Long story short, I have been sorely disappointed by the direction the game was going and got tired of the constant price increases and less than thoughtful rule changes. Being handed the short straw two editions in a row for my beloved Tyranids was the last drop that made me consider jumping ship and moving along, a decision I still feel was the right one to make. I am enjoying Privateer's take on competitive gaming and organized play way better than the 'we make games for narrative play' attitude of the late GW.

I still have the models however, so I could have a game now and then if I fancy it, but it is not likely.

What about past conventions?

I attended Games Day Spain in 2009 and since I moved to the UK two years ago I have attended two Games Day UK and Salute 2014. Games Day UK 2013 was ok but 2014 was a big disappointment. If you are into this hobby you must surely have heard the stories about how they ruined it by changing venues to an smaller space, dedicate it mostly to sales, bad placement of the painting competitions in the low light basement, and so on.

Salute 2014 was a complete blast (but quite expensive when you account for all the models I got home) I really enjoyed that one and hope to go back next year.

So that's it for now. Presentation...check, Declaration of Intent... check, Random Rants... check. Yes, I think we can close this one.

I hope you liked it, more to come soon...ish.