GAS GAS GAS

 

There is a term used by musicians called GAS - Gear acquisition Syndrome. The manufacturers of items of extremely desirable music and studio equipment  release a product that is so well marketed, so perfect for your particular niche, so essential to your particular style of music creation that you have to have it. Regardless of price tag, complexity or the fact you could probably get exactly the same results with your existing products, it  becomes an essential purchase without question. And then something else comes along, you sell your last purchase at a loss and buy the next gizmo. And so it repeats 

GAS isn’t unique to the music gear industry - you get the same thing with any hobby be it photography, cars or birdwatching. It’s obviously very prevalent in the wargaming hobby. I highlight music gear as that was my first experience with the syndrome. I sunk thousands of pounds into shiny high end production equipment to the point of bankruptcy. All in all it was not a pleasant experience financially nor creatively but even more woeful it became a habit I’ve had trouble shaking off.

I re-entered the world of wargaming in an attempt to exercise a new creativity at a lower cost…. Laughable in hindsight….

My GAS habit carried straight over into my new hobby and as I have mentioned previously my purchasing and resell mindset soon spiralled out of control. 

This habit and my caution of repeating history is very relevant as I reach the half year mark of 2023. I always take stock of the years progress on my half year birthday to assess how things have gone and where things will go.  So 2023 so far….

Wins -

• Painted a 10mm army for Oathmark 
• Built a 2x2 set of terrain tiles for Epic 
• Bought and started a new Stargrave crew
• Played my first game of Frostgrave 
• Built and painted a small force for Dragon Rampant 

Loses- 

• Bought and sold Necromunda Ash Wastes
• Bought and sold Dropfleet Commander
• Bought and sold Bloodbowl starter set
• Bought, painted and sold starter army for Flames of war
• Swapped an epic army for a Viking army which subsequently got sold 
• Started and painted a British WW2 force f which was gifted to a friend 
• Bought or downloaded 10+ rulesets that I have yet to try

Hmmm, yeah.

 Not quite got the GAS under control. So I’ve decided to set myself a few ground rules for the rest of the year -

1. Not to buy any new miniatures until my current painting pile is finished
2. Not to add any units to finished armies until I have played 5 games with that army / warband 
3. Play through every existing scenario for each game I have minis for before buying any new rulesets 

Now - my painting pile isn’t very big - if I were to paint for a week solid I could probably have everything finished ready for the table. So I am allowing myself to at least think and plan a few projects for the autumn / winter. 

My summer is usually a slow time for painting and gaming as I like to embrace my other hobbies of fishing and pit fire cookery while the weather is good. This usually refreshes me enough to approach bigger projects with a renewed sense of enthusiasm and commitment once the days start to get shorter and colder

So a few ideas I have forming

• Militia army for Horus Heresy / Xenos Rampant
• Chaos titans for NetEpic
• Cultist army for Sludge (with war elephants) 
• Crew and terrain board for Frostgrave 
• Ork or eldar army for epic
• Nurgle themed kitbash army 
• Hedonites of Slaanesh army 
• Mordhiem warband
• Inq28 Inquisitor and Retinue 

That’s the short list. I’ve had to be a bit brutal shortlisting as things quickly spiral in my head and I’ve learnt there is a clear divide between having ideas for project and actually completing that project. The science of the dopamine hit clearly illustrates our fixation with dreaming and planning. It’s an easy reward to come up with a good idea. Much harder is getting that satisfaction of completing an army to a high standard and unique theme. 

So a bit of whittling to do. I’ll be back shortly to air my ambitions. Unless I get distracted with a new release in the meantime….