Hobby log update (no pics- yet!)

Hi all,

well, I'm finally ready for that Fantasy game (you can see the updates as time goes along here, here, here, and here!) I actually finished up well over target, and got the army up to 4000 points fully painted, with a few extra Zombies for good measure (for those all important raises.) . all the shields are done, all the movement trays are built (although I did sell out and use GW movement trays- that was my 1 time concession.) So overall, I'm pretty happy. The list has changed, so here's what I've ended up with:

Lords

Count Mannfredd on Barded Nightmare
He leads the Black Knights

Heroes

Lady Rosslynne- Vampire, Level 2 Caster
Lord Rickon- Wight King with Great Weapon
They lead the Skeleton Horde unit.

Markus- Vampire, Level 2 Caster
Kain- Wight King with Great Weapon
They lead a Skeleton unit

Kossov- Vampire, Level 2 Caster
Juan- Wight King with Great Weapon
They lead a Skeleton unit

Sigurd- Cairn Wraith
He leads the Grave Guard

Core

Skeleton Horde- 38 Skeletons with spear, shield, full command and the Banner of Swiftness

Skeleton Rabble- 23 Skeletons with hand weapon, shield, standard and champion

Skeleton Rabble- 23 Skeletons with hand weapon, shield, standard and champion

Zombie Rabble- 25 Zombies with standard

Wolf Pack- 12 Dire Wolves with Doom Wolf

Wolf Pack- 6 Dire Wolves

Special

Black Knights- 9 Black knights with barding, lance, full command and the Banner of the Barrows

House Guard- 19 Grave Guard with hand weapon, shield, full command and the Screaming Banner

Ghosts- 2 Spirit Host

Wraithriders- 5 Hexwraiths

Twilight Vampires- 3 Vargheist

That's 2999pts, all requirements met. It's more units than my original list, and although I've lost the Mortis Engine, I've gained Vargheists and Grave Guard, so it's a fair trade. Especially since in the 3 games I've used the Mortis, my opponents have been so terrified of it they've killed it by turn 3- until I get 2 of them, I don't reckon they're worth it.

The basic plan now is to have the infantry advance blasting away with spells, while Mannfred runs up a flank with all the Cavalry and fliers. Simple enough. Hopefully Manny will be able to put out spells regularly, which will keep the Vargheists alive through the Lore of Vampires Attribute. All of the units hit fairly hard thanks to the characters... so now we'll just wait and see. I know that there's 9 people besides me, so I have no idea what I'll be facing across the table.

From a project point of view, now that monkey's off my back I've got a little time to spend on other things. The Khador models that I've had kicking around are getting painted, and my LotR Dwarves have found their way into my bits box. My next step over the coming weeks is to replenish my paints and dip, and then I'll be looking at new games. The plan at the moment is, starting around September, to buy a game and 2 factions and get them painted up every 2 months. I'm not talking whole armies, but there's a hell of a lot of games out there now which have passed me by, and to try them out and see what other people like I'm adopting the coffee table gaming approach and getting small collections for a few games, which I may grow later.

Anyway, that's the plan. I'm going to pack up the army for tomorrow.

Comments, as always, are welcome.