Hi folks,

The announcement of a resuming of the Call to Arms’ challenge for the third consecutive year has set my mind in turmoil. Every year this event is a key incentive to reach new milestones in completing assembly and painting of these numerous minis stuck in Piles of Shames.

For me 2023 has unlocked a very serious progress: I resumed an Aeldarii project stopped at least a decade before Crafworlders changed from Eldars to Aeldarii. This cleaned part of my backlog and allowed a revival of this first (second in fact) love (once the concept is applied to 40k factions). Additional entries for the Imperium faction helped progressing on my 2023 New Year/New Army (AdMech) and cleaning down remaining ooP SW vehicles.

2024 also contributed to reduction of my carry-over but in a lesser extend: the challenge allowed me to complete my AdMech Force with lesser investments. It also included some Scenery and a few Drukharii bought to complete the Ynnari orientation of the Aeldarii built in 2023. But volume was lower; My consolation is that quality increased. Or at least it is what I like pretending. Biggest lies are the ones you address to yourself. But I clearly progressed if one compare with my early (90’s era) works (now largely cancelled/repainted.

2025 is going to be very similar to 2024 I guess. Mainly because I have less time and less minis in the queue. And also because what remains is still related to Pointy ears and AdMechs. Let’s check the inventory I made. It covers most of my 30k/40k back log once excluded a kitbashed LR, some hacksawed metal models and a serious amount of ooP EPIC squats and SM.

.xlsx is my fav list making tool…

It brings me to a split into forums that makes the Xenos faction ahead with a total of up to 106 pts available for being painted. Aeldarii and Drukharii can combine nicely in a global Ynnari series of vows, maximizing the potential point value that could be harvested if I can paint all of that. GSC and Spore mines are the (xeno-infected) cherry on the cupcake.

Imperium is a tad behind with up to 76 points available. Yet AdMech is still representing a backlog of about 31 pts, which is not that far from Drukharii. And I paint now AdMech faster than before. So it remains a good second family of vows.

Trick is that many minis require being built or kit bashed. All of the Astra Militarum must be kitbashed from GSC. On the first hand it is a lot of insigne cleaning and head swaps over 30 footsloggers and one vehicle on the waiting room. Corsairs and Proxy scouts also represent, on the other hand a similar amount of infantry models to be kit bashed.

So, it is a lot of work to be done before the launching day. I will definitively start with the Pointy ears, but first step is to get the slottabases. I have just placed the order for the 28,5 mm bases I need for getting all these kit bashed Corsairs properly built. I couldn't have anyway used the original 25 mm bases I had with the Guardians as I lost these... Next update will therefore be focused on that point: kit bashes

See you once work will be worth being reported.