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Intro. Hobby; Painting; Game-play; Rules; All things Imperial Guard/Astra Militarum (IG/AM) - especially Death Korps of Krieg (DKK) GOALS: #1 Goal: Getting an IG/AM army and display board up to standard (as best I can do) is goal #1. A. Get it built and Painted. B. Get Better at Painting. C. Make the effort, try new things, push my skills. #2 Goal: Second, I'd like to work on my game-play on the tabletop with Guard. A. Tournament prep. B. Better Mindset. C. Play more games. D. Learn better from the games I do play. (e.g. avoid leaps based on anecdotes - 'the basilisk killed 3 dreadnoughts this game, I need more basilisks') Reasoning/Understandings: It seems to me that others will not only be different in their approach, but directly opposite in several instances. I share this now as a starting point of discussion, not the last word on truth. Regular; Methodical; Stable. Based on past experience, motivation and discipline ebbs and flows, and it takes way more time than scheduled for me to complete anything. Regularity is needed because starting several months in advance is the only hope I have of showing up prepared - instead of my usual showing up last minute and cramming to get a substandard army done, which is usually very disappointing. Striving to achieve is far better than just showing up. Continuing along with a specific mental picture (bad and good) is also helpful to stay on a charted course, as opposed to starting and not finishing dozens of projects. Working towards completion and goals adds legitimacy and satisfaction, where chasing somebody else's new projects and wins is a more hollow path leading to burn out. mandating an hour a day can fall apart can collapse once real life hits. 15 minutes can and often is enough to breath life into a project - one step at a time. Mindset; Orientation. It's fun to win some games. And, realistically it's hard to keep any hobby motivation while getting crushed game after game. While there are lots of very thoughtful, professional, and in-depth articles written these days at various blogs and websites, they almost all carry a rather large blind-spot--the middle and bottom half tables. There are tons of armies that don't make the weekly 'what's broken in 40k' round of podcasts and youtube channels. Let's set some realistic (uncommodified) goals and make some honest appraisals. In 9th we know DKK are not good, but it's not helpful for that to be a crutch. That'll spiral out into, 'lets just not play.' It's a hobby, let's enjoy it. I've got to be accountable as a general. And, at the same time, if winning was the only goal, I should be playing 2x per week at least, and all 2000pts would have to be on the table to change out at a moment's errata or FAQ. I think I start to get comfortable with an opponent army around 10 games. I don't have the time, inclination, or hobby group with a free trade pool of models, to chase after most other armies codex creep. And, if I can get 3x games a month in, that'll have to do (hopefully I get more in). That said, within the limits of goal #1, I'm ok with using custom or other regiment rules, as even the codex itself specifically allows the player to decide regimental traits. And, I'm ok with taking allies, though even that has limited rules appeal in 9th edition. Battle #1 post COVID - Harlequins Fun game and a close loss to Harlequins. Wow they move fast. Fusion pistols are very good. I don't think it'd have been close if I didn't get first turn. The harlequins themselves are like little Tasmanian devils--it only takes a few of them to just obliterate units. Bullgryns did not do well at all. Death riders points increase really hurt as I removed their commander to fit in points. Without the orders their movement wasn't stellar. The malcador infernus was comically bad, though always fun to have on the table. I suppose I could put it in reserves to keep it away from my units when it explodes. The Medusas look cool, I guess. -1 to hit really adds up on units that don't get bonuses. Overall, hugely rusty on the rules. It's been a year. Woof. Having trouble remembering secondaries, terrain, army rules, etc. The brain has limited bandwidth--only so much real estate is available at a time, and using too much depletes capacity. This highlights how necessary practice games are to me playing well. I could play Manticores instead of Medusas, but i lose a lot of DKK flavor... I did see a cool taurox - manticore conversion recently. The Tank Commanders have good output, but the smaller table size seems to make deployment even more difficult than in 8th. I'm thinking more and more about scout sentinels, or Gaunt's ghosts to get into no-man's land quicker.