This week I set out to make a decision about what my next hobby project would be. That is not easy task for me because I had to make sure that it was something that I would be happy sticking to from start to finish, and that’s something I have never been able to do.

So I set out to check out my local hobby stores of which there are two in my immediate area. The first was Good Games, I went in on Wednesday, the big gaming night there and found the store packed with CCG players of all types. I asked one of the staff if they get any table top gaming, he explained that they do have tables available for those who would like to use them but this location is usually just card games and the other location (about 20 min out of town) is where Warhammer and Warmachine are played regularly, the latter being much more popular than the former. On Thursday I visited the local Games Workshop on what I found out was their games night. It was just a little bit further than the local Good Games but much closer than the Good Games with table top gaming. I found it to be a really friendly place with lots of people painting away on their armies and battling on the tables. I spoke with one of the staff there and found out that it was a slow day for a Thursday and that they often run other events on the weekends.

After checking out the local venues I set out to weigh my options. At good games I could build a Magic or Yu-Gi-Oh deck, I could commute out of the city to play Warmachine, I could search a little and find a D&D campaign to join, or I could go to the Games Workshop and make either a Fantasy or 40k army. It was time to do some serious soul (and wallet) searching.

I started with the CCGs, I have a bit of a soft spot for Magic because it was the first geeky game I got into so it wins out over Yu-Gi-Oh, but looking at a card deck as a hobby I find it lacking in the control you have over the deck’s creation. Unless I were to spend oodles of money and buy the whole deck in singles I would be limited to using what is randomly purchased in booster packs. Also I am itching to do some modelling and painting, so a CCG was out.

Warmachine has always been something that interested me, there is just something so appealing about giant steam-powered constructs psychically goaded into fisticuffs with other similar constructs, that’s just awesome! The miniatures are also really cool and detailed so I can see myself spending the time to perfect the appearance of my army. Something I find off putting about it is the fact that there is no choice but to use named character warcasters, I generally shy away from the use of characters in my armies, I like to have the ability to build an army of my own led by a character of my own creation. Warmachine in general seems like it has much less customization within the units than I am used to with Warhammer. I think this characteristic of the game makes it much more balanced overall but for me would probably provide less fun in finding a way to make something tactically viable that is currently not. The biggest drawback to a Warmachine army is the distance I need to commute to the hobby shop that caters to it and holds open gaming. I don’t like to commute.

Joining a D&D Campaign would be really fun, but as far as hobbies go it is a bit too passive. I would only play ones a week at most and all that would be required of me would be to show up and play. I could DM but I do not have the confidence in my abilities to DM for a group of people that I do not know and that is the only kind of group there is in for me in this city right now. I would put this one on hold for now and possibly join one when I find one.

Finally I feel my hobby compass pointing me back to Games Workshop. I like the fact that the store is in walking distance. I know the hobby well having played it for over a decade. It won’t be a huge new challenge of starting from scratch and learning a new game, I think part of my draw back into the hobby world was to have something familiar in a still unfamiliar city. It will just be a matter of deciding between 40k and Fantasy and choosing a new army. If I can focus I will have a table top ready army in a couple of months. Now it is onto the specific decision of what army to play!

Between 40k and Fantasy I think 40k suits my situation best because of the lower model count possible in the armies I can field an army that is more portable and cheaper than I could in Fantasy. So I would like to play an army that:

– Is fun to paint (not Black, I have had enough of that colour with Black Templars)

– offers interesting conversion opportunities

– has a low model count

– is fun to play

Looking at the above criteria and my own army interests my options are:

– Ork dread mob

– Dreadnought heavy marine army

– Grey Knights

– Blood Angels

– Chaos Thousand Sons

Judging these against the criteria I have listed plus the immeasurable and often mercurial coolness vibe I get from them, I find that the Orks will end up containing a huge number of models no matter how hard I try, I would be very tempted to paint the Dreadnought marine army as Black Templars so I can later add them to my Black Templar army when go home, the Grey Nights may be very difficult to make competitive if I go an with extremely low model count, Blood Angels would have nipples on their armour, and the Thousand Sons are a little too Egyptian looking. No more time for flip-flopping, time to make a decision, the winner is Chaos Thousand SonsBlood AngelsGrey Knights! And that’s final… Probably.