 Hello, everybody, and welcome to another hobby-cheating video. And today, we're going to talk all about, well, 2024 plans. Let's get into it. So this is going to be potentially a slightly different video, but as 2023 has drawn to a close and 2024 is beginning, it gives us a moment to pause, reflect, and take stock. And also set some goals for the future. Now I've never been one for New Year's resolutions. I largely think they're stupid and don't work. That being said, the New Year is a great time for reflection and to sit down and think about some things that we can hopefully achieve in the coming year. And I know that might sound like a resolution, but to me, the difference is it's aspirational versus punitive, I guess. I've never liked the idea that these things are so, that these New Year's resolutions become, I will never do this or I must do this. I'm instead going to say, I'm going to try to do this, and I hope to do more of this. Maybe that isn't a strong of a statement, but for me, it becomes part of a mantra of every day, because I do believe this hobby and how you paint and what you achieve is largely a matter of what you believe you could. Not what you can, but what you could. And so I'm going to put that into practice every day in 2024. So in this video, we're going to talk about some of what's happened in 2023 and how I hope to build on it in the year to come. 2023 was really, I think, a great year of growth for me. I feel better about my hobby right now, where it's at, what I've achieved than I think I have in the past any years that I remember. It's been a year where I felt like I actually was able to push myself and achieve things I wasn't able to kind of ever before. And it's ironic because this year that I feel the best about my hobby and the pieces that I've done is also the year I've performed the worst overall across the board in every miniature painting competition I've went to. I've done worse across the board in every single one since I started doing basically miniature painting competitions eight years ago or something. This is probably the worst year since that first year. And that's, I suppose, tough to reconcile that somehow I could be proud and happy of where I am and what I've achieved and yet still have that occur. And I think it's because in the end I hope what I've learned is to evaluate my own work and my pieces about how proud I am of them and how happy I am with them and what I feel they represent in my hobby journey and not what any other external person says. And I hope that the same can be true for all of you. External validation is awesome. It is truly amazing when someone else looks at your piece and says, this is really good or I like this or here's a medal, you did great. But at the same time, I think that we have to be able to validate ourselves. And I think that's been my major journey this year is when I look at my pieces and I look at where they are and I hold them up to what I painted before, I'm like, wow, I've learned so much. And of that I'm really proud and so that makes me feel good regardless of medals or awards or anything like that. So there you go. Yeah, I mean, I've had a few of the pieces scrolling here over the top as I've been talking. But really you can see how this year has been a year of experimentation with light and color and all sorts of things that I've really tried to push myself on texture and all sorts of things like that. And I want to continue doing that. So let's talk about my four hobby goals for 2024. All right, hobby goal number one is to keep pushing myself with display painting. I've gotten bit by the large figure bug and I don't plan to stop anytime soon. That does mean there will be a fair amount of display scale tutorials on this channel. But don't worry, those of you who are worried, stop worrying. Are you stopped? Have you stopped? Okay, good. I'm glad you stopped. I'll still have plenty of normal army scale stuff too. But I want to keep pushing myself. I want to keep experimenting with light and color with really painting some pieces that are a challenge to me, something that I might have looked at in the past and said, whoa, that is too much or I'm not sure I could do that and do that well. And really give it a shot and see what I can accomplish. I think this is a year where I'd like to push myself some. I want to do that because I feel like just operating outside of the edge of my comfort zone this last year has really led to growth. And that's a really important part on the hobby journey of how you grow is you don't push yourself to where you're scared, but you put yourself outside of your comfort zone just enough. And that's going to be different for everyone. But I would say it's something that I would, you know, if you're looking to grow yourself, which you don't have to be perfectly fine if you're not interested. But if you are, I think that's probably the best way to do it is on every piece, push yourself on something about that piece just outside of your comfort zone. I also want to keep experimenting with some new tools. We're going to mess with some really cool different types of tools this year and some upcoming videos you're going to see. Specifically, we're going to start messing around with some oil pencils and things like that. So look forward to that. We're also going to take a look at the Army painter, new fanatic line, the new war paints. I am very excited about those and to be sort of getting into and amongst those. So stay tuned as I continue to of course be obsessed with and try new paints, new tools, new everything, because you know I'm a fanatic for all that stuff and can't stop myself. So in this case, the goal is just, I guess, lean into what I would do anyways when it comes to trying new things. And if they work, they become part of my repertoire. And if not, throw them out. My second goal is to keep participating in competitions. I know I said that 2023 wasn't a great year for me in competitions. It was a lot of loss, a lot of loss, or not placing as high as I had previously or whatever. But that's fine. I still want to go back. I've got that fire to take my pieces to competition and see what I can accomplish. The reality is I do really enjoy painting competitions. Now I won't be participating in Golden Demon this year. My resolution from last year is that is absolutely still on the table. I have nothing prepped for it and intend not to participate and will not be participating in US Golden Demon given all of the challenges and problems I talked about with the competition last year. Now that being said, I will still be going to Gen Con's many painting competition. I will absolutely be looking forward to Nova's Capital Pallet again. The judging on that and the entries in that have only escalated in an incredible way every year. And frankly, I've got to push myself to keep the pace with just the amazing stuff that's on display there. And in 2024, I'm going to go to Monte Sansevino, already spoken to the wife and everything like that. So that's all arranged. I have a couple of friends I want to go with. But I want to head over in November to Italy and participate in this. I'm really looking forward to it. I've obviously never been. It looks like an incredible time. Obviously it's a lot of artists who I respect and admire. I love the way the competition is run as being as much of a show as it is a competition. Being as much about sharing in everybody's art as it is about walking home with medals. And I really just want to participate in that. My goal is to build a set of entries and pieces that hopefully I can take to Monte that I won't embarrass myself with. That's really the goal. But I guess we'll see. But I'm looking forward to that. It's going to be a long 11 months until that day. But my guess is it will not be enough to make me as comfortable as I want to be with all of the pieces I want to bring. My number three goal. I want a new army. I just really want to get into an army project. I know that sounds crazy given the display painting goal I just said. But the army can be something slow and over the course of the year. It doesn't have to be done fast. But it's been a little while since I've done a really cool army project that I can work on slowly and put a lot of love into. The last project I really worked on to that degree was my rat cast. And I truly did love working on my little Skaven storm cast. I loved the conversions. I loved painting them. Doing an entire army in red and steel non-metallic metal is no I suppose mean challenge. But I really do love army painting. And my hope is that somewhere in maybe the middle of the year fingers crossed maybe when we get an AOS fourth edition that Skaven end up being like redone and the launch box or something like that. Or maybe they redo the whole army like they did for necrons in eighth edition 40K. I think it's a line that I fell in love with now. 25 years ago, 19 or more than good night. Yeah, longer than that. Time goes too fast in the late 90s. We'll just say it that way when I fell in love with original Skaven. And I've always just loved to continue painting that army. I'd love to see what the sculptors can do with it, how they imagine that army in 2024 and in the mortal realms and in age of Sigmar. And I look forward to if we would get new sculpts, man, that would just become my dream project to work on for the rest of the year. And importantly, something I can share with all of you who might be interested in the same thing and also something to help me break up the display painting. For those of you who know how I like to work, I like to do a display pace, sorry, a display piece and then an army piece and a display piece and an army piece. I kind of like to alternate and it keeps everything fresh and it keeps the juices flowing and I suppose your brain from melting out of the side of your ears, which is always a nice advantage. My final goal, one, I'm guessing probably a lot of you can empathize with. And that is to play more games. So I played somewhere between 55 and 60 games of AOS this year, something like that, as well as a bunch of other ancillary games around that, including obviously play testing for the games that I write and that Adam, Uncle Adam and I put out under snarling badger. So my hope is that I'll get to play some more games this year. I've got a good buddy who just came here and move close and joined our sort of Warhammer clubs. That's another person who can come and roll some dice, looking forward to more games there. I really want to try the Old World and see what it's like. Have they, you know, I played Warhammer Fantasy for a really long time and I'm interested to see what the update is and to give it a shot. You know, I have massive Bretonian and Tomb Kings armies still on square bases, still ready to go. So they can be busted out at any moment. And I'm I'm excited to get them on the table again and see how the game plays. So I want to play lots of games in different games. I just I want more time with friends sharing that awesome communal experience that is actually playing the games. There's something that's magical about this hobby because it is both the art side that we get to push ourselves in that way to be creative. But then also we get to get together with our friends and be social and engage in this actual gameplay experience with a lot of what we do. It's a rare hobby that allows for both of those things simultaneously. And I think it's what makes miniature painting really, really special in my mind is that it has so many facets that you can choose to take part in. And honestly, I want to take part in more this year. So that's my goal is to play more games, not only of, you know, AOS, Old World, but also try some new games as well and see what it all comes down to. There you go. Those are my goals. I want to know what are your goals for 2024? Do you want to paint a new army? Are you looking to learn some new technique to paint something that's always scared you? Tell me down in the comments about your goals for 2024. I really appreciate you watching this video very much and more and deeply more and deeper than that. I appreciate you going on this journey with me. It is truly wonderful to have all of you watching week to week. All of the patrons who support this channel, I cannot thank you enough. You are the lifeblood that keeps the lights on around here. That and it's unbelievably meaningful to me. Everybody who watches, who likes, who subscribes, who comments and shares and supports the Patreon and buys the merchant does everything. I am just a guy. I really wake up every day and feel like I am the least special person in the world. And I consider myself blessed and lucky every day that I get to share my hobby in this way with all of you and go along in this journey. I am honored in a way that I really can't easily describe that I get to share this and do all of this with you every week. And as long as you'll have me, I'll keep at it for the years to come. So thank you. Hit like, subscribe, do all those things that make all those dings. If you want to support the channel, like I said, maybe you're looking to grow. Maybe your resolution is to take your next step on your hobby journey. There's a Patreon link down below focused on review and feedback. We'd love to have you as part of the community. As always, though, I thank you so much for watching this one and we'll see you next time.