Last year I got a new sever for the house, well, it’s an auld office one but for my needs perfect
When I first set it up, I went with a ZFS setup for the two 3TB drives I got with it, but that was a major mistake and the thing kept giving me headaches before deciding it was going to go offline and refuse to ever allow me to access it
Never figured out why it went so bad, but the end result was that the whole system ended up refusing to boot again, so I had to scrap the install and start again
And I was pretty disheartened by it, and basically just brought online the bare minimum
But the past few weeks I have been slowly doing stuff that’s gonna make it work better, slowly but surely I am restoring functionality and adding new stuff
Firstly the system originally used CasaOS as a front end GUI, and that’s turned out to be a mistake as the developers abandoned it and are trying to move everyone onto a paid version that has fewer features, so screw that
The first thing I got running properly was Kavita, a book server, which is a great piece of software, I use Calbre to add the metadata, then save it to the servers book folder
But why use this instead of Calibre, simple, this will allow me to download books or PDFs to my phone, which can be helpful, but more helpful, it will email books directly to my Kindle, as well as Lindsay and Megan’s kindles too when they log into their accounts
The second service to fully get working was the media services, this revolves around PLEX for which we have a PLEXPass, I hated paying for it, but JellyFin just isn’t there yet in terms of access.
PLEX is really good, we ripped all my families DVDs/BRDs as well as Linux ISOs and now everyone gets access to our combined library without having to physically lend people the media
For media requests we have Overseer, where people can tell me something they would like to watch, and then I will go to CEX or eBay and acquire the physical media to rip and upload. Sonarr and Radarr are also installed, just saying!
When media is uploaded, another service called Bazarr then hunts out subtitles, downloads and adds them to the programs folder for use on PLEX
Which is just great because as a neurodivergent person, I can tell you that subtitles can be a godsend
AudioBookShelf, has alson been getting a few upgrades, mostly in setting my Audible account to auto download to it, which means all my old books needing to be downloaded and sent to the server, but thats ok, most of whats left to got on there is histroy book!
We also have a CCTV system running now, which is great, its recording motion outside the front of the house and retaining the footage for 7 days.
We don’t exactly live in a crime free area, but its not too bad, but when stuff does happen its a pain in the arse!
And yeah the notice board is great too, that’s running out of Home Assistant and whilst its not 100% there its almost there
We got a CCTV camera for the font of the house, there have been a few incidents down the years, and we think it would be handy to have a camera to help deal with that.
At the start of the year, one of my hobby goals was to develop my early war Germans for Bolt Action to a nice point where I had a nice collection that allowed me to play a variety of game play styles.
And I am getting closer and closer to that and I think I am basically at the point where the final plan is is place.
The above embedded Google Doc is what I have currently and my current development plans.
The army is supposed to cover 1939-1942, going from the Bzura, to the Meuse and then the Volga.
I think my plans work and will cover up to late 1942, very early 1943 meaning I may, may add a Tiger Ausf H to this list.
I am really enjoying working on this army but realistically with Graham and the other guys playing mostly late war stuff, I am gonna have to develop a later war army, probably sticking with Germans.
But I really want to explore more early war, so I can see myself expanding the French to 1250pts and perhaps some BEF.
I really wanted my next project to be Afrika Korps, but my most regular opponent is Graham and he has gone with a late war British list, and to be fair a lot of players, play late war.
This leaves me at a significant disadvantage with the early war army, so I am having to pivot to building a later war force to stand a chance in these games.
The difference in what you can take in the early war, and what you can take in later war is just unreal.
The above YouTube short demonstrates this issue for me, although the Centurion came into service just after the end of the war, you get my meaning, I hope!
So whilst I have Panzer Is and maybe a Panzer III Ausf H, Graham is rocking in with a Churchill, Sherman Firefly, Matilda II and a Cromwell in his arsenal, and that’s just not something I will be able to easily deal with.
So I have some Fallschirmjäger STLs from RKX and Colonel Muller, and I am gonna get some of them printed off, alongside a few vehicles.
I already have a Stug III, Luchs and Sd. Kfz 222 painted up for it, thinking of adding a Panzer IV Ausf H, Panther and Sd. Kfz 234/2.
But yeah, it is what it is, and next time I have some resin I will start printing them!
What I Am Modelling
I started out with a test model for an English themed New Antioch army
These particular models are form the Empire of Iron and Rust Kickstarter by Studio Historica
This one is a bit different, but I needed a 107mm x 105mm oval base for a Flak 36 for my Germans, but there was no STL for a plain one in the style of Warlord Games, so I kinda modelled it myself.
Its not going to be the start of a career in 3D modelling, that is not something I feel capable of, but its something, anyway you can download it yourself on Cult3D
So what’s up next?
Blood Angels Landspeeders
Ultramarines Saturnine Terminators x 6
Neophyte Hybrids x 10, Primus & Magus x 2
Rat Ogres x 3
Deffkoptas x 3 & Kustom Boosta-Blasta
World Eaters Daemon Prince
Grundstock Thunderers x 5 & Torrk Lennsen
Ultramarines Saturnine Command Squad x 3
Einhyr Heathguard x 5
Skywardens x 3
What I Am Reading
I finally, finally finished Dropsite Massacre by John French, I dunno why the headaches keep coming back, but it is what it is, I enjoyed it, but it did feel, I dunno, not rushed, but there wasn’t a lot of the betrayal in there which was a bit disappointing, but it’s a solid addition to the series.
I listened to Armageddon: Season of Fire by Jude Reid which was very good and a very good concept, I strongly recommend people give it a read, compared to the last new edition launch novel, this was a big improvement.
After that I listened to Memory Lane by Eddie Robson, which was a good concept, but it didn’t quite hit the landing, but a good listen.
Then I hit Butchers Nails by Aaron Denali-Bowden, an audio drama I have listened to before, but a long time ago when it first came out, and it was still really good. I miss Black Library audio dramas 🙁
I also got Kavita working when it comes to sending book via email to my Kindle, which is handy as hell, no more having to go upstairs, and as long as I am sensible and make sure to keep Kavita up to date with my books, it will work
What Tabletop Games I Am Playing
I played Brian in my first game of 11th Edition and it was a massacre!
We also ran a demo day at Gamers-At-Hart and I was demonstrating Bolt Action with some early war French and Germans, whilst others demoed Blood Red Skies, Warhammer 40k, Blood Bowl, Barons War and Trench Crusade
The Blessed Militia of the Martyred Saints has successfully funded and I have paid for that, looks like a really interesting set of minis for either Trench Pilgrims or New Antioch
Paintpal Studio XP successfully funded, I have the other STLs, and this made sense, one day I will actually get round to printing some of it to better store my paints
The Epic Sector – Frontline Project funded, I really want to play some Legions Imperialis, but it needs terrain, I already have the other two Epic Sector projects, so again it’s a one day I will get round to it!
I’ve come to the conclusion that I really dislike the very idea of Konflikt ’47, not just mildly, but viscerally.
That probably needs an immediate caveat: I’m not here to judge anyone who enjoys it. Plenty of people do, and that’s completely fine. We can like different things for different reasons without it needing to become a moral argument.
But for me, Konflikt ’47 just feels… wrong.
I love playing Bolt Action. It’s one of my favourite wargames. However, World War II gaming is already a serious subject. It isn’t just a neutral backdrop for cool tanks and infantry, it represents real human suffering on an unimaginable scale. It carries historical weight, and that weight never really disappears, even in a game.
That’s where my discomfort starts.
Konflikt ’47 takes that same historical foundation and adds zombie soldiers, mechs, occult experiments, and super-science. On paper, it’s alternate history pulp. But in practice, it turns something already rooted in real tragedy into something closer to spectacle.
Enhanced SS units, dieselpunk weapons, and “Nazis with lasers” sit uneasily with me. Not because I think people who enjoy it are endorsing anything, but because the aesthetic draws directly from regimes responsible for very real atrocities. It feels, to me, like it risks turning that history into something stylised, almost consumable, and that’s where it becomes uncomfortable. At times it even feels commercially exploitative, like the imagery is being used because it’s provocative rather than because it’s being meaningfully reframed.
I don’t think anyone who enjoys the game is a bad person, or thinking about it in the wrong way. I just find I can’t reconcile the mix of pulp spectacle with real-world tragedy. Or maybe it’s the idea of extending such a regime into “what if” scenarios that linger too long over history’s worst parts. Either way, it doesn’t sit right with me.
But then there’s the contrast: I really like Trench Crusade.
I’ve thought quite a bit about why that is.
The key difference, for me, is that Trench Crusade isn’t trying to be WWI with a technological twist. It isn’t asking “what if Verdun had mechs?” Instead, it’s a mythic, theological alternate universe where history has already diverged into something fundamentally different.
Yes, there are trenches. Yes, there is war. But it’s not anchored to specific real-world battles or regimes. It’s a gothic horror setting, a fantasy abstraction rather than a reimagining of identifiable history.
In that space, humanity is fighting literal demons of Hell alongside crusader-inspired factions drawn from Abrahamic religious imagery. It’s not alternate history in the traditional sense; it’s religious and mythic horror. That abstraction creates distance, and that distance changes how it feels.
The result is that it doesn’t trigger the same sense of proximity to real-world events. It feels like symbolism rather than substitution.
They just land differently emotionally.
That said, I do have some reservations about Trench Crusade as well. It’s intensely grimdark, almost relentlessly so. Compared to something like Warhammer, it lacks much of the satire or levity that helps break up the tone. I once summed it up in a Bluesky conversation as: “there are no Orks.”
But even with that, it doesn’t produce the same discomfort. It feels like a fully fictional mythos built to explore horror, rather than a stylised extension of real-world catastrophe.
And that, I think, is the distinction that matters most to me.
In the end, this is just my personal reaction to tone, framing, and proximity to history. I don’t think it’s something universal, and I don’t think it should be. People are going to respond differently to the same ideas, and that’s fine.
If anything, it’s a reminder that in games like this, tone matters just as much as theme. What a setting is doing emotionally is often more important than what it is doing structurally.
And for me, that’s where the difference lies.
What I Am Modelling
I started out with a squad of Pioneers for my Early War Germans
I also painted this Panzer III, but it’s a pretty crap model, the details are bad and the print isn’t great, I ended up scrapping the idea of it being for my early war Germans and painted it in dunkelgelb with the idea of giving it to a couple of my nephews as a toy
I also painted some test models for a French army, I am kinda fancying doing to face off against my Germans, and I am quite happy with how it turned out
His detachment negated most of my tough weapons, so stuff that should have been wounding him on 2 was now doing so on a 3 and that made a huge world of difference
Plus the oath of moment rerolls are so very powerful, but it was an excellent list and his played it very well
What I Am Creating
We published the latest epsiode of Edge of Empire
What I am Backing
I have backed the Worlds Beyond Brawl campaign by One Page Rules with a friend, it’s an interesting concept and we fancy a few of the models so why not!
And this Wednesday I managed to make sure to grab two issues of 90 to allow me to make myself a Forgefiend and Maulerfiend for the True Sons Warband of Chaos Space Marines.
He went off his food a little, something that was very unusual for him, but as it was hot and two of the others went off their food at the same time, we thought not too much of it, but a couple of days later and he was eating less and less
Initially we believed he had something up with his teeth as his breath was rather smelly, so away he went to the vets
After an initial examination followed by an ultrasound they discovered that his kidneys were failing, pretty badly and his bloods were really bad
They advised that the kindest thing would be to let him go, and that’s what we had to do, we were devestated
There were options for us, but the vet said these wouldn’t be great for his quality of life, especially given his spiciness when it came to medication
He was a beautiful boy, and we miss him so much, the house is very quiet without him as he was a huge personality
Barrington, Bonnie and Mango all seem a bit down without him around, but are slowly getting used to his absence
We aren’t getting another cat to succeed him, we are going to stick with three cats for the foreseeable future simply because we are just way too sad right now
I miss his cuddles, when he would randomly come to the studio, demand a cuddle and snackies, my nights have been very quiet without his presence
Good night sweet boy
Storage
We have now rented a storage space, annoyingly the only place we could find an affordable one was in Harrogate, which is an hours drive away, which is a ball ache, but we are paying a month, half of what most places wanted a week near us.
What is being stored in there right now is my Warhammer Scenery, 14.5 tables worth, with a couple more boxes going to join it soon, the Edge of Empire PA system and a bunch of Paul’s theatre gear.
This is great for all of us, because we have been struggling with long term storage of some stuff, my terrain has been stored in my in-laws attic, which will be replaced with some armies to clear space in my studio, but they will take up a lot less space.
What I Am Modelling
I started out by painting some bits for my Germans, starting with an officer and escort, these being from the Meuse to Volga project
At one point my Panzerbefehlswagen and Panzer 38 (t) shot all three of their machine guns at his anti-tank gun, and all 12 shots missed!
But still, it’s nice to get a win, although that rules me out for the wooden spoon!
What I Am Backing
We now have everything for Meuse to the Volga, with the delivery of the Sd. Kfz 251 pack, Panzer crew and the terrain.
I backed the German What-If (Prototype) Vehicles of World War II, it will have no value for game play for me, but could be interesting to model, or perhaps for Konflikt ’47, that delivered hella quick and I now have all the STLs.
The models are cool, as I said, more for modelling or for Konflilt ‘47 usage, where the Panther II will fit
Over There Part 2 continues to deliver and the fella who made it is a really cool guy, he is thinking of setting up a Patreon, which I will join!
For the planned DnD digital tabletop, me and Megan bought an old 32” TV which we are going to encase in wood and use for playing RPGs on using a digital tabletop, probably Foundry
I finally got myself the LinusTechTips Screwdriver and I have to say it’s pretty sweet, certainly the best consumer screwdriver I have handled in a long time
I also got the Shaft Extension, a set of Phillips head screwbits, plus a bit of PTM7950, not sure if I will put that in my current PC of hold it back for the next one!
Also got the Precision Screwdriver EndCap set which had to ship separately due to a checkout error
I don’t remember exactly when it happened, but somewhere along the way I stopped getting excited about new codexes for Warhammer 40,000 and started getting excited about the Napoleonic Wars.
These days I’m just as likely to be reading something like French Tanks of World War II by Steven J. Zaloga as I am flicking through Warhammer content, and when I look at new projects, I’m browsing Napoleonics as well as the latest Games Workshop release.
Which led to a slightly uncomfortable realisation:
“wait… am I a grognard?”
The word “grognard” actually goes back to the Napoleonic Wars, where it was used to describe Napoleon’s veteran troops, the grizzled soldiers who had seen enough to justify a bit of grumbling and bitterness.
In modern wargaming, it’s become shorthand for the kind of player who cares about historical accuracy, rules, and whether your unit really should have that equipment. A player who is less about the sci-fi settings of Warhammer 40,000, or the low fantasy of Warhammer: The Old World, and more about systems, structure, and coherence. The kind of person who can open a drawer and have multiple tiny-scale Napoleonics ready to go, with different forces representing different eras of a war.
In other words… the sort of person I may be slowly turning into.
I’ve always been a WYSIWYG player for myself, and yes, I’ll admit it—I sometimes silently judge those who aren’t. Not in a serious way, more in a “hmm… interesting choice” kind of way. Definitely not gatekeeping. Probably.
For example, my Heresy Death Guard don’t really do fragile or complicated weaponry. Very little plasma, no volkite at all. They’re bolters, flamers, meltas, and lascannons. They footslog rather than bounce around with jump packs, and when it comes to vehicles, it’s tracks and wheels only—nothing overly exotic or suspiciously floaty like grav tech.
Even when options were available in earlier editions, I tended to keep things grounded. In 2.0, they all carried chainswords when that was an option, because lore-wise it just made sense: standard kit, used sensibly, no unnecessary faffing about.
That said, I don’t expect anyone else to play like that. That’s important to me. I don’t gatekeep—I just quietly assume my way is correct and move on with my life. (Joking. Mostly.)
It’s the same with painting. Because I have the time, I insist on fully painted armies for myself. I won’t put unpainted models on the table. But I’m not about to enforce that on anyone else. People have jobs, families, studies, and significantly more important things to do than debating whether that shade of grey technically counts as “battle ready”.
What’s slightly concerning is that the same instinct that makes me design sci-fi armies like miniature historical organisations is now pulling me further towards actual historical wargaming.
Bolt Action in particular has started enabling this behaviour. Instead of building lists that are remotely efficient, I’ve found myself constructing early-war Germans as if I’m curating a museum exhibit, very specifically 1940 to 1942, carefully avoiding “just taking the good stuff” and instead focusing on what feels appropriate for the period. Which is a very normal and well-adjusted way to approach a wargame, obviously.
And I am already planning the next army: a French force to counter it, built around artillery, inexperienced conscripts, tough but flawed tanks, and hastily reactivated WWI Renault FTs.
Even outside the tabletop, it’s spilling over. I played Assassin’s Creed: Unity, told myself I was just enjoying the setting, and then suddenly I’m reading about the French Revolution and Napoleon like I’ve got a dissertation due.
So now the hobby doesn’t feel like separate systems anymore. It feels like different ways of scratching the same itch: structure, narrative, and making toy soldiers behave like they belong in a coherent universe rather than a random pile of statistics.
And I think that’s the shift. Not away from sci-fi or fantasy—but towards becoming the sort of person who says things like “coherent force structure” without irony.
As for Napoleonics, I’ve acquired some STLs and I’m just trying to figure out a system to use. Black Powder is tempting, but my friend Ken highly recommends Sharp Practice. Either way, I’m going to be that basic bitch, which, let’s be fair, I am, and play the Grande Armée.
But I am not leaving behind the Games Workshop stuff. The Horus Heresy remains my favourite setting, and the 3.0 ruleset is my favourite yet (although the missions are not great and are really holding the game back).
I like narrative-focused games, which, with the current way Warhammer Age of Sigmar and Warhammer 40,000 are played, is increasingly difficult. Standard terrain layouts make it hard to run asymmetrical, story-driven games rather than simply racking up points.
These games are very meta-driven, and that’s just not me. I want thematic armies, scenario-driven play, and less obsession with having the perfect list.
But these games do allow for a lot of freedom, exaggeration, and creativity, while historicals give me constraint, realism, and interpretation. I’ve realised I don’t have to choose one philosophy of gaming—the hobby, for me, has always been a spectrum, and I’m just expanding it. It doesn’t need to be binary.
I think this is how I’m going to approach things from now on. I want a choice of armies I can use for different systems, and that means focusing on one or two “main” armies per system and putting the rest into long-term storage.
So I need to go through what I have at home, compare it to what’s in storage, and decide what becomes my core collections, then store the rest. That doesn’t mean I won’t add to them, I probably will, because I love having variety to paint.
I’m going to keep Combat Patrols available because that’s such a fun format, but I’ll have one, perhaps two armies (so Megan and I can play together) for each system:
Warhammer 40,000
Warhammer Age of Sigmar
The Horus Heresy
Bolt Action/Achtung Panzer
Some form of Napolionics
Probably something for Sage
Legions Imperialis
Trench Crusade/WWI
Something fantasy, probably The Old World
This will give me some much-needed space and allow me to develop historicals in a way that represents different eras and theatres. For my Germans, I want a collection that covers early war, Afrika Korps, and eventually Normandy/D-Day, giving me a range of matchups. Meanwhile, my sci-fi and fantasy collections can remain more fluid and constantly evolving.
Terrain-wise, I’ve already sorted my fantasy setup, and I think that will work for Age of Sigmar, The Old World, and D&D. My home 40K terrain is probably going to shift in a new direction, I’m thinking a trench-focused set with two building styles: one sci-fi and one more real world. That way it can cover both world wars and Trench Crusade. One larger box of 3D-printed trenches, and two smaller sets of buildings.
So yeah, I’m not leaving behind fantasy and sci-fi, just expanding the hobby and making things at home a bit more organised.
I still love the grimdark of Warhammer 40,000, and I always will. But I’ve also found myself increasingly drawn to the structure, detail, and reality of the Napoleonic Wars and the World Wars.
So maybe the question was never “am I becoming a grognard?”
Maybe it’s simply that I’ve realised the hobby was always big enough for both.
What I Am Modelling
I painted up a Panzer I for my Germans, thinking of doing another one cause it seems like it’s gonna be good at supporting the infantry in Bolt Action
After that I painted up an Sd.Kfz 265 which I need for my Bolt Action escalation list, turns out that my idea of taking a Panzer I as a command tank doesn’t work as it can only be taken in this form as the Panzerbefehlswagen
The game was a loss for my, by a lot, but my army scored a lot more kills than normal, the Demolisher cannons proved their worth and my Malcadors were the MVP of the game
The major problem was that the intelligence of my Solar Auxilia is just not good enough to compete in a Relic mission with the Mechanicum, but the mission was great and I throughly reccomend them
On Thursday we started the Bolt Action escalation campaign and I am starting with this list
Rifle Platoon
Oberleutnant - Regular SMG
Heer Infantry Squad x 7, Regular, LMG, NCO with SMG
Heer Infantry Squad x 7, Regular, LMG, NCO with SMG
Sniper Team - Regular
Light Mortar Team - Regular
Armoured Patoon
Panzerbefehlswagen - Sd. Kfz 265
Panzer 38 (t)
I was playing Ken’s Soviet Workers Milita and it was a really nice army he had painted up
It was a pretty good game, but the game turned when Ken’s Ampulomet took out a squad of Heer, and my other squad attempted to run up the flank, but were wiped out by a combination of a machine gun team and a mortar shot!
I played a second game of Heresy against Russell, I took the list Inplayed against Graham with, just added a Stormhammer as we played 3500 points
The game was just the basic kill the other team scenario, and it was really a lot of fun, but my dice rolling was attribute and I went 2 1/2 rounds without rolling a 7 and thus didn’t hit anyone and I really think that hampered my results
It ended up being a loss of 31-17, which was fine, it was first game and I have learnt a lot, I just took a starter list suggested by one of the fan sites
Learnt an awful lot, and really had a good time!
What Video Games I Am Playing
I played Verdun for the first time, that was kinda cool
More of the From Meuse to Volga, 1940-1942 was delivered, including the vehicles, the pioneers and a bunch of stretch goals, including the PAK 36, which I have printed two of
I fancied watching They Were Not Divided, but couldn’t find it anywhere on a streaming service, so bought it on DVD cheap from eBay to add to the PLEX server
A couple of Sundays ago, myself and Megan played in a doubles tournament at Games-at-Hart, and it was for Megan their first time playing against someone other than me
We took this list, the rules were two armies of 1000pts so we took this list. With me playing the Guard and Megan the Blood Angels
Our first game was against a very serious pair playing Orks and Death Guard with both Mortarian and a Gorkanaught
It was a hard game and I felt I had to be a bit strict with the pair as they tried to control the game in ways that were not friendly such as picking our cards in the app for us, something which is a real faux par and extremely rude
I could not have imagined a worst game for Megan to start with and was a very much we went through the motions to just get through it
The second game was much better, sadly Megan fell ill and had to leave 🙁
Another excellent game and at the end we were 3 losses down, but that’s fine with me as fun was had
The event was brilliant, but there was a degree of the issue I dislike about 10th edition, and that is the problem of armies being built around the best most destructive units with the lists not resembling an army you would see in “reality”
Hopefully something that changes in 11th
What I Am Modelling
I started out with an Anointed with an Anti-Material Gun for the Heretic Legions to use in Trench Crusade
I then began work on a Fire Raptor for the Heresy Death Guard, I have had this model for so long, originally it was intended for the Space Wolves, but plans changed.
