Planning my Fun Pt.II

OK, so it looks like my old method of just buying figures in a random fashion might have been better!!! As I sat down and began listing the 25mm figures that I want/need to get some units together for WW1 gaming I quickly realized how much it will cost (in money and time to paint) and became a bit overwhelmed. It seems that when I plan out my figures needs I feel compelled to add one of every possible unit type "just in case!"

I am looking at @100 to 150 figures per group that I want to represent and there are 8 to 10 groups that I want to collect!

Germans: 1914 and 1918 (Different uniforms, so...)
French: 1914 and 1918 (Different uniforms, so...)
British: 1914
Americans
Austrians
Italians
And some troops for operations in Middle East/Mesopotamia

If I had sat down and planned my Napoleonic collection like this then I would have been too daunted to have ever begun the project!

In truth, it is actually nice to have a plan going forward. While the project is large it has obvious increments that make it easy to break up into manageable bits. Time to get focused on completing one of those groups so I can mark them off of my To - Do list.

Whats the old saying...
"How do you eat an elephant?

"One bite at a time..."

Planning my fun?

I have never been much of a planner when it comes to wargaming. I buy whatever figures that I like in whatever quantity I want/is currently available. Mind you, I don't buy 100s of figures at a time - after all, that might actually get me a discount - but I do buy in batches of 40 or 50 at a time. Oddly, that usually equates to about 1.5 units in most of the games that I play! I will never learn...

Lately, I have been staring at the assortment of figures that I have stored away for my various projects and trying to choose between buying more of them to fill out these armies or to sell off (unpainted) collections that have not seen the light of day in 5 years, or more. I have, more or less, completed my French Napoleonics and have loads of odds and sods left over from that. There are a variety of special units that I can make with all of these unpainted figures but I find myself wondering, will I actually do it? Further, I have piles of 25mm Saracens, ACW, WWII, Cowboys, and Vikings awaiting the call up. A quick examination of those piles reveals that I need more of them to make enough units for the games I think that I want to play. So I am faced with the hard choice of buying more to "finish" things or selling off what I have and moving on. Being a realist, and knowing how I am, I will buy more figures.... :)

This brings me to my Great War project. I have been "just buying figures" as I saw them. I can already see how this is going to get out of hand. So, I have actually written down what totals I will need to collect to have the forces that I want to play with and will buy the appropriate figures to meet those plans. Now I just have to settle on whose figures I want to buy!

This is as close as I can get to taking "The Pledge"...