The Butterfly's Hobby Tally 2025

Happy New Year! It took me some time to get this tally of my hobby activities together. But now I invite you to have both a look back and a look ahead with me!

Pict 1606: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Army for A Sector Ablaze

The Hobby Tally 2025

As always, I will start by having a look at what I set out to do at the beginning of the year. I had three goals lined up: 

• Paint 2 pieces of terrain each for the SciFi and the Fantasy collection
• I did finish both the fallen head for my Amon Hen table as well as a Cottage made by ForgeWorld. I did, however, not paint any Sci-Fi related terrain. So halfway there!

• Once again paint more than 100 miniatures.
• Smashed it mate! The final tally stands at 219 finished miniatures. Quite an impressive number and the highest since 2020! One additional stat: I posted 169 pictures to this blog and of course took loads more.

•  And again, buy less new stuff, paint the stuff I have and most importantly play with it!
•  While I did buy quite a bit more stuff, I'll still count this goal as mostly fullfilled. Mainly because I really did paint a lot and because I'm happy with the amount of gaming.

Again, if you want so look back at my painting progress of previous years, here are the links to the tallies of the past: The Tally 2017, The Tally 2018, The Tally 2019, The Tally 2020, The Tally 2021, The Tally 2022, The Tally 2023, The Tally 2024

Looking back through notable projects of 2025

• Scenery: The two terrain pieces I finished this year: the head from Amon Hen and a simple Cottage. I quite like the both of them, but I yet have to play a game with them. I really should paint up the Amon Hen ruin and make a board to play the narrative scenarios!

Pict 1529: Amon Hen Statue Head

Pict 1560: Warhammer Forge Cottage

•  Legions Imperialis at Warhammer World: One of the highlights of the year has to be going to Warhammer World for the first time and playing in the A Sector Ablaze narrative event. Winning a trophy for my objective markes was the cherry on top!

Pict 1607: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Army for A Sector Ablaze

Pict 1612: Legions Imperialis Forward Operating Bases and Trophy from Warhammer World

• Heresy at home and abroad: During the same trip to Great Britain, I also got to play in the Discordia narrative event in London. I painted quite a few additional Blood Angels both for this event and the tournaments and narrative games at home! I still have yet to try out Heresy 3.0 and my painting progress has stalled after its release. Right now, I'm focused on small scale Heresy to scratch that sci-fi itch however.

Pict 1617: Horus Heresy Blood Angels Army for Discordia

• DreadTober: Speaking of, this year's DreadTober project of two Reaver Titans and a bunch of magnetized weapon option fits right into the Epic Heresy. I feel like I stepped up my game, especially with the additional decals on them. I really should try and get them to a gaming table!

Pict 1664: Legio Solaria Reaver Titans

• Adeptus Titanicus: In addition to the two Reavers, I also did some good work for the Legio Solaria with four Warhounds. And I painted some of their retainers, the Knights of House Procon Vi with four Cerastus Lancer Knights and four Atropos Knights.

Pict 1535: Blood Angels Tacticals advancing with Cerastus Lancer Support 

Pict 1546: Legio Solaria Warhound Titan on the Prowl

Pict 1563: Legio Solaria Warhounds

Pict 1655: House Procon Vi Cerastus Knight Atrapos

• Ents: Lastly, for Middle-earth I painted two more Ents – one Birch and the third character, Beechbone. I played them in one tournament and had great fun beating up a whole load of orcs while doing so!

Pict 1579: Ent

Pict 1631: Beechbone

Hobby Plans for 2026

Looking ahead, I don't have a specific project in mind. But I want to try and focus on playing and reducing my backlog again. So the three simple goals are:

• Once again paint more than 100 miniatures.
• Paint the stuff I have and buy fewer new miniatures.
• And most importantly have fun and play with my miniatures.

 

Going back to Rivendell

During the past few weeks, I ventured back into Rivendell. Of course with Christmas, the Lord of the Rings films are in rotation! I refurbished an older paintjob on a mounted Rivendell Captain and started wo work on three more heroes of horseback as well.

Pict 1694: Rivendell Knight Captain (reworked)

Pict 1695: Rivendell Knight Captain (reworked)

Pict 1696: Rivendell Knight Captain (reworked)

I had finished this Captain when I first painted Rivendell elves a few years back (even before I started this blog). In the mean time his lance was broken and I felt that I could do a better job with the details by now. So I replaced the weapon with a spare one and did some repainting. In particular I focused on the face of the rider and the horse as well as the highlights on the cloak. I also changed the colour of the robes to a brighter beige. I am now looking forward to painting some more Rivendell Knights as well as mounted heroes.

Pict 1697: Elrohir, Glorfindel, Elladan (WIP)

What promted this switch to Rivendell was the Tale of Four Painters series that ArbitorIan is running. This time around they are focussing on MESBG. I would like to paint along and try to do at least 500 points of all mounted Rivendell in that time.

Next up are a few more heroes. The old metal Glorfindel as well as Elladan and Elrohir, the sons of Elrond. I also had started these three back then. The on foot versions are already done, but I will go back to them, once these mounted versions are painted. I started with the faces, which are recognisably done by Gary Morley. I love his work on Warhammer Fantasy sculpts, but somehow the proportions on his Middle-earth stuff are often not quite right. Nevertheless, I do like how they look so far and I think they will be great once they are done.

A Swarm of Jetbikes and another Legolas

During the last few weeks of the year, I want to try and finish a few more projects that I started during the year but never quite finished. First up are the Legions Imperialis Scimitar Jetbikes from last week and another Legolas.

Pict 1688: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Scimitar Jetbikes

Pict 1689: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Scimitar Jetbikes

As planned, these Jetbikes were quickly done over two more evenings. The pigment on the base always ties the paintjob together and I'm quite happy with them. They look like a swarm, ready to descend on any enemies!

Pict 1690: A Piece of the Battle of Five Armies

Pict 1691: Legolas

Pict 1692: Legolas

I started this Legolas with the MESBG tournament in November in mind. While I ultimately decided on The Black Gate, I also toyed with a Battle of the Five Armies list consisting mainly of Iron Hills Dwarves supported by Beorn and Legolas. With the pivot to Morannon Orcs and Troll Chieftains, Legolas was left by the wayside. Finishing the highlights did, once again, take not to long and I'm very happy to clear the miniature from my backlog!

Pict 1693: Procon Vi Questoris and Porphyrion Knights (WIP)

These Knights do not quite fit in with the rest, because they are a new project. However, the colour scheme does lend itself to a quick paintjob. For now, I put down the base colours. Next will be the deacals and then it is on to the oilwash.

ArcWorlde Faery Dragon

While I did not finish to much over the last few weeks, as the Real Life once again took over, I still managed to finish up a cute Faery Dragon from ArcWorlde.

Pict 1684: Encountering a Feary Dragon

Pict 1685: ArcWorlde Faery Dragon

Pict 1686: ArcWorlde Faery Dragon

The dragon had been sitting in my box of started projects for quite a while and had collected a fine layer of dust. I had done the base colours, but then was daunted by the fact that I decided on a mainly white scheme. Starting with some very diluted pinks and violets to shade the wings and the blue body gave me the required confidence. Thankfully I had started the white parts with Ulthuan Grey, so I was able to put in some layered highlights. I'm pretty happy with the outcome!

Pict 1687: Legions Imperialis Scimitar Jetbikes (WIP)

I also continued to work on my Legions Imperialis Jetbikes. The decals over the hood were a bit tricky, but all right in the end. They might have come out even better with an additional go of Microsol, but I wanted to get onto the washes and highlights. I'm almost done with them now, with only the glaze and highlights on the red armour to go. And of course the pigments on the bases. But they should be ready for my next game!

A third Mordor Troll Chieftain

Over the last two weeks, I mainly worked on a Black Gate of Mordor army that I took to a tournament last weekend. I finished a third Mordor Troll Chieftain, a Orc Taskmaster and a Morannon Orc Banner bearer. Afterwards, I turned back to Legions Imperialis finishing my Mastodons and converting some more Predators.

Pict 1674: Black Gate Reinforcements

Pict 1675: Mordor Troll Chieftain

Pict 1676: Mordor Troll Chieftain

The lynchpin of my tournament army were three Mordor Troll Chieftains. This third one is not converted as opposed to the other two. Whily I simply repeated my colour scheme from a few years back, I'm really happy with the way this one came out. I added another layer of highlights to the armour, which doea help it look less bland and I'm tempted to do the same with the first two.
The trio was quite the menace once they got into close combat. But since I did not have to much practice with them beforehand, I made some errors placing them. They and the Morannon Orcs were often in each others way. Nevertheless, they were great fun to use!

Pict 1677: Morannon Orc Banner and Mordor Orc Taskmaster

The other two finished miniatures of this army are the Orc Taskmaster (Where there's a whip, there's a way!) and the Morannon Orc with Banner. While not that exciting, they both provide important buffs to army, even if I only ever profited from the Taskmasters ability once. But he did manage to kill a Mirkwood Elf by using his whip as a throwing weapon whilst charging, so I'm really quite happy with him!

Pict 1678: Morannon Orcs (WIP)

The Morannons themselves are not quite done, but I got them to a place where I could put them on the table and not feel bad about it. They have their base colours and a wash applied to them. And as you can see, I have already done their bases. The danger is that I'm now not incentivised to acutally finish them! I will try and finish the details and highlights on them in smaller batches in between other projects. If I can get that done until the end of the year, I'll be happy.

Pict 1679: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Mastodons

Pict 1680: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Mastodons

Pict 1681: Legions Imperialis Blood Angels Mastodon Conversion

Switching back to Legions Imperialis, I finished up these two Mastodons. I'm really looking forward to using them in a game sometime soon. I only have four bases of Terminators to fill the converted one. So I might just use them to drive around Leviathans instead.

Pict 1682: Legions Imperialis Scimitar Jetbikes (WIP)

I also started to work on my Legions Imperialis Jetbikes to finally add some Vanguard choices to my painted pile. So far, they are still missing the metals to complete the base colours. I think they and the washes should go on rather fast. As I have leared by now, the highlighting will take a bit longer, but I hope to have them finished by mid-december to immediatly put them onto the battlefield!

Pict 1683: Legions Imperialis Predator Destructor Conversions

Lastly I also converted some more Predators for my Legions Imperialis collection. This time in the Destructor configuration with the additional pintle mounted Heavy Bolters. They should provide some good anti-infatry dakka. I used the bits I had left over from the other Predators, a set of Deimos pattern Rhinos and some plastic card. They are not perfect, for example I did not cover up the door details and simply glued the sponsons into side hulls. But once painted up, I'm sure they will look the part. The one pintle marine with the banner will be my Predator Commander and the HQ choice for my armoured company. I magnetised the cuppola to make transporting the miniature easier.

DreadTober Week 4: Reavers are done!

While I did not manage to post last sunday, I have now finished the two Legio Solaria Reavers that I had pledged for DreadTober. Once again a successful year!

Pict 1664: Legio Solaria Reaver Titans

I am really quite happy with the two Reavers! I feel that the decals really help to bring them to life. And of course it is great fun to swap the various weapons around! I can see myself painting more Warhounds or even a Warlord, but I think I done with Reavers. (At least for now...) The final touches I was missing at the start of the week was pretty much only the trim on the main engines. But man – that did take some time! I am, however, happy to have done the additional highlights – it does help with the contrast.

Anyways, here is a bunch of photos of the two and all the weapon options I painted:

Pict 1665: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan

Pict 1666: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan

Pict 1667: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan

Pict 1668: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan

Pict 1669: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan

Pict 1670: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan

Pict 1671: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan Carapace Weapons

Pict 1672: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan Close Combat Weapons

Pict 1673: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan Ranged Weapons

The Contemptor I wanted to do as a stretch goal is very much in the same state I showed it at the start of the month. The hobby butterfly has well and truly distracted me!

DreadTober Week Three: Decals and Oilwash

Lots of works on progress today as I am plodding along with the two Reavers as well as two new projects in Middle-earth.

Pict 1660: Legio Solaria Reaver Titans (WIP)

Pict 1661: Legio Solaria Reaver Titan magnetised attachments (WIP)

The finish line is in sight! I finished up the trim over two evenings and then spend a further evening only applying the decals. The oilwash is just about dry – drying takes quite a bit longer, now that the temperatures are lower once again. Still, I should be able to varnish them over the next few days and then put in the finishing touches of highlights, battledamage and weathering.

Pict 1662: Legolas (WIP)

I was toying with the idea to go to a MESBG tournament at the start of November. But with about 800 points per army I did not quite know what I would want to play. Messing around with some options with the help of Tabletop Admiral, I landed on two ideas. The first one of them being the Battle of the Five Armies using mainly Iron Hills Dwarves but getting help from borth Beorn and Legolas. Something I had wanted to do for a while now. Especially the Beorn and Dwarves combo – I had painted my Beorn accordingly. But I was missing a Legolas painted with a fitting base and so I went looking for a fitting sculpt. This one, from the Heroes of the West box set is not quite perfect, sporting the Galadhrim bow and cloak he is gifted by Galadriel. But he will do the job! For now, the base colours are done and I hope to finish him in between everything else on my desk right now.

Pict 1663: Morannon Orcs and Mordor Troll Chieftain (WIP)

The other idea revolves around the Black Gate and another Troll Chieftain. But since the army now can no longer take normal Mordor Orcs, I'd have to paint a whole bunch of Morannon Orcs. I'd like to try nonetheless. Both because I think the Morannons should paint up quite fast and in a big group and because I had a great test game with them yesterday. We'll see how far I can get!