Its getting to look like Christmas

The calendar keeps moving faster and faster. It seems only a few days ago it was just January. Now we are approaching Christmas and year's end. All in all, it has been a good year. Health-wise, it started rough but things are looking so much better. New meds and eating healthy has gone a LONG way.

On the hobby front, I didn't accomplish as much as I thought I would. I was aiming for 1000 points in the Vis Lardica painting challenge. I did break the 700 point realm, which was nice.

In terms of publishing, I did release the Second Kharkov Campaign. I was able to create the PayHip store which simplified direct sales. And I am looking into doing print on demand with Wargame Vault. (If I figure it out). I spent a while working on my scenarios for the War of Jenkin's Ear. I would say, that is at the 90% point. I am looking at expanding the North Carolina Campaign that I have the framework of in the back. I really want to run that campaign soon and see how well it works. The scenarios will get played out next year and should be able to publish by Quarter 2.

To celebrate another completed year, I am running a sale on my Payhip site till December 31st. Use coupon code OZG57E324Q for 35% off of everything. The address is: https://payhip.com/ChrisStoesen

Santa Clause

Lastly, it is getting a bit too later to run the Santa Clause event again. I really miss doing that. It was a great event. I would really like to know if anyone was interested in reviving that. As a reminder, Santa Clause was an event where folks would put their name in and be assigned a secret Santa and you would paint about $10 to $15 in miniatures for your target. It could be miniatures or terrain related. Then you would mail the the item to your target in time for Christmas morning. Being that it is December 11th, that is not practical. I miss this as it was my one chance to end up with hobby items as asking for them from family gets mixed results.

I'd like to pick this up again. It was fun and over the years, it resulted in some really cool gifts that were exchanged. I enjoyed following folks progress on what they were painting and seeing people post on the what they received.

I'd like to know if there is still enough interest to make it viable again. So, lets try something. If you are interested in seeing this come back to life and have a "Christmas in March - Santa Clause" event, please reply to this post and send me a mail through the contact form on the side of the blog. If I can get 15 names by Christmas, I'll start it back up with the first one due in March and in September 2020 will relaunch Santa Clause proper. I have some older posts on this. See http://cstoesen.blogspot.com/2017/09/2017-santa-clause.html for an overview of what we did back in 2017.

Anyway, Merry Christmas everyone.

It is Time for a Christmas Sale

As December rapidly approaches, let's go ahead and do a sale.

From 12/7/2015 through 1/3/2016 I will be running the following sale on my scenario books:
In the Name of Roma - $5.50 (normally $11)
The Coming Thunder - $5 (Normally $10)
The Falcon and the Gladiator - $5 (Normally $10)
Western Desert Campaign - Free with any other purchase

PLEASE NOTE: Do not use the quick buy links for this sale! Paypal the money directly to cstoesen@corecard.com. I have not updated the links.

You can take an additional $1 off the price if you join the mailing list for my fiction books. Folks who join the mailing list will also receive a free copy of Sharpsburg Sunrise, the prequel to my first novel, CSS Appomattox.

Merry Christmas Everyone.

Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year

As we approach year's end, I realize that this is probably my last post for the year. What a fantastic year it has been. I was able to get in more games than I did in 2013. I painted more figures than 2013. All in all, it was a very productive year.

This year we did a few giveaways. I saw record traffic on the blog only to have it die off to a trickle in November. Still, its been great fun. Thank you all for visiting.

Next year, I hope that things pick right back up. On the Vis Lardica site, the painting challenge was a great motivator. I ended the year with over 500 points. I am quite pleased with that.

That beings up what should I try to accomplish in 2015?

Here are my loose goals.
1) Complete a scenario book for the American Civil War in West Virginia.
2) Get some AWI figures painted that have been languishing in the lead pile in preparation for another AWI book.
3) Get some Old West terrain and get in some regular games with my son.
4) Play more Chain of Command.
5) Play some games of Terrible Sharp Sword.
6) Work some more on my Roman Dux project.
7) Get an article into both the Summer and Christmas 2015 TFL specials.

I want to try to keep it simple. I think these are doable goals. They are just vague enough that they should be within reach.

What are your plans for the new year?