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Is it possible to burn yourself out at modelling. I got some warhammer fantasy for christmas and I'm really struggling completing them seems to be taking longer than normal and I don't think I'm giving them enough attention, not sure if this is because I'm not used to fantasy being smaller and more intricate. Is there anything I can do mindset wise or just take a long break till I feel the love again? Lemme know if anyone else feels the same and how you deal with it.

Just be patient and dont force it.

Before Christmas, my hobbying hit a low. After about two or 3 weeks, i got back on the bike and over the christmas break, i painted each day (all day, on some occassions).

Don't try too hard.

Set yourself goals that are clearly achievable.

Break the armies down into bite size pieces.

A few thoughts

1) Don't Panic

2) It's perfectly normal to find models taking longer to assemble esp if you get a good pile of them all at once.

2) Just take your time with each model and don't rush, you're not under any time restriction and there's no pace that you have to reach. Just assemble at your rate.

3) Set yourself times during the week for your hobby and in those time slots set yourself some rough targets to work with.
These don't have to be very specific and can be as simple as "start assembling troops".

I tend to find that its good to mix in some fun things in amidst the grunt troops. So say every 20 troops assemble or work on something fun like a hero or beasty before returning to the troops.

4) Try and avoid buying until you've cleared a good portion of your backlog.

The best thing I found was simply 'do something each night', without setting myself goals more complex than 'finish this unit', 'build this unit', etc. That way, when I sat down for 10 minutes, I could throw a layer of paint down or build a few models. Nights where I had longer I got more done.

Setting yourself deadlines that are hard to acheive makes your hobby more like work, which defeats the purpose of having a hobby.

Prior to that I would force myself to sit down for a whole day and finish a unit, which just burned me out and I did barely anything. Having a more relaxed approach to my progress actually helped me make more progress than I ever did when giving myself hard deadlines.

Mmmm... happens sometimes. I despair over the rules and the feeling I know them all, it leads me to not want to paint / build stuff.

Honestly, I get back into the hobby by looking at ebay. Take a few weeks off, look around at what other people are doing, and see if you don't feel inspired again.

Leave them on the table, do one model when you feel like it. Do anything like glue a hand on. Once you are bored walk away. That's how I ground out an Imperial Guard army.

Don't ever take a full Skaven army on at once. never.
Otherwise, the others have just about covered it.

 DarkHero wrote:
Is it possible to burn yourself out at modelling. I got some warhammer fantasy for christmas and I'm really struggling completing them seems to be taking longer than normal and I don't think I'm giving them enough attention, not sure if this is because I'm not used to fantasy being smaller and more intricate. Is there anything I can do mindset wise or just take a long break till I feel the love again? Lemme know if anyone else feels the same and how you deal with it.

Sometimes you just need to give yourself a break. Put all the toys away for a month.

Also, do you have all of your minis sitting out in various states of completion? I find that it can be overwhelming looking at 10+ unfinished models. Put them away and pull out one at a time, unless you assembly line paint.

 DarkHero wrote:
Is it possible to burn yourself out at modelling. I got some warhammer fantasy for christmas and I'm really struggling completing them seems to be taking longer than normal and I don't think I'm giving them enough attention, not sure if this is because I'm not used to fantasy being smaller and more intricate. Is there anything I can do mindset wise or just take a long break till I feel the love again? Lemme know if anyone else feels the same and how you deal with it.

Over Christmas, I set myself the target of painting 33 undercoated Praetorians. As a motivator, I posted daily pics of how the progress was going on my blog. I found that really helped as it had been a while since I'd conducted any serious painting.

Although it was assembly line type progress, I didn't do 33 of everything. It was back row trousers, middle row jackets sort of painting then vice versa

Well, DarkHero, at least you don't have burnout while trying to finish several large commissions. Nothing sucks quite as much as that.

~Tim?

I once assembled and painted 60 plaguebearers, a plaguehulk and 3 beasts of nurgle in 3 days for a local tournament and that took a toll on my will to paint and model for a few weeks but after some rest and focusing on other things the inspiration was back.

I find that changing scales and 'types' of minis can help with painting fatigue as well. I've got some Heavy gear stuff I 'should' paint (12mm) but am more into painting Dreadball (28mm) minis right now... And I'm a little burned out on robots (Heavy Gear and dreadball (my team of choice is the robots) so kind of looking forward to painting the human and ork teams that come with the Dreadball boxed game just for something different.

Any hobby, not just mini war gaming, should be done only as long as it is still enjoyable. There's nothing wrong with taking a break, some people end up going on a year long hiatus or more! This isn't your job, just do what is fun and enjoyable. It's healthy to have some other interests/hobbies so you can change your focus occasionally.

I painted a full DA 3rd company (and other models here and there) for Bartertown's Member paint challange. Now Im looking at my orks, IG and BA and Im like more to paint...........

Im going to paint a few here and there till the new book comes out. Ill see what the book has and either keep orks or dump almost all of it. Gaming time is almost nothing now with a child.

jason

I find working on a few different things at once helps a little.

At the moment I am rotating between Samurai and Deadzone. There is enough variety between different Samurai models (especially when you considering monks) and different deadzone models that I am hoping to not get two burnt out in the painting and modelling.

Of course working with restic does test ones paitentnce.

I'm kind of in the same boat, but it's been coming for awhile.

I have about 80 minis that are in various states. Some are still in the box (with the plastic wrapping), some are half way assembled, others are primed, and some, the lucky ones, have a base coat. - I do have a fairly extensive collection of completed models; I think it's around 500 individual models covering most of the 40k product line.

My painting skills are such that I've never been happy with a "3 color" unit. So when I look at an unopened box of 10 guys what I see is about an hour to decide the load out, 6 hours of assembly and another 16 to 20 hours of paint work. Which is a bit much when you think of it that way. I finally had to tell myself that I'm not allowed to buy another unit until I make some good progress on what I have...

Another issue I have is simply indecision. For example, I bought a FW Tantalus last summer and completed building it in November. That was a tough model to build, probably took about 16 hours due to all the warpage and "flash" (flash isn't exactly the right word when we are talking about chunks bigger than 1" x 1" that need sawed off). Now I have no idea how to paint it. My DE army is a hodge podge of 4 different schemes - green hair is the commonality. I'm leaning towards an darker orange base but I'm not sure; it's a BIG model.

The final issue is that every so often I have to deal with young children that decide to "play" with the models. My 2 year old made his way through a Nid army a month ago and I was finally able to finish "fixing" them last night. It's hard having to go back and repair things... Yes, they are put up high and in my garage - and he isn't allowed out there without supervision. However he knows how to find a step stool and climb very quickly...grr. I'm just glad I found all the pieces.

A few months ago, the Independent Characters podcast threw out the idea of using a Kanban board. Essentially you have 5 "stages" that each unit goes through: for example, Purchased, Assembled, Primed, Painted, Based. When a unit finishes a stage, you move it forward on the board. Pick a number, like 3, and say that no single stage is allowed to have more than that number of units in it. This way you know what it is you need to do to keep moving forward. When you have time, just pick a stage that you want to work in, grab a unit and go for it. One thing is that it forces you to keep moving forward with units that you might not really want to work on in order to get to the ones you do. This sounds like a really good idea so I may try it.

Another way of encouragement is simply playing the game. I made the decision that I won't play a game without completely painted/based army. League night just started up last week for me, so as we move on to bigger and bigger point values then I am encouraged to make sure that the units I want are finished. For example, I bought a new Cronos two months ago that I finished just before league started again so I was able to field it. When league hits 1500 points I plan on taking Vect, so I'll make sure that model is completed by then.

Other times you just need to take a break. Do something else for awhile like get some sleep. I find that when I'm not sleeping well my motivation for anything hits a low.

Absolutely take a break. Absolutely. If what you do for fun (which any hobby should be) starts to feel like genuine work, put it aside for awhile.

If there is something you're working toward (like you know a tournament is coming up and you need to get stuff painted for it), set a time frame like, "I'll pick this back up two weeks from now" or whatever it might be, and then make sure you actually stick to it.

I'm actually pretty burnt out on hobbying myself. I'm new to the hobby (got into it October of 2012 and didn't really meet anyone else that played til that January) and have always been kind of a loner my whole life. Made a bunch of friends with the local wargaming group and so I wanted to get them all something but as a poor post-graduate who can't find a full time job, money is an issue. Painting is not. I took it on myself to do a figure for each of my friends, which ended up being like 13 figures. I also am still in the process of building/painting a WW2 Spitfire made by Tamiya for my oldest brother as what is now going to be a late Chrsitmas/Early Birthday present. It's been a furious pace and ate up all my free time in December, so I'm totally burnt out even though some of what I've still got on my plate is now "late" I suppose.

It's amazing how people are different in regards to this hobby. I, for example, can assemble stuff (including cleaning, filing, and drilling) all day long and not get the least bit burned out. Painting, however, is a massive chore for me and I tend to force myself to get anything done.

I have three weeks to get a 2400pt Lizardmen army built and painted.

I have a super easy paint scheme lined up, and my Mrs is helping out, but it's a huge task still so I'm grateful that you started this thread, and for the great advice that has been shared.

Thank you Monders I agree great feedback thank you everyone and all the best with your current projects! I'm going to have a break from it and come back refreshed.

I first started collecting 40k about a year ago and I think I made a few beginner mistakes.

1. I chose a horde army without realizing how mind-numbing it can be to paint 100 ork boyz.

2. I was buying new units faster than I was painting them.

3. Assembly line painting. I would try to do too many units at once get burnt out after painting 20 Ork arms in a row.

These were the first models I had painted and, after doing 20 boyz or so, I eventually decided to strip them all and start over because I didn't like the paint scheme. Long story short, I ended up with a pile of unopened Orkz that gathered dust for about a year until I recently got motivated to start painting again. Now I just try to take it slow enjoy the modeling aspect of the hobby instead of worrying about finishing a horde army in two weeks. I feel like this has led to better painting results and more appreciation for the final product.

oh yeah, its possible. I started playing a while ago and would usually get a few marines every 2 weeks or so. One birthday, i picked up assault on black reach since i was a marine player and also wanted to start an ork collection. With that, some friends decided to get me some lootas, burnas, about 30 boyz, and a deff dread.

At first, it seemed fine. I rushed off to get everytrhing all glued, and when it came to painting them... I just couldnt do it. It was too much, and although i enjoy painting, i knew that i was a slow painter. After working my way through the boyz and nobz in the box set, i couldn't bring myself to paint any longer. Two years later, the models are still sitting around, just waiting to be painted, and i have revisited them within the last week and am slogging my way through.

Long story short, painting can become extremely overwhelming, especially when you're a perfectionist like me and have OCD about every minute error or the tiniest spot that was missed by the brush.

 Breotan wrote:
It's amazing how people are different in regards to this hobby. I, for example, can assemble stuff (including cleaning, filing, and drilling) all day long and not get the least bit burned out. Painting, however, is a massive chore for me and I tend to force myself to get anything done.

this is essentially how i am. Painting is a very difficult task.