You know what’s better than cranking out a brand new fully painting army and rolling up to the club to play it? Doing it in half the time.
That’s where tag team painting come in! I talked about group painting and collective paint nights in an article awhile back called Group Therapy for Miniature Painting. Two parts of this article sparked a lot of questions, so today I’ll answer one of them ( you’ll have to wait for next week to read the other).
Some years back, in 5th edition, me and my then roomie Stephane would spend one night hobbying. The whole living room was turned into a hobby studio and we would build and paint a whole army. In two or three sessions like this, whatever army we would want would be fully painted. We were degenerates back then, and over the course of autumn we probably had 6 whole armies.
So here’s how to do this part at home:
1- Find another like-minded degenerate
The premise of this is having a buddy to keep you accountable, focused and motivated on the task at hand: building armies like savages.
You don’t have to be roommates, but living close enough or having a decent meet-up place is required. This is either really easy or really hard, depending on your scene. Whatever you do, don’t get a Kevin.
Like-minded how:
- On board with the plan: Build armies and don’t stop until you drop
- Owns or can purchase armies at the same rate as you
- Is not completely useless with an X-acto or a brush
- Shares your beverage preferences. Noticed I didn’t say Miller Lite / beer. If y’all want to fine wine and hobby, who am I to judge.
2- Plan
We are big in planning in here. But because this is a two-hobbyist job, both of you degenerates need to be on the same page.
The first thing is expectations. Set up realistic goals and means of achieving those goals. If you’re plan is to win big painting competitions and your buddy is more the drybrush and dip type, it’s not going to work. Work and manage expectation to avoid eventual letdown.
The second thing is workload. The keyword for this is evensies. Split things right down the middle as much as possible. One week my army, one week yours and alternate this way.
The same goes if you plan to sell the army after. Buy all the models, split the cost right down the middle. Sell the models, split the profits right down the middle.
This serves 2 purposes:
- Nobody feels cheated out of time and/or money
- This is not rocket science, it’s model painting. Keep it as simple as possible.
3- Consistency
Every week means every week. It’s like date night with your loved one, you don’t postpone, you don’t plan stuff that day and you don’t cancel by text or by email. Commit do doing this and expect your tag team to commit as well. If you don’t show up when it’s not your stuff that you’re working on, how do you expect to get work done comes your turn.
Show up. Win big.
As always, until next time,
No excuses; hobby like a champion!
