Forgone Miniatures - 2025 End of Year Wrap Up
Retrospective
2025 has certainly been a change of pace for me. To cut a long story short I have switched jobs. Where previously I was able to work from home a lot, and therefore get more painting done, my new role I’m in the office four or five days a week. Essentially, I now have less time for hobbying and blogging.
I got 183 models painted this year, almost half what I did in 2024 but I’m happy with that. I got through a lot of miniatures I’ve had for quite a while like the Games Day 2012 Blood Angels Captain, and I got to paint a lot of new stuff as well, particularly the stuff for Kill Team.
The number of articles published is a similar story, 39 this year compared to 47 last year. Although given the nature of what I have published I would be willing to bet I published more words in 2025 than I did in 2024.
So, knowing I didn’t achieve quite much this past year let’s see where we’re at with the goals that I set for myself.
Paint all Commemorative Series models.
Eh… I did only publish three new Commemorative Series models this year: Grombrindal, Invocation of Elements, and Azrakh. However, I have painted a bunch more. It's just that the articles will be published next year.
Review at least one book and one WarhammerTV show.
Nope. The trouble is that now I have less free time, I want to spend that time painting rather than writing. And what writing I have done is for my narrative campaigns.
Publish at least six narrative campaign battle reports.
Speaking of narrative campaigns, I published four this year. Not as much as I intended but as I said I have much less free time. Additionally the articles were part of my Five Parsecs from Home campaign rather than my much anticipated Kill Team. I have tried to get the Kill Team solo mode to work for me but unfortunately it just doesn’t have the feel that I want.
Make a start on the next board game.
I have waded right into Massive Darkness 2 and in fact I should be finishing up the core box in fairly short order. And then I can crack on with the plethora of expansions. I have also decided that if I can get Gotham City Chronicles done then I will get an FDM printer to go in the space it creates.
Assemble and paint the Bandai A-Wing and B-Wing kits.
Another nope. I think after the issues I had with the Y-Wing I just can’t muster the enthusiasm for the other Bandai kits. Part of it is also the disjointed process; instead of building and painting the model, you build and paint the cockpit, and then assemble the rest of the model around the cockpit.
Stats and Numbers
It was another year of growth for the website. We had nearly double the traffic, 21,354 visitors this year compared to 11,744 last year. It means an average of about 1800 visitors each month and between 50 and a 100 per day.
As always the Gloomhaven Jaws of the Lion Level 5 unlocks article takes top spot as the most popular page this year, with 1747 visits. However the Kill Team articles are beginning to sneak up on it, with the Volkus Terrain, Veteran Guardsmen and Inquisitorial Agents articles slipping into the top ten this year.
As for engagement, people spent the most time on the Grisaille Underpainting and Kâhl Yôht Grendok articles, 13 minutes and just under 10 respectively. Both garnered just over 200 visits each. The Feculent Gnarlmaw article makes a return with an average of 9 minutes over 48 visits.
We did get a lot more traffic spikes this year, and even our first traffic drop alert. Feels good to be getting enough traffic that Squarespace lets me know when it’s lower than expected. I’m not entirely sure where all the spikes come from, some of them are a result of my posting on social media. But some are what I suspect are bots, the one in mid-October for example it was around a hundred page hits in less than a minute. Definitely not human in any case. Probably some AI is scraping my website for its precious data. I wonder if there’s a way of checking?
The Year Ahead
In 2026 Forgone Miniatures will turn five years old. I feel that I should probably do something to mark the occasion. I do also have a few website improvements that I want to do but it will be a case of finding the time.
So what do I want to achieve in the new year? I’ve gotten to the meat of my Five Parsecs campaign so I’m keen to see where that story takes me. But also I don’t want to abandon my Kill Team campaign, I’ve put a lot of effort into it and I feel I just need the right game system to make it work. Kill Team is just a bit too balanced, not really designed for fighting hordes of enemies. I do have a bunch of other campaigns planned but I’m already pressed for time so those may have to wait. In particular I have picked up the Five Parsecs from Home expansions and I already have a few ideas in mind.
On the painting front, my copy of Warhammer Quest Darkwater has been delivered so I can get stuck into that. Obviously I have the rest of Massive Darkness 2 that I need to do. And I seem to have an endless supply of Commemorative Series miniatures to paint as well. As I didn’t do them last year I really need to get the A-Wing and B-Wing done this year, I feel they might be my big projects that I put a decent amount of hours into.
Looking ahead to the rest of the year, there’s the Maggotkin of Nurgle range refresh coming, so I’m excited to pick up the new models. And of course we’re expecting Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition so that will come with a litany of new Space Marine sculpts.
Given that I do have less free time, I think my goals for the coming year need to be fairly conservative.
Publish at least six narrative battle reports.
Finish painting Massive Darkness 2.
Assemble and paint the Bandai A-Wing and B-Wing kits.
Find a suitable game system to start my Kill Team campaign.
Paint the Rascal Town Goblin.
Overall I’d say they’re fairly achievable, only three of them involve actually painting something so I feel like my odds are pretty good.