Journeyman Painting Log # 25

Leader lost a hand, as is tradition. 

Quite the round number this series has gotten up to.  Today was more relaxed than yesterday's frenzy, but I still got some good work in.  I finally got started on the Striders, as you can see, and would guesstimate that I'm about halfway through them.  I'm still slacking on building the UA, which is one of four things I absolutely have to construct by the Nova Open, but there's still time to get it done.  Ideally I'd assemble and paint them before the Open, but a look at the 48ish hour forecast shows that the next likely spraying window is midday on Monday.  Priming should be no problem for the stuff that I hope to build by then, but painting and varnishing before I leave for the Open is a longer shot.  The current plan is to finish the Striders Monday morning before my spray window opens, then varnish my recent haul and prime the stuff I hope to build tomorrow.  If everything goes according to plan and if there's another spray window sometime Wednesday then I'll push to get the Strider UA done as well and call it a job well done.  I've already hit my (realistic) goal for the painting portion of the Journeyman league, namely getting a list painted for Hardcore, and will even take a decent run at my unrealistic goal of painting all my Legion stuff.

In non-painting news (!) I realized I've made a mistake over the last few weeks.  Hardcore has been my overwhelming focus for most of August, and July, and I still haven't fully settled on a list.  I have a general idea and a few iterations, but it's looking like an executive decision will trump play testing.  This is not ideal.  Even worse, I've neglected the rest of the events.  Since Hardcore is 50 while the non-"Championship" rounds are 35, this is a double whammy as I've been focused on one level and so haven't gotten a lot of practice at the other.  The lists themselves haven't been much of a problem, aside from a complete lack of recent testing, but a bigger issue has emerged: reinforcements.  At 35 points I'll need 7 points of reinforcements (I think, another bad sign) and I have few viable options for that level.  Striders are 6, but lack the UA.  No beast comes in at 7 points with the exception of a discounted Seraph, which will likely be in my Absylonia list already.  Raptors run 6 for a min unit, which would be ideal, except I don't have Raptors.  The best solution I've come up with thus far is Annyssa and a Totem Hunter, but best is relative here.  I've played Annyssa exactly once, which is one more game than the Totem Hunter has seen.  At least Annyssa is assembled.  On paper I like the pair as they're both fast, Stealthed, and reasonably resilient, but my lack of experience with them is unsettling.  Then again I'll be less familiar than I'd like with most of my lists, so at least they'll have company.