Good Orcs, Great Banter, and the Eternal Question of Base Rims
Painting progress, hobby peer pressure, and one very important unfinished detail
Sometimes a hobby chat says everything you need to know about how things are going.
This time it started with the kind of reaction every painter wants to see. Stas showed off his freshly painted orcs and immediately got the response he was clearly waiting for: “Naaaaaajs”, “mega”. Fair enough too — the minis landed exactly where they were supposed to. Good enough that the compliments came first, and the nitpicking only a moment later.
Because of course it did.
Michał quickly pointed out that there was still “just the rimming left” because the model looked a little unfinished. A few seconds later the whole conversation had already gone where hobby conversations always go when someone says “rimming” out loud. Pegie summed up the initiation path into the hobby perfectly: first people convince you to get into Warhammer, then they get you painting… and then comes the rimming.
Classic.
The base rim debate lives on
The best part is that Stas wasn’t even forgetting the base rims. He actually had a plan.
He said he was thinking about not painting the sides of the bases at all. Not because he has anything against neatly finished rims, but because he liked the idea of leaving one visible trace of the painting process — one little element that still shows the miniature as something handmade, worked on, in progress even when it’s basically done.
And honestly? We kind of get it.
There is something charming about that moment right before a miniature becomes fully finished. Sometimes the unpainted base rim really does make a model feel like it’s still sitting on the painting desk rather than in the display cabinet. On the other hand, a clean rim is one of those tiny finishing touches that suddenly pulls the whole miniature together.
Which is why Michał immediately delivered the obvious counterpoint:
“Doesn’t the fact that the miniature is painted already reveal that it was painted?”
A fair question. Possibly impossible to answer. Certainly very funny.
Hobby energy is building
What we also love in this exchange is how clearly the momentum is building in the group.
Pegie mentioned that a whole package from “the Chinese seller” had arrived, and that once the wrists recover a bit, painting is back on. That is a very real hobby sentence if we’ve ever heard one: new supplies are here, motivation is high, the body just needs to catch up.
Meanwhile Wilini dropped in to confirm two things:
- the orcs are good,
- he was also absolutely going to mention the base rims before Michał beat him to it.
So yes — the consensus seems clear. The minis look great, and the group instinctively zoomed in on the exact last detail that separates “painted” from “finished”.
A beautiful weekend ahead
And maybe the most exciting bit: the upcoming nerd weekend is shaping up very nicely.
Wilini called it already — this weekend is going to be beautiful. We’re looking at Combat Patrol and Spearhead games all the time, with the possibility of some bigger Warhammer 40k or Age of Sigmar if enough points get painted up and assembled.
There was also a mention of Marek, whom we’ll apparently meet during the nerd weekend, and who has picked up a Seraphon Spearhead. So the pile of potential games is growing, the painted models are appearing, and the usual social pressure to finish just one more unit is doing its job.
Exactly as the hobby gods intended.
One shirt, one image, one perfect side note
In the middle of all this, Michał also reminded us that Wilini once bought Marek a very specific T-shirt. We are not going to improve on that story by overexplaining it — it is simply one of those perfect little group-chat detours that makes hobby communities what they are.
Final verdict
So where do we land?
- Stas’s orcs got the reaction they deserved.
- The base rims are now a matter of philosophy, not neglect.
- More painting is coming as soon as wrists, time, and life allow.
- The weekend plans are looking dangerously good.
- And yes, apparently this is exactly how the sect works.
If you’re reading this while staring at a miniature that is “basically finished” except for the base rim: we see you. We know. And our group chat would absolutely call you out too.