Some info about Brendon

By The Kiwi

Current head quarters…where are you at?

I live in the City of Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia.

It’s the City of sweating mostly. At the time of writing this (late November) it’s the annual Wet Season with really high humidity, thunder storms and big fat tropical rain. It certainly takes some getting used to and has an affect on painting miniatures. But most of the year it does not rain at all.

Do you belong to a game club?

Yep. The Darwin Tabletop Gamers.

How did you get into the gaming hobby?

Hmmmm…hard to say. Always liked games but came across this RPG called Dungeons and Dragons in the early 80s. I started with the Red Box with a fire breathing dragon on the front cover. I soon found some metal miniatures (25mm) and started painting and collecting them (I think they where made by Grenadier). My older brother was into model planes and I was always drawing a lot as a kid. I also attacked tank 1:35 scale models every now and then and my brother was a keen reader on history and military stuff. This is a significant influence I feel. Soon the figures got more interesting than the RPG and levelling up. My group of friends picked up a copy of Battletech. A hex map based battle game which I really dug. I was out of the gaming hobby for a while when I knuckled down for a few years to get a Diploma in Graphics. One day in my town (New Plymouth) a bloke I knew suddenly had a Games shop with lots of GW stuff in it. I very slowly started getting a few GW fantasy Orcs & Goblins and soon I was doing commission painting for the shop. It was great way to get my own collection started and kept my hobby costs down. When I moved to Oz my armys went into storage. It was again in 1999 I think when I very slowly got back into the hobby and haven’t stopped since then.

What’s ya Geographic story? Born where? Travelled anywhere?

I was born in New Zealand (Taranaki). In 1997 I moved to the Northern Territory in Australia. In 1998 I went to England on a working holiday and did a trip around some European Citys. On the way back to Darwin I stopped in Bali. Been back to NZ a couple of times and also managed to see every Australian capital city except Hobart. I like travel.

What do you play currently?

I play Flames of War exclusively at the moment. I just don’t have the time to learn any more rule sets really. I really enjoy the game and have not gotten bored with it yet. I first got into it after glancing at fellow gamers tables at my local club and thinking….that looks cool and they look like they are having fun. One of them told me that the Kiwis have an army list so from then on I was hooked.

What’s on ya table at the moment?

At the moment I have lots of stuff that I seem to be jumping from one thing to another. I have lots of buildings to finish painting, some Stukas and, some Early War German tanks that just need decals and matt coating. When I have had enough of doing one thing like buildings I go back to some tanks or something else. This helps break the tasks up so I don’t have 2 straight weeks of doing buildings (though I have been known to do that). Bottom line is though this is my hobby and not my job so if it starts to feel like a chore I stop or just switch to another task.

Cheers Brendon