All the units of the Roman faction from the starter set have been painted! Finally!
Here's the line of thinking that started it all:
-Is there a tabletop miniature wargame with an Asian-themed army? Oooo, Arcane Legions has a Chinese-themed army, called the Han faction! And it's cheap!
-I don't want to mess up painting the Han army, so i'll paint a few Romans units to test out prep, prime, paint, and finishing techniques.
-They look pretty good, i should just finish painting the entire Roman army.
Man, that took forever. Nothing kills creativity and excitement like monotony, and painting 10 identical units gets boring quick. Maybe if the sculpts were better, like units from games workshop with lots of detail, it would be more interesting to paint an entire army. But that means it would also take much more time to finish. I guess that's why most miniature games are skirmish-level, i.e. usually 5 to 10 units per side duking it out, because it's much easier to get them painted and start playing the game. Arcane Legions is a mass-action level, so 4 or 5 formations of 10 units each is typical.
Hateraid: I hated painting legs. Curved structures can't be painted with one careful brush stroke. You have to turn the figure. And each figure has two legs! and two arms! What a pain!
Loveraid:
-They look great! Much more fun to play with good-looking army.
-Worked out painting techniques like priming and finishing. Settled in on the ones i liked with a few test pieces.
-My brush stroke is much more controlled now. You get better after 40 figures so you paint more efficiently and faster.
-Figured out how paint consistency is related to how much paint is loaded on the brush. To keep thinned paint from pooling in crevices, you have to remove enough paint from the brush so it acts more like dry-brushing and paint will stay on the raised surfaces.
Future:
I'm probably only going to paint detailed, inidividual figures from now on. It keeps thing more interesting for me. I'll paint the Han faction when i'm all out of individual miniatures.
A toy fan was connected to a PIC microcontroller, which controlled the flicker of the LED candles! Blowing on the fan triggered a mechanical switch, which was counted by the microcontroller and turned off the LEDs. If you didn't blow long enough, the candles would turn back on like those trick candles that keep re-lighting! 
For anyone who eats banana's, banana stands are awesome. It hangs the banana like nature intended, so you don't get the brusing you normally get when you keep them in a bowl or on the counter. However, they cost ~$10-20 and they take up valuable counter-top space. For a small apt like mine, you need all the kitchen prep surface you can get! Here's an easy <$1 solution, a mug hook (package of 4 for $0.97) from Walmart! Drilled a hole into the cupboard above my sink, screw it in and ta-ta! done! 
