The Game Will Not Be Denied

We made a grave error by thinking we could get away with letting that whole endeavor thing pass from last lantern year. No problem. We just skip getting endeavor this year and draw another event and see where that goes.

Us: "Hey, it's all good, The net result is the same and it would be a pain to go back and undo all the rolls we did."
KD:M: "Pain? I'll show you pain."

We started the settlement phase and immediately drew.... plague. Plague is what wiped a prior settlement. We are terrified of plague. It's especially bad when you have a limited number of survivors to choose from, since it can only infect survivors with at least 1 hunt XP. Each of the four you choose has a 20% chance to die from contracting the plague.

We lost all four. One of them was a savior.

Also, plague comes back next lantern year. That means we have to choose four more survivors to roll on the plague table. More potential tragedy.

For the hunt, we decided to add Spidicules to the campaign, the first expansion we've added. For a new campaign he could replace the Screaming Antelope, so we thought that would work well.

Yeah, right. Remember the pain thing?

Warning: some Spidicules spoilers here...
Right away, the "Young Rivals" story event to introduce the big spidery ball ended up losing us an experienced survivor. We were really down to a limited number of survivors who had been on a hunt at this point.

We set out with two new survivors, the red savior and the experienced archer Link. Getting Link to bow mastery is part of our settlement strategy to allow more survivors to get bow specialist points. Right away the hunt started oddly. We faced a muggy heat wave and had to roll for heat exhaustion. We all laughed because last time we faced a snap of freakish cold that damaged the unarmored. What did we get later in that hunt? The cold snap again. Survivor Al was especially beat down by the cold.

What went especially well was the hunt event that resulted in our getting the rare gear Spidicules sword. We couldn't use it this time but we'll have that one ready for next time.

Facing Spidicules was scary but not terrible. In fact, we walked out of that encounter with more survivors than walked in thanks to the nest at the center of the table, from which we freed two captives. He flings lots of little spiderlings around, and they are a decent enough threat but easy to kill. We must have drawn another easy AI deck or immediately buried any difficult cards because nobody suffered any maiming. At the end of the showdown, the spider (another spider maybe?) grabbed survivor Al and carried him off. We'll find out what happened to him if we fight the spider again or as a settlement event on lantern year 11.

We took our loot and headed back. One thing we didn't really notice before is how great armor sets are. If you have all the same type of armor in all five slots you get some pretty good (and fairly distinct) buffs. Things like being able to switch hits to other locations or getting spent survival back 50% of the time. We only noticed it when adding the Spider Silk armor card to the set.

I'm Still Writing Lantern Year 5 On All My Checks

Lantern Year 6 is almost over. Sometimes it gets a little sketchy as to when one lantern year stops and another one starts, since part of the settlement phase happens in one lantern year and the rest in another lantern year. In this case, the settlement event (haunted) from lantern year 5 carried on to bite us in lantern year 6.

So, to recap....

We fought an antelope in year 5, and returned.
We drew "haunted" and lost all our endeavor for the settlement phase.
We incremented the lantern year, and fought a Kingsman (as a result of "armored strangers")

...but then we cheated.
We forgot we had lost our endeavor, and so we endeavored. We got two new survivors as a result of intimacy rolls, but nothing else in augury or scavenging. I'll get back to that after describing the hunt.

Deciding to hunt another antelope, we crafted a couple new weapons (including the counter weighted ax I've been wanting) and departed. Since Daphne died last battle I was now controlling Sharon.

Nobody likes Sharon. It all started as an in-joke with my daughter but we decided Sharon was the girl in the office (or settlement, I guess) that nobody likes or pretends to.

But Sharon got the counter-weighted ax and almost zero armor and we departed. The first thing that happened was a freakish cold snap that froze the less armored of us (I guess not everyone is smart enough to dress in layers, Sharon.)  That ended up being a big problem for Sharon when the antelope grabbed her in its gut-mouth and chewed on her. She lost an arm. Fortuitously though she managed to grab a strange toothed heart out of the beast's innards and it proceeded to barf her out. Yay! Oh, wait. Lost arm means no more counter-weighted ax. Boo. So we killed it without further maiming, and returned victorious (quit your whining, Sharon. We all have problems.)

We called it a night, only later realizing that we had spent non-existent endeavor. The idea of rewinding the settlement was daunting enough (more from inconvenience than result) that we decided to lose the endeavor from this settlement phase instead. Yeah, I know. We have been really hardcore about doing things exactly by the book, but fixing that just seemed.... onerous. None of us feel terribly guilty about it. The group is expected over here to play again in 8 minutes, so I suppose it's time to publish this.


RULES LESSON: We've been playing something wrong. During the hunt/encounter phase, resource cards do not return to the deck. That limits the number of some things you can get from a monster (makes sense, since "Lion Testes" is an option) and makes it more likely that you will get one of the rarer cards if you draw enough. Okay! We will start doing that correctly.

Lantern Year 6: Brutally Outclassed

Having so recently killed a Screaming Antelope for the first time, the group was feeling pretty good about our combat readiness. We were also looking forward to crafting more gear now that we had some more resources.

Instead, we met an unexpected adversary.

Armored strangers entered the camp before we could even craft more gear, and marked 5 of our 10 survivors for execution. We decided to rise up and fight rather than let our population be halved.

So begins Showdown: Kingsman.

Dave couldn't make the game, so Stef, Seth and I took our red savior along and gave her the zanbato to ensure some high strength auto-hits. Survivor Hondo had his lion katars, Kiki used Link's bow and Daphne used her bone dagger.

It became evident quickly that this was going to be difficult. The Kingsman uses his own fighting style, and could easily counter any one of us. Only by overwhelming him with attacks or attempting to learn his rhthyms can you hurt him, and attempting to match his steps can result in injury or death for you. Survivor Daphne managed to figure out his fighting style well enough to keep him distracted long enough for the others to get a swipe in. Even with Daphne figuring his style fairly early on, his attacks were devastating, destroying armor and requiring us to burn survival points to avoid too many rolls on the dreaded severe injury table. Daphne kept close to ensure she could keep him distracted, but ended up getting her head exploded near the end of the battle. Hondo suffered a leg injury and can no longer use fighting arts. Kiki and red savior Zelda escaped unscathed. The dying Kingsman drops no resources.

So now we are down a survivor and haven't even done the lantern year 6 hunt.

Spoiler: for landing the killing blow on the Kingsman, Hondo is now cursed to slowly become a Kingsman. It might. Not happen for a while (at least 4 more hunts, likely many more) but it's inevitable. Even in victory this world punishes.

I Have Two Mouths And I Must Scream

Lantern year 5 started with emboldened survivors ready to take on new quarry. The "bold" didn't last long.

Right off the bat, the settlement event resulted in two of us getting our strength decreased by one. Ouch. Nick-names... who said names can't hurt you?

We had been living in fear of the Screaming Antelope ever since seeing the artwork depicting its stomach maw devouring survivors. This game is brutal, but that was especially horrifying. Nevertheless, we had recently geared up, had some decent survivors and thought it time to try something beyond the lion. Hondo was concerned about his 0 insanity going into the battle, but went anyway.

On the hunt phase, we were immediately subjected to a stampede, which struck Kiki right in the head, splattering her brains all over us. Everyone suffered brain damage as a result. This was really starting poorly. We even started asking if there was a way to back out... there wasn't. We were on the hunt now.

....except, that didn't really happen...

A little further investigation revealed that event damage is non-lethal. It can cause woulds, but can't make you roll on the dreaded tables. Kiki's head miraculously reassembled itself. We all got some insanity back, Hondo and Daphne recovered from the disorders they had so recently acquired and we were on our way. It's funny how our first reaction to this was not relief but surprise. The game didn't kill us with extreme prejudice?! We lived?! Even so, we were all down 2 damage in each slot, which put us at a perilous disadvantage.

The group had actually modeled our various survivors, so not only were we hunting new quarry but we weren't using starting survivor miniatures for the first time.

Stef modeled Kiki with her huge Zanbato and Seth modeled Hondo with his lion katars, both of which their survivors are using. I chose a somewhat different route, since I'd only ever used a bone dagger. I modeled a survivor with the counter-weighted ax (a very cool looking bit) and holding a lantern out, as if on the hunt phase. Now that I've got some skill with dagger I'll probably model another survivor with daggers, since the daggers you can get from the blacksmith are pretty great.

Dave even went so far as to magnetize Link's limbs/head so that he could reflect gear as the game went on. He's a fellow "bakcer" (in-joke: game creator Adam Poots is a famously bad speller, so his kickstarter backers are colloquially known as "bakcers") so he's got all the bits at home to make his own minis.

Side note: as a fellow "bakcer" Dave and I both received the Spidicules expansion. There is a huge packing issue with that kit, with many people receiving a duplicate leg sprue instead of the two distinct sprues they should have received. Dave and I each had the problem, but it turns out that he got two of sprue #1 and I got two of sprue #2. We swapped a sprue and now each have a full Spidicules!

The battle with the antelope was much less eventful as we thought it might be. There wasn't even much screaming involved. I ended up getting bashed against the side of the board, so the antelope stayed over by me as the others harvested acanthus plants to prevent the antelope from regenerating. We must have pulled the easiest AI deck possible because everything just fell into place. The claw head arrow lowering the beast's evasion by 1 didn't hurt us either. I burned almost all my survival avoiding rolling on any severe injury tables, and everyone got a good hit in for weapon proficiency progression before bringing it down. We gathered up our newly acquired resources and headed back to the settlement.

In the settlement phase, we drew "haunted." Since our last session had resulted in Al and Peggy playing out "Story Event: The First Hookup" and Peggy dying, we decided to nominate Al as the survivor to see ghosts. We decided to keep him around, and so lost all our endeavor for the year. Nuts. No innovation, no augury, no salvage.

Now comes the hard part of figuring out what to craft out of this stuff! After the Butcher popped the only resource we had were broken lanterns, so it's nice to be able to make some stuff again.

San Francisco Dark Ride

Somehow we got on the topic of San Francisco today at work (and the "treat" that is Rice-a-roni) and I remembered this:

Skip to 4:45 for the "Old San Francisco" ride.

I rode this thing when I was five years old, and loved it. I was easy to impress as a pre-K I suppose.
We had a 45 rpm record of that "San Francisco, San Francisco out on San Francisco Bay..." song for years and years.

Good times.

KD:Monster ... a very unlikly night

If there's one thing we've learned playing Kingdom Death: Monster is that the game is relentlessly brutal. A single attack can take a survivor from unhurt to dead if the dice and cards conspire against you. Even the phase after the battle can wipe out an entire settlement. If you commit yourself to following things exactly as drawn/rolled this game will run you over like a semi, then back up to finish the job. Unforgiving doesn't cover it.

As a group, we've committed to letting the chips (or more often, severed limbs) fall where they may. We've also tried very hard not to read ahead, experiencing things as the survivors would. That's why last night's session was so amazing. It didn't start that way though. The settlement event saw two of our characters re-enacting a hunt and one of them being killed in the process. Ouch. On the settlement enhancement side, we had been constantly struggling with whether to invest resources in new settlement assets or gear for survivors. We knew we were going to face the Butcher this year, but we still had the whole rest of the settlement phase to do prepare. It turns out there was very little we could craft, so we innovated and got bed to go with our hovel. We still had some endeavor left so we gave augury a shot. The dice came up "intimacy", which was thrilling and terrifying. The only other time we'd used intimacy resulted in both survivors dying at a time when we were low on survivors. That settlement was eventually wiped.

So we looked up the intimacy story event, and were pleased that both hovel and bed enhanced it. Neither removed the potential lethal aspects, but added some nice enhancements to the good results. So survivors Al and Peggy got bizzay and... Peggy and the child died and Al was traumatized. Lovely. Driven more by a surplus of endeavor we augured again and got... intimacy. Okay, this could still be a good thing since we were out of unnamed survivors. We held our breath and rolled ... a lantern! Twins! No, wait. With hovel it triggered a different event. Birth of a Savior! Saviors are the super-humans of the Kingdom Death world, not invincible but definitely enhanced. We chose the red variant, which has better attack skills. The whole group was giddy about getting such a great edition to our settlement.

We looked at wrapping up the settlement phase and getting to the Butcher, but we still had one more endeavor to spend. We decided to auger again, and rolled an 8... intimacy again?! Alright! Stef threw a die for the intimacy table and... another lantern! We had another savior born! This time we chose the luck/range savior (green? can't remember...) and planned to equip with bow. That extra luck for scoring crits would be handy.

Now the mood was decidedly less grim than a normal KD:M session. (Don't get me wrong, we love the grim. It is a nightmare horror game, after all.) Two saviors in one lantern year. But now it was time to face the Butcher. We decided to leave the saviors out of the fight, since we only get a few battles with them before they disappear forever. Tonight the regular survivors would face the nemesis monster.

Like I said, we've really been trying to keep the game suprising for ourselves by not reading ahead, so we had no idea really what the Butcher was about other than his little background blurb in the showdown section of the book. When the first AI card we drew was a mood, a scream that he does every turn that does brain damage to all survivors, the color drained from Dave's face. His current character had zero insanity, and would therefore be in mortal danger from this scream. Everyone else had a fair bit of insanity to shield our brains from the mind-rending horrors of KD. The turn the mood card came out he filled his only damage box for brain. Next turn he would have to roll on the table.

Just in case anyone missed this, "roll on the table" is typically a bad thing in KD:M. There is almost always a "you're dead" on that table.

But as luck would have it, it was Dave's turn to be the monster controller, and he could give his character a point of insanity by having the Butcher target him for an attack, That would give him yet another turn to try and do something to avoid rolling on that table. We continued to pummel the Butcher, doing some damage but not nearly enough to avoid that table for Dave.

The moment of truth finally came... the maddening screams of the Butcher pushed Dave's character to roll on the brain trauma table. The result....? Impossible! How can this be? (I think that's the actual name of the entry.) Dave gained 7 points of insanity (brain armor in this nightmare world) and +2 luck for the rest of the encounter! We proceeded to wear the foe down until he finally exploded and left broken lanterns scattered around. We didn't get any of the good drops from him, but we survived without anyone being maimed. We decided to proceed with the settlement phase next session.

Executive summary for Lantern Year 5:
2 Saviors added to settlement
The Butcher defeated

This is as close to good times as it gets for KD survivors. For the players, definitely good times.

Why We Owe the iPhone to Peter Molyneux

Of all the James Burke-y connections in this world, here's one that I had completely overlooked until recently. We owe almost every interface action we do on our smart phone to the most disappointing game of 2001. 

Allow me to elucidate.

In those heady, pre-9/11 days we gamed. Oh, how we gamed. We played Warcraft before there was a World thereof. We Commanded and we Conquered. We Duned too. We fought any number of AI and human opponents on a screen that represented only a small portion of the world map. And how did we move our little window to the world around? We either used shortcut keys, we clicked a mini-map or we maxed the mouse cursor against a screen edge and the view would magically shift to reveal more in that direction. 

This was completely normal.

Okay, quick. How do you move everything to the left (revealing things hidden to the right) on a smart phone screen? Answer: you hold and swipe left. Sooooooo.... how did that ever become a thing? When did the world start sticking to your finger? Personally, I think it started in March of 2001.

Here, take a sec and watch this video, starting at 6'17". This scene comes from the beginning of Black & White, a god simulator from Peter Molyneux's studio Lionhead.

Did you catch that? Drag the landscape around with the mouse to move. Anyone who grew up using a modern handheld device is saying "I know, right? Big deal." (Actually, nobody who grew up using a modern handheld device is reading a blog so I can probably be as demeaning to that demographic as I want.) Dragging to move is ubiquitous now but back in 2001 it actually took some getting used to. It was new. 

Okay, who cares, right? Well, I do. I have maligned this game since I realized that I blew $50 on a box full of empty promises, but this may actually have been the single more important interface design change of the decade. The iPhone wasn't released until June of 2007. I honestly cannot think of a game that did click and drag to move before Black & White and the whole iPhone experience is predicated on that action.

Okay, so P.Moly did something great. It isn't like he hadn't before. His former studio Bullfrog released Populous, Powermonger, Syndicate, Theme Park, Dungeon Keeper... he has been responsible for some amazing games. These are some of my favorites. 

=== TIME TO RIP ON BLACK & WHITE. TAKE THAT, YOU 15 YEAR OLD GAME

In Black & White the execution just couldn't keep up with the vision.

You basically play a god in this game, but your primary presence on the earth is a giant monster that you train to be good or evil. They start out small and cute. 

You have to play quite a while before you even get to this

As you train them one way or another they start to take on the appearance of their training. Here, enjoy a picture of a good turtle.

I don't even remember how to get a turtle in the game

Likewise, an evil goat.

I don't remember how to get a goat either

The only problem is that the AI in this game was stooopid. I desperately wanted to think there was a complex system that I just couldn't understand, but in the end I gave that theory up with the realization that this was just a big disappointment.

Granted, it's easy to read intention into observations when you assume there is more depth than there actually is. It's like Eliza with violence.

Go read this:

http://www.oldmanmurray.com/news/347.html ... I'll wait here.

I'm really hoping your reaction to that was, "Ummm. What?" because that's what a healthy adult should be thinking. That's because you realize that a video game tiger from 2001 does not have sacrificially altruistic motivation. It just has bad AI.

Now go back and read the rest of that entire site, Old Man Murray. The authors are the guys who wrote the script for Portal. I know you won't read it, but I had to try. 

There were other problems with the game.... infuriating design decisions like making you play through an excruciatingly long intro sequence if you want to restart the game with a different monster thingy. Oh, and it got boring fast once the novelty of watching the monster wore off or you chucked all the villagers with names from your Outlook address book into the ocean. (Yes, it read your Outlook address book and names villagers after your contacts. Funny, but a little creepy.)

In the years after abandoning actually playing the game, it has lived on. For years, my coworkers hid the B&W game CD / manual / box in each other's desks/cars/etc. I also have enjoyed torturing my children with the sailor song from B&W. Look it up.

Hyperbolic design claims are what got us the @PeterMolydeux twitter account, which is spot on satire.

On the plus side, B&W gave us the phrase "the fuzzy leash of compassion." I can't say I've ever said it in conversation.

You read the whole thing! Here's a bonus pic of Mr. Molyneux himself.

I can reduce all of human existence to three signed doubles and handful of bools.

And now here's a double bonus pic of John McCain watching a video of someone paying $50 at a Babbage's in the mall for a copy of Black & White in 2001. It might have been me.

Ouch. Right in the funds.

Robotech RPG Tactics: My Field Trip to Palladium

I got an email from Palladium Books that my Robotech RPG Tactics kickstart rewards were ready, and since I was in Michigan I was able to go and just pick them up. Their office in Westland is only about 20 minutes from my house, so today I drove out there. They had all my rewards boxed up and ready to roll for me, but invited me into the warehouse to see things.

Here is a giant pile of game boxes waiting to go to their new homes...

A little further in they had glass display cabinets filled with painted models from the game. (The buildings are apparently from Dropship Commander.)

MAKURO no sora o tsuranuite ...

There were also unpainted versions of some of the other models, including the Monster.

Chikyuu o utta ikazuchi wa ...

 The Zentraedi looked especially nice, all decked out and ready to be shot up.

Warera osanai jinrui ni ...

Some of the models were still resin versions. I got a chance to hold the Miria-type Queadluun Rau. It was surprisingly heavy, but the PVC should be much lighter.

Mezamete kure to hanatareta

What a great bunch of people! Everyone seemed genuinely happy that I was there to pick up my stuff. I talked to Jeff at length about the kickstart, issues with manufacturing, Macross canon, etc. It was huge fun. Here's another great thing... I hadn't planned on doing this today since it's my 20th wedding anniversary. My wife insisted, and said it would be fun. She's a gamer/nerd/geek/whatever so it's not terribly out of domain for her, but miniatures are not really her thing and she wasn't a huge Macross fan. Nevertheless she wanted for us to go and didn't once make me feel like she was doing it under duress. I love that woman!

Recognize Everyone and Communicate Hope

The people from our relatively smallish church got together with friends around the country and world to create this song and video. The goal is to get enough downloads (through CD Baby or other means) to fund our new building with no debt. We've been meeting in school gymnasiums for a decade, and while we actually own land we want to build so that we can continue supporting causes around the community and missions around the world.



So check it out. Share it if that's your sort of thing and if you like what we're doing buy the song for a buck.

The title of this post is our church's motto: REACH (Recognize Everyone and Communicate Hope.) Thanks!

Snow Basing Materials Reference

Inspired by the most recent issue of The Weathering Magazine, I have sought some other solutions for creating snow bases. I had been happy with my techniques, for the most part, but over a few years anything I did with baking soda yellowed. To find something that appeared the way I want and would (hopefully) retain its color over time, I created this reference.

 

High resolution version available here.

The products are fairly easy to get. The Microballoon filler is commonly used to cut resin to make lighter casts, and it is a very fine powder. Try not to kick it into the air and inhale! The Snow Base is part of a Woodland Scenics "Scene-a-rama" set that includes base, snow flock and some icicle making lacquer in a little paint jar (the kind GW includes with their starter paint sets.)

Interestingly enough, some of the samples changed dramatically in the 24 or so hours between creation and this photograph. The Vallejo Foam Snow sample shrunk, and the Woodland Scenics Snow Base cracked and separated more, although the snow base might not have been adequately mixed for that sample. Some of the microballoon samples lost volume as well. 

Overall, I was most pleased with the simple and cheap mixture of PVA and Woodland Scenics Soft Flake Snow, either just mixed together or mixed and topped with more Flake Snow. The PVA + microballoon mix probably looked the most like a fresh fall of snow at a small scale. The simple PVA topped with Flake Snow would make a good frost cover. Some of the later samples were topped with a mixture of Flake Snow and microballoons to see if the surface texture was dramatically different than using just one or the other, but I don't think the results warranted the trouble. The mixture of all the products led to some different textures, and I would assume that those could to roughened/smoothed with the addition of more of the wet component. 

Bruno! Gobbos! Cupcakes!

You may recall that I was a little miffed recently that I never received my Pirate Gobbos from an IndieGogo campaign a while back. On July 1, I received an unexpected email from the campaign originator, Bruno Galice.

Hi Mike,

The Post Office did return me a whole shipping I did last year (that's more than 90 miniatures sets in more than 60 parcel/letters...) that was somehow lost by them, yours was in, I just resend it to you this morning. I hope you'll receive it !

Keep me posted !

Cheers

Could it be? Will I finally receive my gobbos? I was cautiously optimistic, but after all the prior near-misses I wasn't exactly excited. A mere six days later I received a padded envelope!

The infamous "box from France" wasn't a box at all!

Inside was the promised two sets of gobbos, along with three sets of gobbo dice (one more than expected!)

The figures themselves look great, and the resin bases are perfectly suited to them.

And now, as promised on the comments of the last post, here is an original illustration of Bruno Galice being wonderful. He is delivering cupcakes to orphans. Spread that joy, Bruno.

Bruno Galice delivering cupcakes to orphans. 1/1

A Reasonable Comparison

The label may be there but the level of interaction is roughly the same.

Whoa-oh Take The Money And Run

I don't know why, but this just galls me today. Way back in Summer 2012 I was just starting to jump on the crowd-funding bandwagon, and a fellow named Bruno Galice had a campaign on Indiegogo running to produce a small band of pirate goblins sculpted by renowned gobbo sculptor Kev Adams. I pledged, the project funded, and I looked forward to my new gobbos.

Cool concept art! 

The problem is that nothing arrived. In fact, many of the backers reported receiving nothing. I held out hope. Things happen. It's not like nothing had been done on the project, since we had been shown supposed evidence of the sculpting WIP and manufacturing.

First there were sculpts

Then there were more sculpts.

Teasers of what we would be receiving.

Then there were bins of pewter!

Months passed, and still nothing arrived. Multiple emails went unanswered. The Indiegogo message area for the project was filled with people wanting answers for their non-delivery. There were claims that things had been sent but somehow not received. There were claims of illness and accusations of lying and all sorts of drama. All the while I held out hope. It wasn't a huge monetary investment on my part, so I was more than willing to wait however long it took.

The last update from Bruno Galice to backers came in February 2013, in which he claimed that he was sending out another 25 parcels that day. Speculation on the Indiegogo campaign messages ran rampant until the campaign was suddenly missing. I contacted Indiegogo about the sudden disappearance and received this response:

Unfortunately, at this time, the Indiegogo campaign, “Pirate Goblins Box Set”, has been discontinued.
Campaigns may be removed from Indiegogo if the campaign is found in violation of our ToU or at the campaign owner’s request during the review process. You can see our full Terms of Use here: http://www.indiegogo.com/about/terms.
We have asked the campaign owner, to contact his contributors. Unfortunately, at this point we have not heard back from him and have frozen his account and campaign(s) so that he can no longer use Indiegogo again.
Additionally, you can try reaching out them through their other social media sites.
Facebook-https://www.facebook.com/pages/TrepsGames/122059754603237Twitter- https://twitter.com/treps

Okay, then. I continued to attempt to contact Bruno through email. I remained positive, if less so than before. I even offered to pay for shipping if that was a problem (he responded that money was not a problem.) Email after email went unanswered after that. Every day I would get home from work and ritually ask my family, "Box from France?" Every day the answer was no.

Eventually I sent him this email.

Hi Bruno, 

   I just saw a few pictures someone posted on their blog about getting the Pirate Gobbos. I don't really know what's going on with you personally, but I saw that the indiegogo project had been pulled. I would still like to get a set of the goblins when you are able to send them. No hard feelings, no questions asked. Just please don't forget the people waiting on those wonderful little gobbos. 

Mike

Soon after, I received this unexpected photo.

For me?!!? Really!!?

What better evidence could I hope for than a photo of my gobbos and an envelope with my name and address? So I waited. And waited. And nothing arrived. 

My final email to Bruno, in my typical non-confrontational manner:

More than three months have gone by since you sent me a photo of the package with my name on it. I never received the goblins. I think I finally believe that I'm never going to get these. Whatever is stopping packages traveling from France to U.S. is impossible to overcome. Thanks for trying.

There was still a part of me that thought staying congenial would lead to me eventually getting the gobbos. It didn't. I will never get them. I have, as they say, been had. 

Maybe a great guy, but don't entrust
him with your money.

The Weathering Magazine

There are pros and cons to having your local hobby store being a scale-model store that sells gaming stuff rather than a game store. They don't have any tables to play on but I get exposure to things wouldn't otherwise find. "The Weathering Magazine" is one of those great finds. It was created by Mig Jimenez, who previously make a fantastic 2010 video on painting weathered tanks for Vallejo using water based acrylics.

The production values on this magazine are fantastic. The pages are thick and color glossy. The tutorials are excruciatingly well detailed and the end results are absolutely amazing. Check out this asphalt paver by Rick Lawler.

I've seen plenty of scale models that were beautiful and pristine, but as a game-painteer that didn't really inspire me much. Things like this paver make me want to paint dreadnoughts and stompas to look like this.

The magazine is published quarterly, and all of the six issues are available at the website. I only have issues 3 and 4, with the others on order.

Macross: Do You Remember Scale?

A few days ago on my Hako Software video blog I ranted a bit about scale of Macross models, and the fact that nothing seemed to come in a common scale. I specifically have been trying to create a diorama of a Queadluun Rau and a Valkyrie, but finding those two models in scale has proven difficult. Bandai (or anyone else) only ever made a 1/144 scale Queadluun Rau kit. For reasons I did not understand at the time, there are no Valkyrie 1/144 kits available. I did find some Gashapon toys online that seemed about the right size.

The one on the far left was assumed to be 1:200. The toys have no scale, but they math out to be about 1:160, and a bit taller than the Zentraedi (ok, Meltraedi to be specific) pilot. Thinking... thinking... wait a minute. Aren't the Valkyrie battroids supposed to be about the same size as a Zentraedi? Need evidence....

Here's exhibit 1. The end of episode 2 has Roy and Hikaru encountering a Zentraedi soldier. It is not explicitly evident, but he sure looks about one battroid tall.

tonight, on DWTS

 Next we have the graceful dance of Commander Breetai and a VF-1J from episode 11. Breetai is supposed to be a bit taller than your average soldier, and I think that fits the picture.

wicked cosplay dude

 In episode 12, Max disguises his Valkyrie as a Zentraedi soldier. The uniform does not look ridiculously sized, and if anything is a little big on him.

Okay, so maybe the Gashapon battroids would be appropriately sized to the Queadluun Rau. All the same, this whole crazy plan came about because I found a 1:100 15th Anniversary Macross kit of a VF-1S Strike Valkyrie at Model Cave and had to buy it. Maybe if I build it and compare it to the QR it will make a better looking opponent, even if the scales aren't quite right.

Aren't you a little short to be an alien killing machine?

Nope. The VF-1S is crazy big next to the Zentraedi. Imagine the first scene above with the giant metallic battroid and the tiny Zentraedi pilot. No. As strange as it seems, the Gashapon toys are the closest to correct scale as I can find. For reference I also put a 15mm fig in the photo. He would be a little large for 1:144, but imagining him a little smaller I can really see him with the Gashapon toy and not the giant metallic guy. The choice of Bandai not to produce Valkyrie's in 1:144 makes sense now, since it would be a really insignificant little kit. Likewise, a 1:100 Queadluun Rau would be pretty huge kit. I understand there is a 1:100 Glaug kit to be had. That should be fun to build.

maybe something more dramatic...

The toys are actually detailed enough that I can cut/reposition/paint them and they will likely look pretty good. The only thing that worries me is that the Valkyrie will look comically small. Maybe the Strike VF-1S's added bulk will mitigate that.

The topic of Zentraedi height in canon/anime was covered on macross2.net in this article.

The upcoming Robotech RPG Tactics game will be 1:285 scale, so imagine the QR suit half that size. It will be interesting to see the comparative Valkyrie/QR size when that hits the street.

Stonecutters Are Victorious!

After an entire first season of losses and draws (in equal measure) the Stonecutters pulled off an actual bon-a-fide "W" in last night's season 2 opener. Slayers Skalf and Dumin both leveled after the match. In keeping with their appearance, Skalf now has "stand firm" and Dumin now has "mighty blow".

My opponent was new league member Rick. His team of humans, the "Marburg Septics", were each named after a disease. Aspiring Nurgle team? Who knows. With three catchers on the field I was expecting a lot more passing. The dice did not go Rick's way, including an interception at a key moment in the second half. On the plus side he hired a wandering apothecary as an inducement, and so managed to reduce a casualty result of "killed" (6-8... maximum killage) to merely MNG. Whew.

This game was also a test run of my recently injured player. Blocker Thorek had leveled and gotten the skill "guard" but had been injured in Dungeonbowl and lost a point of movement. Blockers only start at M4, so going down to 3 seemed pretty harsh. He actually performed quite well, and so I will keep him instead of firing him and hiring a new player. He is also the first miniature I painted for the team, so for reasons I can't quite understand I was reluctant to fire/re-hire, even if it just meant a new name and stat line for the same miniature.

Ok, off to get me a Big Moot Sandwich(tm)!

A Little Treat from Blackwater Gulch

These came in the mail earlier this week. It was a bit of a surprise since I had completely forgotten about pre-ordering them in April '13. These figures immediately appealed to me since they fill in the gaps of the Sedition Wars "Calamity Crew" figure set by including a not-Simon, a not-Kaylee and a not-Book. I put a wash on them so they would photograph better, which helped and hurt. They are not as bug-eyed as they appear in the photo.

The sculpts are nice enough. Not-Mal is the only figure in one piece. All the others required one added piece, except not-Simon who required both hands to be glued on. The proportions are a bit more "heroic" than McVey's figures, so they are an imperfect but reasonable fit together.

Now all I need is someone to make a not-Wash and not-Inara figure and the set will be complete.

Pegasus Gothic Building Combo

Despite my attentions tending toward the digital lately, I took a little time to assemble and dry-brush a combination of two Pegasus Hobbies kits.

sometimes one front door isn't enough

I had originally bought the large set to assemble as ruins, but the regular line and attachment pegs across the top of each wall really killed the aesthetic. When Jimmy bought me the small set for Christmas, I decided to see what sort of building it can make combined. A little balsa for the roof and it makes a nice little scenery piece. The extra pieces made a neat little tomb, which I will need to roof in some way. It certainly looks like it would be at home in a fantasy or grimdark sci-fi setting.


This assembly uses the following:
#4923 Gothic City Buildings Large Set
#4924 Gothic City Buildings Small Set #1
http://pegasushobbies.net

So I Quit My Job Today...

Bitwise OR is funny

Yup, I pulled the trigger. I'm going to be self-employed as of January 10, 2014, developing apps for PC and mobile platforms, and by apps I mean games. That's the plan. My kids have asked me if we are going to be hobos. Probably not, kids. Well, maybe probably not.

So stay tuned here for more information. Any advice for the burgeoning entrepreneur?

The Blood Bowl Season So Far

I am relatively new to Blood Bowl, and can already say that I am a die-hard fan. This game hits the sweet spot for playability, community, modeling, you name it. This year I have been playing in a league with some local guys, and the experience has been fantastic.

Here are a few highlights from the season so far... I haven't gotten a lot of pictures, and the ones I have are pretty lousy.

The Fetterspike Gougers made an appearance to crush me 4-0 in my inaugural game. It was a lesson in what a speed team can do to a slow-ish team. Yikes.

All lined up and ready to lose.

I knocked over and even K.O.'d a ton of rats, but no injuries.

The Orc team  "Birch's Bloodmoor Brawlers" was a tough bunch, and I got to see both how great "guard" is and how annoying "Really Stupid" is (for the owner, not the opponent! That troll just standing there made my day.) I lost 0-1 but learned a lot. My mercenary Deathroller was waaay too big, and we ended up using stand-in models for the Deathroller and the Troll when they got near each other.

The Dark Elf team "Tehn'azi Spoilers" gave me a real run for my money. We had to reschedule the main match and even then couldn't finish the match once we met, so we called it a draw. One of the funny things about this match was the fact that neither of us had a board on us, so we ended up making one quickly. Cheap but effective.

"Grunk's Pounders" was the first team against which I scored, and much celebrating ensued. The game ended tied at 1-1 and was a ton of fun. The snotlings get stunned easily but the Ogres are tough as nails both dishing it out and taking it.

 My most recent game against "Elfin Whimsy" resulted in my very first inflicted casualty. An elf lineman went down and didn't get back up. Ha! EW is high up in the standings, and I feel just a little bad that I put his best player MNG for what will be the championship game for him. I lost the game 3-2 but 2 points was a record for me.

I have one more game this season, and with zero wins to my name I am hoping to score a single W. Next season should be better now that my team all have block and one blitzer has guard. I really like the idea of using better players instead of all the inducements I've gotten.

Despite my dislike for it initially, I really like the PC version of Blood Bowl now. I played my first online game with a friend and it was basically the board game. It's no match for moving minis and rolling dice, but it was a lot of fun. Just make sure to switch the camera from automatic to manual.