The Goats of Thor

So after a few hopeful months we still haven’t heard of a buyer for Wizkids. There was some talk about a group but it fell through when they looked closer at the financing.
Then there was some talk about Tops releasing the next set – Hammer of Thor – at GenCon. With ComicCon last weekend, Neca was selling the Thor’s Mighty Chariot – which was supposed to be the Buy-the-Brick figure for the set. They are also taking pre-sales at Amazon for Aug 15. This had led to some speculation if Neca has picked up the license or if they just bought out the stock of boxed figures. Since I won’t be at GenCon again this year, I will have to wait and see.

I did win some more figs on ebay and now have the rest of the Arkham Asylum basic figures on their way to me. I even have a few of the Super-Rares coming as well. Still no luck yet on acquiring any of the other big figures I still need.

Big Plans - Big Cash

So, the nice man from Renovation Masters didn't laugh at our plans. But, since he gets paid anyways, I didn't really expect him to. We have a few options - from finishing off the second floor - about $60K, to adding our wing $60K+$70K (2nd floor), with a basement +$35K, and a garage $50K. It should be about 3 months work - with at least 3 months lead time.

Now we just have to talk to the nice people at the bank and see what they will aprove and then talk to the designer to make some pretty plans to get a better idea. Definately fun times ahead.

The Masters

The nice people from Renovation Masters are popping by tonight to look at our house and our plans and let us know what they can do for us and how much that would cost us.

Once we have that info from them, we can talk to the bank and see what we can actually do. This could mean a major upheaval in the house this year or maybe for next year. I'm leaning towards doing the second floor and the wife is pushing for a garage.

I’ll let you know.

Battletech

I never got into Battletech back in the day. I had played it at Gencon once - with the heat sinks but it never really grabbed me. I did get into the Mechwarrior Dark Age when it came out from Wizkids and even was a Warlord (judge) for a few of the sets.

I just got the classic rules from ebay yesterday. I'm going to check them over to see if they are viable for Wincon. I'm still very interested in the system from an upsizing view. From the book, I found out that the nice people at Armorcast used to make 28mm scale Battletech mechs. They look keen and inspring.

My Pet card game

So, for challenge 6 we had a few options of which to do. I went back on forth on which one to do. One was to take the game Risk and modify the rules to advocate world peace. I toyed with this one for a while but couldn’t come up with a set of rules that would still maintain the fun of the game.
I ended up doing the option to create a game that introduces the concept of grief to children. I came up with the following:

For dealing with grief I have designed a card game to deal with the life, and ultimately the death, of a pet. While the deck presented below is set up as a ‘dog’ deck, it would be easy to modify for other pets – cats, fish, hamsters, etc (for shorter lived pets the age cards would be months instead of years).

This can be played as a solo game or as with other children. Each child would have their own deck and take turns playing as below. The decks don’t mix.

The 50 card deck consists of the following cards:
1 Young Pet card – depicting a puppy. Text: ”Young Pet. Start with this card in play.”
1 Adult Pet card – depicting the adult dog. Text: “Adult Pet”
1 Passing/death/better place card – depicting a pleasant afterwards (example – tree on a hill, empty field, sunny day, rainbow, etc). Text: “Passing”

20 age cards – depicting a birthday cake. Text: “Age”
10 play cards – depicting a ball or a stick/Frisbee being thrown. Text: “Play. 1 point”
10 training cards – depicting a leash or a whistle. Text “Training”
1 simple trick card – depicting a begging dog. Text: “Simple Trick: Beg. Needs 1 Training. 2 points”
1 simple trick card – depicting a dog barking. Text: “Simple Trick: Speak. Needs 1 Training. 2 points”
1 trick card – depicting a dog running with a stick in its mouth. Text: “Trick: Fetch. Needs 2 Training. 3 Points”
1 trick card – depicting a dog walking behind legs. Text: “Trick: Heel. Needs 2 Training. 3 Points”
1 trick card – depicting a dog lying down. Text: “Trick: Play Dead. Needs 2 Training. 3 Points”
1 trick card – depicting a dog sitting. Text: “Trick: Stay. Needs 2 Training. 3 Points”
1 trick card – depicting a dog rolling over. Text: “Trick: Roll Over. Needs 2 Training. 3 Points”

Rules (for younger children):
Remove the Young Pet, Adult Pet, and Passing cards from the deck and place aside. Shuffle the remaining cards and place the deck face down. Place the Young Pet in front of you and draw 3 cards to start.

The turn sequence:
- Draw a card to start your turn.
- You may play one Age card.
- You may also play one of the following cards. Note that you may not have more scoring cards in play than Age cards.
- Play a Play card.
- Play a Training card.
- If you have enough Training cards in play you may play a Trick card. Discard the needed amount of Training cards from play as are on the Trick card.
- If you have more than 5 cards in your hand, discard a card. You may not discard an Age card.
- Once you have 10 Age cards in play, change your Pet card to the Adult Pet.
- Once you have 20 Age cards in play, change your Pet card to the Passing card. Add up your Play and Trick cards to see what kind of life your pet had.
- The next player may now take a turn or go back to start of the turn if you are playing by yourself.




Rules (for older children):
Remove the Young Pet and Adult Pet from the deck and place aside. Shuffle the remaining cards (including the Passing card) and place the deck face down. Place the Young Pet in front of you and draw 5 cards to start.

While the Young Pet is in play:
- Draw a card to start your turn.
- You may play one Age card.
- You may also play one of the following cards. Note that you may not have more scoring cards in play than Age cards.
- Play a Play card.
- Play a Training card.
- If you have enough Training cards in play you may play a Trick card. Discard the needed amount of Training cards from play as are on the Trick card.
- If you have more than 5 cards in your hand, discard a card. You may not discard an Age card.
- If you draw the Passing card, change your Pet card to the Adult Pet. Place the Passing card in the discard pile, and reshuffle the discards and the remaining cards in the deck together and place the deck face down.
- The next player may now take a turn or go back to start of the turn if you are playing by yourself.


While the Adult Pet is in play:
- Draw a card to start your turn.
- Play any Age cards in your hand.
- You may also play one of the following cards. Note that you may not have more scoring cards in play than Age cards.
- Play a Play card.
- Play a Training card.
- If you have enough Training cards in play you may play a Trick card. Discard the needed amount of Training cards from play as are on the Trick card.
- If you have more than 5 cards in your hand, discard a card. You may not discard an Age card.
- If you draw the Passing card, the game ends. Add up your Play and Trick cards to see what kind of life your pet had.
- The next player may now take a turn or go back to start of the turn if you are playing by yourself.

Old 40K marines – beakies

I remember when we first got into 40K. Back then, Rhinos came in 3-packs and marine had a 10-man lead tactical squad and a 30-pack of plastic marines in Mark VI Corvus armor – more affectionately know as “beakies”. These were reasonably priced – about $30 US. This was the same time when they were selling a Warhammer Fantasy army pack of 60 plastics for about the same price – 10 each of wood elf, dark elf, dwarf, goblin, orc, and humans.

The problem with the figures was finding them. No-one seemed to carry them. When we went to Gencon that year, we lined up for the dealer’s room to open and rushed directly to the Games Workshop booth. They had a stack of 8 of them and I grabbed them all – 2 for Connor, 2 for Don, and the rest for me. It turns out that that had been all they had brought. I think I still have one of the sets unopened – I had also picked up lots of extra heavy weapon sprues to be able to make extra Devastator squads in the later years when they returned to GenCon so still have about 3 sets worth of figures unmade.

Back then, in the Rogue Trader days, I needed a lot of marines as I had thoughts of painting up marines armor in all the flags of the world. Plus I had been working on a mouseketeer squad of marines with ears that only got as far a making a few heads and a female torso.

casting films

Heath Ledger won a posthumous Oscar for his role as the Joker in The Dark Knight. I think he did a great job. Some people think that the role should be retired as no one could replace him. I don’t think that he did that great of a job. In fact, with the makeup, I think that he could be easily replaced by Ed Westwick. You may know him better as Chuck Bass from Gossip Girl. He was also in Son of Rambow. He has a similar build and face and could pull of the presence of the character for as much as he will be needed in any subsequent movies.

While we’re on the subject of casting, I think Bryan Dattilo who plays Lucas on Days of our Lives would be a great Dick Greyson / Nightwing. At 5’8”, he’s about the perfect height - compared to a 6' or 6'2" Batman. I just feel it needs to be put out there.

She's a bit old now, but Winona Ryder would have been a perfect match for Mai, the Psychic Girl.

Amazon - Chapters

So, the book I needed for the Game Design course wasn't in any of the local stores or even the library. I was tempted to order it from Amazon but ended up ordering it from Chapters. I had some concern - as they had a 2-3 week lead time but it came very fast. I had ordered it on June 30 and it had shipped on July 3 and I picked it up on July 10.
I was very impressed with the turn-around time. It had been listed as a hardcover but came in a softcover. The price wasn't too much more that what it would have cost from Amazon after shipping.
Plus Erin was at the counter when I picked it up and she's a real sweetie.

I'm probably going to give them another try for the Sky Galleons of Mars book. I can't find any good deals on ebay with shipping that would be much cheaper than what I could get it for from Chapters.

Freeze your brains

Today is Free Slurpee Day! July eleventh, or 7-11, is the day when the 7-eleven stores give out free small slurpees.

It's an especially good year to go and get one as this year Winnipeg was crowned the Slurpee capital of the World! Actually, it's the 10th year in a row we've been crowned - every year, in fact, since they started doing it in 1998.

Is there a reason that we keep making it? It could be our hot summers - which often peak over 40C (313K for those using Kelvin). It could be nostalgia - for all those of us who remember the taste from when we were kids and it was a cheap way to cool off. The main reason though is that even when it cools off outside, and the summer days fade, we still keep on buying them - right through the winter. It may be our way of taunting the weather - "Is that all you got?" when the temperature dips to -40C (233K).

It's interesting though that, for a city with a reputation of being such bargain-hunters, we are so enamored of what is basically just overpriced flavored ice.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Air Superiority

I'm enjoying the game design course I signed up for.

The first real assignment was to design a World War I game where the primary objective of the players could not be territorial control, or capture/destroy.

Since that would leave out most of the trench warfare, and with my exposure and research I had done for Canvas Eagles, I made an airplane technology game.
Even with the standard caveats, it hasn't been tested enough; it needs more detail; I was rushed - I'm still pretty happy with the mechanics. It expresses the concepts I was trying to get across. Give it a try if you get a chance.

AIR SUPERIORITY
by DKWD

In World War I the ground battle had quickly settled into a locked battle of the trenches. In the air however, the war quickly drove research into the new technology of air warfare.

Goal:
In this two-player game, you have to try and move your technology along in aircraft development while preventing your opponent from doing the same.

Contents:
these rules,
the Technology Chart,
17 counters (9 for each player, and 1 timeline marker),
and some 6-sided dice (up to 10).

Set up:
Decide which side the players Place a counter on the Timeline on Fall 1914. Each player places a counter on their Resource track on the 10 and a counter on the Technology track on the first box.

Game play:
Each turn represents the development in 6 months of the war. Both players’ turns take place simultaneously for each step.

Assign Resources:
Each player’s Resource track will have a marker showing the current value of your country’s resources that they can allot to air superiority.
You can use the resources to buy planes at any of the current levels available to you (at applicable costs) – just move the Plane markers up one for each purchase. Some planes will allow you to make Resource attacks or Dogfights. The starting planes will only allow you to make Resource attacks.
You can also use the remaining resources to purchase rolls on the Research Track. Rolls are purchased at 1 roll per resource – move the Research marker up one per purchase.
Once all your purchases are made, reset your Resource track counter to 10 for the next turn. You can’t save resources from one turn to the next.

Research Roll:
The counter on your Research track indicates the amount of dice to roll to see if you can develop the next level of technology.
If you roll a 6 on any of the dice, you may advance your marker on the Technology track to the next level. You may only advance once per turn regardless of how many 6s you roll.
Once you have rolled all the dice allowed, reset your Research track marker back to 0.

Resource Attacks:
Decide which planes which have the capability to make Resource attacks will be doing so this turn. These planes will not be available for Dogfights this turn.
Starting at Technology level 1, roll for those planes making Resource attacks – the value needed to roll is on the Technology Chart. If you roll the value needed, your opponent has to move his marker on his Resource track down one. If you roll a one your plane is lost – move your plane marker on that Technology level down one.
If you lose a plane of a Technology level higher than your opponent has achieved then they may increase their Research marker by one.

Dogfights:
The remaining planes that are capable of Dogfights and did not make a Resource attack now participate in Dogfights.
Starting at Technology level 1, roll for those planes making Dogfight – the value needed to roll is on the Technology Chart. If you roll the value needed, your opponent has to move one of his plane markers on one of his Technology tracks down one (he must decrease one plane if possible – even if that plane type didn’t participate in Dogfights).
If you roll a one your plane is lost – move your plane marker on that Technology level down one.
If you lose a plane of a Technology level higher than your opponent has achieved then they may increase their Research marker by one.

Advance Timeline:
Advance the marker on the Timeline one level.
When the marker gets moved to Armistice, the game is over. The player who has the highest technological level is the winner. If both players are tied at the same technological level, then the player with the most planes built in the highest technological level would win. (1 level 3 plane would beat 4 level 2 planes).
If it is still tied then the player with the higher Resource level would win a minor victory.

If Armistice is not reached, return to the Assign Resources step.

[The format on these are a bit wonky in this medium - leave enough space between the numbers to use counters]

GERMANY
Resources: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

Research: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

Technology: Planes
Type 1: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Basic planes – no guns Resource attacks only (6) Cost - 1

Type 2: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Stable planes – no guns Resource attacks only (5-6) Cost - 2

Type 3: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Mounted guns Resource attacks (6) Dogfights (6) Cost - 2

Type 4: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
May shoot through props Resource attacks (6) Dogfights (5-6) Cost - 3

Type 5: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Fighter planes Dogfights only (4-6) Cost - 3


Fall - Spring - Fall - Spring - Fall - Spring - Fall - Spring - Fall - Armistice
1914 - 1915 - - 1915 - 1916 - - 1916 - 1917 - - 1917 - 1918 - - 1918 -


BRITAIN
Resources: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

Research: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

Technology: Planes
Type 1: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Basic planes – no guns Resource attacks only (6) Cost - 1

Type 2: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Stable planes – no guns Resource attacks only (5-6) Cost - 2

Type 3: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

Mounted guns Resource attacks (6) Dogfights (6) Cost - 2

Type 4: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

May shoot through props Resource attacks (6) Dogfights (5-6) Cost - 3

Type 5: 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10
Fighter planes Dogfights only (4-6) Cost - 3

BSG - big fraking deal

Battlestar Galactica.
So we finally got around to watching the finale of Battlestar Galactica. We haven’t been impressed with the series and kept watching in the hopes that it would pay off. It didn’t.

The show had very little in the way of humor. I know war is supposed to be grim – but at least Space Above and Beyond had humor. The main things I wanted from this show – dog fights and cylons were few and far between. Now, when I say cylons I’m referring to the walking toasters or even their new upgraded version. The flesh-covered cylons, whining on about their goals, didn’t really impress me. I didn't like the dogfights and their garbled space communications. Shan pointed out that your two hotshot pilots, Starbuck and Apollo, did very little actual flying.
Part of what really hurt it was the glacially slow pace of the series. After the first two seasons they had just got to Cobol and they were heading towards Earth. This was the story from the original two hour pilot from the old series. They set up a colony which was destroyed – the resistance all being led by cylons.
That also might have been the issue – most of any characters that we actually cared about all ended up as Cylons. They made a big deal about the number of survivors – but we never really see any stories about any of the survivors. We didn’t care anything about Baltar – so any storyline with him was a waste for us.
The ending was pretty poor as well. After 6 episodes of nothing happening, they mention a singularity which automatically forshadows them being displaced to the past. A bit of a battle and then a poor version of Earth2.

This is definitely not a series we will pick up. As much as I like the CG toasters, I can’t justify the rest of the mess. I might get the movie Razor to get a simple taste of it and possibly the mini series, but the rest of the series is a wash. If the seasons were in the $10 bin I would still have to really think hard about if it was worth it.

Lots of people were raving about it being the best written sci-fi series though. I can’t help but wonder if, like Saving Private Ryan and Titanic, these people haven’t seen a lot of the genre. Your mileage may vary.