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Friday, February 28, 2020
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Monday, February 24, 2020
Suzy Cube Update: June 8, 2018
Sunday, February 23, 2020
WIP - "Rescue Of Hommlet" - Playtest Weekend
And I wanted to give the model a shakedown, to see how it would be used by (hopefully) friendly faces before taking it to GaryCon to sit next to two other Greyhawk games taking place with the same topic - the goings on of the Temple of Elemental Evil and the infamous Moathouse.
But first... picture porn of the model! I've made progress since the last model update from early December.
It felt really good to get the model to a point where I could play with it. Obviously, a lot of work left to be done, with painting details, making the mucky moat and surrounding terrain. The comments I got from players was very positive!
Playtesting - I had three concerns with the scenario and rules:
- Will the rules work in reflecting that we have figures that represent single characters (1:1 scale) and figures that represent troop units (~10:1 scale)
- With using the forces as represented in the module T1 - Village of Hommlet, is there a huge mismatch?
- What surprises do I need to account for that devious players will come up with?
I'm happy to say that I got tons of great feedback from my very patient friends! Overall, they all expressed enjoyment with the scenario and with the approach of playing "D&D" with Chainmail as the battle mechanism. It became clear that what we had was more of a skirmish game than a huge battle. That turned out to be OK!
If you go and look at the rules, you can see a number of tweaks and approaches that I've adopted to reflect lessons learned. Here are the three big ones:
I. Having a character figure that isn't a superhero somehow take out a troop unit figure with just a single dice roll didn't feel right. The character should be a lot more threatened when they go against a unit of soldiers [1].
To solve that, I took this approach:
1. If the battle is troop unit figure vs. troop unit figure, or character/creature vs. character/creature, roll number of dice equal to Fighting Capability (FC) of unit. Count hits. This is standard Chainmail or Book of War.
2. If battle is troop unit figure (representing 10 soldiers) vs. character/creature, scale the dice. Roll # of dice representing FC of unit multiplied by number of soldiers left in figure. Count hits against character. Character rolls number of dice equal to their Fighting Capability.
So, Rufus the Fighter is facing a figure of bugbears. He has an FC of 6. He is attacking as Heavy Foot (HF) and the bugbears are defending as Armored Foot (AF). In my rules, he needs a 6. He rolls 3 6 1 1 2 5, so he scores a hit! That means a bugbear will be a casualty out of the unit.
The bugbears return the favor. Their FC is 2. The figure represents ten bugbears. So the player for the bugbears would grab TWENTY six siders and roll. The bugbears attack as HF and Rufus defends as AF. With twenty dice, the chances are likely for at least 3 to 4 hits, so Rufus might be in trouble here...
THIS felt right, even though it would be murder on the characters - as it should be! Up to about Superhero level, a single character is taking huge risks to get involved in an Aragorn-esque fight against a bunch of baddies.
What helped was the adopted rule that magic armor removes a dice from each roll. So if ten bugbears are rolling 2 dice each, Rufus's magic armor made that 1 dice. Which, magic armor should have that effect. So this felt right as well.
It does mean I'm going to have to track the "hits" on a troop figure from characters. So that as the character whittles away at the troop unit, it grows less and less effective in attacking, meaning less dice to attack with. I'm OK with that right now, but I'm still considering if this is the approach I want to take.
I may revert to the approach of Chaos Wars and represent units as multiple figures - so it will look like a 1:1 game, although troops on troops will still be adjudicated at a 10:1 scale. I'm not sure yet.
II. Magic and the different classes. At first, I was struggling with how to interpret the various bonuses and minuses from the gear that the inhabitants of Hommlet and Moathouse have with them. Through testing, we agreed to use the approach from "Compleat Chainmail" - if the defender (against ranged or melee) has magic armor, attackers remove a die from their roll. If attackers have a magic weapon, they add a die to their roll. This worked well for a convention game approach.
I also had to dig through OD&D history, original booklets, supplements and the Strategic Review articles to fill the rules and approaches for things in T1 that don't come in OD&D/Chainmail as written. Things like how to implement Elmo the Ranger (riff off the Ranger article from Strategic Review Vol 1, #3), the Druid Brother Smythe and his spells (look at Supplement III, Eldritch Wizardry), how does Lareth's Staff of Striking work in the Chainmail combat rules (riff off of AD&D/DMG description of the staff and have the player opt to improve a hit to be two or three, while spending charges).
That was a fun exercise in looking at how iconic classes were built, and how AD&D was still a similar game to OD&D in that you could easily use magic items from one in the other.
III. Crossbowmen are murder! The basic scenario has the Forces of Woe at the Moathouse, prepared with full knowledge of the approach of the Forces of Weal. This means that logically, the ranged forces are going to be on the ramparts, ready to shoot down any who approach. It's a sound tactic, used effectively through history. In the first game, I had written down the wrong range for crossbows, using the heavy crossbow range of 24" versus the actual range of 18". I also had two figures of crossbow units on the ramparts, to represent the 20 Guards of the New Master.
Had we run with the rule of multiple dice x FC of troop units versus single characters, I doubt that many would have survived the approach!
In the second game, I reduced the number of New Guards with crossbow to 10 soldiers (1 figure) only, but even with that, they murdered the approaching forces of Weal - taking out both single figures of mercenary bow and militia bow, then the elderly farmer captain armed with a crossbow.
The one factor in both situations was that the crossbowman had cover on the Moathouse's ramparts while the forces of Weal were out in the open.
I have a solution that is tied to the description of the terrain around the Moathouse.
A scrub of thorns, thistles, weeds, and shrubs grows thickly along the edge of the track which leads to the ruins, and even the track is mostly overgrown and cluttered with fallen branches and trees.I had been saying that the only place where normal movement can happen is on the path/track to the moathouse. If you go off-road, you are in that thick scrub and vegetation, therefore you move at half movement. My fix here is to give anyone in the weeds the benefit of cover as well.
...
After two miles of distance, the land begins to sink and become baggy, as the track turns more northerly, and tall marsh plants grow thickly where cattails and tamaracks do not. Off to the left can be seen the jagged silhouette of the moathouse.
...
The bogs here stink, and the vegetation appears dense and prolific, but somehow sickly and unhealthy, creepers and vines throwing their strangling loops over the skeletons of dead saplings and living bushes alike. The rushes and cattails rustle and bend even when only a slight zephyr blows over the marsh, and weird bird calls, croakings, and other unwholesome sounds come faintly across the fen.
So it's a tough choice, go slow and with benefit of cover, or go fast and possibly get cut down. I think this is a good tactical choice, so I will leave the forces as-is, and playtest this approach.
Plus, I get to make more terrain! Scatter terrain to represent the bog/swamp around the moat.
There are a lot of other lessons and tweaks from the play-test, but these are big ones. I'm really glad I did the testing, it's going to make my Greyhawk game that much better.
Friday, February 21, 2020
Convergence Of Cyriss - A Side Project
My unit of Reciprocators were missing the tips of their halberds. These are near impossible to find bits for online, but I ended up going with the Steelsoul Protector spear from PP and luckily I was able to use the tip of the spear as a replacement for the halberds and have it work out nicely. All in all it was $30 in bits from PP to replace parts either too broken to salvage or bits that were straight up missing. Not terrible, but not great either.
Between pinning up Aurora, 3 units of Clockwork Angels, and building a fresh Father Lucant, lets just say I never want to build anything like that again. My fingers still hurt from all the pinning I had to do to get those things securely built!
-Corrolary
-Cipher
-Inverter
Thursday, February 20, 2020
Hybrid Heaven (N64)
Developer: | Konami Osaka | | | Release Date: | 1999 | | | Systems: | Nintendo 64 |
Super Adventures is back again! It's only going to be around for eight weeks before going back into hibernation over the winter, but I'm going to be writing about so many games. Like, maybe even eight of them.
First I'm playing an N64 game called Hybrid Heaven. It's one of those games that I've been meaning to check out for years, but it's finally completed the arduous climb to the top of my 'to play' list. It made it just in time as well, as it's the game's 20th anniversary this year, though that's true of a lot of N64 titles. In fact my half-assed research on Wikipedia tells me that about a third of the system's games came out during 1999. Then after 2000 the console dropped like a rock for some reason (PlayStation 2).
Hybrid Heaven wasn't exactly the N64's biggest hit, but I don't feel like it can be that obscure, at least not to people who owned the system. I think it's probably one of those games that lots of people have heard of but not necessarily played themselves. It's one of the few carts my family had for the console back in the day and I even I haven't played it, though my brother did spoil the twist for me.
The game was nice enough to give me two title screens to pick from for my screenshot up there, but I decided to go with the one with menu options on it instead of the one with the Twin Towers filling the screen... because it gives me an excuse to talk about the resolution!
A few N64 games offer a 'high resolution' option if you've got the Expansion Pak installed, which doubles the resolution to 640x480. Or at least that's what you'd expect it to do, but it was apparently more like 480x360 for most games (or even less in widescreen). Hybrid Heaven seems to be one of the few N64 games that actually does something close to proper 640x480... but I've heard that the frame rate's terrible in that mode so I'm going to leave it on standard definition.
Read on »
Suzy Cube Update: April 6, 2018
AP 2006, Infiltrate!
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Wednesday, February 19, 2020
D-E-D Dead!
Today for the #2019gameaday challenge I played a game of Colt Express on the mobile app. It was a great game but I'm a little biased about the game, lol!
I didn't end up winning but I felt a bit rusty with the game. I can't wait to play it again and trying to win!
As always, thank you for reading and don't forget to stop and smell the meeples! :)
-Tim
People Behind The Meeples - Episode 206: Charley Cross
Welcome to People Behind the Meeples, a series of interviews with indie game designers. Here you'll find out more than you ever wanted to know about the people who make the best games that you may or may not have heard of before. If you'd like to be featured, head over to http://gjjgames.blogspot.com/p/game-designer-interview-questionnaire.html and fill out the questionnaire! You can find all the interviews here: People Behind the Meeples. Support me on Patreon!
Name: | Charley Cross |
---|---|
Email: | charleycross@arboartsllc.com |
Location: | Springfield, IL |
Day Job: | Work at an elementary school part time, carpenter part time, game designer full time. |
Designing: | Over ten years! |
Facebook: | Arbo Arts LLC |
YouTube: | R'Bow |
Other: | Not yet. |
Find my games at: | Just direct right now. |
Charley Cross
Interviewed on: 8/16/2019
This week we get to meet Charley Cross, a designer from Springfield, Illinois who likes to make casual, family style card games. You can currently buy a copy of R'Bow, a light color matching, card shedding game with similarities to classics like Uno and Skip-Bo from Arbo Arts, LLC. He's also working on a game called QUEUE and others! Read on to learn more about Charley and his other projects.
Some Basics
Tell me a bit about yourself.
How long have you been designing tabletop games?
Over ten years!
Why did you start designing tabletop games?
I realized that I have a talent for creating really good family style games.
What game or games are you currently working on?
R'Bow, Queue, and several others not yet ready to discuss.
Have you designed any games that have been published?
R'Bow
What is your day job?
Work at an elementary school part time, carpenter part time, game designer full time.
Your Gaming Tastes
My readers would like to know more about you as a gamer.
Where do you prefer to play games?
Home, Parties
Who do you normally game with?
Friends and family
If you were to invite a few friends together for game night tonight, what games would you play?
They really like Queue. R'Bow, and sometimes Spades.
And what snacks would you eat?
Chips, Dip, Hummus
Do you like to have music playing while you play games? If so, what kind?
Not really, like the conversation.
What's your favorite FLGS?
Titan, Springfield, IL
What is your current favorite game? Least favorite that you still enjoy? Worst game you ever played?
Favorite QUEUE. Least but enjoy, Trivial Pursuit. Worst: Old Commodore Game: Docking a Space Shuttle.
What is your favorite game mechanic? How about your least favorite?
Favorite is shedding or collecting. Least is wagering.
What's your favorite game that you just can't ever seem to get to the table?
A lot of people do not want to play Monopoly, but they rarely play it by the actual rules, so it goes on forever. I understand, but if you play it by the exact rules it is a real challenge and doesn't usually take that long.
What styles of games do you play?
I like to play Card Games
Do you design different styles of games than what you play?
I like to design Board Games, Card Games, Other Games?
OK, here's a pretty polarizing game. Do you like and play Cards Against Humanity?
No
You as a Designer
OK, now the bit that sets you apart from the typical gamer. Let's find out about you as a game designer.
When you design games, do you come up with a theme first and build the mechanics around that? Or do you come up with mechanics and then add a theme? Or something else?
My games are all modifications of a specific theme.
Have you ever entered or won a game design competition?
no
Do you have a current favorite game designer or idol?
no
Where or when or how do you get your inspiration or come up with your best ideas?
I start with a basic structure and keep adding and subtracting options.
How do you go about playtesting your games?
Family and friends.
Do you like to work alone or as part of a team? Co-designers, artists, etc.?
Alone mostly, and with my husband.
What do you feel is your biggest challenge as a game designer?
I have already conquered several. The biggest one now is exposure.
If you could design a game within any IP, what would it be?
One of the family favorites like UNO, Rook, Phase 10 etc.
What do you wish someone had told you a long time ago about designing games?
Cover all your bases before you spend any money.
What advice would you like to share about designing games?
Seek advice, be self critical, and believe in your project.
Would you like to tell my readers what games you're working on and how far along they are?
Published games, I have: R'Bow Have a few thousand, will sell these to see how well people like them.
Games that will soon be published are: Queue: Will hopefully publish this year or early next year
I'm planning to crowdfund: Hope to approach Kickstarter as soon as I build more of an online presence.
Games I feel are in the final development and tweaking stage are: We are ready to go.
Games that I'm playtesting are: We are ready to go.
Are you a member of any Facebook or other design groups? (Game Maker's Lab, Card and Board Game Developers Guild, etc.)
no.
And the oddly personal, but harmless stuff…
OK, enough of the game stuff, let's find out what really makes you tick! These are the questions that I'm sure are on everyone's minds!
Star Trek or Star Wars? Coke or Pepsi? VHS or Betamax?
Star Trek, No High Fructose Corn Syrup!!! VHS
What hobbies do you have besides tabletop games?
carpentry, music, opera, theatre, cooking, gardening.
What is something you learned in the last week?
My adult daughter is dating someone.
Favorite type of music? Books? Movies?
blues, motown, mozart, books, sci fi and historical fiction, action
What was the last book you read?
Les Miserables
Do you play any musical instruments?
no
Tell us something about yourself that you think might surprise people.
I have lived in over thirty places.
Tell us about something crazy that you once did.
rope swing on cliff above creek, couldn't reach it from the ground so I jumped off the cliff (low one) to catch the rope in mid air. I missed.
Biggest accident that turned out awesome?
Speeded up my car and used a driveway as a ramp to avoid a collision and landed straddling a ditch, saving myself and my coworker.
Who is your idol?
Bernie Sanders
What would you do if you had a time machine?
Break it into very small bits before I destroyed the world with it.
Are you an extrovert or introvert?
extrovert
If you could be any superhero, which one would you be?
I am actually Superman.
Have any pets?
Not in a long time.
When the next asteroid hits Earth, causing the Yellowstone caldera to explode, California to fall into the ocean, the sea levels to rise, and the next ice age to set in, what current games or other pastimes do you think (or hope) will survive into the next era of human civilization? What do you hope is underneath that asteroid to be wiped out of the human consciousness forever?
QUEUE. Racism just has to go.
If you'd like to send a shout out to anyone, anyone at all, here's your chance (I can't guarantee they'll read this though):
Everybody. Play QUEUE. It really is the best card game since someone took a game played with two decks of playing cards, dressed it up, and became the most successful game since King's Reverse.
Just a Bit More
Thanks for answering all my crazy questions! Is there anything else you'd like to tell my readers?
Email me, I will answer.
Thank you for reading this People Behind the Meeples indie game designer interview! You can find all the interviews here: People Behind the Meeples and if you'd like to be featured yourself, you can fill out the questionnaire here: http://gjjgames.blogspot.com/p/game-designer-interview-questionnaire.html
Did you like this interview? Please show your support: Support me on Patreon! Or click the heart at Board Game Links , like GJJ Games on Facebook , or follow on Twitter . And be sure to check out my games on Tabletop Generation.
Sunday, February 16, 2020
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