Tres Anos!

Yeah, three years of blogging. well, intermittently.

The first post was made to this blog Friday April 24th 2009.

Lets do some stats.

At time of writing (Saturday 21st April 2:30PM) Yeah I know, queued posts, but no way I'll get time on Tuesday :)

351 Followers have made  94,264 all time pageviews of 239 posts!

Wow. Now, I know that compared to sites like FTW and BoLS that’s nothing, but for lil’ ol’ me just rambling along that’s fantastic, and I thank you all for your attention, time and feedback.

Clearly you can see that both my readership, and my activity goes in fits and starts, and that this year has been a bit slow, but steady. I haven't had much time for the blog to be honest and am aware I’ve just been keeping it ticking along, which makes the readers I do still have all the more valuable, so Thanks for that. I would still be writing if only twenty people r4ead this, but over a hundred daily hits is amazing. it does however make me feel kinda guilty when I go a couple of weeks without a post :)

Anyway. What can I learn about what you want to read?

All-Time Top five posts?

Numero Uno is still that AoBR Grey Knight tutorial. wow. I don't even play them since the new cheese umm codex came out.

Second most popular is the Daemonhost tutorial.

Third we get The Cadian Snipers

Fourth is Logan

and fifth is that Grey Knight again.

I was expecting to see that it was mostly Tutorials, or maybe mostly content I know has been widely linked out in other sites, but it’s a mix of those factors, three of those posts aren’t “how to” articles at all. so what can I say?

It looks like conversions get as much attention as tutorials, and what seems to get people here is more my modelling than my painting. (I guess I can understand that :) ) If you’d like to add any thoughts on why you come here, what you;d like to see now I’m back in the drivers seat post mass effect, then drop ‘em under the article.

But whatever you come here for, Thanks for doing it, thanks for saying something in the comments box when you feel you’ve something to say, and for just reading and moving on if you feel you haven’t.

I didn’t think about how long I would be doing this when I started, but I’m glad it’s still something I keep up with most of the time, and hey, I play so little and get out into the gaming world so little, without the site no-one would ever see these dudesmen :)

So thanks, and here's to three more years!

Mass Effect 3

 

If you will excuse the diversion, I thought I'd add my comments to the discussion about this game and particularly the furore about it’s ending. there may be light spoilers, but I will try to speak more generally than that,

Obviously, there haven't been any posts for a while. this is because of Mass effect 3. those of you who read these  blog will know I teach game design, particularly as it pertains to game art 2D and 3D, and as a fan of the previous Mass Effect Games, I had to play this, the last instalment.

In my opinion it’s an absolute masterpiece of a game, and of a game series.

But yes, there has been a virtual internet riot over the ending, and I’d like to offer a few thoughts on that. My experience of playing this game is that the whole game is denouement, exceptionally plotted denouement. decisions are made, consequences deeply felt, and the narrative rolls on.

One of the main criticisms I hear is that your decisions were of little consequence.. well that’s a fault of the game’s success I am afraid. Each title in the mass effect series is a linear narrative. sure you make choices but the choices are always about HOEW something goes down, not what actually happens, but the ME series does this so9 well.. especially for a one-play through gamer that the illusion of massive, universe altering change is perfect. it’s not unless you are like me and play the games several times, making different choices that you see that all the choices are only for a given value of Shepard.

that is to say you are allowed to rail around and act within the parameters of a linear story and within the boundaries of a characters extreme possible reactions. many people playing this haven't realised that. and so for there to be an end. a single end to the narrative, without much variation, then that’s understandably disappointing.

There’s another thing at play here too, and that’s a wide user base not being used to some of the curve balls truly epic sci-fi can throw you. I consume a lot of this stuff, so I expect the odd “star Child” ending. for many this will be their first encounter with such, but me, hey I was there when the hand of god descended in that Stephen king book, I’ve watched angels appear in Galactica and winced when the advanced AI’s showed up in.. well in AI.

My point?  That if Games are to grow up as a genre, we need to accept more that esoteric narrative has a place here. further, and the really really instrumentally odd thing – we have to accept the author’s narrative.

The feeling of audience entitlement, to demand that a product be changed because they don't like what happened, is phenomenal. we’re talking “Misery” level of fan obsession here, but on a unified scale not often seen.

Sure there are examples of society railing against such things, Arthur Conan-Doyle's famous resurrection of Holmes by popular demand chief among them, but should this be creation by consensus, or should authors be allowed to stretch the boundaries of creative game making without fear that the mob will turn on the, pitchforks and brands in hand?

My worry is that this pressure to deliver the expected, to play safe is already huge in the industry, not least of which because of the sums of money involved, and without studios feeling that they can be brave and push at boundaries, and sure, make mistakes sometimes, disappoint people sometimes, then we will never grow as a genre.

That makes me sad.

So for those reasons, and because it’s truly a stunningly crafted game and more a game series with a story arc spanning three titles and six years, I’m a fan of the author’s intentions.

If you read this far, and you aren’t one of my students, then I applaud you, and thank you for your patience during this interlude.

I’ve finished the game a few times over now, so normal hobby content service should begin to be resumed :)

Wolf Lord with Jump Pack

For those days when Skyclaws need a little extra “oomph”

 

Seriously, what’s not to like about 5 S5 attacks on the charge, ignoring armour, with a 3++ save. Ouch.

Plus that quiet, evil heretical voice says I could maybe get away with using him as a Sanguinor proxy *coughcoughSpaceBloodAngelWolvescoughtcough*

More Skyclaws!

Bored of these guys yet? :)

Yeah I built a few more. having picked up a box of assault marines, combined with some scavengable parts I’ve managed to make enough that I can choose to field either a whole big mob of ten, or two mobs of five.

I’ve always loved jump pack marines, and just how dynamic you can make them with the current kit is awesome. these four were made with that kit and some SW pack box parts, with a little GS fur here and there.

 

 

 

 

 

These last three were bitzbox scavenged, as such they are more static, but I feel that as a mob they compliment each other quite well.

 

 

 

Of course my brain is still shouting at me that if I buy a pair of stormravens and convert up another Aobr Dread i’ve got a 1500 pt blood angels list… or rather SpaceBloodAngelWolves.

How can you bear to read my Heresies?

Considering the etiquette of a three-way..

Often i find myself in three-ways. I’m sure a lot of us do.

Okay, my partner is looking at me funny now.. I’m talking of course about those 40k games where there's three of you round a table.

Now it’s me experience that in a three-way the guy in the middle gets it, literally, from both sides.

Okay, schoolboy innuendo aside it is difficult, and often unfair given the deployments that we have in the brb. last time I found myself in this situation i tried something different and I wrote a scenario to try and redress some of the issues.

“His Name Is Mudd.”

Imperial requisitions officer Harry Mudd has been a very naughty boy.

He’s been selling secrets and imperial goods and codes to both the Tau and Eldar. Then hes been selling Tau movements to Eldar, and Eldar to Tau.

Tsk tsk.

Suffice to say he’s a wanted man, and each side wants him alive.. in order to find out just how much he’s divulged.

Harry is currently on Rourke 11, refuelling and about to run into the fringe worlds. He’ll be gone in 5-7 turns.

Each side in the running has to detain Harry and call for extraction. Coincidentally that will take 5 turns…

 

Table kinda looked like this – everyone was equidistant from Harry at the start of the game

MISSION PARAMETERS

1200 pts per side.

Harry starts by his ship, equal distances from each force.

Harry can be detained my making base contact during a turn. On the next turn Harry will move with the squad or vehicle he has joined (Harry can join any vehicle or unit that is not mindless or subject to stupidity, regardless of transport capacity. Harry is assumed to be unceremoniously grabbed, stowed or otherwise inconvenienced)

Harry cannot be directly targeted (wounds cannot be allocated to him) but he can still be injured by blast (if everyone is hit, so it harry) or template weapons (if he falls directly under the template)

If the unit holding harry is killed, Harry will make a run for his ship. Harry moves 12” per turn at the end of the turn, beginning with the turn he escapes. (if at any time harry is not being detained he moves back to the middle of the board)

Victory conditions

If a unit hold harry for five turns, they successfully extract him and win.

If no one holds him for long enough, whoever has him at the end of the game wins

If no-one holds him at the end of the game, the force that held him longest wins.

If harry is killed, no one wins and the game is a draw

Now don’t get me wrong this wasn't perfect and we made a few tweaks as we went along, but all in all it made a nice change from a normal game, and it had the distinct advantage of making it so the person being “ganged up on” was the guy in possession of Harry, rather than just the guy in the middle.

I also tried it with an oddly shaped table, kinda like a “T”, which worked quite well too.

So yeah.. moral of the story.. it’s your game, write stuff, experiment with stuff. dont be a slave to the brb.

I’d love to hear ways you guys change the game to fit your circumstances. as a guy who teaches game design, it actually does interest me.