Projects and Updates

As you may well imagine if you saw my last post, I've got a lot of packages to get together and weigh and get shipping quotes on. That doesn't mean there's nothing else going on.

For those waiting on the next Ever Expanding Dungeon session, it's coming. I tried to calculate the XP for the last three sessions just this evening, but I didn't really have everything on hand to do that, so I'll try again, possibly tomorrow night when I'm not packing up books to send out. I am also trying to find a way to make the survey responses more readily available during a game. In the meantime, I'll be using Mythic Variations for the in-between story while the party heals, before returning them to the dungeon. 

I also have two sessions of Ariale's game to write up. There's been a lot of bloodshed out Fjorgyn's way!

My second  RPG zine, Save vs. Paper Cuts,  a one-pager that I attempted to get done for DragonCon, is sitting around waiting for me to dig out the scanner, scan the cover "art"/"logo". Once that's done, layout will be a snap since it's only one side of a piece of paper. When it's available I'll alert everyone through the usual channels. It will be available for a stamp basically.

The other day, I decided to break out Cthulhu Dark and play a solo game, more to test an idea than to start yet another campaign. I'll write up the whys and such soon.

Friday night, the GURPs campaign I am playing in kicks off. We're playing the Reign of Steel setting/campaign (I guess?). Honestly, we rolled up characters so long ago that I've forgotten all but the overview I came up with for my character (and the GM has the character sheets, so I can't even remember what skills he has). Let's not even talk about whether or not I remember how combat works in GURPs. My enthusiasm for this was really high back in June or whenever it was, but with so many delays, I have to admit, it's kind of waning. I'm hopeful that once I'm there playing, I'll be as excited as I was then.

The next BKC game will feature a Guadalcanal scenario - I just need a 2 hour window to set up and play the game. That might be tomorrow night, or maybe Friday night after I get back from the FLGS.

Speaking of wargaming, there's a pile of unpainted miniatures that keep looking to me to do something with them. Never mind the painted ones that haven't been out in awhile (they will factor into next year's plans i think). The unpainted ones are probably not long for the sale/trade/give away pile. 

And as for challenges and such, here's where i stand currently on the ten games, ten times:

Game	Total
nuts! final version	10
Blitzkrieg Commander	5
Song of Blades and Heroes	0
S&W Whitebox	9
Tunnels & Trolls	0
Adventure Maximus	2
Urbion	10
Battle Over Britain	2
MIce & Mystics	0
Pathfinder Card Game : Rise of the Rune Lords	0
	38

Given that there's only 3 months left in the year, and that they are busy months for holidays at that (I have my son's Halloween costume to build over the next few weeks, then November is both NaGaDeMon and NaNoWriMo, December always goes too fast), I doubt I'll finish all ten games, ten times. I started in June though when I first heard of it, so I don't feel too badly about it. 

On the other hand, if I don't play Mice & Mystics or Pathfinder Card Game, they'll probably both go up for sale, since I'll have had both too long without any use and I have lot's of other games waiting to be played that I acquired more recently.

January 2014 Updates

This is one of those updates where I just lump everything together: role-playing, wargaming, zine-ing, etc.

A scene from a favorite song on Adventure Time
It has nothing to do with this post.

• Of late, I've been working on issue #2 of 6 Iron Spikes & a Small Hammer as often as possible. I'm deep in editing and revising - I seriously feel that I have to step up my game to accompany the amazing artwork I received.

• The majority of my hobby time not spend on the zine has been spent on finishing a mere six Swedish infantry for the Great Northern War by 11:59 PM tonight. Clearly, there's no consequence if I don't, it's just something I want to do. As it is, I've had to revise my original painting plan, and allot 3 months for every 2 months of GNW painting goals.

• Inking in of the Ever Expanding Dungeon map continues. It's tedious, not difficult. Once done, I'll scan it and post it with each session summary and indicate where the action is taking place.

• I've tentatively scheduled the first game of an ongoing open table dungeon crawl campaign for my local meetup group for later in February. The dungeon is not one of my own design, but I still have prep work to do.

• Finally, the budget tally:

January Budget: $15.00

YTD Budget: $15.00

January Actual:  $37.35

• BMC Iwo-Jima 32 Piece Set 
• Britain's Kublewagen

YTD Actual: $37.35

So, as you can see, not a great start on the budget .On the other hand, if I don't buy anything in February (not counting any birthday funds I might receive), I'll be back on pace in March.

It looks like I have 28 really long days coming up!

Some Admin Type Updates

Had a few minutes to go in and update the Campaigns page (in the bar at the top of the blog). 

It now includes links to all 20 sessions of The Ever Expanding Dungeon campaign, as well as posts on some of the methods I use, for those coming here and looking for info about solo dungeon crawling, or for those who want to read the full story.

I also updated the 6 Iron Spikes & a Small Hammer page (again, at the top of the blog) to include links to the following reviews of issue #1:

• Rended Press
• Gothridge Manor
• HeroPress

Thank you to all three sites for giving issue #1 some air time!

Speaking of the zine, if I told you I was sending you a copy and you didn't get it yet, please let me know. I'm pretty sure they should have all arrived by now.

The Long Weekend

While I was out and about Saturday picking up some maintenance items for my car, I swung by the library for their Memorial Day weekend book sale and to drop off some books. I had only intended to buy books for Young Lord Shadowmoss, but as these things invariably go, I purchased yet another 4 items for my own reading pile:

• Split Infinity by Piers Anthony
• Prostho Plus by Piers Anthony (best setup ever: "Will a mild-mannered dentist from Earth be able to make it in the high-powered politics of galactic dentistry?")
  
• Neuromancer by William Gibson 
• No Bended Knee: The Battle for Guadalcanal: The memoir of Gen. Merrill B. Twining, USMC (Ret.)

As recompense for this tomfoolery, the universe deemed it necessary for me to slice my knee open on my way inside after mowing the lawn that afternoon. To explain exactly how this happened would be too complicated, but it involves a two car garage, a ladder, the garage door track, and thinking about what I was going to do, not what I was doing. The end result was 3 hours sitting around at urgent care in order to get 6 stitches.

In other, not unrelated news, in addition to watching war movies galore, I got a lot of painting done this weekend - my Soviet rifle squad is done, I'm nearly finished with the Semonovsky unit (a 12-figure battalion) for the Great Northern War and I started work on 4 more Soviets and 3 more Germans.

I also managed to squeeze in learning games of Iron Ivan's Disposable Heroes/Coffin for Seven Brothers, using my newly painted Soviets and Germans, and David Newport's "Tactical Combat" (available for free on the Lone Warrior site. Scroll down and look for 'Tactical Combat' WWII Rules), with my PTO collection.

Here's a blurry cell phone pic from the latter(turn 1 i think):

The stands represent sections, the individual figures are platoon HQ, and the individual in the center bottom is the company HQ. Ratio of figures to men is 1:3 in this case, but the figure count is irrelevant. You could got 1:1 or 1:5 (which i probably what I'll do in 1/32) or 1:10 (for battalion level games where each stand is a company).

I sent 1 company of USMC against 2 HMG teams and 2 rifle sections of Japanese in dug in positions guarding a cleared trail/road. The optional HMG rules - ignore long range penalty and roll 2 dice/choose the best result -make them pretty powerful. Although my marines won the day, we took around 30% casualties to clear those two positions.

As Lady and Younglord Shadowmoss are visiting her mother, tonight I will have ample time to paint and game, and plan to do just that, including working on the Semonvsky unit, and getting back into the Ever Expanding Dungeon (I haven't gone in there all month!).