Day 2: The making of Moirai and it’s 2 lifes.

Really Brad you’re doing a blog post about a game you helped make? Why yes I am!

Okay so Moirai is a little game that I did the art for about 2 years ago (maybe even 3 now). Originally we set out to make this game for the 7 Day FPS (First Person Shooter) challenge (its like a game jam, but over 7 days and is focused on FPS games). Well we all got a bit lazy (I think from memory) and the game ended up getting made over the space of a mouth. I think it took me around 20 hours to make the art assets for the game. I imagine the others probably spent a bit longer on their parts (music and programming), especially Chris with the programming as the game relays on getting data from a sever and sending out emails to players ect (I don’t really know how hard this would have been, don’t ask me I’m just a artist 😛 ). Any way the game Eventurly got made and had has now had what I will reefer to as 2 life times. Actually what was probably the most memorable part of developing the game for me was when one tested asked if we could let them kill the sheep, and Chris said he would put it in if I did a dead sheep sprite for it (yes I did one).

Here is the spoiler warning from here I will probably end up talking about the games story and mechanics. The game only takes about 5 mins to play, so just go play it! Its currently got a 96% positive ratting on steam so it’s probably not going to be a complete waste of time.

The games first life was mostly through a website called Game Jolt, I remember being super excited and thinking the game had probably peaked its players at ten thousand. At this point the game had had a reasonable amount of coverage from small you-tubers. From this the game continued to gain more and more traction until it hit about 40k play throughs. What gave this first life a second push was when a you-tuber you may know called Pewdiepie played the game. Him playing the game alone got us another 10k downloads. Another worth while highlight from the first life is the game was featured on the show floor for a few hours in Game Jolts both ad GDC. So most of this life was powered social media and more so by you-tubers. The issue is when some one makes a YouTube video of the game it ruins the point of the game as it’s a one trick pony.

The second life came just a few weeks ago about a week before AVCon Chris got a email I had assumed was never coming as it has been so long, it was the email from steam saying we had made it through green light about a year after Chris had submitted it. This was Chris’s second game to get onto steam so he had rough idea of what to expect in terms of getting a games set up on steam. What Chris didn’t know to expect was 120k people playing the game in the space of just over a week. (Ah writing that made me laugh way to much) The good thing about all the steam players was that they where mostly playing it because it was in the popular new release section for a lot of that first week.

Hmm its after Midnight now, not sure what I wanted to get across in this post, I guess the main thing that this gets across is that steam is powerful get your game on it. 😛

Day 1: Pokemon Go is it good?

Hmm Brad do you really think it’s a good idea to share what will be an unpopular opinion as your first blog post for Blaugaust  ever? Well I don’t care. 😛 

So you mostly know what about Pokemon Go, especially if you have stumbled onto this Blog. The short answer as a game Pokemon Go is not a good game, as a game any way. What is a game (hmm something I can do a full blog post on… Brad take a hint)  it needs a advocacy, game mechanics, a win condition and most importantly a lose state.

Though, that’s not a really the main reason why it’s not a good game. The two main game play currently is catching Pokemon and attacking gyms.

The mechanics of catching Pokemon is  really just a basic paper toss game that has overly touchy curve ball detection (fixed in the patch pushed on the 31st) and harder to gauge distance with little reference given. I personally play with out the VR on as it’s even harder to gauge the distance with it. I could go on about this a lot more, but I’m not looking to do a full break down of it. I propose this question keep every thing the same about catching them, but strip out Pokemon and make it say real animals. Will this part of the game hold up on its own?

Gyms are a bit better on mechanics as they do have some tactics and encourages you to get together to take down a gyms. Though they have a massive problem as casual players can’t do any thing effective to help their team attack or help level one. As the CP of the Pokemon you catch is based on your level, if you’re not playing the game a lot your probably sitting around level 16 maybe even 20. I think I have been playing a lot (currently level 20) and I can’t do much to most gyms. I guess you can call gyms the End game for Pokemon GO, but that just means that you’re stuck just catching Pokemon and visiting Pokestops until you’re among the top leveled players. When you get the games premium currency from holding gyms it just doesn’t feel right limiting the currency gain to only the top players. Over all I don’t think Gyms are great atm, attacking one is fun, but for me at least the fun is mostly gone as its so pretty much out of my reach to impact them in a meaning way.

Over all I’m still playing it most days for a hour or so after work, but not because its good which as game it isn’t (obviously in my opinion). Why do I and I think so many people keep playing it? It’s game play loop is very good at triggering your reward circuit and  when paid with the nostalgia people have for Pokemon, well yeah.

Any way, just some of my thoughts on Pokemon Go. cya tomorrow (okay later today)

 

Blaugust 2016 is here!

So I haven’t post on here in, idk go look for you’re self. What’s made me come back you ask? Well Blaugust WTF is Blaugust you ask? It’s what a few people who where addicted to the stress of organizing a convention called AVCon (specifically the people form the Games team) came up with to fill the void of stress less nights post AVCon which runs in July. But Brad that’s just why it exists what is it? Its where the participants post a blog post each day to cause them simular stress levels as in the lead up to AVCon. To help simulate the fact they do love running AVCon they typically post about things they like some times adding a twist like forcing them self’s to a theme or alphabet challenges ect.

I first heard of this ludicrous idea after my first year running a part of the convention in 2014, back then I was still in uni and was doing more writing for other things, and well thought its was stupid. Last year I was burnt out and was wanting to start up other side projects, and well still kinda thought it was stupid. Now this year I guess I have drank enough of the Kool-Aid to join in! I will not be forcing my self to keep to any strict theme, but hope to use it as a chance to write down my thoughts on games with a focus on their mechanics. Will be aiming for a minimum of 300 words.

Well I guess once I have posted this and shared it on the Facebook page I will be socially committed to doing this for the next 31 days.

Pen, paper & paint.

Okay so gotten more painting done today, but that’s not the focus of the post my army’s compensation is. For those of you who have read some of my older post you may remember that I am doing this army to take to Cancon mid war comp. Since then there have been a few changes, Cancon for the first time is running a Late war competition. At first I had no interest in playing late war, especially after having a look at the revised points for Red Bear (pretty much all soviet army lists for late war) making them notably cheaper, and the heavy katiuskas having their price more than halved. So whats made me brave enough to risk having to fight against the soviet hordes? Air-con, its pretty simple the late war comp at Cancon is in the 2nd hall that’s got air-con. If you have ever been to Canberra late January you would understand, it’s still hot and its also started raining so there is a bit of humidity that’s killer in the main hall.

I have been using Devil’s Charge to write army lists, mostly because it has a lot of deserve option that not all of the other books have, and because by the battle of the Bulge where this book is set the Americans where fully equipped with pretty much all of their powerful toys including AT (anti-tank) 13 M10’s. So here are a few of the lists I have come up with:

List 1: Garry’s Suggestion: (this one was suggested to me by a friend) HQ  C/V(15pts), Rifle Platoon + one extra bazooka C/V(205pts), Rifle Platoon + one extra bazooka C/V(205pts), AT platoon 6x Bazookas C/V(120pts), AT platoon 3x 57mm guns + 3x Bazookas C/V(160pts), Scrapyard Tank platoon 2x Priests + 2x 105 Shermans C/T(140pts), 4x 105mm artillery C/V(185pts), 2x 155mm artillery C/V(145pts), 2x M10 C/V(255pts), AA Platoon 1x Bofors & 1x M49 C/V(60pts), AOP (40pts).

Comes to a 1500pts on the dot which is the limit for the Cancon comp. Likes: 9 Platoons so I can losse one before I start losing match points, can combine the 105s with the 155s to make a 6 gun battery with AT 5 and has 2 armored platoons. Dislikes: quite a few small platoons that can easily be picked off, Bazooka platoon only has a short range so can be picked off at range, only 2 M10s, no recon.

105mm Guns

List 2: Gun Line: (my version or Garry’s list) HQ  C/V(15pts), Rifle Platoon + one extra bazooka C/V(205pts), Rifle Platoon C/V(200pts), AT platoon 3x 57mm guns C/V(100pts), AT platoon 3x 57mm guns C/V(100pts), Cavalry Recon Platoon C/T(70pts), 4x 105mm artillery C/V(185pts), 2x 155mm artillery C/V(145pts), 4x M10 C/V(405pts), AA Platoon 1x Bofors & 1x M2 C/T(35pts), AOP (40pts).

Likes: 9 platoons, 4 M10s, 6 artillery pieces, 2 57mm AT platoons. Dislikes: to many gun teams, would like more mobility.

I think I will need more than one of these.

List 3: Bazookas!: HQ  C/V(15pts), Rifle Platoon + 3 extra bazooka + SMG command C/V(220pts),  Rifle Platoon + 3 extra bazooka + SMG command C/V(220pts), AT platoon 3x 57mm guns C/V(100pts),  Cavalry Recon Platoon C/T(70pts), 4x 105mm artillery C/T(140pts), 4x 155mm artillery C/T(210pts), 4x M10 C/V(405pts), 2x Calliopes C/T(80pts), AOP (40pts).

Likes: 2 full arty platoons, calliopes, rifle platoons are armed to the teeth, 4 M10s and recon. Dislikes: only 8 platoons, only Trained artillery. Possible change: drop Rifle SMG command teams and 3 bazookas for a 35pts AA platoon taking me to 9 platoons.

Well that’s all for now. Would be great to hear some other peoples thoughts on the list or some complacently different ones that may be comparative.

2nd Platoon progress.

Just a Quick post before I do some painting. In this batch I am painting more not only painting my second rifle platoon, but also the bazooka teams for each platoon, my Company Commander and Second in Command. What makes this batch a bit ambitious is that I am aiming to have it done before Sunday giving me tonight, Friday and Saturday to finish them off. I started this batch on Monday, so far I have done the base coating on the boots, pants, jackets and skin. Leaving me to do the base coating on weapons, helmets and webbing before I get on to highlighting the lot of it. At this point I know I am going to be a pushing it to get them all done, but its do able. My normal work flow with painting is to base coat a color and highlight it immediately, but with the number of small mistakes I made with the fist platoon when base coating on parts of the model I had already highlighted. So this time I am doing all the base contain first and highlights second. When highlighting I am much neater so hopefully wont end up having to do so much patch up work. That is it for now, tomorrow I may make a post about the army variations I am considering. Any way later.

First Platoon Ready!

It’s been way to long since I have made a post at all letter lone one for my painting, but it does not mean I have not done some painting! I will be making some more posts over this week talking about the changes I am making to my army and some stuff on the next platoon I am going to be painting. For now the Platoon I have finished!

This one was taken after I had base coated every thing other than the gun metal.

Before I went on my base coating frenzy I had already highlighted the pants. After I did the jackets and a some what subtle highlight on them I wanted to get all the other base colors on them so I could get a better idea of how they would look finished. What had me concerned was how light and bright the jackets where looking in comparison to the unpainted parts on the miniatures. After I had painted the other colors on them I was much happier with how the jackets where looking.

Nearly ready to varnish, just need to paint the metal.

I was really happy with out they are coming along at this stage, the helmet highlight looks a bit stronger than it actually is. At this stage I was still unsure how I wanted to handle doing metal for the army either with metallic paint which I would wash back to get rid of the shine or just paint them non-metallic using a dark grey  as a base and then follow it up with a light grey blue. I decided to go with the non-metallic option wanting to try something I had not before.

The finished models.

So I know this is a bit of a jump, but I did not take nearly enough pictures ounce I got into it. I know the shine from the low gloss varnish is coming off quite strong, but when they don’t have more normal lighting on them its a lot more subtle. I had the choice of 2 varnishes to use for the army either the low gloss that I went with or the no gloss that dulls the the colors on the models. Just another note I varnished the figures while they where still on there sticks.

The basing where to begin, so I originally started  with using chocolate brown (872 by Model Color) for the base rims, but after trying of it with Flat Earth (983) it was obvious it was the superior choice. Flat Earth had better contrast with the rest of the base and complemented the figures better.

The base soil was done with a black under coat, Chocolate Brown, Flat earth and a final light coat of a 50% Flat earth and 50% White. I considered doing a final much lighter color applied very lightly, but decided against it wanting to keep it quite dark.

So on the rest of the bases I have a lot going on, “Grass” flock by Games Work Shop, Brushes Medium Green by woodland Scenics, the foliage I believe to be German by the text on the bag and the wood from a dead plant in my back yard (I have collected more than enough to do the whole army and then some).

Less glare.

Any way that’s all I have for now; I will make sure to take more pictures, and will hopefully get around to put up more post about what I am up wargaming wise and more.

Planetary Annihilation: Hot key Image

Hey with the new patch comes motivation, which has resulted in me finally making a hot key image. I have been talking about doing one since I made my Eco image a few weeks ago. First up I am much happier with how this guide image has come up its easier to read and is more visually pleasing. My first guide image the eco image’s text was hard to read in certain parts and is a bit squishy, but now with this superior style developed for this new image I will mostly redo it in the same visual style which will hopefully make it easier to read. For the hot key image I have just included majority of the default hot keys plus a few that are not actually in the options (chat and pathing debug).

(click for full image)

 

When ever I get in to a new game after having played a few games I will always take a look at its hot keys, and begin to learn a few at a time until I’am using them all regularly, but Planetary Annihilation I have been hard pressed trying the learn them all with not being able to hover my mouse over an icon to get its hot key. This is what has motivated me to make this image, as much as I believe we will have such a features implemented by the games release for now we are in beta.

So far I have found the select all air or land units on screen to be really useful. With good use of these hot keys it can make fighting on multiple fronts a lot easier as new units filter into the fight that will not be in your original control groups. What I want to add on to this next is the camera anchors to help with fighting on multiple fronts and with getting back to my base for some extra fabricator micro.

Any way I will be making a steam guide with info on how to use hot keys.

For now later.

More Painting!

I know its been well over a week since I have done any painting, but today I did some. I have always been a fan of batch painting going back to when I first started war-gaming. The issue with batch painting 15mm scale figures (Flames of War figures) over Games Workshops 28mm scale figures is that batch painting them means your typically painting something like 39 figures (number of riflemen in a platoon) over some thing like 10 in a squad for warhammer. Where the issue arises for 15mm is the shear number that your painting at a time makes it easy to become absent minded, and missing parts of the figures. My way to combat this is to check over each stick ounce I think it’s done and then again after I have finished the whole platoon checking over every stick again with a new found energy knowing that I have nearly finished a color.

Progress: anklets, pants and jacket test.

 

Really happy with how they are coming up so far. That said not having painted in so long my hands are not quite as steady as they use to be, so as a result some of the painting is not quite as neat as I would have liked it to been, but I can feel my brush control returning so at least from my second platoon onwards my figures should be up to the standard I’am hoping to achieve. I only did the jackets on 2 of the miniatures to test the paint order, and have discovered that I really need to do the sink before the jacket, so that’s what I am going to do next time I paint (hopefully less than a week from now).

After starting on my computer chair I opted out for the stall.

Just a quick note on my working posture, so on my computer chair I was finding my self sitting to high over my figures and hunching over a lot so decided a switch out for the much lower stall putting the figures at a much more appropriate height. The moment I switched over I found my back feeling much better, and at a better height to work at.

That’s all for this for now Later.

First Engagement

So today I had a game with a borrowed american army, unfortunately no battle report at the request of my opponent. Instead a quick summary of the game with some thoughts on also changing my list. I won the game 5-2 after losing 2 platoons. The way scoring works in Flames of War is the winner gets 6 points, and the losers  gets 1, but for every platoon the winning player losses they get one less point, and the losing player gets one more for the first 2 platoons lost. The exception to this is an army with 9 or more platoons ignores the first platoon lost (my army has 10 platoons), so in the game I lost a rifle platoon and my mobile AA platoon.

Mission Break Through, Attacker: British Armour Defender: American Infantry.

I am thinking of trading out the MG platoon for a 37mm AT platoon. The MG platoon can put down a lot of anti infantry fire power, but by mid war tanks amour is more than heavy enough to no be threatened by them. Mean while the 37mm AT guns are equipped with both anti infantry, and anti tank rounds, but half the amount of fire power. As much as I love the ability of MGs to cut down infantry in the open they are not going to get many opportunities to do this, and all I really need them to do is pin down an assault which the 37mm will give me enough a shots to pin down assaulting infantry while also being threatening to tanks.

Borrowed American FoW army.

For those of you who know my army list from my first blog post you will notice quite a few of the units in the photo above are quite a few of the units are not quite right. Because the army is borrowed quite a few of the of the platoons are represented. Going from the top left to right: 105mm Artillery, 155mm Artillery (represented by Air-landing Cannon Platoon), 57mm AT Platoon, 2 M15 CGMC AA Platoon, T30 75mm HMC (represented by half tracks). Middle row: Parachute Rifle Platoon, MG platoon. Bottom: Rifle Platoon, Rifle Platoon and Weapons Platoon.

Later.

Planetary Annihilation: Eco image

Hey so making my first PC gaming post today, more Flames of War stuff soon I promise 🙂

So I have been playing Planetary Annihilation since the beta came out a few weeks ago, and with me always wanting to know the most efficient way  to play a game especially one like this where managing you economy is so important. When I first started playing I made the same mistake as most new players and built air fabricators, and then moved to vehicle fabricators when I saw an out dated eco guide on steam. The other day I decided after talking about it for ages to make my own eco guide/image, and with that ounce again changed my go to fab unit.

https://i.imgur.com/UqLdZWp.jpg

After seeing that bot fabs are cheaper to build in the first place and have a faster acceleration, I have now moved to them over all other teir 1 builders.

Note all build times are for unassisted factories. Any way hope this is usefull to some people be sure to keep an eye out for more helpful images I make. Next up will be a one for hot keys.

Later.