Week 2: A Whole Bunch of Stuff

A slightly vague title, I know. But that's not the worst part. The worst part is, what am I going to do for a title next time?!

So it was hot - really hot.  But talking about the weather destroys conversation (how do meteorologists manage it?)  So in the interest of preserving this blog slightly longer than two weeks, let’s get right to the gritty stuff - the star-stuff that refined ideas spawn from.

Random Goats Idea:

*** Disclaimer: Don’t ask me where this came from because truly I do not know ***

Some time in the future, or perhaps even an alternate now, whether through natural or artificial selection, or some kind of genetic experiment gone awry, or even the actions of an extraplanar being with an absurd sense of humour, majestic herds of mountain goats float along thermal air currents.  Naturally attuned to high altitudes, and now able to apply a buoyant effect to their bodies through the use of a specialised bladder and ballast system, they effortlessly float through the peaks of high ranges - stopping here and there to graze on the grasses that other creatures are unable to take advantage of.

Side note 1:  This also opens up a spot in the ecosystem for airborne carnivores, or at least mountain-based carnivores that might trap airborne goats as they come in to feed, the way a spider might trap insects, or a frog might grab insects with its tongue.

Application Possibility 1:  A webcomic immediately came to mind, or perhaps an animation with goats in a flying ‘V’ formation and put to majestic classical music.  Perhaps throw in some terror too as tourists scurry to avoid being hit by goat excrement travelling at terminal velocity.

Side note 2:  What happens to the goats when they die?  Do they lose control of their buoyancy - like a rigor mortis effect - and shoot up into orbit?  Perhaps Earth has gained a photogenic ring of snap-frozen goat carcasses.  Perhaps governments have to routinely clear away the goat-mass to stop a possible larger goat-satellite forming and ruining the world’s tidal charts.

Application Possibility 2:  A monster statistics block for these goats would be great.  I can already see ridiculous uses for them at the RPG table.

Side note 3:  Are these goats derived from fainting goats?  If so, and they get frightened of something while airborne, do they collapse upwards or downwards?  Or would it be random depending on what their breathing or digestion was up to at the time?  How would insurance companies feel about the possibility of goats going through aircraft engines or falling out of the sky into cars as they drove along narrow mountain roads.

Application Possibility 3: Goatnado. Or the lesser-known cumulogoatbus cloud formation.

Application Possibility 4: Goat Simulator: Sci-fi edition!

These cute little guys have a million and one uses and extrapolated problems and adaptations.  I won’t put them all in here, but I’m curious to see what other people think of them.

I Built a Road!

This was time well spent with Miss 9 who wanted me to help her build stuff in her Minecraft world.  So I got super creative and made a big straight road from her royal hall to her big tower/castle/fortified wall thing.  Then I decorated the road with a courtyard, big diorite cliffs, sea lanterns, and a small hedge maze.  I’ll stick pictures here for those interested.

I know roads aren't super exciting to look at, but I think the fun was in the cooperation with my daughter, and as you can see from the second picture, she's a pretty decent builder - probably better than me to be honest, judging by the bridge.  I'll probably learn a thing or two from the expert since she's been studying the Minecraft books she got for Christmas.  In the meantime, we've started a new race track for her and her sisters to race around while riding their horses.

A snippet from something else I’m working on here

The light rain smattered amongst the banana fronds. Kevin ran through the leaf litter, laughing.

“You can't catch me! I'm gonna win!” He puffed and tripped, and a pain shot up his leg.  He shouted in alarm.

“Kevin!” He heard his little brother shout through the foliage.

“Kevin,” he heard his name again, only this time the voice was more mechanical and less caring.

He blinked himself awake. “Huh?”

“Kevin, I have detected a distress signal. Coordinates are on the primary display.”

Kevin was surrounded by control panels and monitors. The smell of the banana plantation had gone and he was back on the Eye of Odin. “Thanks Felix. Sorry, these long hauls are killing me.”

“No harm done, Kevin,” the ship's computer replied. “Shall I modify our course?”

“No. We're already late enough as it is,” Kevin sighed. “Notify the Station, Felix. They have personnel that can take care of this.”

“Yes, Kevin. Activating the long­-range comm array... Message sent.  Putting the array back to sleep.”

Kevin looked down apologetically at the green blip on the sensor display. “Sorry, buddy. You'll have to hang on a little bit longer.” He reset the displays to show several different views from outside of the vast ore transport vessel, leaving one showing the navigation information.  Kevin slouched back, watching the Estimated Time until Arrival at Peary Base count down until eventually he returned to the smell of the banana plantation.

Youtube Content

Okay, a quick mention here about a short video I uploaded to Youtube today, showing a bit of Don’t Starve Together gameplay.  It’s a fairly uneventful rainy night sequence until disaster strikes, with no warning and with deadly consequences.  It’s a good example of how unforgiving and challenging DS/DST is - but I’m not complaining really.  It’s high level challenges like this that really keep me interested in things.  There was some behind the scenes stuff that happened while we played this that I found amusing too.  I realised after we’d stopped playing that I had forgotten to tell my recording software to record my microphone, so my initial thoughts were along the lines of .oO(This is going to be a lot of one-sided conversations).  Then I realised that the steam voice output from my DST partner was coming through a different set of speakers and different sound device to the rest of the audio so it also wasn’t being recorded.  It worked out in the end, because I was able to have a bit of roleplay fun in text captions, and the short snippet I grabbed wouldn’t have really had anything useful voice-wise anyway - except maybe some amusing exclamation and half-screams.

Table-top Fantasy Strategy Game Ruleset Stuffs!

Okay, so I feel that pasting in all of this in one hit is going to be a lot of spam, so I might break it up a bit, into sections about related stuff.  So to start us off, here’s the stuff I've written about the pre-game game - taking turns to build a world.

Terrain and the Map

The map’s terrain is broken up into hexes, and each hex has a terrain type chosen from the list below.  Each terrain type has benefits and, in some cases, challenges as well.

Map Creation

Prior to the start of the game, the map must be built.  This process involves players taking turns to choose a terrain type for each hex on the map, one at a time.  Roll a dice to determine the order of turns.  There are a couple of straightforward rules to placing hexes during the building of the map:  Firstly, each hex placed must border another hex, so that the map grows from a single location.  Secondly, aside from the first hex, all hexes placed must be bordered by the most hexes possible, so one hex cannot be placed to border two others if there is a vacant place available that would allow it to border three.  This stops the map from becoming a straight line, or a shape surrounding a void without hexes.

There are a finite number of hexes of each terrain type, but these are not divvied up amongst the players before they create the map, so players will find that there will be tactics involved in choosing particular terrain types before other players do in order to form the map a particular way that they might want.  You could end up the only player without forest near your City, for instance.

The basic properties of each terrain type are as follows:

Grassland - 1 move, can build: farm, trading post.

Forest - 2 move, provides stealth options to some non-stealth units, can build: lumber mill.

Mountain - Impassable except by flight or by some special units.

Hills - 3 move, provides extra defence to units, can build: mine, trading post.

Desert - 2 move, can build: trading post.

Note that there are some features which can only be built on certain terrain types.  This can also play a part in deciding where to place your hexes.

Well, that's it from me for this week.  Feel free to comment or ask me about any of this stuff, and I hope you'll stop by for Week 3.  :D

-Ix.