This is my favourite picture that I've taken ever. It is from an over night camp Strider and I did back in the Summer of 2010 on Holkham beach. The photo was taken around 4:30 in the morning on my iPhone. It's several pictures stitched together using a panoramic app. Sadly this app did a poor job and gives the photo it's major flaws. However it doesn't distract from the mood that the photo captures. I love the lighting, the primal feel, and captures Strider really well.
If you are one of the few people interested in what I do whether on Instagram, Twitter or Facebook, then you will be aware of my liking of lego mini figures. Or I'd hope so with the number of photos I share on those social networks. It may have also rared it's ugly head on here as well in the odd photo or two on one or two of the posts.
I'm not one of those big lego fanatic collectors. I just buy figures I like, or think I can use to illustrate a blog post. So we are looking at Lord of the Rings, Superheroes, and Star Wars stuff really. To be honest I only have a small handful of figures. Although I do have certain figures to illustrate certain board games, such as the scientists, doctor etc for Pandemic.
However since Christmas I've come up with a little project involving the lego mini figures. The idea is to get or create mini figures that represents who I am and my interests. A couple were easy, such as the gamer, the computer programmer, the mountaineer, because they already existed as official mini figures. I had to create a blogger. Which I did by buying the individual parts to put together a mini figure to represent me as a blogger (see below).
Next up is to create the following mini figures for this project, a hacktivist, a backpacker, and a lecturer. Now I know they do a backpacker in a lego set that you can buy, and there is also a teacher mini figure. However I'm going to create my own version of these. So I've been trawling the custom lego figure parts sites looking for appropriate bits to make these figures.
Once that stage of the project is complete it has a second stage. I want to put together some custom lego sets to photograph the figures on. So I'm looking to create a blogging desk/workstation, a tabletop gaming table, a wild camping camp site and maybe a classroom!
Here are a couple of the photos I've shared on other social media outlets. This first one is titled “Father and son”.
This next one is using the new Heath Ledger figure I've just got.
I've also found a couple of books about making your own custom mini figures, so payday they will be on their way to me. I'm sure stuff I learn from this will feed into gaming too, and painting miniatures.
In the run up to Christmas there was a teacher thing on Twitter that had teachers on holiday taking photos of lego mini figures doing Christmassy stuff. I forget the blog name now but they had a hashtag #legoholidaychallenge (Here is the blog post I was talking about click here) . It's not something I took part in. But it's something I've been doing on and off since then. The nice thing is I can use the appropriate mini figure of me in different situations.
Now as I've already said I putting together custom figures to represent me. And this idea came from the organisers of Game Camp (which I went to last year), where they had on a previous Game Camp used minifigs as a game/getting to know you activity. Where attendees were given a mini figure and had to swap with others to get the parts to make a mini figure of themselves. One day as an induction exercise I'd like to do this with my students. But in the meantime how cool would it be if these teachers did a similar thing and created minifigs of themselves and used them in the photos?
So maybe not the most exciting “hobby” but certainly a light hearted fun one.
Hopefully if you are local you will be able to make it and help raise funds to fight Ebola. I think there is space for 20 people at the location. So come along have a good time playing a great game.
I've mentioned in a previous post that I like games that have expansions. They expand the game! Add new options, modes of play, more players, new scenarios, etc. Basically add more variety. They aren't necessary on the whole but for the odd game they are to make the game more enjoyable.
Today the Harbour Expansion for Machi Koro arrived. It adds the cards to allow a fifth player, new cards and play modes. I'll do a more indepth look in another post.
In the Harbour Expansion is also a teaser for the next expansion coming out later this year!
One game I'm playing a lot of at the moment (admittedly using the iPad app) is Star Realms. There are two main expansions for this deck building game, Gambit and Crisis. But can I buy these in the UK? Nope nowhere has them in stock. Ones I can find are in the US and with postage (and possible import duty) really expensive. The Crisis expansion is made up of four individual themed packs, each costing (if available in the UK £3.95 – yeah back to the $1 = £1 exchange rate). However buying them through eBay means each pack is pushing over £10! The Gambit expansion is roughly £20 for a £10 game. It's rediculous. So why is there such a shortage in the UK? This is making the Marvel Dice Masters Avengers vs X-Men shortage last year look like a small blip. I won't even mention how hard it is to source an official play mat for Star Realms, or how my heart sinks at the thought of how hard it is going to be to get the storage box (with exclusive promo card) and the official card sleeves. Poor supply is such a frustrating thing, and there is no excuse for it in this day and age. I understand that companies can be caught be surprise by being a lot more popular than they thought they would be with a game. But still I think the writing has been on the wall that Star Realms would be a popular game.
Later this year a new co-operative game based on Thunderbirds is coming out. The game is design by Matt Leacock and published by Modiphius. Matt is famous for such games as Pandemic, Pandemic the Cure, Forbidden Desert, and Forbidden Island. All great co-operative board games. So the early indications are this should be a great game, great theme, great designer that excels at co-operative games, a theme that is suited to co-operative play.
So there you have it a brief “look what's just arrived”, a rant venting my frustration, and a “look what I'm excited about coming out later this year”.
On my way to drop off some bits for this Thursday's Play Pandemic to fight Ebola event I passed a sign in a local Christain bookshop window promoting read a book a month list of Christain books. This got filed away for later today in my mind. Unlucky for you dear reader I remembered this and my thoughts that went with seeing this sign.
I've seen this sort of thing before in other places, such as Twitter where some teachers are reading an educational book a month as part of their CPD. I've read in newspapers about book groups etc doing this. So it seems a popular thing to do. Seeing that sign earlier reminded me of this. And I'm never one to miss jumping on a bandwagon, even when that bandwagon has nearly come to a halt.
So then the cogs started turning in mind and I thought “wait why don't I do something like this for this blog?” But are there enough gaming books to do this? I'm not sure, but I know four to start with.
So starting in February I'm going to read the first book on the list Chicks Dig Gaming. Then at the end of the month I'll write a blog post about the book, and have a discussion in the comments for that post about the book. Then in March I'll read the second book, write a post and repeat.
In the meantime if there is a relevant book about gaming you think should be added to the list leave a comment below with your suggestion. I know there is a book looking at the history behind the game Monopoly. Which even though I don't enjoy the game I think could be very interesting. So I will find out the books title and author and add it to the end of this post as an update.
Hopefully this post has made you think this is a cool idea and would like to join me in this challenge.
UPDATE: The Monopoly book isn't out until mid February and the other I have as an audio book (yet to listen too)
This Thursday sees a Pandemic Party being held in Wisbech at The Entertainment Centre in aid to raise funds to help fight ebola. I wrote about Pandemic Parties previously here. Hopefully if you live locally you will be able to attend, have a great time playing Pandemic the game and help raise funds to fight ebola.
Click HERE to get full details of the event (it's a facebook event page)
11th April sees the Third International Table Top Day. This is a general gaming day, with the intention to just play games, maybe try something new, meet new gamers, possibly introduce new people to gaming. Wil Wheaton is one of the brains behind this day, and his excellent web series Table Top.
25th April sees the first International Catan Day. A day celebrating the game Catan (that's the new official name for Settlers of Catan). So an excuse to play this modern classic.
So I hope this has given you a heads up to maybe organise something for these days yourself, or to ask your FLGS if they have plans for these days.
Finally my starfield playmat for X-Wing arrived! This was an Eggbox Terrain Kickstarter for Starscapes that I backed last year, £26 for a 3' by 3' playmat. Amazing value. It looks gorgeous. Look how awesome it looks with a couple of ships on it.
The only drawback is my “gaming table” (a fold down dining table) is about an inch not wide enough. But I will work round it. I'm so excited to take this with me on my next visit to Nathan for us to play on.
Well technically one is a new arrival (today) the other two came just after the New Year.
First to arrive were two promos purchased from Board Game Geek (BGG) for the games Alhambra and Tokaido (top half of the photo). I like that BGG gets promos (not all sadly) to sell. Most promos are gained from attending conventions (majority based in the US). So the only chance to get one is either eBay or BGG. BGG tends to be the kinder option of the two selling the promos at a reasonable affordable price.
Promos aren't necessary for a game. There said it before someone else did. So why do I like them? I have a character flaw. Sadly companies exploit people like me. My flaw? I'm a completesionist (is that a real word?) If I like something I have to have all the bits for it, expansions, promos, different covers (if comics), appearances (even if it's a single panel in a comic). So you get the picture. Yeah I'm weird. Besides my flawed character, promos add a little variety or new options to a game. For example the Takaido promo I got adds a new character for players to chose to play with. While the the Alhambra promo adds new tiles (buildings) to purchase.
In the later half of last year Fantasy Flight Games (FFG) announced the Scum and Villainy faction for the X-Wing miniatures game, which is wave 6 iirc. Now the Scum and Villainy version of the Aces packs for the Imperials and Rebels comes with extra cards etc that convert one or two ships to the new faction if you want to use them with the new faction. One of those ships that can be converted will be Slave-1 which I didn't have. Now the ships in X-Wing have print runs, and if you try and get a ship between runs it can cost you a lot more (depending on how desperate you are) than the rrp. Luckily Slave-1 and the Falcon (already got) have just been reprinted and the container ship has hit our shores and the contents distributed to the game stores. Which means these ships can now be bought for a sensible price again. Hence I've bought the Slave-1 while it is available. There will be many like me that will have waited for this reprint, and snapping up the ships at the correct price. Which means they will sell out quickly again and become scarce and expensive once more. It's a vicious circle.
Posted by me using my iPad and the Blogsy app