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Wednesday, 3 June 2026

A Game Design Philosophy

A long time ago I ran a game of Conspiracy X. It's got X Files vibes, horror, aliens, monsters ghosts, magic, psionics and of course conspiracies. I love that game. The rules had some crunch and on the surface a fair amount of detail.

By nature I am a bit of a tinkerer. Rules are representations of reality and I like my subjective reality to have rules that hold a mirror up to reality. So every now and again I find something wrong and often glaringly so. 

In my life I have been around firearms more than most. It was things like an MP5 being classed as a pistol made me think . It started with shotguns. Do I know that trying to shoot something with a shotgun at range is problematic. Anything more than about 40-45m is unlikely to hit (don't tell me about shotgun slugs). At shorter ranges than that damage is less significant. This game was showing a range bracket of double that. 

Sniper rifles were actually under powered. In scale, which was about 25mm to 1m, for the game. On tabletop a heavy sniper rifle could hit something on from the end to end of my 3m table. When I looked it up, not being a sniper, the range was more like the table, the garden, a small carpark, two footpaths, four lanes of road, another smaller garden and I estimated you could readily hit something in the back room of the house opposite. That wasn't even close to the record which would be around double that. 

The players were okay with this. It made sense to them. My guess is that it also helped that for the most part things got better for them. 

Having done some martial arts, I have some idea about fighting. Again, not an expert but I have done more than most. One of the rules said that you couldn't kick when you were on the ground. Having been knocked off my feet by a kick from someone on their back the week before, I changed the rules. This did not go down well even though it was true to reality.

It was after this that I changed to Savage Worlds. Unlike almost all games I have played in the past, SW has a lot less crunch. It has enough, but only enough to keep the rules working. Being a tinkerer I have found the need to add to it on occasion but I haven't really found the need to change it.

When all said and done it works. Sensible tactics, like using cover, still work and arguably works better. Combat, which could take hours in the other games I had run, took easily a quarter of the time. Everyone is still happy and we move on to the next thing.  It also works as a skirmish game. Which I may have mentioned in the past.

Now it's not everyone's favourite game. Amongst the none D&D it's fairly popular. So not as popular as it should be. In over two decades of running it I haven't had an argument about rules. Well maybe once. 

So in a roundabout way I am suggesting that simplicity is better. Personally I like a lot of crunch in theory but then I have to play it. Rules are generic enough that they can be used to for pretty much an era. It works. It fun to play (and fast and furious apparently). It makes for a calmer tabletop. 

Tuesday, 2 June 2026

Actually Ending The Start Of The Week (22)

So I got round to finishing last week's task. Starting at the beginning of the end. It makes sense to me. Under the circumstances.
This week is going to be about the Guards of Traitors Toll. Again. This should see the end of the plan. I have a half dozen knights to glue together to make the yellow team or some mercenaries. I might have to get some more if I am going to do the Baron's War force. For some reason I have ended up with another twenty two figures again. No real plan to it all. I'm just finishing off this part of the queue.

What I've finished is below. They are not bad but I am sure there are a few missing details.
I've been thinking about my daughter a lot today. I wonder about the future more now than ever. It was my best mate from school's birthday yesterday. He died back in 1990. Living, or rather dead, proof of what happens to someone riding a Suzuki bike into the back of a car. I don't want either end of that for her. In fairness I am pretty sure she will be fine.

Monday, 1 June 2026

Start Of The Week?

This really is a start of the week post. The day just got away from me. My plan for the week was pretty solid. Everything was ready to go. The minis were trimmed and are on textured bases and even primed. The only figures I have ready to go are the Trench Crusaders (I keep wanting to call it tench crusade, the war against the carp), the Soviets and the last of the Traitors Toll stuff. So it's looking like the way I am going.

I'm still finishing off last week's stuff. Again. But I am nearly done. Just a few bits and the skin. Finish the mini with a wash and a little titivation for the base.
So I ended up with less gladiators than I thought. I put one of the frames together. In my mind there were going to be about eighteen of them but I ended up with only eight and only four of them were actually gladiators. So this is not going to be a project. 
 
My plan to turn my daughter into a gamer took a massive step forward this week. I got both copies of Stuffed Fables. Ideal for the little one. Or do I hope. I have even bigger plans, but let's not get ahead of myself.

She decorates her hair with shoes and live yellow diamond shape buttercups daily. The computer mouse turned into a real grey mouse today. He collects the sounds of breaking glass inside tin cans. The sky was striped like a circus tent all day.