Finding the Time to Play Games - Part 2

Back in January 2012, I wrote about my deep desire to play more tabletop games, even though the ever-present bugbear of limited free-time was keeping me from doing just that. I came to the conclusion that I needed to focus my attention on the 3 Fun Things that I enjoy doing more than anything else, and spend my time on those things. I even went as far as suggesting the scheduling of regular fun-time events on my social calendar. So how did I do? Read on dear blog-readers...  

It's now late-summer and I'm a bit better off than I was in January 2012. But truth be told, I still have a long way to go until I reach a satisfactory level of gaming nirvana. The 3 things I chose were:

1. Designing and playtesting my miniatures wargame rules (Sword of Severnia) and its associated campaign system (Crown of Severnia).   
2. Participating in the Wars of the Third Age wargame campaign with my friends Wally, Kevin, and Geoff (which use the Crown of Severnia rules, and Sword of Severnia for tactical battles). 
3. Painting Miniatures.

So why did I choose those 3 things?

Number 1 was a no-brainer. I've been seriously developing my miniatures wargame rules since 2006. Progress has been somewhat spotty the last 3 years, due in large part to the demands of my job. I simply have a lot less time to work on the game than I did in previous years.

That said, I've made damn good progress on the rules (both tactical and campaign sets) in 2012. I'm starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel and hope springs eternal that I will (God willing) eventually get these wargame rules published within the next 1 or 2 years. I admit to being a bit of a design perfectionist at times, and continue to hone these game rules into something that I can be proud of, and which don't feel like every other set of fantasy mass-battle rules currently on the market. But bottom-line, I enjoy the creative process of designing these games immensely, so it's something that I desperately WANT to spend my time on.

Number 2 was also a shoe-in for my top-3 list. I had a goal of getting this grand fantasy war campaign going in 2012, and by God, we did it! The Crown of Severnia campaign kicked off in May 2012, and it's going strong as we speak. We're still in early stages of the campaign (middle of Season 2 out of 8 total seasons) and not only are the four of us enjoying the hell out of our roles as Warlords of Severnia, but it's proving to be a great way to fully test out my campaign and tactical battle rules. Truth be told, it's the ONLY game that I'm currently playing right now.

Number 3 ties into the first two things on my list, but it stands on its own merits as something unique. I've always enjoyed doing hands-on art projects. In fact, I was very close to entering college as an art major. Ultimately, I fell in love with computers in 1981, majored in Computer Science, and the rest is history.

But art is still dear to my heart. Painting miniatures serves as my "art release" and fills a definite happiness niche for me. I don't do it nearly enough. And I will NEVER paint all the unpainted tiny tin-men and plastic soldiers that I own! But by putting this as Number 3 on my list, I'm going to MAKE THE TIME for it now. Eight months into 2012, I have failed on this goal, but I fully intend to get back into it as soon as I complete some pending work on my wargame rules and things calm down a bit there.      

Picking ONLY 3 fun things was truly excruciating. So settling on Number 3 was a gut-wrenching decision for me; as much as choosing to do something FUN can actually be considered gut-wrenching!
 
I love playing strategy board games, and I've got a pile of new games sitting on the shelves of my bedroom closet just begging to be played. But the truth is, despite repeated attempts, it has been extremely difficult finding a group of committed players who want to play board games on a regular basis. And with the time that I'm spending on miniatures gaming & designing, I simply don't have the time to organize a board-game club or host games at my house on a weekly/bi-weekly basis.

While I haven't given up on the board gaming hobby, it has become painfully obvious that I only have so much free-time to spend on gaming. So board games have taken a back-seat to minis gaming. I'm even planning to start selling off part of my board games collection, with the sad realization that I have more games than I'll ever have time to learn and play in my life-time. Such is life.

In the end, I've come to understand that TIME IS IN SHORT SUPPLY once you're a middle aged man. You'll never be able to do all the things you wish you could do. So the key to finding happiness, and not being overwhelmed by it all, is to FOCUS. Find your favorites and throw all your energy into those things.

You may not be able to do everything you want, but at least you'll have a blast doing a few things that you truly love.

Peace!

Finding the Time to Play Games - Part 1

I recently turned 48 years old. There's really nothing magical about that particular age. Talk to me in two more years and I might feel drastically different. But for now, I'm just another year closer to a milestone birthday.

That said, flipping another page on my Life Calendar did trigger me to stop and ponder the state of my life. What significant problems do I need to fix in my life? How do I boost my happiness level? What are my plans for the future? There are always dozens of things to think about.

Over the past 3 years, one recurring thought has continually bubbled it's way to the top of my brain: How do I find the time to do those fun things that I truly love to do? I wish I knew the answer to this one of life's many puzzles. But I haven't figured out the magic formula yet.

You see, I love to play tabletop games (board games and miniatures war games). They fill a very special niche for me, exercising the strategic-thinking and creativity portions of my brain. But try as I might, I have failed miserably to achieve any consistency in getting my friends together for regular game nights. I have done much more in the way of researching and thinking about games than actually playing them. That's truly sad.

There are a host of reasons why getting games to the table have failed for me. For starters, 9.5 to 10 hours of every weekday are spent working or driving to/from work. Then it's home for dinner with my wife Anna, followed by doing dishes. So most nights, my "free time" doesn't begin until 7:30 or 8:00 pm. Some nights are devoted to spending quality time with my honey, who unfortunately, does not share my same passion for tabletop games. So that doesn't leave a big window of opportunity for gaming during weeknights. Not to mention, I'm mentally exhausted from work many of these nights. Those of you who work in the IT field can probably relate to this well.  

My gaming buddies are of a similar age, and although they may be home earlier than me, they have their kids' activities to deal with. So free weeknights are typically limited for them as well.

I confess that I have other outside interests that eat into my time, like dining out, going to the movies with my wife, reading, listening to podcasts, walking, painting miniatures, designing games, surfing the internet, occasionally playing the drums, etc. Perhaps I have too many other interests?

All I know is that it adds up to one thing: I don't get to play games often enough.

At this moment, you're probably thinking, "so do something about it Nancy Boy and quit whining!" And you're right; all the whining in the world doesn't result in problems fixing themselves. So after mulling it over in my head, I believe that I need to do a couple of key things:

1. Prioritize which Fun Things are most important to me. 
2. Take that priority list, cut it down to the 3 most important things and focus solely on them. 
3. Schedule regularly recurring Fun Time events on my calendar and stick to that schedule.

I've often said to myself that scheduling fun time seems silly. I have a schedule at work; why do I want to create a task schedule for FUN stuff? But after several years of failing to achieve what I wanted (which is playing more games), something has to change. Flying by the seat of my pants is NOT working.

Perhaps a disciplined approach will produce the desired results? I guess I'll never know unless I try.
So it's off to create a prioritized Fun Things list. I'll share that in Part 2 of this blog-post series.
Wish me luck!

A New Approach

Sheesh on a leash and a bag of hashish. This whole blogging thing is a real learning experience. It's not that I've struggled with the technological end of things. Blogger is certainly easy enough to use. If you can write an email, you can blog. The real trick is finding the TIME to post to your blog on a regular basis. And that's the part I'm really struggling with.

I've learned that my previous blogging approach, which was to write lengthier posts, often covering an assortment of related topics, just doesn't work all that well for me anymore. Sure, it's great fun to write and read the meatier stuff. But it's extremely hard to find the time and personal motivation to create those longer blog-posts.

Let's face it, people are butterflies when it comes to reading stuff on the web. They flit about, fluttering to one web-site and drinking a little online nectar, and then they fly to another site for another quick slurp of digital juice. From my perspective, blogs aren't really meant to contain exhaustive posts detailing everything you always wanted to know about X-Y-Z topic. They're meant to appeal to the butterfly in all of us; just give me that quick little drink of goodness and then I'm off to the next site to read something else.

So I'm going to try something different. I'm going to try to write SHORT blog-posts, and write them MORE FREQUENTLY. You know, small little doses of coolness. My plan is that these suckers won't take me too long to write, and nobody will get bored wading through a long post. Plus, I can keep the blog fresh, rather than posting once or twice a month (or even longer as has been the case of late!).

Let's see how it goes. It's a new year; time for something new right?

The Brown Eyed Man and the Chocolatier

Once upon a time there lived a brown-eyed man. He was a creative soul who toiled in virtual obscurity, doing what he loved. But after many grueling years of being overworked and underpaid, the frustrated man sought out a new path in life. He shouted into the digital ether, hoping that some sentient being out there in the vast cosmos of 0's and 1's would hear his plea for guidance. He sat back, drank a raspberry margarita on Cinco De Mayo and waited.

The call came from the mystical chocolatier, Mr. Goodbar, who lived high upon a hill in his shining factory. The brown-eyed man sat down for a pow-wow with the chocolatier and they chatted about manufacturing candy bars, building software, and appeasing the Oracle. It was a good meeting.

Days passed. The brown-man spent the time watching the Steel Magnolias grow, and engaging his friends in mythical warfare with scores of tiny tin troops who battled across a killing field made of fake grass. He celebrated his wedding anniversary, taking the girl he loved to a land where tasty Italian dishes were served in countless numbers to patrons of all shapes and sizes.

He met with the chocolatier again. They seemed to hit it off. The brown-eyed man was intrigued. Perhaps his future was in the candy making business? Time would tell.

The brown-eyed man traveled to the far reaches of Virginia to contemplate his future. He walked the fields of Fredericksburg, consulting with the ghosts of long-dead Civil War soldiers. He chatted with Martha Washington at Mount Vernon, who told him there was no dishonor in working for a chocolatier. Even the men at the Game Parlor in the duchy of Woodbridge agreed, but then they would probably say anything nice just to ensure that the brown-eyed man paid for his $100+ boxes of board games and tin soldiers and went out the door wide-eyed and happy, not knowing what damage he just did to his now appreciably lighter wallet.

Upon his return, the brown-eyed man got a phone call. It was from a representative of the chocolatier. The candy-maker wanted him to come work for his company. Heath Bars, Peppermint Patties, and Reeses Peanut Butter Cups were calling. A few were even eaten in celebration, and there was much rejoicing.

And then it was JUNE...

Yes, it was a crazy month for me (the brown eyed man), one filled with lots of excitement and anticipation. I landed a new consulting job as an Application Design Analyst working at Hershey (the candy folks). I'm optimistic that it will work out well. But it's scary. After running my own small company for 14+ years, the thought of working for someone else is a very strange feeling to be sure. I hope I like it, and I hope they like me. Wish me luck!

A Detour into a New World

For awhile there you might have thought that this fun little Blog had died a grisly death. What has it been, about 2 months and I've posted nary a word? The silence has been deafening.

Fortunately, I've held off the saliva-dripping hounds gnawing at my ankles and have escaped with my dignity and my tootsies intact. Well, at least my tootsies. Reclaiming my dignity may take some time. You see, I've made one of those major life-altering decisions to leave my current full-time job as a micro ISV owner (not entirely, as my tiny software development company will live on as a part-time gig), and return to working full-time in Corporate America.

There are several reasons why I'm making this move, but the overriding consideration is a purely financial one. Despite pouring lots of time, money, creativity, software development skill, patience, and hard work into my micro business, it has never become the money-maker that I had originally hoped it would become. Developing a great product and providing top-notch customer support for it isn't nearly enough to succeed. You've got to out-market and out-sell a large portion of your competitors. That's extremely difficult to do when your biggest competition can spend $1,000 for every $1 that you spend to promote your product. Eventually, you have to confront reality and admit that you're not going to win every fight.

There have been successes and accomplishments to be extremely proud of, and many new friends made along the way, but in the end the reality is that except for a few very fortunate software entrepreneurs, working for someone else pays a helluva lot better.

So I'm in the midst of re-assimilating into the world of "working for somebody else". On one hand, it really sucks. I will sorely miss the benefit of choosing my own projects to work on; projects that I'm intensely passionate about. I'll miss picking my own development tools to use, and implementing my own personal procedures and methodologies. I'll miss setting my own work-schedule. But I won't miss being underpaid, working mostly in isolation and anonymity, working lots of nights & weekends, and frequently feeling completely overwhelmed by the sheer variety of tasks that need to be done to keep a micro ISV running to even a mild degree of success. I've "worked for the man" before. Let me say that it is a much easier job and usually less-stressful than running your own business.

What's hardest for me to deal with right now is the loss of dignity that comes with moving from full-time self-employment to hunting for a position working for somebody else. Most of the people who you'll interview with have absolutely no concept of what it takes to run a small software development business or all the things you do to make it happen. They don't realize all the hats you've had to wear and all the things you've had to learn entirely on your own.

The simple truth is that you come from a totally different world than they do and they don't really value it like they should. If they want a VB.Net developer and you've been using PowerBuilder or Java for years, they scoff and kick you to the curb. If it's NOT EXACTLY what they want, they move on. It doesn't matter whether you've designed software for 20 years and can probably run circles around them as an analyst & developer, or can learn the language well enough to be teaching it to new programming recruits by next year. Nope. They want what they want; who cares if you actually ran your own company or not? I'm slowly learning to swallow my pride, like it or not.

Working for someone else will probably always be "just a job" to me. It helps pay the bills, but it's unlikely to become something that I'm completely passionate about. Who knows, maybe I'll catch lightning in a bottle? But I kinda doubt it. Most people just aren't that lucky.

That's why I'm keeping my business around as a part-time hobby gig. That will be one way to satisfy my personal desires, to work on stuff that I truly love. I can dabble in what I enjoy and will no longer need to worry about whether it's a big financial success or not.

I'll see how it all works out. Until then, I'm taking a detour into a New World; one with bosses, co-workers, time-sheets, business attire, rush-hour traffic, meetings, and office politics, but most of all, one with health benefits, regular vacation, and a steady paycheck. Wish me luck!

Saving the World, One Toy Soldier at a Time

Time to get political, but in a gaming way.

MSN recently asked the question, "is America on the decline?" Many people are passionate in their belief that the USA is sinking quicker than the Titanic. The economy sucks. Just look at the stagnant housing market and the recent woes on Wall Street if you need proof about that. Consumerism runs rampant through our society.

We're mired in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that show no immediate signs of ending, while more and more American boys are killed and maimed each day. Diplomatically, more and more of the world hates us with each passing day.

Faith in our politicians to remedy these problems has faded to an all-time low. So what do we do about it?

Well... I'm an American. I'm also a miniature wargamer. And you can learn a lot from a miniature wargamer. Sometimes more stuff than you really care to know. Maybe, just maybe, we can learn something valuable from the way these gamers approach their hobby and use that knowledge to model changes in American culture? Hell, it's worth a shot, right?

You probably think I've been smoking crack or that I've been toking on the Wacky Weedus. Maybe you just think I'm a jackass. That's okay, but please bear with me.

It seems to me that our society is plagued by 3 evils that will eventually drive us to ruin unless eradicated. Those three bugaboos are (1) rampant consumerism, (2) an entitlement mentality, and (3) the general malaise of laziness that has crept into our culture.

Rampant consumerism revolves around our society's need to buy everything they see, whether it's really needed or not, and then throw it away in search of the next big thing to lust after. Today's American culture is burdened by the "gotta have that, and gotta have it now!" mindset. We're big-time gluttons.

Take video games as a sub-group. There's a palpable lack of innovation in the video/computer game industry. For years, vidiots have been stuck with a never ending flow of 1st-Person shooters, RPG adventure games, and interactive sports games. Not that there's anything wrong with these popular genres, but when will new ground really be broken here? The video game industry is driven by giant companies hoping that they'll produce one mega-hit out of a bunch of mostly lackluster titles and that one hit game will make them rich. If they produce a hit, they continue to make slight variations of that game formula, over and over and over again. The little software companies don't have the financial resources to develop and market their products to a large audience, and as a result, innovation on the whole suffers.

So what do video gamers do? They scarf up a butt-load of new games, churning through title after title like Pac-Man on speed. Most of them are mediocre rehashes of a few great games, and end up getting pawned back to GameStop or auctioned on eBay for pennies on the dollar. Not to mention that even the best video games don't really last. I have board games and miniatures from the 1970's that I still use today. How many video gamers can claim the same thing? Technology charges ahead, rapidly making older games extinct. It's a consumerism based industry. You gotta buy the latest & greatest games now! Once you buy into that, it's hard for addicted vidiots to jump off the merry-go-wheel.

More and more Americans have also been brainwashed to accept an Entitlement Mentality. Young people feel that society owes them a good job that pays high wages. Customers feel that no matter how unreasonable their demands are or how rudely they act, that companies simply owe them fantastic, bend-over-backwards customer service. Ultra left-wing thinkers believe that everyone should have a nice home and get free health care, even if they make zero-effort to get a job and contribute something helpful to society. People are clamoring for more and more free stuff all the time. C'mon gimme free stuff! Gimme gimme gimme! You owe us!

This mentality of entitlement fosters a delusional sense of pride in Americans. If they're entitled to good things it's only because they deserve it. Oh yes, don't you think for a minute that we don't deserve these things. By God, we're Americans. We're the greatest nation in the world. We're smarter, stronger, and richer than everyone else. We're better than everyone else. George Bush and all of our politicians believe this. They're swelling with pride. It's the kind of pride that infers we can do no wrong.

Too much pride is a dangerous thing. A self-absorbed, vain society is one that asserts how it's always right and everyone else is always wrong. And that's just ridiculous because nobody in the world is always right. We're not gods.

When I think of pride like this in terms of gaming, the great "Euro vs. Ameritrash" debate in the boardgaming world quickly comes to mind. Surf on over to the BoardGameGeek website and you will inevitably stumble upon a myriad of forum posts from Euro-gamers asserting their intellectual superiority and telling you why "their games" are so much better than the inelegant, overly time-consuming, and mindless adventure games and wargames that you play. They profess to know what true gaming genius is. If you disagree with them or criticize a Euro-game for being bland or too lightweight, they become apoplectic and spew an endless stream of venomous words.

But Euro-gamers aren't the only ones who are prideful. There's a whole contingent of Ameritrashers (those who enjoy meaty, old school, theme-rich games about war, zombies, space-men, pirates, and monsters) who can hurl insults with the best of them. In fact, the debate over at BGG has gotten so heated that a group of Ameritrash game enthusiasts, feeling unloved and jabbed in their pride-swelled egos, have formed their own website called Fortress Ameritrash. To them, it's the last bastion of sanity in a world filled with foofy Euro-snoots who don't share their impeccable taste in games.

And lastly, we come to the general malaise of laziness that pervades our culture. America didn't always act this way. We were once manufacturing giants, technological innovators, and financial gurus. American people built our country on an ethic of hard-work. We put our minds and bodies to the test and great things were accomplished.

Fast forward to today. It's sad to look at the back/bottom of so many products and see the words "Made in China" instead of "Made in the USA". We're outsourcing tons of technical jobs to India and other foreign nations. Perhaps it's because people just don't want to work as hard anymore. Why should they; they're entitled to take it easy after all. Americans just want to work hard enough to bring home a decent paycheck, and then sit back and buy more and more shiny things that provide the illusion of happiness. They can't be bothered to solve the problems of the world anymore.

Much of the gaming world has responded to our culture's overall laziness in concrete ways.

Remember back in the 80's when you played adventure games like Zork and had to figure out all the riddles yourself? Nowadays you just buy the cheat-book to your favorite video game and it tells you all the secrets you need to know. Remember when you could look at the actual source-code of games you played on your Apple II+? If you were really curious and hands-on enough, you could learn Basic programming and tweak the code to do new things. I fondly remember editing some lines in my Tuesday Night Football software so that I could play games with Dracula at QB, Frankenstein at tailback, and the Wolfman at wide-receiver instead of using the Cowboys and Steelers rosters that came with the game. I don't see too many average Joes doing those kinds of things today (most programs aren't designed to allow that sort of thing).

In the board-gaming world, the explosion of light, family-friendly Euro games is a clear indicator that the majority of people want fast-playing games where they don't have to think very hard. While Carcassonne and Ticket to Ride are both fantastic games, they're certainly not brain-burners that you immerse yourself in for 3 hours. Playing long games with fairly complex rules just takes too much effort for most folks.

So what's the solution to these cultural woes? Well, you've stayed with me for this long, so let me put it to you simply: we need to think more like veteran miniature wargamers. Seriously.

Unlike the gluttons of our society who buy up all the latest mass-market stuff only to throw it away in short order in search of something new, the veteran miniature-gamer tends to hold onto his precious toy soldiers for a long time. This isn't a quick-fix hobby. Buying miniatures in any appreciable quantity can be costly. So you need to pace yourself. You buy what you can afford and build up your minis collection slowly, over a period of years. Remember that H.G. Wells wrote his famous miniature wargaming book, Little Wars, in 1913. People have been playing with toy soldiers ever since. You don't have to buy every single available model today; they're not going to run out anytime soon!

Miniature wargamers who paint their own models become very attached to their little guys. When you spend all that time putting your own love & attention into something, you don't just toss it aside willy nilly. So while many of us will be the first to admit that mini-gamers love to amass scores of toy soldiers, they're usually treated like tiny treasures, often passed down to friends and family through generations. This isn't a chew'em up, spit 'em out glutton-fest.

By and large, I never think of miniature wargamers as being lazy. They work hard to enjoy their hobby. This form of gaming takes some effort. You've got to plan what types of armies you want to build and research the marketplace to discover what available models are out there. If you buy a batch of unpainted models, then you'll need to set aside time to assemble and paint them. Or if you're lacking free time or artistic talent, you can pay someone else to paint the soldiers for you. Or you can buy pro-painted figures at conventions or off eBay. All of this requires you to get up off your ass and do some planning, and what you ultimately decide is whether you're more comfortable spending time or money.

Mini-gamers are typically a highly creative bunch; much more so than any other type of gamer. They paint. They build things. They dabble in writing their own home-grown rules. They build fictional armies and craft background stories for fictional leaders & heroes that fight for fictional countries. They read history or fantasy/sci-fi to get cool ideas to use in their games. No my friends, being a miniature wargamer is not the domain of the lazy. You need to work at your fun.

While every gaggle of gamers has its overzealous know-it-alls and holier-than-thou jerks, my experience with the majority of veteran mini-gamers is that they're an extremely hospitable bunch. We respect the effort that our peers put into painting their figures, writing their own rules, and crafting their own battle scenarios, because we've done it ourselves and appreciate all the effort it takes to accomplish those things. Miniature wargaming is such a broad-hobby from a creative perspective that you can't help but be humbled by the variety of people doing amazing things with their various talents.

While we take pride in being able to outsmart a friend in a head-to-head military conflict, us old-school tabletop generals value good sportsmanship and know that it's wise to be gracious when we've gotten the stuffing beaten out of our tiny tin army. Friendly competition is what it's all about.

What I've learned over the years as a miniature wargamer is that owning more models doesn't make you happy. Consumerism isn't the answer. When your closet is loaded with too many boxes of unpainted tin soldiers all you feel is overwhelmed that you'll never have time to paint everything.

I've learned that having an inflated sense of pride is just a quicker way to make enemies. There are all types of people involved in the miniature wargaming hobby. Some are masterful painters. Some are innovative rules writers and scenario designers. Some are historians. Some can build wondrous terrain. Some are fantastic storytellers. We should embrace them all, because they all have something to offer. You're not better than they are; you're simply a part of their number.

Happiness in the miniature wargaming hobby is gained through the journey. You can't sit back and wait for everything to magically fall into your lap. You must do something. The thrill of the hunt as you search for cool models to add to your collection is a lot of fun. Taking the time to paint your own models is artistically fulfilling. Those are your shiny little masterpieces! Crafting your own scenarios or wargame rules set is tremendously satisfying. So soak it all in and enjoy the ride for as long as you can.

So America listen to us wily miniature wargamers. When you buy things, savor them. Don't be a voracious glutton hungrily chasing down material nuggets with the hope that the more you consume, the happier you'll become. Check your pride at the door. Don't feel that you're entitled to things because you're better than everyone else. You're not. Everyone has something useful to offer. Respect that. And finally, get off your ass and do some work. Nothing good ever gets done when you sullenly lay around hoping that you'll miraculously win the PowerBall jackpot. Hard work doesn't guarantee success, but laziness is a surefire road to failure.

My name is Steve. I'm a miniature wargamer. And I'm saving America, one toy soldier at a time.

Frustrated Incorporated

It's time for me to vent and let off some brain-steam. I'm frustrated. About what you say?

Well, truth be told, none of these bothers are earth-shattering frustrations. Rather, they're smally niggly bits which are eating away at my patience; a patience which most friends and family members claim that I have an enormous amount of.

Let's take them in turn...

#1 = WORK
I'm in the process of changing gears work-wise, switching my day-to-day emphasis on baseball related activities (data development, sales, tech support) and returning to a heavy immersion in wargame design, development, and playtesting.

I'm excited to change gears and am really looking forward to doing new things. The preseason and early-season baseball rush always causes me to suffer a bit of burnout, so switching to something radically different is a big boost to my mojo.

The niggling frustration I'm having right now is that I want (and need) to become like Butter. I need to get "on a roll" with my game development & playtesting, but I haven't found that steady flow of inner-brain magic yet. Oh, I'm working diligently and making progress. I just need to get in the zone. That's something that software designers, programmers, artists, architects, and even athletes can probably relate to.

I can't explain how to make it happen. It's not a switch that you simply flip and suddenly, you become inspired and enormously productive. But if you focus on something long and hard enough, eventually magic happens. Ideas flow like cheap wine. You do three days worth of work in one-day. Inspiration bubbles up. You find yourself thinking up brilliant ideas right before dozing off to sleep and while in the shower the next morning.

Anyway, that's what I'm missing right now. I want it to happen... NOW. I guess I'll just have to keep plugging away and stay focused. Sooner or later, it's gonna happen.


#2 = ROTISSERIE BASEBALL
I have never finished dead-last in any fantasy baseball, football, or hockey league that I've participated in. And I've been playing in various leagues for well over 20 years. I'm used to finishing in-the-money, and I've won my fair share of league championships. But currently, in my HARL Baseball league, my favorite fantasy league of all time, I find my Sevy Rhinos team in dead-last. Yikes!

As frustrating as being in last place is, I have faith that things will improve for my ballclub. Experience tells me that you cannot really gauge the strengths/weaknesses of your rotisserie team until 6 weeks of the season have elapsed. On paper, I was pretty happy with my team when I looked it over post-draft. The offense looked very strong, and the pitching seemed decent, although there were a few question marks to consider. But man, has my pitching staff totally sucked so far! Their total implosion is the major reason I'm dwelling in the cellar right now.

My starting pitching staff (this is an NL-only league) consists of Jeff Francis, Oliver Perez, Tom Gorzelanny, Randy Johnson, Joel Pineiro, and Shawn Chacon. Of my top four hurlers, only Oliver Perez has been any good. Francis started off poorly, but his last 2 starts have been solid, so he fortunately appears to be returning to form. Gorzelanny may be hiding an arm injury. His control has been dreadful, and that's very unlike him. The Big Unit missed the first 2 weeks while resting on the DL. He's been decent so far, and I'm hoping he returns to his form of 2005 and leaves his 2006 Yankees season as an aberration. Arizona has a good young team, so the Unit can't help but benefit from that.

The rotation hasn't been my only worry. Prior to this past week, my bullpen had been lit up. Jose Valverde and Tom Gordon have been like kerosene matches standing next to an open flame. Ryan Madson hasn't been much better. Only Kevin Gregg has kept his ERA down and helped my club. Fortunately, things appear to be turning around, as all four relievers combined to bolster my staff last week with Wins, Saves, and quality outings.

So things are improving. I even stuck SP-Odalis Perez into my flex slot to get more Innings Pitched and hopefully whittle down my bloated ERA and WHIP with some quality statistics. Of course, banking on Odalis Perez to be reliable is like hoping that Paris Hilton disappears from the tabloids. But hey, when your options are slim, you gotta gamble sometimes!


#3 = BOARD GAME CLUB
Getting my local board game group to show up and play games on a regular basis has been a major point of frustration for me. I have played a bunch of board games with my friends over the past 8 months or so. They've been extremely enjoyable gaming sessions. I just wish they could happen A LOT more often!

Let's face it, organizing anything is always a big challenge. It's especially tricky when you're dealing with adults who have very busy schedules and kids. Plus, since this is just a fun thing and not a formal event like a class or work project, or participation on a sports team, people tend to blow these things off when squeezed for time. I can understand, but it's still frustrating, especially for the person (me) who arranges everything.

Plus, some of the problems with maintaining a steady gaming schedule has been my own fault. I was extremely busy working overtime and doing other activities during off-hours in February through the first half of April. Nobody else picked up the ball and ran with it, so the game club basically went on hiatus for a few months.

On the plus side, I haven't given up hope yet. I love board games, wargames, and card games. And I have a bunch of new games (at least to me) to try out, as well as many old favorites to continue to bring to the table. Despite my disappointment in not getting enough traction going amongst my gamer-friends to put the game group on auto-pilot, I still think it can be done. It's just going to take time and plenty of patience. The fact that I own a bunch of cool games and don't want to see them languish on the shelf for eternity is a driving force behind my continual efforts to light a fire under people's butts.

So I shall start again. People need to come to the realization that having FUN with family and friends is a critical component to a healthy, happy life. It's too easy to get overly caught up in work and day-to-day trifles which are not important in the big scheme of things. So I'm trying to do my part in spreading the joy. Hopefully it will work!


#4 = WRITING TO THIS BLOG
I have three blogs going right now. There's a private one dedicated to the development of my tabletop miniatures wargame called And On the 7th Day They Created Severnia. That's where the project team members and I post our thoughts, ideas, and observations about the Sword of Severnia fantasy wargame we're involved in developing.

I also maintain a blog for my HARL Baseball league, where I write about my fantasy baseball league and share information with the league members. There's also an associated website called HARL Central where members can download weekly stat reports and view online reports.

And then there's this blog, a personal journal where I discuss board games, card games, miniatures, wargames, software development, fantasy sports, and anything else that strikes my fancy.

Keeping all 3 blogs up-to-date can be a challenge. Of all three, writing to this one is the hardest. Experiences designing software/games and with my fantasy baseball league help to generate articles for the other two blogs without much of a problem. But writing to a personal journal is different.

While I almost always have something to say, sometimes I wonder if it's really worth saying. I mean, there's only so much people can read while surfing the net. So I frequently ask myself the question, "what makes this blog worth reading?" Why bother writing at all if I don't have anything interesting, informative, or captivating to say?

That's probably something that a great many bloggers struggle with. Sure, you can use blogging as a pure ego trip, gaining satisfaction in the simple fact that your voice is on the internet somewhere. Or perhaps, you just want to write for cathartic purposes; because it makes you feel good to share your feelings and get things off your chest. They're both valid reasons I suppose.

For me, I want to inform and entertain. The thing that I hope for is that a reader learns something and has fun doing it.

I know that I don't always succeed. I'm still learning what makes a good blog post, what's useful to write about, and what people enjoy. Truth be told, I'm probably overthinking this. Perhaps that's why I'm frustrated about not writing to this blog often enough. Four or five posts per month is not enough. I want to be more prolific and not let things get too stagnant. Posting 12-16 times per month would be oh so much better!

But for an increase in posting to occur, I'm going to have to take a new approach to this blog. Perhaps I should be willing to write shorter posts? Perhaps I should feel free to just brain-dump and not feel guilty about it? Perhaps I need to stop worrying about being informative and just starting writing? It's very possible that could be holding me back.

So I'm going to try something new. I'm just going to LET GO and WRITE and see what happens. At least I can't be frustrated about lack of posting any longer if I take that approach!

Until next time... BE GOOD.

He Lives!

Wow. Has it really been 2.5 weeks since I last posted here? It seems like even longer than that! Hopefully my readers haven't totally abandoned me. I'm not dead folks. I do live!

So where have I been since March 5 and what's been happening?

Rhino Software

Well, for starters, I have been mega mega busy with work at Rhino Software for the past month. Being that our flagship products involve fantasy baseball software and a weekly baseball stats service, the preseason (especially late February, March, and the 1st half of April) is always totally crazy for me work-wise.

On the plus side, orders for software and stats services have been steadily rolling in these past few weeks. I'm very grateful for the business, but of course, I wish there was even more. The fantasy sports business is extremely competitive nowadays, and it's tough for a tiny company like ours to compete in a world that's dominated by the giant media companies such as CBS, ESPN, Yahoo, and MLB.com. But we offer products a little outside of the mainstream, and our customers are a little more experienced and do-it-yourself than the typical fantasy sports fan. The really great thing is the nice batch of repeat customers who have stuck with Rhino with many long years. I've lost track of how many folks are in our Gold Club; it has become quite sizeable. Serving these people, who have become my friends in many ways, is really what makes all the thankless years of hard-work worthwhile. Thanks for keeping me going guys!

Rhino Baseball

Despite the fact that Rhino Baseball has been around for 10 years, I know that it could still benefit from lots of added exposure. Perhaps I'll eventually force myself to make the time to create some updated video demonstrations of the software via YouTube or another online movie/demo tool. Rhino Baseball takes some time to learn because it's a pretty deep program, but man, it is a very cool program once you learn what it can do. I wish more people could really see that by having an expert user like me show them all the neat stuff it can do.

I obviously love fantasy baseball, having played in and run a league for 22 years now. But I can honestly say that I probably would have given up on fantasy baseball many years ago without Rhino Baseball. It just really adds so damn much to my enjoyment of projecting player stats, doing draft prep in the preseason and tinkering with plans/strategies, tracking my picks & progress at my annual player auction, running my HARL league in a smooth fashion, and being able to provide my league-mates with some fantastic analytical reports such as in-season dollar values, impact ratings, team point graphs, top-30 roto leaders, and other neat reports during the regular season.

Blecho Sicko

The flu bug has really bitten my family and friends hard this year. Just about everyone that I know has suffered through some bout of illness this winter. I was healthy up through March 10 and then BLAMMO! On March 11 it struck. I came down with some nasty bug, which knocked me on my tookus for almost 2 weeks. I'm still dealing with the tail-end of it as we speak.

Needless to say, being sick in bed for many days, with occasional forays into the office to take care of some pressing business needs, put the kabosh on my blog-writing for awhile.

I had planned to do some reporting on my experiences at the Cold Wars convention in Lancaster which I attended on March 7 and 8. Those reports will be coming real soon -- they'll be part of one of my next 2 blog posts. It was a great weekend. Perhaps I caught "wargamers disease" from the teeming masses of damp gamers (it was rainy that weekend)?

The Blog is Back!

So although the blog was on hiatus for the past few weeks, the Six Sided Rhinoceros still lives. Over the next few weeks, you can expect:

• A mix of miniature wargaming stuff as I report on my adventures at Cold Wars 2008, share some pictures taken by my friend Kevin (and some of my own), and discuss the cool toys that I bought there. It was a very good con for painted minis!
• A few words about the coming fantasy baseball season. I've got 2 weeks to prepare for my upcoming draft (HARL Draft Day is April 5), so my head is swimming with rotisserie thoughts right now.
• Some fresh boardgaming stuff. I've also been on a tabletop gaming hiatus for the past 5-6 weeks, simply do to lack of time and being sick. Once early-April rolls around and my fantasy baseball draft ends up in the rear-view mirror, I'm hoping to get back into the swing of board gaming and wargaming again.
• Some thoughts on Sword of Severnia playtesting. Spring sees the kickoff of playtesting of the much anticipated computer-assisted miniature wargame that I've been developing for Rhino Software for the past 2+ years. I'm probably going to go ahead and share some thoughts on that process and the wargame's development progress here. Maybe I'll even share some designer notes as well, although I've got to be careful not to reveal too much before the game is officially released (hopefully later this year).

So stick with the blog and come back often as the posting frequency should increase now that I'm healthy again!

Cheers!

Reflections on Love

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone.

Today brings mixed emotions. On one hand, it's a great day to celebrate the love you have for your spouse, family, and friends. Whether you express your love through flowers, chocolates, hugs, kisses, or a warm smile, the important thing is to show it and mean it.

On the flip-side, Valentine's Day is a very sad day for me personally. You see, it was on this snowy day in 2007 that my Father lost his battle with cancer and passed away. I was there and I'll never forget it.

Unfortunately, Valentine's Day has taken on a new, dual meaning for me. One-half happiness and celebration of love in the here & now, and one-half melancholy reflection on the loss of a loving parent, a role model, a confidant, and a personal hero.

But on a positive note, I've learned that love carries on after death, and that it can be celebrated in remembrance of happy moments that have long since passed. When I think of "true love", I typically conjure this image in my mind's eye...

The love that my Father (Joe) had for my Mother (Patricia) represented, at least for me, the concept of "true love" in its purest form.

Perhaps then, it is appropriate that my Dad passed away on St. Valentine's Day. Maybe it was meant to be a way for us to understand that true love never dies and is not forgotten, it just moves to a different place, a place that we may no longer be able to reach out and touch, but which sticks deep down in the recesses of our soul.

I'm Not Dead Yet!

Hello. Remember me? Yeah I know, it has been awhile. Sorry for not posting anything in almost 2 weeks, but life gets in the way sometimes. Anyway, here's what has been going on in my life.

Middle Age Madness

My birthday has come and gone. I'm now 44 years old; officially middle-aged and damn proud of it. Okay, well I'm not really damn proud, but since I can't change the creeping advance of Father Time I might as well make light of it. My mind still feels young. My body... well not so much.

Dice and Games

I did get one really fun thing for my birthday -- a 2nd dice tower from VixenTor Games. I already had the Dungeon themed tower. The new one was the Phoenix model, very colorful and vibrant. My friend Wally and I used it while playing two games of Battle Cry last week. Unfortunately, I got spanked twice. Ouch! I'm not blaming the tower though. I just had crap luck all night. During the first game, Wally wiped out a completely fresh Confederate infantry unit (4 soldiers) by rolling 4 (yes 4!) kill symbols on his throw of 4 dice. That's a 6.25% chance of success. But wait, not only did he do it once, but he did it twice! Jeezus, Mary, and Joseph! We could probably play 20 more games of Battle Cry and that would never happen twice in the same game. I hung in there, but that enormously good luck swung the tide for him. During the second game, I did even worse. It was the card draws that hampered me that game -- the majority of my troops were stuck on the left flank all battle while I kept picking up Center and Right Flank cards! Oh well, it happens. I still like Battle Cry. Sometimes war is just a cruel and unfair mistress.

Feeling Bookish

I also finished reading the Hobby Games: The 100 Best book. Man, what an excellent book and a truly fun read. I plan to do some separate blog posts in the future about stuff I discovered in this book. All I can say right now is this: if you like board games, go buy this book! It will open your eyes to many games you've never heard about, and is a celebration of the wide variety of games just itching to be played. I sincerely hope that editor James Lowder and the folks at Green Ronin are able to release a second volume sometime down the road. There are easily another 100 great games worth delving into. I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

February Already?

It's hard to believe, but February starts tomorrow! Where did the first month of 2008 go? Zoom zoom, it's gone.

February brings a good bit of sadness with it for me and my family. I lost my Dad to cancer last Valentine's Day. The two of us were very close, and it's a pain that hasn't gone away. I'm sure that it never will. But he's no longer suffering and my faith assures me that he's in a much better place, so at least that's something.

I learned many things from my father's passing. One thing is that a little part of you dies as well. Some things that you previously found enormous joy in pursuing suddenly become a little less exciting. Not everything; just certain things -- especially those that you shared with the person who has passed on.

Another thing that I learned is that your faith will be tested. You begin to wonder if what you have believed in all of these years is still true to you. You wonder if this life is all there is. You talk to God a lot and become introspective. Eventually, you either reinforce what you previously believed or form new beliefs.

Thirdly, you gain a greater appreciation for the time you spent with that person. Your fondness for them does not diminish, it grows. You begin to fully realize that what's truly important in life is NOT your job, how much money you make, how big your house is or how luxurious your car is, how many gadgets you own, how sexy you look, whether your favorite team won or lost, or how deranged Britney Spears is. All that really matters is that you and those you most care about are healthy, happy and self-fulfilled, and doing their best to make society a better place for everyone (even if it's only in some very small way). It's quite amazing to me that even though my Dad is gone, he still hasn't stopped teaching me valuable lessons.

Anyway, I didn't mean to be Debbie Downer. Sorry for my diversion into my inner-self.

Cold Wars is Coming!

The first big game convention of the year, at least in my neck of the woods, is slowly sneaking up on us. Cold Wars 2008 is a miniatures wargaming convention held in Lancaster, PA every winter. I even recall driving to Cold Wars in the snow last year! This year's 3-day convention is being held on March 7 thru March 9. The theme of this year's convention is "the golden age of piracy". Gotta pre-reg soon and get me a T-shirt swabbies -- it looks devilishly cool! Arrrrrr!

HeroScape Still Alive & Kicking

A combination of hard-to-find sets of the Wave-7 expansion, extended delays in releasing Wave-8, and steep holiday discounting of the Swarm of the Marro master set had driven many doom & gloomers to predict the demise of HeroScape. Well, it just ain't so folks. One of my favorite tabletop games is here to stay, and it will be under the guidance of a new company, Wizards of the Coast (a subdivision of Hasbro). You can read all about it on the HeroScapers.com fan site.

It looks like a fresh batch of Wave 7 (including those elusive and much-wanted Templar Knights on horseback) will be released sometime in April. We can also expect to see the Wave 8 expansion in midsummer, probably in conjunction with either the Origins or GenCon game conventions.

I love HeroScape and am glad it's sticking around. It has always seemed to be more popular with adult hobby gamers rather than young kids, so I think the move to Wizards makes sense from that perspective. Plus, Wizards really needed a non-collectible game to factor into their current product mix, and I think they'll push this game hard into hobby game stores, somewhere it has never been available before. That will only help more people gain exposure to the game. On the downside, I think the price for the game and its expansions will increase. Wizards has a more limited budget than mega-corp Hasbro, so that means you'll get less product at higher cost. I think the days of that Rise of the Valkyrie master set that was jam-packed with cool plastic goodness are now over. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted. But I'm a minis whore, so I'll pay whatever they want to charge us (within reason of course!).

That's it for now. I'll promise to write more often. Cheers!