Scott King's Blog, page 26
October 27, 2014
Texas Pecans!
Last winter when traveling to San Antonia for Christmas we kept seeing shops and stores selling “Texas Pecans.” There were pecan pies, jellies, drinks, soups, and other random items. We thought it was odd.
Now we understand why! There are pecan trees EVERYWHERE down here (gulf coast Texas) and each tree produces a hella amount of pecans. We have two trees in our back yard and so far we have nine buckets and more drop everyday. It’s been like blueberry or strawberry picking but instead of going to a random farm we get to do it in our yard.
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October 24, 2014
Creators Cast: Eric Summerer!
In the newest episodes of Creators Cast I chat with voice actor and audiobook narrator Eric Michael Summerer!. Eric is best known for being the co-host of the Dice Tower podcast and for his audiobook work, including two books written by yours truly! If you want to know anything about the biz and what a voice actor does then these are the episodes to listen to!
iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/creators-cast/id907534102?mt=2
If you don’t use iTunes or prefer to manually download an episode you can do so by going to the libsyn feed.
Libsyn http://creatorscast.libsyn.com/ (for listening online or downloading)
RSS Feed: http://creatorscast.libsyn.com/rss (for subscribing via a podcast app)
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October 22, 2014
Beach Heart!
I saw this on the beach. A single heart slowly being erased by the wind.
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October 20, 2014
2015 Gaming Calendar Now Available!
The 2015 Gaming Calendar is now on sale! Head over to lulu and pick up a copy today!
12 months
Geek Holidays
11 x 17 inches when open
It’s perfect for your home, office, or for holiday gifts!
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October 17, 2014
Princes of the Dragon Throne Preview!
Princes of the Dragon Throne, designed by Fred Mackenzie and published by Clever Mojo Game, is a fun mash-up of deck building and area control mechanics. It’s got tons of dragons, is seeping with theme, and has top quality components.
“The very first spark of an idea [for Princes of the Dragon Throne] was simply me saying to myself that I want to make a game about dragons,” Mackenzie said. “That thought made me remember a poem my brother wrote about the birth, life and death of a certain dragon. I wanted to make a game that also went through that progression. Princes of the Dragon Throne is not that game. My dragon game, which was called Dragon Frenzy, started out similar to the poem’s premise, but quickly changed direction as my idea required 125 dice. This was pre-Quarriors and I knew there was no way anybody would publish a game with that many dice.”
In the world of Princes of the Dragon Throne, the Dragon King has died and his sons, the princes, are vying for control of the kingdom. They do so by recruiting powerful supporters, controlling regions on the map, and by earning favors from guilds. At the end of the game the prince with the most prestige becomes the new king.
“As a kid, I read a lot of fantasy novels,” Mackenzie said. “I first read The Hobbit in 1980 and from that point on I always had a book in my hand. I just never got into reading sci-fi. So fantasy is what I love and what I wanted to make a game about.”
While in development, Princes of the Dragon Throne went through several variations using different mechanics, including role selection, set collection, and even rock/paper/scissors, but nothing clicked. It wasn’t until Mackenzie discovered deck building that Princes finally started to take shape.
“Once I decided upon deck building I also discovered that the mechanic was quickly becoming a favorite among designers,” Mackenzie said. “It seemed like everybody had a deck building game they were either developing or publishing. We play tested a version of the game that was only deck building for several weeks. It had its own personality and wasn’t just a Dominion clone, but it still didn’t seem to me like it would stand out in a crowded genre. One day it just hit me that the game needed to change once again. I wanted the deck building to cause you to do something on a board, a map of a fantasy land. I used the same card characters we had already, six races of peoples running six types of guilds and made a map with six kingdoms, with each one of them containing one of each of the six guilds. In the center was the dragon kingdom. The mechanisms employed in the dragon kingdom changed a few times during play testing, but for the most part the rest of the map stayed the same. Once I had a game that didn’t involve dragons fighting, but instead would have a more political approach to becoming king, it didn’t make sense to call it Dragon Frenzy anymore. David [Mackenzie] suggested Princes of the Dragon Throne and it stuck.”
The heart of Princes of the Dragon Throne is area control. Players do their best to make sure that they have the most units in a certain region or with a certain guild. This scores them points and favors. The deck building comes into play because the cards that players buy give them resources but also determine where on the map a player may place a unit.
When deck-building in the game there are a lot of meaningful choices that a player must make. Should they buy a card that gives them more resources? Should they focus on controlling a specific region? Or should they be playing more aggressively and buying cards just so another player doesn’t have access to a certain guild or region?
“Princes of the Dragon Throne resembles the earliest version of the final iteration pretty closely,” Mackenzie said. “The look, and function, of the dragon kingdom changed a few times. The six race kingdoms are basically the same. The prototype used a hex based board and looked very abstract. The final version is made to look more like an actual map. It really is a shame that we had to cover up so much of the beautiful map artwork with all those busy icons. But those icons are vital to game play so sacrifices have to be made…. Don Aguillo did an amazing amount of work in an amazingly short time and I couldn’t be happier with his work. As I said, I just wish we didn’t have to cover so much of it up.”
Princes of the Dragon Throne is currently on sale from Game Salute!
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October 14, 2014
Flip The Table: Beakman’s World!
I listen to a slew of podcasts, but one of my favorites by far is Flip The Table. They are a group of gamers who focus on playing odd, old, or obscure games.
What sets them apart from the dozens of other gaming podcasts is production quality of their show. Not only is their audio always crisp and clean, but each episode is edited, well structured, and entertaining.
Being a big fan, I’ve been wanting to contribute to the show. Since the cast is in Maine and I’m in Texas I knew there was no chance of weaseling myself into an episode, so I figured the next best thing was to find a game that could appear in one.
For many many months, Lisa and I scoured thrifts shops looking for a magical gaming gem. Finally, on a hot July day, on our way back from crabbing we found Beakman’s World: Beakmania! I bought the game. I sent it to Flip The Table and luckily they deemed it worthy of appearing in an episode.
Check-out the episode here: http://tableflipsyou.blogspot.com/2014/10/episode-64-beakmans-world.html
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October 13, 2014
Creators Cast: Mike Raicht!
In the newest episodes of Creators Cast I chat with New York Times Bestselling writer Mike Raicht about and the ins and outs of writing comics. Mike is best known for being the co-writer and co-creator of Stuff of Legend, but has worked for both DC, Marvel, and for several other publishers. If you want to know anything about the biz and what a comic book writer does then these are the episodes to listen to!
iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/creators-cast/id907534102?mt=2
If you don’t use iTunes or prefer to manually download an episode you can do so by going to the libsyn feed.
Libsyn http://creatorscast.libsyn.com/ (for listening online or downloading)
RSS Feed: http://creatorscast.libsyn.com/rss (for subscribing via a podcast app)
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October 10, 2014
First Star Trek Uniform in Space!
This is the first Star Trek uniform to actually be worn in space (Before I get yelled at by my geek friends, I know that it technically is a United Federation of Planets Uniform that appears on Star Trek and not a Star Trek Uniform)! An astronaut took it to the international space station as one of his personal items and wore it when doing a video call with William Shatner.
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October 8, 2014
Lost Legacy: The Starship Preview!
Lost Legacy, from AEG, is a quick micro-game. If you’ve played Love Letter then you already know the basic mechanics: draw a card and then play a card. The main objective is is to find the Lost Legacy card which will be distributed in either the main deck, the face-down pile, or in another’s players hand.
In many ways Lost Legacy feels like Love Letter. The big difference is that due to the end game goal and the card powers there is a lot more meaningful social interaction. Factor in additional decks, which can be combined to the base deck, and the super lower cost it’s worth checking out!
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October 7, 2014
First Star Trek Uniform in Space!
This is the first Star Trek uniform to actually be worn in space (Before I get yelled at by my geek friends, I know that it technically is a United Federation of Planets Uniform that appears on Star Trek and not a Star Trek Uniform)! An astronaut took it to the international space station as one of his personal items and wore it when doing a video call with William Shatner.
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