Cult Of Games XLBS: Write Better Rulebooks!
November 7, 2021 by avernos
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It the XLBS Show………Happy Sunday Fellow CoGs! Well Earned Golden Buttons! Nice dry brushing @brennon the brushes I use for dry brushing are makeup-style brushes, with a rounded end. I do want the Harrowdeep box set. I’d like the minis for Soulbound. But, I’ll be staying tuned to see how the game goes for you @fcostin @avernos The Mantic paper starter mat, reminds me of the Priveteer Press ‘War Machine’ instructions. They told you how to get started quite well and you were told how to place things and move and such. Third edition if I remember right. (I could… Read more »
Am I first? Woohoo! Happy Sunday!
Done by the deadly, Dennis de Dimanche! 😉
Happy Sunday folks!
Greatest movie ever made
Thanks a million for the Golden Button. Completely stoked.
Gerry, the image on my laptop is just a Weird World War Two US model from Westwinds Secrets of the Third Reich range. The wall is a model I made from plaster and painted up years ago. My wife liked the photo so it ended up as my background on my laptop.
Excellent show as always. Just the thing to watch while cracking on with more stuff.
Happy Sunday everyone.
cheers, your very own personalised desktop looks fantastic. Also I’m easily distracted ^^
Welcome back, I missed you guys last weekend, I sat down to do more to the Elf Lords Hall for my Middle-Earth SBG table, and remembered no weekender. I did get more done, and should update the project.
This weekend was more about adding a bodyguard unit to my Dark Angels
A lot of rulesets run into problems in their layout and wording because they are either written specifically for competition gaming or the writers know they will be used for competition gaming. Given the nature of a lot 9f competition players who look for every loophole and examine the placement of every comma to try and gain an advantage it inevitably leads to rulesets being over wordy and too descriptive
Totally agree. What FFG got right with the Star Wars Games was that they understood they needed an encyclopaedic rules reference for the serious gamer, but also a standalone “how to play” that covered all the rules, but without all the ifs, buts and edge cases getting in the way of the learning process. Not saying they were perfect, but exactly the right idea to make the game accessible to casual and competitive players alike.
It’s a problem with manuals in general though.
Not just rules for games.
And that’s before you get to the simple fact that not everyone has English as their primary language or (for extra difficulty) the manual itself written in Engrish ..
Was I missing something with that deadzone mat. How to set things up and rules are on one side but you play on the other. Or was that square in the middle big enough to play a game on.
the square in the middle is the teaching game that all the rules around it are for. The other size is the standard mat for regular games once you’ve got a grip on it
I see. Makes sense. It is a good idea
Happy Sunday everyone.
Here’s a quick urban basing tutorial for Ben
https://www.beastsofwar.com/project-entry/1552207/
Much appreciated – thanks!
I introduced my teenage niece to Flames of War and she loved how easy it was to pick up. We don’t really it much beyond the Hit the Beach box. I added another starter box and a few new units and that’s it. So we have enough on both sides to just field tanks or play slightly larger games. By doing that she’s learnt the rules a lot quicker and I think enjoys not having an overly complex game.
On impenetrable rules: I agree completely on @fcostin calling out Gloomhaven. Even watching a couple of “how to” videos was no help; so naturally it went back on the shelf. Bought Jaws of the Lion in the Xmas sales last year, watched a couple of “how to” videos and played a bit. Thoroughly more enjoyable. Wanted to get *immediately* back into Gloomhaven-proper. Also now very much looking forward to diving into Frosthaven when it arrives. Happy Sunday!!
I had the luxury of someone teaching me how to play Gloomhaven but they did clean things up a lot with Jaws Of The Lion etc – about to start that in a couple of weeks!
So in order to ‘fix’ the ‘problem’ of no Free in the trailer we’re getting Free in the images for the XLBS ?
I think that is a brilliant fix 😀
Happy Sunday. Sci-fi basing. I made some industrial looking basing. The only thing I would add regarding my texture added to the base, would be that the side you stick down should perhaps be roughed up with sandpaper to encourage a good bond and that the pieces need to be as flat as possible before gluing down. Adding urban / black grey flock here and there can make things look more realistic. The idea to add Kipling cake container texture to the bases to give a similar space station / shuttle floor look might work in a similar way. You… Read more »
Much appreciated – thanks for sharing the idea 🙂
Ooh the XLBS Show.
Nay bother Gerry I’m Boris Johnson 10 Downing street London.?
Thank you for the Golden Button! Great work everyone
Them new dry brushes look like make-up brushes may be worth checking out the aisles in the pound shops for way cheaper for them?
Happy Sunday. Regarding printing your own bases, I guess you could find a high definition image of your gaming mat and print parts of that out for your bases so they’d blend into the actual surface you’ll be gaming on. I took a few new players of Frostgrave through a game or two last night and one of them commented how, although the rules are fairly simple, the book is written in big large paragraphs with no bullet points, so finding a specific rule can be a bit of a search. I think this example was more a frustration due… Read more »
Happy Sunday wonderful people! Congratulations to all the Botton winners! Fantastic work.
Happy Sunday! 00:00 “Coffee”…. @avernos meant to say “coffee”…. 01:50 “And wasn’t picked because it hand Gandalf in it..” Sure mate. *sips coffee* 06:00 Said Christmas thread: https://www.beastsofwar.com/forums/topic/christmas-secret-santa-2021/ 09:40 “zapp”… catchy name… not XD 11:05 MY EARS 18:00 the uHH is the place where everybody is allowed to vent stress… sound of in the twitch chat! Win prizes!* (*no really giving away things) 19:45 Happy trees… or a very happy builder? 😉 25:00 @brennon tarmak. grates. grey rocks. lava. Dead bodies of your enemies. 35:00 googling words to learn a game? oO What hell is this?! 44:00 Gloomhaven? Is that… Read more »
@brennon For your ruins you may try rattle cans that have a granite effect from Montana.
I will have a look at that!
Regarding sci fi bases for Ben, Customeeple make base toppers. They’re flat, etched card and barely raise the height of your mini. I don’t have a picture to hand from where I’ve used them. https://www.customeeple.com/?s=Base+top&post_type=product&v=0f26a103da90 Kujo painting made a really good video about painting Mars bases. You don’t have to preshade like he did. Just give the base a light colour and run two colours together from opposite sides. Here’s the vid: https://youtu.be/l5SB54QeCSM I’ve used it several times. Here’s an example. https://www.beastsofwar.com/project-entry/1686236/ Choice of colour will affect how sci fi it looks. I’ve been thinking about using it to do… Read more »
Thanks for the help – going to do some research based on this 🙂
Ooh a fab show guy’s.
I had literally ignored the cardboard tokens, because I had ordered the acrylic tokens so wasn’t going to use them.
And guess where this ‘manual’ was ?
In between the token sheets that I had tossed in the bin …
Mantic could learn a thing or two from GW’s packaging.
The manuals may be overly wordy and crap, but there’s no way you’re missing the build-instructions in the average GW boxed game.
I can see free start a cat channel full of cat video’s doing daft funny stunts thay all do?
He is a DEMON!
Lol Aren’t they all.?