Writing For Stargazer’s World

Recently I started writing for a roll playing site called  “Stargazer’s World“. The site covers everything related to roll playing games it can get it’s hands on and I have had fun int he last few weeks writing for them.

So far I have written the following posts for them.

• The Importance of Dice
• DMs Should Join Other Games
• Castlemolds Review

Writing is something I enjoy doing and hope to improve with over time. What better way for me to do that then with a topic I am really have an interest in.

Hirst Arts Castlemolds For Dungeons & Dragons

I am always looking out for new ways to enhance my weekly Dungeons & Dragons game. Things that might help immerse the player and keep everyone excited. One thing people can do is buy miniature environments that player characters can use  to explore. The most popular of these are made by a company called Dwarven Forge.

My Fiancé Testing Out The First Castelmolds

The Dwarven Forge sets are very well made and are pretty much the cream of the crop when it comes to miniature environments. They are a bit spendy and if you can afford them, then by all means knock yourself out. But I have been looking around the Internet for something in-between a battle mat and a Dwarven Forge set.

Personally I hate Dungeon Tiles. So they where not an option in my mind. I would rather just use graph paper if it came down to it.

What I have found is a product called Castlemolds from Hirst Arts.

When I found the Castlemolds sets on-line I showed them to my fiancé who immediately thought they where a good idea. As excited as I was to have found them, she is the one who really pushed me to order a few.

Dried Molds

Casted Molds

As the name implies Castlemolds are molds. They are made from silicone and according to their website they will last for years and hundreds of casts. I suggest reading the “How it works” page on the Hirst Arts website to get a sense of how much work and money is going to be required for building a miniature set. When you factor in the cost of the molds, Plaster of Paris, Paint, and time the whole project can become quite spendy and time consuming rather quickly. But in the end I find it still costs less then going out and getting a Dwarven Forge mini set. Your mileage may very

Painted Molds

As soon as our first order of Castlemolds came in the mail my fiancé when right to work on creating the first set of molds, then another, then another, and so on and so forth. At one point she became quite the little multitasker, popping out hardened molds one moment and painting dried molds the next.

It took about three or four weeks of this before we had enough floors and walls made that we could use them for a full encounter. My fiancé even went as far as to glue felt under each of the completed Castelmolds peaces. She really did an amazing job with them. For the most part now she does the painting and I do the mold casting.

First Game With Castlemolds

Before long we were ordering more molds and expand the look and the feel of the Dungeons we can create. There are still times when I will use my battle mat and wet erase markers to lay out an area of battle. But as much as I can I try to use the Castlemolds sets.

How To Organize Your D&D Miniatures

My Table of D&D Minis

I had a need to organize my D&D minis. I was finding that just to  locate a particular one for D&D night had become a chore. I was always sifting through a box or bag of them just to find one in particular. Not to mention storing minis in a box or bag is not the best thing for them.  Parts get bent or broken if your not careful. So I have come up with a way to organize your Minis. For the most part your only going to need 3 things.

1. Sterilite Draws (You can find them most retail stores)
2. A Label Maker
3. Apple’s iPhoto (mac only) or Google’s Picasa (Mac or Windows) Software

STEP 1: LABEL THE DRAWERS

The first thing I did was to label my drawers. I printed labels from my label maker saying “Drawer 1″, “Drawer 2″, “Drawer 3″, and so on and stuck them to the front of each drawer. The drawers I am using I picked up from Wal-Mart and they are called “Sterilite“. Just little plastic drawer storage units big enough to hold my minis.

STEP 2: LOOK UP EACH MINI ONLINE

I layed out all my D&D minis on the kitchen table. I then proceeded to look up each one online. I would use a site like Alter Reality Games to search for each mini individually. When the search would come back I would be presented with an image of the mini and some text including the mini’s name and the set it came from.

iPhoto D&D Mini Collection

STEP 3: PUT THE INFO INTO IPHOTO

Save the mini’s picture to iPhoto (or Picasa).

SIDE NOTE: You can create a brand new iPhoto library so as not to add a bunch of pictures of minis to your personal photos by holding down the option key and launching iPhoto. The program will ask you if you want to create a new library or open an existing one. I created a new library and saved it in my computer’s D&D directory.

Next I created an album for each drawer. So I have one album named “Drawer 1″, “Drawer 2″ and so on. As I copied pictures of minis into iPhoto’s album named “drawer 1″  I would select the image and paste in text related to the mini that I found from the website.

In both the iPhoto and Picasa programs you have the option to enter text information about the image. Here is where I enter the mini’s name and the set it came from. (See the image on the right)

D&D Mini Drawer

STEP 4: PLACE THE MINI IN THE DRAWER

After all the all the information about the mini was entered into iPhoto I then put the mini in the corresponding drawer. Repeat steps 2 through 4 till your whole mini collection has been cataloged in iPhoto.

So now If your looking for a green dragon all you have to is type in “Green Dragon” In your search field and iphoto or Picasa and it will tell you what draw the mini is located in.

SOME HISTORY

I have almost been playing Dungeons & Dragons for a year now. For less time then that I have started collected D&D minis. My collection has grown quickly and I needed a way to store then. Rather then reinvent the wheel I turned to Google for help. I figured I was not the only one with this question and someone else must have come up with a solution that I could use.

Well sure enough I found a hand full for websites selling products for miniature storage. But I was not finding a lot of end user experience. Since I was not satisfied with what I found on a few Google searches I turned to Twitter and asked the following question of some DM’s I Follow.

@theodudek, @SlyFlourish, @newbiedm I need a way to store my growing #DnD miniatures collection. Do you guys have any suggestions?

NewbieDM sent me the following response:

@Nicap (thats me)  I buy these plastic drawer storagethings at Wal-Mart. keep them there, sorted by undead, PC’s, creatures, etc…

Right off the bat that sounded like a good idea to me. I went to the store and picked up a couple of these plastic drawer storage things and tossed my minis in them and life was good. Life was good till my collection of minis grew to the point that finding ones needed for a particular game was becoming a chore.

After some time thinking about the problem I am up with the solution above that has been working out for me very well. I hope you all find it useful.

Throwback

This last weekend I was thrilled to death to  find Pepsi Throwback products in my local stores here in Juneau Alaska. Pepsi Throwback and Mt. Dew Throwback are Sodas made from the original formula Pepsi used back in the 60’s and 70’s (That they never should have stopped fucking making) containing real sugar. No high fructose corn syrup at all.

I have been trying to stay away from soda’s using high fructose corn syrup and I have accomplished this by drinking products like Jones Soda, and Thomas Kemper soda. So last weekend I was thrilled to find Pepsi Throwback in my local store giving me another option of something to drink.

I knew Pepsi Co. had released Throwback earlier last year. I also know it can take a while for the stores in Juneau to get some of the products that have been available in the lower 48 states for a while. So I was glad to finally see this.

After doing some quick Google searches I learned that the Throwback sodas I am seeing in my local stores are actually the second run that Pepsi has done for this drink. Giving it an updated (retro) logo. The sad news from what I am reading is that Throwback is only going to be available for 8 weeks and then Pepsi will stop making it again. From the other websites I have been reading I am left feeling that the reason that Pepsi Throwback came back this second time is a result from all the facebook, twitter, and blog posts of people writing about how much they like it. So I am writing this post along with the other masses out their hopping Pepsi will see it and know that the public would like Throwback to stay as an alternitive to high fructose corn syrup shit drinks.

In the mean time I am stocking up!

Fixing My Arrhythmia

I will be heading down to Seattle next week to fix an arrhythmia of my heart. It was discovered a month ago during a doctors check up here in Juneau. What happens is that every now and then my heart starts beating really fast for no real reason. How fast is my heart beating? Well the doctors have clocked me at over 200 beats a minute. Not the best thing for your heart.

So my heart can go in to over drive for no reason at all. But it also happens just about every time i swallow. Which no doctor I have spoken with has ever heard of happening before. .

The procedure to correct this is called a “Cardiac Ablation“. It’s rather common and no one expect there to be any issues from it.

…ablation is a relatively non-invasive procedure that involves inserting catheters – narrow, flexible wires – into a blood vessel, often through a site in the groin or neck, and winding the wire up into the heart. The journey from entry point to heart muscle is navigated by images created by a fluoroscope, an x-ray-like machine that provides continuous, “live” images of the catheter and tissue.

Once the catheter reaches the heart, electrodes at the tip of the catheter gather data and a variety of electrical measurements are made. The data pinpoints the location of the faulty electrical site. During this “electrical mapping,” the cardiac arrhythmia specialist, an electrophysiologist, may sedate the patient and instigate some of the very arrhythmias that are the crux of the problem. The events are safe, given the range of experts and resources close at hand, and are necessary to ensure the precise location of the problematic tissue.

Once the damaged site is confirmed, energy is used to destroy a small amount of tissue, ending the disturbance of electrical flow through the heart and restoring a healthy heart rhythm. This energy may take the form of radiofrequency energy, which cauterizes the tissue, or intense cold, which freezes, or cryoablates the tissue. Other energy sources are being investigated.

Once this is all over and I am back on my feet I will write a follow up post.

I found the following links to be helpful for me when looking this up on line.

http://my.clevelandclinic.org/heart/services/tests/procedures/ablation.aspx
http://yourtotalhealth.ivillage.com/cardiac-ablation.html
http://www.sjm.com/procedures/procedure.aspx?name=Catheter+Ablation
http://www.hrspatients.org/patients/treatments/cardiac_ablation.asp
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/cardiac-ablation/MY00706

The iPod Dice Tower

I have no clue what the HELL came over me or what possessed me to do this. I feel like I had a real ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind‘ moment. You know the scene where Richard Dreyfuss is eating diner with his family, and he uncontrollably starts sculpting the Devils Tower from his mashed potatoes? That’s how I felt! I just saw these two Apple iPod Touch boxes lying around and I uncontrollably starting building a dice tower out of them with a rubber band, an exact-o knife, and some super glue. It took me about 45 minutes.

I have had dice towers on my mind. They seem like a good idea and a sure fire way to increase the randomness of ones dice roll.

After building the iPod Dice Tower and showing it to my weekly Dungeons and Dragons group, the response was not what I hoped for. Everyone seemed very impressed for the first round of game play, but after that everyone switched back to just rolling their dice on the game table.

Here is how you can make an iPod Touch Box Dice Tower

1.) You need to iPod Touch boxes. Not just a top and a bottom but two complete boxes. You will also need an exact-o knife (modeling knife) and Super Glue

2.) You can see how the top iPod Touch box holds the bottom iPod Touch box insides it’s self. The bottom of the box has a layer of foam attached to it which makes for a soft landing for your dice.

3.) Next we are going to be prepping the hard plastic case that held the iPod Touch still in the it’s box.

4.) Being very careful with the knife your going to want to cut the top 3rd of the plastic case off. This will be used as one of the “Shelfs” that the dice will bounce off inside your iPod dice tower.

5.) Here you can see how I have attached the 2 cut off sections of the plastic case and super glued them inside the bottoms of 2 the iPod Touch boxes. One close tot he top and one close to the bottom.

6.) Carefully using the exact-o knife I cut out a square on the top of the box. I also cut and exit hole on the bottom of the same box. Here I am using a rubber band to hold the to bottom boxes together and placed them inside the top of the foam filled iPod Box

7.) Using super glue I attached the last 3rd of the plastic case to the top of the new iPod Dice tower. The whole in the plastic case just happens to the right size for a standard set of gaming dice.

To Be Continued…

Do Dice Matter?

I don’t know. But when I watched the following videos found on the GameScience website it’s hard not to drink the Kool-Aid.

Being a Dungeons and Dragons player, and Dungeon Master, it’s a scary thought to think that all the games you have been involved with have not bin fare. On the other hand,  I (and my friends) have had a lot of fun playing D&D and would a set of dice that cost a few bucks more really affect our game play in a positive way at all? I don’t know. If I ever am lucky enough to be at GenCon or find a set of GameScience dice at gaming store I am sure I will pick up a set for myself. But I don’t know if they are worth the price to order on-line and have them shipped to Juneau Alaska.

To Be Continued…

Dink

Dink,

You were great. I will miss you everyday.

Paper Block

The paper block is just that, a block of scratch paper that you can terror off. Like a 3M sticky note, but no sticky side. Just paper. The paper block has become a key part of my GTD dump process. Someone storms into my office with something for me to do while I am already working on a project. I jott it down on my paper block, rip of the page and put it in my inbox. Then continue on what I was originally working on. Someone calls while I am in the middle of an office memo e-mail, I write it down on my paper block, rip it off and put it in my inbox.

I find it so much better then using sticky notes. It’s so simple and easy.

More Pictures From 4th Of July Weekend In Juneau