Gibraltar Chess Festival Gets A Stamp

The Gibraltar Chess Festival has become one of the premiere events on the chess calender, drawing some of the top talent to the Rock for 10 days, from 24th January to 2nd February, 2012. For the tenth anniversary, they're issuing a set of stamps depicting classic games from past years:

The games featured on the stamps have been specially chosen as representing the best of the many thousands contested in Gibraltar over the past decade. All the players shown are grandmasters. Two are women. Pia Cramling (Sweden) has played in all ten Gibraltar festivals, while Natalia Zhukova (Ukraine) won the top female award in 2010. Michael Adams, Nigel Short (both England) and Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukraine) are all former Gibraltar champions. Viktor Bologan (Moldova) and Fabiano Caruana (Italy) are elite players with aggressive styles popular with the public. Chess legend Viktor Korchnoi (Switzerland) fought two World Championship matches with arch-rival Anatoly Karpov.

My children were puzzled when they first learned about stamp collecting. I explained that it was something we had to do before fun was invented.

You can follow the Gibraltar games live if you like.

h/t: Wayne Schmittberger

Policy Resources Available To You

We want to do everything we can to help our publishers succeed.

Beyond providing the AdSense platform to monetize content, we provide various channels through which we communicate policies, best practices and product changes to our publishers.

What resources are available?

We know that one size doesn't fit all for publishers when it comes to preferred methods of transmitting messages and information.  There are several platforms where we provide policy information to publishers.

First, we have our Policy Help Center. Through the Help Center, publishers can view all AdSense program policies, with detailed information on specific areas such as content policies, ad implementation policies, webmaster guidelines and much more.

Next, we have an AdSense Forum, comprised of experienced expert publishers that are passionate about helping other publishers better understand AdSense policies.  Here, you can review previous threads or post questions and receive feedback from the community.

We also have our AdSense YouTube channel, a platform we are investing in going forward to address questions for those publishers who prefer videos over text. We plan to update this resource frequently throughout the next year.

For big policy changes, check out our Inside AdSense blog, where we generally post updates first. We have Googlers from across AdSense posting best practices as well as practical advice to avoid common pitfalls, increase revenue and remain policy compliant. We'll also provide updates on industry drivers, which may be useful to publishers. 

And more recently we've also tried to amplify our messaging through the AdSense social channels on Facebook & Twitter.  Generally, these posts reiterate an update that we've posted on our AdSense blog, with a link to that posting.

Lastly, we often speak at conferences and host publisher events at our offices worldwide. At these events, we discuss our program policies and gather in-person feedback from you. This feedback is valuable and has resulted in modifications to products, policies, and policy enforcement to better serve your needs.

Why is it important for Google to provide all of these resources?

We know that your first priority is creating content and growing your business. We want to do our part to help you succeed, so we've provided multiple platforms to help you understand our policies in the way that suits you best. To put it simply: we want to provide the right resource information, at the right time, in as many places as possible to help you understand our policies.

We also want to make sure you have a number of paths to provide feedback. Our publisher events at Google offices are a great opportunity for this. Additionally, my entire role representing Publisher Policy Communications places a face to our policies, and a feedback loop from you, to the policy team.

Communication involves listening

Communication is a two way street. We've listened to your feedback, and created several ways, on several platforms for publishers to better understand our policies. We will always try to interact with you in ways that work best for you. When you succeed, we succeed. Please let us know how we can better communicate our policies to you.

John Brown
Head of Publisher Policy Communications

People Behind The Meeples - Episode 162: Mike Nudd

Welcome to People Behind the Meeples, a series of interviews with indie game designers.  Here you'll find out more than you ever wanted to know about the people who make the best games that you may or may not have heard of before.  If you'd like to be featured, head over to http://gjjgames.blogspot.com/p/game-designer-interview-questionnaire.html and fill out the questionnaire! You can find all the interviews here: People Behind the Meeples. Support me on Patreon!

---

Name:	Mike Nudd
Location:	UK
Day Job:	Head of Product for an internet telephone service provider
Designing:	Five to ten years.
BGG:	Mike Nudd
Twitter:	@Mikelosaurus
Find my games at:	Online

Today's Interview is with:

Mike Nudd
Interviewed on: 1/11/2019

You may have heard of this week's designer since he's had a few successful games published lately. Dice Hospital and Waggle Dance were both hits for Mike Nudd last couple of years. He has more games in the works, too! Read on to learn more about Mike and his other projects.

Some Basics
Tell me a bit about yourself.

How long have you been designing tabletop games?
Five to ten years.

Why did you start designing tabletop games?
As a rewarding intellectual exercise.

What game or games are you currently working on?
Captain Scarlet, Dice Hospital expansions, Termite Towers (a sequel to Waggle Dance), and more!

Have you designed any games that have been published?
Yes

What is your day job?
Head of Product for an internet telephone service provider

Your Gaming Tastes
My readers would like to know more about you as a gamer.

Where do you prefer to play games?
Anywhere there are players

Who do you normally game with?
Friends

If you were to invite a few friends together for game night tonight, what games would you play?
Right now Underwater Cities and Teotihuacan

And what snacks would you eat?
Not big on snacks, some Walkers crisps or Pringles maybe.

Do you like to have music playing while you play games? If so, what kind?
Yes, preferably film soundtracks that fit the theme.

What's your favorite FLGS?
Leisure Games

What is your current favorite game? Least favorite that you still enjoy? Worst game you ever played?
Too many to single out. Coaster Park is possibly the worst game I've played in recent years. Love big epic games with spectacle, theme, and narrative such as Twilight Imperium, Eclipse, Clash of Cultures, Cthulhu Wars. Battlestar Galactica is also a long-time favourite.

What is your favorite game mechanic? How about your least favorite?
Most: Dice worker placement. Least: anything dependant on random luck of the draw.

What's your favorite game that you just can't ever seem to get to the table?
High Frontier by Sierra Madre, the level of think is an acquired taste.

What styles of games do you play?
I like to play Board Games, Card Games, Miniatures Games, RPG Games, Video Games, Other Games?

Do you design different styles of games than what you play?
I like to design Board Games, Card Games, Miniatures Games, RPG Games, Other Games?

OK, here's a pretty polarizing game. Do you like and play Cards Against Humanity?
No

You as a Designer
OK, now the bit that sets you apart from the typical gamer. Let's find out about you as a game designer.

When you design games, do you come up with a theme first and build the mechanics around that? Or do you come up with mechanics and then add a theme? Or something else?
There is no particular formula, although it usually starts with a setting or theme.

Have you ever entered or won a game design competition?
Yes

Do you have a current favorite game designer or idol?
I am impressed with the wide variety of good games that Vlaada Chvatil has designed.

Where or when or how do you get your inspiration or come up with your best ideas?
Often when I am playing other games.

How do you go about playtesting your games?
Just put a prototype in front of as many people as possible.

Do you like to work alone or as part of a team? Co-designers, artists, etc.?
I have mostly worked alone to date, but I am open to more collaborative projects.

What do you feel is your biggest challenge as a game designer?
Trying to come up with a combination of theme and mechanics which are fresh enough to see it out in today's competitive market.

If you could design a game within any IP, what would it be?
Die Hard. Underworld. Supernatural TV show. Mad Max. Inception.

What do you wish someone had told you a long time ago about designing games?
Difficult to think of anything specific.

What advice would you like to share about designing games?
It's a labour of love - and you have to enjoy the process because the financial reward is generally very low. Listen and learn from critical feedback, and be prepared to kill your babies if you have to. Research the market to inform your decisions, spot opportunities, and make sure you're not treading on already well-trodden ground.

Would you like to tell my readers what games you're working on and how far along they are?
Published games, I have: 3
Games that will soon be published are: 1 (not including expansions)
Currently looking for a publisher I have: 3
Games that are in the early stages of development and beta testing are: 3
And games that are still in the very early idea phase are: 20

Are you a member of any Facebook or other design groups? (Game Maker's Lab, Card and Board Game Developers Guild, etc.)
Most of them?

And the oddly personal, but harmless stuff…
OK, enough of the game stuff, let's find out what really makes you tick! These are the questions that I'm sure are on everyone's minds!

Star Trek or Star Wars? Coke or Pepsi? VHS or Betamax?
Star Trek, Star Wars and Babylon 5.

What hobbies do you have besides tabletop games?
Playing other kinds of games. Keeping abreast of cool TV and film. Live gigs and theatre.

What is something you learned in the last week?
There was more than one French Revolution.

Favorite type of music? Books? Movies?
I listen to all kinds of things but gravitate towards heavy rock/metal.

What was the last book you read?
Thin Air by Richard Morgan.

Do you play any musical instruments?
Drums, guitar, violin, and I sing.

Tell us something about yourself that you think might surprise people.
I studied astrophysics at university.

Tell us about something crazy that you once did.
I won a holiday to Australia off the radio.

What would you do if you had a time machine?
Visit the future to see if humanity wipes itself out or not.

Are you an extrovert or introvert?
Somewhere in between, but tend more towards introvert.

If you could be any superhero, which one would you be?
Iron Man, for all the cool toys.

Have any pets?
1 cat

When the next asteroid hits Earth, causing the Yellowstone caldera to explode, California to fall into the ocean, the sea levels to rise, and the next ice age to set in, what current games or other pastimes do you think (or hope) will survive into the next era of human civilization? What do you hope is underneath that asteroid to be wiped out of the human consciousness forever?
Chess should survive if humans do, maybe Go too. Not that I'd wish ill of anyone, but right now a collision in midwest USA or Saudi Arabia would seem like it would do a lot of good for global politics and economics.

If you'd like to send a shout out to anyone, anyone at all, here's your chance (I can't guarantee they'll read this though):
Thanks to anyone who has backed or bought my games so far!

Thanks for answering all my crazy questions!

---

Thank you for reading this People Behind the Meeples indie game designer interview! You can find all the interviews here: People Behind the Meeples and if you'd like to be featured yourself, you can fill out the questionnaire here: http://gjjgames.blogspot.com/p/game-designer-interview-questionnaire.html

Did you like this interview?  Pleasse show your support: Support me on Patreon! Or click the heart at Board Game Links , like GJJ Games on Facebook , or follow on Twitter .  And be sure to check out my games on  Tabletop Generation.

DreamForge-Games Price Increase.

We started down the road to manufacturing plastic kits in 2012, a lot has happened since then. I have seen shipping prices nearly double, WGF has ceased to be our distributor and we have taken over that aspect of operations. We now purchase our kits from WGF China directly.

We recently place two restock orders to bring our stock levels back on par, the shipping costs have been an eye opener. In many cases shipping from China to the US was more than the actual cost to manufacture a kit. Some kits needed to be brought in line with their cost of production. This price increase was as minimal as we could make it most items will see an increase of 5% to 8% with some more drastic adjustments to kits that were selling into distribution at a lower than delivered cost to us.

To maintain the health of DreamForge-Games it has become clear that we will need to implement a price increase, effective February 15^th2016

 

 

I thank you for your continued support.

Mark Mondragon

DreamForge-Games

GMB Versus The Flag Dude

May has been a poor month for painting as I remarked last week, although things picked up in the last couple of days and I managed to up the number to 48 which was another German Infantry batallion, this time IR 63.

So not too bad, this means I'm still just about on course for 1,000 figures for the year providing I don't have too many more months like this.

A tiny difference between this unit and all my previous line infantry is that these fellows have a standard from The Flag Dude. I saw these at Salute and couldn't resist buying a couple. They are actually 7 years War standards but giving the "scrunching" its somewhat impossible to tell the difference, and, lets face it, if I hadn't mentioned this, you'd have never known.

IR63 Bianchi, sporting a Flag Dude standard 

To be honest, trying to compare the 2 is a bit like asking which footballer would you prefer in your pub team, Wayne Rooney or Lionel Messi? Both companies are brilliant and worlds apart from anything one could produce for oneself, the quality of both is so incredibly high. Particularly given their relative cheapness.

Which gives us our first comparison. FD are £3.00 each while GMB are £3.50 for 2. With GMB you have to cost in the finial and staff which adds a bit over a quid for 2  flags so the cost is actually about the same(ish)...buttons really either way considering the effect.

Obviously the big initial attraction the FD is that everything is done for you, and done very nicely. Flag is "scrunched" rather attractively (though probably not realistically), The finial is included and the flag is attached to a lengthy staff,in fact the only thing that needs to be done is to trim this to a desired length and paint it.

With GMB you do have to do a tiny bit of work.

The pole  needs to have its finial attached, and then the flag glued to the pole. My prefered method for this is to cut the flag out, fold it so its creased centrally around the pole before "dry fitting" it. Only then smear PVA glue over the inner surface of one half of the flag before folding in and lining the flag up as neatly as possible. At this point a bit of scrunching can take place. I always try and do it to expose as much of the detail of the flag as possible (otherwise, whats the point?). Then leave it for a couple of hours before giving it a few thin coats of brushed on gloss varnish to stiffen it. Finally give it a coat of matt (or not, depending on taste).

More IR63. Custom "scrunching"

The final analysis comes in the detail. The printing on the GMB stuff is slightly better, and their finish a little bit finer. Also the colours on these Austrian flags is a little more vibrant.

I can't comment on how this is with other periods. One nice thing is that the ranges are somewhat complimentary, there are items that each company do which the other doesn't.

I.R.24 Baron Strauch. Proud of their GMB flag

Oddly,  the deciding factor for me is the fact that the GMB flags aren't the finished article which FD are.

The reason for this is that with GMB I glue the standard with the finial to the figure before priming. So all painting and handling takes place with a bare standard pole, but one which is firmly glued on bare metal with the glue painted over. Then, when the figure is completely finished and varnished I attach the flag as outlined above.

More GMB.

With FD flags this isn't possible. Because the flag is all done you can't attach it until after the figure is finished. One could prime the figure and then attach the flag, but this would mean having a great big flag flapping about (ok,not actually flapping but you know what I mean) while painting the standard bearer which I'm not that keen on. Subsquently, I ended up gluing on the FD flag once the figure was finished and then varnishing over the glue. Not ideal.

So, for me, GMB has it. Just.

Free Counter

Veins Of The Heartland

What's going on everyone!?

Today for the #2019gameaday challenge dear ol' dad and I played a game of Ticket to Ride on our tablets. 

Luckily for dad, I played an honest game and didn't cut him off on a route or two of his that he got on me which ended up winning him the game!

All in all, it was a great time and I can't wait to play again.

As always, thank you for reading and don't forget to stop and smell the meeples! :)

-Tim

X-Wing: Second Edition Is On The Way!

Feeling fresh.

Oh man, I'm excited.  I haven't played X-Wing in a while because the competitive meta was just so stagnant with all the health regen, turrets,and bombs.  Now that they rebooted the entire game, I'm really pumped to get back into it.

The official announcement is here:
https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2018/5/1/x-wing-second-edition/

There's a thread on the FFG forums that has all the consolidated info:
https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/274813-consolidated-x-wing-20-changes-thread/

Here's a quick run-down of what changed and what didn't..

These things have not changed in 2.0:

• Models carry over (some models may be re-released with new sculpts/paint/features)
• Dice are the same
• Range ruler is the same
• Range bonuses and obstructions work the same (except turrets)
• Templates are the same size -- but have a line down the center for alignment on nubless bases
• Basic game flow (but phases are renamed; some new phases)
• Maneuver driven by hidden dials plus actions
• Actions include: Focus, Target lock, evade, boost, barrel roll, cloak, reinforce, jam, coordinate, rotate arc (specific action mechanics may change)
• Upgrade slots: EPT, modification, title, torpedo, astromech, bombs, missiles, crew, system, turret
• Some upgrades will still take two slots
• Tokens (some art changes, shape): focus, evade, target lock, cloak, stress, tractor beam, jam, shield, ion
• Conditions are still a thing (Director Krennic)
• Setup Phase is largely the same

These things have changed in 2.0:

• New phases/phase names ("Strategy Phase")
• Medium ship bases (confirmed: U-wing, ARC-170, K-wing, G1A, Kimogila, Scurrg, Firespray, TIE Punisher, TIE Reaper, TBD)
• The new templates have a centerline that aligns to hash marks on the base and assists with bumping.
• Green maneuvers become blue 
• Red actions which gain a stress after taking
• Push the Limit is gone; some ships may "link" a first action into a second and gain a stress (example: focus into target lock linked action)
• New tokens: Force, charge
• Force tokens which power force abilities for some pilots; they may also be used to change one Focus result
• Charge/surge tokens which power some pilot abilities and ordnance
• Token shape now indicates when removed: "End of Round" tokens are round; square tokens have other triggers to remove (e.g. ion, stress) 
• Evade tokens to not add evade results; they just change green dice to evades.
• No costs on pilot cards or upgrades; these are in the squad builder app. Baseline is now 200 points.
• Each ship base has a bullseye arc and quadrants marked
• Turrets adopt mobile arc mechanics
• Turrets also get ranged bonuses and penalties, Ordnance does not.
• New upgrade cards are full sized, landscape
• New upgrade slots: Force Abilities ("Instinctive Aim"), Configuration ("S-foils")
• Resistance and First Order will now be separate factions
• Firespray-31 is no longer Imperial; Scum only
• New pilots
• No upgrade bar; either use ship build cards from the core set or the squad builder app
• Pilot skill is now called Initiative and goes from 1 to 6 [Wedge Antilles: 6]; no Veteran's Instincts or ability to change
• Damage deck - new. Repairing damage is now a thing. New cards ("Fuel Leak", "Panicked Pilot", "Wounded Pilot"); only 5 Direct Hits in the deck now.
• Regen exists, but is powered by charge tokens and nets a weapons disabled (R2 astromech)
• Decimator gets Reinforce and a red Coordinate
• Some ships have built-in abilities: Phantom (Stygium); TIE Advanced (Advanced Targeting Computer)
• Ordnance appears not to spend target locks (e.g. Proton torps); 
• Ion tokens: 1 for small ship, 2 for medium ship, 3 for large ship
• Bombs can blow up obstacles (and do damage in the process)
• New abilities will affect the Setup Phase
• They will introduce new obstacle types
• Shield levels have been reduced on many ships
• Barrel roll is not adjustable; they use the hash marks on the bases for alignment.Barrel Roll now only has 3 positions per side (6 total) – makes Barrel Roll more inline with Boost as you only have 6 total positions.If you declare and action and you can't do it (ie Barrel Roll would land you on a rock), you just lose the action now
• There is a "range 0" for own ship abilities.
• Target Lock is now just Lock – and you can Lock on to objects as well as ships (friendly and enemy).
• Certain ships have different attack values for different arcs now.

Took inventory last night.  Looks like I'm going to have to do some massive trading when the game comes out.

Rebels:
3 A-Wing (2 Aces)
4 B-Wing (2 Aces)
4 T-65 X-Wing (Core)
2 Z-Wing
1 HWK-290
1 Y-Wing
1 E-Wing
1 K-Wing
1 YT-1300 (Heroes)
1 YT-1300
1 YT-2400
1 Sabine's TIE Fighter

Imps:
3 TIE Interceptors
2 TIE Advanced
1 TIE Phantom
7 TIE Fighters (Core)
4 TIE Interceptors (Royal Guard)
4 TIE Interceptors (181st)
3 TIE Defender (Veterans)
3 TIE Bomber (Veterans)
1 TIE Advanced (Raider)
1 TIE Advanced Proto
1 TIE Aggressor
1 VT-49 Decimator
1 Lambda Shuttle

Scum:
2 BroBots
1 Slave I
1 H-6 Bomber

Resistance:
4 T-70 X-Wing (Core)
1 T-70 X-Wing (Heroes)

First Order:
7 TIE F/O (Core)
1 TIE Silencer