First Post

Hello, dear reader! Can I call you dear? Is that too formal? Too intimate? In any case, you don't actually exist yet, so I'll call you what I want. Welcome to my Blog, where I'll be talking to you (an immaterial narrative construct) about my hobbies, thoughts, and whatever tangential flight of fancy I end up falling into.


There is a point, though: I've been thinking about different facets of miniature gaming, a genre that I've been involved with as a consumer for at least a decade, from business models used to resolution mechanics, play styles - competitive, narrative, casual, and arts. While I can't claim to be more than an armchair dev, I do hope that by keeping this blog I'll be able to explore these aspects more deeply and at the very least gain a stronger appreciation for the work that goes into these designs.

Who are you?

Hi! I'm Jacob! I'd probably describe myself first as a scientist - as of the time of this writing I've just spent three weeks doing data analysis for part of my PhD thesis (evolutionary biology) that was meant to supplement what I had already done for this chapter. I'll be meeting with my adviser in a few hours to discuss the results, which amount to "Yep, came out like all the previous analysis". I'm also a bit of a math and computer science person, somewhere in the ballpark of data-scientist is probably accurate. Because I'm a giant nerd, my initial adventures into data science were simulations and learning algorithms for optimizing builds/strategies etc. for minis games and RPGs.

I'm also a huge fan of painting. I'm not golden-demon level competitor, but I think I've produced some solid models.

Centaur Avatara from Conquest

Sharn from Judgement

Mukhtar from Infinity

Kappa from Infinity

Lineage Highborne from Conquest


And during the pandemic I decided to learn Blender and get into sculpting. It started as an interest in making terrain and doing hard-surface modeling, but I've since branched out quite a bit -I'm even working on a custom army for 40k.

"David Boulder Clearer-outer"

Cheese Stealer Cults





Okay, I'm a pretty big nerd...

In addition to the above pictured games I've also played X-Wing, AoS, WMH, Warcaster, Underworlds, ASoIaF, Bolt Action/Konflict '47, Guild Ball (RIP), Adeptus Titanicus... and probably some others. This is really a huge part of what got me wanting to start this blog. Each of these games has different mechanics - activation/turn order, resolution mechanics, victory, measurements and moving. I have a lot of feelings about which of these things are good and which are bad, and why, but that's honestly a topic for several later posts. Suffice it to say, the differences and commonalities of these games and their mechanics is going to be a huge part of the start of this blog, and I hope you'll join me on this adventure!
Location: Ithaca, NY 14850, USA

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