Kickstarter Roundup, May 2018

Recently there was good news in updates from two long-delayed Kickstarter campaigns I’ve backed and another thing I backed just ended, so why not do another review of projects I’ve backed that I’m waiting on?

One of the ways you can review your backed pledges is by going to the pledge page on your profile. It’ll have a list of your active pledges, all the things you’ve backed (“successful pledges”), and a really annoying section called “unsuccessful pledges”. I hate that last section — it “includes dropped pledges and pledges to failed or cancelled projects”. I hate that section because I have one, and only one, project listed there, a project I cancelled my pledge to because we had a financial crunch right at that time. So it just sits there, Kickstarter reminding me of that one time we had an emergency that caused us to cancel our luxury expenses because there was this Thing going on.

I suppose it’s like when you’re on facebook and they keep trying to get you to be friends that ex that cheated on you in college or how it reminds you that four years ago you had the cutest dog ever, not knowing it’s been dead for months and you were just about over the loss.

Thanks, computers! You’re awful.

Anyway.

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The BattleTech DMG: Missions

The BattleTech DMG: Missions

When developing the movement system, one of the questions I had was why use it at all? After all, if my ‘Mech is dug into good cover, why would I ever leave and expose myself to enemy fire? The answer is in the actual BattleTech miniatures game: there are missions, and those missions have your force doing something. So why move? Because you have a mission to advance to a target. Or because you need to get into position. Or you need to search for an objective.

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The BattleTech DMG: Movement and Positioning

The BattleTech DMG: Movement and Positioning

One of the comments from the demo of the BattleTech DMG at GenCon last year was about getting more of the tactical aspects of the BattleTech game into the DMG. The proof of concept game was really a slugfest: two ‘Mechs pounding it out on the battlefield with Take Cover or Dodge cards allowing ‘Mechs to avoid getting hit. It really wasn’t much more than playing an occasional card to adjust your opponent’s chances of hitting. Playing the miniatures game, a lot of the gameplay comes into maneuvering your ‘Mech around into a better position, hoping to get flanking or around to where the enemy cannot react to your attack.

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