On one of the Podcasts that I listen to they do a book club style episode every month or so and there was one that stood out to me. However, the Library didn't have it in stock, and I felt like I might need a little it more of an introduction to the Mediterranean in the 14th to 18th centuries. So I turned to one of the books that was available, Lords of the Horizons: A History of the Ottoman Empire. Written by Jason Goodwin, this 325 page book is an introduction from the humble beginnings of the empire as a group of nomadic warriors to an empire that stretched from Baghdad into Europe and all through the Mediterranean.
This book was tough to read. Goodwin's style is a bit flowery and poetic, which makes it tough to retain the focus on the source material. While roughly organized in chronological order, there are a lot of instances of jumping around in each chapter. This makes keeping all of the main players difficult, as you try to track which Sultan is still in control or Vizier is making the calls for a particular campaign. THe content of each chapter is also only roughly organized, with descriptions of fortifications on the frontier intermingling with descriptions of poetry and an out of date tax system.
Apart from the style, the book also is mostly concerned with the European portion of the Empire, with long details of holdings in Eastern Europe and exploits there, with only a cursory look at the Turkish people that made up a majority of the empire. There is also a large reliance on works by Europeans visiting the Empire versus primary sources of Turkish origin. The descriptions of many of the campaigns and important battles are built more narrative than likely should have been for such important inflection points in the Empire's history. The Siege of Vienna especially was written without any insight into the tactical moments.
Overall I'm a bit disappointed in this book and its overall ability to give a real working history of the Empire, and to provide a framework for which to study the topic further. I would only give 2 stars for it.
Friday, July 20, 2018
Saturday, July 14, 2018
Wheat Street Dogs Review
Wichita continues to have a growing food truck culture, and one of the newest additions to the group of trucks is Wheat Street Dogs. They're a vegan hot dog cart that started earlier this year and have been pretty good reviews. They were near work for me the other day, so I decided to try them out. I am by no means a vegan (see my other food reviews), but I have no problem branching out and trying something new.
The cart makes their dogs themselves, from a variety of began ingredients. They currently have a few specialty dogs and their standard Ball park dog. I saw this month they had a Banh Mi dog, and had to give it a go. A banh mi is a Vietnamese sandwich that I am always drawn to, so this dog had a bit to live up to. The hot dog was prepared it looks like by having been heated up in a water bath, and then placed on a small flat top grill on the cart to finish it. This was a nice touch because it also let them give the bun a little bit of a toasting which was a nice addition. The owner warned some customers after me this one might be a little spicy, since it had both jalapenos and a sriracha mayo, but I went ahead and added some extra sriracha just to kick the heat up a bit more.
The toppings for the dog were delicious and plentiful. The daikon and carrots had been done just right, so they were still crisp and had just a right amount of sour tinge. The mayo and hoisin were at good levels, although I wish there had been a little more kick to the mayo. If I hadnt added the sriracha there would have been little heat overall. The only other minor complaint was I wish the cilantro had been a little more chopped up, because it fell off right away on the first bite. The bun was also good, although it might be a little thick for all the other toppings that were loaded on. As to the dog itself, I liked the taste. A little less sweet than regular hot dogs tend to be, and it was certainly of a good size overall. The hoisin suce paired very nicely with it in every bit. The only issue I had was that it tended to be a little chewier. Not a big detriment, but something I was not expecting really.
I'll need to try them again when they dont have such a tempting specialty dog to give the regular ball park a full on try. But Wheat Street Dogs are likely going to find more fans and add a very different take on food here to the Wichita scene.
Monday, July 9, 2018
Far too early College Football Ratings
We're fewer than 50 days left until the kickoff of the college season, it's time to start looking at the far too early rankings. The Top 25 seems reasonable, although I'm not certain I can see Northwestern making their way into the top. But they return an experienced team, and have recruited solidly. Full rankings are after the jump.
Thursday, June 28, 2018
Does the MLB have a bad baseball problem?
This week in a USAToday article, Bob Nightengale posed the idea that the MLB is running into bad baseball situation that is driving away fans. THe article is a little broad in its criticisms, ranging from a concerning drop in attendance at games to an overplayed attack on analytics in baseball.
Nightengale's criticism of analytics follows the typical pattern. Somehow using statistics that give a better view of how efficient players or actions are is a bad thing. Statcast is one of the most innovative ways of sharing information any of the major sports leagues has developed. He quotes Mike Trout about RBIs and runs as the most important stats, since scoring runs wins games. However, scoring runs has not been the issue this year. Since 2010, the 4.38 runs per game is tied for 3rd best. His issue with walks is also misplaced, since the rate this year of 3.29 per game is essentially unchanged from anytime since the 1990s. Hits are down this year, but its a bit out of the ordinary. SInce 1990, the number of hits per game has hovered around 8.7, with the mid to late 90s seeing a slight uptick and recent years hovering there again.
The drop in MLB attendance so far this year is disconcerting. The league is currently lagging about two million attendees over last years same pace, which would not be a positive sign. However, there are a few teams that are currently dragging those figures down that might not be of such real concern. The Blue Jays get mentioned in the article, but they're a team in rebuild mode that has put their average attendance back to their typical from 2009-2014, before they became a playoff contending team. The other teams dragging are other rebuilders that had seen huge recent success (Kansas City, Baltimore, Detroit, Pittsburgh) and a couple of teams that have struggled for years (Oakland, Cincinnati). The other big faller is the Marlins, whose ownership group basically came out and said they were going to burn down the team and follow the route the Astros set out to tank hard to acquire talent that will be MLB ready in 3-4 seasons and take charge.
The MLB as a whole as well up to 2017 from 2009 actually saw an attendance growth of 1%. So this might just be an anomalous year. It is also not difficult to imagine that with the NFL seeing its own ratings hurt, and the NBA seeing attendance decline in 16 of its franchises over the past two years to imagine that people just are not consuming sports in place as much anymore. The MLB does have an issue with game length, which a pitch clock would help to adjust. The league might also want to consider fewer mound and pitcher warm up times to help ease the number of minutes fans wait late in game for relievers to enter to do their work.
Nightengale's criticism of analytics follows the typical pattern. Somehow using statistics that give a better view of how efficient players or actions are is a bad thing. Statcast is one of the most innovative ways of sharing information any of the major sports leagues has developed. He quotes Mike Trout about RBIs and runs as the most important stats, since scoring runs wins games. However, scoring runs has not been the issue this year. Since 2010, the 4.38 runs per game is tied for 3rd best. His issue with walks is also misplaced, since the rate this year of 3.29 per game is essentially unchanged from anytime since the 1990s. Hits are down this year, but its a bit out of the ordinary. SInce 1990, the number of hits per game has hovered around 8.7, with the mid to late 90s seeing a slight uptick and recent years hovering there again.
The drop in MLB attendance so far this year is disconcerting. The league is currently lagging about two million attendees over last years same pace, which would not be a positive sign. However, there are a few teams that are currently dragging those figures down that might not be of such real concern. The Blue Jays get mentioned in the article, but they're a team in rebuild mode that has put their average attendance back to their typical from 2009-2014, before they became a playoff contending team. The other teams dragging are other rebuilders that had seen huge recent success (Kansas City, Baltimore, Detroit, Pittsburgh) and a couple of teams that have struggled for years (Oakland, Cincinnati). The other big faller is the Marlins, whose ownership group basically came out and said they were going to burn down the team and follow the route the Astros set out to tank hard to acquire talent that will be MLB ready in 3-4 seasons and take charge.
The MLB as a whole as well up to 2017 from 2009 actually saw an attendance growth of 1%. So this might just be an anomalous year. It is also not difficult to imagine that with the NFL seeing its own ratings hurt, and the NBA seeing attendance decline in 16 of its franchises over the past two years to imagine that people just are not consuming sports in place as much anymore. The MLB does have an issue with game length, which a pitch clock would help to adjust. The league might also want to consider fewer mound and pitcher warm up times to help ease the number of minutes fans wait late in game for relievers to enter to do their work.
Monday, June 25, 2018
Star Wars Armada: New Campaign Ideas
In the lull of information from FFG, the Armada community has started an attempt to create a homebrew new campaign. So the first mission is to brew up some new titles and objectives. These are fairly rough draft, but I think a lot of them could be fun or at least provide some different gameplay scenarios. hey can probably use some balancing and
Red Objective: Relentless Assault
Set up: After deployment, place one objective token on each ship.
In Game: After performing an attack, a player may spend their objective token. If they do, they may perform another attack from a hull zone with half the dice rounded down.
Scoring: Unspent Objective Tokens are worth 20 points at the end of the game
Yellow Objective: Hazardous Nebula
Set Up: After Deployment is complete, the second player may place 1 Dust Field Obstacle in the set up area.
In Game: Ships may not move shields from one hull zone to another
Blue Objective: Asteroid Drift
Set Up: Replace debris fields with asteroid obstacles.
In Game: After even odd numbered rounds, the second player may move 1 obstacle to within distance 2, or 2 obstacles to within distance 1 of their current location. After even numbered rounds, 1st player may move 1 obstacle to within distance 2 of its current position. After a player overlaps an obstacle, their opponent gains one victory token
Scoring: Victory tokens are worth 15 points each.
Base Defense: Hardened Veterans
Set Up: After setup, the defending player places an objective token on each if their ships.
In Game: After being dealt a face up damage card, you may remove one objective token from that ship. If that face up card is a crew effect, discard it. Otherwise turn it face down.
Special Attack: Search for survivors
Set Up: Replace the Asteroid Obstacles with Debris Fields. After set up, place an objective token on each obstacle, starting with the first player.
In Game: While at Distance one of an obstacle when you spend a command dial, if you count a higher command value, claim one victory token and remove the objective token. If possible, place that objective token on another obstacle without a token. At the end of the 2nd and 4th rounds, place objective tokens on each obstacle without one.
Scoring: Each player gains 10 resources for each victory token they have. The winning side also gains 50 resources
Victory Star Destroyer: Firewind: 6 Points
After you perform a maneuver, you may suffer one damage to perform a speed 1 maneuver.
Gladiator Star Destroyer: Serpent : 5 Points
Increase your Squadron value by 1
Nebulon B: Shadow Raptor: 10 Points
After Deploying Fleets, you may re-deploy Shadow Raptor and up to Four Squadrons to within a distance of 3 of their current locations.
AF Mk 2: Redeemer: 4 Points
While performing an attack against squadrons, you may count critical results as hit results.
Red Objective: Relentless Assault
Set up: After deployment, place one objective token on each ship.
In Game: After performing an attack, a player may spend their objective token. If they do, they may perform another attack from a hull zone with half the dice rounded down.
Scoring: Unspent Objective Tokens are worth 20 points at the end of the game
Yellow Objective: Hazardous Nebula
Set Up: After Deployment is complete, the second player may place 1 Dust Field Obstacle in the set up area.
In Game: Ships may not move shields from one hull zone to another
Blue Objective: Asteroid Drift
Set Up: Replace debris fields with asteroid obstacles.
In Game: After even odd numbered rounds, the second player may move 1 obstacle to within distance 2, or 2 obstacles to within distance 1 of their current location. After even numbered rounds, 1st player may move 1 obstacle to within distance 2 of its current position. After a player overlaps an obstacle, their opponent gains one victory token
Scoring: Victory tokens are worth 15 points each.
Base Defense: Hardened Veterans
Set Up: After setup, the defending player places an objective token on each if their ships.
In Game: After being dealt a face up damage card, you may remove one objective token from that ship. If that face up card is a crew effect, discard it. Otherwise turn it face down.
Special Attack: Search for survivors
Set Up: Replace the Asteroid Obstacles with Debris Fields. After set up, place an objective token on each obstacle, starting with the first player.
In Game: While at Distance one of an obstacle when you spend a command dial, if you count a higher command value, claim one victory token and remove the objective token. If possible, place that objective token on another obstacle without a token. At the end of the 2nd and 4th rounds, place objective tokens on each obstacle without one.
Scoring: Each player gains 10 resources for each victory token they have. The winning side also gains 50 resources
Victory Star Destroyer: Firewind: 6 Points
After you perform a maneuver, you may suffer one damage to perform a speed 1 maneuver.
Gladiator Star Destroyer: Serpent : 5 Points
Increase your Squadron value by 1
Nebulon B: Shadow Raptor: 10 Points
After Deploying Fleets, you may re-deploy Shadow Raptor and up to Four Squadrons to within a distance of 3 of their current locations.
AF Mk 2: Redeemer: 4 Points
While performing an attack against squadrons, you may count critical results as hit results.
Monday, June 11, 2018
Armada possible 2.0 fixes?
So, following the huge let down of the HYperspace report, I've basically just stayed away from Armada. The fact the FFG has continued to keep under wraps "something big", has further hlped spur my lack of interest lately. However, a recent thread on the Forums speculating about changes people would like to see in a Armada 2.0 got me thinking as to what my wish list would be.
I honestly don't think there are any ships that need drastic overhauls, barring the Vic 1. Which, I think could be fixed by releasing a similar App like they have with XWing 2.0 to give a quick point redo for it. It seems like if it was more aggressively priced like a Quasar there is at least an argument to bring it as a battle carrier. The AFMk2 A could also use a point reduction, so there is at least some choice between it and the B variant for general usage. The Assault Pelta could likely use a Weapons team, maybe at the expense of the support team slot. These though are some minor tweaks, because I dont think the Ships in Armada are in a bad spot really. Most are well balanced and can see at least some play. I also think the flotilla changes cleaned up the big issue with activation spam that was starting to drive the game towards a very bland spot.
There are several ideas in the thread that I found intriguing, the ones about changing some of the squadron commands were the best. Allowing ships to activate up to their native squad -1 every turn without command would be a way to boost some of the battle carriers that need some help. It however I think really diminishes the value of Thrawn, and then of the Quasar and Pelta, ships that really want to be just pushing squads all day. Changing the squadron play during the squad phase I think would be interesting. The suggestion had been allow move and shoot during squad phase, but just at half speed. It would still allow full speed move and shoot during a command activation. This idea has traction really, because if FFG then allowed Rogues to still move at full speed in squadron phase their value moves up again.
The biggest change I would like to see besides getting the app to do quick card re-costing, would be a re-balance with fighters. The biggest issues I have with the current fighter framework are just how much more cost efficient they are against Capital ships, how pervasive full Ace lists are, and how there is a pretty stark dichotomy between min and max squad builds. As to the first point, fighters occupy a special niche when engaging capital ships. They perform the same ping style damage MSU lists enjoy, but can typically cause more damage over an activation than MSU lists can thanks to the multitude of re-roll options they have and the ability to hit more vulnerable arcs consistently. This, along with small based ships high vulnerability to ping damage has helped push MSU out of most competitive areas. One quick fix I see is making ships able to fight off fighters a bit more effectively. By making crits count as damage, I think we now would see some real hesitation to simply take max fighter builds and throw them at large based ships with no real second thought. Its also a bit more thematic, when you see squads being removed and largely aces escaping the fight in the end.
This solution though might exacerbate my second issue, Max Ace lists though. World's and many other tournaments have been largely dominated by max Ace lists on both sides, with Rieekan and Sloane fueling both. I hate hard limits placed on list building, but it might be time to experiment with restricting lists to 4 unique squadrons to help the imbalance as they did with flotillas. The final piece to the puzzle is to somehow re-strengthen the middle fighter group capability. I think the Ace restriction actually strengthens the case for taking the four aces and a couple of generics to sit at around 80-100 points, because the overall composition is now much more level to max builds that fill out with generics. Likely, either of these changes I do think helps out the game by large margins to reduce the overall time with squads and helping to re-balance from pure ace lists since they face more danger from flak and become less efficient, or from just not being so prominent.
Overall Armada doesnt need a huge re-boot to contineu its success, just some small tweaks to help move the game along and increase the efficiency of several lists.
I honestly don't think there are any ships that need drastic overhauls, barring the Vic 1. Which, I think could be fixed by releasing a similar App like they have with XWing 2.0 to give a quick point redo for it. It seems like if it was more aggressively priced like a Quasar there is at least an argument to bring it as a battle carrier. The AFMk2 A could also use a point reduction, so there is at least some choice between it and the B variant for general usage. The Assault Pelta could likely use a Weapons team, maybe at the expense of the support team slot. These though are some minor tweaks, because I dont think the Ships in Armada are in a bad spot really. Most are well balanced and can see at least some play. I also think the flotilla changes cleaned up the big issue with activation spam that was starting to drive the game towards a very bland spot.
There are several ideas in the thread that I found intriguing, the ones about changing some of the squadron commands were the best. Allowing ships to activate up to their native squad -1 every turn without command would be a way to boost some of the battle carriers that need some help. It however I think really diminishes the value of Thrawn, and then of the Quasar and Pelta, ships that really want to be just pushing squads all day. Changing the squadron play during the squad phase I think would be interesting. The suggestion had been allow move and shoot during squad phase, but just at half speed. It would still allow full speed move and shoot during a command activation. This idea has traction really, because if FFG then allowed Rogues to still move at full speed in squadron phase their value moves up again.
The biggest change I would like to see besides getting the app to do quick card re-costing, would be a re-balance with fighters. The biggest issues I have with the current fighter framework are just how much more cost efficient they are against Capital ships, how pervasive full Ace lists are, and how there is a pretty stark dichotomy between min and max squad builds. As to the first point, fighters occupy a special niche when engaging capital ships. They perform the same ping style damage MSU lists enjoy, but can typically cause more damage over an activation than MSU lists can thanks to the multitude of re-roll options they have and the ability to hit more vulnerable arcs consistently. This, along with small based ships high vulnerability to ping damage has helped push MSU out of most competitive areas. One quick fix I see is making ships able to fight off fighters a bit more effectively. By making crits count as damage, I think we now would see some real hesitation to simply take max fighter builds and throw them at large based ships with no real second thought. Its also a bit more thematic, when you see squads being removed and largely aces escaping the fight in the end.
This solution though might exacerbate my second issue, Max Ace lists though. World's and many other tournaments have been largely dominated by max Ace lists on both sides, with Rieekan and Sloane fueling both. I hate hard limits placed on list building, but it might be time to experiment with restricting lists to 4 unique squadrons to help the imbalance as they did with flotillas. The final piece to the puzzle is to somehow re-strengthen the middle fighter group capability. I think the Ace restriction actually strengthens the case for taking the four aces and a couple of generics to sit at around 80-100 points, because the overall composition is now much more level to max builds that fill out with generics. Likely, either of these changes I do think helps out the game by large margins to reduce the overall time with squads and helping to re-balance from pure ace lists since they face more danger from flak and become less efficient, or from just not being so prominent.
Overall Armada doesnt need a huge re-boot to contineu its success, just some small tweaks to help move the game along and increase the efficiency of several lists.
Wednesday, June 6, 2018
WPL 2018 Reading Challenge: Superman: Red Son Review
Another month another book checked off the list. I'm typically not a fan of graphic novels, but I decided to a do a pair of them for this challenge to really try to push myself a bit outside my normal likes and dislikes. A friend who is very much into Graphic Novels recommended Superman: Red Son as one of the best pieces in the genre and its well recieved by pretty much everyone that reads it. I found it to be a good story, although with a bit of a weak ending. The art style is very good, which is what typically will pull me off a comic. Its also a good introduction to the genre, since most of the named characters are well known enough to even casual fans and the story is not set in the middle of several other arcs. The rest of the review will contain some spoilers, so I'll put it beyond the jump.
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