Library of the Sapphire Wind

by on July 30, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

Three young, and slightly desperate people perform a summoning for help. This is something that is a known idea in this world, and especially at Hettua Shrine, which will bring you the person most capable of getting you exactly what you ask for.

We don’t get any other examples, or full explanations, but it seems like this is generally someone already in this fantasy world. The rushed ceremony performed by our three produces three people from… elsewhere. Earth, actually. And while you might expect some sort of action hero, they get a trio of ladies from about 50-70 years old, who had just been sitting down to a book club.

I’ll point out here, that Lindskold is indulging a in a bit of self-insert here, and I’m sure Meg, Peg, and Teg are all directly expressing facets of her own life, as well as people she knows. At any rate, it’s well done, and the three of them are our viewpoint characters for a portal fantasy adventure. And, yes, their learning and life experiences are indeed what is needed by our three summoners, despite their unusual nature.

For this is world of… well, near-furries. Most of them are more in the Egyptian god model of a human with an animal head, though the ‘animal’ traits carry beyond just the heads in some cases. Humans are entirely unknown to them, and a big shock.

We get a couple chapters of both sides getting over the initial shock and introductions… and our three ladies accepting the call to adventure. It’s hard to keep something like this from dragging out a bit, but Lindskold keeps it all moving, and even at those points where there’s a feeling of “okay, I get it already,” things are moving fast enough that you know it won’t drag out.

The adventure itself is well done, and there’s plenty going on for external and internal issues, especially once the main leg is done, and we get the major twist of the story. However, this is part one, and while some major things get sorted, instead of things ending at that point, we pick up the next major thread, and get a “to be continued” as that gets going. I don’t mind a series, but the break is at an odd place.

At any rate, it’s a fun book, I’m more than happy with it, and I need to get to book two.

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Two Rounds of Sotium

by on July 26, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: CC:Ancients

After Patch managed to take back Hatten again, we went to the usual between-bigger-games round of Commands & Colors: Ancients, this time with a scenario from Expansion #2. Sotium features an interesting mix of scattered terrain, and both sides are a bit scattered at start, with each side’s left near the baseline.

I had the Gauls the first game, and started with a Mounted Charge, wiping out an Auxiliary (four greens!), with momentum doing three blocks to a Medium, who did two blocks to my MC, who immediately retreated to the baseline. A Light tried to stand up to LC, but took two banners, and the LC retreated back to the baseline, going down to one block, after failing to finish off the Medium. I got a Roman MC as well, but only after it did three blocks across to LC, and my MC retreated back to the line after doing two blocks to a Medium. Patch Ordered Two Right and finished off a LC.

I Ordered One (Heavy) to bring up an Auxilia, and Patch Ordered Three Left, doing a hit to an Auxilia with his HWM. I used Line Command to bring up three units on my right to do a block to a MC and drive it back to the baseline. Patch Ordered Four Left to move up, and I Darkened the Sky to get two hits on a Medium. Patch Ordered Lights to do a block to an Auxilia, forcing it two hexes back, and making another abandon their hilltop. I Double Timed on my right, only doing one block, but forcing the HWM to evade, and taking two hits each on two units. Patch used Line Command to rework his left, finishing off an Auxilia, doing three hits to a Medium, and taking two in return. Leadership Any Section let me continue in there, finishing off two Mediums, and forcing a Light to evade.

Patch Ordered Lights, finishing off Warriors, doing a hit to a Medium, and killing their leader, while taking two hits. I Out Flanked, finishing off an Auxilia after three attacks (including momentum; the first attack was three helmets with now-leaderless troops…), and taking a hit in the process. Patch used Mounted Charge to finish off a MC and force a leader to evade off-board, and finish off a Warrior. 5-6

For the second game, Patch started with Order One (Heavy) to move an Auxilia into woods, and I used Leadership Any Section to come into contact with him, forcing two retreats, while the HWM forced a LC to lose a block on a retreat. Patch Ordered Lights to move his Auxilia up and do two ranged hits (one on the HWM). I used Mounted Charge to move into contact on the left and middle… doing one hit in return for two each on a pair of MC. Patch launched a Coordinated Attack to kill a weak MC, and force two others to evade. I tried another Mounted Charge, this time wiping out a Warrior and leader, doing two hits on another with momentum, and losing the weak MC, also taking out a MC and forcing Adiatuanos back to an Auxilia, who took a hit on momentum.

Patch Ordered Two Right to form a small line, and I used Line Command for most of the left and center, though only one unit came into contact. Ranged fire chased off an Auxilia, and close combat forced a Warrior retreat. Patch used Line Command at the junction of his center and right, and did a block to an Auxilia. I Ordered Lights and did no more than force two Auxilia to retreat. Leadership Any Section got Patch’s left into contact, taking out an Auxilia. I Ordered Mediums to bring a solid line up there, and advance on my left, trading five blocks to four in hills and woods, and knocking out a MC.

Patch used Clash of Shields to do two hits a Medium, but lost his Auxilia, finished off a Medium, did two hits to another, and one to a Light. I Ordered Mediums to press forward and took out an Auxilia in two attacks. 6-4

Afterword

The terrain and setup make this an unusual scenario. It’s a lot of fun, with a good mix of units and position. Neither side has a solid line, so using Line Command and Double Time is a challenge. I spent much of the start of the second game just getting rid of moderately useful cards, because I didn’t have any section cards to force an area with. Patch pointed out how I kept everyone moving, which was good, but I was constantly at the whims of the cards, and knew it was going to end soon.

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Lincoln’s Lieutenants

by on July 22, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

This is a decent book with good high concept. However, it did not entirely grab me.

The major problem is that Sears is trying to keep track of nearly everyone in the Army of the Potomac from brigadier general on up. While that’s not a large population, it is still a decent number of men, and most of them don’t leave a strong impression. Worse, there are places (mainly after large battles) where we get paragraphs that are very dense with names, attempting to describe who was dead, who was wounded, who was shifted around; it’s very hard to get through these lists, and not, in isolation, nearly informative enough.

But, that is in service to a better goal. In a way, this is a history of the eastern theater of the ACW; it is a history of the Army of the Potomac, which touches just about every other Union army that campaigned in the east. There’s no real attempts to get the soldier’s eye view, instead, this is looking at the upper echelons, as commanders order men into the fray, or—often—are ordered to, and don’t.

And that is valuable; the interplay of the men at top determines a lot of what happens. There is a lot of men leading from the front, and often getting wounded or killed. There’s just as many occasions of commanders not being present at all; sometimes drunk, and always not providing needed direction. A look at some of the staff work to go along with this would be good, but outside of the scope Sears decided upon.

Another valuable thing is that Sears does pay attention to the evolving organization and leadership of the artillery and cavalry, especially just how little attention was paid to both at first, and how long that persisted with the cavalry. He also points up the breakdown of logistics under Burnside after Fredricksburg, and its recovery under Hooker. Sadly, this is not a consistent theme, and it probably should have been.

So, this reads as an overview, but it’s trying to concentrate on a particular subject. Doing that at the level of a single campaign isn’t hard, but that wouldn’t get at the changes over time that he’s trying to show. The book ends up with too many separate threads of different personalities, and other than the top command, it’s hard to keep track of them, and that’s with some of them being familiar to me.

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American Husky

by on July 18, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Boardgaming

After our dogfight excursion, Mark and I returned to BCS, in the form of Danger Forward, the game included with the new Battalion S3 magazine. Having played BCS once, I found the magazine of limited use, as much of it is aimed more at first-time players, answering questions that I’d already had to work out. The more Danger Forward oriented parts were better, since I of course hadn’t played that yet. I certainly think the intro combat article could have been better done, as it didn’t answer questions in a really useful way. The article on blobs on the other hand was better, since it explained some of the thinking around a concept that is hard to write ironclad rules for. The charts in the back aren’t bad, but (I think) already existed, and could still use some layout improvements. The spare player aid card is a big help, even when you’re playing on Vassal.

But the real point is the game itself, which is nicely small with a single poster map, one sheet of counters, and all done at a 5/8″ counter size. I’d kind of like to see the British landings on Sicily at this scale, since I’ve played Primosole Bridge ages ago, but the American landing does make for a good situation. There’s a few wrinkles; we had to do an extra lookup that the garrison units do have a ZOC (they generally have the characteristics of “unready” no AV and no assault arrow), the 82nd Airborne is exempted from a lot of usual supply and command details, and the Americans have a decent amount of naval support to assist their attack. We did use the HQ Orders optional rule, though it is probably about as much trouble as it is worth here.

Mark had the Americans and won the initiative. However, he tried for the 82nd Airborne, which starts with its second activation (the first presumably is the drop itself), and he failed the roll for the second activation, leaving them all unready. I activated PG KG and got a partial activation, and no second, advancing to the ridges north of Acate, and taking fatigue since I mistakenly put down an objective (an article on how and when to use objectives could be a good idea).

The 45th Infantry went next, with a double objective on 25.10. The attack on the garrison there went well, with a follow-up battalion getting adjacent to Biscari Station. (Other elements got too far out and around the 27.07 garrison as we didn’t think it had a ZOC at this point.) Pz KG had two companies of the 82nd to deal with (in 31.26 and on the road in 27.27). With a full activation, I put an objective on each, and eliminated them both with barrage or attack by fire, leaving the division scattered about the north edge. The 1st Infantry took two attacks to clear the 16.16 garrison (we missed that you can only have one regular attack on a hex per activation), and then went inland to grab Gela-Farello Landing Ground. Livorno got a partial activation and moved the two elements of Groupo Mobile (the mechanized infantry) onto the plains. Finally, Force X managed to clear both hexes of Gela and get a second activation, which let them reduce, but not eliminate, the third Italian garrison.


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Anime Spring 2026

by on July 14, 2026 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Anime

Once again, I’m well behind on talking about what I’ve watched over the last threeish months. It’s been another good season of anime, and there’s nothing here I wouldn’t recommend. As usual, this is in declining order of recommendation, and the first three are all on my ‘everyone should see this’ list.

One Piece — Saw the second season of the live action series, and it is just as good as the first. It goes through Drum Island and Tony Tony Chopper; they did a good job on the CG for him. In some ways it’s not quite as solid because the first season did a good job with everyone’s background arcs, but that leaves more room for Chopper, and the main plot definitely works. Looking forward to season three!

The Owl House — We were at the end of the second season last time, so the watching here was just going through the three parts of “season three”. It feels like each episode is a summary of what could have been an entire season. I’m certainly glad there was a chance to wrap everything up, but I’d really like to see a more fleshed out version of it all.

Frieren — We’ve just now gotten to starting second season, and am only a couple episodes in. So far, a solid start to the season, but we haven’t had time to see much more than the reintroduction get established.

The Amazing Digital Circus — I started watching this just before the last episode came out. I’m… uncertain. I did like it, I think the overall arc was interesting, and there is a lot going on. It didn’t engage me as much as I’d kind of like, but it has a lot to think about.

To Your Eternity — We’re just shy of the end of the third and final season. I was very uncertain about the entire shift to a modern-style world, but it has actually worked out. The new environment has helped with bringing certain philosophical elements to the fore, though I have to say the exploration of that has been very uneven. A lot of it is that Fushi continues to be a very impulse character, and just doesn’t sit down to try and figure out what some of this means….

Shadows House — We’re well into the second half of the (released) series. It has long since lived up to my initial reaction of being something everyone would be interested in. It has certainly been nice to see a lot of sub-elements branch out and become their own little mysteries, and we’ve gotten the basic explanation of just what is the main mechanism of the shadows themselves.

Gamoverse — Saw the pilot of this shortly after it came out. I had been totally unaware of Glitch until about six months ago, and they are doing a lot of good stuff. This had a feel of ‘the pilot is still shaking things out’, but it was still a good setup, and I want to see more.

100 Meters — Just saw this with Smudge. A very good sports anime movie. As such, it invites comparison with First Slam Dunk, and suffers since that one was decidedly better. This one is more focused, and more internal character focused, which it does well. Pretty much everything is rotoscoped… which is fine; but different portions are done by different people, and the main character wildly shifts body language a couple times. There’s some really well done scenes such as a track meet in pouring rain.

Primal — Only seen the first two episodes so far: In every respect this is an excellently done series. It’s not exactly my genre, but I respect it a lot. This would be higher up a lot of people’s lists than mine simply because the ‘ahistorical caveman + dinosaurs’ genre doesn’t do much for me.

Campfire Cooking in Another World — So, the Japanese food fetish meets the hyperfixation on isekai (technically, this seems to be a portal fantasy). There’s a lot of bad attempts at doing off-beat subjects in the genre. But, this one works. Mukohda is an ordinary enough guy with a passion for cooking, and gets to really dive into it after getting called to another world. He’s competent to scrape by making it all work on his own, which is great to establish. And then his delicious food comes to the attention of some powerful monsters….

Dr Stone — Just finished off the latest arc of this, which looks like the next part could wrap it all up. Good science, bonkers engineering, but at least there was some real acknowledgement of needing several tries to get things right with rockets (this should have been true all along, with this just being worse…).

That Time I Was Reincarnated as a Slime — Currently near the end of part 4(?). As usual, this lives off its characters, though there’s enough now that the series has a hard time juggling them all. Still, the overarching plot has continued—Remeru has gotten Tempest recognized by the human world, and the various big powers, and people who want to influence them try to shift the ground under him.

Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? — Any time me and Smudge are a bit short on our viewing schedule, this gets left behind, so we’re still just exiting the first half of series five. Certainly, things we’ve had bits of have escalated to new heights… on the harem front, instead of the nature of the dungeon front. It’s good, but not about the part I enjoy the most.

Pokemon: Horizons — We’ve recently started part three, Rising Hope, which has been an interesting shift. It’s a year later, so our main kids are a little older (in a Pokemon anime?! gasp), and the nature of the series has shifted a bit with the big past mystery solved, and now working through the consequences. Ult feels like he’s more there to be annoying, but I’m sure his character arc will underpin a good chunk of the action.

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