To Brave the Storm

by on November 25, 2023 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

Part two of the Romulan War series is a lot more fragmented than the first half.

Surprisingly, given the original ‘fifth season’ nature of the idea, only a small part of the book continues with 2156, where part one left off. Then, a fair chunk of the book skims over three years, and then comes in for a big climax in 2160.

That last is a good, well done, action-packed gigantic space battle, that definitely ties things up decisive battle style, with… some of the subplots coming together to help out. Others seem to have been largely forgotten. There was some resolution to them all, but not always very good ones.

The ‘summary era’ has Enterprise away from the action, effectively doing a “charm offensive”. I suppose, if you want to envision what this would have been like from a TV series standpoint, you’d have a season of more-or-less regular Star Trek exploratory adventures, with the Romulans off  in the background.

In general, the idea of a protracted (five year, long in ‘on screen’ history) war works out. The idea of Earth being on the back foot, with the Coalition slowly dropping out around her as losses mount is good. But, Martin hasn’t studied war as much as some. It is often the case that both sides are having trouble in any war, and the problems are piling up faster for the side that seems to have all the momentum. If it was me, I’d go for a structure where things go from grim to grimmer for Earth, but meanwhile the Romulans are having mounting problems of logistics and things less flashy than a ‘warp seven’ project (why are we skipping a warp six engine in the first place?), and they come apart because they just can’t feed their own fleets with personnel and parts, and suddenly they have little left and have to sue for peace.

But that’s me.

What we have is good enough, and well enough done on the character side. Well, in the first book. This also feels a bit rushed in that it feels like there’s not as much time spent on the characters here.

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Group Corp

by on November 21, 2023 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Boardgaming

On Sunday, we got the main gang over to try out Space Corp. Mark and I had tried it before, which helped confirm that it was likely the group would like it (we were right), and gave a leg up on teaching it.

We got through the end of Mariners by lunch, with taking a somewhat shaky lead. Dave had initially kept up, but then fell behind, with Mark and Jason trailing in between, but Dave managed to land two of the contracts at once at the end, and the profit put him back at the front. Only he and Mark had any producing sites at the end of the era to save as legacy production. I had concentrated on the Lagrange stations to grab that contract, and eventually got the 1st Beyond marker (I was actually tied with Dave at the end, but counting that as 3T, as if we were ending the game there, would put me ahead).

I’d also managed to get two Genetics actions, but couldn’t find life to build a Bio station for a third (I learned to concentrate on that if I got a chance after the first game…). Mars was pristine until near the end of the era, when everyone converged on it (except me, I just couldn’t get there in time). And the era ended from a lack of cards, with only about 3-4 contracts done (this seems to be usual).

After lunch, we dove into the Planeteers era, Mark had taken 2nd Beyond, so the pair of us duked it out for control of the asteroids. At one point, I screwed up, left a site before building the base, and that let Mark get three bases and that contract. By that point, competition had heated up around Jupiter, and I’d sent my second team to Saturn. I was slow enough developing there, that I only got two bases, but the second one was a secure base to grab 3T.

I also managed to stay ahead on adaptations, grabbing Cooperative Empathy early in the era, and abusing it for the rest of the game. As the era wound down (we could coast along on existing infrastructure a long time after the deck ran out), Dave managed to get himself into the Oort Cloud for 1st Beyond, while I followed with 2nd a while later. I managed to get two exploration upgrades (e1->e2, e2->e3; sadly not on the same draw), and found Alien Artifacts, which helped get me close to a breakthrough, but I never managed one in that era. The final bit of drama was the exploration of Umbriel turning up Pirates, which Jason didn’t have cards to deal with (the B+2 penalty), especially in the one move left after the passing started.

I didn’t take notes, and should have. I won by the end-of-game scoring, though Dave was still right behind me, and Jason wasn’t far behind. Mark ended up holding Time cards too long, and had three with nothing to do with them, and was trailing all of us in terms of profit.


I’m Blue, Dave is Green, Mark is Yellow, and Jason is Purple.

There was still a decent amount of time left, though I knew it wasn’t enough to finish Starfarers, but we pressed on to see the early bits of it anyway. Dave managed a decent colony in in Alpha Centauri, but had to give up a team to do it, while the other two pressed on to Wolf 1061 and Groombridge 1618.

I repeated my early double (Time) move to Epsilon Indi and Epsilon Eridani. I found a Primitive Culture in Luhman 16, but never could manage the Build 12 for bases there. I did hurry things through a bit so that I could build a colony at Epsilon Eridani right before we had to pack up for the day.

Mark had also scattered his teams around, though he only got a chance to explore and build in Lacaille 9352. Jason sent a pair of teams to Groombridge 34 and 61 Cygni, hoping to have a colony built to provide a nearby bonus by the time the second was ready to develop. However, he got an alien culture, which turned out to be the Phobes, who sent the team back to Earth.

Afterword

As expected, it did well with the group as a whole. I think we certainly can do a full game in one day, just not the first time out. We may even want to start with Planeteers next time to make sure there’s plenty of time for Starfarers to finish.

Everyone agrees that Cooperative Empathy is just way too annoying/good. Always being able to leech off someone else’s infrastructure without worries of giving them profit just bends the incentives too much. I mean, I tend to be an infrastructure guy, but once I had it, I never upgraded again, as there was just no need during all of Planeteers, and not a lot of need in Starfarers. The main suggestion is for it to be more cooperative, and a two-way street. That is, using anyone else’s infrastructure is free for you, but it’s also free for everyone else to use yours. I don’t think that’ll really solve anything, but it moves in the right direction.

Mark also has Ventures, which we will need to contemplate adding in, though I think I’d like the group to get in a full Starfarers era first. But that’s without knowing exactly what it adds into the mix.

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Beneath the Raptor’s Wing

by on November 17, 2023 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

I actually like Star Trek: Enterprise. It had its problems, and plenty of problem episodes, and I’m not a fan of the Expanse story. But whenever the series dealt with the Vulcans and Andorians (especially), the series was at its best, and showing Earth’s initial influence on its neighbors was a good direction.

The apparent plans were that the fifth season would tackle the Earth-Romulan War mentioned in “Balance of Terror”. So, in a series of novels dealing with carrying the Enterprise storyline forward, that is an obvious, and attractive, subject.

The first problem is that it is more tied into the previous novels than you’d think. This starts off right after Kobayashi Maru, and everyone is still dealing with the aftermath of that book… which I haven’t read. Second, I am quite tired of in medias res openings that try to excite you with things that happen long after the start of the story. If the story’s good, it can be good from the start, trust me. And this one is so bad that you don’t even catch up to it until the next book! After that… the novel is a bit too ambitious. It covers a bit over a year with Star Fleet having to deal with a real shooting war that they’re not really ready for, and the Coalition of Planets’ mutual defense treaties buckle under. (Actually, the main problem is Vulcan staying steadfastly out of the war, and that’s not handled as well as it could have been.)

The novel is long, and goes for the ‘cast of thousands’ side of things, which works here. Far better than it would in a shorter format, such as weekly episodes, so Martin making good use of his opportunities here. It does mean this is a much slower read than most any other Star Trek novel you’re likely to run into. On the other hand, I think he needed to tighten up on tone and theme, and look more at how this war is shaping Star Fleet, and taking it ever further from it’s pure exploration roots.

One sub-plot I have definite troubles with is with Tucker. The plot itself isn’t a bad one, and certainly becomes important in the next book, but he just feels like a really unlikely choice for spy. Of course, this also flows out of a previous book (presumably Kobayashi Maru, but I don’t know). There’s a good attempt to explain why TOS’s bridge controls are so… “retro” compared to everything else, but I think we just have leave that to the side, since Strange New Worlds has overwritten that part. Unfortunately, one bit in that part would be… frankly, impossible, and I’m glad it’s just a one line mention. (There might be ways to make it work, but not as stated.)

Overall, it’s a good book, and a good delve into a period that we won’t see in any other way. There’s a bit too much sand in the concrete of the foundation, but it still stands well on it’s own, other than ending on a ‘to be continued…’ note as To Brave the Storm is directly tied into it.

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Two Rounds of Loos (2nd Division)

by on November 13, 2023 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Boardgaming

In Mark and I’s regular tour of WWI battles, we went over to The Great War as they have one not covered by Great War Commander. The Battle of Loos is broken up into five scenarios, and we tried the first one, covering a British diversionary attack on 25 Sep. The Germans have three trench lines, with half their force in the rear one, so the British start with local superiority. The British get an extra banner for having units in the first two trench lines (each).

I had the Germans for the first game, and the initial bombardment was about as light as it could be, generating two gaps in the wire. Mark led off with Assault Center with a Machine Gun Barrage, which let him get three units into the wire (one in the gap), and reduced the two forward German Infantry units by four figures. Direct From HQ let me command four units, and I managed to knock out an Inf hung up on the wire completely, but lost the weaker of my two front Inf to a Surprise Ambush. Mark went Forward, getting his center into the first trench line, and did another figure to the remaining front Inf who fell back a hex. I laid down a Barrage with my two MGs (using Probe Centre to order them), and knocked both leading Infantry down to one figure, but Replacements brought them back to 2 and 3 figures, and they headed for the British right flank.

Probe Left did nothing, while Recon in Force got a Bomber into the left wire, and one unit on the right got into the first trench, and reduced my weak infantry. Probe Right let me hit the Bomber, but Body Armor negated it, though he still retreated off the wire. Recon in Force got an Inf into the second trench line and the Bomber back onto the wire, and knocked out my weak Inf. Attack Left and Machine Gun Barrage let me reduce one of the Inf in the first trench, but had no other effect. Artillery Bombard targeted my third trench, and reduced a Bomber, Mortar, and Inf by one block each. Out Flanked got all my heavy weapons in action, and finished of a British Inf in the first trench line, and forced the Bomber to retreat again. Recon Right got another Inf into the first trench. Attack Right forced the Bomber back to the British trench, and did two figures to an Inf in the open.

Assault Right let Mark get to close combat with one of the MGs, reducing it to one figure, but Butt & Bayonet let it do two hits to the attacking Inf. Attack Center lost me the MG when it failed to do anything in CC, and Butt & Bayonet wiped it out. Mark Attacked Right to follow up, and back off the damaged Inf. Infantry Assault let me get the third line reserve up to the second trench without spending lots of time in the open, and a Bomber wiped out the lead (undamaged) British Inf. Storm of Fire thankfully didn’t amount to more than one loss on a Bomber. Probe Left let me finish off the only British unit in the second trench, but a Strike First cost me two figures on the same Bomber.

Assault Right didn’t do anything, but Storm of Fire did a figure to Mark, and forced two units back a hex. Recon in Force with Mortar Barrage also failed to get results, while I started advancing on the first trench, doing one figure damage with Probe Right. Attack Centre and Reposition let Mark get a MG into the first trench, and another into one of the pre-game shellholes, while Forward let me finish off an Inf and Trench Raid let my weak Bomber get into the first trench, where he drove off an Inf (he was then going to go back, but I don’t recall what we judged prevented that). Counter Attack and Machine Gun Barrage got my Bomber, though it took a couple of tries. Storm of Fire reduced an Inf to one block, and drove British Bomber back to his own trench again. Probe Left advanced him again, and an Inf got into the first trench line, reducing one of my Inf, and I Returned Fire to reduce the Bomber two figures. Direct From HQ let me command four units and get to close combat with a weakened Inf to eliminate it. 6-5

In the second game, the opening bombardment was more effective, knocking out three hexes of wire, and generating four shellholes in front of it. I opened with Probe Left, and Mark’s Probe Right let him get a hit on my lead Inf. Recon in Force should have gotten him into the trench but Trench Foot kept him in place. A center Infantry Assault let Mark get three units into his second line from the reserve, while Attack Left got me onto the wire and eliminated a hex on the left flank. Attack Centre got a hit on my forward Inf, and I went Forward into the first trench with two Inf, and did five figures across two units, driving one Inf back two hexes.

Probe Centre got the retreated Inf into cover, Forward (again) got me a little further, with some artillery doing a figure, and close combat finishing off the remaining front-line Inf. Lost Messenger largely cancelled Storm of Fire, but still finished off my Inf. Probe Centre started another Inf forward, while Attack Left with Messenger Pigeons let him start swapping out his damaged Inf and did a figure to one of mine. Attack Centre did nothing, and Recon in Force reduced my Bomber to two figures. Assault Centre got a figure on a German MG, and Counter Attack with Trench Raid reduced the Bomber to one figure, and did two figures to an Inf.

Short Supply forced a German Bomber to his baseline, while Probe Right got me a hit on a MG. Artillery Bombard failed to have any effect, while Attack Right with Reposition got my MG into the first trench, with the Mortar into shellholes. Assault Centre got an Inf hit, and Attack Right with Mortar Barrage knocked out a MG, and did a hit to an Inf. Another Artillery Bombard got a hit on my other MG, while Probe Left did a figure to the remaining German MG. Storm of Fire failed to have an effect (not for lack of trying), with Probe Right doing a figure to an Inf. Out Flanked also failed to have an effect, and Probe Right got to close combat with a one-figure Inf, and failed to have a result, and my Inf took a hit and retreated two hexes from Butt & Bayonet.

Big Show ordered three units and finished off two of mine. His last shot did nothing, and Return Fire finished off his weak Inf. Attack Centre got a MG up, but had no other effect. Attack Right drove off an Inf with a hit to that and the MG. Recon in Force let me pull out a weak Inf and do a figure to an Inf. Probe Left saw artillery take out a section of the first trench line, but thankfully did nothing to the MG there. Whistles & Bugle Calls let me move up on the right, but did no damage. Storm of Fire knocked out my center MG. Forward did nothing, and Infantry Assault let Mark reshuffle his defenders, while my Infantry Assault let me try a direct assault on the defenders of the second line (in the open) to try and get the last banner, but the first attack did nothing but lose me a full unit from Butt & Bayonet and the second did one figure and forced a one hex retreat (I should have ‘gained ground’ into the trench, but didn’t think of it). Recon Centre put his Bomber back in the trench, and then finished off my Inf in close combat. 5-6

Afterword

That last charge of mine was a bit premature (I really needed a unit that had taken a loss or two to attack), but I was wearing down fast, and only saw things continuing to get worse. I certainly was having no luck getting anyone to the second trench line.

Great War suffers a bit with lower dice totals and and lots of protective terrain. So battles drag on a bit compared to C&C: Ancients. But, the high protection, low damage, makes it feel like WWI combat. The combat cards add some nice variety to things, and managing the HQ tokens can be interesting (we nearly ran out for a bit in the middle of the second game, with me short of them, but Mark eventually found better uses than hording them).

The subtle differences of the Bombers makes them noticeably more effective. Things really turned around when I got my Bombers into play in the first game, and impressed us both with them. The British only have about parity with the German forces and are on the attack. But the Germans have everything in reserve, so they can get in, and take parts of the trenches for a win. If they miss that chance, they’ll like lose as the Germans get organized.

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The Horse, the Wheel, and Language

by on November 9, 2023 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

The problem with getting an idea of the origins of civilization is that no one that far back had yet started writing anything down. But, there are still clues we can gather in the absence of records. David Anthony tries to tie the main two together here.

He notes that there’s a lot of professional resistance to trying to tie historical linguistics to the physical artifacts found by archaeology. One problem he notes is the two disciplines use very different jargons, and both are specialized enough that there’s no one who’s fully qualified in both fields. Anthony himself is an archaeologist and admits his deficiencies, but from my passing knowledge of the subject, he seems well read enough on Proto-Indo-European to say intelligent things. What he has to say certainly seems intelligent to me.

The first part of the book sets the scene by going through the basics of why people think there was an actual Proto-Indo-European language, and what we can deduce from that small part of it we can reconstruct. He also tackles some limitations that I had not seen discussed before, which was nice. And then the general archaeology targeted in the likely time and region, finishing with work on trying to set bounds on the likely time period PIE existed in. He he gets into arsenical bronze, which I had not known of before (bronze made of copper and naturally co-ocurring arsenic). Also, the intellectual history of ordering prehistory ‘ages’, which I suppose I must have seen before at some point, but I had forgotten it all.

One point he goes into some different terminology used in Soviet, and now post-Soviet studies, though I wish he’d gone a little further with it. Naturally, the main part of the book has a lot of more detailed looks at the archaeological record in it. It can get a bit much on the minutiae, and certainly trying to digest all the archaeology of a broad area of land and time means things sort of fly by.

He and his wife have also done work on trying to figure out just when and where the horse was domesticated. There’s some limits to what they’re doing, but it’s a much better study of the subject than we’ve had before.

In the end, this is guesswork. However, its very well thought out guesswork based on what we do know. If you’re interested in early history, if you wonder just how one language group came to dominate much of the planet, this is a very interesting book. I do think he’s on the right track, and is as good of a guess as we’re going to have until continuing archaeological discoveries can say more.

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