The Terrible Gamer

Happy Valentines day!

2011-02-14T08:49:00.000-08:00

Here is a game related (and true) picture to look at and giggle at in amusment.

The thousand sons are calling me!

2011-02-12T10:19:00.000-08:00

So recently I've been on a real Warhammer 40k binge! I have been reading the Horus heresy series of books and have also picked up the grey knights omnibus ( a lot of reading ). As well as playing a bit of DoW 1& 2 has lead me to pick up some real cravings to start collecting an army again. This craving has gone as far as watching battle reports on Youtube and decieding on an army to collect if I do decide to take the plunge. As well as putting a general army list together.

The army I have decided on is a thousand sons chaos marines army (just in case you didn't guess by the title!). Since researching them I've really grown an interest in the history and the feel of how the army should play. And I'm actually getting pretty psyched about collecting them even though it is just the though at the moment.

The only thing stopping me from taking the plunge right now is the cost. After totting everything up that I would need i.e. rulebook and codex as well as the models and paints brushes glues etc. It came up to nearing about £200. Now obviously I would space this out over time however. The only thing I could really afford for a few months would be a chaos marines battle force the codex and paints etc.

Combine this with the fact I currently don't know anyone that collects 40k, it would be a pretty expensive painting hobby. However at the moment this is what I would be looking forward to the most.

So my question to you would be, what are your experiences of going to a local games workshop and finding someone to play against? Also what would you recommend my first purchases to be? I would only really be willing to spend around £70 - £80 on my first section of buys in case for some reason, I either can't or don't want to play/collect avidly?

Terrible Starcraft 2 Tips #1

2011-01-05T09:44:00.000-08:00

So for my first post I'm going to put forward a idea which I have been playing around with on Starcraft 2.

This is to help and improve your opening timings, which is something I struggle with as a non-serious and not very frequent Starcraft player. I find that if I haven't played Starcraft for a few days then I tend to mess up my opening builds, mainly forgetting and completely missing out a vital unit or structure. To combat this I used to have a little post it note on my monitor with the order of the build and on what food each building/unit should be constructed. This is all well and fine helping me remember in which order to build things, however I found that I was getting distracted by constantly looking over to my note and reading through it. Meaning that I would sometimes lose a couple of seconds on defending an attack because I wasn't even looking at the screen.

Now the solution...A SONG!

Yes, when I play a game of starcraft at the very beginning after I've set my workers to start mining and got another one in production I press play on a song. So as I am playing I'm listening to the song but also never taking my eyes of the screen, with each action that I need to do linked with a particular part of the song (yes I'm finding this hard to explain). Let me give you an example.

I use Battery by Metallica as my song as choice because it transits between different sections. The opening is an acoustic section and while this is playing I know that I need to be getting my workers out. And by the time the drums and heavy guitar kick in I know that I need to have had put down my first production building....and so on as the game and the song continue.

Yes it isn't perfect but it allows you to keep full attention on the game whilst reminding you of anything you've forgotten. But hey maybe that's why I'm such a Terrible Gamer............. BA DUM TSSCH