Earlier this month I looked at my progress in 2021, much like I did back at the beginning of the year while looking back at 2020. Much like before, these goals have been useful in not just maintaining momentum, but picking it back up when something hits the fan and brings things to a screeching halt. And the last year (more like two!) have shown an especially impressive capacity for this. So, in the tradition of continuing with a good idea, here are the 2022 goals. One thing that I said that I would do that I didn’t was dropping completed tasks. While it sounds like a good idea, I confess it’s a bit of a morale boost to see completed tasks on the list. So they’ll be staying.
2022 Goals
These goals are approximately in order of priority and in order of precedence (IE have to do #1 before you can do #2). There’s some goals from 2021 that are coming back, but a some of them are going to be brand new ones as well. As before, some of them are one-and-done, while others are big projects. There’s a couple more tasks on it this year compared to last, but a bunch of them are more housekeeping tasks; easier one-and done things that can be pounded out sometime in the year.
So enough banter. On to the list!
1) Complete turn processing for all empires up to turn 175
Last year the goal was to get to turn 160, but 3rd Elysium took way too long to get done (not that it was bad that it did). As a result I barely got to 145. Turn 175 is a pie-in-the-sky goal, and 160 is probably more realistic, since each turn means at least two short story bits, and 175 means 60 short story bits, or a little over one a week. 160 is literally half that (30 short story bits). I’ll be happy with 160, but let’s see how far beyond the madness place I can go…
2) Update/Archive all the Sketch Sunday Worldbuilding
The Sketch Sunday project has been a LOT of fun, and something I intend to keep hammering away on. But while it’s generated a lot of content, it’s also generated a lot of unarchived content. Some bits are, but the vast majority isn’t. What is archived is in scratch text files, unedited and completely unorganized. This needs to be corrected.
3) Finish playtesting and balancing for Scenario Book 1 – The First Contact War
With the Starfire (and facebook!) discords starting to build up a fairly good amount of activity, I think I have a good place where I can start fishing for some playtesters. Frankly, the discord is pleasantly active, even moreso than the forums used to be. We’re definitely getting more people filtering in and joining, and games live and die by their community. Anyhow, I’m hoping that a few people will be willing to function as some playtesters. Fingers crossed!
4) Finish the writing work for Scenario Book 1 – The First Contact War
Getting this process back on track is another 2022 goal. The plan here is to go do a fresh read-through, compare my evaluation notes, and see what still needs doing. I don’t recall it needing heavy revisions, but I need to get myself reoriented on this task.
5) Introduce and post completed artwork
This one is a little embarrassing. I went and called it Complete, and it turns out that I missed my oldest and first commissions done by Blu3Dawn14! Which is VERY embarrassing since that means both the Sintillan and deWulf uniforms haven’t actually been formally shown off!
At least this is an easy thing to take care of; I have pictures already set up back from when I posted them on DeviantArt. They just need some DPS Yards logos in the corners and they’ll be good to go.
6) Go do a second pass on the artwork for Scenario Book 1, incorporating new details and design concepts over the past year
Originally this was just based around the concept of taking all my sketches, notes and the like, and then incorporating them into the 3d models. In the fall however, with the commissions that D1D2M3 has so elegantly done, this is expanding to a more in-depth rebuild of the models to match his own artwork of various deWulf and Sintillan ships. I’m hoping to get a little bit more work commissioned from him, and as a result of that work the renders will, eventually, have to get redone. Frankly though… I just might ask him to do that art too. He does damn good work and if he’s able to do it, I have no issues paying him properly.
7) Start fishing in my contacts to find someone who can do proofreading for Scenario Book
This task is sitting low on the to-do list for fairly obvious reasons. Need to be done writing and my own edit pass before the work can get handed off to an editor.
8) Rename systems/planets that do not fit the universe setting
This is another longer term task, though not so much long term as it will take a long time to do, but more because it’ll take a while to look through all the material, ID names that don’t fit, and then change them to something that is similar to the original but more unique/fitting.
9) Look at the Solar Starfire Freight Handling Rules
I kinda brought this one on myself. I’ve made enough questionable comments about how I perceived the freight handling rules that it was almost inevitable that I’d be asked to take a look at them. So here that task is on my to-do list. This is basically to do a critique and a mechanical review of the rules to see what it can be made interesting/more realistic. So, tall order!
10) Set up a redundant deWulf data backup
Right now I’ve got a redundant backup handled by SVN, but I’m not going to lie, it’s gotten PRETTY big, and it’s being supported solely on my friend’s kindness. While I appreciate it, it’s also not terribly fair. So I’m going to set aside some time and money this year to get a proper NAS setup with RAID to function as a proper data backup. I’ll still do the SVN, but this will offer some advanced security.
11) Update the deWulf Story Document
The currently available deWulf story document on the website is, to be honest, really old. It was originally done as just a backup log, but with it out and on the website it does have some amount of actual attention. So the plan is to split it into three parts and then give it some short synopsizes on the website to explain (and more importantly warn) readers what’s going on in each of them. Mind you that’s not warn them of anything really questionable…. it’s more like my early writing is kinda… rough.
Which is anther reason why this is so far down the to-do list.
12) Review Sketch Sunday
As I had mentioned earlier this month, Sketch Sunday has been a lot of fun, but I’m staring to see the bottom of my sketch pile. And unfortunately, I write a heck of a lot more than I sketch. So sometime this year I think I’m going to have to A) cut down on the frequency of posting, B) start adding in other things on Sunday or C) accept that at some point Sketch Sunday will come to a halt. At present I think I’ll be looking at option B, though exactly what I cut it with, and when I start, are yet to be decided…
13) Designing a Space Navy series
One thing I am thinking of cutting the Sketch Sunday with is a series on “Designing a Space Navy”. This original concept came from the book “House of Steel: The Honorverse Companion”; specifically a segment written by Christopher Weuve. It specifically discusses the mechanics of designing a space navy not from a mechanic of classes of ships, or fleet mixture, but from something more elemental…
The above image explains the concept rather succinctly. The idea is to start on the far left, and then work one’s way right, each column being another post or discussion. This work was already done to a fairly substantial degree for the deWulf (which was what initially hinted back in Turn 128), but it also exists in smaller degrees to other groups like the Terrans and the Krak as well.
Dollarton Proxima Shipyards 