What's on Your Workbench for February 2023

[Diamondback]

As you are obviously contemplating about ship types not yet thoroughly represented by ARES, how about these:

- Just plain merchant ships (less well armed than India-Men). This could open the door to convoy / escort actions.
- Small craft, i.e. cutters.
- Lateen rigged craft - not yet represented at all and with different sailing properties that the square-rigged ships available now.
- Boats (along with rules) which could be launched from larger vessels for boarding actions, cutting-out actions, landing-actions in combination with on-shore batteries.

In my humble opinion these would be of greater benefit to the game overall as adding something between the 20 to 28 gun range or 44 to 50 gun range.

Lt. Bush

To be honest, once you get below about Sixth Rates trying to keep track of all the various ships and designs built and how they were rigged and rerigged is the stuff of screaming nightmares, I've had my copies of FWAS for years and have never even touched the corvettes or anything smaller, nor anything below brg-sloops from BWAS. Are these things that are needed for the game? Yes. Am I the man to handle them? No, because I know my limitations and the burnout from a mere attempt could render me of no further use both on them and on the rated warships and EIM's that ARE my forte. However, if anyone wishes to take a run at using the data organizing tools I've developed to take a run at adding them to the "master catalog" I'm happy to share the tools and coach in their employment.

"A man's gotta know his limitations..."--Det. "Dirty" Harry Callahan, SFPD

[William Bush]

To be honest, once you get below about Sixth Rates trying to keep track of all the various ships and designs built and how they were rigged and rerigged is the stuff of screaming nightmares, I've had my copies of FWAS for years and have never even touched the corvettes or anything smaller, nor anything below brg-sloops from BWAS. Are these things that are needed for the game? Yes. Am I the man to handle them? No, because I know my limitations and the burnout from a mere attempt could render me of no further use both on them and on the rated warships and EIM's that ARE my forte. However, if anyone wishes to take a run at using the data organizing tools I've developed to take a run at adding them to the "master catalog" I'm happy to share the tools and coach in their employment.

"A man's gotta know his limitations..."--Det. "Dirty" Harry Callahan, SFPD

Rule #1 for a hobby - it must be fun.
If it turns into "work", then something is amiss, and one should take steps that it is fun again.

So stick with what is fun for you and don't care about the rest.

Lt. Bush

[Diamondback]

Rule #1 for a hobby - it must be fun.
If it turns into "work", then something is amiss, and one should take steps that it is fun again.

So stick with what is fun for you and don't care about the rest.

Lt. Bush

Indeed, sir. Two big lessons I've learned in life:
1., from my grandfather: "If you can find an opportunity to make a living at something you love and are good at, you'll never 'work' a day in your life."
2., from too many game systems, fandoms and hobbies over the years: "When it stops being fun, it's time to leave. Whether just to take a breath and recenter or for good depends on the circumstances, but it's IMMEDIATE time to walk away."

Some of this may be autism-spectrum neuropathology t work, we tend to (even more so than "normies") VERY strongly like things that can be neatly "tied up in a bow" (in this case, the relatively standardized stats and designs of large-order warships and "catalog model" merchants) and just as intensely DISlike anythin that can't (one-offs that never evolved into anything, custom builds, things that don't neatly fit into a large cluster that can all be accurately modeled from one sculpt and can't be neatly categorized on my spreadsheet *stares with seething hatred at anything French in particular corvette-size or smaller, and the annoyances of the Continental Navy and USN before 1816).