2018 Mastery Challenge

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For the third year running, I'm creating a Mastery Challenge. While I never seem to achieve the goals I set at the start of the year, these challenges have served me well in the past by helping me focus on getting better at the games I enjoy.

Here are the challenges from 2016 and 2017:

Due to career commitments, I have no goals for 2018.

2018-12-30: Current average plays for count of owned games: 718 / 103 = 6.96.

2018-12-29

The year is a few days from over. It went reasonably well overall in terms of game playing activity. This needs to be in context of deliberately attempting to get 12 hours/day in the office, at least 3 days per week (10-11 hours otherwise). I'm not required to work these hours, but doing so is ramping my skill set up at 1.5x speed because I'm pursuing this deliberately.

I was able to get to H-index 13 this year, as anticipated. Getting to 14 next year could be relatively trivial, but as with this year and last, I'll almost surely spend some time setting up for H-index 15 and beyond. This means playing a lot of games with 10 or more plays to get them to 13, and playing a few others to bump them into range for a future year. For example Phantom Leader Deluxe is at 5 plays. If I got in 5 plays this year, then in 2020 I'd be well positioned to get another 5 plays to count for H-index 15. This is reasonable as the game lends itself to campaign play.

In any case, it wasn't a bad year, and if next year goes as well I'll be quite happy.

2018-06-03

As anticipated, this has been a relatively slow game year so far, and will likely continue to be a relatively slow year. There are a number of small goals which could be pursued through the end of the year, but it won't be possible to acheive all of them.

The main choice is whether to pursue depth by increasing H-index, nickels, dimes and second plays, or increase breadth by knocking out some of my unplayed games. H-index can get to 13 pretty easily by playing any of a half dozen games once or twice each. I'm leaning towards StarForce twice and Vietnam Solitaire twice. These are both at 11 plays, and getting them to 13 also makes them easy plays for H-index 14 next year. For unplayed games, I have loads, the decision revolves around how much time I want to spend learning new rules, and the length of the games.

Along the way, I'd like to continue with LotR card game, which is always good for an afternoon's amusement.

H-index

H-index is the number of games played number of times. For example, an H-index of 5 means 5 games played 5 times. At the start of 2018, my H-index is 12.

  1. 101/68 Lord of the Rings LCG will almost surely be my top game in 2018, as I have no plans to pursue Hive for now. The main reason LotR stays at top billing is that each scenario can be played start to stop in usually 3 hours max, and often much less time, and there is a clear progression of scenarios to follow. Because I can play this solo, it's easy to start and stop. Hive requires an opponent, and playing turn-based may stretch over days.

  2. 63/63 Hive will probably lose its top billing in 2018. My best bet for playing is online, and with the turns spread over several days for a typical game, I get too wrapped up in the game at the expense of other things. I look forward to the day I can spend some serious time with Hive.

  3. 39/35 Ogre will likely stay in the Top 5, as I have no plans on playing large amounts of PanzerBlitz in 2018, and it's unlikely that any game other than Star Realms will rise close enough to challenge Ogre's ranking.

  4. 30/27 Zombie Dice will almost surely pass PanzerBlitz, provided I get any plays at all in 2018. It's such a favorite to bring out as a warmup or cooldown game.

  5. 27/27 PanzerBlitz might see a play or two in 2018. Stranger things have happened, and I haven't worked my way through all the scenarios solo yet.

  6. 23/19 Star Realms will almost surely climb right along with Zombie Dice, these often get played in the same sessions.

  7. 20/17 Silver Bayonet stays in rotation. I have some unfinished business with respect to computing probabilities for the very small training games, which would be fun to work on.

  8. 18/11 Fire in the Lake may or may not make it to the table in 2018. I have no plans at the moment to set up solo games, and it's not the easiest game to get a full crew for.

  9. 17/15 6 Nimmt! will climb, but not overly much this year. I don't plan on bringing it out very often for 2 player sessions. It's a must for 3 player sessions though.

  10. 15/15 Cathedral is overdue for a few more plays. It's not my favorite game, but I do win it occasionally, and I find myself strangely compelled to continue playing it when I can.

  11. 15/15 Race for the Galaxy will definitely climb, but probably not into the top 5 in 2018.

  12. 13/12 Ogre: Objective 218 will stay in active rotation as a filler game in 2018. I may also play a few solo games while doing chores on weekends, it's a great game for that.

  13. 13/11 Vietnam Solitaire still has many plays left in it, regardless of whether those plays land in 2018. In 2019, play Special Edition rules only.

  14. 12/12 Battle for Moscow will likely see at least a couple of plays to keep it on the H-index. I haven't really figured this one yet either. I have the mid-late game, which is the same as the mid-late game for the others in this series (controlling the eastern edge communication), but do not have a good handle on the early game.

  15. 12/12 Objective Kiev may take a break this year. While I'm pretty sure I'll get to H-index 13 this year, I'm not bent on having Objective Kiev make that cut.

  16. 12/12 Pandemic will likely get a play or two, as it's a favorite of main opponent who also likes coop games.

  17. 12/12 Soviet Dawn I definitely want to play this more, not sure how many plays will land in 2018.

  18. 12/11 StarForce has a solo scenario, which I really ought to play in 2018, at least once. I've been having trouble getting opponents interested in playing this, sadly.

  19. 12/12 Target Leningrad may or may not see action in 2018. It will almost certainly stay on the H-index list, but it's easy enough to play that a few games can be knocked out pretty fast. Since I have both sides of this game figured out, it's essentially out of rotation unless someone badly wants to play it.

  20. 10/10 Flash Point I have not found a consistent opponent with which to play Flash Point. I'm anticipating any games I get in will be solo games, and that's fine.

  21. 10/10 Hapsburg Eclipse will almost surely see a play or two in 2018, although it won't be a high priority.

  22. 11/5 Leaving Earth joins the list as I am having quite a bit of fun playing solo games with it. I may make up some LaTeX calculation tables, the tables provided are not detailed enough for me.

  23. 8/8 OCS will not see any plays Q1 2018, and most likely not in Q2 either. Exceptions would be dropping in on other people's games.

  24. 7/7 France '40 will probably not see any plays until Q3 or Q4.

  25. 1/1 COIN will almost surely not see any plays in Q1 or Q2 2018, at least not solo, and not instigated by me. I might well be interested in joining someone else's game.

Wargame-specific H-index

My wargame-specific H-index started 2017 at 10. Wargames are so much more time consuming that this index will increase much, much more slowly than the overall H-index. And that's fine.

  1. 39 Ogre
  2. 27 PanzerBlitz
  3. 18 Fire in the Lake
  4. 20 Silver Bayonet
  5. 13 Vietnam Solitaire
  6. 12 Battle for Moscow
  7. 12 Objective Kiev
  8. 12 Soviet Dawn
  9. 12 StarForce
  10. 12 Target Leningrad
  11. 10 Hapsburg Eclipse
  12. 8 OCS
  13. 7 France '40
  14. 5 Phantom Leader
  15. 3 The Arduous Beginning
  16. 2 Ottoman Sunset
  17. 2 Winter War
  18. 1 COIN
  19. 1 Combat Commander
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What to play next?

Deciding what to play next is always a tough call when faced with a closet full of games, all of which were purchased with intent to play. Here's one I'm dealing with the decision.

  • Something New: this means both something new to me and a game which has been published recently, within the last two or three years.
  • Something Classic: I've acquired a number of games properly considered "classic" which haven't yet been played. The current example would be PanzerGruppe Guderian.
  • Something Again: mastery requires constant practice, which means playing games many, many times to allow nuance to appear.
  • Something Vietnam: as I'm on a Vietnam binge. I don't have all the Vietnam games ever published, but I can say that I have a lot of them, and probably more than most people.
  • Something Obscure: as it's fun to poke around in the dustier corners of game design.
  • Something Different: break away from the same old publishers and try a game from one of the new kids on the block. Or, conversely, dip into legacy with a classic tried and true.
  • Something Light: once in a while it's nice to actually finish a game all the way through in one sitting, in an hour or two.
  • Something Heavy: if possible, it's nice to set up something big and complicated which can be left out for days or weeks or even months, for a leisurely stroll through a very large or long game.

There are surely many more ways to choose, but the above method keeps me busy enough, helps me get both breadth and depth into my play, and provides me with a sense of progress.

The odd man out

When there is an odd man out:

  • Have a solo game ready to play.
  • Keep score or advise on a game in progress.
  • Referee a game in progress.