Actaully, I think it would be cool to see deckplans for various ships. We could start with the main cruiser of each race, and work down in size for each race from there. Save the dreadnoughts and battleships for last since they are the least common.

Doubly cool if the maps are to scale with 25mm figs so you can use them with Prime Directive or maybe even a separate mini's skirmish game (like Star Wars minis)

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 08:21 am: Edit

Do you have any idea how much paper would be burnt up doing a 25mm deckplan of any cruiser in the game!?

They have already done a deckplan of the G1 at that scale, and it by itself has lots of sheets. Plus I don't get the impression it is a hot seller.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 09:30 am: Edit

It wasn't a hot seller, and it was about 25 inches long. The Free Trader was like four feet by five feet. A cruiser in 25mm scale would be, I dunno, 20 or 30 feet long? 50 feet? I'd have to go look up how big a cruiser is and do the math. Somebody want to do that for me?

By Reid Hupach (Gwbison) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 01:08 pm: Edit

Didnt Fasa do a couple in 15mm

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 02:51 pm: Edit

For larger ships, I would just have them done on normal 8.5x11 and at a smaller scale. The important thing would be to add in the square grid, to scale for miniature use (i.e., each box represents 5' by 5', not that they'll be large enough to put minis on).

This way, GMs can use the sheets to "talk" the players through the ship (while maintaining game movement scale) and then, when needed can either photocopy and expand or manually draw out on a grid play mat the part of the ship the players are in. Without the to-scale square grid already in place though, its too difficult to use.

By John Hall (Fedf111fan) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 03:49 pm: Edit

A fed cruiser is approximately 945 feet by 397 feet. if the scale of the squares is 1 box=5 feet, then the ship would be 15' 9" by 6' 8"

By Ken Humpherys (Pmthecat) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 04:04 pm: Edit

John,
Most 25mm scale miniatures go of the 1 in.:3 feet, so that a human figurine laying down is in 2 squares(or hexes). (actual conversion is 1 meter:25 mm)
This gives a deck plan of 26' 3" by 11'

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 06:51 pm: Edit

Well, it an old suggestion to do the deck plans in small scale and common rooms in play scale.

By Patrick H. Dillman (Patrick) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 08:02 pm: Edit

Make them some kind of PDF or what ever and then the players can print a copy of the sections they need.

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 11:11 pm: Edit

Ken. I would not necessarily agree with your 1:3' scale assumption. For example, Dungeons and Dragons, the most played 25mm RPG, uses 1:5'.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, April 12, 2007 - 12:22 am: Edit

And then we have to consider multiple decks. Assuming 12, we have 16x80 feet (16 long, 6.7 feet wide per deck). Some decks aren't that wide, so call it 16x60 feet.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 01:49 pm: Edit

SVC: Is it possible to customize Large Scale Extreme Scale F&E Map?

I would like to get one that is numbered but blank of all territories, boundaries, province markings, planets, off-map areas, or capitals. I dont necessarily need the Raid Pools/Battle boards either.

I'd like the whole thing done in the grayness of the Neutral Zone (or even lighter, kind of like the Gorn shade of gray). It would have to be laminated so we could write on it and I would like the weight of the current paper, the existing blue border, and F&E/ADB logos to remain.

How feasible is this? Can it be done for about $100? If so I'd be interested.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 03:12 pm: Edit

Lawrence: You would have to convince/bribe/beg/pay Chuck Strong to do the hours and hours of graphic work.

Once the file exists, it would be easy to print copies. But somebody has to do the work on the file.

I don't know if Chuck has time or what he would need to do it. The problem is that you are (so far) the only one who wants it, so my promising Chuck $10 per gray-map we sell might well mean Chuck does 4-20 hours of work for $10.

I don't know how Chuck's file is done. It might be as simple as cloning the file, turning off a few layers, and converting the color on the others. On the other hand, even if it IS that simple, it could take a bit of doing because of processing time. Might take four hours once Chuck hits the "save key".

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 03:33 pm: Edit

Lawrence: Good news, maybe. We were having the daily meeting and your request was mentioned. As usual, we were discussing how insane, unreasonable, and impractical such a project would be, when an IDEA dawned.

While it's not Chuck's map and lacks all of his added details (planet names, starbase numbers, and so forth) I do have the file for the "map used in the boxed game", several versions of it in fact.

Now, at the moment, nobody knows where the color version of the B (east) half is, but we are sure it's on the master backup disks. Why Map A is on my hard disk and Map B is not is anybody's guess.

If you wanted a simple B&W map with just the hexes, planets, and hex numbers (I think that's what you want) I can do that by just turning off layers, resizing the file, and having somebody ZIP it off to Avalon. Of course, that would take me two hours and you've seen my list of things to do, so asking me about this after Origins might be a good plan. Not sure about the price. Leanna might charge you something over a normal map for my time. If you want color, that's a bunch tricker, but still doable, assuming I can find the B side of the map on the backups.

Is this something that can wait until after Origins?

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 04:40 pm: Edit

Well I was planning on using the map at Origins for the Early Beginnings Scenario.

This years EB scenario is being attempted on a F&E sized blank map rather than the hexagonal shaped map.

A B&W copy could work if it were just the cleared hexes numbered for location. It really needs lamination so we can draw the discovered zones. I have possible connections to bring a printed one from a plotter. It would also be B&W and I do not know if it would be possible (or worthwhile) to laminate a plotter printed map.

I asked about color because of the exceptionally high quality of the LSM products.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 04:51 pm: Edit

Yeah, but if you wanted it for Origins, you had to ask before 1 April. Nobody has time to do a high quality one.

Anybody know if Kinkos could print a 30x70 B&W file?

By Stacy Brian Bartley (Bartley) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:03 pm: Edit

SVC
Some (Larger-read in a Metro area)Kinko's can. You can even e-mail the PDF file to them. You can e-mail it to a Kinko's close to Laurence and he can pick it up and pay for the printing cost.
regards
Stacy

By Mike Curtis (Nashvillen) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:04 pm: Edit

No, but I can at work. No charge. I will even deliver it to Columbus...

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:05 pm: Edit

Do you want the bases? Which ones, if any?

No color in any hexes, except wyn cluster, right?

Find out if your local Kinkos/Whatever can print a file (and what kind of file) and I can probably get you something B&W that would work.

By Tim Losberg (Krager) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:12 pm: Edit

Steve, if this is for the EB game, then no bases, planets, borders, Neutral zones, offmaps etc.. just a blank numbered map with the same hex dimensions as the F&E map...
I'll let Lar confirm since it was his request but that is what we would need for Origins...

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:13 pm: Edit

Lawrence:

Plan A: You (Lawrence) talk to Chuck Strong. See if he can do what you want. If he can, and can get it to Avalon by mid-June, we should be able to make this hapen. What you (Lawrence) have to do to get Chuck to do it is between you and Chuck.

Plan B: If Plan A fails, I can whip up a B&W map in some format (PDF-HiRez probably) and Email it to somebody who can take it somewhere and print/laminate it. I just don't have time to print/laminate it from here.

Let me know how Plan A turns out.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:18 pm: Edit

This is a very low-rez version (due to file size) so you can tell me if anything needs to be added or deleted.

earlybeginnings.jpg earlybeginnings.jpg (64 k)

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:39 pm: Edit

Tim is correct. I am looking for just a simple blank hex grid numbered like the F&E map. What you have would be great but without any planets, wyn cluster, etc. Hexes and numbers only.

I have sent an email to Chuck with this request to see what he says regarding time...I am hoping he has an early file left from when he began the LSM project (without all the beautiful details) that would save him man hours.

If it comes down to plan B then Mike C. could do one for me and I'll pay him for his trouble, time, and lamination.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 05:56 pm: Edit

Everything on my verion of the map is on layers. I can delete planets and stuff easily by just turning the layer off and exporting the file.

But you really just want a blank grid? Aren't you using capitals as starting points? Or when you said "no planets" did you mean "no planets, but capitals aren't planets since they're kind of pointy". And of course, the WYN cluster is a geographic feature.

By Tim Losberg (Krager) on Friday, May 25, 2007 - 06:13 pm: Edit

Steve,
Blank grid, we have a differed starting location for each race, this won't be historical starting points...
No WYN, there is an option for finding a cluster but it would be in a random location.