There is gurps and there is traveller. One uses one inch hexes and the other uses 1.5-inch squares. Since most of the cost of the product is in the work to produce the plans, and the overlays are cheap to do, it really doesn't increase the cost that much but it does increase the sales by double.

By Van Rippey (Towerwarlock) on Friday, June 22, 2007 - 12:03 am: Edit

Does anyone have the Megatravller stats that were done for the Klingon Gunboat Deckplans? I was trying to locate them to see it I could come up with T20 Travller d20 stats for it.

By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Thursday, December 06, 2007 - 02:18 am: Edit

Stanford University has come up with a program that takes a JPG or other graphic and converts it to a vector drawing, output formats include EPS.

You don't download this program, you go to their website and upload the JPG and get the EPS back. I'm guessing that they don't want to release it until it is completely debugged.

http://vectormagic.stanford.edu/

By Will McCammon (Djdood) on Thursday, December 06, 2007 - 03:45 pm: Edit

This looks intriguing. I've been using the 'trace bitmap' functionality in Flash for years, but it is very limited and more often than not I end up tracing things manually.

I've been converting a lot of logos, etc. for decal art. I'm looking forward to putting this site through it's paces and seeing if it can produce more of what I need.

Thanks for posting it!

By Will McCammon (Djdood) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 01:30 am: Edit

Wow. Vector Magic is a pretty spiffy little online tool.

I'm using really old software (Freehand 10 and flash 4) so maybe there is better bitmap-to-vector conversions in more recent versions, but Vector Magic blows the doors off anything I have. Super-clean and it's pretty clever about dealing with gradations and dithering. Great stuff!

By Gary Plana (Garyplana) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 09:53 am: Edit

Yes, but is an output file in EPS format compatible with the Macs at ADB? I'm going to try a little experiment and see what can be made of it.

By Will McCammon (Djdood) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 03:03 pm: Edit

I'm having trouble with the eps files too, but I assumed it's because I'm using ancient software (Freehand 9 and Flash 4). I'd been seriously thinking of getting a current version of Freehand, this is just one more nudge.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 03:50 pm: Edit

Will,

there is no current version. Freehand, I believe, has been eliminated from the line up since Adobe bought Macromedia. Illustrator CS is the replacement.

Lynda.com has tutorials about migrating from FH to Illustrator CS2/3.

By Will McCammon (Djdood) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 05:56 pm: Edit

Loren -
Minutes after I typed that and was driving to work, it dawned on me that, yeah Adobe bought Macromedia and Freehand probably went away. As it is, I'll still end up with a new-ER copy of Freehand. My pal is a graphic designer by trade and I often end up getting his older software as x-mas stocking-stuffers.

I'm sure I can work around the EPS thing using intermediary software. PowerPoint2003 ought to work for one.

I sent some feedback to the VectorMagic guys and they said they intend to investigate the FreeHand9 eps issue and that they are looking at adding cgm as another export option.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 06:20 pm: Edit

I have Freehand MX which I was able to get at an upgrade cost because I had CorelDraw9. I got it solely so I would someday be able to send in vector art to SVC in a format he can use.

However, vector, for some reason, is vexing. I've not been able to produce art with it yet. Frustrating.

By Will McCammon (Djdood) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 08:29 pm: Edit

Judging from the nice pen&ink art of yours that I've seen, I can see how it might throw you. It's a different mode of thinking and isn't really conducive to a tactile-art mindset.

I'm a full-time CAD guy, so for me it's just another flavor of the candy I eat every day.

I'm weaker using bitmap-based tools like GIMP and Photoshop.

I did find that I have much better luck with both when I got myself a Wacom tablet. Now if I could just afford to get myself a spaceball controller for home I'd start doing more fun 3D stuff...

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, December 07, 2007 - 08:45 pm: Edit

I have a Wacom Intuos3 6x9. It makes a world of difference.

Thanks for the complement. It's especially welcome about now.

By Shawn Hantke (Shantke) on Saturday, June 27, 2009 - 10:11 am: Edit

this idea would work really good for the cardboard standups for PD games : http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/06/how-to_shrinky-dink_gaming_minis.html

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Saturday, June 27, 2009 - 12:54 pm: Edit

That's awsome. I remember Shrinky Dinks but I didn't know they had that stuff for Ink Jets. His idea for a base is pretty good too.

I could see using this stuff to make great web counters of any size.

Also, I'm surprised the F&E guys haven't come accross this stuff for their fleet markers!


Grafix Ink Jet Shrink Film Opaque

It's six sheets for $10.95 and a couple bucks more for clear (which the guys says doesn't stay clear).

By Shawn Hantke (Shantke) on Saturday, June 27, 2009 - 03:15 pm: Edit

Loren, that is a good idea. I was also thinking of turn or slip markers as well

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, August 18, 2010 - 12:06 pm: Edit

Restarting this topic....

Two different people have, in the last week, asked me about deck plans and have been stunned to find out how many of them we have published.

Most of what we have published have been in fairly small "reference" scale.

We did the U1/G1 in "playable" scale (Traveler compatible) but didn't sell many of them. The other ships done would take hundreds of pages to do in that scale since they are bigger ships.

One idea that came up in conversation was to take the existing deck plans (Burke, SkyHawk, Free Trader, Fed Express, whatever else we have done or can get somebody to do or finish) and print them in "larger than reference, but smaller than 1.5-inch wide corridor" scale. For example, the Free Trader might be printed with each deck taking up two 11x17s, so it would take five sheets to do the ship (three for the front half, two for the back half which has two decks).

With print on demand, we could do these since (1) the plans already exist and (2) we could print exactly as many as would sell. It would take maybe two hours of Steve Cole Time per ship to prep the files for printing, which would be acceptable if we could expect to sell 10 or 20 copies.

Any thoughts?

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Wednesday, August 18, 2010 - 12:50 pm: Edit

A thought on scale...

When we've been doing boarding combat in SFB (using the Module M diagrams), I acquired a bucket of the 1cm plastic cubes. Printed out smaller phaser (Type-I or Type-II or Rifle) stickers on transparent sticker paper, and stuck them to the cubes. (In fact, I actually printed out two for each cube - a "x3" version and a "x1" version on the back side so fewer cubes could be needed to reflect step losses.)

ANYWAY, the net result was fairly visually compelling, and kept the scale needed for literally dozens of troops down to a manageable table size.

If a corridor is roughly wide enough for two people to stand side-by-side, using a 1cm cube for that size means the corridors are only 2cm wide...about 2/3 of an inch, or about half of the current scale. And with stickers on them for player character art, they look pretty cool (IMHO).

By Jeff Johnson (Jeffro) on Wednesday, August 18, 2010 - 12:51 pm: Edit

Random comments:

1) I'd buy the G1 plans mostly to get the Klingon figures. If you released more cardboard heroes as pdf or with another product, again... I really want those.

2) The G1 was really not a ship I was interested in. A pack of usable deck plans (even if they're just print-and-play) in Traveller and/or GURPS scale would be great if they gave me a generic bridge, a generic cargo bay, a generic engineering location, etc. If you had some modular plans like that... you could use the large deck plans for the macro scale... and the generic locations when you actually play things out. The modular stuff should mostly work with DD's, CA's, DN's-- all the cool fed ships... and could be adapted to foreign fleets in a pinch. Though, if Roms and Klinks had sufficiently different layouts (maybe a cramped bridge?) they might rate their own generic combat map sheets, too.

3) If you do this... I'd really like some scenarios to play on it. (Think GDW's Snapshot and Azhanti High Lightning.) GURPS would be fine for me, but maybe your Marine Assault game would be a better fit? [If this doesn't fit in the product as you envision it, I'd really want this in Captain's Log at least.]

4) The deck plans in your other products... I was always kind of "meh" about them because they could not be used to immediately sit down and play out an rpg style combat.

5) What about modular deck plan thingies? Print-and-play... you could then specify different ships based on how different sections would fit together. This way the DN and CA and DD wouldn't have to use the exact same generic bridge... and it might be easier to print out and assemble these plans at the same time.

Sorry if this is off topic. Sounds like you are more interested in a fast release of stuff you've already done. If you could even add just a few of these print-and-play map sheets to this product, I'd be much more likely to buy it. And if it came with a "generic science officer" card board hero... some "red shirt" security officers... a captain... yes! *That's* what I'd really like to see. The macro level deck plans just aren't that useful to me without the "extras" that I'm talking about here.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, August 18, 2010 - 12:53 pm: Edit

A reprint of the old freighter plans too.

If you can get the Orion LR (or the Raider?) in that pack, well heck, that would be the full monty.

By Nick G. Blank (Nickgb) on Wednesday, August 18, 2010 - 02:51 pm: Edit

I liked the idea someone else posted of selling them PDF, which means you have one deck per "page" of the PDF, which a purchaser could print as is, or if using adobe reader you can zoom in and print the "current view" which could be just a couple of rooms, or the front third of the deck, or whatever. It gets you the whole thing but lets you print at essentially whatever scale you want, albeit not necessarily very precisely.

By Mike West (Mjwest) on Wednesday, August 18, 2010 - 10:54 pm: Edit

I really like Jeff's "modular rooms" deck plan idea. When you think about it, you don't really need the whole ship. You just need the bridge, some corridors, and engineering. Plus some props for crates 'n stuff so any open map can be the shuttle bay. Maybe a quarters and a bunk room, just for fun. You can get all of that in about the same space it took for the G1/U1. You can even do a Fed one, Klingon one, Romulan one, etc. That would actually be really, really cool.

(BTW, it also really, really hurts that the perfect player sized military ship for RPG use, the PF, doesn't exist for the Federation! While it works for the overall SFU, it really hinders the RPG.)

By Jeff Johnson (Jeffro) on Thursday, August 19, 2010 - 07:54 am: Edit

Even more random comments:

In response to the "we don't have time for this" argument.... It's pretty neat that you've stacked up this relatively huge set of deck plans over time-- now you have the chance to bring out a new product with very little creative effort. For new Cardboard Heroes(TM) and Modular Deck Plans(R), include maybe 2 pages of maps and 4 to 10 characters in the next Captain's Log Supplemental. Have it tie into a fluffy "bathroom reading" style piece that would be of general interest to non-rpg Captain's Log readers. By the time Jean Sexton is ready to handle Prime Directive products on a more full-time basis, you'll have a nice stack of maps, characters, and scenarios worked out for whatever you decide to do then....!

http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=BEW000

In the "how to do this" department, check out how 01 Games do their PDF's. See how they have all these overlays and how you can turn everything on or off to get exactly what you want? Nifty! Your already-printed map products are not going to be competitive with that feature *unless* someone is fine with the one-size-fits-all approach.

http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG30-6002

This old Steve Jackson rpg product is 100% combat oriented. It includes some maps for the scenarios that are modular. As to the adventure, it is more-or-less a linear set of encounters. That style of adventure has become the much more the norm in D&D these days, if my observation is correct. The idea: publish maybe one of these sorts of encounter situations in each issue of Captain's Log (and/or Supplemental) and after 6-8 issues or so, you have enough material for an adventure module with all the maps and counters you need to play.

http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG30-7136

Another example of modular maps vis a vis rpg adventuring. A huge part of what makes rpg's superior to computer games is the sense that you can go anywhere and do anything. Modular maps like these City Blocks allow you to lay down some map squares, start playing... and then in the style of an SFB floating map, keep going in whichever way the action develops. You can see that sort of thing in action here:

http://boardgamegeek.com/image/761827/car-wars-supplement-city-blocks

Now imagine a set of mapsheets like this that can do an effectively "endless starship". Take Mike West's "bridge, some corridors, and engineering" and make sure that they can connect somehow. Now you have an instant tessellating floor-plan of unending adventure! (You can also do generic planet-side city and wilderness locations for "away teams" and prime teams to drop into.)

Slip a couple of these modular map sheets into each issue of Captain's Log Supplemental and you increase sales of that product. If you add in the Cardboard Heroes(TM) to the PDF, then your Ranger teams will have everything they need to run a demo session for GURPS/D20 Prime Directive. (I don't see any rpg games being played without maps and miniatures anymore. This stuff is essential in order to get this stuff onto the table, IMO.)

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, August 19, 2010 - 10:33 am: Edit

There are several subjects getting muddled together here.

Taking existing deck plans and finding a way to use them in other products is one thing. The deck plans exist, and it's no big deal to slide them around in a page layout program and hit the "make PDF" button.

The "just a few parts of the ship" idea is amusing and we might look into that. I'm dubious that the idea is actually workable since, as a defending captain, I only have to guard the papers of the ship you have maps for.

Cardboard heroes is nothing thing entirely. An artist has to be paid actually money to make them. They aren't something that's going to magically appear and be stuck into some PDF product for free.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, August 19, 2010 - 12:07 pm: Edit

Here is the thing for me. I want full sheets to lay out and look at. For the time being this will probably be only for fun, or for reference to write some fiction. In plain 11 x 17 sheets they are something of a collectable item. I don't really want to have to look past the play grid because it's the actual "official SFU" data I want. Having a grid printed on the plans actually takes away from the "art" value... for me.

Like SVC said, to do a frigate in full play scale is way too much but having to press open a book, possibly damaging said book, is certainly going to be frustrating during play. Also, in many cases, the type and details are very small and hard to read.

11 x 17 is going to make me do the Snoopy Happy Dance. One pack, two packs, whatever. I'd prefer they be in packs of more than one ship.

OK, how about this (my personal "wish"). Say theres a frigate pack (a later pack could be "More Frigates") and a Civilian Pack (which includes a pirate?). You get the 11 x 17 deck plan sheets and a small booklet with all the explainations and some nice exterior art (use the LFS art?).
A color cover would be nice, but since sales are questionable a B/W cover would suite me fine.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, August 19, 2010 - 12:10 pm: Edit

I am 100% certain that we will do one ship per pack rather than listen to players complain that "I was forced to buy a ship I didn't want to get the ship I did want."