All posts by The Plaid Mentat

Math on the Weekends

Among those who know me well, it’s likely no surprise that there are two things I really enjoy – solving problems and doing math.  So, when I find a problem that turns out to be just a math problem, solving it is really fun.  That’s what I did this weekend – I wanted to 3d print an addition to my 3d printer that would help my filament buffering problem, but the design required that I obey some obviously mathematical constraints. Continue reading Math on the Weekends

Looking Forward in 2021

Having spent a bit of time looking back, I’m ready to look forward into 2021.  This year, I’ve got a whole pile of resolutions that I’m excited about, and even something that’s not a resolution for just this year, but something I’m looking forward to for multiple years to come.  I think over the years I’ve well-tuned what I choose to be resolutions and what I choose to just be things I may or may not do over the course of the year, and this year’s list is overall pretty safe.  They are things that I’ve planned a bit ahead on, and things that are very achievable this next year without going too far out of my way.  On the one hand, I might ask, why bother if it’s not a challenge; on the other hand…  …I’m not sure I really need a challenge this year, as there will be plenty going on without anything extra.

With that said, here’s what I’ve got: Continue reading Looking Forward in 2021

2020 In Resolutions

With the last blog post of the year, it’s time to go through my resolutions and see how I did.  I always find this one interesting, not only to judge how I did, but also to look back at my intentions.  Sometimes the two match up, sometimes…  …Not as much.  As usual though, this is going to be strictly pass/fail based on what I set out to do, whether the intentions match up or not. Continue reading 2020 In Resolutions

2020 In Review

It’s not saying a lot to say that 2020 was an odd year.  There was a lot going on, and I certainly had a lot in my life that wasn’t planned for.  Still, I’m still here, still healthy and doing well.  As usual, this is the first part of my end-of-year blog posts and I’ll talk through the year through the lens of how it went, where I’ll save how I did on my resolutions for the next post. Continue reading 2020 In Review

Designing a Special Tile – Part 2

Apparently, I’m quite good at taking a hiatus on a cliffhanger of a post.  I left off last time talking about customizing a Hexhog STL with runes to make a Warmahordes objective marker and all the little pieces of software and techniques I used to make that happen.  But, designing and printing the tile was only half of the equation; the other half is painting it up so that it looks nice.

Continue reading Designing a Special Tile – Part 2

Designing a Special Tile – Part 1

A while back, I talked about building a terrain table for miniature gaming using the Hexhog Tabletop system as a base.  One of my first design projects was to build objective zones for Warmachine and Hordes.  While there’s no reason you couldn’t set objective zone templates on a terrain space, I thought this was a cool opportunity to design something that fit a bit better with the overall ascetic.  Also, I latched on to the idea because it’s something that I could do with my existing tools – this is always a boon for me because there’s a ton of things I can’t do or am really bad at, and this is something that I could.

Continue reading Designing a Special Tile – Part 1

Life without an FLGS

Although 2020 has had plenty of things that shook up everyone, one of the things that happened before the pandemic closed a lot of stores, was that my local game store, The Rogue’s Roost, closed down.  There were a lot of things I liked about The Rogue’s Roost that I now miss, but there are some more subtle things that I just don’t get without having a game store that I visit on a regular basis.  I’m going to dig into this a bit below, as I think about what the year has been like without the opportunity to visit any local game store regularly.

Continue reading Life without an FLGS

Prusa Multi-material Upgrade – Part 2

After a week of troubleshooting, I’ve finally gotten my printer back up and running again.  If you read my last post, you’ll remember that I upgraded my Prusa with the new MMU2S, and while building the upgrade itself wasn’t too bad, getting everything working again afterward didn’t go well.  I didn’t document the time I spent troubleshooting, taking things apart, and putting them back together, but I did document the original build, so here’s the image montage of that, then I’ll talk through the steps I took to get it all back working again.

Continue reading Prusa Multi-material Upgrade – Part 2

Prusa Multi-material Upgrade – Part 1

Over the weekend, I decided it was time to build my long-awaited multi-material upgrade for my Prusa 3d printer.  I had planned on ordering this way back in March, but the combination of my funds and other things I wanted to order at the same time being out of stock stayed my hand.  Still, after lots of different delays, I finally got around to ordering it and building it. Continue reading Prusa Multi-material Upgrade – Part 1