The 7 Month Itch

I've been sitting idle on this project for a few months now; but the itch to get back onto it is setting in. I've got a significant desire to get back to work on this project. I haven't even rebuilt all the graphics that I lost when my previous flash/micro drive died on me; so I think that's the place to start. I'm also considering moving my project wiki to the new GRHG portal, if for no other reason than to just get a bit more content in that portal.

I'll post more when I actually get something significant done on the graphics rebuild work.

We Can Rebuild It; We Have The Technology

So, the long work to rebuild the collection of graphics I had previously created started tonight. Fortunately, thanks in part to this blog, I at least have most of the graphics I created in raster iamge format, that I can use as guides to recreate the images as vector graphics in inkscape.

I started simple by recreating the 'Iroquois Confederacy' border pattern that appears on the card backs, and on the Building Cost cards. It's a small start; but it's a start nonetheless.

Lost, But Not At Sea

In a most horrible twist of fate, this custom settlers project has suffered a serious setback; the flash drive on which all of the latest graphics files for the project were stored is pooched! Of course, being the bonehead I can sometimes be, I haven't backed up the drive's contents for over six months.

I'm lucky enough to have a much older version of the icons SVG file on my office computer; that file, at the least has the complete version of all the icons, and the resource card face design for at least one card. The card back designs, the Building Costs cards, the tile number chits, and my soldier graphics are all gone. I've lost a whole lot of work. Fortunately, I've got the one working SVG file; I've still got a bunch of my original inspirational/resource images; and I've also got the images I've posted to this blog to help me rebuild all the graphics to the point I was just before the flash drive crapped out.

I'm discouraged; but I'm not giving up. I've already ordered my new flash drive; it's a solid state flash drive, which ought to be more reliable. I'm also gonna be more diligent in backing up my flash drive, from now on; at least once a week.

Once I get the new flash drive, I'm gonna transfer the few files I still have and rebuild the project folder so that I can get back to work on recreating the graphics I had already done, and continue the project.

An Eye for Details

I finally managed to get back to working on the graphics for this project; specifically, I'm still working on the soldiers.

I had previously done a lot of the fixes to the soldier's eyes, to make him look better. Today, I decided to rough out a soldier card, and print it out at actual size to see just how it looked. As suspected, the soldier, once on the card ends up being so small, that a fair bit of the detail I put into the face becomes indistinguishable. Furthermore, the soldier just doesn't have the same whimsical style as the icons; ideally, I think that's a style that I would like to maintain in some fashion throughout the game's artwork.

So, I think it's time to simplify my soldier before I get too far along on him and end up wasting countless hours on details that just won't be visible, and that will create an inconsistent look.

I don't have an image to show this time around; maybe next time.

Soldiering On

It's been a while since my last update. Between the overtime, and the not quite up to par new laptop, it's been difficult to make a lot of progress on this progress. I have been working on it though, a bit at a time.

I decided to go ahead and work on the graphics for the soldiers. That's been a very interesting learning experience. I've never been very good at drawing people before; but the work I've been doing on on my first soldier is causing me to rethink that opinion.

All I've got done so far is the face; I still have to add the hair and ears before moving on to the rest of the body. Nevertheless, the result is very encouraging so far. It's more realistic looking, and less iconic, than the resource icons; but I don't think that's such a bad thing.

Have a look see at what I've accomplished so far:



I don't know how many hours I've spent on this one face so far; it's quite a few, that's for sure.

Of all the graphics to be done for this game, I get the feeling the soldiers are gonna be the ones that take the longest to do.

I can't quite put my finger on what's wrong with the eyes; or rather, I know what's wrong with them, I just don't know exactly to to fix them. I'll be working on that soon.

Aren't We Resourceful?

A couple of new developments to mention in this post; I'll start with the less visual one.

The playing card blanks arrived a couple days ago. They're thinner than I expected; reminiscent of playing cards you'd buy from a dollar store. However, it is definitely the kind of card stock that would be used for playing cards; so I've got high hopes for how things will turn out. The only thing that concerns me about the card sheets is the way the rounded corners of the cards are punched/perforated. The cards have a very tight perforation like most business card sheets; but the corners are not perforated, so much as they are punched, so the corners are kinda loose. I'm just hoping that doesn't pose a problem for the printer that I'll be using to print the cards.

Now that the cards sheets are in, I'm probably going to ramp up my search for a suitable coating medium. I may email the company from which I got the card sheets to find out what they recommend; in the abscence of the coating spray that they sell.

Now for the next bit of news, which still concerns the cards (gee, what a surprise). I finished up the design for the resource card faces. As I mentioned, I added a section at the bottom of the cards that shows the building costs for elements that can be purchased/built with each particular resource card. It looks pretty sharp, and should be nice and helpful. The icons in this bottom section are quite small, so much of the detail is lost; but when printed, they're still nicely legible enough to work.

Have a look see:



The resource card face design is pretty simple; it's the same shield shape as the logo on the back, with banners top and bottom for the resource name, and the building costs respectively. Simple, but elegant. I think this face design sets the precedent for the rest of the cards too.

So, other than finalizing the color of the card back patterns, I think that about finishes off the resource card designs; now to move on to the development cards. I'll probably design the five special development cards - the ones with the various buildings. I think those will be the easiest to design. Either that, or I'm gonna bite the bullet and get working in earnest on the soldiers. The way I figure it, I've got at least three designs to do for the soldiers; a french soldier, a british soldier, and an aboriginal/native soldier. I may want to do more than just one design of each though, so I might end up with a total of five or six designs. It's gonna be a lot of work, and I think that's why I'm reluctant to start the soldiers next.

Well, we'll see what I decide to start next, when I get to it; I'm ready to start the soldiers or some of the development cards.

If You Build It, They Will Come.

I mostly finalized the Building Costs Card this morning. Have a look see:



It's simple and elegant, yet maintains the graphic theme used on the card backs. I didn't put a little graphic of the roads, settlements, or cities on the card; the reasons being that I would want to put on an actual photographic image of those 3D pieces - which are not yet constructed, and the card is smaller than the commercial game's version - since I'm opting to use the same playing card sized card for ALL the cards, including the special cards. I don't think the lack of graphic for the various buildable/purchasable elements is problematic in any way.

Now I'm moving on to the final design of the Resource Cards faces. I'm still debating whether or not I want to try to include a small banner at the bottom showing how each particular resource card can be used to build stuff. That'll take experimentation to see if it works out or not.

I'm Back In The Saddle Again!

Did some work on the card back design today.

The first step of that process was importing the Iroquois Confederacy flag graphic into Inkscape, and creating a pattern of sorts based on it. I made a few modifications to the pattern design. I gave the tree symbol at the centre smooth sides, as opposed to notched/variegated sides, and I centred all the elements along a horizontal axis instead of having some of the horizontal bands and the tree lower than other elements.

Remember that I'm placing my custom shield logo on this card back also; so the border pattern has to look good around that logo.

So, with the shield logo in place on the card back's centre, I then played around with how to arrange the pattern on the card back for best appearance. I first tried developing a border that would paralled the card back's perimeter; but it just didn't look quite right.

My next attempt, and the one that seemed to look quite good, was to put two bands of the pattern across the card back, one across the top, and one across the bottom. The pattern, both top and bottom, is oriented the same way; the shield logo is non symmetrical across the horizontal axis, so there seemed little point in mirroring the border pattern.

The final step was to determine the color of the card back's field and of the border. There are two distinct types of cards in the game, which in the commercial editions by Mayfair Games, uses different card backs to distinguish them. I figured I'd take a similar approach; it's logical. In my case, though, I decided to use the same card back design all around, and simply use colors as the differentiating aspect of the card backs.

I went in two directions with the card back colors. I first tried a colored field, with white border pattern, in a number of different muted colors; the resulting card backs look pretty good in my opinion - but I'm probably biased. Check them out:



I then tried a white field with brightly/dark colored border patterns; this turned out quite nice too. Check them out:



So, now it seems that I have ten viable card back designs, but I only need two; maybe a third one for the building cost cards, and the special cards - the largest army, and longest road cards.

The bulk of the cards will be resource cards, and development cards - only two card types; so I think the best solution will be to use one back with a colored field one of the card types, and one back with a white field for the other card type, then choose yet a different back for the special cards.

I'll decide on the specific color choice later; but I'm leaning towards purple 'cause that's my favorite color.

I'd like Economics of Art for 400, Alex.

I realized recently, that when compared to the standard set of Settlers of Catan by Mayfair Games, my purchases for this project have already surpassed the cost to purchase it. This isn't suprising; it was pretty much a given that this would happen.

However, the real benchmark will be comparing the cost of this project to Mayfair's 10th Anniversary 3D edition of the game. It's the most appropirate comparison.

The comparison will encompass only the ecomonic aspect of the project; how much it costs me to produce my set of Settlers, compared to the cost of buying a 10th Anniversary set. There will be no comparison in terms of the detail of the 3D sculpture, or similar aspects; I'm going for a very different look to my set - particularly, a more cartoony look to the 3D sculpted pieces.

Looking around online game stores it seems that the average price for a set of the 10th Anniversary 3D Settlers of Catan is about $400. Add taxes to that and we end up with an approximate total of $450.

So, that's my benchmark. Will I be able to produce this 3D set of Settlers of Catan for $450 or less?

I've probably got just a little bit of equipment still to buy; but not much. I'm mostly set up and ready to go for the cards. I just need to look for and buy Clear Satin Acrylic Sealer/Finish; that'll be relatively easy to find.

Other than that, most of what I need to buy is more Fimo poly clay. Given the quantities I need, I'll be looking for deals wherever I can get them. But if anything is going to push me over the $450 dollar mark, the Fimo clay will do it.

It should be interesting to see how it all works out in the end.

Pasta Point of No Return

Wow, what a day! I went and did some shopping around looking for hex shaped cookie cutters and a pasta machine. I never did find hex shaped cookie cutters; I may have to go online to get some of those. But then, that's if I even decide to go the cookie cutter method after all.

What I did find today though was a crazy deal on a pasta machine and a whole pile of Fimo soft poly clay.

The day started with a trip to Fairview Park Mall only to find out that the Castle & Barnes housewares store that used to be there is gone. Since I was at the mall, I decided to check out Wal-Mart; that was a bust, but unsurprisingly so.

From there I headed to Sunrise Shopping Centre at the opposite end of Kitchener and checked out Benix & Co. - who were having an inventory clearance sale, Bulk Barn - who does carry cake decorating and candy making equipment and supplies, and finally Linens & Things; that trip turned out 0 for 3.

I passed by S.T.O.P. restaurant supply; but they're closed on Sundays. So being in the area, I decided to check out Herrschnerrs craft shop. My wife, Carrie was with me, and I knew she'd be happy to check out yarns, and stuff; so it seemed like a good idea.

Was it ever a good idea! Due to poor demand, Herrschnerrs stopped carrying Fimo poly clay, and related equipment. However, they still had a couple of used pasta machines in the back room that they used for craft classes they provide; they sold me one for ten dollars. At their cheapest, such pasta machines are thirty dollars; usually, up here in Canada, they tend to go for forty or more. That was a great deal in itself; but it got better.

Although they returned most of their Fimo stock to the manufacturer; they still had a small stock of it left in their clearance area. They had a bunch of the standard 56g blocks on sale for twenty-five cents, and a few large 350g blocks on sale for around six dollars. Around here, these packages sell for around three dollars, and seventeen dollars respectively. I started off with just a few blocks of Fimo, 'cause I didn't have a whole lot of money to spend. But in passing, while the cashier - who I guess is also the manager or some such - was starting to ring up our purchase, I asked if she'd make me a deal on cleaning them out of their entire stock of Fimo clay. Since they no longer carry the product, I figured that she'd probably be receptive to not having to have this little remaining bit in inventory. My hunch was right; she offered to sell me the remaining stock for just a couple dollars more than the few blocks she had already rung in at their already discounted price.

All in all, I got five large blocks of Fimo Soft in varying colors, and at least fifteen of the small blocks mostly in yellow, but with a few other colors also, all for less than twenty-five dollars. Essentially, I got over $130 worth of Fimo for a bit over twenty bucks; that's a frikkin' deal.

It's true, not all of the colors of the clay are quite what I would have chosen in thefirst place; but colors of Fimo clay can be mixed to create new colors, so I'm sure it'll work out in the long run. Besides, I can use some of the less desirable colors as underlying build-up layers to be covered by the finish layers on many of the scuplted pieces; or failing that, I can keep it for other crafts that I might decide to do with my young son Alex.

The colors of Fimo that I have now have put me in a position that I can probably starting planning and building some of the game pieces - the roads, settlements, and cities - for the game.

The project is really taking on a sense of definitive reality now that there's more going on than just cute little graphics.

I Must Be Getting Soft

A few items to post about tonight:

First, I went and checked out what was available at Hobby and Toy Central, here in Kitchener, regarding Fimo polymer clay. All they had in stock was Fimo Soft; that was a bit disappointing, 'cause I'd prefer to use Fimo Classic. Fimo Classic, which is stiffer to start with, and needs more working to make it more easily malleable, is also supposedly more durable after it's baked/cured.

So, not finding Fimo Classic in stock, I inquired if they could special order it. It turns out that Fimo Classic has been discontinued; so Fimo soft if gona be the product of... well, necessity, I suppose. It'll do, I guess. I bought two 54g (2oz.) blocks so that I could play around, experiment, and get familiar with working with Fimo, as well as what it's like once it's baked/cured.

On that note, I suppose I ought to mention that since I've started buying material and equipment for the project, I've added a table, keeping track of all the money I spend on the project, to the porject wiki over at ForgedRPG.

Next, as I prepare to start drawing up my soldiers for the development cards, I've been scouring the net hard for decent pictures of colonial era soliers, predominantly french soldiers, to use as inspiration. As part of this search, I've been checking some north-american history, particularly regarding the french-indian war, which was a war of key significance in Canada's history. Also as part of this search, I've been looking for pictures of aboriginal warriors of the era, and french and british soldiers of the era.

Well, I found out that key aboriginals involved in the conflicts of this era were the tribes of the Iroquois Confederacy. The Iroquois Confederacy consists of the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, and the Tuscarora. The flag of the Iroquois Confederacy, which is based on an ancient belt of wampum is shown below.



I also found a few, well at least a couple, of good pics of aboriginal warriors - mohawk and oneida, I believe. So added to the inspirational pics of the french and british colonial soldiers I've got, I've got a solid basis to draw a series of soldiers that will be a tribute to the french, british, and aboriginal origins of this great Canadian nation.

Since I'll be going ahead with drawing aboriginal warriors (and british) in addition to the french soldiers, I've decided to use the motif of the Iroquois Confederacy flag in some way on the cards, most likely as a sort of border around the cards.

Well, I think that covers everything I wanted to mention in this update. Stay tuned.

At Arms Length

As I mentioned previously, I planned on using my personal arms (unofficial, and currently only a shield without foundation, supporters, mantle, or crest as the basis for my custom Settlers of Catan logo.

Described in layman's terms, my personal arms would be a two swans facing each other, swimming on rolling water, above a broad white stripe on which rests a signle purple ring, all atop a purple field - the field being the entire face of the shield.

To customize it for my Settlers of Catan build, I removed the white stripe and purple ring, and instead put a rising sun at the base of the shield.

I think it looks pretty cool, and will look really sharp on the card backs. As an aside, the card backs, are another element I have to think about; there are multiple types of cards in the game that will each need a distinct card back design. It'll probably be a simple matter of using different background colors behind the shield and whatever other embellishments I decide to put on the card backs.

In any case, have a look see:

Isn't it Iconic?

The full set of resource icons are now complete, they have a consistent look to them, and I'm very proud of them.

Here they all are together:



Now, compare these new custom icons to the icon set that I used as initial and primary inspiration:



The wood icon is the only one that really looks remotely like that first inspirational icon set's counterpart. All of the other icons ended up being drawn from scratch using other images as inspirations or as starting points.

I think I feel all the better for having diverged almost completely from that inspirational icon set.

What The Flock Is Going On Here?!

I like my little sheep icon, but it just seemed to be missing something. It turns out what it was missing was a thicker coat of wool. I started playing around with the sheep icon to see how it looked with a fatter, thicker wool growth; that experimenting yielded surprisingly nice results.

So, after a bit more revision, I had a sheep with a thicker unshorn coat of wool. Since I was revising a copy of my sheep icon, I also had a sheep with a thinner, seemingly shorn coat. I decided to put the two together. The result is synergistic; the two sheep icon looks even better than either of the sheep on their own.

Have a look see...



On a side note, I've been doing some research into polymer clay sources locally (in the Kitchener, ON area); specifically, Fimo clay sources. Hobby and Toy Central, near the Costco on King Street sells Fimo. Fimo Soft seems to be the more popular and common product, but they do also carry the more desirable Fimo Classic. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Michael's probably stocks Fimo clay also. I'll probably be going to H&TC, though; they're local, and can probably be of more immediate assistance with special ordering items they don't have in stock.

Stihl Looking For Ewe

I finally got my wood and sheep icons redrawn to be more consistent with the other scratch drawn icons. The wood is very similar to what it looked like before, but the sheep is definitely very different. All in all though, I'm very much happier with these new icons than I was with the old ones.



With these new icons finished, I can move on to other graphics work.

I've started work on a card back design; it will feature my own personal arms (which are unofficial) but may be modified in some way as a tribute to Mayfair's Settlers of Catan arms logo - the shield with the sailboat and sun.

I've also started working on designs for the knights, or soldiers as they are known in some sets. I decided that I want to use revolution era french military as my soldiers; I've always liked the uniforms of that era.

I am tempted to create a variety of soldier designs inspired by some famous canadian battles of that approximate time period. For example, the french-indian war, and the war of 1812 are important periods in the history of Canada; it would be cool to pay tribute to that. I'm just worried about the amount of work that would be involved.

So, that's where I'm headed next in this project; I'm sure I'll have another new update some time soon.

It's All In The Cards

I have finally made a decision about the cards, and particularly their size. The cards will be 2.375" x 3.5"; I will be using playing card blanks purchased from PlainsCards.com.

The PlainCards website described the card blank sheets as follows:

Blank on Both Sides Coatable Cards - 8 micro-perforated cards per 8-1/2 x 11 in. sheet. Cards measure 2-3/8 in. x 3-1/2 in (60 x 89 mm). These cards have a coating that enables them to be made glossy by spraying with the clear plastic playing card coating and they are true playing card stock. Your printer might require that adjustments be made to the advanced printer settings in order to obtain best printing results.

Since the card blanks are blank on both sides, I'll be able to fully customize the cards with custom backs as well as custom faces.

I won't be laminating the cards as I previously assumed I would do. Instead, I will use a spray coating/sealer on the cards to protect them and give them that typical playing card 'plastic coating'.

I can't get PlainCards' proprietary card coating spray up here in Canada, so I'm gonna have to find a slightly different solution available up here. I don't think that's going to be much of a problem. A satin finish clear acrylic spray sealer should do the job perfectly. I've used such a sealer before to protect wine labels. The satin finish acrylic sealer create a durable, only slightly shiny, and rather slippery/low friction finish. I can probably pick that kind sealer up almost anywhere.

Rock This Town

The fifth and final resource icon is drawn; the rock is ready. Like the wheat and the brick, it is an original icon. It was inspired by a photo of chunks of iron ore. Beyond that I don't know that I've got much to say about it; so without further ado:



So, with all five resource icons drawn, the next steps on the graphics side will be to a) edit the wood and sheep icons to make them match the look of the three original icons I created, and then b) move onto the graphics for the various other cards of the game.

I'll eventually have to think about card backs too. I found a great, simplified version of Mayfair's Settlers of Catan shield shaped logo for the game which I might redraw, simplifying it further; or I may use my own personal, and definitely unofficial, arms emblazon. I think the latter would definitely solidly mark this custom build as my own. I'll get a sample up soon.

Drawing a Line In The Sand

As I look back at the icons that I mostly traced from the original set (the wood and sheep), and look at those that I created from scratch (the wheat and bricks), I'm realizing that I'm no longer happy with the wood and the sheep icons.

I'm proud of the custom icons I created, and the mostly traced icons don't quite fit the look of the new/from scratch icons. It all boils down to the black outlines. On the traced icons, the outlines are mostly thick throughout and have a sketchy not so clean look; whereas the new icons are cleaner and thave thinner outlines on the inside with thick bold outlining around the perimeter only.

I like the general concept of the two traced icons, but I think I'm gonna rework 'em to be more in line with my new icons. I'll probably do that after I finish the rock icon though.

She's a Brick... House!

More graphics work during lunchtime yielded the faces for the Number Tokens - for both the basic set and the 5/6 player expansion, and the brick icon for the resource cards.

I haven't exported samples of the Number Tokens yet, but will do so eventually.

As for the icon for the Bricks, I used the original icon set as a guide, but diverged significantly. Rather than build an icon representing a disorganized pile of bricks, I went for a more stacked and organized appearance. I think it actually looks nicer than the original icon. I added a little bit of distressing to the bricks, to show chips and such on them. I may add more distressing later; I haven't decided - I don't want to overdo it.

So with the Bricks done, that leaves me with only the Ore/Mineral/Rocks to do. I think that'll be the most challenging icon yet; making an appealing yet clear icon of Ore will be tough.

Without further ado, here are the bricks:

Baa! Baa! Black Sheep, Have You Any Wool?

I took a few minutes this morning to do that final embellishment of the sheept icon that I've been wanting to do. It's a pretty simple embellishment, really; nothing more than some shading along its underside. It makes a difference to the appearance though. It looks nicer, and is certainly more consistent with the other icons I'm building.

Have a look see:

Is This In The Farmer's Almanac?

Did some more graphics work tonight on the icon set for the resource cards; this time around I decided to work on the wheat icon. Of the five resource icons in the set I am using as my primary inspiration, it's the icon I like the least.

So, I did some looking around and found some images of wheat and cobbled up my own orginal wheat icon that I'm much happier with. It's not 100% the same style as the other icons; it's lines are a little too clean and crisp, but it's not so far off as to look odd.

So, here it is:

I'm a Lumberkack and I'm Ok!

Did some significant resource card icon work over lunch today. I did the wood icon; check it out:



It's much like the icon from the set I found on BoardGameGeek.com, but embellished.

It seems like the Heathenx Inkscape tutorial screencasts I've been watching have paid off.

I have the sheep icon started, but its practically just a trace of the original icon; I want to give it more shape and definition like I did with the wood icon, so that'll be coming up soon.

That's About The Size Of It.

I did a bit of a hex tile sizing study this morning to determine how appropriate my proposed hex tile size of 3" (edge to opposite edge) would be. Here's how it looks.



The dimensions shown based on the AutoCAD's extreme accuracy; I expect that the finished physical product will vary slightly from the dimensions shown. No matter though, the dimensions are close enough to indicate that a 3" hex tile is a good size.

I'm looking at a 3"x3" post it note, and imagining a 3" hex in relation to it, and I like the size. Allowing a 1/4" edge border around each hex for placing roads and settlements/cities, and providing a 7/8" diameter central 'plateau' for the numbered chit in the centre leaves me with a 13/16" wide (at the narrowest parts) ring in which to sculpt the tile's terrain.

The basic game will make a board that is a foot and three quarters wide by about a foot and a half. The expanded layout is longer, but maintains the foot and a half width. Since typical tables are at least two feet wide or more, this ought to make a perfectly sized playing surface.

It's a Font of information.

We have a winner! I've made a decision regarding the font selection for the chits and card titles. The lucky font is called Tolkien, presumably because it's patterned after some kind of Tolkienesque or Tolkien associated type face.

Here's a sample of what it looks like:



It's decorative and elegant, yet informal and whimsical in ways; it also happens to be nicely legible and has well formed and consistently sized numbers.

I cast a Hex upon thee!

My mind is on Hex tiles; lots and lots of hex tiles.

The game has 38 hex tiles; 53 if you include the 5/6 player expansion.

Rolling out the poly clay for all those isn't too bad, but trying to cut them out could get ugly and time consuming.

Another fellow who made 3D hexes used a board with thickness guides to roll out the poly clay. Natch! That's the easy part. Some poly clay websites have suggested a pasta roller for quickly and easily rolling out clay in even thicknesses. I like making homemade pasta, and the machine would make rolling out the clay to an even thickness easy; it's an option I'll have to keep in mind as it gives me an excuse to buy a piece of kitchen equipment I've wanted for a while. I'd just have to make sure to clean REALLY well after I'm done using it for this project.

That same fellow I mentioned used an existing hex from the Settlers of Catan game set as a guide for cutting his hexes. That doesn't work so well for me. I don't already own the game; If I did, I probably wouldn't be going to the trouble of making my own.

So that got me to thinking about using a hex shaped cookie cutter to cut the hex tiles. I think that's likely to be my best option. I can get hex shaped cookie cutters online from Golda's Kitchen.



I'm sure if I look around some local home furnishings shops I'll find some locally and save myself the shipping costs.

I need only check their geometric trueness, and cut carefully, and it could save me a whole lot of time in comparison to using some other kind of jig/guide setup. I could easily cut several hexes at a time; probably faster than cutting a single hex with a hobby knife and ruler. I'm also more likely to have straighter (vetically) sides by using a cookie cutter.

I guess I have some shopping to do.

Icon See Clearly Now!

Planning for some of the cards started in earnest last night starting with a search for suitable icons for the Resource cards. The plan is to find images that I can use as inspiration for drawing my own icons in Inkscape.

That brings me to another decision; the majority of the graphics for this project will be developed in Inkscape. I've got the program installed both at home and at work, it's feature/capability rich, and best of all, it's vector based, which is something I'm very keen on; it provides the best image scaleability.

Finding individual images in similar styles might be a challenge; but with some reasonable effort, should be a surmountable problem. As I write this, the strangest idea has struck me; drawing icons and artwork in a similar style as Rich Burlew's Order of the Stick Comic. It would certainly have that whimsical appearance that I'm hoping for. I'd best tuck that idea away for now, I think.

Yesterday, I found a custom resource icon set on boardgamegeek.com that has a nice iconic/whimsical look to it. Check it out below:



It was the sheep and the wood that appealed to me the most. It fits the bill nicely, and will be relatively easy to trace and modify for my own purposes. I'm not entirely satisfied with the wheat and ore icons though; so I may look for alternates of them.

I've also started comparing different fonts in order to select a decorative font that I'll use for the Card Titles, a more practical font for the card body text, and a font for the numbers and letters on the chits.

With regards to the numbered chits, I've decided the easiest way to deal with them is to draft up the faces in Inkscape, and then glue/adhere them to circular wooden cutouts. 3/4" diameter cutouts ought to be just the perfect size. The technique of choice here will be to print the chit faces on a heavyweight, high quality paper stock using a color laser printer so prevent ink bleed - gee, I wonder where I can get access to that kind of equipment, heh heh. Then using carefully applied white glue or similar craft glue, attach them onto the cutouts, which will have been painted prior to the face application. Once the faces are applied, a clear acrylic spray lacquer/sealer applied in a couple or few thin coats. I know that sticker sheets could make the sticking to the wood cutouts easier; but in my experience, label sheets compromise the print quality, and the adhesion of the sticker sheet to the wood can sometimes be hit or miss.

I'm starting to put some thought into the hex tiles size. My initial thoughts were to make the tiles 3" from edge to opposite edge; but I have to do some diagrammatic planning to get an idea of how big that would make the fully laid out board.

Introduction

It's true, after playing just one simple game of Settlers of Catan, I fell in love with the game. It's a strategy game and an economics game all rolled into one with very simple rules. After doing some looking around on the internet and discovering that others had made their own 3D versions of the game, just going out and buying the Mayfair Games edition of Settlers of Catan just wasn't going to be good enough for me. I figured I needed to make my own custom 3D version.

So, this here blog is intended to be a journal of the project that will track and record my thoughts, work, and processes, and progress on the project.

More, and consolidated, information about the project can be found at this project's wiki page at ForgedRPG.com.