Designing medieval fantasy armies: Ylaruam

I recently posted a guide to authors who wish to include armies in their medieval historical or fantasy stories, or in background materials for role-playing games. I want to follow up with some examples and what is done well or poorly in each. In the next post I looked at the army of the Duchy …

Designing medieval fantasy armies: Glantri

I recently posted a guide to authors who wish to include armies in their medieval historical or fantasy stories, or in background materials for role-playing games. I want to follow up with some examples and what is done well or poorly in each. In the next post I looked at the army of the Duchy …

Designing medieval fantasy armies: Karameikos

I recently posted a guide to authors who wish to include armies in their medieval historical or fantasy stories, or in background materials for role-playing games. I want to follow up with some examples and what is done well or poorly in each. An example of army design done wrong is found in the Mystara …

Designing medieval fantasy armies: doing it right, doing it wrong

Let's say you're writing a fantasy story, or some fiction based in the medieval world, or writing background information for a role-playing game in a medieval-like fantasy setting.  Appearing in your story, or your game campaign, is some interaction with the army of the kingdom.  You want to write something believable, but you're not an …

Open letter to Microsoft

Dear Mister Gates (or whoever runs the place now) Please stop restarting my laptop with no warning. I already set my preferences to have you only restart it at night. You're obviously not sticking to that. Can you at least please give me a day or so warning before you dump everything I have open? …

Rhino and Badger Published!

The Rhino and the Badger is now available as a Kindle ebook! https://www.amazon.com/Rhino-Badger-Ken-Pascoe-ebook/dp/B08G5DB4NK/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3H6623Z2OJNEN&dchild=1&keywords=ken+pascoe&qid=1597966511&sprefix=ken+pascoe%2Caps%2C235&sr=8-1 Like so many authors before me, I had an idea. The idea bounced around in my head until it had to come out, so it became words in a file. I wrote, edited, solicited feedback from my wife and others, and improved …

Pole Estimation for Target Recognition via Late Time Scattering

This is a paper I presented at the European Electromagnetics Conference (EUROEM) in 2004. The conference was held at Otto von Guericke University in Magdeburg, Germany. The paper was also published as a book chapter in Ultra Wideband, Short Pulse Electromagnetics 7, published by Springer. There are some formatting issues in this blog version. Greek …

Advent Calendar

You may remember Advent calendars when you were a kid, or for your kids. A cardboard box with a bunch of fold-up doors, and inside each door a piece of chocolate. Well, here's the man's version. My lovely wife got me an Advent Beer Calendar. The 'Brewer's Advent Calendar 2019' has a half-liter can of …

Atlantic War: Order of Battle Charts

These charts show the ships that enter the game every turn. Edit: rearranged. Allies Order of Battle Chart Turn 0 at Great Britain or Malta 5 5 3 Nelson5 5 3 Rodney4 4 4 Warspite4 4 4 Barham4 4 4 Malaya4 4 4 Valiant 4 4 3 Revenge 4 4 3 Royal Sovereign4 4 3 …

Atlantic War

This (very long) blog post lays out the rules for a new wargame derived from War at Sea. It will look a lot like the existing game, but play differently. Ship factors will more consistently reflect the historical capabilities of the ships. More ships will be present on both sides. The US Navy will have …