Scopique
ScopiqueI have spent a lot of time over time printing a desk organizing system. My desk is often a mess, being the place where I spend a whole lot of time, and whenever I have something going on, I need somewhere to put it. Usually that’s on top of other stuff that I placed when I needed somewhere to put it.
About a year ago I purchased a 3D printable system from the Workplace Hero, and it took me a while to get around to setting it up in part because it uses wooden dowels as its foundation. Printed parts are attached at intervals along a set of dowels (I am using the 5-dowel config) and on either end, forming a shelf. I can make this shelf as long or as short as I want; I can also create angled braces to curve around an L-shaped desk and extend the length should I really get into the organizational spirit. If that’s not enough, there are all kinds of fun add-ons that can be…added-on, such as the Gridfinity desktop organizer you see on the left, above a set of printed drawers, and mounts for the various button-and-knob controllers I have set up for myself. On the far end I have a stand for my headphones, too. This has helped a lot in getting things organized, but it’s taken a whole lot of time and filament; one of the slip-on shelf tops takes, I think, 8 hours to print? I have 8 of them, 3 of them unused, and my printer bed can only make one at a time.
Next, I have to start thinking of organizing the cables that connect the nine-billion attachments I insist on having.
TTTRPG App Update
Sad to say that after the intense spate of posts regarding my search for a TTRPG organization app, I haven’t really done much with any of them. I kind of settled on Lore Forge mainly because it is flexible and a generalist app, although I don’t have much use for it’s novel-writing features. Part of the reason I’ve sidelined my mission is pure fatigue, as I went into the task hard and burned myself out. Another part is that the next version of the app is due out this week or maybe the next, and I’m eager to see what features, if any, will help my particular use cases.
Geometry Nodes
Another reason why the TTRPG search fell off is because my orbit swung back around to Blender somehow. It had been quite some time since I deleted the default cube but I got the urge to go back to try and update some of my earlier projects now that I think that I know better. One of these that I think got short-changed was my “abandoned churchyard” scene, maybe in part because I have been working on the Secret World adventure and the scene was certainly inspired by things similarly eldritch.
For the revisit I have this time modeled my own church, or at least blocked it out, but I got wondering how to do the siding on the building. It would be easy — but painful and, some might say, wrong — to do it by hand using an array modifier on each wall, and the correct answer is probably “geometry nodes”, so I went back to a Udemy course I had purchased a while back on the subject.
Geometry nodes are stupidly powerful, and an entire scene can be created using them in place of hand-placing artisanal objects in the viewport, but its also a lot of work that requires knowledge of each node available, what they do, when they should be used, and then how they all work together. And math, by nemesis. I tried using geo nodes to create wooden siding, but failed spectacularly; instead, I picked up a package on Super Hive Market that does it, and uses geo nodes. Check this out:
I’m not anywhere near close enough to being able to do something like that.
iPhone Duo
We could be reductionist and point fingers and make claims and all that, but here’s the situation. I am still seething over the cancellation of the Courier, full stop. That loss drove me to investigate e-ink tablets which are nice, but they’re not The Future of Note Taking-level nice. Foldable tech is a pretty sweet idea, in my opinion, because it makes less than portable things portable, which opens up opportunities in places where a carrying around a full-sized tablet or laptop would be difficult.
Since my household is currently in an Apple-device cycle, the dual-screened Duo caught my attention hard enough for me to pre-order one. Then I started down several paths. The first was finally giving proper weight to the mantra of “don’t buy first-gen” because I was willfully ignoring that advice because I wanted the device. The second was that several people, including my daughter, were sending me horror stories of people whose Duos were breaking on account of the design. I keep going back and forth, trying to decide if I want to take the risk, and ultimately cancelled with regret, but now trying to order one has a fulfillment date well into the end of January, 2027. I am patient, but I am not that patient. I have decided to wait until next year to see how things go, maybe with a more robust inventory refresh, and if not, then for next year’s inevitable Duo 2.
Notice I’m not saying “that fucking price-tag” because we’re back on the ol’ installment payment treadmill with our phone carrier and switching would only cost an additional $10 per month. That’s not to say that I’m made of money; it’s just that I’ve purposefully spent more per month on stupider stuff in my lifetime.
Speaking of which…
Star Citizen
4.10.3 looms, and not 4.11 as we’d hoped. The IAE event should be included in 4.10.3, which means I need to get around to melting my fleet in order to free up money for the Galaxy’s release at the show. I pawned off the Guardian MX, the Hull-B, and the Connie Mk V which returned more than enough cash to my wallet for the Galaxy, so I’m contemplating the fates of the Apollo, the Cutty Black, and the MSR. I am considering CCUing the MSR to the Galaxy, as the former has lifetime insurance that would transfer to the Galaxy.
Playing around with the Centaurus, though, made me think about people like me — long time backers who have incrementally paid into this project over 15 years and who do or can own Very Large Ships. For me, I wanted to use a large ship as a mobile home; my Carrack was to be a Winnebago-in-space which I’d only leave via parasite craft, but since the Carrack has yet to be relevant enough to receive a gold-pass, I melted it some time ago. The Centaurus could be contender, but it is large and ponderous, and not suited to my desired playstyle focus anyway. The Galaxy is, however. It’s also larger and potentially more ponderous than the Centaurus which causes me concern. I won’t be dogfighting in that thing, that’s for certain.
The progression within Star Citizen is, understandably, bigger ships because characters won’t have numbered attributes like we see in other CRPGs. Instead, people advance by earning money, which allows them to buy bigger ships. Considering that I have owned many large ships in this game over the years (up to a limit at which I decide a ship is just too big for me to realistically do anything with), what will my progression look like in Star Citizen 1.0? I’ve played for so long that I’ve done pretty much everything there is to do, currently, in the game, and do new things as soon as they are delivered and I am able. When 1.0 arrives, will there be anything that keeps my interest? And if I already own the ships I want, what will I be building towards? I’m thinking about this quite often, now.
We are still in the middle of the RSI Event which offers us several tracks of missions to complete for rewards. I’ve reached the 66% mark on the combat track which for me is weird. This was an easy get, though, because I just needed to take on a few smaller craft in a fighter over and over until I got sick of doing it, which is apparently at 66%. I’ve started trying some of the hauling and industry missions, but I don’t think I’ll get far enough to earn anything from either track. Low-end rewards have been paints for ships I don’t have, and grade B components for ships I mostly cannot fit. Still, it’s been an excuse to get back into the game, and I’ve been enjoying my time well enough to tide me over until IAE.
Whether we’ll get 4.11 and Genesis: Part I in December is still up in the air. Not making the next patch 4.11 is a strong and restrained move on CIG’s part, and I applaud their willingness to hold back. I think a lot of people feel the same. Unfortunately, I think that for many, it’s is due to a malaise over CIG’s stupid pet tricks phase this past year; many long time backers are still checked-out from the current state of the game so it’s less of a silent nod of approval and more of a conspicuous vacuum.
