After almost half a year of silence, it's time to write a new post - on board this new ship. Thanks, G! I haven't spent the past months idle, I've been painting, reading, tasting a lot of rum, and the issue of the ship game was quickly resolved (but more on that another time). Since I haven't uploaded anything to this category yet, namely the menu dealing with the topic of Salt and Smoke (which is my upcoming tabletop miniature game - does it sound rotund enough?), this will be the best time.
I mentioned earlier that wargame/tabletop/figure painting and I were as far apart as Makó and Jerusalem (sorry to non-Hungarian readers, that's a weird saying here for when two things are very far apart). But this madness grabbed my neck and since then I can't wait for the rare occasions when I can pick up a brush again. Now I want to write about what I imagine Salt and Smoke to be like.
So I decided the theme: pirates. Then the books (yes, you can still learn something new from such boomer things) and of course the internet made me realize that, on the one hand, pirates were not exactly the ones I played when I was a kid/played with LEGO/Stevenson wrote about/saw in the movies. In other words, they were partly true, but still not half as true, so that at the same time they were a thousand times more. (My previously enthusiastic readers will now quickly forget this entire page for the sake of future sanity and delete their browsing history to be safe.) So it's not enough for pirates to beat each other up and rob each other. If I base the game on even a little bit of real elements, I need "good guys" - that is, those who defeat (I mean shoot, dismember, hang) these bandits. So there needs to be some order in the chaos, this should be the army of the great powers of the time. Like the British Empire, France, Spain and the Netherlands. But wait! This is going to be a game, and MY game. What if I would mess up history a bit? There would be characters who didn't exist (like that), in a part of our Earth that never existed, and the ages would be a bit blurred. Confusing enough? Bullshit? That's okay, I like it! (The essence of the hobby can be really captured somewhere here).
Okay, this guy has written enough, but what does he want to say? Let's get to the point:
What is Salt and Smoke?
Salt and Smoke is my tabletop miniatures wargame, for the sake of simplicity we will call it a wargame. I came up with the title in 2022-2023, that's when I started thinking about it and developing it in my head.
What era is it set in?
This has changed a lot over the years, but the earliest year is 1650 and the latest is 1815. So 165 years passed between the start of the Golden Age of Piracy and the Battle of Waterloo. In many ways, there has been significant progress in that time, but when you look at the difference in development between 1860 and 2025, it might not have been that much. What else would have changed the most in that time other than warfare? I currently imagine the game to be set in the early to late 1700s (only 100 years, huh), a time when the tricorn was in fashion. Why is this important? Because I like tricorns!
Where does it take place?
In the Caribbean Sea (pirates? That's the only thing I can think of!), and within that, on an archipelago I made up.
What nations/peoples/factions/groupings will be at odds with each other or will they be allies?
Let's start with the end. As usual, alliances are formed or dissolved according to current interests. This will be no different in Salt and Smoke. And history will be written by pirates, settlers, merchants and soldiers. And behind them are powers like the British, the French and even those we wouldn't think of. Let it be a surprise!
What is my goal in all this?
I need (or was and will always have) an activity that is sufficiently relaxing, I can research it (this is especially important to me) and when I finally have free time, it is always "at hand". Last but not least, I used to not spend my free time on relaxation, but usually made up for what I otherwise didn't manage to do. This has had its ups and downs, but I have learned from my mistakes, so wargaming is a pleasant leisure activity. Salt and Smoke will be a rule set that is not too complicated (so that the game is more of a game and not a tabletop copy of reality), can be played on a low budget (you can start with a small number of figures and a few terrain objects - knowing my plans, I have already failed at this point, but no one will have to take out a loan to get started anyway) and which I would like to make public domain (perhaps creative commons, in this - again - I will ask for G's help).
In short, that's it, I will let my imagination run wild and it will develop.
I hope that the new platform will motivate me enough to write in the three menus more often...