A New Nerding

John is doing his best to lure me into a new world of nerdom: Star Wars miniatures.

It helps that it's a really well designed game.

John has bought enough models that I don't need to spend a dime. He's organized it all into carrying cases and come out to visit me a couple of times (like when Carrie went to Genevieve's party). He likes to send me links about strategy and new models, too. He knows I'm a sucker for strategy games and the spaceships in Star Wars are far cooler than the Jedi.

We both grew up on this:

John loaned me the CD back in 8th grade! I shot x wings and played ping-pong in his basement when we were kids.

I am not planning on buying anything myself, but it's great to spend some time with John again. Half the fun for me is the talking and hanging out while playing. We bestow names on ships that do particularly well or poorly; We shoot random asteroids so that our ships don't come back with their ammo bins full (never mind they're lasers). If there's a clear loser, it becomes a chase. The loser attempts to flee their remaining ship(s) off the board to fly home and report their "glorious victory" against impossible odds (minus losing their squad).

It's given me something to use my brain on, too. I typed up a few ideas on how to make campaign characters while watching Jake and the Never-Land Pirates with Shane one night. I don't know that I'll ever use it, but it's the first non-blog writing I've done since I made a goal to write more. It won't make much sense if you don't know the game or GURPs. It felt good to do something creative.

If Shane shows an interest in Star Wars or strategy games when he's older, I may pick up the box set. I'd use it to geek out and teach him math and probability simultaneously. Until then, I'm not going to spend time or money on something that doesn't benefit my family in some way.

For now, It's a fun activity I can do with John once every month or two. Maybe we'll be able to get one in over Spring Break!

PS - I wonder if my brother-in-law, Bill, would be interested in this. Maybe I'll get John to give him a demo when they're in town!

PPS - Lightsabers counts as cool, too.