I’m not sure if I’m going to split this into a two part site update, but so far the results have been decent, barring one or two cripplingly annoying limitations of the Divi theme builder.
So far I’ve:
Standardized some elements across the site
Dropped the ‘glow’ from most text for easier reading
Removed some old plugins I don’t need/want
Did some front and back-end optimizations
Fixed a couple of old nags in the theme editor
Did some view testing on various screens
I think the LGT page gave me the most trouble. I liked the old layout I was using for that page, but while I was trying to bring everything in line with the rest of the site changes, I wound up deleting the synopsis. That’s the last time that’s happening. Due to the way rows, columns, and borders work, there wasn’t any way for me to use the type of border I like around the whole thing without merging all of it; mobile users would have been in for one nightmare of a margins and padding mess otherwise. I’m going to do some research at some point to see if I can’t have separate versions of a page for PC vs mobile. That would let me do a lot more with both individually instead of the balancing act I went with.
I may decide to go back in and do another round of changes across the site, but I’m going to see how things feel for at least a few days before deciding one way or the other.
I’ve been having a few minor issues (some on the front-end and some on the back-end) that I want to try and fix. Sometime tomorrow, probably in the afternoon, we’ll be going on maintenance while I poke around and try to fix and/or improve things. I’m also going to be looking at the theme more closely and try to improve legibility and navigation, as well as make sure everything looks good on mobile (something I’ve admittedly neglected up to this point). So just a heads up there. I hate just doing blurbs but that’s really all I’ve got to say about it prior. I may post about some of the changes after I’m finished, though.
It’s a shame this is only temporary for now. I wanted to play a few matches before I gave an opinion about this mode, and I have, so I shall.
I only played four matches so far: three wins, one loss. The first match was with my Tirpitz B and didn’t go well at all. We got stonewalled before we even got close enough to start shooting at transports. Quick and brutal loss.
The next match I used a Lenin and it was going very poorly at first. I got taken out after we sunk the first or second transport–can’t remember which since they both died within moments of each other. We went on to win though.
The third match I was also on the attacking team because of course I was. I was getting sick of battleships so I dusted off my Prinz Eugen and secured the game by shooting and sinking the last transport. That one was a fun line up with all the T8 Hipper hulls present save Tallinn.
The last match I used my Graf Zeppelin B and finally got to play as an escort instead of an attacker. My performance wasn’t stellar since I haven’t played GZ regularly in quite a long time, but I did my part and got fairly close to knocking out the enemy CV (Kaga) to tie up the match. I was a few hundred hitpoints shy and I think we had only lost one ship by that point, so the focus fire was immense. She was going down within a few seconds no matter what. I just happened to do a good chunk of damage near the end.
I think I prefer escorting transports to attacking them but while writing this I’m not quite sure. I think I’ll need to play some more matches this weekend to really get a feel for the mode. The battleship gameplay is fairly hit or miss though with the way convoy interception works. It forces you in close so it’s better to have a brawling ship than a sniper. The problem is that Asashio is a thing and deep water torpedo ambushes are pathetically easy to pull off when you know where all the big ships are and where they have to go to be effective. That’s why me and a Massachusetts B got walked all over near the beginning of my first Convoys match.
I’ll play the mode more this weekend and see how I like it, but regardless of anything else, it’s a breath of fresh air and I really hope this isn’t the last we see of the mode. Wargaming should make it a permanent game mode, even if they have to put it into some kind of rotation in the random battle mode. That’s better than doing nothing or leaving it as a one off or annual experiment. The mere mention of convoys was enough to get people excited, so hopefully WG doesn’t let this go to waste.
I couldn’t settle on what to post today. I was looking back through previous posts, even going back through the old archived stuff, but I quickly realized that at the rate I was going I’d just spend the evening reading old content. So I decided instead of reading my old thoughts, why not just muse about it and post that? Couldn’t hurt for today. I’m honestly too tired for what I had planned this morning.
Looking back on the last year and a half or so, I’ve tried a lot of different approaches to keeping myself posting consistently, everything from relaying news I’m interested in, to quickly dipping in and out of politics. Some days I just threw in the towel and left a small blip on the blog to let the net know I was still alive. I already know what the real secret to consistency is, at least to spurring it on once it starts. It’s the audience. I haven’t lifted a finger to draw traffic to the site because I prefer to finish the building before I invite anyone into it. It’s fine if someone curious comes along and leaves a comment, but I’ve always been a presentation type. If something’s not finished, you’d have to hold me at gunpoint for me to start waving people over to see it. It’s one of those weaknesses I’ll have to have sorted by early 2022, I think.
As for finishing the building, I’d say having things a bit more organized and having a few more of the free stories and some bits of media published here would be good enough. Unfortunately that’s a ways off still. I might have to settle for ‘the beginnings’ of as much as I can and hope that the kind of people I attract lean more toward curiosity and constructive criticism than the dismissive gammas that started flooding the Earth a while back. We’ll see.
I don’t know exactly when I’ll start trying to drive traffic to the Praedian Records, but I’m looking at no later than my birthday this year, so not past winter. No pressure, Phee.
I’m getting excited about this. I’ve never tried making a height map before. While I didn’t plan to originally, I’ll need a lot of different variants of this dual continent, and height maps are extremely useful for the things I’m planning. It’s not just going to be used for a single time period either, so the political maps will be all over the place depending on the period.
Though … I guess now’s the time to consider if I want to move any islands around or not. I’ve made some changes since the previous version of the landmasses, but nothing major, as I didn’t really have any ideas. I’m starting to get some now, though. We’ll see. There’s still time, since I’m doing the height map in two groups, the “Above Sea Level” or ASL group, and the “Below Sea Level” or BSL group. ALS and most of the big details come first so if I need to move things around later on, I won’t have to change everything in the BSL group to match. The BSL group just won’t be made until the ASL group is finished or near enough.
Keep an eye out for these map posts. The look of this thing is going to change quickly and dramatically.
