A few things I like about Tuscany

It's in Italy, and I'm part (1/8) Italian, so that's pretty cool.

Oh, wait.

The Tuscany I was actually referring to is an expansion for Viticulture. Sorry if you came here thinking I was talking about the place. Side note: For some reason, now that we've gotten the expansion, we've been referring to the game by the name of the expansion. "Do you want to play Tuscany" instead of "Do you want to play Viticulture". Which is interesting.

Anyway, I wanted to post something, but didn't know what to talk about, but this popped into my head, so I'm just going to talk about it.

First off, I wanted to state that I really do enjoy the base essential edition of this game. It was really enjoyable. But I'm never planning on not using at least the new board expansion that was added in Tuscany. If I'm teaching a new player who's not super duper adept at board games, I probably wouldn't use the structures or new workers. If I am teaching a new player who I know has played lots of games in the past, I might include all three modules at once, I wouldn't be surprised.

I really really enjoy how many good options there are that I want to take. In the base version of the game, all the actions weren't very exciting. There were many action spaces that I just didn't care about. I never felt excited about going to a lot of the spaces on the board. I felt exciting about some of them, sure, but a lot of them felt like they just never got used (imo).

In the expansion, however, there are tons of things I want to do, and I'm not able to do them all. I love that. Every action space I take feels rewarding and enjoyable. I want to do train a worker and build a building and build this other super cool building card, but I also really want to plant and I probably need more green cards, and trading twice is just so cool and good. There are just a lot of exciting things going on, more than I just listed.

And the action spaces feel tight. Adding two seasons means there are less actions in each season. Which means more fighting over those action spaces when the time comes. You have that suspense hoping that your opponent won't take that space you really really want. You feel rewarded when you take a risk and do something else first, but still get the spot you wanted (that's now even better because of your previous action) and you feel crushed when they harvest two field and you just really really needed those crushed grapes. It's enjoyable.

The new wake-up chart is sooo cool. And it just feels exciting. The base game one was pretty good too, but the new one is better by a decent chunk. I love how it gives you exciting options that you want to pick. In Fresco, it was the opposite. Almost all (if not all, I haven't played it in a while) of the wake-up options you have in Fresco are negatives. Everytime you wake up in that game, you're sad. Everytime you wake up in Tuscany, you excited about how many cool things you get this round. Even if you take the top spot and only get a coin, you're instead excited about how you'll (most likely) be going first and you get to take two green cards before anyone else, and then plant twice before anyone else has the chance to get the spot etc.

Another reason why I like it is because it values winter visitors over summer visitors. We played the base game a couple times right before we got the expansion in the mail. And my mom even commented, "Is it just me, or in Fall do I almost always seem to be picking up Winter visitors?" It wasn't just you, Mom. I almost exclusively picked Winter visitors in the base game. Maybe a couple of rounds in the beginning where I would pick Summer ones, but other than that I would get Winter visitor cards. And Tuscany addresses that. You have to wake up later on the wake-up track in order to get Winter visitor cards, and I think that's awesome. Because they do feel more valuable (imo).

The star mini-board off to the side is pretty cool. We've played a few two-player games and two three-player games. In two-player games, it suggests you don't score the victory points, and so we didn't. So the star mini-board is only alright in a two-player game. I still like the variety of choices you get when placing a star, though.

But in a three-player game, it was really cool. It was this strange area-control aspect that actually seemed to fit well into the game. It was cool to see how the spots on the board would shift. When I was ahead, she abandoned her fights with Eric. Thus giving Eric free points at the end of the game, but hopefully stopping me, the person she targeted as being ahead of her in score, from getting a few extra points. My mom doesn't care if Eric gets a few extra points as long as I don't get a few extra since I was ahead. It was cool. I like it.

The structure cards add a lot of variety to what you can do with your money and I love it. And the card all feel cool and exciting.

Special workers are probably my least favorite out of the modules, but they're still a super cool addition. It's fun to have new workers that can do a cool thing that other people might not have. And the fact that you only use two per game means there's a good chunk of replayability in that, which is great. Having different workers each game changes the way everyone plays and it make it more dynamic and interesting.

I love how there are bonuses on the two-player spots now. I've played Viticulture as a two-player game more than any other player count combined, and it's always sad when you can't go on that super cool version of the action you're taking. Now you can in a lot of different scenarios, which is amazing. This also adds a cool thing when you play with more than two people as well. This is because you have to choose between which bonus you want, which is another little interesting choice to think about.

This post was longer than I thought it was going to be, but that's fine. I didn't realize how many new things in the expansion I enjoyed. It's a really good expansion.

I'm so excited to play it and other games with Andrew soon!!

My Mission Call

I'm going to the Utah Salt Lake City mission and I'm reporting to the MTC on November 6th.
I. am. so. excited.
I leave in 48 days. Probably 47 by the time anybody reads this since I'm posting it lateish at night.
It's soooo soooon.
Which means my plans of reading all those books that I wrote about in the previous blog post are out the window. The Ender and Bean series will have to wait until after I get home from my mission. Along with The Giver Quartet (Although I might just read the first book again. It's short, so it wouldn't take too long).

I'm excited. I'm happy.

I've been reading a lot (Favorite Books List Revamp)

So, fun fact of the day that I would bet money I'm the only one who remembers: A long while ago I decided I was going to revamp my favorite books list. I decided I wanted the books to be split apart (instead of by series like they were before). I never did it. Until now *party popper* *party popper* (Note: I'm still debating if I'm going to put novellas on my new list.)

So you can go ahead and look to your left at my new list. Here's the old list in case you're curious:
1. Mistborn Series
2. Ender's Game/Ender's Shadow
3. Books of Umber Series
4. The Rithmatist
5. The Reckoners
6. Elantris
7. Jinx Series
8. The Emperor's Soul
9. Mysterious Benedict Society Series
10. The Healing Wars
11. Alcatraz Vs. Series
12. Flowers For Algernon
13. Uglies Series
14. Fablehaven Series
15. Beyonders Series
16. The Phantom Tollbooth

As you can tell, a vast majority of them are not on the new list. This is because I haven't read them in years. The ones on the list, however, I have read recently. Because I have been doing a lot of reading recently.

I have this info written down in my journal, so I'm just going to transfer it (with own commentary and such added. Not exact quotes or anything). Note: I don't have the start date on many of the books. Just the finished date. Between certain books, I had a couple-few days break, between others (such as the Mistborn Trilogy), I started the next book the day after the previous book. It just depended.

I started on July 6th.
Finished Skyward on July 9th. I read this as an ebook.
Finished Warbreaker on July 17th. I listened to this with GraphicAudio. I couple years back, I listened to about the first half and then stopped. This time I listened to it all the way through.
Finished Elantris for the 2nd time on July 24th using GraphicAudio. The previous time I read Elantris was back in 7th grade.
The rest of the books in this list, I read physical copies of.
Finished Legion: The Many Lives of Stephen Leeds on August 5th.
Finished Mistborn on August 13th for the third time.
Finished The Well of Ascension on August 18th for the third time.
Finished The Hero of Ages on August 27th for the third time.
Finished The Alloy of Law on September 4th for the second time.
Finished Shadows of Self on September 8th for the second time.
Finished The Bands of Mourning on September 11th for the second time.
All the above books are by Brandon Sanderson. The next eight books I have read/will read are by Orson Scott Card.
Finished Ender's Game on September 15th.
I'm currently reading Ender's Shadow. Afterwards I plan on reading the rest of the Bean series, and then the rest of the Ender series. After that, I'll most likely read The Giver Quartet by Lois Lowry.
I plan on rereading The Stormlight Archive + the fourth book when I get home from my mission.

I also read several novellas and the annotations for several books in between.
August 2nd, I read the annotations for Warbreaker and Elantris. Directly after reading the Mistborn Trilogy, I read the annotations for their respective books (aka, right after I read Mistborn, I read the annotations for it etc.). Note: the annotations for those books may have been read the day after.
On August 30th, I read The Eleventh Metal (It was my second or third time doing so) and on August 31st, I read Mistborn: Secret History (for the second time).
Right before I read Alloy of Law, I read Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania (Episodes Twenty-Eight through Thirty).
On August 12th, I read Sixth of Dusk.

Perhaps I'll do a separate list for ranking my favorite short stories/novellas. We'll see.

In conclusion: I've been reading a lot and it's great.

Which Ferring ability? pt.4 Cognitive Metals

Okay, cognitive metals. This is where things get really difficult for me. These four powers are all super high on my list; I think they're all incredible.


Brass (Warmth): This one used to be my pick for being a ferring. Never being too cold or too hot? Yes please. The obvious draw to this power is it being equally useful for both storing and tapping. Winter's chill doesn't get to you. Summer's heat is a pushover.
What I realized about this power, though, is I'm not often bothered enough by being too warm or too cold to warrant me picking it. Especially where I currently live, I survive both the coldest winter nights and hottest summer days relatively well. Obviously it's not a fun time. But it's not that much of a bother. If I lived in a place where the temperature varied more and I couldn't really deal with the heat or cold, this power would be more attractive. Currently, though, I'm not all too interested.

I know I did say I think all four of these powers are incredible, but I did just tear on Brass a little bit. Probably too much. I still think the power is super cool. There are also minor applications that would be fun to experiment with. Tapping tons and tons of it to potentially light things on fire around you. Or tapping a lot to warm people near you up.
And, as I said earlier, this used to be my top pick. It's still high up there for me, I think. I've just realized that I live very easily without controlling my temperature through said means.

Verdict: Still awesome, but I live just fine in my day to day life just dealing with the differing temperatures.

Bronze (Wakefulness): I really really like this power. I think it's important to make sure you get the full effectiveness out of storing it. On paper, storing it doesn't seem that useful; you just spend an extra hour asleep and then later you could tap it for an hour. So, in the course of a day if you did that, you would wake up an hour later and stay up an hour earlier.
But. But.
There are a few ways to make storing it awesome. First off, it becomes super easy to fall asleep anytime, anyplace. And. And. You can stay asleep for as long as you want. During car or plane trips, it's effectively time travel into the future. You just get to be at your destination (supposing you're not driving). You're just automatically there.
Also, I think it would be surprising how in random scenarios in life you could store it for just a few minutes. I forgot my book at work or am waiting for a new book to come, I can just store wakefulness during my break instead of wasting time looking at my phone.
Tapping it has its clear uses.
Maybe I'm overrating this power, but I think it's super cool.

Verdict: Super awesome (imo)

Zinc (Mental Speed): In Bands of Mourning it briefly takes about how tapping mental speed makes you hungry. So, presumably, storing it would allow you to not be hungry? That's not that important, especially since we don't really know how it works, but I thought I would mention it. It also probably gives signs of what's actually happening when you use the power.

Anyway. So, one misconception I had a few years back about this power. It doesn't increase your intelligence at all. It just allows you to think more in a given amount of time. Effectively, time stopping to allow your brain to think.
Storing it would suck. Sazed talks about how he has to struggle to comprehend every word said etc. But, storing it does have its uses. Theoretically, you could time jump with this power, similar to how someone would time jump with storing wakefulness. You store so much mental speed that it just seems like time is passing super quickly since you can't process anything or something like that. The benefits of that have already been talked about.

How useful is tapping it, then. I'm not exactly sure. I wouldn't use it during tests because I feel like that's cheating. I could read faster with it. That'd be nice. If a lot of things are happening around me at the same time, I could easily process and understand all of it. I could listen to several conversations at once since I would have a lot of time to think about what the people are saying. At work when we're particularly busy, it would be nice to be able to process everything that's happening easier.
I think a weird tiny benefit that we might not think of is being able to "live in a moment for longer", if that makes any sense. If there's something exceptional going on, you could have it, effectively, go on for a longer period of time. I'm not sure how often I would use the power like that, but I do think it's cool.

I think one thing that makes this power cool is thinking about the potential of it. If there's a really hard question or problem or something, you can spend a lotta lotta time and solve it in what seems like an instant to other people. It's cool.

Verdict: I think it's cool, but I'm not quite sure when I need to think more at any specific time.

Copper (Memories): Here's the thing about Copper. 1. It's awesome. But 2. I kind of want to keep the memories. Memories that I want to be able to get a fresh copy of at any time would be memories I wouldn't be willing to store in the first place. So, the memories I would store would be ones that I could have multiple copies of. I would make an additional copy in my Coppermind so at any time when I really want the info/watch/see the thing, I could.

One weird thing about this. We learn in the annotations for the Mistborn Trilogy that Sazed was trained at a very early age to memorize very very very well. He has crazy crazy good memory without ever touching a Coppermind. So, the question is, how well would memories stay put in my brain? Sazed is able to take and put back information into his Coppermind (I don't know why I keep capitalizing it, but I am) many many times without needing to replace the old copy with a new one. How many times would I be able to take information out, then put back in, without needing to refresh them? I'm predicting it would be far far less. Which obviously isn't a good thing.
I wouldn't use the power during tests because I feel like I would be cheating.

Even with all this said, I'm sure the power would be incredibly useful and super awesome to have. It pretty much eliminates small written down lists. In many forms at least.
When there's a random phrase or idea that you want to right down, but you can't because whatever reason, you can just chuck it into a metalmind.
You're getting rid of the specific words or whatever in your head at that moment, but you'll remember the build up to them, so you'll still have that memory of them. Point being, you have both your actually memory and the memory in the Coppermind.

Things like visual memories or audio memories for things you can only see/listen to once are the memories I was referring to at the very beginning of this portion. I'd rather have the actual memory of them rather than forgetting them just to remember them later. I want them to be a part of me, not whisked away.
Although you would still remember how you felt and such if you did put the memory away, which is weird. Copper is weird.

Longer memories would be a thing you could store parts of. You're watching a really pretty sunset/sunrise? Those last a while, so you could store parts of the memories, so another time if you really want to see the sunset/sunrise, you totally could.

Verdict: Copper is wild and incredible. Also very very fun to talk about. Also I want to talk more about Bands of Mourning stuff because I just came up with new theories on stuff and I want to spread my ideas. That was mostly irrelevant to this verdict, but whatever.

Rankings:
4. Zinc.
3. Brass.
2/1. Copper/Bronze.          Still not sure on this one.


(I'm not rereading this right now because it's a lot, but I might later and edit a few things)

Ferring Ability Small Update

I'm currently rereading Bands of Mourning (I've been reading a lot recently, which I'm planning on talking about in a different post) and it's given me some new information about feruchemy that I'd forgotten about (the last time I read it was when it first came out (or very near that time)).

The main point of interest: tapping Connection allows you to communicate to people in their language.

As I stated in a previous post, I learned more about feruchemical speed that I didn't realize (from Shadows of Self, specifically).

Anyway, the point of this post is to say that I'll be making a post about adjustments to stuff at some point.