Pirates: 2018 Year in Review

Hi everyone! This is a thread where you can share what Pirates stuff happened over the past year. It can be just about anything, from accomplishments to purchases to cool ideas. If this seems too vague, you can look at mine for an example. There’s also the option of stating your Pirates Goals for 2019.

It will be nice to look back upon the entire year and find joy and amazement in how much we’re capable of. List (possibly with links and/or a short description) everything you accomplished in 2018 in regards to Pirates that you thought was a good thing that happened. Everyone could make their own post and contribute their own things that they did or are currently doing. When I think about this past week for example, I don’t really think much of it, but when I consider everything I’ve personally done in the entire year, I feel amazed at myself!  I think others could share that feeling as well if they look back at everything. Also, little things count too, so it doesn’t have to be all about one particular event or anything. Once everyone has posted, we can talk about what we accomplished as a whole forum.

a7xfanben

Pirates Goals for 2018

-At least 8 new players taught: Pathetic, ZERO players taught.  🙁  Darn.
-VASSAL module (get more players on the module, hopefully edit for more ship types, execute on plans with Xerecs): Somewhat successful, The Caribbean Game has begun but no consistency has been established.
-Finish VASSAL Tournament #2: Done!
-Make a bunch of videos for youtube: DONE!  I technically have produced/uploaded 231 videos to youtube in 2018!  O_O
-Make great podcast episodes and have more guests: The podcast doesn’t seem to have a growing audience from the numbers I see on ShoutEngine, but we did have some great episodes including the reveals of Unreleased game pieces.
-Finish stuff for Ocean Terrain Contest #3: I didn’t really do this, but it was because more important priorities got in the way.
-10 year anniversary games (RotF, F&S, SS): These were played, and eventually the Battle Reports for the first two will be restored/redone.
-Try to play at least one game in every month of the year: Another total failure, as I missed four months in a row from July through October.  I also finished with just 11 total plays (not counting The Hourly Campaign and the Caribbean game, which are ongoing), my lowest ever total for a single year by a wide margin since I started playing in 2011.

General accomplishments:
-Made a lot of progress in salvaging Miniature Trading content (database pictures backed up, Master Spreadsheet saved, many threads and other content saved)
-Completed 4 trades
-Submitted 5 fleets
-Wrote 2 Miniature Reviews
-Posted a lot of pictures on Instagram and surpassed 250 followers (as of now)
-Was the driving force behind starting VASSAL Campaign Game 4
-Produced 24 Podcast episodes
-Produced 231 videos for Pirates CSG (including starting a Pirates CSG Blog/Vlog series)
-Tried out a Facebook ad and an Instagram ad – good “reach”, but not many people seem to actually care about the game.
-Made the transition to Pirates with Ben from my Weebly site – up and running, content transferred over, speed is now improved, more posts coming, forum up and working with some members posting, huzzah!!
-Actually made a little money from Pirates through affiliate marketing rather than direct sales – this is important going forward because my time commitment to the game is simply not sustainable financially in the long run….

Games:
-Played 11 games (my lowest ever total, though massively affected by the amount of campaign game playing rather than games that can actually be completed in a reasonable time frame)
-Finished and WON VASSAL Campaign Game 3
-Started CG4
-Started The Caribbean Game
-Started The Hourly Campaign

Pirates Goals for 2019
I’m anticipating a number of potential major life changes in 2019, so I may not be able to do all the things I’d like to with Pirates.
-I’d like to teach at least one person how to play, though of course I’d love to break my record of 7 from 2015.
-Make videos and podcasts about Pirates
-Continue The Hourly Campaign with at least some consistency – although I doubt I’ll play and finish games in every month of the year, playing THC each month and sometimes each week can satisfy my “playing bug” and allows me to be playing consistently.
-Continue optimizing, building, and monetizing Pirates with Ben
-Actually do things that matter in terms of restarting the game – realize that posting on Instagram all the time, playing random games on the VASSAL module, and doing “random” Pirates stuff really isn’t going to move the needle at this point. I’ve done a TON of the “small stuff” over the years, and it doesn’t help much in the grand scheme of things even if it’s fun.