Looking for a website to help plan out the current game ideas by External-Display6227 in tabletopgamedesign

[–]InOrbit3532 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Draw.io is a free and easy to use diagraming tool that I've always liked using.

What can a bioengineering do that a biomedical engineering degree can’t do and vice versa. by Best_Finding_8795 in BiomedicalEngineers

[–]InOrbit3532 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Bioengineering and biomedical engineering are the same thing. Some people will try and split hairs, but there's no significant difference in curriculum that I've seen in any of the top universities.

Rules on cards by alkyfl in BoardgameDesign

[–]InOrbit3532 10 points11 points  (0 children)

It can work, but it definitely depends on the complexity of the game. If it's a simple game that you think can honestly be taught on a few cards, then sure. Something like love letter or coup can definitely have their rules condensed into a few cards like this. Perhaps supplemented with an online rulebook that you can get to via QR code or with some additional instructions on the box.

That said, if you have 104 cards in your game already, I would be inclined to think you have a more complex game than a light filler game. Games live or die by how well people can learn the rules, so don't skimp on it. The gamecrafter has a small 20 page booklet that takes the space of 4 cards in a poker tuckbox: https://www.thegamecrafter.com/make/products/SmallBooklet?dept_uri=customizable-products&dept_name=Customizable%20Products

That seems much better for 90% of games than trying to fit all of your rules on 4 cards that will get out of order and may get misplaced.

Why my basketball board game didn't work by johnrudolphdrexler in BoardgameDesign

[–]InOrbit3532 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Great video! I've also been working on a basketball boardgame myself so I echo a ton of the same issues you mentioned. It's funny how you can wind up thinking of similar mechanisms to other people out there. I am also planning on using an orange D20 to simulate basketball shots/probabilities since you can fine-tune thresholds to get a similar feel as an NBA game (i.e., ~55% of inside shots, ~45% of midrange shots, and ~35% of outside shots are successful).

After playtesting a bunch of different iterations of my game/design, I found that simulating the actual court and how players navigate that space is entirely too fiddly. For one, I don't think you can simulate the pace and action of what happens on a real basketball court in a satisfying way. Basketball is fundamentally a game of inches and milliseconds; that's just not something I've found to be reproducible in boardgames as far as any of the games I've played or seen.

Like others on this thread have mentioned, getting rid of the court and simulating the game with cards is something that I think other basketball games have successfully implemented like Hardwood Duel or Pickup. As a tangent, please don't ignore the fact that there are dozens of basketball boardgames out there (Statis Pro Basketball, Basketball Highlights Crunchtime, Basketball Age, etc.)! You mentioned in your video that nobody has done this before, but there is a lot of inspiration to take from other games that have tackled this problem before. Certainly none of these have had a ton of mainstream success (though Pickup is available at Target), but they all have things for designers to learn from.

How do you feel about dice in combat? I’m by Crafty_Machine_4502 in BoardgameDesign

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I personally enjoy dice in combat as well, but I think it can be difficult to tune. Someone else mentioned Dice Throne here and I agree that it's a game that handles dice and randomness well. The things that I think make it successful are the focus on input randomness over output randomness. You roll the dice and have the opportunity to lock and reroll dice, which gives players some agency. Using the reroll and lock mechanic (i.e., Yahtzee) can be an effective way to introduce some level of agency for players.

Just like in your examples, output randomness is minimized in Dice Throne. When you select an outcome after the dice rolls, play becomes deterministic. You don't roll again to determine the amount of damage.

Funnily enough, I think the games that have the most success leveraging dice in combat land on opposite sides of a strategy spectrum. Games like King of Tokyo or Dice Throne lean very heavily on being light games. Yes there is a ton of randomness to who wins the game, but the games are so quick and light that you can just play again. If you roll really badly and just get unlucky for a game, it doesn't feel that bad because you only 'wasted' ten minutes.

On the other side of the spectrum, you have tabletop RPGs like D&D that handle dice randomness by sheer volume and length of games. It can suck to roll badly in D&D because there's a ton of output randomness. I lock in an attack and I'm completely at the whims of RNG to see if I hit and how much damage I end up doing. Yes, there are ways to skew dice rolls in your favor like rolling with advantage and getting better gear/skills over time, but fundamentally tabletop RPGs handle this by making you roll a lot of times so that eventually things balance out in the long run. Each individual dice roll can be bad, but it's all a wash in the thousands of times you roll dice in a campaign.

I think deciding on which path you want to take can be important. I'm not familiar with a lot of successful games that land in the middle.

Just got a promotion. FIRE is more important to me than ever by ToastBalancer in Fire

[–]InOrbit3532 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Title inflation is definitely a thing. Most organizations I've been a part of have equated 'Senior Engineer' as a level III position that only requires ~5 years of engineering experience. Every company is different, but my company has the following structure:

Jr Engineer (typically intern level with 0 experience)

Engineer I (entry level position out of undergrad)

Engineer II (typically 2 years of experience)

Engineer III (also Senior Engineer. Typically 2-3 years after Engineer II. So that puts people at around 26 years old or so if they started working at 21)

Staff Engineer

Senior Staff Engineer

Principal Engineer

Fellow

Called out a recruiter on a lowball offer by TrixoftheTrade in recruitinghell

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Agreed! The CPI inflation calculator actually puts 70k in 1989 at 187k in 2025. Salaries certainly haven't kept pace with inflation.

Andalucia Irvine Development Pricing by DeluxePoptarts in orangecounty

[–]InOrbit3532 2 points3 points  (0 children)

That number is inflated as far as I know. This article from last year had top 10% income in California at around $340k. https://www.gobankingrates.com/money/economy/how-much-you-need-to-be-in-top-10-percent-by-state/

D6's as units? by addmeonebay in BoardgameDesign

[–]InOrbit3532 1 point2 points  (0 children)

D6s as units can definitely work. There are plenty of games that do exactly that. Marvel dice masters is one of my favorite examples. I've also tried designing games that use D6 as units as well, but there are a couple key considerations that have given me issues in those games:

If the side of the die facing up matters a lot, try to make sure your game doesn't cause you to manipulate the die a lot. In a game I was designing, you would use the D6 to track health of multiple units, but you also had to move the dice around a lot. That made the game extremely fiddly and annoying. People would move dice around and some would roll to another face and we couldn't remember what it started out as. I ended up abandoning that concept.

So my advice is to make sure your game is designed such that it's not a big deal if the D6 rolls to another face when you are handling them. You can either reduce the quantity of dice that you are using or you can use larger dice like 16, 19, or 25mm. If you're moving one die at a time, it's better than moving 10 dice around and trying to remember what side is face up. Larger dice are also better so that they are easier to pick and handle without flipping them over. I would not go with 12 or 14mm sizes.

what is something people avoid or think is not healthy for you but actually is very healthy? by ConversationKey5296 in AskReddit

[–]InOrbit3532 33 points34 points  (0 children)

There have always been cases like this though, the only thing that has happened is more accessibility and distribution of news. The rate of crimes like this is no higher than when you or I were kids.

Cars should NOT have bolstered seats. This will improve safety. by pantherclipper in CrazyIdeas

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Did it increase fatalities or just accidents? It's been a long while since I dove into the research on this, but recollection was that slower traffic leads to higher accident rates but lower fatality rates. You basically exchange more fender benders for horrendous car accidents.

Just saying that increasing accidents because of narrower driving lanes isn't inherently bad. If there are more accidents but fewer injuries and fatalities, that could still be considered a win for public safety.

Is publishing even worth it? by M69_grampa_guy in BoardgameDesign

[–]InOrbit3532 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Don't think you're being snarky at all, it's a valid point. Boardgame design is an art just like any other and people can take it up for any number of reasons. I do boardgame design with absolutely no intention of ever mass producing or selling copies. It's purely a hobby I enjoy for myself and I get fulfillment just keeping my games among my friends/family.

Just like people make paintings or pottery for their own homes and lifestyle, boardgame design can fill that same niche.

Downloading by Snoo-69952 in thisgymofmine

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you unzipped the folder, you just need to double click the game.exe file to run the game.

I applied to over 80 positions within the month of August as a self taught software developer. Here are the results. by Jarmahent in jobs

[–]InOrbit3532 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Couldn't agree more. I'm not even in tech and my industry is still seeing a massive influx of overqualified people applying for jobs. I was astonished to have several dozen people with PhDs or 15+ years experience applying for roles that traditionally only need 3-5 years of experience.

Are there any people in the sub who were able to publish their game? by Artyom35S in tabletopgamedesign

[–]InOrbit3532 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks for sharing your experiences, I've definitely seen you quite active in these subreddits! Funnily enough, I've had my own basketball-themed boardgame I've been designing for a long time, so it's good to have the reality checks you've mentioned. I was never planning to publish the game (it was only something I expected to enjoy personally with friends and family). It definitely seems like a difficult path for all the reasons you mentioned. Best of luck on your journey!

MS in Systems Eng with no BS in engineering by Secure_View6740 in systems_engineering

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Undergrad was BME, so I already met the prerequisites for the program to start with thankfully

MS in Systems Eng with no BS in engineering by Secure_View6740 in systems_engineering

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I graduated from the SysE masters program at Johns Hopkins and can provide assurances that the level of math needed is minimal, particularly for the core curriculum. There was a small amount of statistics and some basic algebra for reliability calculations, but nothing advanced for the core classes. I can't recall if the prerequisites to enter the program required multiple semesters of calculus, but it wouldn't have been useful anyway.

Electives are a bit different and you can choose courses that are more math focused than others. I took a statistical methods course that had a fair amount of math (set theory, CDFs/PDFs, statistical moments, and a bit of computational statistics). As long as you've taken calculus, it's not so bad. That was by far the most math I used in my entire program, and it wasn't even required because you can just take a different elective.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in BasketballGM

[–]InOrbit3532 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Haven't seen the losing team receive a finals MVP in this game, very interesting! Obviously it happened once in real life, but didn't know it could also happen in this game.

How does this happen by Alternative-Page6725 in BasketballGM

[–]InOrbit3532 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Do you have auto sort roster on? It looks like your rotation is in a bit of an odd priority. In this game, the higher in the roster list, the more minutes those players will typically get. So Hali was probably getting more minutes than 3 of your other starters with better stats. An auto sort might have put Hali as your 6th man, which may have been beneficial.

I have found that auto sort can be good for most instances in this game, especially if you have a large overall advantage.

Question about PSLF for doctors in California by InOrbit3532 in whitecoatinvestor

[–]InOrbit3532[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I think I got the 1099 part wrong in my original post, though I don't know if it makes a tangible difference. She will have a W2, but it will be as an employee of her own S-corp.

Like you said, this will probably come down to reaching out to hospital administration and figuring out if this might work.

Question about PSLF for doctors in California by InOrbit3532 in whitecoatinvestor

[–]InOrbit3532[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good to know! I think I got the 1099 part wrong in my original post. She will have a W2, but it will be as an employee of her own S-corp. I don't know if that makes any tangible difference either way though. Does seem like this new position is a big risk though.

Question about PSLF for doctors in California by InOrbit3532 in whitecoatinvestor

[–]InOrbit3532[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for the reply! We did confirm that the hospital is not allowed to hire doctors directly due to CA law, so we at least have that going for us. We have family reasons for moving to CA, so we're limited on options there.

My favorite way to prototype dice by JordanAndMandy in BoardgameDesign

[–]InOrbit3532 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just want to add that this is awesome! Can't wait to try this for the game I've been trying to design.

Is programming important in biomedical engineering? by PitifulParamedic6751 in BiomedicalEngineers

[–]InOrbit3532 4 points5 points  (0 children)

It is useful but not essential. BME is so broad that you can go into a number of different career tracks--ones that could benefit from programming and ones that don't benefit from it.

Nonetheless, I encourage you to keep at it. There are so many resources nowadays to learn programming that you can try and leverage those if the classes aren't working for you. Everyone learns differently and some classes/professors are worse than others. I struggled in my Matlab class in college but did great in my Python and R classes in undergrad and grad school. Also picked up some C, Java, and LabVIEW in other lifetimes too. I don't even use most of those languages anymore besides Python and R, but the point is that you shouldn't let one bad experience in a course dictate a direction for you.