Puddingwrestler's Perfidious Playthings, or: Alliteration and Carpentry FTW!

[puddingwrestler]

I have decided to make one thread to rule them all. To wit: a single thread in which can be contained much muttering about my current wooden toy making binge. Because it's not all going to be boats you know.

By way of introduction, allow me to lazily copy and paste the introduction from my wooden boat thread:

Last [fortnight] the esteemed woodwork teacher of my school announced he would open the mighty workshops of the trades wing every tuesday evening for staff to pursue some projects and spend some social time hitting nails together. That is, the staff would come together to hit nails. Although I guess we could just get a few nails and whack them together. Might not be that interesting...
So naturally, I started thinking about making wooden toys.

Things kicked off with the building of the mighty Floor Games Flotilla.
Wot haz itz own fread, as the Orks say.
Here are a few pics anyway. Because I can.




And now for muttering about the future!

Having visited my parents, I have now accumulated various of my father's books, including the excellent Ivor Carlysle scrollsaw toy book. This has lead to planning the following projects:

• A floatable wooden cargo ship with removable cargo blocks
• A magnetic crane to remove said cargo
• A wooden block balancing game
• Wooden toy biplanes* with removable pilots based on Ivor Carlysle's figure designs
• A toy barn/farmhouse with farmer and animals. An orc farmer.

Mostly developing my own plans and patterns, but if anyone knows sources for good stuff let me know.

When things happen, you shall hear of them first here!
Unless you work at the same school as me, in which case you may even see them come to fruition in the woodwork room.

*Yes, one will have floats. And red triangle markings.

[Weaver]

Would a joke about the staff nailing each other be inappropriate? 

Those look great!

[puddingwrestler]

About as appropriate as jokes about having wood.

[zenrat]

Those would go against the grain.

[Weaver]

About as appropriate as jokes about having wood.

Ah, barking up the wrong tree then?

[NARSES2]

How about some wooden WWI style tanks and armoured vehicles ?

[puddingwrestler]

Was planning to do planes and cars first, but tanks could be done. A tank floor game would certainly be a possible thing, it'd play basically like the ship game but look different. If it was WW1, there'd have to be different dice used by different tanks. I can see a British MK.IV getting two shots using D20s since it had the two heavy guns, but a German A7V had one heavy gun and a bunch of machine guns, so it's have to use say one D20 for the main gun and D10s for the machine guns or some such.

[puddingwrestler]

Tomorrow's wood work session shall involve completing the second forward battery cruiser, preparing some glue-ups for a biplane and roadster project I have planned, and building a Toppollo game.

Toppollo is a balancing block game I have created. I'm pretty sure someone else has already created basically the same game, but I can't find anything on Board Game Geek which is that close. It's a pretty obvious idea for a game, and it's pretty self explanatory.

TOPPOLLO RULES

Object of the game: to get rid of all your blocks.

Components:
Toppollo Tower (basically a small plywood table just large enough to hold four blocks - in my case 60mm diameter)
Four sets of blocks, consisting of:
Cube
Oblong
Cylinder
Wedge
Pyramid
Arch
Curve (the bit cut out of the block to make the arch)
Slanted Oblong
Slanted Cylinder
(these will be made from 30X30mm pine and 25ish mm dowel - closest I could get to 30mm dowel)

Setup:
Place the Toppollo Tower on a hard, flat surface such as a table or board within easy reach of the the players.
Each player is given a complete set of blocks.

Starting the game:
Each player takes their cylinder piece and tosses it underarm towards the tower. The player to land their cylinder closest to the center of the tower goes first. Blocks are allowed to touch the tower and land on top of the tower.

Playing the game:
Players take it in turns to place one of their blocks.
Blocks must be placed on the Toppollo Tower or on top of blocks which are already on the tower.
If any blocks fall off the tower, the player whose turn it is takes these blocks into their collection.
The first player to get rid of all their blocks is the winner.

Pretty simple, and it should not take long to cut all the blocks out. The tower will be made from plywood and slot together. I'll try to make it collapsible for storage, but it might end up being permanent. We shall see.

Time permitting, I'd also like to scroll saw some bodies for figures. I found 25mm plain wood beads at a craft shop, with 6mm holes drilled through them. Perfect for making heads on little toy figures. The figures themselves will be used for the biplane and roadster I am planning. The idea is they sit in slots made into the toys, an can be changed around. I'll make other toys with compatible slots as well - I'm thinking a boat and a tractor are possibilities. Maybe a tank to please NARSES2.

[NARSES2]

 

[puddingwrestler]

Ran out of time to make all the Toppollo blocks - I did not make the pyramids, curves or arches. The rest of the blocks and the stand are done, and I'm going to test-play tonight.
Some very sketchy in workshop tests make me think that the oblong and cube pieces are too easy to balance, and might be phased out or altered in some way - ends cut to angles or some such.
Also got a start on some toy biplanes and cleaned up the remaining turrets for the ships. I still have not had time to make the second forward battery cruiser.
Pics tonight.

[puddingwrestler]

Toppollo had it's first play test tonight, and proved to have a drug-level addictive affect upon five year old girls. Well, a five year old girl.

The complete Toppollo set so far - no arches, curves or pyramids yet.

The game worked well, getting very intense and entertaining. The fact that my novice level sawing skills made blocks not quite square and angles slightly variable added to the chaos and worked out well. Some blocks, like the oblong and cube are easy to use, others are very hard. I want to test the game with the three missing pieces and if the oblong and cube are still too easy they'll be elliminated or have edges cut to subtle angles to add to the chaos.


Mad Juzzy the Flutist, resplendant in Star Wars Pyjamas in honour of the day places a block.

Having stollen my hat as is her long standing habbit, his daughter places a block.

Starting to look interesting...

While Mad Juzzy the Flutist photographs things, I honour tradition by throwing up the rabbit ears behind the tower.

After about five games we talked the daughter into sleeping. It was not easy - Juzzy did not appreciate the opiate-like grip the game has on the young mind. I stacked all the blocks from the three player game to see how it looked...

[Captain Canada]

Very cool. The floating cargo ship and magnetic crane sound like a great and fun idea ! Glad yourself and the daughter had so much fun, sure looks like it !

[puddingwrestler]

That's not me or my daughter - that is my esteemed flute riddled opponent and his daughter.

[puddingwrestler]

Tonight, I tested Toppollo on teenagers at my Games Club.
They invented 'expert mode'.
Then the four who were unable to play due to piece numbers invented Dice Toppollo, using spare D20s, D10s, D8s etc. Also beads we were using as markers.
Pics here.
There is also talk of trying to build 'Giant Toppollo' for GeekFest 2017 (in January some time - the date is not finalised yet.)

[Weaver]

Splendid! You should patent this and speak to manufacturers: seriously. 

Presumably 'Beast Mode' would add spheres to each set...