random average

The clearest review of 3.5 that I've seen is here:

This release is like Microsoft charging for software updates. If you love the operating system and are devoted to it, you'll buy it. If you're a casual user, you'll ignore it until a time comes when you need it, or have the means to get it. If you're a first-time user, by all means, this is for you. If you prefer another operating system, it becomes moot. If you thought 3.0 and the D20 system was "broken", a common euphemism for "these rules aren't to my taste so let's just hate them", you're not going to be impressed by 3.5, either.

Posted by Doyce at 2:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Creative Guy asks "is it time to hang it up?" (Referring to what is, apparently in his neck of the woods, a dearth of players willing to do more than your basic hack-n-slash. I can't comment there, so I'll comment here:

I disagree. Transcribing quoted bits to respond to here:

Based on discussions currently happening on the message boards, perhaps it's time for me to acknowledge that the roleplaying community really has grown so inbred that there's no place for a guy like me.

Message boards? I work with a player-based, just counting my friends, of over a dozen people. Moving that out to include cool acquaintences in the local area, that number number jumps to the low thirties. I didn't meet any through a message board, nor do I correspond with any in that fashion -- perhaps the medium just doesn't attract that style of gamer you're looking for.

The problem? These [good] people are spread all over the place. Getting them at a table even once a month? Never gonna happen.

You never know until you try, and you simply must try. I ran TiHE for two and a half years, every week, on a weeknight, and every one of the players worked full-time at demanding professional jobs. The closest participant in the game lived 35 minutes from our house and had to get up at five a.m. the next morning.

In my current biweekly-Saturdays Nobilis game I've got two players with an toddler who drive up 70 miles from Colorado Springs to the game, getting there later than most because one has to get off work first.

In the other biweekly-Saturdays game (Amber), one player drives down to our house (southern Denver) from Boulder. Look it up on a map, or can summarize: It's Far. (That same player comes down on the other Saturday for Nobilis.)

In my d20 games, I've got a couple driving down from Broomfield (see: Boulder) every week, no less than a 75 to 90 minute drive, during Friday-night rush-hour traffic.

Is it harder? Hell yes. Can it be done? Absolutely.

In the past three years I've played with (let's see) with four people who gave a damn about the things I give a damn about.

There are more. There are always more. When I moved to Denver I suspected I'd never game again. I'd left every one of my gaming buddies behind in a college town and didn't expect to ever see or play with any of them again, and didn't know how to go about meeting new gamers.

I finally posted a message on the board of a local gaming store, talking about roleplaying, innovation, and mature players. I got two calls. One was from a guy who I still game with once or twice a weekend. The rest just tumbled into place.

It took about three years to really get going again, but it did get going.

We've come to a point in the hobby where if one wants to do more, to step outside the maze of 10'x10' corridors, people wonder why bother?

We haven't come to that point -- those people have always been there. I simply don't game with them.

The game industry has matured to the point where we can have something truly innovative, even brilliant, like Nobilis come along, only to crash and burn.

[looks around] I don't see any crashing and burning. Heck, the Nobilis mailing list sees more activity every month since I've joined, from a steadily-increasing group of participants.

The vast majority of gamers want to keep their eyes fixed on the ground in front of them and, boy, if it doesn't irritate the hell out of them when somebody looks up.

90% of everything is crap. Yes. I agree. However, 10% is still a workable percentage.

Unless you're a thirtysomething parent who spends the vast majority of your time in or near your home, your gaming experience probably has no parallels to mine.

I chuckled at this part. If you know me, you're probably chuckling to. Suffice it to say that I've found being a thirtysomething parent who spends the vast majority of his time in or near his home to be no great hindrance to my gaming. Is it harder than it was in college? Sure. Doable? Sure.

I love the Creative Guy. I do. I solidly disagree with the fatalistic tenor of this particular post, but I love this guy. I do agree with a lot of his assessments of the average gamer and the average game group.

I just think (from personal experience) that such things are surmountable.

Posted by Doyce at 11:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Perverse Access Memory: WISH 57: System, Setting, Style, and Play

Do you find that you play differently when you play in different game systems? For instance, do you approach D&D or Champions the same way you approach Vampire or Werewolf the same way you approach Amber or Nobilis? Do you build the some kinds of characters? What are some examples of different characters in different systems, and why do you think they evolved that way?

This goes back to the post (and lengthy number of comments on) from a few days back (Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes, for those keeping track at home.)

This is more evident in the comments, but I think it's clear that a person's perception of the game they're going into strongly influences the kind of character they're going to make up.

In my currently running DnD game, few of the characters are deeply involved in what I would call character-driven plotlines. This is basically an evolution of the game as it's being run, which in my mind is a largely mindless hackfest with a vaguely overarching plot.

(I love the group, I do... but if it quacks, it's a duck.)

One of the players commented that, with a lot of time having gone by, we really hadn't had much in the way of exploring the setting that he'd read about on the web page.

Well, no, we hadn't (and, I should note, haven't) because that isn't the way the group went... the majority showed up expecting an old-style dungeon crawl, so that's what I gave them -- the setting has thousands of nooks and crannies to cram bad guys into... I can do a game that way.

There's a good quote in a Hitman 2 walkthrough that I read a few weeks ago:

"In this mission, you can basically succeed two ways... you can sneak in, arrange for the target to die, and sneak out, without anyone even knowing you were there, or you can go in, guns blazing, and kill everyone. I'm going to focus on the sneaky version, because the other way isn't... you know... hard."

We chose the easy option -- people's perceptions of what the game was going to be hugely affected the type of game I ended up running -- the group that I wrote the website material for was frankly not the group that ended up playing the game. C'est la vie.

The same's true of any game. I chuckle and shake my head when someone tells me that my Star Wars game has much more 'story' and 'character development' to it than a DnD game... see, due to running about fifty games a month, I take a lot of free, online modules, file off the serial numbers, throw in some familiar NPCs into certain roles to lend it an air of continuity, and let the players do the rest -- probably half of the sessions I ran for Star Wars (which ran for just about two years) were based on Standard DnD modules I downloaded from WotC.

The player's think there's depth, so there is... if they don't look for it, there isn't.

Sometimes, I want to conduct an experiment -- tell everyone that I'm going to run... hell, I don't know, a diceless swashbuckler game where everyone plays close advisors to the King... or an Amber game, whatever. Ask for character write ups. Then, run it using straight d20 rules, first level -- see if I can get them to break out the magic Box of Limited Expectation that's been built around one game system or another.

Posted by Doyce at 11:56 AM | Permalink

In my Palm, July 6th, 2003:

1st TiHE Game Session (not counting bidding war - 1997)

Six years ago... wow.

Posted by Doyce at 9:36 PM | Permalink

August sucks for scheduling games.

Posted by Doyce at 8:45 PM | Permalink

Randy and I were having a conversation last night about character ideas and starting power levels. I'm one of those people that enjoys starting out at first level with a campaign. Randy isn't, perferring instead to begin play with a character that more closely matches the capabilities of the orginal character concept.

There was a lot to say on the subject...

To a certain extent, I put this down to which game each of 'imprinted' on. I'm a Lonely DnD Player from way back -- getting the pink boxed set of DnD stuff via the Sears catalog when I was ten and spending three years just working out the rules and making character after character, trying to figure out how it all worked with no examples, no help, and no other players. I became enamored with the process of character creation, looking at the new sheet and thinking about all the ways that the character could go as things progressed. Starting out on a game like that makes me automatically think in terms of The Beginning Character -- the One Who Doesn't Know What's Going On. (Look at Hidden Things and Strange Weapons... same deal.)

Randy imprinted on Amber, where the characters start out completely competent at any skill they include in their background, fully capable in sorcery (if they take it), able to change reality at a whim, and (normally) able to handily embarrass or subjugate any 'normal human' they run into. Decades, perhaps centuries of the character's life has passed before we ever focus on them for the game's story.

That's a simple explanation of why I like starting a d20 character with the beginning power levels and Randy prefers a more advanced version. I do see the argument for an advanced character in some cases -- sometimes the GM has a game she wants to run that involved defeating 2000 mummies, and sometimes you want to play the character you envision, not the character that might eventually become that character after 133 life-threatening encounters. It's about having what you want. I get that.

On the other hand, I've run games where the players told me "We'd just like to be better than first level when starting off -- if that throws off the bell-curve or makes us too powerful for the end of the arc, then start us at 5th or 6th and just leave us there until we would have gotten there anyway, or double the experience points to advance levels for awhile, or something."

That doesn't work. I'd like to say it does -- in the campaign (OA) where I did that we survived the process -- but it didn't work. The main reason is the same as the one behind why I like playing beginning characters.

It's not the having that's important, it's the acquiring; the change that occurs with your character needs to be a semi-constant thing that tangibly affects them (and you) -- slowing that down to a crawl, even when your character is all pumped up and touch, is eventually unsatisfying -- it's not fun to be static. Again, starting things out at a higher power level is fine (not usually my cup of tea, but that's not relevant), but don't start people out a higher level and just slow down advancement to make up for it -- people will eventually resent it.

It's change that really jazzes most people, even if they don't realize it. It's one of the reasons that d20 is still popular: Levels -- you get into a new one and BOOM, stuff changes: your base attack gets better, your saves might improve, ditto skills, maybe a new feat or class ability... heck, there's people whose eyes will dilate just thinking about it -- it's not that they're power gamers -- it's exciting. I think that a lot of people who want to start out at higher level might subconciously want to get that 'charge' all at once. That's not always the case (in some instances, granted, you can't play the really whacked out, cool idea you have without a few more points), but I think it might be so more times than most folks realize.

Maybe that's obvious to most people, but I'd never really thought about it in those terms before. :)

Posted by Doyce at 11:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Some nostalgic chatting via email about playing SpaceHulk back in college led me to find this: QSpaceHulk : the total conversion of the Space Hulk boardgame:

Space Hulk is a great board game of Games Workshop in the world of Warhammer 40000. This is a two player turn-based game where one play the 'Marine', the other play the alien called 'Genestealer'.
This video game is a complete conversion of the board game with the 2nd edition rules. Well, I know there is some fans discussion to know whether the 1st or the 2nd edition of the rules is the better. For my part, I only played the 2nd edition, that's the edition this game is based on.
The project is aiming at providing a way to play SpaceHulk on your computer exactly as you could do it with the real board version but with some extra : you can play via network (no need to have two players in the same room) synchronized or asynchronized (via e-mail), and you will even be able to play solo against an artificial intelligent opponent. Currently, only HotSeat and Play-By-Email mode game are implemented. You can see some screenshots or download it.

I always thought this would be a completely do-able game via some sort of turn-based email interface. Looks like I'm right. I LOVE being right.

MAN I can hardly wait to get home and try this thing out.

Update: There's apparently also a Visual Basic-based Space Hulk SP (Single Player)

Posted by Doyce at 3:36 PM | Permalink

Roll the Bones: Role Call 25: The ideal group:

"What qualities would your ideal group possess?"

Honestly, I think I've been blessed in this regard throughout almost all of my gaming 'life'. When I was in high-school, my group suited me right down to the ground: lots of hack, lots of slash and the sort of group that found going through all fourteen Dragonlance modules to be an eye-opening venture into 'real' roleplaying.

Ahh, youth.

In college, I went one very dry year without really playing anything, then got into a really great group where we alternated between a DnD game run by me and another one run by Lonnie Kruse -- the first game where I went through an entire session without drawing a weapon or attacking anything.

(Actually, that was perhaps the first game I ever PLAYED, as opposed to GM, which was cool.)

I met a lot of gamers during college (due in no small part to starting up a collegiate-sanctioned student organization for role-playing gaming) and I enjoyed a lot of what we did back then immensely, although a few of the games still stand out in my mind. Back then what I was looking for was enthusiasm and a willingness to try anything that wasn't DnD. This finally culminated in two of my favorite games: Mythus Fantasy and my first campaign of Amber Diceless (Keys to the Pattern, for those keeping track at home.) Two game systems more dissimilar you could not imagine, but I enjoyed both of them immensely.

These days, I look for group compatibility. If the players don't seem like the kind of folks who could enjoy hanging out with each other in some other social situation, then I have to wonder if it's a good idea to include them in the game. With very few exceptions, all the people I game with now are people I spend time with when I'm not gaming.

The other big one is creative commitment. I put a lot into the games I'm running, and I always respond better to a player who puts a lot of effort into their characters as well. Show me that you're putting time into your character and I will reciprocate -- if you aren't, I'll try a few things to get you into that active frame of mind, but if I still don't get anything back, I disengage. The one problem I have with DnD is that it puts players into a Passive state of mind where they are merely responding to what's happening -- the vast history of the game itself encourages you to sit and wait for someone to hire you.

Bah, I say. Get out and do something -- make up a personal project for yourself: start a school, build a monastery, buy an Inn. If you're just showing up to roll some dice and kill whatever monsters I pull out of the book, then I'll try to make you happy, but I guarantee that I won't be.

The people that are writing up journals and plans... those are going to be the people that the story is going to be about... everyone else is going to come off as supporting cast. I try to work around that, but sometimes I'm simply wired that way.

Posted by Doyce at 5:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So my biggest problem with the games I'm running right now are:

1. Most are too big (have too many participants).
2. There are too many.

The most recent development in this is, of course, that the Star Wars game came to a screeching halt on pre-game on Friday, two sessions before I'd planned to wrap it up.

So I've been thinking a lot about the games I run, why I run them and how I get into certain situations that leave me with bad endings like the Prince of Alderaan got me. Also recently, I got one of those personality evaluations at work, via the Insights system and, while it's not perfect, it does pretty damn well with only twenty-five questions, and says a lot about my strengths and weaknesses as a ... well, person, actually, but also as a gamer. Here's some excerpts, applied to the problems I mentioned above.

The Good

Doyce is sympathetic, empathic and affable and can be very effective in using his concern for others to ensure involvement.

I should note that this is a work-oriented eval, but it certainly applies to any group gathering/function, which makes is unusually salient for gaming.

Although his feelings are deep they can change quickly with his mood. He tends to be light-hearted and sunny, and because he constantly seeks to avoid painful experiences, he tends to steer away from personal anxieties.

It is a storytelling weakness of mine that I do not enjoy the scenes of personal confrontation -- it bothers me less if I'm playing one of the people involved in the scene, because I know *I* don't mean it. I'm considerably less sanguine when a scene calls for two players to be in conflict, because I'm always worried that someone's going to take something personally.

He likes to be remembered and appreciated for the services he continually seeks to offer to others.

Well, sure. I suppose that's obvious. If folks don't seem to be enjoying what I'm doing, I have to question why I'm doing it.

He tends to be fiercely loyal to his friends, prepared to sacrifice his own wants for the needs of the other person.

This is one of those bits that answers the question of 'why do I always have too many games running, and why are there almost always more people in the game than I intended?

He pays scant attention to negative, pessimistic or divisive situations or conclusions.

Again, that's a story type that I don't really focus on... it's one that personally stresses me out in a game, though I don't mind writing it into a story.

He needs to be appreciated for himself and his service, and he can be highly sensitive to indifference or criticism of the support he offers or provides.

Yeah. This is the bit that I focused on when I started to feel like hammered shit after permanently canceling the Star Wars game. Any prematurely ended game makes me feel like I personally screwed up. I hold onto that for a long time.

Don't believe me?

Music in the Wires, Shadowrun, Dark Conspiracy, Worlds Beyond, Fallen Cities, Keys to the Pattern, Brokedown Palace 1 & 2, BESM Haven, Cull, DCM 1 & 2, Prince of Alderaan.

Those are the campaigns I've started up and failed to complete to mutual satisfaction since 1991. The facts surrounding each still bug me. Doesn't count the ones that never officially got started.

Able to cope with a number of projects at once, Doyce gets a lot of enjoyment from the social aspects of his projects.

Umm. Duh. On both counts.

This next bit is funny:

He tends to live for today with a "you only go around once" philosophy. Doyce displays fierce loyalty to and for people who report to him. He enjoys socializing, but likes to plan his entertainment for maximum effect.

That would be a gamer, yes.

He is prepared to attempt almost anything, but his work needs to be active rather than theoretical. Optimistic in outlook, he is rather impulsive in decision-making.

"This game looks cool. I think I'll start a new campaign for it."

Ugh. If I could have the days back that I've wasted trying to back up that lead-in statement.

Compassion, caring, warmth and contented relationships are important to him. He probably prefers more relaxed social interaction. Do not assume this to be an indication he is not serious.

Slowly, I've really begun to hate when people ping down 'digressions' when we're playing DnD (I give out exp when I digress... it was a bad idea, not for game balance, but because I spend more time arguing about that or telling the pinger to 'hush' than the digression would have taken.)

He prefers communicating vocally rather than through the written word.

And this is why I suck at PBEMs, as a player or GM.

Looking for perfection in a relationship can result in a sense of vague dissatisfaction with the reality of the way things are.

GOD. That happens all the time. I am an Idealist. I've realized this. I'm trying to get better :P

Decision Making

Doyce will usually encourage democratic or even consensus decisions, as opposed to them imposed autocratically.

"I'll run what you guys want to play."

In decision-making he may prefer to apologize for exceeding his authority rather than getting permission in the first place.

The preceeding has nothing to do with my gaming style, it's just funny because it's so true.

In his attempts to please others he may make promises he cannot fulfill.

Word, as the man said. This very thing is usually why I end up with seven people playing in a game I'd originally planned for four. :P

Doyce's key strengths:

. Creative and future orientated visionary.

I will toot my own horn and acknowledge that I almost always have a really good idea of what the 'main story arc' is going to be.

. Assumes both authoritative and democratic leadership.

Which is really just being a GM. I wonder if this is my personality or if I learned it from GMing. Chicken, meet egg.

. Can act spontaneously.

The key of diceless gaming.

. High ego strengths.

A nice way to say I'm arrogant :)

. Can "go with the flow", particularly where people are concerned.
. His glass is usually half full.
. Approachable and affectionate with friends.
. Articulate and active in communication.
. Highly resourceful around people.
. Sensitive to the needs of others.

Yeah. Well, that was the good stuff.

Doyce's possible weaknesses:
. Does not enjoy working or being alone for long periods.
. Loses interest when the initial challenge has gone.
. Easily distracted from the routine.

Easily distracted. Yeah.

. May appear too smooth to some people.
. Overly concerned with the opinions of others.
. Over-compliant and easily led.
. Fails to recognize the finer nuances.
. Knows the answer before the question is asked.
. May exaggerate the significance of the event.
. May be perceived as too trusting.

Guilty. I have nothing more to say about this.

Strategies for communicating with Doyce: . Be alive [duh, that always helps] and entertaining. . Use lots of words and body gestures. . Be spontaneous and harmonious. . Adapt to sudden changes in direction.

Heh.

. Sprinkle in praise, flattery and compliments.

True, but I'm curious if there's a personality type for which this isn't a good thing.

. Encourage him to stick to the agenda.
. Avoid unnecessary distractions - keep to the point.

Jackie read this and just laughed and laughed. I'm so glad I can entertain her after so long. :P

When communicating with Doyce, DO NOT:
. Use destructive criticism or create unnecessary conflict.
. Overload him with facts, details and paperwork.
. Appear slow, sluggish or too formal.

These three things above seem so damn negative to me that I, as a person, have to wonder if they are ever a good thing -- though objectively I know that they are.

. Do not get carried away by his enthusiasm.

Man, if my players in college had only known this, they would have saved themselves dozens of hours of effort from not making up characters for campaigns I never ended up running.

. Do not assume you will complete all of your agenda.

Har. Hardiharhar. Har. Yeah, Jackie laughed at this too.

. Do not speak too slowly or hesitantly.
. Do not talk slowly, mumble or whisper.

Justin's learned those two.

Doyce's possible Blind Spots:
He may be so focused about the feelings of others that he can be blind to important facts when the situation will mean hurt feelings.

Translation: he'll agree to do things he doesn't want to so that everyone's happy, or at least happier. :P

Highly vulnerable to idealizing relationships, he tends to overlook facts that contradict what he wants to believe.

Again, this isn't oriented towards gaming, but it affects my perception of everyone I know, so...

He responds well to praise, but is easily hurt by negative criticism.

Bear with Thin Skin Ahead. Approach with Caution.

If he were more humble and modest

... which he isn't...

he would recognize that he does have certain limits.

And the grand finale:

Doyce may feel pressured to make decisions and commitments too quickly, before he has had adequate time to consider the full implications of his actions.
He frequently overlooks his own needs due to his desire to please other people.

Which lead me to the place I'm in most of the time, overcommited, playing or running 2.5 games a weekend and mentally exhausted. (And people wonder why I use modules for some of the games.)

Possible upside: working on so many things at once keeps me from burning out on any single game too early. Maybe.

Posted by Doyce at 11:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Via SfAD, the UPC Bar Code Character Generation.

Posted by Doyce at 10:10 PM | Permalink

Two-Fisted Tales from Spectre Press, available as a PDF or book.

Posted by Doyce at 9:45 PM | Permalink

Something I've mentioned before: someone who took Nobilis and the League of Extradinary Gentlemen comic and came up with Convention game.

Nobilis: The League of Extraordinary Americans

Posted by Doyce at 11:03 AM | Permalink

Perverse Access Memory: WISH 56: Friends and Associates

Do your characters have friends and associates who play a regular role in the game? What about henchmen and hirelings in the old D&D sense or Champions-style DNPCs? How does your group handle playing them? What sorts of things are they used for in the game? Is their influence good, bad, or indifferent?

Hmm. This bears some categorized responses.

D&D game
One player's picked up the Leadership feat, but ended up with an NPC that he doesn't take anywhere -- not exactly sure why he picked up the Feat, if that was his goal. Anyway.

Other than that, not really, although the mage has a 'bodyguard' in the form of an evil charmed rogue/fighter that was trying to kill her awhile back. She's become annoyed that the woman hasn't 'come around' -- the charm makes her like the mage, but she still hates all the goody-two-shoes in the group and finds the few 'acceptable' characters in the group too... coarse. The mage has taken to sending her off into innocuous-seeming-but-likely-deadly scouting missions, so I doubt that counts as 'friends'.

Aegyptian Game
I'm actually playing a priest for this with Leadership and a cohort, but since I'm playing the cohort as well (to provide some firepower and comic relief), that doesn't really count.

OA
Despite traipsing all over the map, the group regularly encounters a few NPCs that they've known since session one -- when you're attending all the important social gatherings in an Oriental setting, certain people keep turning up. Tonbo Genso is probably the main one right now -- everyone likes him, and refers to him as "the poet", simply because he won a poetry competition the first time he interacted with the group.

There's also a couple 'foil' characters from the shady Scorpion clan that the group sees every now and then, and Mako-styled Witch-hunter from the Crab clan that I want to use some more. We'll see.

I would also be remiss if I didn't mention Kot t'uk, the Nezumi (ratling) who swore himself into the service of Randy's character Gu. I regret only that I haven't had much time to play him up, but he fills a very needed gap in the group's skill set (as a tracker).

Also, there's Menho-the-Boss, who is normally too wrapped up in his curse to chit-chat. It's ironic that I've roleplayed scenes with the NPCs who aren't around all the time more than I have with the NPCs who are in this game. Weird.

Star Wars
If we're discounting love interests, then Nayda doesn't count, and if she doesn't count, then there's no other 'yes' answers in this game.

Nobilis
Bonanza. There are any number of peer-level, non-romantic relationships going on in this game, not to mention the fact that the game is designed to make sure that most players have at least one Important NPC that they deal with on a regular basis. To day, there's Avrileros (who's essential coming in as a 'mutual respect' sort of peer), Senachiel (Marquis of Lost Things and possible future love interest), Haley (the Power of Imagination whose sort of 'adopted' the stunted social growth of one of the characters), Hank (the Bukowski-like mortal anchor for one of the PCs), Cerny (a peer of Death and 'professional acquaintence', although he's not exactly friendly at the moment), Byron, Goose, Tinkerboy, and a laundry-list of others that I haven't had a chance to introduce yet.

And that doesn't even include The Boss.

Amber
In TiHE, the main NPCs 'friends' where Kethos and Vaughn. Kethos was a sort of Lascivious peer to Jackie's character, whom I had fun with here and there, while Vaughn (Flora's son) attached himself to Dierdre's kids (first Ander and then Brea). My favorite line of his was when he told Brea "I'm one of the princes, sure, but I'm not the sort of person that people write stories about -- I'd rather play a supporting role in your story than be the hero of mine."

So: I guess I use them to fill holes in the group (though I'm horrible about remember them when they're needed), but mostly they're there to provide a peer that people can talk with, work out problems with, provide advice (both good and bad and always biased, I hope). That sort of thing.

Posted by Doyce at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I almost don't want to teach Justin how to play Dice Castles, since he'd probably do it during our 'real' games, but the mental exercise would be pretty cool.

Posted by Doyce at 9:36 AM | Permalink

Jackie got an email notice today that her 3.5 PHB is shipping.

Me? Nothing. Why? Because I preordered my stuff too soon.

Yeah. A lovely but little-known fact of Amazon pre-orders is that, once they get the book in, they start shipping out in reverse order of the date the order was placed.

So... the longer you wait to pre-order, the faster you'll get the book. Makes a hell of a lot of sense.

Posted by Doyce at 3:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

For anywhere from $2.50 to $6, The Language of Flowers is a steal and terribly terribly useful for a Nobilis game.

It's a very simple book: the first half is lists of flowers in alphabetical order, matched to their traditional message/meaning. The second half of the book is arranged alphabetically by meaning/message, with the flower following. Good stuff, and pocket-sized.

Posted by Doyce at 3:53 PM | Permalink

hypocorisma: a weblog on names :: in other words, pure RPG gold.

Posted by Doyce at 11:12 AM | Permalink

Mongoose Publishing: Babylon 5 RPG, due to hit local shops any day now.

I'm only surprised it took this long for someone to get this license. I'm not surprised it's d20.

All the previews are up on the web site. Tidbits include a sneak peek at the rules for Telepathy and a few of the major characters on board Babylon 5 -- including Sinclair and Ivanova.
Fiery Trial, the first story arc, will be shipping to distributors this week.

I'm of two minds about this. First: cool. Mongoose is going the way of the licensed BESM products: half game-book, half sourcebook, so that there's lots of good stuff even if you're 'just' a fan of the show with no interest in the game. They repeat a number of times in the production blurbs that the book is 'more detailed than anything you've ever seen from yadda yadda yadda', so that's good.

Second: this is Mongoose. Mongoose is a mixed bag for me -- on one hand, I like their stuff, but on the other, they have a REAL tendency to come up with REALLY COOL IDEAS that are in no way balanced within the d20 system.

Emphasis: Often really cool. Often not balanced.

For an example, I present the Quintessential Monk book -- the 'varied paths' that they came up with for monks, coming up with 'substitution sets' of alternate feats for the free stuff that monks get as they progress to give you a dozen 'variant' monks that are nicely balanced... that's beautiful.

The prestige classes from the same book? An abomination before man and GM. Wow. Absolute crap. Cool concepts? Absolutely. But game busters? Wow.

So you'll have to understand my trepidation -- do I think they're going to come up with some great ways of handling the deep, intriguing bits of the B5 setting. I think they will be fantastic at that... Story they understand.

Game balance? Well, we'll see.

Posted by Doyce at 9:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)

Prompted by watching the Prophecy, Dracula, and seeing similar stunts in the LoEG trailers, I present this bit of fluff for Nobilis (though, like many Nobilis Gifts, I'd rather have it in Amber :)

Gift: Body Swarm
Greater Change of Self (9) Self Only (-3) Simple Miracle (-1) One Trick (-3) Uncommon (1) = Cost: 3

This gift allows you to change into a flock/swarm/pack of vermin or small winged critters... pick one type of critter, whatever works best for the character -- power of Heaven might go for white doves or butterflies, a power of Light might go for sparrows or honeybees, a power of Hell might select bats or rats or something equally disturbing. Generally, the animal needs to be fairly small -- swarms of Condors might be a bit much. As a rough guideline, ten little critters will manifest for each Wound Level the character has, and killing off ~10 of the things will inflict a Wound level on the character. Other than that, you consciousness is pretty much distributed over the whole group, which might make it easy to spy on many people (provided you've got the Aspect to process all that incoming information), though there should probably be some logical limit on how far apart the individual critters can be spread out... call it a mile.

Posted by Doyce at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Dave's Mythical Creatures

Posted by Doyce at 1:00 PM | Permalink

Roll the Bones: Role Call 24

Have you ever felt like it was time to take a break, short or long, from roleplaying?

A few months ago, I had every intention of ending my bi-weekly Star Wars game -- 2/3rds of it isn't really working for me, and while I like the story arc, I just don't have the time to make it really come out right (or the desire to make the time).

In a sense, I'm still ending the game, but with a couple of the players getting ready to move to Texas, I decided to keep it going long enough to finish the current arc. I've had some reasonably good ideas recently in that regard, and it should end up (a) interestingly and (b) soon -- both of which are pretty important to me.

I think it's important to mix up your games -- play a bunch of different styles of stuff -- modern, fantasy, horror, and both diced and diceless. It keeps everything fresh and keeps you from getting sick of the 'same old thing' that can crop up when using the same system for three different games (*coff*guilty*coff*).

Posted by Doyce at 11:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Perverse Access Memory: WISH 51: New Genres

What are three genres that you’ve had limited exposure to as a gamer that you’d like to try or play more of?

Listed quickly:

I'd really like to play some 'spy genre' stuff -- I've got an awful lot of spycraft d20 material that I could use toward this goal, but the idea here is that this is a genre I'd like to PLAY, so I haven't been reading up on too many modules. That said, the only way I'll ever get a chance to play all the character ideas I have for this genre is if I GM the thing so I can make up lots of NPCs. :P

I think it'd be fun to run some Unknown Armies stuff (dark mystic conspiracies in a modern setting, basically) but I know enough about my Usual Suspects (the folks that are easiest for me to schedule pick-up games with) to know that it really wouldn't suit that group very well.

I'd like to play in a Nobilis game. It'll probably never happen to my satisfaction, probably, since it's unlikely that I'd find a GM whose into the same tropes that I am, but maybe at a con or something...

Posted by Doyce at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Perverse Access Memory: WISH 53: Schtick

What are three examples of physical or verbal schtick that you’ve used to develop your characters?

Well, with Gwydion the Skald, it's the scottish accent, laid on nice and thick.

With Sscraseetota'bobah (you may say "Bob"), my wandering mystic in Star Wars, it's the monosyllabic, halting speech (he's not fluent in Basic).

And then there's 'thick as a brick' Tony Vincetti, with his traditional American-Italian acceent and such pithy comments as "Collateral Damage? What's that? Like, 'damage we will do in lieu of damage we're gonna do later'?"

I use schticks for most of my characters and almost all of my NPCs (or at least any of the ones I really want to stand out). I don't really know when I started doing it, but I know I do it more and more as time goes on (and as I care less about what people think of a grown man who talks with funny voices).

My current beef? I wish I was better at doing the Mako-style voice that you hear in the narrative voice-overs in Conan and Samurai Jack.

Posted by Doyce at 10:52 AM | Permalink