Graph Paper Games

I haven't posted in any of my blogs for a couple of weeks, mostly because I haven't done anything particularly hobby-related in that entire time. But, as a way of, um, kickstarting my hobby enthusiasm, I got my Vampire-level Reaper Bones Kickstarter package, along with the red dragon and Cthulhu upgrade. Oh yes, and the Reaper paint set too, just for good measure. Now I need to get going and start the 100+ miniatures involved.

The Doom Pool at one point: 4d12, 3d10, 2d8, and 1d6 When last we saw our heroes... The Ferret, Abrasax, and Mr. Eternity had successfully stopped Empyrean from obtaining alien DNA from the Celestial, but only because the Celestial had mysteriously returned to life as the Dark Celestial.  Now the Dark Celestial is on the loose, and the three heroes have rounded up most of the Ultimate Posse to help. Scene One The Ferret, Abrasax, Mr. Eternity, Samkhara, and Dr. Mind are approached at the HQ by Gen. Niles MacCauley of the USAF, who reports that the Dark Celestial is heading for the Strategic Air Command base at El Seguro.  There's a nuclear arsenal there, and MacCauley fears the worst.  After some very un-heroic dickering over what kind of future support the USAF would give to the Ultimate Posse, they head out in their new jet, which doesn't yet have a name. The team also sees news footage of Empyrean's trio of clone bodyguards--Crimson, Cobalt, and Viridian-...

Friday we played another game from our Marvel Heroic Roleplaying campaign.  Here's the recap: Scene One Mr. Eternity, the Ferret, and Abrasax the Guardian Gargoyle were alerted by the authorities to a break-in at a Genesis Technologies facility that manufactures military- and industrial-grade construction vehicles.  Accompanies by the new heroine the Huntress, they rushed over in their new jet (whose name hasn't quite been determined yet) and discover three supervillains--Feral, Gale Force, and Crowdsource--obviously trying to steal something.  The four heroes and three villains ended up fighting a highly destructive battle that left most the facility in ruins.  Shortly after defeating the villainous trio, Lancelot shows up, rebukes the heroes for causing so much damage, and hauls the villains off into custody. The Huntress was being played by my daughter, who wanted to try out MHR and would help flesh out the group.  The players rolled incredibly badly, a...

I just saw Star Trek: Journey Into Darkness today over the Memorial Day holiday with my family, and after some careful consideration, I have to say that it fell short of the first of the re-boot series. It's hard to talk about it without spoiling the plot, and I'll include some spoilerific comments after the break, so don't click on those if you haven't seen the movie yet. On the upside: Chris Pine has clearly been watching old Star Trek footage, because he is definitely imitating Shatner more in the movie.  Not in a bad way, just in some little mannerisms here and there. On the downside: Benedict Cumberbatch was awful.  I like him a lot in Sherlock  but he was pretty woeful in this movie.  His dialogue was limited (I think he had one multi-sentence piece the whole time) and he didn't radiate the power he needed to for the character he was (I won't say whom). Okay, the break:

If there is one element of the Old School Renaissance that is the most discordant with me, it is the issue of PC mortality.  Or rather, the element I think I would find most difficult to sell to others.  The idea is that you're going to burn through a small ream of character sheets as part of the game and that the process will be fun.  Or at least have some value.  Ignoring the "it's a good idea because Gary said so" element of the argument, the most thoughtful reasons why this is the case are the following. It encourages intelligent play.   If you're going to die from a single arrow to the neck, you're less likely to just start kicking in doors and swings swords around wildly.  You have to hire retainers, move carefully, and manage resources.  No superheroics and stupid players pay the price.  Now this only really works if the GM does a good job of providing sufficient clues for the danger: small details that can reveal the location of traps, o...

Yesterday I was attending a graduation party for a person I know through work.  Her son was graduating from the University of Kansas, and she was holding a party for him and his friends and had invited, well, everyone on the planet to attend.  At the party the host introduced to me to her nephew, whom she identified as a gamer like me.  Now my place of work had organized a fundraiser in which local youth could come and play boardgames with unlimited concessions, the proceeds of which support a local food pantry (my place of work is cool like that).  So the host was basically trying to get her nephew involved with the fundraiser the next time we do one. We, however, began talking gaming, and I told him that while I love board games, I'm more of a roleplaying gamer and a wargamer.  As might be expected we frequented the same local gaming stores, etc. and he said that he and his wife would love to find a roleplaying group to be a part of. Right now I've got a...

Tim Brannon at The Other Side is supporting the Bloghop against Homophobia and Transphobia , and while I didn't sign up to specifically support that bloghop, I will support Tim's efforts.  Prejudice against a person based on their sexual orientation is wrong, and I'm glad that in my own line of work we have made great strides to address that. Tim's doing a cool thing to support the bloghop by first offering a free copy of his RPG sourcebook The Witch in a raffle to those who link to his blog, but also is contributing the proceeds from the sale of this book from May 17 to 27 to The Trevor Project .  So go buy a copy (I'm going to, not the least of which is because I have a player in my gaming group who loves to play witches), support the bloghop, and do what's right! -Robb