Friday, March 25, 2011

Have Evil, Will Travel

One of my favorite They Might Be Giants songs is 'The Mesopotamians,' a song about a band of ancient Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian, and Sumerian emperors who drive around in their Econoline van and play gigs.  If you have somehow missed out on this gem, go watch it here.  There.  Aren't you better person now for having watched it?

I love ideas like that - and they are so fun to implement in a game.  Imagine the looks on the PCs faces when they discover that the bards who have been playing innocuously in the back corner of the local tavern for the last year are actually undead emperors from a bygone era with a desire to make music?  Then the band discovers that the PCs have been looting their tombs!  Talk about awkward.

Themed traveling groups are fun.  During one campaign, I created a traveling circus called Cirque Noir.  This circus was run by evil monsters.  The citizens of the towns and villages that the circus visited never really caught on that the evil monsters were really evil.  They just figured that the monsters were people dressed up in costume and makeup. 

The ring-mistress of the circus was a drow - who also did acrobats and used her drow-y powers to startle and confuse the crowd.  There was a strong-man ogre, a knife-throwing dark-stalker, and lesser demon who did fake magic tricks.  One of my favorites was Manny the Minotaur, who dressed in sparkly sequined clothes and carried an equally sparkly red cape.  Manny was a minotaur matador.  I was very pleased with myself for coming up with the idea, and woud laugh for hours thinking aobut it.  The party immediately began calling him Liberace.

My absolute favorite circus members were the clowns.  These were creepy two foot tall clowns with white skin, red noses, pointed hats, and fangs.  They were not wearing makeup or costumes.  They were undead.  They would throw paralysis pies at people, and squirt them with acid from flowers on their lapels.   

The clowns had a self-propelled carriage that they would travel around in.  The carriage would appear to fit an infinite amount of clowns.  The vehicle was actually a portal to another plane of existence where the undead horror clowns lived. 

The PCs stole the carriage at one point and kept in on their ship.  Later, while traveling in another plane of existence, they found where the clowns lived by accident - in a flop-house above a tavern with a portal on the wall leading back to the carriage.  Talk about awkward.

So, anyway, I enjoy themed traveling groups - and akward situations in RPGs. Feel free to use any of these idea any way you wish.

- Ark

PS - I'm inspired by events to remember the exits in back of me.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

I Never Look At My Blog Stats

I am so confident in my posts that I just don't need to look.  I know I am awesome.  I know my words are golden.  Readers swoon at my insights. I can lift cars with one hand.  My toenail clippings can cut through steel.  I can pound nails into oak planks with my penis.  I never even think of the statistics.

Um, well, on occasion, I take a peek.

By 'take a peek,' I mean that I stare at the numbers and charts until I bore a hole though my flatscreen and then click on the REFRESH link over and over again until the good folks at Blogger have to ban my IP to protect themselves against the Denial of Service attack.

What follows are a few things I've learned.  I don't do this to brag.  I do this to show you how much better your blog is doing compared to mine. :)

The big number is 6,445.  That is the 'Pageviews all time history' stat.  Most of that was generated since January when I began to blog seriously.  I am blown away by that.  That is well over 100 times the hits I've gotten in all other project - combined - since 1994.  Wow.  Thanks for watching.

The post with the most hits is "Moonlighting," a brief little ditty about exposed ass cracks at the FLGS with 255 hits.  However, most of those hits are from images searches of the picture I have in the posting of Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd.  The big search keywords are 'Moonlighting Reunion.'  This comes from Google pages all over the planet - Canada, Australia, France, Korea, Japan, Belgium, Germany, and Russia.  So what it appears like is that people all over the world are DESPERATE to know if David and Maddie will get back together again.

Sorry guys, but no, they won't.  The love is gone.

The second highest page is 'Fish in the Sea,' from people searching for FISH IN THE SEA.  Mostly from France.  WTF?  I don't get that.  Why are the French so interested in knowing about FISH IN THE SEA in ENGLISH!?!?

The biggest game related search is 'Forgotten Realms.'  I bet people are not expecting to stumble into my rants on the subject. :)

Google is how most people get to the site.  Here is the referral breakdown for blogs:

523 jrients.blogspot.com
157 eternalkeep.blogspot.com
121 cyclopeatron.blogspot.com
107 gothridgemanor.blogspot.com
101 daddygrognard.blogspot.com
 93 www.risusmonkey.com
 62 unknownzine.blogspot.com

I just gotta say - the amount of people who use Jeff's Blog as a bookmark list must be STAGGERING.

As far as Locations go, 63% of readers are coming from the US.  Our neighbors to the frigid north comprise 12 percent.  Those crazy tea swilling islanders over in Europe are about eight percent. Germans, whom contributed to about half of my genetic makeup, tied Denmark for two percent.  The other 13 percent are scattered from all over the world, with Brazil and India making huge leaps recently.  WHERE ARE THE IRISH?  Come on guys.  Suck it up and read the blog.

Firefox users are 49% of the users.  I'm not sure what all the rest of ya'll are thinking, but hey - to each there own. :)  Windows is, of course, dominant with 74%.  I am just floored, however, that people are viewing the blog with their iPhones, iPads, Blackberries, and even the Nintendo Wii! 

Okay, enough of this nonsense. I shall actually have an interesting, game related posting soon.  I swear.  I just had to get that out of my system. :)

- Ark

PS - Oh, apparently I am a Maven or something now, per the follower XP table thing..  I always thought that a Maven was a chick.  The things you learn . . .

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Something for you d24 Lovers

Okay, it's not much, but here are two list you can use with your d24s.  I'll be using them in the next Labyrinth Lord game on Saturday.  Yeah, I know 6 more would have made it d30 worthy - but I'm giving a hand to the underdog here.  :)


Common Human Names
d24 Female Male
1 Adela  Aldous 
2 Alison  Alistair 
3 Amelia  Anselm 
4 Ava  Bertrand 
5 Belle Bryce 
6 Bliss  Caine 
7 Cass  Caspar 
8 Clarissa  Cid 
9 Colette  Colin 
10 Constance  Dawson 
11 Courtney  Fuller 
12 Ella Gavin 
13 Emma  Geoffrey 
14 Eve Godfrey 
15 Joan  Kimball 
16 Katelyn  Lance 
17 Katherine  Paul 
18 Latisha  Randall 
19 Morgayne Reynard 
20 Pagan  Sterling 
21 Paige  Tristan 
22 Rachel Tucker 
23 Tristana  Wade 
24 Ysabel  Walker 

Have fun!

- Ark

Monday, March 21, 2011

A Hex on You

I was bumming around Half Price Books this weekend.  In the gaming section, I spied something with my little eye; a mess of tall, skinny, funny shaped boxes in the board games section.

It looked like some variation of scrabble.  Lexigo was the name.  Not exactly my cup of tea, but for some reason I could not avert my gaze. 

The back of the box claimed the game came with 100 hex shaped tiles. 

My mind exploded with possibilities.  I've been having a lot of fun with hex-based wilderness adventures using random land type tables.  The tiles had a blank white side.  I could draw land markings with dry erase on the back of the tiles and build a map right before the player's eyes.

I grabbed the game.  For less than seven dollars, it was a steal.

It even comes with a giant black 'dice bag' for all 100 tiles.

The plastic tiles look good and are nice and heavy.  No cheapo crap plastic here.  The big problem is that when you write on them with either dry erase or wet erase, it doesn't completely erase.  Not great for my original idea.

However, one could easily use a sharpie or acrylic paint to mark what type of land the tile represents.  And heck, you could just prepare all the tiles and draw them randomly from the bag, rather than rolling a die, then drawing the tile.  It would be easier that way.

So I'm excited.  I think this would be a cool doo-dad for wilderness adventurers.  I could even have the players draw the landforms from the bag as they explore.

Another thought struck me.  You could use this bag selection process for important random events as well - having the letters act as indicators.  I worked out percentages based on tile frequency.  Here is an example:

Tile # % Magic Weapon
[blank] 4 4% Callandor
A 8 8% Glamdring
B 2 2% Spear of Lugh
C 2 2% Tizona
D 4 4% Gáe Bulg
E 11 11% Fragarach
F 2 2% Mjolnir
G 3 3% Sting
H 2 2% Narsil
I 9 9% Axe of the Dwarvish Lords 
J 1 1% Clarent
K 1 1% Stormbringer
L 4 4% Hrunting
M 2 2% Grayswandir
N 6 6% Mournblade
O 8 8% Excalibur
P 2 2% Sword of Martin
Q 1 1% Anaklusmos
R 6 6% Joyeuse
S 4 4% Kusanagi
T 6 6% Zulfiqar
U 4 4% Orcrist
V 2 2% Broken Sword of Stubbing
W 2 2% Umbrella
X 1 1% Golf Club
Y 2 2% A Stick
Z 1 1% Air Guitar

So, looks like I'm going to have some type of fun with these tiles, even if it wasn't the original method intended by the creator. :)

- Ark

Friday, March 18, 2011

AAAUUUGGGHH!!!

Some of my earliest memories involve sitting on my mother's bedroom floor with my little sister and tracing the Peanut's characters from comic strips and redrawing them into new scenes.  I've always loved comics - and web comics makes the addiction so much easier - so much more focused into the odd niches that interest me.

Below is a list of comics that I've read religiously for a good long time - comics that have not failed to make me smile.  I know that I am probably missing some very important rpg related comics that I just never have gotten around to.

So, in the interest of sucking more morning work time away from my boss - please send me more.  I showed you mine - now you show me yours.  :)

Scott Kurtz' Player vs. Player - http://www.pvponline.com/

Obsidian's Commissioned - http://www.commissionedcomic.com/

Jeph Jacques' Questionable Content - http://questionablecontent.net/

Randall Munroe's XKCD - http://xkcd.com/

Tycho and Gabe's Penny Arcade - http://www.penny-arcade.com/

Phil Foglio's Girl Genius - http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php

Zach Weiner's Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal - http://www.smbc-comics.com/

Ashby, Jones, and Weiner's Snowflakes - http://www.snowflakescomic.com/

- Ark

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Harry Blackstone Copperfield Gandalf Fizban Polgara Merlin Stephens Rincewind Malfoy Mordenkainen Avatar Elminster Majere Dresden

I remember seeing some advertisement for a TV show a while back. The Dresden Files, I believe they called it. My first thought that it was odd to make a show about the firebombing of Dresden. Perhaps I watched too many World War 2 documentaries as a child. It seemed to be about some wizard private eye. How stupid. Almost as stupid as the vampire private eye shows from a while back.

Then, a couple of years later I think, I heard about an rpg based on the the show. That seemed even stupiderer. I quickly filed that in my 'to avoid' mental file. Tossing magic and monsters into the present day in an rpg reminded me too much of the whole White Wolf Wave. Blech.

Just recently I saw a blog with one of those 'NOW READING' blurbs, and on it was some book about this Harry Dresden character. I don't remember which blog. I didn't realize there were books. I wondered if the books came first, but that is about all the thought I gave it.

Then I happen to see the audio book for the first book, Stormfront, by Jim Butcher.  Against my better judgement, I picked it up.

I just finished it.  You know what?  I like it.

Stormfront is a great mix of film noir private eye pulp and arcane sorcery.  There are mob bosses, vampires, prostitutes, vampire prostitutes, evil plots (really evil plots) and talking heads.  It reminds me a lot of an HBO movie from about 20 years ago with Fred Ward in it - a movie I really liked called Cast A Deadly Spell.  If I remember correctly, Ward's character was just a private eye.  Dresden makes a great gumshoe - always on the wrong end of a fist.  But he is a cool wizard was well.

I was really impressed by Butcher's writing style.  It flowed well and was very evocative.  I really liked how Dresden was portrayed as well - a great character.  Some of the writing is pretty schticky - but that is kind of the whole point.

I suppose everyone else in the world has already heard about, read, or seen the Harry Dresden stuff before.  I chose to stay away - and I think it was a good choice since I got to stumble into the book before the TV series.  I don't know how the show is, but I would image, like all adaptations, it's watered down.  But I'm actually interested in seeing it now.

But not before I read the rest of the books.

I do wonder about the rpg.  Was that any good?  The magic, as the first book describes, is pretty dang cool.  It would seem to be a fun genre to romp around in.

So, if you haven't already, go read Stormfront.  It's pretty nifty.

- Ark

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Good Dice Hunting

After learning more about the Order of the d30, I wanted to go get one of those strangely shaped things.   I decided to forgo the online experience and honor my FLGS.  There are two decent gaming stores within comfortable driving distance, so the boy and I set out for adventure.  I call one the stores the 'Grumpy Man Store,' and the other the 'Cool Dude Store.' 

The 'Grumpy Man Store' is run by the Grumpy Man(tm) and his Grumpy Employees.  It is a store with an amazing amount of gaming stuff.  There are shelves and shelves of rpg books from big and small publishers, board games, boxes of ancient games stretching back decades, thousands of minis, and various gaming paraphernalia that boggles the mind.  And that is just one half of it - the other half of the store is devoted to comics and all of action figures and resin busts and other stuff involved in that particular addiction.

I have a habit of pissing off Grumpy Man(tm.)  I do this by asking for things.  It's his own fault.  He does that whole 'how can I help you' bit.  He doesn't really mean it.

"I'd looking for some dice . . "

He points to the dice rack.

" . . . some unusual dice . . ."

The vein in his forehead starts twitching.  I get the feeling that I'm about to experience a Grumpy Man(tm) moment.

" . . . in particular, a 30-sider."

His teeth clench. "What the hell?  No.  I don't have any 30-siders.  I never have had any 30-siders."

"Really?  Are you sure? I mean, you've got a lot of dice here." I ask, trying not to smile.  Am I an asshole if I like to wind up other assholes? Hmm, I shall have to ponder that during meditation.

"I don't have the money to stock weird inventory no one could afford to buy."

"So how much would a die like that cost?" I ask. 

He thinks for a second.  "Four dollars."

I shrug.  "That's not much."

"That's not the point.  You are the first person ever, in the history of this store, to walk up and ask for a thirty sided die.  Ever."

"Oh," I nodded.

He turned to his computer near the cash register and smacked the keyboard around, then wiggled the mouse.  "See," he said, pointing to what may have been a porn site.  "The company that makes those thirty sided dice went out of business years ago."

I try not to laugh.  I used to be really offended by Grumpy Man(tm.)  I did my research.  I know that several companies man 30-siders.  I know he was lying.  I've never quite understood why he hates his customers (or maybe it's just me) so much.  I stopped trying to understand a while ago.  To me, Grumpy Man(tm) is less of a store owner and more of a carnival ride.

"Oh well," I said.  "So . . . do you have any 24-siders?"

After the fun at Grumpy Man Store, (it's an absolutely wonderful place to browse games,) we went to the Cool Dude Store.  The Cool Dude(tm) devotes most of his floor space to gaming tables.  His inventory has been shrinking over the years as he makes space for more and more gamers.  He's just about abandoned aisle shelves, instead bolting everything to the walls.

I walked in and ask for a 30-sider.

"Sorry, I don't carry those," the Cool Dude says.  He whipped out a catalog.  "If you want, I'll order you one though.  They are right here on this page.  What color?"

Give the man a prize.  I ordered one.  Heck, I should have ordered fifty.

I did, however, pick up nifty pack of GameScience dice.  I always want to call the company "Science Diet.'  I'm not sure why.  Anyway, it's a twelve-piece set, so not I can roll d3, d4, d5, d14. d16, and d24 with the rest of the uber-geeks - and I can do it with complete randomity.  I think my nether regions just swelled with gamer excitement.

There is a big problem, however.  The beautiful ruby red gems have no color to the actual numbers.  I'm having flashbacks of 1981 all over again.  I'm wondering - rather than whip out my crayon box (yes, I have a crayon box - mine - no they are not the boy's - he has his own and is not allowed to touch my crayons,) I'm wondering if I could color the numbers in some other way.

So, does anyone out there have experience with 'inking' or whatever, dice?  I figure I might could use acrylics, but I'm also thinking that the acrylics won't hold very well and will chip and fall off.  But then again, I just don't know.  Does anyone have experience with this?

Otherwise, I'll have to write a blog entry about how I screwed up a pack of Science Diet dice.

- Ark