True20 Cheat-sheet Updated

Sablemage of the True20 forums has fixed some errors on his quick reference sheet for the True20 rules. The updated version as a .pdf can be found here.

Grigbertz Update: Mountains and Monsters

And, oh yeah, naked girls in bondage. So neither of these are safe for work. First we have “Chained Up on Madness Mountain”. The landscape is surreal and dreamlike, and while she seems to be a center of stable coherency in the picture, her flowing hair certainly seems to be more a part of the misshapen terrain. Is the flying serpent near her a friend? What is that thing flying towards them? And why is she up there? As a sacrifice? Or is this the only way she can learn the vital clue she needs?

Next we have “Dungeon Encounter”. As one of the commentators says, it’s an excellent example of Mr. Ackergård’s “ability to combine cold brutality with gentle caretaking.” It’s striking work, but leaves me a little uninspired. I think it’s the lack of context. Why is she in the dungeon? Why is he there? His utter lack of ornamentation is odd. We have no hints about who he is, what his culture is like, or why he’s there. There’s too little for my imagination to catch on and weave a story from.

Still, if you’re the sort who enjoys just letting your imagination drift, needing only the most meager starting points, be sure to check out Mr. Ackergård’s tamer galleries. You’ll find dingbat hatchlings, anthropomorphized ink blots, and a cute druidess in a new category with the promising title “Savage Tide”. Cute and bizarre seems to be the order of the day, and his technique continues to inspire.

POW! OOF! PZZZOOOOOOOSH!

These guys look like they're having fun.

Another Thoughtful Consideration of 4RT

Zoombaba has carefully studied the art released so far in the marketing of D&D’s 4^th edition and asks a very probing and vital question: “Is this the most METAL version of D&D ever?”

Consider this ... the 4e default campaign is "points of light in a dark, dangerous world." (sounds grim). Orcus is on the cover of the new Monster Manual. Paladins can be any alignment (um, meaning evil). The PH cover shows the return of hookerplate boobmail. They're getting rid of gnomes. Armored Beholders. Asmodeus is a god. Half-demon (excuse me, tieflings) PC races -- like here and, um yes, here: the hot demon chick. I mean christ, even the dwarves are hot!

I guess this does explain why everyone is holding aloft their weapons like they're posing for a Man-O-War cover. I certainly wouldn’t complain if WotC embraced the “four-stringed axe”, but I won’t be holding my breath, either.

Dancey Wraps it up All Purdy-like

Mr. Dancey has finished his series of blog posts detailing a plan to revitalize the RPG industry. His final post was basically a review and summary. Obviously, he remembered the wise words of high school English teachers everywhere: tell 'em what you're going to tell 'em, then tell 'em what you have to tell 'em, and finally, tell 'em what you told 'em.

It's definitely worth a read, especially if you haven't been following along. I had no idea what he was thinking at the beginning (which is obvious from this post), but now that's he's laid it all out, I'm mixed. Overall, I think he's got some very good ideas, but I'm at a loss as to how to implement all the points in a coherent package.

I think a lot of folks threw themselves off the rails when he mentioned "Storytelling Games". The name, honestly, isn't as important as the rebranding. To most folks not into RPGs, "roleplaying games" means "D&D". Hell, to many folks in the hobby, it still means "D&D" or all the many games like it, including "GURPS", "Shadowrun", "WHFRP", etc. Renaming the style would be a powerful marketing tool that would both get people to look at the game who might otherwise recoil at the "roleplaying" moniker, and get roleplayers to approach the game with an open mind as to how it should be played. This is vital as Mr. Dancey is intent on skewering a few sacred cows along the way.

The main area of conflict that I'm struggling with is the intersection between player-influenced and altered environments and shared worlds maintained by the "service provider" STG company. But maybe I'm overthinking things. After all, LARPs do a lot of this all the time, don't they?

And now that I think about it, you do see similar activities across the web, but most are rather free-form. We've all seen the RPG "taverns", chat-boards and IRC channels where people get together and free-form stories. Perhaps we should see this as some crossbreed between MUSH and RPG?

Maybe. I don't think that's the direction Mr. Dancey was thinking. Again, we run into the same issues. If everyone can affect the world at whim, then most of those effects will be ignored and then do we really have a shared, persistent world? What sort of utility must the service provider offer in order to earn the money of the players? WotC is hoping a combination of online DM tools, periodical content, and virtual gaming table will do it for them. But at the end of the day, the only thing you really need to play D&D is a few rulebooks, some dice, and your imagination. How do you shift the focus of RPGs from the small, insular, table of friends to the wider community?

YAF ORE Character Generator

For those of you playing "Reign", Mapache, the trickster god of RPG.net, has posted a JavaScript character generator. Even if you don't play the game, the generator is fun to play with. Here's an example character:

History

1x1 Raised Wild: Perhaps you were abandoned in the woods as a child and were nursed by wolves (or a bear, or an ape, or whatever). Maybe primitives who have no real language of their own raised you. Whatever it was, you're used to living on the edge.

Endurance 2

Hearing 3

Language 3

Language (Native) 0

Sight 2

Throwing 2

2x2 Petty Thief

Coordination 1

Dodge 1

Run 1

Stealth 3

1x3 Love Triangle: At some point, you were in love with her and she was in love with him. Or maybe she was in love with him and he was in love with you. Or maybe they were both in love with you and you didn't want either. Whatever happened, there were lots of hurt feelings and regrets and probably at least one really embarrassing public scene.

Lie 1

Plead 1

Advantage: Beauty 3

Mission: Find True Love

3x5 Weathered Tar

Coordination 1

Athletics 1

Climb 2

Endurance 2

Fight 1

Student of Sailing 2

Vigor 2

1x6 Vengeance Quest: They murdered your father! (Or maybe it was your husband, or sister, or child.) You've spent years honing yourself into an engine of vengeance. Now they must pay!

Sword 2

2 Levels of a Martial Path relating to Sword, Dodge or Parry

2x8 Squad Leader

Command 1

Fight 1

Inspire 2

Ride 1

Tactics 1

1x10 His Majesty's Personal Cobbler: You made the most beautiful, most comfortable, most durable shoes in the entire kingdom, and as a result you are one of the relatively few people to have seen the monarch barefoot. Do you still have this exalted position? If not, what happened? If so, where'd all your money get to?

Expert Cobbler 4+Master

Character Sheet

Body 2

Charm 2

Command 3

Coordination 4

Knowledge 2

Sense 2

Athletics 1

Climb 2

Dodge 1

Endurance 4

Expert Cobbler 4+Master

Fight 2

Hearing 3

Inspire 2

Language 3

Language (Native) 0

Lie 1

Plead 1

Ride 1

Run 1

Sight 2

Stealth 3

Student of Sailing 2

Sword 2

Tactics 1

Throwing 2

Vigor 2

2 Levels of a Martial Path relating to Sword, Dodge or Parry

Advantage: Beauty 3

Mission: Find True Love

Making it Casual

This was posted recently over at RPG.net by Bradford C. Walker:

There is one benefit to the per-encounter design philosophy that adult gamers will come to find useful: it allows for meaningful progression in smaller, but more frequent, episodes. In other words, regular short gaming sessions become viable. You get online, you play through one or two encounters in an hour or so, and you call it a night. Still have plenty of time to watch your favorite shows, spend time with the wife and kids, run off to that choir practice at church, or whatever else takes up your time after that and yet you maintain your presence as an active gamer. This style of design and play is more convenient, more casual-friendly, than the current or older designs.

Again, as the industry greys, the games will begin to drift from their service to people with no money but lots of time, to people who have lots of money but no time. If WotC did what they've promised, expect a lot of the load to be taken off the DM's back, especially in terms of preparation for the game, and running combats. How well this works remains to be seen, but I imagine it will be a the make-or-break deal for a lot of older gamers.

4rt

If you go here, you can see the D&D 4^th edition preview slideshow. You’ll get to see some of what I assume is 4^th edition art. But before you watch, be sure to don eye protection. I swear, I have never before seen a collection of art with so many sharp, stabby, spikey, glowey, hurty things being jabbed RIGHT AT YOU!

I once said that Wayne Reynolds was on his way to becoming the Larry Elmore of 3^rd edition. With the covers of 4^th, it’s now official: Mr. Reynolds is the Jeff Easley of 4^th. Already, I have to say, things look promising for 4^th edition.

So far, I like it. I don’t *love* it. Ok, I think I may love the cover for the new DMG. But otherwise, it’s ok.

I wish I could get a closer look at some of those covers, especially the PHB. What I think I’m seeing on it is a strong, action movie freeze-frame, posed feel. Everyone is striking a cool pose, lightning is flying, but the attentions of the characters seems divided. The wizard is toasting something outside the frame, while the warrior babe is looking directly at you. There’s a lot of “directly at you” in this preview art. Almost all the portrait pieces had someone holding up a staff, a sword, or a mace towards you, as if to threaten you or show it off. A lot of people are going to look at these and say the look is all about action, but I think they’re really all about looking cool. There’s a strong differentiation between the characters, especially in Wayne Reynolds’ work. In the green dragon piece, the dragon is green, the warrior is blue and silver, the swashbuckler is red and brown, and the wizard is yellow. The dwarf’s palate melts into the orange of the walls, but he still stands out thanks to his crucifix-like pose and being a dwarf. The focus is clearly on the dragon, but everyone stands out here. Where Mr. Elmore’s work was “you are there,” Reynolds in 4^th edition is “Who do you want to be?”

And William O’Connor is hitting all the “cool” buttons hard. The warrior here has strong Warhammer vibes with the oversized weapon and oversized pauldrons of overlapping plates and hanging tabs. But he’s got a spiky shield for a touch of 3^rd edition. The thief, of course, is a tiefling, which is already fairly cool in most folks' books, but she’s got those crazy flaming daggers, and kick-butt heeled boots. The off-the-shoulder pauldron is a nice touch, both tying her visually to her warrior comrade and being flirtatiously sexy in an untypical way. Feminists will frown as they flip past it, but won’t immediately reach for a box of matches. ;)

And it’s very interesting what you don’t see. Everything is grim, cool people in the heat of action, or about to take action. You don’t see young men chatting up tavern wenches, or playful pranks. This is all about looking serious and looking cool.

The goal, clearly, is getting you, the viewer, excited, and to spur fantasies of the sorts of things your cool character will do while you play the game. The art is realistic enough for you to identify with it, but doesn’t impose any sort of realism on you. This is the “reality” of dreams, where gravity is optional and style is more important than practicality. With 4^th edition’s emphasis on quicker play and PC options, it’s probably very fitting.

As if Nerds Around the World aren't Boggled Enough...

4th edition D&D and warp drive in the same week?!?

A pair of German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light - an achievement that would undermine our entire understanding of space and time.

I'm not an expert in this type of thing, but it looks like they didn't really break the speed of light, but took a short-cut by tunneling through space-time. Which is just as good, honestly, and might avoid a lot of the relativistic issues that come with moving at or near or faster than the speed of light.

So who's for holding the 2012 GenCon on Alpha Centauri Prime?

4DVENTURE

WTF?!?

If this is what I think it is, what most of us think it is, I'm in shock.

Seriously, lots of mind-bogglin' goin' on this week.

Update:

Originally Posted by Simple Man

I felt as if millions of nerds suddenly cried out in terror... and were suddenly silenced...

2nd Update:

From The Miniatures Page:

August 16, 2007 (Renton, WA) – Whether you storm a mad wizard's tower every week or haven't delved into a dungeon since you had a mullet and a mean pair of parachute pants, one thing is certain - millions of D&D players worldwide have anticipated the coming of 4th Edition for many years. Today, Wizards of the Coast confirms that the new edition will launch in May 2008 with the release of the D&D Player's Handbook. A pop culture icon, Dungeons & Dragons is the #1 tabletop roleplaying game in the world, and is revered by legions of gamers of all ages.

The 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons game includes elements familiar to current D&D players, including illustrated rulebooks and pre-painted plastic miniatures. Also releasing next year will be new web-based tools and online community forums through the brand-new Dungeons & Dragons Insider (D&D Insider) digital offering. D&D Insider lowers the barriers of entry for new players while simultaneously offering the depth of play that appeals to veteran players.

The 4th Edition rules emphasize faster game play, offer exciting new character options, and reduce the amount of "prep time" needed to run the game. D&D Insider includes a character creator that lets players design and equip their D&D characters, dungeon- and adventure-building tools for Dungeon Masters, online magazine content, and a digital game table that lets you play 24/7 on the internet — the perfect option for anyone who can't find time to get together.

"We've been gathering player feedback for eight years," said Bill Slavicsek, R&D Director of Roleplaying and Miniatures Games at Wizards of the Coast. "Fourth Edition streamlines parts of the D&D game that are too complex, while enhancing the overall play experience. At its heart, it's still a tabletop game experience. However, D&D Insider makes it easier for players to create characters, run their games, and interact with the rest of the D&D community."

Wizards of the Coast will release two 4th Edition preview books in December and January — Wizards Presents: Classes and Races and Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters. The first live demos of 4th Edition will happen at the D&D Experience gaming convention in Washington D.C. in February 2008. The full scope of 4th Edition books, miniatures, and adventures will be available in the spring and summer of 2008.

Since its first release in 1974, the fantasy roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons has taken millions of players on imaginary adventures of epic scale. Today, D&D is universally regarded as the original game that created the roleplaying game category, and the inspiration for generations of game designers. D&D is enjoyed by millions of players worldwide, while countless more remember it with fond nostalgia.

3rd Update:
EnWorld, of course, has the most up-to-date info. See the first post in this thread here.

Massively Multiplayer Offline RPG?

Mr. Dancey and Mr. Antunes seem to be almost riffing off the same theme, though their work appears to be independent of one another. So far. Anyone else wondering if Mr. Dancey has a GenCon surprise up his sleeve?

I'm a bit mixed on this latest portion of Mr. Dancey's plan to save the pen-and-paper RPG hobby. On the one hand, it sounds kinda cool: playing in a massive world, where the actions of your party have an effect on the gaming world as a whole. Games Workshop has been having some success generating excitement with similar “campaigns” for their fantasy and sci-fi war games. Mr. Dancey's “Legend of the Five Rings” has also benefited from similar play. Done well, this sort of thing could build into something really exciting.

But I'm seeing conflicts with yesterday's blog. Doesn't a single, persistent world require a unified set of rules? Yes, you could tell all sorts of stories in a single world, and the idea of taking a standard “kill the ogre” adventure and having one group play it as a standard monster hunt while another plays it as a drama full of tragedy and pathos is neat. But how far can those two group diverge and still say they are playing in the same world? How does the second group explain the self-sacrifice of their sorcerer, for instance, when the first group burns through resurrections like toilet paper?

Mr. Dancey's pulled a lot of rabbits out of his hat so far. And so far, I'm cautiously optimistic. But he promises a bit more technical info on how he thinks something like this might be implemented. I look forward to seeing him conjure an alligator.

Also, be sure to check out his “Time Out” piece on how roleplayers appear to segment within the hobby. Old data, but still interesting to consider. I'm pretty sure both I and the Trollwife fall pretty heavily on the Strategic/Story quarter.

Storytelling Games II

In Step 2: Redefine the Experience, Mr. Dancey seems to be jumping deep into Forge territory. “Death to the GM!”

I mentioned in my last post a fun little card game called “Once Upon a Time”. With that game, you get cards that include things like characters, settings, and plot points. When it’s your turn to tell the story, you toss down a card every time you use the thing on that card in your story. The object of the game is to empty your hand.

The stories, however, tend to be fairly simple and madly disjointed things. Characters get abandoned or killed off on a whim as players steal the storytelling spotlight from one another. You don’t really care what happens to the characters except in a very shallow way, because every element of the story is ephemeral.

Nobody enjoys a bad investment, whether it’s financial or emotional. People are much less likely to invest in a character they think is unstable or subject to frequent, bizarre personality changes. This is why changing the writing team on a comic book often results in losing readers (though a good writer will bring new readers to a title). People are also hesitant to invest in characters who are likely to die. You see this in the classic spoof of old style gaming, where Bjorn Redhawk VIII, virtual clone of his seven forbears, joins the adventuring party shortly after the death of his sire, Bjorn Redhawk VII. And the same is true of any aspect of a story, including setting, climaxes, and even plots.

I asked Mr. Dancey about this, and his reply is interesting. If maintaining a cohesive plot is important to you, assign someone the responsibility of maintaining it. The idea isn’t so much the sort of round-robin storytelling that many of the more daring Narrative style RPGs are, but rather a toolbox that you can pull from to create the sorts of stories that are important to you. So if you’re worried about verisimilitude and cohesion of story, you can put someone in charge of maintaining those for the various aspects of the story, and give them the tools from the box that will allow them to do that.

With a modular rule set, you can have all sorts of tools, from rules that maintain cohesion of character (“each character in the story is assigned to one player, and only that player may control that character and his/her/its resources”) to rules that define the setting. The rule set is going to have to be vast, because it can’t take anything for granted, from the focus of the story to the viewpoint or even the goals of the players, beyond the simple desire to create a story.

This sort of gaming requires a very high level of cooperation and trust between the different participants. Say you want a tale full of magic, and you put one player in charge of the rules for magic. You then have to trust that this player will adjudicate those rules fairly and in the best interests of the group and their story. In traditional gaming, most trust the GM to make sure everyone else is playing honestly. Even if they’re not, the amount of damage they can do to everyone else’s fun is mitigated by them only have responsibility for, and control over, their own character. Of course, untrustworthy players will become known and blackballed just like bad GMs are today, so it’s not as great a danger as it might appear at first. Still, it’s something to keep in mind.

Hopefully, Mr. Dancey will have more to share tomorrow.

Storytelling Games?

(Most of this was posted over at Mr. Dancey’s blog in the comments to “Step1: Redefine The Hobby”.)

Ok, I’m still not entirely happy with “storytelling games”, but I think we need to keep in mind that Ryan Dancey hasn’t been called up to defend his right to exist. Roleplaying games have.

Why should people bother with these games? A lot of folks would contend that roleplayers don’t sit down at the table with the idea in their heads that they are about to create a story. That’s true, but the reasons they claim are not well served by pen-and-paper RPGs. You’ll get a lot more social interaction bang for your buck playing poker, Munchkin, or Settlers of Catan. It’s not just the expense of the game books versus a pack of cards or a board game. To learn how to play Settlers, it takes maybe a single half-hour to peruse the thin rule book. Before you can play D&D, the “gateway drug” of RPGs, you must first slog through the PHB, nearly 300 pages long. And you can’t just skim it. You must “approach these books as texts to be scoured and sections memorized like back in school.” Yes, you don’t need all of it at once. You can learn it over time. But you still need to know enough to create a character, and that process alone can easily take an experienced player an hour.

And even then, you’re still not ready to play. Most RPGs, including D&D, require one player to prepare the adventure in advance. If you want to play Settlers, you open the box, set up the board, and start playing. That takes less then five minutes. But with most RPGs, one poor player must spend hours in isolation, crafting the adventure. So no, the promise of social interaction will not bring people into our hobby.

What about the tactical challenge, the joy of digging into the rules and seeing what you can do with them? Like social interaction, that’s certainly there. But computers can do it better. They don’t, not yet, but they will soon, as MMORPG designers grow more bold, and take off the training wheels of “just like D&D, but on the computer”. A computer has no problem at all juggling a dozen different attack types at once, plus a swarm of modifiers. How often does your GM forget to give the gnome his defensive bonus for small stature? Computers never forget. All those dizzying charts and tables of games from the early ‘80s might be daunting to flesh-and-blood players, but a computer can juggle them all with ease, providing a much richer, and deeper, tactical experience.

Now, I’m not saying that people interested in socializing or in tactical play or the complex interactions of rules shouldn’t play pen-and-paper RPGs. Those are absolutely important aspects of the games we love. I’m only saying that there are other games out there that do those things, and many do them better than RPGs. What is it that pen-and-paper RPGs do better than any other sort of game? They create a cooperative and interactive process through which narrative emerges. Board and card games tend to be too simple; you can force narrative upon them, but most of them don’t help much. (Once Upon a Time is, of course, the exception, and it’s fun, but it’s not as good as RPGs in this regard, for various reasons.) Computer games are not interactive enough. If you don’t want to play through the story programmed into the game, you’re out of luck. Only pen-and-paper RPGs give us the flexibility, the interaction, and the forum where we, together, all at once, as a group, can shape our own story. As Nefandus says over at Mr. Dancey’s blog:

A good session of an RPG/storytelling game is often too tempting to last longer than it should, way into the night, past the point of physical comfort. Those people are not playing just for the company. They are enjoying the experience of being lost in a story.

Mr. Dancey to the Rescue?

Ryan Dancey thinks he’s got a plan to resurrect the moribund RPG market. And yes, it’s moribund. No doubt about it.

Look here for what he sees as the proper perspective. And then see here for Step 1 of his approach.

Now, I have no idea where he’s going with this. I have a few guesses, but nothing solid. But I have to say the “storytelling” bit leaves me a bit cold. It may a be a knee-jerk reaction, however. And I’m not sure it’s important. Here’s the gold in them thar hills:

Here are three sustainable, believable, and valuable points of differentiation between tabletop storyteller games and MMORPGs:

1. * A truly persistent environment, where participant actions shape and redefine the game world in lasting and meaningful ways using the power of emergence.

1. * Participant created content which expands the game world, sorted & made accessible through the power of a reputation economy.

1. * The ability to interact with one another in various social network configurations, from very small (2 people) to very large (10,000+ gatherings), from “party” focused adventures to city, national, and world sized population systems.

This is a topic Dan over at Fear the Boot has been discussing for some time. There’s really no point in making RPGs more like MMORPGs. Tabletop RPGs can never out-MMORPG the MMORPGs. Trying to do so is silly. I think Mr. Dancey is absolutely on the right track with this. Pen-and-paper RPGs need to focus on what they do best, and I think he’s nailed it on these three points. I’ll have to think about that some more.

But then he takes a sudden swerve that looks very intriguing:

The successful Storyteller Industry company will be at heart a customer service company. Most of its work product will be related to internet services and community tools, rather than making & printing rule books. We need to rewire the fundamental DNA of the industry from book publishing to internet service & community support.

Whoa! Ok, now we’re talking a major shift in how this industry has worked for a long time. What is he talking about? Gleemax?

Maybe. Ok, as RPGers, we all know exactly what’s wrong with the industry: it’s a bitch to get a game together. When you’re young, have no car, and you and your friends are pretty much hobbled by school and lack of funds, but unburdened by adult responsibilities, it’s easy to blow eight to ten hours playing RPGs in a single session. You also have at least that much time between games to work on new material, to read new books, and learn new rules.

But once you become an adult, it’s nearly impossible to get together even on a bi-weekly basis. It’s even worse if you try to do something only once a month. That schedule won’t survive three sessions. And if you want to play an odd game, which is pretty much anything other than D&D, you’re in real trouble. Where do you find players? How do you get together with them? Even if you’re young, it can be a pain trying to sell your friends on your game de jour. And the best way to learn how to play an RPG is to join a group that already plays it.

And the best way to insure that your RPG survives and has fans who will support you financially is to get people to play the game. So what if players could find a group to play with online? Maybe using headsets and cameras, or chat programs, or other sorts of telecommuting software that businesses have been using for over a decade. What if you could log into the web site of your game-of-choice, and find a weekly/bi-weekly/whatever game to join in on?

What if you could find a game right now that was looking for members? A game that is set to begin as soon the requisite four-to-six players were lined up?

What if you could find a game right now, that was looking for members, and was run by a GM trained in how to play the game by the designers of the game, running an adventure specifically crafted to make the best use of that game’s features?

Is that something you might be willing to pay for?

Is that something an RPG company might be willing to support?

The mind, ladies and gents, freakin’ boggles.

I have no idea if this is where Mr. Dancey is going. I have no idea if enough players can overcome the notion that they are owed good GMing for free to support that sort of thing. I have no idea if any RPG company could find investors willing to take the risk to fund something like that.

But yeah, when I get visions in my head of players across the world logging their characters into a central database, and then using those characters in one-shot pick-up games or more organized campaign play, I can’t help but get excited.

Renaissance? Renaissance of What?

I just finished watching Renaissance. It’s an animated film out of France that takes place in the near future, a bright, sunlit “Bladerunner”. If you’ve seen the trailer, or the ads for it running as a sidebar on sites like aintitcool, you know the cool shtick is that it’s all black-and-white. Faces are ovals of negative space, in which float lips, noses, and most of all, eyes. It’s very much in the style of those pseudo-erotic, very simple art pieces that were all the rage in the 80’s. The artist had a name like Olivia or some such, but I can’t remember it now.

Anyway, the art’s neat, and only occasionally swerves into being pretentious and too fancy for its own good. There’s a strong computerized feel to much of the animation, but the black-and-white keeps it from feeling like some sort of Pixar-noir. Neater stuff was done to better effect in “Serial Experiments Lain”. But if you’re fascinated or excited by the art you’ve seen so far, you might want to check it out. Don’t bother worrying about the story, however. It’s a horrible mush.

[SPOILERS FOLLOW]

Seriously, the writers were so lazy, or the story so chopped up in editing, that they couldn’t even be bothered to go through the motions of presenting their clichés. We have the tough-guy cop who gets suspended part way through the story, but that doesn’t seem to interfere at all with him using official police resources afterwards. His opposition is the nasty evil medical corporation. We know they’re mean and nasty because… er, well, because they’re a corporation, and we know that corporations are all nasty and evil, right? They do kill some people about halfway through the film, seemingly just as a matter of course. But to show just how despicably and unabashedly evil they really are, it is revealed that their secret plot is research that might lead to human immortality.

Yeah, really. Immortality. No more death, no more disease, no more aging.

No, it doesn’t require that they harvest the spinal fluid of poor children kidnapped from the slums of Asia or anything like that. It seems to be a fairly simple and safe process. It doesn’t reverse whatever problems you had before, but it does seem to provide eternal youth and eternal health.

Which is evil. Because, you know… Big corporation, with immortality serum they sell at the grocery store. Evil! Right. No more disease, no more death or suffering from old age. Evil! Because, well, because…

“Without death, life has no meaning!”

That’s a quote from the movie. No, I’m serious. And no, they don’t provide any sort of support for that thesis. We’re just supposed to believe it because the doctor who stole his research on immortality and spent his life working in a clinic for the poor says it.

Of course, that didn’t stop him from using his research to save the life of his younger brother.

And, in the end, our “hero” saves the world from immortality by shooting the young researcher who was on the verge of rediscovering the medical breakthrough that would make it possible. In the back. And then he lies about it to her older sister. So he can bang her.

Um, yeah…

Seriously, unless the art really floats your boat, don’t bother with this one.

100 Years of RAH!

Yesterday was the 100^th anniversary of the birth or Robert A. Heinlein, one of the Trollsmyth’s favorite authors. I first came across his work in Boy’s Life magazine, where they serialized his novel, Between Planets as a comic. Unfortunately, these were old issues I was reading, so I never got to finish the story there. But I did pick up the book later. Before that, however, my father bought me Have Spacesuit, Will Travel on the recommendation of a friend. I loved the book, and buying a new Heinlein novel became a weekly thing for me. I still remember reading Starship Troopers by flashlight on a Boy Scout campout while my tentmate read one of the Dragonlance novels.

My favorite Heinlein story is still “Green Hills of Earth”. I’m a sucker for the Horatius-on-the-bridge sort of story, and that one has everything I love about them in spades. I've cruised the web a little bit for blog posts about Heinlein, and this has been my favorite post honoring the event of RAH’s birthday. If you haven’t read any Heinlein yet, do so.

If you’re feeling poor, however, or too lazy to get out, you may be interested to learn that much of H. Beam Piper’s work is now on Gutenberg. If you like RAH, you’ll probably also like Piper. I recommend Space Viking, Little Fuzzy, and Lord Kalvin of Otherwhen. For something a bit shorter, but still a great read, try Omnilingual.

Walrus Porn!

Um, ok, maybe not. But it is one of the cutest things I’ve seen in a while. Seriously, if naked breasts don’t cause you to blow a gasket, this not-safe-for-work pic by Fredrik K.T. Andersson will probably put a smile on your face. There are six new pics on that page, ranging from the charming to the disturbing. It’s all what we’ve come to expect from Mr. Andersson. While some of the pieces look a touch sketchy, they’re all infused with the character and expressiveness we’ve come to expect from his work. There's also the sense of continuing story, of lives actually being lived. I continue to look forward to his updates.

Håkan Ackergård has also updated his Playelf Gallery. Again, not safe for work, but rather sweet. And again, no surprise. In fact, this is classic Ackergård, with a cute, scantily-clad girl in nature. The clothing is especially daring in this one, and a touch bondagy. (Are those roses around her right ankle? With thorns? OUCH!) But there’s a touch of the whimsical and the mystical about it. The expression is great. And Mr. Ackergård proves once again you can be sexy without screaming SEX!

One thing I find interesting is my reaction to Mr. Ackergård’s more anachronistic pieces. They really rub me the wrong way. The Underdark sketch series is a good example of what I’m talking about. At first, I was thrilled to see the title, as it promised a fun romp through traditional D&D territory. And while the drow babe’s armour was silly, it was an excellent display of talent, juxtaposing the hardness of the metal with the softness of her flesh. I even appreciated the pieces with Syline, though I’m not really in to piercings.

But “Orc Leatherboy” really rubbed me the wrong way. Why? Because the anachronism really blindsided me. If you go back to my review of Larry Elmore’s work, you’ll notice that one of the things I really appreciate about his art is the sense of verisimilitude. The people look real, the clothing looks real, even the monsters look like they could be real. The landscapes, the rigorous anatomy, and the equipment in Mr. Elmore’s art all look like they belong to a real world, a place you could actually visit. It’s the same thing that really helped to set the LotR movies apart from most fantasy film.

Mr. Ackergård usually delivers this in spades. His anatomy may not be as exacting as Mr. Elmore’s, but it rarely offends or looks completely wacky. It often has a softer, more cartoon-like feel, but that only heightens the sense of the fantastic in his work, and it’s exacting enough to draw you in, rather than shutting you out of his art. As I’ve mentioned before, the clothing, backgrounds, and characters all have a sense of the real to them. You could wear that clothing, fight with those weapons, sit on the chairs and drink ale in the taverns. But that only makes things like “Orc Leatherboy” or “Hell – Moe’s Tavern” (NSFW either) feel more like a smack in the face. It would be like Mr. Elmore slipping Prince Valiant into the background of the Inn of the Last Home, or seeing one of the puppet Feebles characters at the Battle of Helm’s Deep. Which in the end, I think, says more about me, as a viewer, than it does about Mr. Ackergård or his art. Mr. Ackergård has an appreciation for the absurd, for juxtaposing our expectations of the “high” fantastic with the coarser, more commercial fantastic of store-brand fetish and prime time television. I turn to the “high” fantastic to escape such things, which is why my reaction to their inclusion is so strong. Very much a “you got your peanut butter on my chocolate” thing.

Return of the LGS?

The Troll Family is blessed with a number of great gaming stores, like this one, within easy drive of where we live. We don’t frequent them as often as we’d like to, but we enjoying stopping by when we can, even if we can’t buy anything. Each visit is like a mini-convention, hanging out with like-minded nerds, chatting about games, anime, comic books, and cool movies. Where else can you find people who think “The Chronicles of Riddick” is an underrated movie?

It has long been a perceived truth that gaming stores are dying. Their ranks have been dwindling for some time now, and even cash cows like "Magic: the Gathering", "Pokemon", and D&D’s 3^rd edition have done little to stem the tide of store closings, at least in the US.

But something you might have missed has happened in the US Supreme Court. Luckily, Ryan Dancey had his ear to the ground, and has this to say on his blog:

Luke Peterschmidt & I in our consulting practice, have considered the full-service hobby game store model to be unsustainable, and have long believed that such stores were doomed. We have been advising our clients to pursue as many diverse retailing strategies as they can, to avoid being “trapped” in a failing business model. At the heart of our analysis was the knowledge that discounting, especially e-commerce discounting, was a clearly superior business model to full-service retail store support, and that given enough time, the e-commerce discounters would eliminate most full-price retailers.

Leegin changes everything. EVERYTHING. Suddenly, the fate of the retail tier is in the hands of the publishers. And the publishers already know that the full-service retail model is the best way to grow their businesses. Given the chance to “save the retailers”, the manufacturers are almost compelled by the logic of the situation to do so.

This is pretty exciting stuff, and ought to have significant impact on the RPG and other gaming hobbies. What Mr. Dancey is predicting is the end of online discounts. (Notice I don’t say online discounters. They’ll still have a place as dealers to folks who don’t live near a gaming store. But the price difference between brick-and-mortar stores and online stores will vanish, which means there’s less incentive for you to buy online what you can get at your local store.)

Read the whole thing. Mr. Dancey discusses the common objections and doomsaying in the article, as well as in the reader comments following. Since he’s done a great job of dealing with those issues already, I’ll jump off what he wrote to other topics.

Assuming Mr. Dancey is correct, and assuming we do see a rebirth of the local gaming store, what does that mean for the hobby? At first, I thought this would accelerate the trend towards more Ptolus-like products. Listen to this special interview on “Have Games, Will Travel”. Without the discounters, will customers be more open to spending a lot more money for higher quality or more expansive products? Doesn’t this encourage the return of the boxed set?

I think it does, but that’s only half the picture. The big thing browsing through a store does is encourage impulse buying. You go to the grocery store for a dozen eggs and milk, and end up coming home with a box of donuts and a bag of chips as well. Gaming stores are the same way. You go to pick up the latest expansion of your favorite game, and you end up buying something else too that caught your eye. This is a huge boon for folks that make small, fun games. Things like “Kobolds Ate My Baby”, “Munchkin”, or pretty much the entire “Cheapass Games” line, are the sorts of things that could really benefit from this sort of phenomenon. This could be the shot in the arm that the independent game publishers really need to push the current small-press revolution to the next level.

Things could be on the verge of getting very exciting again for the gaming industry.

Update: For those of you thinking that this is an excuse for the manufacturers to hold retailers and customers over a barrel while they rifle through their pockets for loose change, read this thread over at RPG.net. Ryan Johnson explains how Guild of Blades is taking advantage of this situation. Notice that there’s a sunset provision, after which discounting is permitted, and even before that kicks in, the price floor isn’t SRP, but a percentage of that, allowing retailers to offer loyal customer discounts and the like. There are also provisions for returns as well. This isn’t manufacturers twirling their mustaches and cackling with avaristic glee. This is manufacturers telling retailers that if the retailers will take a chance on new products, the manufacturers will have their back, and not let them get screwed by deep discounters.

Seriously, people, the manufacturers we’re talking about make games for a living. You think they don’t know how to min-max? ;)

Painful Dragonlance Update

Haven’t said much about this movie lately. There hasn’t been much to say, honestly. And now, what I have to say is disheartening.

There are four new pics up. These are labeled as “production shots”. I’m not entirely certain what that means, but there appears to be some confusion. Ms. Weis is quoted as saying the stills are over a year old. But it seems odd that they’re releasing year-old pics, and as I understand it, production shots are supposed to be from the actual, working production of the film, as close to final as you can get. So there may be some hope here that these are, for reasons I can’t even begin to guess, very incomplete and not very representative of what the final film will look like.

God, I hope so!

Let’s start with the pic of draconians on the march. Not bad, nice and atmospheric. But look closely. Notice that the two scuffed-up shields that we get a good look at are identical in every detail. That seems to hold true for every detail of the draconians in this picture. If you just see a flash of it, a few mere seconds, I suppose that will fly, but it is worrisome.

Even more worrisome, this is the best picture of the new quartet. Much has already been made of the fact that all of Takhisis heads are breathing flame in the still labeled “Takhisis vs. Paladine”. The juxtaposition of 2d and 3d elements is annoying, but not a deal-breaker for me. I’m afraid lots of that sort of thing handled with varying degrees of success in anime has already inured me to it. But take a look at Takhisis. Look at the shape of her chest and belly, or how her right arm attaches to her body, and the angle it’s being held at. She looks misshapen, like she was put together by someone who has a poor grasp of anatomy. She almost, kinda-sort, looks like an alligator. Sorta. But that is one ugly looking dragon.

Look at the close-up of Pyros. This is supposed to be a villain? Does he look sinister or comical to you? Notice the lack of texture, the lack of bump-mapping, the lack of shadow. Also notice the lack of teeth. I guess he lost his dentures somewhere?

Finally, and most horribly, we have Pyros in flight. Again, notice the arms. It appears the artist started with a snake and then tacked very human arms onto the sides, without consideration for or inclusion of such details as shoulders. Look how the limbs are splayed all akimbo, feet and arms going every which way, making the dragon look about as aerodynamic as a brick. This awkward pose is only exacerbated by the duck-like feet, hanging straight down rather than tucked up close to the body. Also notice that Pyros has apparently found his dentures, and now has fanglike canines. These are very ugly dragons that wouldn’t pass muster in your average MMOG, forget a movie.

There is a ray of sunshine in all of this. Karl Preusser’s Q&A has some very heartening things to say. In addition to a live orchestra, female choir, and female vocalists, he’s also drawing on the talents of a medieval instrument ensemble. He talks about building themes around characters as well, themes that take into account action from later books. If nothing else, we might get another cool and inspirational soundtrack to play at the gaming table.

More Green Ronin Goodness

The Fates have been unkind to Green Ronin. First, they had issues with the printer for their Free RPG Day stuff. So they made their freebies available on their website (which was better for you and me anyway, because there just wasn’t enough dead-tree freebie material to satisfy demand, from what I’ve heard). Only, the demand was so large, lots of people couldn’t get in to download the goodies. A real mess.

But Green Ronin, as I’ve said before, is a class act. They’ve turned Free RPG Day into Free RPG Week. Here’s the schedule for goodies listed on their web page:

Tuesday: The Mutants & Masterminds Beginner's Guide will be free once again for 24 hours. The following Mutants & Masterminds PDFs will also go on sale for the rest of the week: Mutants & Masterminds Second Edition for $15, Agents of Freedom for $10, and the Masterminds Manual for $13.50.

Wednesday: At long last the Pirate's Guide to Freeport will debut. The full price of the PDF is $19 but for this week we're offering it for only $17. The following Freeport PDFs will also go on sale for the rest of the week: Freeport Trilogy 5-Year Anniversary Edition for $12, Creatures of Freeport for $10, and Crisis in Freeport for $8.50.

Thursday: Bleeding Edge Adventure #5: Temple of the Death Goddess will be free once again for 24 hours. The following Bleeding Edge PDFs will also go on sale for the rest of the week: Mansion of Shadows, Beyond the Towers, Dirge of the Damned, and A Dreadful Dawn.

Friday: True20 Adventure Roleplaying will be free once again for 24 hours. The following PDFs will also go on sale for the rest of the week: True20 Bestiary for $12, True20 Companion for $10, and True20 Worlds of Adventure for $9.

I can certainly recommend True20. Hell, I’ve been recommending True20 when you had to pay for it. Getting it for free is really a no-brainer, folks.

At the risk of sounding like a shill (and seriously, I don’t work for ‘em and they don’t pay me for this), thanks again to the GR folks for stepping up to the plate and once again demonstrating that they are the sort of company I want to do business with.