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Ah Pook
I found this on Youtube when I was looking for stuff about Aztecs and Mayans and Toltecs and whatnot for an "into the weird pyramid" segment of my pbp.
Also, when I went to Panama City, Panama in the National Guard for two weeks, I was warned to stay away from a bar called the Blue Goose.....wondering why this was fifteen years later and googling "Blue Goose" I found a letter from William S. Burroughs to some other guy detailing his visit there in search of young men and/or smack. So naturally I felt I should name a strip club in Sasserine after the Blue Goose.
I like looking at Burroughs' stuff and then making a game like I like looking at Rembrandt's stuff then puttering around with my crayons.
My first initial setup for this gang in the pbp I tried to go with the idea of Kafka's The Castle, because somebody on Paizo asked if anybody ever did anything with Kafka in gaming.
So I said I never read any Kafka, but I'm forty so I better get busy and do a lot of things I haven't done, so I read some Metamorphosis and tried to figure out what I could snag for a game.
It actually ended up being the players writing and creating most of the initial game sequence instead of me, and I was confused by it because I thought I was supposed to be controlling everything being the dungeonmaster, but then I thought of the Aborigines singing up the sun every morning, and said to myself, "no; this is good; abandon control and let the horses pull the wagon where they will."
It wasn't anything like Kafka's The Castle, which I haven't read anyway. It was them in control of reality, which is really the antithesis of "Kafkaesque," but that's a good thing.
It never goes where you think it's going to, but that's a good thing.
I followed Marcus' link to Youtube, watched it, then saw "words of advice to the young from Bill S Burroughs" down there to the right.....
"Never trust a (prostitute) who says she doesn't want money. She wants MORE money......a LOT more."
One line from Burroughs at any given moment can inspire a whole freakin' month of game adventures.....
Back in Athens. I got so behind on this one during December that I ended up just reading along. For some reason when we get into house maps / dungeon maps I just start dragging once my mapping falls behind. This time it was just unlucky enough to coincide with an abnormally hectic schedule. I'm still here! I've read up. I'll jump back in today and normal posting shall resume as we slide back into normal Athens life. Sorry to be sketchy there guys. :(
No worries, it happens to us all - it certainly happens to me. You seemed insanely busy with Christmas and marriage and so on, so it's all fine.
Mapping is a chore, though necessary for the way we play - you simply don't know where stuff is otherwise. It's a particular problem I find with this game because Paizo authors create quite intricate maps for table-top playing, but it becomes a complete pain when describing it in coordinates. You will notice that my maps for the Eberron game are normally big flat open spaces created from sub-rectangles mostly, as they are so much easier to describe. Hence the map of the fort is also seriously schematic, to aviod having to put down all the details - it was just to give you a general feel for the fort. Of course, it means the real mapping is yet to come. :-(
Mapping is a chore, though necessary for the way we play - you simply don't know where stuff is otherwise. It's a particular problem I find with this game because Paizo authors create quite intricate maps for table-top playing, but it becomes a complete pain when describing it in coordinates. You will notice that my maps for the Eberron game are normally big flat open spaces created from sub-rectangles mostly, as they are so much easier to describe. Hence the map of the fort is also seriously schematic, to aviod having to put down all the details - it was just to give you a general feel for the fort. Of course, it means the real mapping is yet to come. :-(
Aubrey, is there a link to a map of the fort I've missed, or just description (that I've missed :) )?
I'm quite happy to GIMP up some outline maps as we go and post them on photobucket if it's helpful.
That probably would be helpful. There is a description of the fort which gives an idea of layout in the main thread. It isn't useful for combat.
Cool, I'll see what I can do from the description. May need a couple of iterations to get it right...
If it's no where near I can use the actual maps, but I'd rather avoid that if I can ;)
Pretty good.
Anything outright wrong on it? I've done the labels as to the squares, should they be instead to lines?
I gadda learn how to do that, steadda scanning some stained map I drew with crayons.
Heh, if I did it with crayons it would be illegible....
It's actually suprisingly simple to do once someone tells you that you can click, hold shift and click again with the pencil tool to get a straight line...
And assuming you use layers. That image has a background (White with the grid), the grid labels, the "map", the text labels, and the scale as different layers. Mostly so they can be switched around easier.
Took about an hour to draw out...But I'm getting quicker all the time.
The stuff I've put in the "User contributed" thread is taking 10-15 hours per map....Fun though...
Vatts: Hope you had some alligator tail, blackened catfish, or other swamp land treats! Food in NO is too good.
Aubrey: You know, most of the places I like in ny are of a particular hole-in-the-wall dirty variety and I'm not sure they translate for broader recommendation. However-- I will recommend my favorite sake dungeon. There is a place in the East Village which you would never see if you weren't looking for it called Decibel. It is below street level, is often so dark you can barely see anything, graffiti covered and the servers barely speak english- but it serves sake almost exclusively and has some really nice stuff. They also have food, but it is more tapas style- small dishes to snack on while you have sake like lotus root, okanamiyaki (okinawan vegetable pancake), edamame and so on. Could be fun if you drink sake.
Also "Co." is a very trendy pizza place that opened last year. The owner is a famous baker (which is why I was interested) and it's real tasty, but pricey as goes with the trendy. You can see from the menu there that pizzas are about $17, but those are sized as plenty for one person or maybe two people as a lunch.
Ah- I almost forgot Katz's deli! In the East Village, that place is an institution! Again it is ny priced ($12 for a sandwich), but the pastrami on rye is like nothing I've ever had anywhere else.
Chicago has Quimby's Bookstore which is underground zines and comics if you are interested in that kind of thing and find yourself in Wicker Park.
Thus ends my unsolicited tour-guiding ;) Have fun!
OK, just to let you guys know, I will be about for the next two days, though interrupted by travel (heading back to the UK tomorrow evening US time). Then I will be incommunicado for a week while on holiday in France. Then I will be back, but patchy (travelling back to the US again) for a week after. Hopefully, after all of that, my great journey will be over.
A vile plot is being hatched over on the discussion thread to Heathy's game to run 4e Dark Sun and a 4e Kingmaker, for those interested.
I was thinking; long as we're in a dungeon and all, wanna pick one dude to decide which way we go? It might be more constructive than waiting for somebody two hours later to say "YEAH! THAT'S SMURFTACKILAR!"
Just sayin...
Oh, and it can't be me unless it's the weekend and I'm not working coz if I'm at work then it's counterintuitive.
Missed your plane? How did you manage that?I don't see what post this is a response to; sounds like a response though(?)
Ugh ... yeah, sort of out of context. Aubrey posted in the game thread that he missed his plane to the US, I was going to reply there, then thought it would be better to reply here ... but didn't quote anything.
I was thinking; long as we're in a dungeon and all, wanna pick one dude to decide which way we go? It might be more constructive than waiting for somebody two hours later to say "YEAH! THAT'S SMURFTACKILAR!"
Just sayin...
Oh, and it can't be me unless it's the weekend and I'm not working coz if I'm at work then it's counterintuitive.
Yeah, I'm thinking the best thing is first person to post a response, we go with that, unless someone else posts something in disagreement (or extra) before Aubrey responds to that first post.
Works fo me, though that isn't the reason things slowed down of late, but because of holiday and extraneous other issues...
... Like missing the plane. Quite simply, the car picking me up drove into the tailback of an accident in some roadworks by taking me on a route he said would be quicker. Actually, it was a longer route anyway and after we had sat in traffic for an hour he ended up detouring to end up further away than when we started. By the, the who reason for getting up at 5.00am was gone as the rush hour had started so we drove into heavy traffic again and when I finally arrived they weren't taking passengers anymore. So I went to the office and had a night in a hotel near Heathrow Terminal 4. But, on the plus side, I now have my copy of part 1 of Kingmaker (plus my PHB3 and other assorted goodies) - so it's not all bad.
Y'know, guys, if you all just want to back out into the hallway with me, I can fireball them like 3 times (at 9d6 damage each!) to soften them up (and clear out all the veils) before we go charging in again. Someone is gonna need a couple counterspells to fend off the inevitable cascade of lightning bolts they'd be sending our way, though.
I don't think we have the counterspelling power to survive that, but it's a fun notion to consider. Plus I'll probably end up needing one or more of those spells later. I'll keep an eye out for an opportunity to pitch a fireball into this fight somewhere. Just try to position yourselves so that I won't catch you in it. The Reflex DC on that sucker is going to be 23, so I wouldn't want to run the risk of "hoping" that you'll succeed on it.