PulpCruciFiction's page

PulpCruciFiction wrote:

I wasn't the biggest fan of ADwD, either, but

** spoiler omitted **

Also

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You're absolutely right. That was my meaning when I said, "(By the by, it is equally frustrating to watch a character die off only to find out that his double was killed. That is like reading a whole book and finding out that the entire story was just a dream.)"

In service,

Rich

Ah, my mistake. I had thought that was what you meant at first, but you had also said something like

Anyway, the character in question hadn't been killed onscreen, so I never fully believed he was dead. Same with

in ADwD. You don't see them die, so I wouldn't assume they're dead. I'm not even 100% sure the latter of those two was reported dead, actually.

A Dance with Dragons (DwD): A Song of Ice and Fire: Book Five

Dancing in the Doldrums

I never liked the series, because GRRM played with your emotions from the first book, and he reveled in causing grief to good characters and rewarding evil.

I wasn't the biggest fan of ADwD, either, but

Also

I'll agree with those who've mentioned the following:

Wheel of Time - I read the first book and thought it was fair, but certainly not enough to keep reading when even many fans of the series say that the middle volumes are terrible. Even the first book really failed to grab me; I didn't like any of the characters and the primary vilain seemed one note.

Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever - Ugh. I appreciate that the author was trying to play with genre conventions, but this was too much. Absolutely hated Covenant and wasn't enthralled by the world building or supporting characters.

Dragonlance - I read the first trilogy last year and wasn't really impressed. The only main character that I thought had any real depth was Tanis.

Icewind Dale Trilogy - I remember being surprised at the quality of the writing. You could make a drinking game out of some of the phrases Salvatore reused over and over in this series - the one that stands out most is "the stamp of booted feet."

EDIT - One that I don't know that anyone else has mentioned: The Name of the Wind - I didn't actually hate this, but I liked it a lot less than most. Kvothe is a bit of a Marty Stu, and I found myself rooting for him to get slapped around. A lot.

Hmm. I was thinking of starting his series, but maybe not. If I read them all now, I'd have to read them all again when the next one comes out and then read them all again when the last one comes out. Because that's what I do.

I'll probably wait for the show to come out on DVD, read the books that the show covers and call it quits.

That's not a bad idea. While the series on the whole is really good, I don't know if I'd recommend beginning it now. The first three books are amazing - the fourth and fifth are weaker, but I'm optimistic that they'll work once the series is finished and you can immediately find out how they resolve. Plus, there's the problem that the wait between books is years long (and if I'm not mistaken he basically took the second half of this year off, so I don't think that's likely to change). Following along with HBO you'll at least get the story on a regular schedule.

So, for the Martin-uninitiated, please:

It goes

Game of Thrones
Clash of Kings
Storm of Swords
Feast of Crows
Dance of Dragons

and then two unwritten ones?

Yep, that's basically correct, it's:

A Game of Thrones
A Clash of Kings
A Storm of Swords
A Feast for Crows
A Dance with Dragons

Then the next two will be (as of now):

The Winds of Winter
A Dream of Spring

I've played in campaigns where the GM had a strong hand in designing characters. (The current game in the rotating-GM project I'm playing is like that: the GM handed out cards such as "this character is older than the others, here's the mechanical effects" and "this character is good at hunting, here's the mechanical effects" and so on. We had to distribute the cards among the PCs.)

I am reminded of the original DragonLance series of modules; the party was strongly encouraged to play the PCs from the novels.

The mechanical advantages for the GM are obvious. She can design a character with this or that special ability, that would be gloriously imbalanced if it were an allowable option to all PCs.

I've got a friend who is planning a Star Wars game in a similar way, but taking it further. He's planning on basically coming up with character roles or hooks beforehand, along the lines of "Your sister was killed when you were a child, your life's goal is to find her murderer" or possibly even things that involve professions, like "You are a smuggler who bought his ship on credit from a crimelord, the next payment is due soon and you have no cargo." Then the players choose between them and decide on stats and personality.

It makes it easier for the GM to tie the characters into the plot, as everyone has built-in hooks. On the other hand, I'm not sure that things will have as much of an emotional impact, where your character's big payoff is something that you had no hand in creating. Essentially, I think the approach is borrowed from video game design, with all of the same benefits and drawbacks.

I get all of WotC's categories except Knuckles, what does that mean?

TriOmegaZero wrote:

I should probably avoid that one then. Rant almost put me off, but I was able to get past my revulsion to finish it.

I found Rant to be much more 'explicit' than Choke. I think Chuck kind of has this reputation of being an 'edgy' author, but the beginning of Rant just seems like an exercise in him trying to outdo himself, which resulted in me rolling my eyes very vigorously. Once I got past the beginning sections of the book I found it much more enjoyable.

Choke ... didn't gross me out nearly as often or as much. Of Chuck's books that I have read I enjoyed Choke the most, though I haven't read Fight Club. I have to say that I did not enjoy Lullaby or Diary overly much. From watching the movie for Fight Club, I can see there are quite a few parallels between Choke and Fight Club.

I haven't read Rant nor Choke, but I can't imagine anything being worse than Haunted...I read somewhere that Chuck takes pride in actually making people pass out when doing live readings of the first story in that book.

Hey Pulp and Leet,

I've yet to use my stats to create a character. I might play anything from a private detective to a college professor but I don't want to duplicate your persons. What are you thinking of doing?

I'm thinking Columbia doctoral student in history, doing some research into the supernatural on the sly.

Rolling up my character:

3d6 ⇒ (6, 5, 3) = 14
3d6 ⇒ (3, 3, 3) = 9
3d6 ⇒ (5, 2, 3) = 10
3d6 ⇒ (1, 4, 1) = 6
3d6 ⇒ (1, 2, 2) = 5
3d6 ⇒ (6, 6, 3) = 15

2d6 + 6 ⇒ (4, 4) + 6 = 14
2d6 + 6 ⇒ (1, 1) + 6 = 8

1d10 ⇒ 8

For me, no matter which AP I am running I have learned to own all 6 books and read them once through before I begin my preparations. I am far less likely to make a mistake if I know who/what the Npc's are and what they are up to.

This is a big one. It also helps in terms of foreshadowing and making sure that major villains get some face time before it's time for them to get killed at the end of the AP. Once you know where the plot is headed, you'll also have a better idea of how to customize it for your group without going so far off the rails that you need to rewrite the later books entirely.

The changes they are referring to is that they might be slightly less free than the books with bringing in new characters and may instead concentrate more on the established gang.

For example, in Book 2 there are two prominent characters from Book/Season 1 who barely only appear, and we only really hear about what they are up to off-page:

** spoiler omitted **

In both cases the characters' roles will be widened in Season 2:

** spoiler omitted **

Because of this, some new characters and storylines from Books 2 and 3 may not appear or be as prominent. Though based on the casting announcements for Season 2 so far, this may not be immediately apparent :-)

That sounds good - based on their departures in season 1, I'm inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt in terms of edits. What's your take on how they'll handle books 4-5?

There might be some blurring between the end of book 2/beginning of book 3 and where the TV show chooses to end things, but season 2 is likely to cover most or all of ACoK, considering that Martin has stated that he's writing the script for the Blackwater episode of season 2, which is toward the end of the book.

That said, I imagine they'd have to step away from the books by the time they get to AFfC, assuming they don't want to confuse the viewers by having half the cast sit a season out. The question is whether they then try to get two seasons out of the combination of books 4 and 5, and whether they take from the beginning of book 6 to pay off some of the storylines that (I feel) were left unresolved by book 5 unnecessarily.

So here's the deal. I want to run Masks. I began the game once on tabletop and it was highly successful, but it fell apart when two players left the group due to real life needs. Now I want to take a crack at it electronically. I haven't made up my mind about whether it should be PBeM (run through Yahoo! Groups for file storage, since I loves me some handouts and play aids) or Skype with a VTT and with a Groups site for file storage. Frankly, I'm open to either one, and which one I choose will likely be determined by the response I get. I'm in GMT-6, though of course that doesn't matter for PBeM.

So right now I'm looking for 5-7 players. Obviously people who've never played the campaign are welcome, but I also welcome people who've played one or two chapters (I get the feeling that beginning Masks is far commoner than completing Masks).

As for me, I've been GMing and playing RPGs since about 1978. I've both played and run CoC as well as many other systems. As a GM I tend to be more on the storytelling and roleplaying side than the hard crunch side, but fortunately BRP's rules are sufficiently flexible and simple that hard crunch is seldom an issue. As mentioned I give lots of handouts. I also tend to roleplay my NPCs rather...exuberantly. Since I've run three chapters of MoN already and have given extensive thought to the others, I feel like I'm ready to roll with it right away.

For players, I'm looking for people who are reliable, who are not completely familiar with the campaign, who like to roleplay, and who understand that the core of CoC is investigation, madness, and death (and therefore will embrace those challenges rather than get upset when this notoriously dangerous campaign claims yet another investigator!). Familiarity with the system isn't required, since it's dead simple and I run it crunch-lite. As I see it, there are several near-certain TPCs in the campaign as written, and my intention is to modify them so that the players actually have a fighting chance of getting out alive (if not...

I'd love to give this a try. I've played CoC a few times in the past, and have loved it each time, but I've never played a campaign of it. I've heard great things about Masks, but I haven't read it and I'm not familiar with the plot at all. I also typically favor storytelling and the like to crunch, and I understand that madness and death are par for the course with CoC (I've survived 50% of the sessions I've played). As far as characters go, I like the idea of playing a retired British military man or a history student working on a PhD in something like history.

As for format, PBeM would probably be easier for me (I would be able to post at least once per day, often more frequently), though I could possibly play on a weeknight other than Wednesday after 7:30 or so eastern time. I've played on Skype a few times and never really had too much of an issue with the technical side; whenever someone would get booted it typically wouldn't take long to get them back up and running.

New tally:

Curse of the Crimson Throne - 13
Kingmaker - 4
Savage Tide - 3
Rise of the Runelords - 3
Legacy of Fire - 3
Carrion Crown - 3
Shackled City - 2
Against the Slavers/Giants/Drow - 1
Age of Worms - 1
Second Darkness - 0
Council of Thieves - 0
Serpent's Skull - 0

John Kretzer wrote:

I remember that adventure...I think it came in one of the 2nd ed box sets or something like that...

Yeah that was a stupid encounter.

Found it!

It was "Beneath the Twisted Tower," in the 2e boxed set for the Forgotten Realms. In other words, one of the first things you encounter in the Realms is Elminster saving your butts not because he cares, but because he saves the world accidentally five times before breakfast.

No wonder the increasingly inaccurately named Forgotten Realms gets such a bad rap. It was fine, great, even, in the 1e days.

Back on topic: I reiterate that I could still use more subtlely in the Golarion art.

I remember that! As a middle schooler, I actually thought it was pretty funny. If I remember correctly, you were allowed to interact with them, but if you just asked Elminster to heal you, he'd refuse (the jerk). Instead, you could basically trick him into healing you by staying hidden and getting the puppy to come toward you, forcing him to keep saying "Heel!"

Was it a rule back in AD&D that you take double damage whenever you try to hit undead with a vorpal sword? I've never heard of that before.

Players who insist on playing the exact same character in every game, specifically where that character is inherently disruptive to the game. I played with a guy who absolutely insisted on playing a dread necromancer with dreams of world domination in every single game we played. Every game was dragged into a struggle between him and the rest of the group, whether they were also evil or not. It got incredibly tedious by the third or fourth time it happened. On the other hand, I've played with another guy who tends to play honorable, non-judgmental paladins in most games we play - I've got no problem with that, as there's no harm done to anyone else's fun.

Sidenote, the dread necromancer player had another quirk that drove me crazy, but it's unique enough that I wouldn't attribute it to a player type. He'd come up with a character background along the lines of "My character is a super-genius eldritch master and he's friends with all kinds of ultra-powerul demons." Then the GM would design the character for him, so he wouldn't need to bother learning the rules. Then, whenever there was even a chance that something in the game wouldn't go his way, he would pout and say things like "My character is a genius, he would have thought of this in advance" or "This is stupid, we shouldn't be rolling for this, my character's demon friends should be able to save him."

I don't have direct experience with either, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but I've been doing some research for a potential upcoming game, and Curse of the Crimson Throne is constantly mentioned as one of the best APs, if not the best. In this thread, for example, CotCT is in first place with something like 13 votes - Kingmaker is in second with only 4. Serpent's Skull, on the other hand, is typically ranked in the bottom three.

I only have direct experience with three of the APs: Shackled City (ran it from start to finish), Rise of the Runelords (played up to the beginning of Hook Mountain Massacre), and Second Darkness (read it all the way through). Based on that experience, my favorite to date is Shackled City, though it did take a fair amount of work to get the most out of it.

Just to provide everyone with a tally, here are the results up to and including me (though omitting everyone who voted for more than one):

Curse of the Crimson Throne - 11
Rise of the Runelords - 3
Kingmaker - 3
Carrion Crown - 3
Shackled City - 2
Legacy of Fire - 2
Savage Tide - 1
Against the Slavers/Giants/Drow - 1
Age of Worms - 0
Second Darkness - 0
Council of Thieves - 0
Serpent's Skull - 0

I'm not really surprised at the order, though I am surprised at how big the gap is between CotCT and the next highest.

We were playing a session of My Life With Master, and my wife (fiancee at the time) was playing a character who was chronically shy and unable to speak to people unless an animal was present. Luckily, she had a pet mouse which she kept with her to allow her to speak most of the time.

The Master (an evil genius with power over the characters) ordered her character to go to a nearby widow's house and invite her to a dinner party that he was throwing. My wife's character was also in love with the widow, so I figured that would give a lot of opportunity for pathos as he has to ask her on a date with the Master.

But when my wife's character arrives at the widow's house, the first thing she does is send her mouse to go take a look around the house, then she goes up to the widow's door and starts knocking. When the maid opens the door, I remind my wife that she no longer has an animal around, so she can't speak. So my wife starts trying to mime something to the maid to ask for permission to enter.

I figure that the maid would be frightened of this warped mime desperately signing at her, so she attempted to close the door. My wife's character then forced her way inside, still signing, but putting a ghastly smile on her face to show friendship. The maid screamed and ran away, and my wife completely panicked at that point and had her character brain the maid with a frying pan.

Everyone else at the table is shocked at how this has gone from dinner invitation to attempted murder. My wife asks "Is she dead?" I thought for a minute and replied "...no, not quite." So my wife actually suffocates the poor maid with her bare hands, then breaks a jar over the corpse's head, in an attempt to make it look like an accident or something.

Making the whole episode even more bizarre, the system allows the players to narrate scenes of horror in the town at certain points, and when my wife gets the opportunity to do this, she narrates a scene where some villager goes insane and kills someone with a jar. So my wife's character's murder retroactively looked like the work of a deranged serial killer with a fixation on jars. This led to one of the funniest lines I've ever heard at a gaming table - as another PC was leading a woman off to kill her, a third character called out "Don't go with him! He's the Jar Killer!"

My top list of games that I've played fairly extensively is first. My rankings are based on the average level of awesomeness experienced - so, for example, Call of Cthulhu gets the top spot though I've only played three scenarios because each of them was amazing. I've had more good sessions of D&D 3.5e than that, but I've also had a number of bad D&D sessions, so the average is lower.

1. Call of Cthulhu (Basic)
2. Vampire: The Masquerade / Old World of Darkness
3. Starblazer Adventures
4. Star Wars (West End)
5. D&D 3.5e
6. Star Trek (Last Unicorn)

I made a separate list of games I've only played a couple of times. I'd like to play each of these some more before I put them on an all time best list.

1. Unknown Armies
2. InSpectres
3. Spirit of the Century
4. Dread
5. The Mountain Witch
6. Trail of Cthulhu
7. My Life With Master
8. Godlike
9. Swashbucklers of the Seven Skies
10. Mutants and Masterminds
11. Pathfinder

I think shoehorning Sci-fi and Fantasy into the same category caused a lot of good stuff to get thrown by the wayside.

No Andre Norton or Anne McCaffery or C.S. Friedman? No Fred Saberhagen or Greg Egan or Peter Hamilton?

No Jules friggin' Verne? Fie on thee!

+1000 to the idea of an Ill Met in Lankhmar movie. It would be some whacky combination of the genre of Conan with protagonists that are as irreverent as Jack Sparrow.

McCaffery's there at #33.

For those of you that have read Strands of Fate, does it discuss cyberpunk in any detail? I have a friend who wants to run some Shadowrun without all of the crunch, and we're wondering if Strands could get him started.

Another vote for ICONS - the FATE system really gets out of your way in play and lets you focus on story, but there's enough to the system to let you accomplish nearly whatever you'd like to do.

I ran them basically as written, but it annoyed me that the climax of the campaign is basically

It seems kind of cheap. Instead,

If she is married to Joffrey and they can kill off all the other starks it would give them the rightful claim to Starks lands.

That's right, it's not meant to pacify the Starks, they know that's not happening after what went down with Eddard. It's also not just to humiliate her, as they don't have to go forward with the marriage to do that. They're doing it so that if they win the war, they can use Sansa to exercise direct control over the North.

Thanks, RL.

Yep, Yoren is a Night's Watch recruiter.

Thanks for the recommendations, everyone - apologies for the threadjack!

To help get back on track, I'd probably agree with those who've listed Shadowrun as overrated, at least up to second edition, which is where I gave up on it. I loved the idea of playing a decker, but I could never figure out how to make it work in practice, and the fans I asked about it said they basically had to make them NPCs. In general, I thought the concepts were all great, but I had a ton of nits to pick with the execution.

EDIT: I was also really disappointed with all of the published modules I read for the game. I had heard great things about one called Harlequin, but that module commits several cardinal sins of GM-ing, notably: (1) it sets up some fights that the PCs can't win, no matter what they do, and (2) the climax of the entire adventure is

I've actually read "Worst GM Ever" threads which list people as terrible GMs just for running that adventure as written.

While the the Anime based on Seinen manga is really only challenged for quality by a very few HBO shows, such as the wire.

Can you give some recommendations? I've never been into anime, but if that claim is true I would love to check it out.

Heh, you've obviously never played Paranoia. =]

Touche. I would like to try Paranoia someday, but it was like the writer of this Traveller adventure was trying to give the players of the adventure the kind of frustration that a Paranoia character would experience in dealing with the Computer. Like an adventure about going to the DMV, with absolutely nothing interesting happening there.

I don't know.

Maybe its the expansive, detailed and interesting setting that leaves almost every other game not set in the real world in the dust for depth and complexity.

Maybe it is the pure awesomeness of playing characters who jump from floating island to floating island, killing five mooks with a single blow as they engage in a philosophical debate with their opponent, aiming to talk them into committing suicide, rather than having to physical defeat them. While the system is not perfect, it does let you do some really amazing stuff, and rewards you for thinking of cool approaches rather than 'i full attack with my two handed sword and use power attack.'

Maybe its that the basic pre-charms system is actually really durable, allowing really interesting and versatile play.

There are a lot of reasons to love second ed exalted. All that really needs sorting out is the charms.

Sounds like the system has really worked for you, that's awesome! Most of what I've read has been first edition, and other than loving the Dragon Blooded book, I wasn't all that impressed with the setting. Maybe they changed things up for second edition, but it's probably that I'm just not too interested in the designers' influences. Anyway, I don't think the game is garbage - it wouldn't make my list of worst RPGs ever - I just never got why it held the place of honor at rpg.net.

My picks:

D&D 4e: I don't hate it the way some people do, but because it's D&D, it was naturally hyped to the moon, and it's really not my cup of tea. I don't really see it as a tabletop version of WoW; more of a tactical combat game to which you can add as much roleplaying as you want, whereas I prefer games that make the roleplaying more central.

Exalted: Even apart from the fact that the worst campaign I ever played used this system, I have trouble understanding why this system gets so much love over at rpg.net. The concept doesn't do much for me, and the system is kind of a mess.

Traveller: I'm not sure which version of this I read, but I've never come out of reading a rulebook with so little idea of what the game was actually about. I remember there were detailed instructions on how to calculate your ship's cargo capacity and how to figure out whether you would be able to make the monthly payments on your ship, but I had absolutely no idea what a game session was supposed to look like, or what the players would do. The book had a couple of sample scenarios, and one of them involved trying to leave a planet with a bunch of ridiculous regulations, getting the runaround from several low-level functionaries. Why would anyone want to spend hours of their free time dealing with fictional bureaucratic red tape?

Aberzombie wrote:

Yeah, having just finished reading the first book, I had realized the same thing about several scenes. They seem to be doing a good job with these scenes of adding to the overall storyline. My one question, however, is this...

** spoiler omitted **

Do we need spoiler tags for episodes already aired?

** spoiler omitted **

Well with what new you have said. i think it comes down to 2 choices.

1) Try playing at their place. Have them make room for the night by moving things as others suggested. Then the kid can be put down when needed and allowed to do what ever in their child proofed home.

2) Cut the players out and risk it becoming a issue in your friendship. Since they might resent you guys not willing to even try gaming at their place. Just saying.

I think he mentioned upthread that they did try playing at the couple's house a few times and found it unworkable due to the size of the group.

Based on everything the OP has said, it looks like the only options are a babysitter or a new group for the couple.

Russ Taylor wrote:

A true master of the craft can fit a quality story into 4 or 5 pages. *Love* the short story format in general.

Some of my best reads have been short stories. Always thought it was Stephen King's best format. Even my fave author, Jack Vance, I felt did best with short stories. I keep avoiding those "SciFi Best anthologies" though. They always seem to focus on depressing stories. Woo Hoo, end of mankind, weee.

Has Mr Martin done the short story thing? I might give him a shot again if he has.

Greg

Martin's got a series of novellas set in the same world as A Song of Ice and Fire (I believe 80 years or so prior to ASoIaF), though I'm not sure where to find them. The first one is called The Hedge Knight.

What you can do is actually have some real world consequences to his real world actions. When he starts his fit tell him once that if he continues the the session is over for the day. The second time he does it, pack up your books and tell everyone that you will continue next time.

Do this every time. Let him know that you are not going to continue to play a game where you are supposed to be having fun with your friends if your friends aren't having fun. Obviously he isn't having fun at that point and his continued frustration only drains the fun from everyone.

Don't play another game at that point. Pop a light-hearted movie in the DVD player or check out NetFlix. Go do something else. Whatever it is, it should not be another game. His frustration will carry over.

Later on, pull him aside and let him know that this is how you are going to run things. Tell him that his actions are making the game less fun for everyone. He needs to focus on changing or he will be asked to not game with you anymore. You two can still do all kinds of other things but gaming would not be one of them.

I have a few friends that I don't game with but we still hang out and do other things. Our friendship isn't hurt by this because we are good friends.

+1 to all of this, though I'd tell him that after a second outburst, he wouldn't be invited back to the game. After that, I'd tell him that I would be willing to hang out with him, but not in contexts that would allow him to have these fits, meaning no gaming.

Just because he acknowledges that he hates losing doesn't mean that everyone else should be forced to tolerate his tantrums.

Pronounciation guide for the TV series. Mostly it seems the same as the books, although 'Ser' is prononuced 'SAIR' for some reason (it's just an earlier spelling of 'Sir'). Harrenhal is also pronounced oddly (HAIR-in-hall). Generally, not too bad.

I just noticed that I've apparently been mispronouncing "Targaryen." I had thought it was "Tar-gar-yen," but Ned Stark pronounces it "Tar-gar-ee-en" in one of the trailers.

The thing is, even if this one FINALLY comes out -- well, it was supposed to be the last one, but now he's saying there will be, what, at least 3 more after it? Which means another 20 years before the series can be finished, at the rate he's going? And look at the guy -- not to be heartless, but I think the concern is legitimate -- will he live another 20 years?

I think that if anyone ever finishes the series, it'll be HBO, not GRRM.

There are two more after this one comes out this year. As far as I can tell from his blog, he's got around 100 pages of material for the next book already written, because he decided not to include certain characters in Dance. That said, I share your fear that HBO or someone else will wind up finishing the series in the end.

Remember not to invite any troubadours or cackling old 90-year-old men!

And remember it's, "I do," not, "Just so."

Also, it's "To have and to hold, 'til death do us part," not, "Night gathers and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death."

:-)

But if I don't invite the troubadour, who's going to play "The Rains of Castamere?" That's kind of integral to my plan...

Freehold DM wrote:

Putting in for that day off work.

Will that be enough? The book is colossal, and looks like it might come in longer than A STORM OF SWORDS.

Decisions, decisions...the publication date is five days before my wedding. I don't think I want to try to finish the whole thing before the wedding, and I don't know if my future bride is going to want me to lug it along on the honeymoon, so it might have to wait until we return.

Well,

I ran a 30 something long Mass Effect adveture/campaign last year. It was reasonably successful using a heavily modified version of... (pregnant silence)... Storyteller (yep, the old one!).

I have kep a journal of sorts with all chnages and stuff. But, be warned that we never delved really into vehicle or spaceship combat.

I have a friend who would be eternally in your debt if you could send that to me at destiny_the_endless [at] yahoo [dot] com.

First time I ever watched an episode of Community myself. Overall it looked like the show has some good writing and was definitely funny in parts. I take it they are all at a community college, but what is the group's association? Are they all students and/or instructors?

They're all students. It's a study group/surrogate family. I'm a huge fan of the show, I think the writing is phenomenal. The range in episode tones they do is astounding, and they manage to make it all fit together.

I tried it out at GenCon this year, and it was okay. Honestly, probably my least favorite game of the con, but it wasn't bad by any means. I think the premise for the game is really interesting, and the different character types were fun, but the game was really crunchy for my tastes. We spent nearly the whole con slot on what amounted to a random encounter, as our party came upon this creature called an asphalt dragon, which is somehow able to use a street's asphalt to camoflage itself in spite of the fact that it's the size of a truck.

For those who have had bad experiences with CoC, I will say only this. Go to GenCon. Seek Bob Geis.

Indeed, but I think this is dramatically overstated with regards to ASoIaF. Out of all the POV charaters introduced in the series so far (excepting the prologue ones, who die by tradition), a grand total of two are dead, and one of them came back (sort of).

I think you missed one, unless I'm misreading your post - Martin has killed 2.5 POV characters so far:

I can easily see why you might have forgotten the last one, but that's a whole different gripe with Feast.

Furthermore I think one impacts the other. If your telling a story with a beginning, middle and end, part of that story - often the most important part, is how that impacts the characters. How their view points evolved from the events that took place. GRRM's characters are not progressing from A to B to make some kind of a meaningful point for the reader to consider. They are simply reacting to the plot twists that GRRM is making up along the way.

I do think that George has a story to tell, but I agree with you that his method of telling it is no longer entirely coherent. I think that ultimately, there is one underlying plotline which George has had planned out from the beginning, which is:

That said, the series has actually spent much, much more time on the politics of Westeros than on that central arc. I personally like all of the political stuff, but the criticism that he's just spinning his wheels with a lot of it is fair. I read a really interesting review of the books which discusses a lot of these sentiments, which is available here.

Jeremy Mac Donald wrote:

GRRM's characters don't really develop - they may physically change, often due to becoming dead, but they don't develop.

I don't think that's completely fair:

** spoiler omitted **

I agree, I think a number of characters undergo significant changes during the series: Arya, Sansa, Jon, Dany, and Jaime are all noticeably different from where they began, to name a few. There are quite a few characters who haven't changed at all (Circe, I'm looking at you), but there is character development going on.

Playing:

Red Hand of Doom - D&D 3.5
Rise of the Runelords - D&D 3.5

Running:

My Life With Master

I run into that in some of the games I run. My wife loves Drow, and has wanted to make one for a long time. 2 guys we game with, HATE Drow. Caps doesn't do it justice. In any game, setting, etc, any remote mention of Drow sends these 2 into a murderous fury. So, needless to say, my wife feels a little inhibited when a chance to roll up a character comes around.

I personally think the situation sucks. I bought her the Drow of the Underdark book for her birthday one year and she's never got to touch any of the material inside, because of these 2 guys.

I had a similar situation one time, though the prospective DM was the source rather than another player. A guy that I knew fairly well but wasn't too friendly with was prepping a D&D game, and his big selling point was that you could play whatever character type you wanted, no matter how crazy it was. I typically stick to the PHB, but I decided to try something different this time and came up with a drow character. When I said "I'm going to try playing a drow," his response was "Absolutely not. No drow under any circumstances."

I tried reconceptualizing the character and decided that it could still work as a tiefling. When I went back to discuss it with him, before I actually told him about the new idea, he declared that the two races he would never allow were drow and tieflings. I jettisoned the whole concept and the game never materialized.

It wasn't until I played Fallout 3 that I regretted owning a console instead of a gaming PC, if only because I couldn't mod the game and deal with those brats in Little Lamplight.

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AKA 8one6

Wow, I can't believe they won't let you kill those kids, especially considering some of the other stuff you can do in that game.