farewell2kings's page

I've had the pleasure of seeing this game develop from a feverish, strange obsession in Uri's mind to something that could be a great fun game...maybe as a side game, a break from a regular serious campaign or just a jaded gaming group that's tried everything and wants to really take it somewhere different. I supported this project.

It's still a strange, feverish obsession, but judging by Uri's previous published work and his ability to poke people with pointed sticks, it will be awesome. He has great collaborators, too and the artwork is excellent too.

Reviewed here and sent to GMS magazine. Cheers!

Thanks :)

Thank you!!! Paizo rocks, as always :)

Greetings :)

I sent an email to the customer service email address a few days ago, but haven't received a reply yet. I never received this order. I thought it was on backorder, but when I went back to check on it, it showed that it had been delivered to my home address.

I asked for it to be sent to my PO BOX, but you all sent it via UPS to my home. The tracking number shows it was left on my doorstep in May, but nothing was there.

Can you check on this please?

Thank you

I switched to Castles & Crusades. I really wanted to play Pathfinder, but I just don't have the time to do the game prep and reading that a properly run 3.5/PF based campaign requires. C&C has the best retro feel, in my opinion. I can still buy Pathfinder modules and run them with C&C, too.

Uri's imagination is like a fountain of cool. Many of us enjoyed his contributions to the Dungeon magazine of old. If you're jaded on the same old thing, check this project out. There was an adventure in Dungeon magazine, right after conversion to 3.0, that featured the ancient holy land as a setting. It was delightfully different and this promises to be as well...with a wicked twist or two, I'm sure.

Wind walk is a 6th level cleric spell. Reconsider your actions and repost.

I use wiki on a stick.

I would say so. The 'spirit' of the rule is that if you're doing something that distracts you from defending yourself properly while in reach of an opponent, they get to whack you. Getting dragged out of a square means that you're not in control of your destiny, so I would say a good carpet beating by anyone in range is warranted.

Sounds cool, Scott. Ghost Detective? That would be a nice twist.

Thanks for the review. My first foray into Pathfinder. Thanks to Mario and Tim Hitchcock for the opportunity.

I tried to make it gritty and not your 'run of the mill' low-level dungeon crawl.

Wow. What's the elven word for 'sad, pathetic attention harlot?'

The west room door opens without incident. Beyond is a 10' wide and 30' long room, with another door at the far end. Barrels are stacked 3 high on the south wall, held in place by leather straps. There is a large table in the middle, with two long low benches tucked underneath. You detect no enemies.

It's a fantasy world. Just say that in your world, the XYZ race is dark skinned. There, it's fixed.

But then, I'm one of those that considers published RPG products to be imagination primers and not chiseled stone tablets of law.....

farewell2kings wrote:

If difficult adventures or the risk of a TPK never existed, then why play the game?

If all you want to do is rack up a bunch of levels in PF Society by playing in easy adventures that never push you to your gaming limits and never have you gasping for breath when you roll your next dice, then you're in it for the (IMO) wrong reasons.

Or, did I miss the whole point of gaming all these years?

Your playstyle is not all playstyles.

Mostly I play for the experience of being wrapped up in a magical world and experiencing it through the experiences of my character. I like levelling-up because it gives me a sense of progress and character development and allows my characters to take me to parts of the world they otherwise could not.

I appreciate that some players want a white-knuckle ride and I'm happy for that to happen. I just don't think it should be presented as: "[T]he whole point of gaming..."

Understood and noted. You and my wife would get along fine. She does not like it when her characters are threatened and doesn't care for the white knuckle ride (she thinks she doesn't, but she sure gets all excited when her party survives a major battle).

What I meant by the 'whole point of gaming' is that I don't think D&D as a low risk to character immersion in a fantasy world with gentle levelling up and carefully constructed low-level challenges is the norm or what module designers write adventures to....I think DMs that choose to run campaigns that way would have to adjust many adventures to suit that style, not just ones written by Greg Vaughan.

I'm not sniping. There's nothing wrong with your preferred gaming style and mine isn't better. Peace!!

It's the writer's responsibility to write an adventure that fits into a certain CR range appropriate for the level being marketed. Sometimes they're easy, sometimes they're not. It's not possible to foresee every circumstance if the guidelines are followed.

If difficult adventures or the risk of a TPK never existed, then why play the game?

If all you want to do is rack up a bunch of levels in PF Society by playing in easy adventures that never push you to your gaming limits and never have you gasping for breath when you roll your next dice, then you're in it for the (IMO) wrong reasons.

Or, did I miss the whole point of gaming all these years?

For what it's worth, my gaming group, if they ever meet Greg Vaughan, will buy him lots of drinks for "Hateful Legacy" which made them all sweat and some of them sh*t.

No index. Buying the copy right to an old classic wonderful game system that brought me many hours of joy about 25 years ago and then adding every house rule your gaming group ever developed over 25 years, turning a 100 pages of game rules into 500 pages.

And

Then

Not

Publishing

An

Index

It's like the a**hole DM who had obscure house rules for every stupid thing buying your beloved game system just because he had a couple of thousand bucks laying around and the publisher no longer existed publishing a book forcing his house rules on everyone.

Not that this could ever happen.

I'll be there. I 'was' scheduled to run a couple of PFS games, then had to cancel because I was going to go out of town for work related training, then the training got postponed....sigh.

Hey, look for me at Owlcon, doing something.

This is the soon to be active Age of Worms PBP game; all characters start off as dwarven barbarians. Forgotten Realms setting. All players already recruited. I'm NOT running this game, but finally get to play in the Age of Worms....

There are four barges that will carry the troops across the river. Thaddeus notes four other wizards--they introduce themselves during the wait to get the barges ready. Glenn, Herbeck, Shatra (female human) and Nio (male gnome)...all seem to be around 4th to 6th level. There are also several clerics. The wizard spell selection seems to center on detection spells to help the troops avoid ambushes, plus a couple of big bang spells to take out enemy spellcasters. They state that Sir Gendar's bodyguards probably carry a couple of enchanted arrows to slay enemy spellcasters.

Ebbers leads your party, 10 cavalry and about 50 infantry on to the first barge. The bargemen push off and the barge slowly moves across the river. All 50 infantrymen have missile weapons ready of some sort, most have light crossbows.

You land on the other side and move off tactically into the woods and terrain, setting up a salient for the others to land in safely.

Six gnomes emerge from the trees, greeting you and Ebbers. They will lead you north. Ebbers suggests you move ahead with him and some other gnomes. The main body will form a couple of hundred yards behind you. Ebbers wants to sniff out danger before it hits the troops.

100xp for RP

Looting the bodies yields no potions, 50 sp, 15 gp and 80 cp. Agathon looks over the ridge line and sees a gnoll archer climbing a tree a couple of hundred feet away downhill and southeast. Two gnolls under the tree have hyenas on leashes and are looking your direction.

forgot to award xp last time

475 xp each

Since he's working in the U.K, expect him to emerge, in a few years, as the most absolutely villanious and kick-ass James Bond villain ever!

It will be fun.

The party finds out that Ahmed, the innkeeper, is supposedly at the dwarven city of Glimmerhold, about 200 miles southwest of Argat. A message delivered by an Orion messenger to Mirrim states that Alastair D'Lyrandar is in Glimmerhold as well and that something"odd is going on."

The party travels to Glimmerhold, their trip interrupted by a visit by a woman roc rider named "Geriane" a representative of the Lords of Dust, who tries to unsuccessfully parlay with the party.

Arrive near Glimmerhold at dusk, Rhaan 20 998 YK

I've incorporated it into my Eberron campaign, running it right after the "Seeds of Sehan" adventure path. Both Sehan and Clash of the Kingmakers takes place in the Icehorn Mountains between the Demon Wastes and the Eldeen Reaches. Running it right now, as a matter of fact.

Rhaan 6, 998 YK

The party moves out of the gnome lab and back into the City to find that the City is under siege by Daelkyr and their plague-bearing barbarians. Noticing that the main pyramid in town is under siege, the party dimension doors into battle, defeating daelkyr and barbarians in a battle. The new City's "mother" summons elementals in an ancient ritual to defeat the other enemies and the City is saved, albeit at a high cost.

A cleric of the Silver Flame of Ghaaskhala barbarians asks to join the party. Panzadeya gives her blessing. At this time, the Falcon's Falchions consist of:

Panzadeya--8th level paladin/3rd level exorcist of the Silver Flame
Helix--11th level artificer
Vola--2nd level barbarian/7th level barbarian of the Silver Flame
Mirrim-11th level sorceress of House Deneith
Renzor--9th level hobgoblin ranger, Blademark Mercenary

Not in NY. In Texas....trying to get my gaming juices flowing again after a few years of floundering about. Stuck with 3.5. Pathfinder is great, but just couldn't keep up with it. No 4th edition for me, but I will try it some day.

The death of the paper magazines still haunts me.

Sorry for the threadjack:

(INSERT RANDOM SNARKY POLITICAL STATEMENT HERE)

Sigh....is nothing safe from politics any more?

I bought some new dice. My PBP game is going well. I get to play D&D tomorrow in my friend's Ptolus campaign.

Rhaan 5 998 YK
Return to the streets to find the City under attack by plague bearing barbarians carried in on Rocs. Some sort of ice demons attack the party in the streets and Elbon is killed. The party retreats, severely injured, by dimension dooring to the old gnome lab underneath the city nearby.

Rhaan 1, 998 YK

Fall settling into Ironhorn Mountains
Peace with Yakfolk and Dread Pagoda
Argot resettled but starvation looms
Mother Innaria still at Dread Pagoda, enemy, a couple of hundred loyal followers
Message has been sent to Church of the Silver Flame and to House Deneith--city secured, threat averted, need reinforcements
Party finds a orc paladin named Arok Thaash and a half dozen Ghaaskala barbarians in town, resettled the inn and recruiting locals for the battle in the Labyrinth.
New Mother elected, Mother Varana
While hunting, attacked by erinyes and 40-50 barbarians from Plaguebearer tribe.

Rhaan 5 998 YK
Barbarian attack through tunnels fought off, rubble blocked off again and sentries reset.

The air elemental remains in place, sucking up smoke fouled air.

Jacques moves stealthily along the west wall to square I-16. He can see through the gloom down towards the area labelled smelter on the map and sees at least ten more smoky figures through the haze. They're butchering deer and roasting the meat on a huge grill that was once an ore smelter. The bugbears carrying the litter of objects walked down the curving north tunnel and is now about 50' down the tunnel, around area U7.

Thaddeus completes his action as described. He sees the same thing.

Belric completes his action as well.

Agathon moves as described. He sees that some of the gloomy figures in the smoke looked at his direction, but it is possible they may not have recognized him as an enemy, since the smoky air makes it hard to distinguihs much detail at a distance.

It appears the vent tunnels once used for the smelter have been blocked off with debris and canvas tarps.

Jacques advances to square J20 on the bugbear mine map. The party is behind him as indicated. The sunrod lights the way. As his eyes adjust, in square K17....a swirling 8' tall miniature dust devil, like a miniature tornado....sucking up smoke from the hallways beyond.

The tornado moves towards Jacques...

Initiative....

F2K! I was wondering where you went! Its amazing how attached you can get to some posters without ever having met them. I remember sharing some stories of your boy with my wife a couple of years ago. She was very touched by them and then stopped in her tracks saying, "wait. how again do you know this person?"

I guess it just goes to show that not all cyber communication in the 21st century is dead and void of heart. People make can make heartfelt connections, sometimes without even knowing each other.

Thanks, that's really nice to hear. My son is doing really well. He still faces more surgeries in the near and distant future, but he's in 1st grade now and besides the 'waking up' part, really likes school.

Hopefully once I digest PF and start running it, I'll become more active again on these boards. I would have liked to have participated in the mega play-test of the rules, but I just didn't have time.

Best regards to everyone, especially my old connections :)

Hi, I'm Farewell2kings and I used to be a Paizo addict, regular messageboard poster and occasional contributor to Dragon and Dungeon. I co-authored some stuff (Seeds of Sehan trilogy) with GGG, Steve Greer, Koldoon and Dryder. I also wonder what happened to GGG. He dropped off the face of the earth after authoring a True20 sourcebook, released just before GenCon 2008, called "Interface Zero." (Superb!).

Theory is that real life caught up with him. Last time he posted on another messageboard I subscribe to was about 10 months ago.

As far as the others....RL issues too, I suppose (no, well, I know, not I suppose).

No offense to any of the later arrivals to Paizo, when the paper magazines went back to Wizards and the extremists of the edition wars took over every thread, I got turned down to "1" in contribution.

I still love Paizo the company. Best folks ever. Some of the old regulars on these boards now have facebook accounts and we keep up with each other that way--Gavgoyle, et al.

I run a PBP game on Paizo that brings me here almost every day posting as DM F2K.

I just bought the PF RPG and plan to study up on it. My entire gaming group is dead set against any edition change whatsoever and they're still slogging through Ptolus with 3.5 rules (10th level) and a FR campaign at about 15th level. I'm still running my first Eberron campaign ever (PCs at 10th level as well) with 3.5, so our pace of play is not fast enough to keep up with edition changes or revisions.

My PBP game is in Greyhawk, so we are involved with GH, FR, Eberron and Ptolus, all still with 3.5 rules. We're not grognards, just not fast enough. By "we" I mean my gaming group. Our intense gaming sessions and campaigns back in late 2005 all the way through 2008 brought me to Paizo and inspired me to contribute and post here. I'm just explaining why I no longer post regularly.

So...I don't yet play the edition most discussed here. I don't care to be attacked/insulted by advocates of any RPG game edition, version, revision etc and it's just not what it used to be.

But I'm not totally gone....I'll never be totally gone.....as far as GGG and the other regulars...maybe they'll chip in a comment or two after a gentle nudge somewhere in a leafy, restricted portion of the Internet.

1d20 + 6 ⇒ (20) + 6 = 263d8 + 4 ⇒ (7, 3, 3) + 4 = 17

1d20 + 8 ⇒ (9) + 8 = 173d4 + 3 ⇒ (1, 3, 4) + 3 = 11

Test

Test dice expression

1d20 + 8 ⇒ (20) + 8 = 283d6 + 4 ⇒ (4, 3, 3) + 4 = 14

Okay, guys, Paizo now has a dice roller funtion built into the BBCode for this site. Awesome. There's no need to go to invisible castle any more, but in some cases you may need to post twice in case your post depends on how well you do on a die roll.

If you click on the button below each post window and click on "show" next to BBCode tags you can use, you'll see what you need to type in to use the die roller function (and all the other Bulletin Board --BB-- code used here)

Summarizing several gaming sessions here. This log has been neglected, unfortunately

The party discovered the huge bloated creature wallowing in its own secretions, the apparent source of the green poison that had been transforming Argat's townsfolk. Battling their way to the bottom of the worm-weakened caves, they defeat the tentacled bloated creature and the wysts guarding the extra-planar source of the madness. The party emerges from the caves only to be ambushed by several tough ogres, apparently hired to destroy them. Finding clues among their effects to the location of the strange pagoda in the Icehorn Mountains that was the apparent destination of some vials of the green welcome, the party decides that they must back off and hire some more backup from the Blademark Mercenaries, since their last archer also met his death in the caves below.

Go cabbages go!!!!!

Barrakas 5 998 YK

After pouring over maps at the Eldeen Reaches embassy, the Falcon's Falchions determine the likely target of the strange plant like monsters fleeing Argat--a cairn of burial mounds 35 miles away.

Summoning magical steeds the party moves to the area, battling a trio of strange chaos beasts along the way. They enter the burial mound, defeating a pair of plant monsters, walling up a locust swarm with a stone shape spell and bashing a demonic woman's head in the catacombs below a rotating statue stairway.

I sent you an e-mail, Josh. Tier 3 for me. I had a blast last year!

Back from trying out the campaign log on a home site, but Paizo is better!

Lharvion 14, 998 YK

Mirrim and Panzadeya awaken in a strange forest, surrounded by kobold zombies nearby. Helix just cast "greater resurrection" on them, courtesy of Alastair d'Lyrandar. Turns out the group had been assimiliated into Halas Martain's undead army. When the group did not return to the Golden Dragon with the skiff, Alastair investgated and determined their fate. Within weeks he hired old friends of the party, Barrtok the lupin werewolf hunter, Sgt. Viduk of the Sharn City Watch and Pendant Argossen, Silver Flame cleric of Falcon's Hollow, to rescue the "Falcon's Falchions" from their horrible fate. Unfortunately, by the time the trio of Barrtok, Viduk and Pendant arrived on Xen'drik, Mirrim and Panzadeya's zombies had been kidnapped by the now zombified former nemesis, the Kobold King of Falcon's Hollow, who tracked down his old beloved crown woven into Mirrim's rotting skull. The trio was able to recover the parts formerly known as Helix and had him reassembled in Stormreach. From there, he met with Alastair and obtained the tools (scrolls) he needed to bring his old friends back from the dead.

That, now accomplished, meant that Mirrim wanted her crown back. It was nearby. The logging camp nearby was crawlign with zombies and the now reunited Falcon's Falchions hacked through a platoon of kobold zombies, looking for clues to the Kobold King's location. They found them......

Lharvion 15, 998 YK
Spent the night in the logging camp.Fended off a skeleton megaraptor. Located its tracks and marked the tree through which the tracks came. Started back on journey back to Falcon's Hollow and ambushed by worgs led by a crysteel wielding troll.

Lharvion 17, 998 YK
Arrive in Falcon's Hollow. The party is celebrated by the town and hired by Lord Kreed to get rid of the undead zombie king once and for all. Party sells some stuff to obtain much needed cash and Mirrim sends message to her house about her being alive again, but without papers. Helix crafts a holy symbol for Panzadeya and Kimi Eavewalker presented Mirrim with a beautiful dress during the large town wide party.

Lhavrion 18, 998 YK
Hire Boudreaux, the warforged scout/waiter from the Sitting Duck Tavern, to lead them to Cold Marrow, the zombie stronghold. Halfway through the day, the party meets Morgsa, the hill giant woman looking for her husband, Lavok. They don't fight and leave on positive terms. Later that night, the party fights three tough chariot beetles and Panzadeya callsout to Morgsa for help. She shows up at the end of the battle and makes a deal with theparty to take her to Sharn to look for her husband, who apparenty wandered away to join a mercenary company (and get drunk according to Morgsa). Morgsa is a very intelligent hill giant and says she has some natural powers.

Lharvion 19, 998 YK
The Falcon's Falchions arrive at Cold Marrow and make quick work of the undead there, aided by Panzadeya's prowess as a Silver Flame undead turning paladin. The kobold king's undead form is defeated again.

Lharvion 20, 998 YK
Arrival back at Falcon's Hollow. Payment received from the Logging concern.

Adventures of Panzadeya

Companions: Helix

Mirriam

Morgsa leads us to the bottom of Cold Marrow Mound. There is a coumn with broken down stairs. There is a graveyard of bones and no noise. We approach the columns. The stairs are covered with runes of unknown origins. Two shadowy figures surprise us. I turned the shadowy figures. My faith must be growing. Going up to the column, a magical trap, possibly a curse is detected by Helix and successfully disarm. Down a corridor we see a black cloud that turned into a bat like thing. We destroyed the Belkir. Helix looks in a room with the ceiling tumbled in and a sarcophagus within and a lady chiseled on it. I look in another room with five coffins. A wraith comes at Helix and from the other room are five wights. I turn four of the five wights with the goodness’ of the Silver Flame. We find a longsword that is great against the undead. It is an undead bane sword (+1 / +3 undead 1d8 +3 +strength and +2d6 against undead).

In the next room, we find the Zombie Kobold King and his army of 13 zombies. Murlow Krap throws a javelin that bursts and sends electrical damage at us. But Mirriam was a bit ticked about losing her crown and threw a fireball and took out most of his army. He was pretty easily defeated. We go to Kreed Manor and collect our 5000 gp reward for wiping out the Zombie King.

Lharvion 21, 998 YK
Gardiss, the Korranberg Chronicles reporter, pays the Falchion's 850 gp for exclusive rights to the story of the kobold zombie king. He also offers to take Morgsa and the Falchions to Sharn on his skyboat, revealing that Morgsa's husband is being kept drunk at Morgrave University.

Lharvion 24, 998YK
While Helix remained in Falcon's Hollow to do some crafting work commissioned by the Lumber Consortium, Panzadeya and Mirrim took Morgsa to Sharn, where they find that a blowhard professor at Morgrave Univeristy has been charging admission at a theater to lecture on Xendrik and display Avarrath, Morgsa's husband, as a "Xen'drik" giant. Tardren, the professor the Falchions helped previously , discredits Celentor, to much scandal and delight of the crowd and Korranberg reporters present. He offers the giants teaching assistant postions at the University to restore the university's honor.

Lharvion 25, 998YK
Panzadeya and Mirrim meet with Alastair D'Lyrandar, who proposes to forgive their debt if they investigate and clear the city of Argat in the Icehorn Mountains and prepare it for for future Lyrandar enclave, with offices for House Deneith and the Silver Flame, of course.

Go to Fallen district in Sharn to investigate the disappearance of Faela, the priestess of the Silver Flame that tends to the slum denizens at the Blackstone Church (Sharn p. 63). Meet Berrick the beggar who says the Ravers have overrrun the church and he leads them to an entrance to the tower. A beggar woman asks them to help Faela and the party enters the tower, meeting up with some Raver guards.

After defeating the Ravers and freeing the cleric, the party retreats back out of the Fallen district, deciding that they need to get to Argat and finish their mission and end their debt to Alastair d'Lyrandar.

Barrakas 2, 998 YK
A Lyrandar skyship drops the Falcon's Falchions off a few miles from Argat, out of sight of the superstitious locals. The party approaches the town and make contact with Bertram Hugelrote, the ambassador of the Eldeen Reaches, who was on an apparent punishment detail at the embassy just south of the City. He recommends Ahmed's Assans boarding house in town and warns the party of the superstitious locals. At dinner, he pumps information about civilization from the party. The guards point out a "Child of Sehan" skulking around the manor house at night.

Barrakas 3, 998 YK
Whie sleeping at Hugelrote's manor house, the party encounters a guard in the hallway outside their bedroom, a transformed Child of Sehan.

Barrakas 4, 998 YK
Make contact with Mother Innara through Hassam, but Mirrim makes her angry even though she showed them entrance to sewers. Defeat lifeleech otyugh, but hostile natives are gathering above.

Continue the exploration of the spriggan caverns, defeating the spriggans and the apotheiosis apparatus. Recruit gnome alchemy techs for future enclave. Engineer an old sewer entrance to take them back to Ahmed's inn, where they rest and recuperate. Dimension door out of City to go to Eldeen Reaches enclave and prepare for journey to the strange place in the hills that the Children of Sehan have been heading to.

Awesome, Boomer!!!!

(Will you share a room with me?)

A porn industry bailout would be the ultimate "money shot."

Everything I know about Gary is from the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons books, namely, the Dungeon Master's Guide. Go find a 1979 copy, snuggle down some where quiet and cozy up to the masterful feel of the game as it was designed to be played.

QFT!!!!! The AD&D DMG is THE BEST!!!

The population of the U.S. would dwindle to 1/3 if the Brits ruled America again because of all the car accidents from having to drive on the wrong side of the road.

I loved Kevin Kline in "A Fish Called Wanda"....

;)

Tim Hitchcock is so evil he can dance solo in a goth club wearing plaid shorts and no one even dares glance at him. Plaid shorts and white socks, no less.

My suggestion would be to ignore the player next time he goes off on a rant and just go on with the game. When it's his character's turn to act, ask him what his character wants to do. If he wants his character to stand around and have a hissy fit, then move the rest of the party on with the adventure. If he refuses to calm down or disrupts the game for everyone, get up from the table and tell the rest of the players to call you back when they're ready to continue the gaming session while you go outside to have a brew, smoke, Mountain Dew or coffee.

Continue with this tactic. It's your world, you're the DM. Just because D&D is a game run by a person that players can argue with when things don't go their way doesn't mean you have to allow them to do so. Become a programmer, they can't argue with them. Just ignore him and forcefully move the game on. He'll either calm down or the other players will calm him down or kick him out of the game for you.

I've adopted this tactic in the last few months because I play with close friends whom I couldn't kick out of the game if I wanted to and my wife. They all love to argue. I've just started ignoring them and moved on with the game. I give one response to a rules question or a debate item. If they choose not to accept it, I move on without them.

Pretend you're Spock and that you are completely deaf to any speech by the players that don't directly relate to character dialogue or action. It'll be tough to pull off (believe me), but you'll run a smoother game in the long run. You don't owe them any explanations. If you agree with a point they've made about a rule or action in the game, incorporate it into the game without comment and move on. They'll very quickly get the point or decide that they'd rather play a computer game where their rants won't be heard at all.

Ubermench wrote:

Mexican American war and WWII also. The teacher was a dumba##.

While US territory was invaded in WWII, I'm going to give the teacher a pass on the Mexican-American war. Fighting over disputed territory between the Rio Grande and Nueces rivers shouldn't be considered an invasion of US territory. It's awfully hair-splitty whichever direction you take on it and not worth calling out a teacher on.

Unless, of course, there was a Mexican offensive north of the Nueces or into Kansas...

Read up on Pancho Villa & Columbus, NM. 1916, I believe.

I'm glad this thing will be over with soon. Presidential elections have become such media frenzies that it's almost impossible to get a straight answer out of anyone. It's like a day long Super Bowl with the longest, most annoying pre-game show ever.

Except that when this game is finally over, when all the lawyers have sued and talking heads have whined, cajoled, berated and generally pissed all over us, we're all still going to be f&*$ed either way.

The only thing that will change politics in the U.S. forever is a constitutional amendment that forces balanced budgets and a government without debts.

Imagine that. Something neither Dems nor Reps could f**k with. We'd have a lean government and our economy would roar like a finely tuned race car.

Sigh....