Vondy

Re: Musings on Random Musings The middle class was better read and culturally informed in my mother's generation. Poetry and literature were required learning in school. My mother had to know many great American poems by rote, as well as highly regarded American writers, beowulf, and some greek classics. I'm on the tail end of that. People even five years younger than me miss a lot of references I make that older folks get. But I may be outside the norm. We didn't have a TV until 1981 and I didn't watch it more than an hour a day all the way through high school. Books were king in my home, and knowing bible, folklore, mythology, important poems, and American literary greats was insisted upon. Even now I only watch 1-2 hours per week of television, and I'm picky about it. This is why I said a classless blend of high and low culture. Public school used to provide a dose of high culture to everyone.

Re: Musings on Random Musings There certainly was highly regarded American literature, poetry, theater, and art. And still is on occassion. And a good deal of low culture isn't indecorous trash and sometimes transcends its essential form. There's nothing wrong with low culture in of itself. I admit to reading a great deal of historical and crime fiction, and playing role-playing games, on top of quintessential American literature and poetry, classics, and Jewish studies. I'm talking about the mainstreaming of base expression, negative mores, ugly humor, and crass, value-less tripe as the nuveaux-unter-pop-culture. We've added a third, sadly acceptable, strata: high culture, low culture, and this abyssal trash-unter-culture that's become mainstream.

Re: Musings on Random Musings A crystallized, symbolic manifestation of a deeper cultural trauma, if you will. And one that accelerated what it represented in an intense cultural feedback loop. America had a classless blend of low and high culture before MTV aired, but afterwards American popular culture has consistently driven downward to the lowest common denominator, creating an trash unter-culture, with MTV frequently pioneering the way or quickly jumping on the bandwagon by showcasing gossip journalism, toilet humor, slapstick, reality television, exploitation films, high-gloss packaging vacuous drivel, and the like. And while popular culture has always been associated with low culture by some, there is no strict requirement low culture be crass, vacuous, shivering, quivering, soul-killing, intellectual novacane. It isn't just MTV, but when I look back at life to date, MTV has come to represent the mainstreaming of trash culture and the sanction of an indecorous social milieu. Its Prolefeed for the bread and circus set. In the form of a pithy maxim: yes, the day MTV aired was the day American culture died.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings I watched American culture die. Time of Death: August 1, 1981, at 12:01 a.m.

Re: Basic Rules Skills Hero has a steep learning curve, but once you've mastered its essential elements, its easy enough to run. And you can streamline play it so it goes quick.

Re: Basic Rules Skills You can use any weapon carte blanch, but doing so without a Weapon Familiarity imposes a -3 OCV penalty to your "to hit roll." Weapon Familiarity represents the ability to used the specified weapon, or weapon group, without said penalty. If you want bonuses to your to hit roll you either purchase Combat Skill Levels (simple) or Martial Maneuvers with Weapon Elements (more complex) or Both. To hit an opponent you roll 3d6 against a target number or less. The target number is your 11 plus your modified offensive combat value minus their defensive combat value. So, for instance, a character with an OCV of 6, Weapon Familiarity: Blades, and +2 CSLs with Swords would have a modified OCV 8 when using a sword. If he attacks an opponent with a 6 DCV he rolls 3d6 against a target number of [(11 + 8) -6 ] 13 or less. Because this can be daunting at first I recommend you make notations of modified OCVs on your character sheet. Using our previous example, you could write down Swords 19-, which is derived from 11 + 8 OCV. Then, when combat starts, you just apply the opponents DCV as a negative modifier to the roll to get your target number on 3d6.

Re: WWII Hero Not a resource, but an opinion. When running war-themed games I've found its best to do one of the following: have the PCs be a part of an irregular unit, like an OSS detachment, or go with the foxhole perspective. In the latter sense I mean, make it about a tight knit squad with finite objectives in the broader fighting. The former is usu., but not always, easier in a character driven game. Another option is to pick a unit that gets some leave so you can have some non-combat intrigue or character stories pop-up. Black Sheep Squadron comes to mind.

Re: Dynamite Comics to publish John Carter of Mars series

Re: Embers of the Reich It raises some interesting ethical questions, like how far will the PCs go in dealing with nazi war criminals on the run, to get the tech. As an example, the Mossad found a Nazi war criminal high on their list of people to bring to justice in Argentina in a key position in Pinochet's government. They turned him as an intelligence asset instead of outing him. It remains controversial in Israel, even today. A thematic, scenario question could be: will you wheel and deal with a war criminal like mengele of the butcher of bergen belsen and help them escape to complete your mission?

Re: 6E What happened to HKA? In terms of logic: the physics of superhero comics has never been, shall we say, logical, sensible, or reasonable. Indeed, it wholly depends on suspension of disbelief. A good deal of this discussion applies strictly to heroic games. In my opinion, of course.

Re: House rule: a new form of figured CHA? I admit my designs have followed the "solid combat value + maneuvers and/or talents" paradigm. I don't necessarily max out the combat values, but I do make sure they're respectable. And with the repricing I've stopped using combat skill levels for the most part.

Re: 6E What happened to HKA? There is a subtle distinction to be made between logical and reasonable. In a strictly mechanical sense, the current paradigm is logical, but may render unreasonable results vis-a-vis special effect, genre, or playability. The X2 cap in old editions was an attempt at imposing reasonableness, though the success of that depended on numerous factors that varied from design to design, concept to concept, and game to game, and it could feel arbitrary as a hard-coded standard. It wasn't strictly logical. This is a major principle in adjudicating hero as GM: judging the reasonableness of a given design or ability within the context of the game it will appear in, which isn't a "one ring to rule every game" fit. Its game by game.

Re: Anyone have a terminator statted out? There's a 5E version on Surbrook's Stuff.... http://surbrook.devermore.net/adaptationsmovie/asstd_movie/terminator.html

Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Not fantasy. Its historical, but.... SPQR I: The King's Gambit, by John Maddox Roberts. Its a historical mystery set in the roman republic (caius julius caesar is still a young man), and follows Senator Decius Caecilius Metellus as he investigates a murder that may have geopolitical reprecussions for the Republic. Its the first in an ongoing series. Its well written. Decius is a believable-enough Roman, albeit tailored to be sympathetic to a modern reader. Maddox has the milueu and hisoty essentially correct. I heartily recommend it. My only gripe is that he can't make up his mind about using latin terms for things, which, in my mind, is inconsistent and sometimes jars one out of the milieu. For instance, he uses many latin terms with descriptions slid in, but then turns around and calls the main character a "commissioner" on the "council of twenty six." I understand not calling it the Vigintisexviri, which is hard to pronounce, but it translates as the college of twenty six, and it wasn't populated by commissioners, but by magistratus minores - ergo, magistrates. The magistrates responsible for polcing were called tresviri capitales or nocturni. This is a nitpick, really, but it was occassionally jolting. Commisioner sounds like a modern police muckety-muck, which doesn't fit ancient rome very well. Still, great book. I'm looking forward to reading the next one.

Re: What are some things , in terms of storytelling/plot, that are "off limits" in yo The only "dark champions" games I run are police procedural / hard boiled detective / noir crime games. It tens to be gritty and sometimes dark. Murder, torture, and rape are all potential lines of investigation. In the case of the latter two, I don't deal with them in medias res (see below). Instead, I describe them post-event in clinical language appropriate the the genre and via scenes-vehicles appropriate to the genre: coroner's comments during autopsy, doctor's comments, victim statement, police report. Graphic, but flat as a tombstone and matter of fact. As a rule, for all genres, I avoid rape involving player characters or significant recurring cast. On one occassion, as a wrench for an undercover player character (played by a female) I had a rape scene. I fully expected the player to get creative to stop it and maintain her cover. She did nothing, which was uncomfortable. As a result I *never* do rape scenes in medias res. Ever. I also avoid torture involving those classes of characters unless the player specifically green-lights it for story purposes, which not surprisingly, has never happened. I have one interrogation scene (of an NPC) in my PBEM that involved chemical interrogation, light physical abuse, and intimidation. That's as rough as the description got and even that was unusual and only done to establish a character and give the player something to react to on a moral level. In terms of things I don't handle at all: child abuse, especially abduction and molestation. I also don't do racism as a theme.Sex is always handled "dress hits floor," style scene-wise.

Re: Sewage disposal in a fantasy world What about an early gas works to extract methane? If you're being liberal-minded about it, even a late western empire or byzantine milieu *could* support it. We talked about this in my antarctic civilization thread. It didn't fit the feel for my fake society, but for a more imperial or high medieval feel it could work. Also, a city that size requires a good deal of farm land to support it. While the farmers would probably have plenty of animal dung, perhaps humanure is in use. Its less useful than animal manure in some ways as human manure has to sit longer to let pathogens die (and has more pathogens to start with) Also, while bovine and equine dung would probably be better, dried feces is used as fuel for fires in some parts of the work. Another option is to create some sort of fantastical bacteria or fungus that breaks down or outright consumes human waste. Perhaps said fungus or bacteria, in turn, has some use, allowing excess bacteria / fungus to be harvested. For instance, maybe it has strong phosphorescent properties allowing it to be use as night-markers, or even weak lights. Or perhaps it can be distilled into dye. Urine is more readily useful as fetilizer, and can be a source of some chemicals. Also, if you have gray water needs, its simple enough to let it separate and use the water for gardens and the like, though its less problematic to pee in the river than put solid waste into it.

Re: Musings on Random Musings Perhaps it was meant in the sense of "something of overwhelming importance to the person" as in "football was his religion," which, which is included in most dictionaries' list of definitions for religion, though it tends to further down the list as its a less orthodox usage.

Re: Musings on Random Musings

Re: A Thread for Random Musings The NPT is dead.

Re: The Rockford Files It would have to be a pardon. There is no state in the union that will give a private investigator/detective license to an ex-con.

Re: I remember when you could stop a train I'd probably allow a brick to apply running to strength to represent "digging in."

Re: Criminal Profiling Incidentally, the FBI has no formal "profiler" position. They have a behavioral sciences unit, which is its proper name. The agents don't specifically have to have psychology backgrounds, but most do as its highly competitive to get in. Instead, there is an extensive array of seminars and coursework they have to take to get certified. The notion of "criminal psychology" is relatively fractuous and unpopular despite the commonality of the term in popular parlance. Individual behaviors common to criminals are often common to honest citizens, including police officers. "Criminal Profiling" is really a combination of abnormal pyschology and tracking statistical norms for violent crimes. Profiling is essentially identifying likely offenders based on statistics and modus operandi based on pattern.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings Vengeance is vastly underrated.

Re: Need list of skaldic kennings The eddas were pretty pulpy.

Re: Need list of skaldic kennings I was fiddling... "...his fate sealed in the distaff court." No dual meaning, but several potential implications.