Thought Experiment: Kinetic Barriers

Hello Blogosphere, t'is proof I'm among the living yet.

Anyhoo, for a while now, I've been pondering the several approaches one could take to mechanically representing force fields, personal shields, barriers, what have you. Some of this thinking first came from thoughts on how shields would come into play for a Mass Effect campaign setting, but would it become too fiddly to track, especially on multiple opponents. So it became the question; what could I do?

An obvious, easy and unobtrusive direction would be the 'plus' bonuses to armour, as if magical in classic DnD, subtracting from the foe's attack throw. It keeps things simple and abstract, and what would be better in an abstract game?

But that was not the direction I sought, no. The players needed to really feel the effects of a kinetic barrier, especially when fighting the Big Bad Evil Guy of the Week, or other tough opponent. And simply 'missing' their attack rolls round after round makes players feel cheated, as if their attacks simply do an absolute zero.

The first real attempt was instead, borrowed almost whole cloth from the game mechanics of the old skirmish/RPG game, Laserburn. In that game shields could negate the damage of a certain number of attacks (20) before failing, and they had the chances of failing each round anyhoo, just from the volume of attacks inflicted. Explosions could outright destroy or knock out shields. For simplicity's sake, I modified this to three grades of shield: 3 hits, 6, and 9 hits. Explosions took out shields 3 in 6 times. If knocked out, a shield would recharge to 1/2/3 hits at the end of each round with 1/6 chances. Simple right? Mechanically obvious, and dramatic when the Referee exclaims as shields burst and flicker out of existence. But one problem. Lots of logistics to manage for the Ref if a swarm of mooks have shields.

The above idea would work quite well if used in settings where such technology were very rare and/or expensive, especially if it's alien artifact tech.

So where'd I go next? I tried another obvious approach: shields as supplementary "Hits". And made up six levels of shielding, each recharging 1/3 Hits every round not attacked. These escalated by: 3/6/9/12/15/18. The last two levels were reserved for vehicles or shielded pieces of terrain/equipment. Sounded good, but still the logistics in a multi-man-melee bothered me.

Some other mechanics I have thought of follow:

-shield level blocks that number of individual dice of damage until depleted.
-shield blocks 1 damage per die by shield level.

The last two work particularly well for the firearms damage matrix I made, based somewhat on the number/hits inflicted from ranged attacks, from games such as Fokker and Chainmail's archery kills. However, Character Rank + weapon skill improve numbers as opposed to how many people fire. There are four small matrices thus for different types of damage potential.

So, in such a situation, what would you, the reader, do?

A Fundimental Future Feature is in a Threatened Space.

The author of an ebook, titled "Spots the Space Marine", has recently come under flak from big-box-business Games Workshop, and I'm sure all but two of you know who they are. Ah, but the problem here isn't author M.C.A. Hogarth participating in fraudulent activity, and impeaching upon the tarnished name of Games Workshop. Rather it is that he is being bullied by the company for using the term 'Space Marine'.

What's so big a deal with that? Certainly any science fiction fan worth their salt, knows how long this fundamental trope has been a part of its literature. The earliest known use dating back to 1932 in Bob Olson's "Captain Brink of the Space Marines", and more widely known within the works of Robert Heinlein and E.E. Doc Smith.

Now this isn't a simple case of one person getting pushed around, and threatened with a legal battle that doesn't truly have grounds for happening. What is the case, is that the more times they can successfully bully the case, the more credence they will appear to have. All big companies do this, because they know the majority of little people they trod on will get lost in the shit-storm that ensues. "How do I defend myself?", "I can't afford the lawyer(s)!" and etc. to that effect.

Funny thing too, given that the same sort of crap Games Workshop can throw at little M.C.A Hogarth, or in another case and make of that what you will, Chapter House Studios, it won't bother with video games giant, Blizzard. When Warcraft was turned down as a Warhammer Fantasy game, they edited it slightly and sold it, and Starcraft is just as guilty. And why is that? They can afford to fight them, and being pound-for-pound and then some, would just as easily throw Games Workshop off.

So if you can support this man, or any other in a similar situation, it'll be one more victory against big business. For further reading, or ideas on what to do, follow through to the author's personal site. Thankfully a number of people have given him some good advice, 'cause he needs it!

A to Zed - the rest of 'em

For those keeping track, I ended off with the Elder Scrolls in this challenge. I've been absent for quite some time. Between just not being around and a curiously dodgy internet connection, there's been little time for the web, or Blogger for that matter. Now, instead of spamming everyone's blog watch I'll condense the rest of my list into one post, that you may at least know where I was going to go.

Frank Herbert - the mastermind behind Dune and various other works of science fiction. Besides my long-standing love for Dune, his Destination: Void (The Jesus Incident being my favorite) series and The Dragon in the Sea are some of my favorites of his works.

Gyrojet - Gyrojet were a unique family of weapons back in the 60's that utilized gyroscopically stabilized microjet bullets for projectiles. Poor manufacturing and design dashed their chances of becoming any more than a curiosity. I first encountered these weapons in the role-playing game, Star Frontiers. Curious as to the nature, I did some research and was very pleased with what I had stumbled upon. The designs of the real world Gyrojets even had the visual aesthetics of fire-arms in Traveller.

Hivers - Given my fixation with non-human sapients, the hivers of Traveller fame were a welcome discovery. Their bodies are fine examples of symmetry, with a distinct society and culture.

Illithid - The Mind Flayer, the brain lasher, cutter, devourer, alhoon, and et cetera ad infinum. They're freaking aliens that eat fantasy adventurer brains; what's not to like? These practically build adventures on their own.

Jason and the Argonauts - Any person considering inspirational flicks to watch prior to running a game should see this beauty. The combat isn't retardedly choreographed, the monsters are mean, and the stop-motion animation still looks fluid.

Knights -I would have prefered to have done a bit on armsmen, or "men-at-arms," though knights are these things. Though there has been, I believe, two paladins throughout our group's entire history together, not one knight has ever truly graced its collective chronicles. Whether it be an errant knight, or merely nobility.

Lüscher -My family name; a Swiss name. I like pole-arms, but no, I'm not some autist with a thing for tables and charts. There is history behind this name, though I know so little of it. My grandfather came to North America after his stint as a missionary and eventually married, then later moved to Canada where when he retired, he took up farming. I've seen pictures of the Lüscher homestead in Aargau, somewhere near Muhen in Switzerland. It was a thatch-roof structure that I believe has since been torn down decades ago. Should I ever get a chance to see Europe I would much like to meet his family, and also give Mr. Giger a good handshake, and buy a pint. My name means roughly "he who lives near reeds."

Marathon Series - One of Bungie Software's flagship series. Originally for the personal Macintosh computer, the games were later ported to Windows. Totaling three games, each starts right where the previous left off; going from first contact with a hostile (aren't they all?) collective of races, the generation ship, Marathon, and its colony on Tau Ceti, is assaulted, to later adventures near the galactic core in a stolen vessel with a rampant AI, (and a good supply of expendable human meat-bags). The first game was instrumental in story-telling within first-perspective video games. For those even remotely interested, I heartily recommend going to Bungie.org and downloading Aleph One (all Operating Systems), and the three accompanying games. Marathons RED, Evil and Morgana's Revenge are also available there, and while fan projects, each are built to a high standard, almost befitting professional standards.

Non-Humanity - This is a recurring interest of mine. Sapient life of any matter, form, or environment, that is by definition alien. It could think completely different and apply obscene logics that make sense only to themselves, and it could be bizarre anatomy and senses that stand apart from ours. Basically, while I do enjoy 'men in rubber suits' aliens, I get a figurative hard-on, (pardon my vulgarity), just guessing at and musing how life not like our own would function.

OD&D - When I first encountered Dungeons & Dragons, it was as AD&D 2nd Edition, and that was just before 3rd started doing the rounds. I've never had a real copy of the three Little Brown Books, but once their realm was known to me, and I made my first step past the threshold, I knew what Arneson and Gygax had done, was lost with time, and edition. There is no purist here; I play anything set before me (except 4th Ed., once was enough!), but I am lessened for knowing too few do or want to play the game as it was. As a result, I also became quite interested in the history and development of the game, and later found things like a copy of the First Fantasy Campaign, and the lovely sites Hidden in Shadows, and Philotomy's OD&D Musings.

Pathways into Darkness - Before there was Marathon, there were pathways into darkness, and they  were full of things that go bump in the night. Though most certainly not fantasy, this was a dungeon crawl; with guns, the dead, Nazis, aliens, and skinny Buddha monks. Popular oppinion says Marathon shares more than just a few easter eggs with this gem of a crawler. As of yet though, still no Windows port or source game.

Querulous - And I don't mean the adjective. Arne of Querulous, his blog, has been to some manner of degree an inspiration to me when it comes to visual design, and just video games in general. Through his web log, there is often re-imaginings of various old game series, and other media icons. He is also responsible for Android Arts and Prometheus Spawning Grounds 7. For anyone simply interested in just looking at pretty pictures, or interested in something to ruminate over if video games are an interest of theirs, I heartily suggest taking a gander. His material on Exile is some of my favorite, given how he somehow makes an awesome game better!

Robert A. Heinlein - If you couldn't already guess, I dig science fiction, and the older stuff moreso. Mr. Heinlein is no exception. And I don't care what claim Games Workshop supposedly has to 'space marines', given that this guy (and a coupla' others) all beat those toads to it, (and can make more interesting space marines to boot!)

Syd Mead - A futurist artist of great repute and resume. A good chunk of his early days were doing futuristic paintings for Ford. If I were to look at a non-dystopic future, I would see it in his worlds. The stylings have 50's leanings, but with the right counter of post-modernism to balance it out. The new world look may not be to everyone's tastes, but there's hope, and a bright future to be had in each of his works, and it is things like his paintings that keep my hopes for the future high. That sounded pretty corny, no? All the same, this man is my favorite visual artist ever.

Tales from Earthsea - Or Gedo Senki, is an animated film by Studio Ghibli roughly(?) based on a collection of stories under the same name, as I recall tell. I've only ever watched it a few times, but the setting, along with various other objects and designs that persist about the world made it special. And definitely a setting I would enjoy running or playing a campaign to.

Unobtainium - Phlebotinum, handwavium, et cetera. This is the magical sauce, the stuff, and the E-99 that makes the latest gadgets, gizmos and reactors run on all cylinders. Often a plot point or enabler in any piece of fiction, without Unobtainium we would instead have to rely on real world materials that wouldn't work as well, either stretching plausibility, or completely throwing adventure out the window.

Vallejo, Boris - If Syd Mead is my fondness for the future, Boris is my fondness for monsters and babes in the company of monsters. A maker of very fantastical illustrations, but I'm sure we already know who he is.

Wipple Shields - Science has told me that wipple shields are a very important asset to spacecraft. So what made them get this spot? Simple: it's one of the first realizations of space armour, and is almost as important as radiation shielding. How wipple works, is that it is a very thin layer of ablative material designed to take hits from micro-meteorites, using their own kinetic energy against them, disintegrating the particles with little more than superficial damage to the surfaces below the shield.

X-Files - One thing I've  humored myself with repeatedly is how much this show is an inverse to Scooby-Doo. They kept thinking it wasn't so, yet always found the supernatural. Scoob and Crew are always on the hunt for a monster, but it's always that old man Jenkins. Incidentally, this post is moreso aimed at my general paranormal interests, and the title music still invokes an emotional response from me.

Yazirians - These anthropomorphic, gliding apes are positively my favorite of the main races in Star Frontiers. I couldn't really tell you why, and it definitely is not the battle rage ability, but the idea of power gliding across some moon with bubble goggles might have some say in the matter.

ZOrk - You wouldn't believe how hard I had to think of, and remember, the only interest of mine that starts with a zed. So, Zork. The text adventure role-playing game. Where being eaten by a grue was punishment for trying to not find a lamp. Originally, as I recall, the eponymous grue was added to replace the fallible logic of stumbling into a bottomless pit in the dark, given that this pit could happen in nonsensical locations. I had the gameboy version, not the original.

A to Zed - C is for Church, Doug

'C' is for Church, or Doug Church, a game designer currently enlisted within the ranks of game company, Valve. After leaving post-secondary, Church went on to begin his career working for Looking Glass Studios. The company, along with Church have received renown as creators of various innovations in video games, all the while still retaining interesting and engaging stories. Funnily enough, their games almost always did quite poorly in sales compared to their contemporaries, and were often regarded as "ahead of their time."

Various titles he is known to have worked on while at LGS include:  Ultima Underworld 1 & 2, System Shock, and Thief. Though I will strain right now that my main interest in this man and his work is for System Shock, and its sequel, System Shock II. He has proven to be an innovative member of the gaming industry time in and out, creating intricate and lively worlds that keep me coming back, even now, when DOS has all but died off.

For what time he has been involved with Valve, we can see his tendrils at work in Portal 2. His work has also influenced spiritual successors Deus Ex and BioShock. And though the company has not said what position he keeps, we can expect from what has been leaked on the internet, that he is involved in another game quite possibly similar to the previous System Shock games. The future can only tell what more this man has in store for us.

A to Zed - A is for Asimov, Isaac

Well, after finally caving in after seeing how much fun everyone else is doing, I figured, heck, why not? After all, it's all in good sport and an excellent way of sharing one's interests with others, and does so without being intrusive like one of those chain-games. We'll see how well I can manage a-letter-a-day.

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I begin with the letter 'A', and to represent it, I choose Asimov, or rather Isaac Asimov to be specific. Writer; futurist; creator of the Three Laws of Robotics; and maker of many science fiction tales. Some of his most notable works include: the Foundation, Galactic Empire, Robot, and Lucky Starr series of books. As time marched on ever forward, he later united these seemingly separate series into one "future history", though Lucky Starr is not included so far as I can recall.

Considered one of the top three science fiction writers that dominated the time, of which the others were respectively, Arthur C. Clarke and Robert A. Heinlein, Asimov also wrote works of mystery and fantasy, along with a fair spattering of non-fiction.

While I almost equally enjoy the works of Arthur C. Clarke, and there are numerous other interests and entries suitable for my representation of 'A', Asimov remains simply for the impact his worlds have imprinted on myself.

Any science fiction nut worth his salt is familiar with Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics. It frequently turns up in various stories in all seriousness and in jest, but also presents a solid platform of which to oppose the non-sense that any and all A.I. will by nature, eventually turn upon its creators. Not only do the rules govern safer synthetic thought processes, it also presents a challenge to the individual's integrity, and whether or not the rules can be broken. The Robot book series has left its own mark on where my thoughts turn to, and how to approach artificial intelligence, and the potential that true, unshackled synthetic intelligence might possess and utilize. One of my favorite Asimov works is The Robots of Dawn, third in the series, and an interesting "whodunnit" adventure for plainclothesman, Lije Baley.

The man can write an intricate story and plot, laced with interesting and diverse characters, whether or not they're human. Some have criticized his style of prose, for its often direct or sparse way, but its fashion leaves room for the mind to interpret and develop. Another intriguing aspect of all but a select few of works feature worlds devoid of non-humanity, where even at times robots do not accompany Man. It is a neat principle that avoids what is known as 'Clement's Paradox', or the effects of time and longevity on sentient races, and the chances of encountering them. This is also handy for certain interpretations of a humanist Traveller universe.

Plus, Alien has been so oft used for the 'A' entry, I found it a little passe to follow suit.

Mine Enemy.

Perhaps for most the flick, 'Enemy Mine' has passed on into obscurity as just another sci-fi thing.

Based on the book written by Barry B. Longyear of the same name, 'Enemy Mine' focuses on the story of a Bilateral Terran Alliance pilot and his Dracian enemy, both wrecked and marooned on an unregistered planet and left for dead. As they struggle to kill one another on the barren world (aren't they all?), the environment forces the two to shift their priorities and work cooperatively to survive, eventually forming an unlikely friendship.

"Shit? What do you mean, shit?"

While compared to today's visual spoilage, just about anyone will consider the effects to be silly, and the brief space battle that sets the premise for the film features noise in space (a la Star Wars), the story told is one marvelously crafted. And if I do say so myself, probably one of the better and more emotional that I've ever seen in film, let alone science fiction from yester-year. And while I admit, I'm quite shit at thoroughly explaining or swaying peoples opinions, as dictated by my rather bestial efforts at chicanery, I implore those of you that have not seen this film to seek it out, and those of you that have, to revisit it, but also to read the book should you find it.

House mk.2

As for you hobbyists out there; what potential does this whole shebang have for gaming? Nothing. Unless you're die-hard role-players that could handle the inter-character tensions and theme, or maybe the meteor showers and planetary fauna would look ace on your next backwater world. Who am I to say; or hold you back?


Also, I swear this web log is more than just binder!

A worthwhile read for any fan of Mass Effect.

Shortly after Mass Effect 3 went public, and devoted fans far and wide ground through the story like some manic drill to soft dirt, outrage soon swept the field. Never in the history of digital interaction media had the world seen such a vast amount of public outrage and general disappointment. The common complaint? The ending, and it alone, destroyed everything; obliterated company honor; threatened to make martyrs of most of the fan-base.

Here is, in my opinion, a strong essay that renders down and distills the elements of what went wrong, and for any of you that follow me that may even have a passing interest in the Mass Effect series, that you may read it.

A Logical Breakdown of Why the Mass Effect 3 Ending Makes No Sense

Just something that really nailed it.

While doing my usual of link jumping on Youtube I came across a music group that just hit everything I've been looking for in passive spacey tunes. I've usually got music playing during games that isn't distracting, so this was a godsend.

Solar Fields - Discovering

MIHYAP I

Hello All!

Just a shout out to any of you interested in aerospace, or science fiction films, and especially space suits. Steve over at Say; Hello Spaceman, has a lovely blog that continuously brings to light more and more gems from space opera past and used-futures present, and he could use some more viewers methinks! Maybe some of you can even give him suggestions to showcase.