Eleven Interesting Elements

Normally, not one for these sorts of posts, but I thought, 'eh, whadda'ey.' So here's what it be, and according to the wee list of rules, I've got to put them out to be seen by all, along with tagging about 11 if you, (which I hope don't mind too much) and answer the 11 questions asked of me by my tagger, in turn asking 11 new ones of you I choose. Without further ado:

The Rules Are:
1. You must post the rules.
2. Post eleven fun facts about yourself on the blog post.
3. Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post, and then create eleven new questions to ask the people you've tagged.
4. Tag eleven bloggers, however, you can break the rules and tag fewer people if you want. Make sure you hyperlink their names/blogs.
5. Let them know you've tagged them!
6. Have fun!

01 - What made you decide to write a blog?
The thought that by making ideas or presenting them to the public eye, would boost and augment my will to be more productive within and without my hobby. Basically, if I give myself a reason to hit some rough estimate of a deadline, that I might encourage myself to do it often enough to get somewhere.

02 - What would you say has been the highlight of your blogging career to date?
Most likely that there's at least a few people following my blog that at least consider some of its content interesting, or useful for rumination.

03 - Name your favorite animal.
Damn, now that's a tough one. If we're talking mammals, it would be somewhere between a Burmese cat and a regular old badger. Reptiles would see either a leopard gecko or the local green/yellow garter snakes of my residence. Birds? Hands-down, pelicans of any sort. As for my favorite? Either the cat or the gecko, cause both are lovely, curious little critters that like perching on my shoulder.

04 - What has been the best thing to ever happen to you?
Though beyond corny I'm sure, either my cat or my best chum. Both are always there for me, and keep the warmest of company. Living is an excellent thing that happened to me too.

05 - You are in a lift with a Nun, a middle-aged business man, a Karl Marx look-alike, a twenty-something female charity worker and Stephen Hawking. The lift shudders to a stop, the lights go out. There is a high-pitched scream followed by a thud. The lights come on and the Nun is lying dead on the floor with a knife in her chest. Who did it and why?
For starters, I can imagine anyone who knows anything about Communism (or at least believes they do) would accuse the Marx look-alike. But that would be baseless, as he only looks like Marx, and doesn't necessarily hold anything against religious people, let alone any interest in killing a nun. Everyone would assume it wasn't Hawking, and he would very agree to their logic that he couldn't have possibly done it. The business man could be a hit-man from a local mafia, an assumption made entirely based on his attire and age, but he wouldn't want blood on his good suit. The charity worker is most likely a good person, given what her occupation is, but perhaps she is scorned by the church taking up all of the people's potential charity, and goes for a take-that.

The assassin would have expected and preferred to make their strike when easily picked-out stereotypes could lead people away from the true killer, which would leave the less likely as the true murderer. Which would in turn breed questions of any one person's true motives, or if they really are what they appear to be.

Possibly there was a hidden ninja above the elevator cab, which would explain the sudden loss of visibility, and easy killing of the nun. But there's one crucial mistake: a ninja leaves no trace behind!

So who did it? My character, who just plain outright hates the clergy, haha! Who will glib his way to innocence.

06 - Name your favorite colour.
Burnt orange.

07 - What has been the scariest thing to ever happen to you?
My vehicle stalling at the top of a large hill heading into right-of-way traffic one very cold morning. Not the brakes, nor the power steering work if the thing dies! Blew right through an 4-way intersection, cranking the wheel left and right, then ended up in the parking lot in front of the Chinese food place.

08 - You are about to break the world record for the tallest house of cards in front of a crowded room of onlookers and world press. All of a sudden, some idiot parent allows their errant child to charge over, knocking into your table, sending your world record beating attempt crashing around you. What do you do next?
I'd tell them all, that if I could get it that high before, I'll build it greater again! But will certainly wait some time (weeks at least) before bothering ever again. I don't think I'd get too mad or anything, it's friggin' cards, after all! I think I'd get more sour about having to clean them all back up after everyone leaves.

09 - If you had to spend a month on a tropical island, what four luxury items do you take with you?
-big Tupperware box full of science fiction and fantasy novels
-paper for drawing and writing
-12-piece pencil set
-bag of polyhedrons

10 - Once on your tropical island you are allowed to have one person of your choice to stay with you. Now this can be anyone famous, living or dead, fictional and from any period of time/history - loved ones are not allowed - who do you choose and why?
Quite possibly James M. Ward, or David Arneson, and make them referee for the whole dang shebang! Though maybe Simon Pegg, just 'cause he's an awesome dude, who's gotta' be awesome to hang out with.

11 - What has been the worst impulse purchase of a totally useless item (one you convinced yourself into believing you needed, but didn't)? What was it, and do you still have it?
Well, I'm sure, like any other buyer and collector of miniatures, would be all the ones I only bought because they looked cool and didn't actually serve any use in my games at all. Ever. For example, I own just about one of everything Copplestone currently has available, and only actually use, let alone have painted, less than a dozen figures. Hundreds of dollars sit carefully tucked away for that year when I finally get back to them...


Again, hopefully they don't mind, but here's those I've considered worthy of tagging, and cheers too all!

• Aeons & Augauries
• A Field Guide to Doomsday
• A Paladin in Citadel
• Gunner's Wargaming
• Hidden in Shadows
• Quickly, Quietly, Carefully
• Terminus Omega
• The Angry Lurker
• The Savage Afterworld
• There's Dungeons Down Under
• Underworld Cleaning Service

Now, for my questions eleven:

1. What... is your name?!
2. What... is your favorite colour?!
3. What... is the average airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?!
4. If any, what is your absolute favorite game, (tabletop and otherwise) and what makes it greater, or at least more better for coming back to, than others?
5. Is there greater value in having good friends at the table, or amazing players, and why?
6. Gorgonops or Shuvuuia?
7. If there was any great, wonderful and amazing period or setting you'd love to play a game in, what would it be, and what sort of character(s) would you have?
8. Is a post-scarcity society one you would be comfortable living in? Why?
9. Do some of these questions remind you of stuff from English class?
10. Would you reckon there is still, or at least was, life, however small it may be, on the planet Mars?
11. Where can I get fried meal worms and apple-candied scorpion lollies? I forgot.

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.

To the Gods, Uncaring and Bemused.

Where then have we gone, to abandon the oracle; hoard the boons; and cast out the traditions of cleromancy? Do we no longer seek mysticism and atmosphere? Is there a wanting that consumes us that ever dance to the clatter of knuckles, that we would rather turn to unsavory practices of fudging and dishonesty? Surely not!

Roll yer' damn dice and leave them were they fall! If it's the tank's day to be eaten by a grue, than so be it; and swift Char-Gen to those now dead.

Consequently, random tables are lovely things.

With a tip of the palm...

...And the roll of a die.

Traveller was always a system and a setting that appealed to me, yet always out of my grasp. It's very hard to play a game if you're the only one that wants to. But what really kept me was how the game played. I like my big bag of many polyhedrons, don't get me wrong, but the call of the days when only the six-sided die consisted my collection is strong. I've always been a great fan of rolling multiple dice in place of single, higher-value dice; it gives better results. Do take note however, that I'm not big on absurd rolls like 12d4 or 20d6, yikes!

From every mechanic, generation table, character statistic and action with randomized outcome, one would need nothing but the common die in classic Traveller. From shooting a walking bulls-eye to succeeding at one of the character's few trained skills, only two sixers were ever needed. This created a bell curve of success, which tied in fluidly with the human-centric feel of Traveller, in that we as squishy organisms usually only do so well, on average. The average roll of '7' guaranteed that characters still maintained a measure of success with basic skill levels. Because generally, we succeed at things we know (flat DC is usually '8'), while still allowing room for potential failure. A stark contrast to the very random nature of rolling a single d20.

Further on, we see the system continuing its variety of uses for the pairing of 2d6 with generation charts. Using one die in the tens, and another in the ones, to the similar effect of 2d10 for determining percentile successes. Each of these tables generate 36 possible results, which while small compared to 100 for 2d10, this again allows for a bell curve effect. The result places more common encounters nearer the center of the curve. So instead of truly random encounters in the sense, we can see an increased chance of more common mooks arising with more interesting and rare things turning up with a probability to match.

Maybe I'm still just too much of a wargamer at heart, but the simplicity of using fewer varieties of polyhedron while still maximizing their potential can be just as fun as throwing pyramids and buckyballs about the tabletop.