Clash of the Tweedledums

We went 3D crazy over the Easter Weekend and saw two (count 'em!) films at the cinema - the execrable Clash of the Titans (which incidentally proves that even high-budget "good looking" films can be hilariously bad) and the slightly less execrable but still not very good Alice in Wonderland. Why on earth either flick got made is entirely beyond me - without the Harryhausen monsters the original Clash was paper-thin, and the idea that you can improve on Alice in Wonderland by "reimagining" it seems like a prime exercise in tilting at windmills if ever there was one. But that's by the by; I liked two aspects of the films if taken as an unholy duo of sorts:

1. The Gods Are People Too

The core concept of Clash of the Titans - war between men and the Gods - is an interesting one, no matter how poorly conceived and executed in the film itself. The idea that mortals can defy, challenge, and even kill the Gods is an idea that was present in early D&D but has since seemed to fall by the wayside, and more's the pity; if I have one criticism of Planescape as a setting it's the idea that "the powers" will always remain beyond the capacity of the PCs to defeat. (This is incidentally another reason why BECMI is great, and why Planescape would probably work even better with that system than with 2nd edition AD&D.) Having a goal to aim for is part of what adventuring is all about, and what greater goal is there than to cast down the very powers that rule the universe?

(Critical as I am of the Dragonlance line, it must be said that the second trilogy, (the one where the titles all end in "...of the Twins") had quite a compelling theme at its core, what with Raistlin trying to cast down the Gods and become one himself. Pity about the writing.)

A long while ago I wrote the following, which seems germaine:

One of my favourite D&D tropes is the idea that if an individual being gains a group of worshipers, it can attain divinity. This makes religion a very chaotic, ad hoc, and above all tangible thing; unlike in the monotheistic religions of our world where Gods stand aloof, D&D powers' fate is inextricably bound up in the fortunes and vagaries of their followers. It also means the interplay between believer and deity is balanced, with neither having the ultimate power; okay, so High Blierophlat the God of Death can squish any follower he so chooses, but if he does that too often he'll eventually find his disciples running off to some more amiable deity like Jethro the Gardener. Unless of course he's willing to offer some serious compensating benefits.

This approach allows for a much more localised, cultish and fertile religious climate, something akin to how I imagine a trawl through pagan Europe would have been: each group of villages has its own local deity, each cave its shrine to the mountain spirit, each river its sprite, and each boulder its guardian - the major difference being that in a D&D world, those things are real, which is infinitely better. The local village deity really will provide summer rains - if the populace are willing to sacrifice a first born. The mountain spirit will kill travellers with an avalanche unless he is properly placated. The river sprite needs just a few more believers before she can attain demi-goddess hood. The boulder is really a galeb duhr who has had divinity thrust upon him by unwanted worship; all he wishes is that his devoted disciples would just leave him be.

2. Things Don't Have to Make Sense

One of the things (probably the biggest thing) that I disliked about Burton's image of Wonderland was that he seemed to be trying too hard to make Carroll's world have a comprehensible form and function - with a past, a future, a political background and an emotional reality at least vaguely like our own. The Mad Hatter is not the brainless cipher he appears in the book, but an emotionally scarred victim of war; the Queen of Hearts is not the image of passion and blind selfish impulse that she is in the novel, but a scheming dictator aiming for global domination (again with added emotional depth: "It is better to be feared than loved"); the Caterpillar is not a capricious know-it-all but a helpful oracle. Unlike the novels, where there are no rules or logic to either the behaviour of the characters nor the physical world itself, the film has a much more conventional worldview. This is to its detriment - indeed it's what I think M. John Harrison railing at when he talked about "tam[ing], colonis[ing] and putting your cultural mark" on a fantastical setting. (He was wrong about this when it came to Tolkien - whose world was meant to be tamed and colonised by the author himself - but spot on when it comes to Carroll.)

It can be tempting to get worked up over details when you're creating a campaign setting - the need for things to make sense and fit together in a logical and "realistic" way can take over, especially if you're of a certain frame of mind. (Not all DMs worry about things like that, but I think it's fair to say a large portion do.) In fact there's surely nothing wrong with going the whole fantastical hog and letting the imagination and the subconscious run riot, if the players are willing to buy-in; who cares about realistic politics, economics and race relations if you can eat a cake which makes you 100 feet tall and walk through a mirror?

Toying with things which should be avoided

Idle Lunch Break Activity #137-5(b): Do a search for "dungeons and dragons" on Westlaw, JSTOR and LexisNexis. Find diverting references to D&D in case law in England & Wales and in Scotland, and in academic articles:

We learn from this report also that Gormley and Wilkes, at the urging of Wilkes, became obsessed with playing a game called “Dungeons and Dragons.” Involved in this is a great deal of fantasy role playing. So it was evident to Dr. Spragg that Gormley and Wilkes had been toying with things which they should have avoided. (From (1992) 13 Cr. App. R. (S.) 689, a Court of Appeal case in which the length of a sentence for armed robbery with a crossbow was appealed.)

"The solicitor for the appellant informed me that, her parents having separated, the appellant had an unsettled background with attendance at residential schools. She was normally employed in catering. On a trip to visit her mother in Edinburgh she had got married and had later given up work to look after her husband's disturbed son. She and her husband had separated about one year ago, and the appellant had been unable to find work since.

"The appellant had bought the drugs the weekend previous to 19th November 1990 and had supplied to friends during games of Dungeons and Dragons. She had made a full admission to the police and had named her supplier. Her supply was not commercial. She sold to pay for her own drug habit. Her accommodation was not lavish. She was very concerned and worried about the offence..." (From Alison Elizabeth Wood or Gibson Appellant against Her Majesty's Advocate Respondent, 1992 S.C.C.R. 855, at the Scottish High Court of Justiciary.)

Never fear, we're not all armed robbers and drug dealers though. We also use our maths PhDs to figure out whether or not a dice could be made with an odd number of sides. From "Dungeons, Dragons and Dice", an article in The Mathematical Gazette by K. Robin Mclean (at of all places the University of Liverpool):

Certainly there are solids with an odd number of faces. We could cut off one vertex from a cube to get a solid with seven faces, but it would not be suitable for an unbiassed die because its faces would not be alike.

Drat you, laws of geometry. I won't ruin the article for you by giving away the ending. I'll give you a clue: it involves Euler's formula for convex polyhedra. Yeah, you knew that already.

Finally, we also write poetry. From the National Council of English Teacher's English Journal, an extract from a US high-schooler's poem entitled "Dungeons and Dragons (to Brion)":

Lost in the world of is,
You wandered in the realms of might have been.
On your white horse you fought dragons,
Lurking in paper dungeons, with your paper
sword.

It goes on like that in requiem-like fashion, though I half suspect it's an obituary for a character rather than a real life person. Kind of sweet though.

Fighting Fantasy Monday (Except on Tuesday): Seas of Blood (X)

Hello, is it me you're looking for? I can see it in your eyes, I can see it in your smile...

Yes, I'm back in the land of the living, ready to Fighting Fantasy it to the max. Sorry for the delay; I'll be back on a daily (ish) schedule from now on.

Last time we had to decide whether to attack a ship or look for something smaller. Look for something smaller! As if. I was glad to see unanimous support for bloodshed and violence.

You give full sail to the Banshee and bring her rapidly alongside the sluggish merchantman. Your crew brandish their scimitars and crossbows as you lean across the gunwale, shouting to the other vessel's captain and crew, 'Surrender your cargo and pas-
sengers or you will lose your lives as well as your ship.' This brings an unexpected response. A
hooded figure, obviously a Warlock or Magus, steps aside from the gaggle of frightened passengers and performs a short spell, which summons a hellish Shade and sends it like a smoky cloud across the space between the ships to attack you, the captain.

SHADE SKILL 11 STAMINA 6

If you defeat it, turn to 252.

What a shady thing to do!

Shade Fight:

R1: Us 18, Shade 19. We lose 2 points of STAMINA; 13 remain.
R2: Us 15, Shade 18. We lose 2 points of STAMINA; 11 remain.
R3: Us 18, Shade 18. Draw.
R4: Us 16, Shade 17. We lose 2 points of STAMINA: 9 remain.
R5: Us 20, Shade 18. Shade loses 2 points of STAMINA: 4 remain. (Thank Christ for that.)
R6: Us 21, Shade 15. Shade loses 2 points of STAMINA; 2 remain.
R7: Us 19, Shade 21. We lose 2 points of STAMINA; 7 remain. (Bollocks.)
R8. Us 18, Shade 17. Shade dies.

Hooray!

The crew and passengers of the merchantman, aghast at the Warlock for provoking you so, rush and seize him. Trussing his arms with a stout rope, they push him overboard into the sea, leaving him to drown or be taken by the sharks. The captain climbs into the rigging and shouts, 'Forgive us for harbouring such an unworthy fellow. We place ourselves at your bountiful mercy!' His crew and passengers vigorously agree. Boarding the merchantman, you seize 120 Gold Pieces and, in a fit of good will, take only 2 of his passengers as slaves -
add these items to your Booty. Returning to the Banshee, you allow the merchantman to continue its journey. Will you continue to patrol the Inland Sea by heading towards the Shoals of Trysta (turn to 66), or change course and travel towards either the west coast (turn to 157) or the Eastern Rim (turn to 10) for a bit of coastal raiding?

What the fuck? "A fit of good will", my arse. We'll take only 2 of his passengers as slaves because we'll have keelhauled the rest.

Log: 17 Days
Gold: 183
Slaves: 3
Crew Strength: 15
Stamina: 7 (out of 19)

Life, oh life, oh life, etc. etc. I hate Desiree really.

Life is hella busy at the moment, so updates will continue to be slow. Be patient. Before you know it I will be RSSing all over your inbox again, like an RSSing RSSer. Or something.

Fighting Fantasy Monday (Except on Wednesday): Seas of Blood (IX)

Plundering rich merchants was definitely the most popular choice. Let's see where it leads us.

The Banshee cuts through the quiet waters of the Inland Sea; your look-outs keep a continuous watch on the clear horizon for any sign of shipping. Roll three dice. If the result is less than your CREW STRENGTH, add 4 days to your LOG. If the result is equal to or greater than your CREW STRENGTH, add 5 days to your LOG. If your LOG is an even number turn to 363; if your LOG is an odd number, turn 294.

The result was an 8, less than our crew strength, so that's 4 more days to the log. The log is now 17, so let's find out what's in store on 294 (took me ages working out how I could make that rhyme):

The square rig and wide hull of a merchantman appear on the horizon. It is a large vessel, heavily laden and possibly well armed, ploughing its way west from the Eastern Rim to the city of Kish. Will you attack this ship (turn to 391), or leave it be and continue patrolling, looking for something a bit smaller (turn to 66)?

(They love trying to build suspense, the FF authors, don't they?)

Log: 17 Days
Gold: 63
Slaves: 1
Crew Strength: 15
Stamina: 15 (out of 19)

Actual Play - Call of Cthulu

Things are busy round here, so updates will be slow for a bit; it took me a day and a half to write this entry. But anyway. Now that the wife and I are settled back in blighty, I decided to set about finding a new group. Last Saturday I met up with some guys (and a girl) in a dimly lit rented basement in an incongruously flash location in Liverpool's business district, and we played Call of Cthulu for five hours. And fun was had. The players reasurringly filled the gamer stereotype of being overweight, dressed in hoodies, and of pallid, sunken-eyed complexion, but they more than compensated by filling the other gamer stereotype of being friendly, intelligent and funny.

They're an older bunch who've clearly been playing together for years, which has its advantages and disadvantages. The disadvantage is that they're obviously used to a certain style of episodic play; at one point near the start it was made clear to me that "this case is closed and we're moving on to the next one now" even though I kind of wanted to investigate what I thought were loose ends. The advantage is that everybody knows what they're doing and it's a well oiled machine.

It was also interesting to observe from an outsider's perspective what the "average" British gaming group is like nowadays (seeing as I've been away from the scene for 7 years or more). Obviously this wasn't a representative sample, but it was notable that:

• D&D dominates online debate, but this group (and the circle of connected groups, about 40 players total) rarely if ever play it. They seemed to like Basic D&D best. Yet another blow struck for BECMI.
  
• Though they were a very trad group, they'd heard of Dogs in the Vineyard and liked the idea of it.
• They thought Shadowrun was "crap", which I'm inclined to agree with even if I've played it an inordinate ammount.
  
• They had no interest in blogs or websites to do with RPGs.
• Judging from the campaigns they've been playing recently, they seem living proof that the games that were popular back in the day (Traveller, 2300 AD, Twilight 2000, Space 1889, Call of Cthulu) are still being played regularly and in pretty large numbers.
  

I'm not sure what this tells us, if anything, but there you have it.

Panthro Says Silly Names Are Silly

I think I've reached a zen-like awareness of what I like and don't like in a game, and it can be communicated very effectively through the use of this graph:



That is, if a minotaur barbarian character in game X doesn't just attack people with his axe and try to gore them, but uses things like a "pressing strike", "swift panther rage", and an "opportunity gore", and there are no tongues in any cheeks, then chances are I will find game X very silly indeed. You can sum my philosophy up thusly:

If you can imagine people in the game world using a given phrase, it's good. If you can't, I want to hit the designer over the head with a shovel.

"I trample and gore the goblins while swinging my axe at them" is immersive and fun. "I use my swift panther rage ability!" sounds like what an 8 year old boy says when he's being Panthro from Thundercats in the school playground.

"I'll swift panther rage your goblin ass, fool!"

People at Story Games Get It

I've written before, if only in passing, on how the Old School Renaissance and the whole indie game/forge movement are really two sides of the same coin. This is true both in the nuts-and-bolts sense (both are all about DIY, Print-on-Demand, and Blog-o-centrism) and also philosophically (player agency and narrative control are central in both movements; the only difference being that games like Mountain Witch make narrative control explicit whereas with OD&D it's entirely implicit).

Further evidence of this can be found in this thread at story-games, which shows that people over there "get it" to a much greater degree than the herd at rpg.net. Here's a paragraph that bears quoting:

Also, about wanting to play a fighter and not getting a good Strength score... I know that my thinking's not that useful for most, as I don't exactly run D&D by the book, but why not just play a weak fighter? If I did the thing with ability minimums for class entrance (which I currently sort of do; some classes require a successful ability check, which is similar), I'd ensure that I also have a set of class options that have no minimums, and from which players could develop their characters into whatever they want them to be. So make that low-Strength guy a fighter, experience the suckyness and then fight your way out of it. From zero to hero, I say!

Couldn't have put it better myself. The obsession with optimization so prevalent on web forums is something that never fails to boggle my mind, not because it's couched in whiny and entitled terms (although it sometimes is) but because it's so godawfully boring.

Fighting Fantasy Monday: Seas of Blood (VIII)

So here we are, stuck in a pit with some sort of giant reptilian beast. Last time we had the choice to either run around the monster, or use its back as a springboard to leap out of the pit. I'm glad to see that you were mostly all man enough to go for the second option. Let's see what happens.

You run and dive at the beast's head, grasping it by the horns and flipping yourself on to its back. It performs a ferocious jump in an attempt to dislodge you, but actually gives greater impetus to your leap for the edge of the pit. With only inches to spare, you succeed in grasping the rim. With the abbot still laughing at your expected demise on the horns of the beast below, you crawl out and into the chamber. Turn to 225.

See, being Sinbad-esque always pays off.

You face the surprised abbot and his equally surprised attendant monk. Whipping your scimitar from its scabbard, you rush the pair, cutting the monk down before he can defend himself and then crossing swords with the master.

ABBOT SKILL10 STAMINA 8

If you defeat him, turn to 390.

Yeah, fuck you, defenceless monk! Now for the abbot.

Round 1: Us, 20, Abbot, 19. Abbot loses 2 stamina.
Round 2: Us, 12, Abbot, 17. We lose 2 stamina.
Round 3: Us, 22, Abbot, 16. Abbot loses 2 stamina.
Round 4: Us, 24, Abbot can't win. Abbot loses 2 stamina.
Round 5: Us, 21, Abbot, 19. Abbot falls to the floor, dead.

You search the abbot's chamber and discover a chest which contains no Gold Pieces. The abbot's sword is also a worthy prize, being forged from the finest Marad steel; it will add 2 to your SKILL whenever you engage in hand-to-hand combat. Searching the room further, you find a trapdoor under the abbot's chair, which opens on to a spiral staircase. Descending this, you arrive at a rough-hewn corridor, which takes you to a point outside the castle walls. You recover your waiting crew, return to the Banshee, weigh anchor and head down the coast. Turn to 123.

"Contains no Gold Pieces." Great.

The Banshee is sailing just off the southernmost tip of Enraki. Apart from this island, the horizon is clear, with neither ships nor clouds visible. The main trade routes between Kish and the Eastern Rim lie to the south, between Enraki and the Shoals of Trysta.
You could patrol this stretch in search of rich merchantmen (turn to 318), or, if your crew have suffered casualties, you could sail to the neutral city of Assur to recruit some more men (turn to 171). Alternatively, if you're feeling lucky, you could try your fortune in the gambling-pits of Calah (turn to 211), or proceed to the Eastern Rim for a bit of coastal raiding (turn to 197).

Log: 13 Days
Gold: 63
Slaves: 1
Crew Strength: 15
Stamina: 15 (out of 19)

Wake Up Baby Cause I'm Coming To You From The Future

I took two days off last week to play with the wife (no, not just that kind of playing... well, okay, quite a bit of that kind of playing, although it depends on what kind of playing you really mean, etc. etc.). So I came into the office today, even though it be Saturday, to catch up on work. Naturally I'm not doing much work at all, and mostly am just listening to Zwan and Alice in Chains, checking the football scores every three seconds, and drinking tea. Nobody else is around. All is at peace. Time to write a blog entry compose of random titbits.

• I'm spending some time posting at Story Games, to see how the other half live. Thoughts? Relatively friendly and sedate, probably due to shared viewpoints and a high degree of consensus on any given issue. A nice change of pace from the freneticism of my regular haunts.
• It strikes me that this list of maxims, found at said forum, could apply equally to what so called Old Schoolers trumpet, except for maybe the last one - just goes to show how both the avant-garde forge games and OSR retro-clones are really a reaction against the same thing:
  Story is created in play.
  Is it fun?
  Create opportunity and provide feedback.
  Player’s actions matter, reinforce this to create immersion
  Story is the culmination of player’s goals.
  Continuity fosters reality
  Supply redundant and convergent paths
  Drive the story with all you have.
  
• Arguing on the internet is a terrible waste of time, but really quite fun sometimes.
• I wonder how many people who are usually the DM are also failed novelists, or at least people who think about writing novels but never do. I suspect there's a high correlation between DMing and Wanting To Be A Writer.
• I love how d12s roll.