Sunday, June 07, 2009

And I'm back.

I hope you all had a good Gameblog-free week. Big thanks to Zachary over at the newly spiffed-up RPGblog2 for taking care of yesterday's Shatnerday post! I've spent a fair amount of time I'd normally be blogging watching Futurama with my lil' sweetpea (she thinks Leela is cool) and doing some reading. I re-read R. Buckminster Fuller's Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth for the first time in forever. I highly recommend it for any referee wanting to run a Star Trek game where the Federation is a genuine Roddenberrian hippy-dippy utopia. I also started Michael Hanlon's 10 Questions Science Can't Answer (Yet), a light but entertaining pop science book.

I also spent some time doing more research for my Saikaido campaign concept. I've been grasping at exactly what I'm trying to accomplish with this whole schlameel, but reading this excellent post helped me zero in on the target. Saikaido is a straight swords & sorcery/weird fantasy game that happens to be set in southwest Japan circa 1275 instead of Hyboria or Atlantis or whatever. That's it. That's the whole concept. What can I say? I like starting with dirt simple elevator pitches and building from there.

Another item I worked on was "Welcome to Slimy Lake", a mini-sandbox for Mutant Future that I hope to see published in the next issue of Fight On! magazine. Gameblog reader and all-around cool guy VacuumJockey kindly did a sweet computerified map based upon my hastily scribbled one. This I guarantee: there will be a bear with laser eyes.

The big bummer of the past week was the Wednesday game session was a no-go. The gamer known as Squirrel has dropped out of the local gaming scene to deal with some sort of personal issue, and he was responsible for bringing two of my other three regulars to the table. So Carl is now my only regular player for the World of Cinder campaign. If next run he's the only other person at the table I may shelve the campaign and try something else for a while. We'll see what develops.

9 comments:

  1. Anonymous2:38 AM

    Welcome back! The absence of your posts was certainly felt.

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  2. A bear with laser eyes? Sweet! Would such a creature happen to be the natural enemy of the dreaded Spider-goat? :)

    I'm looking to your MF sandbox, Jeff -- it sounds like just the place that insane wizards would gate adventurers to...

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  3. Forward. I'm looking forward to your MF sandbox...

    It's monday, what can I say?

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  4. Yay! Woohoo! Jeff's back! My life is once again destined to be filled with quality game blog entertainment. What a relief.

    Interesting you should mention Fuller, as I've heard or seen a number of articles and tv spots on the man in the last few days. It may be celebrating an anniversary of some sort.

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  5. Good to have you back, and I'm glad that you liked my HF vs. S&S post.

    I would like to analyse the issue deeper, but I don't know if too much philosophy and theory is good for gaming.

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  6. Speaking of Shatnerdays:

    http://img.trekmovie.com/images/comics/twok_1_0ri.jpg

    Brand-spankin'-new David Frickin' Deitrick cover, that's what that is.

    Deitrick + Shat = Win.

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  7. (addendum to the above: it's one of three interlocking Deitrick covers appearing across the new [yes, oddly enough, I said new] Wrath of Khan comic book adaptation, hitting shops any day now)

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  8. God to have you back, O Purveyor of Gaming Wisdom!

    And thanks for your comment on my Boxed Set post!

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  9. Good to have you back. I enjoyed following the links into that odd part of the blogsphere to which they lead.

    Regarding how 'theory and philosophy' interact with gaming, I was reminded of recently hearing a standup comedian talk about the impact of his academic studies on humour affected his art. Just like a musician, he said that when the T&S was in the front of his mind, it poorly affected him. When he just got on with the job, the theory made the journey seem a little clearer and he felt improved the work.

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