Oink, Oink...

Sooooowheee! Made a pig of myself over the week--I had loads of fun staying up the weekend playing nothing but Dark Cloud 2 and Final Fantasy X. Then watching rented movies--I picked up quite a few to see. Tomb Raider, The Italian Job, Ocean's Eleven, Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai... I still have The Seven Samurai and Caddyshack to view, along with some yummy horror hentai (The Bible Black series) to top it off. A DVD copy of Bruce Campbell's Army of Darkness was also purchased for my collection--you can't have one without its campy goodness. (Mental note: Check the Rathole Reviews on the movie Dagon.)

Also, a trip to Sci-Fi City yelded some great goodies, including a discounted 2-for-1 sell on Shadowforce's The African Alliance, of which I applied to Burger Tech, a supplment to Ninja Burger: The RPG. Add in some more Pirates of the Spanish Main packs, Shadowforce's The Shop threat book, Poke'thulu handbook, more PSH 364 comics (what, where's my missing KotDT?!?), the new SnapfoosII puzzles, and more Ironclaw supplments! (Doleroux, Bisclavret, and Pehlan--I'm still missing out on the Rinaldi. More info to follow.) I'm a happy person, aside from the info about the diecast Kyruu-MechaGojira that's finally being shipped out tonight.

Hrmm... Perhaps I should go over to Blockbuster's again and try to pick up Bionicle: Legends of Metru Nui again along with Death to Smoochy or Spirited Away.

Nah. Dark Cloud 2 is calling for me again, perhaps with a side of Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates...

The Poseidon Files: Setting

It's been a bit, in which I've been busy working out some details in regards to the Spycraft world setting I want to GM for my group. The, ah, 'document' will be called The Poseidon Files, due to the name and nature of the parent organization. I think starting here, and gathering my thoughts on it, will be benificial for me. If nothing else, this is public material. (Editing will becme neccesary at this point.)

General Elements
Organization(Org): Poseidon Force ("Humanis, Fraterias, Umbra")
Symbol: Black shield with stylized blue trident, gold trim
Size of Org: "Agents" within 200-250 people; specialists at near equal numbers
Location: Base (New Babylon) unknown; multiple entry points, including the island of Uji-Gunto in between China and Japan (northernmost point of the Okinwa(sp?) Archipalego
Technology Level: High; think 'Genetic Manipuation' and 'advanced stealth technologies for vehicles' for starters
Funding: HaloTech Industries worldwide; world leader in technology (quietly manufacturing well-developed "lower" technologies from PF labs)
Scope of Org: Global
Org Agenda: Stability; achieving self-sustaining global balance of power while not limiting freedoms
Targets: Potential threats, tyrants, general terrorism on national scales
Leader: Scott Pyros (CEO of HaloTech, Commander of PF)
Recruitment: Both "internal*" and from selected facilities such as the British SAS; prospective agent heavily evaluated by key people for loyalty and skillsets useful to PF

Key Elements
Psionic Talents?: Only 1% of the world posess the talent; they are usually called Latents in PF. Of that 1%, rougly 5% or more are Talented (meaning that their psi-gift is Awakened, as the occasion is called.) This factors heavily in PF, were a large number of Talented are recruited and trained to help PF in the best capacity they can. Unfortuantly they are not incredibly powerful; only certain cases are documented where further trauma or mutations (such as Pyros himself) have been "induced" did their effective, if very focused, power increased measurably. It should be noted that any new psis are strongly discouraged from seeking more power through these paths.

Mystic Talents?: None whatsoever. Any that PF has managed to track down have been cases of untrained Awakened performing these "miracles" without proper guidance. (Usually, further investigation into these lost Talented determines wether or not they can be embraced or suppressed.)

Rules Documentation:
All three base Psion classes from Shadowforce Archer Handbook are limited up to 5th level. It is as of yet determined if the psion skills from those core classes can become cross-class skills or not, even with some restrictions.

A synergy bonus can be applied to the agent's Investigation skill depending on the nature of their Talent and the investigation involved. (Example: If the agent has over 5 ranks in Energy Control as a pyrokineticist, he/she can apply the synergy bonus when studying causes and effects of most kinds of fires.)

Sourcebooks Used
Spycraft d20 Master Handbook
Modern Arms Guide (including on-line chapters & expansions)
Fixer/Pointman Sourcebook
Mastermind Sourcebook
Shadowforce Archer Master Handbook
Offical on-line extra materials from spycraft.com

UrU: The Return

Looks like registering Uru actually fixed the problem. Spent quite a bit wandering the ages--I seriously love the way the lost city of D'ni looks. It's so... abandoned. (If you check the city login where you'd first port in, the last known actual port-in is listed at Feburary!) I am well aware of the descion to not support UrU Online, but the remains of it is still pretty creepy...

At least I figured out a positive direction in the Greamadamatonblargh Age (where you get your Ki device,) so I'll keep moving that way later...

Leirune

A little rough draft of a new character for Leirune. Inspired by the Avoirdupois source book, to be honest. I think I like the quickdraft, but I need to work on the background. Perhaps he was orphaned?

Quote: "Empires rise and fall not because of conquest and wars, but of greed and envy."
Full Name: Estoc duTropos
Name: Estoc duTropos
Nick Name(s): Tok, Esk
Age: 35
Age Appearance: 30ish
Sex: Male
Species: Horse
Height: 6' 7"
Weight: 150 lbs
Marking Type: None
Marking Color: N/A
Fur color: Dusty Tan
Ears: Notched in one ear
Head-fur Color: Dusty Yellow
Eye Color: Brown
Weapons: Greatsword
Powers/Skills: Strength, endurance
Disadvantages/Weaknesses: Honor-bound, moody
Favorite Food: Leafy greens
Least Favorite Food: Meat, in general
Favorite Color(s): Light blue and tan
Least Favorite Colors: Garish pink and lime
Getup: Light blue hooded tunic, light tan loose pants, leather fingerless gauntlets, chain shirt
Family: Menas duTropos (father)
Mate: Unmarried
Hometown: Perakor
Behavior: Cynical, stubborn, moody
Fears: That he may just be right...
Religion: Versev
Rune: Isa

Appearance:
A big, tall, well-muscled Palmino horse, clad in a simple light-blue hooded tunic with ear-holes, and simple loose light-tan pants gathered up at the ankle. On his arms are simple fingerless leather gauntlets that double as armguards. An old, well-maintained chain shirt is draped over his tunic and belted at the waist. Strapped on his back, at a near-horizontal angle, is a simple triangular greatsword in an undecorated leather sheath.

Personality:
A cynic at large, he isn't terribly impressed with the world in general. He feels that hope isn't very useful, and there's no point in dreams, as both can be all too easily shattered. His past experiences conflicts with his desires, causing him to be rather dour and curmudgeonly.

The Background...

UrU

I've just popped Myst Uru: The Complete Chronicles into my green custom-kit PC ('Biolante' from here on,) and loaded it all up. It's great eye candy, and with the new 3D aspect it brings out a more interesting look that easily surpasses the orignal Myst (of which I still have.) I won't bore you with the details--it's not hard to find.

Unfortuantly, early on into the game--specifically 'The Cleft,' to exact, since I can't redo that Age until I get the Relto Book, I seem to have issues. Primarly, it seems that someone forgot about a very important rule of Game Design. It's a very critical one, IMO, as you can't sell a game without it.

I'm reffering to User-Friendly Interfaces. One should never fuck this one up. I can't stress this part.

In the case of Uru, this primarily involves the world itself, as it is the vehicle for interaction. Let me point out one of the cases involved here. I'm speaking of the bucket that has one of the needed Journey Cloths to open the Relto Door for that particular Book. It's set up so that you need to push a foot-lever to release the bucket so you can touch the Cloth obviously on its side. But this is where the messed up. When you build a first level/stage, you want it to help teach the player on what to do. That means that they can poke and prod multiple things before they figure it out.

But! It turns out that when you use the foot-lever, without any power on, it does its 'not on' action and stays untriggerable even when the power is turned on. Big no-no there. I had to restart with a fresh new game. (I liked my avatar in that one; I made him a near-duplicate of myself, straight down to the glasses. Just no belly.)

And a second critical flaw happened, with the same object. I went ahead and turned on the power before even coming anywhere close to the ledge the foot-lever was on. Pushed it, and made the bucket go down so I could reach it. And I was unable to touch the Cloth, when it was obvious that you can easily touch the damned thing! Is it some sort of 'you need to register before continuing' thing? 'Cuz if I made this, and wanted that, I'd stick it in the Relto Book instead, in big red letters, where the players would be movitated to send Ubisoft their info, instead of being pissed off at being so close to finishing this Age!

I'm looking into this. Someone needs to send me a patch, damnit.

It also bears mentioning that I get pissed when they (game designers) forget to include subtitles for their spoken dialogue. I'm rated as moderately to severely hearing impaired in both ears--although that's up for question these days, thanks to my left ear. (I can hardly hear shit out of it, and I wear that side's hearing aid without a battery for convience's sake.) And out of courtesy, I keep the speakers off on my computer--I play them loud enough for me to hear, but too loud for the other two normal-hearing people in the house. (That's why I love the Closed captioning on the TV.)

It's so trivial, code/art-wise. Even Blizzard did it for their FMV sequences in WarCraft3. Yet, for a game like Myst, with a deep storyline and history--which, I admit, comes from mostly books, but I haven't touched anything beyond the orignal Myst. And that still needs some subtitles just for the funny stuff Artus' sons say. (I'm not kidding--their ranting and threats sound funny just because they're two meglomaniacs trapped in books.)

Uru, unfortuantly, suffers the same issue when you punch the button in Yeesha's workroom. Despite that it's neat to have a holographic projection in-game of her, there will always be people with hearing difficulties playing these sorts of games. And it reflects badly on the company if they can't provide alternatives in-game.

Shitlist.addTo("Cyan Worlds");

Avoirdupois

I've managed to procure this book by luck, thanks to finding out that SciFi City is attempting to carry some of Ironclaw. (Actually, I was tempted by the Bisclavret suppliment as well, but it'll keep. Another read for another day.) Read it through today, and I liked it. Looks promising for an armadillo priest I've written up for a rainy day.

Short overview, it gives the rise and spread of one of the Noble Houses of Calbera into the mighty force it is now, backed by the Church of S'allumer. It also gives interesting backgrounds into the feudalism of the Avoirdupois demese, and fun options as well as better detail about the S'allumer faith, with a seperate holy path of magic and several Orders/Heradoxies of different faiths within the lands. Very well done, with a French-European feel to the theme. Makes me look forward to obtaining Bisclavret and Phelan books in the future.

It's a shame that this system isn't as widespread as it needs to be. I blame WotC for that. In fact, I think I'll bugger my group for a try, if they're bored. (Either that or a game of Kobolds Ate My Baby! 3rd Edition. There's something interently funny trying to make everyone say 'ALL HAIL KING TORG!' or take a Death Check Penalty.) I haven't even started on the details for my Spycraft world, 'The Poseidon Files'.

Midian

I have yet to give a shout-out to my good brother, Jason, about his own blog about his Nevada home he's building, Midian, at : http://midianranchblog.blogspot.com/

He's done good. And yes, he's slightly eccentric, but so's my father. He keeps a '41 Lyman Islander motorboat in running condition. I collect stuff that most people don't understand. It runs in the family.

Ooo, ahh...

I have plenty to write about, but first things first.

I still have much to do with the blog layout, but this 'minimal black' template is a good start. I'm thinking of further expressing the 'Iron Dragon' part of the layout, but understanding the blog HTML will take me awhile to puzzle out. I'm not a big fan of CSS style sheets, but at least it's flexible.

I'm thinking of using here and there the "Ironclaw" font from Sanguine Productions, as I've used that font well in the past. They have it as a free font download here: http://www.sanguine.com/downloads/Ironclaw_fonts.zip (And yes, I like Ironclaw. I'm thinking about ordering more suppliments, including their Jadeclaw book. So I like dragon PCs. Ask Nuemon, my D&D Ebberon-style silver hachling PC. He doesn't give a shit about much, BTW. )

Offhand, a good grey scale-like sideline fading into black from the left side seems to be a good start there. I might mess around with 'bordering' for the top box, but that's an option. (But I am strongly tempted to be a smart-ass and use my favorite Breath of Fire 2 textbox instead. 'What do you want to do with the Dragon God?' makes me think up random smart-ass replys, mwahahahah... )

I think I'd better start this now. Oh, and just to finish this off...

[Insert poop joke here, much hilarity ensues.]