A Posting Cornucopia of.. STUFF

Why just.. STUFF? Cuz I have a long work week thanks to holiday schedules. And... I can actually use the money. Like really need it. So enjoy a selection of silly things, quick ruminations, and junk like that.

This is what gaming with me gets you:


CHEESECAKE! Holiday themed Cheesecake, covered up until game day with a plastic lid that still has that sticky glue crap on it. I haven't done anything one could really consider cooking in a LOOOONG time. Like 06 or so. Even this was mostly just a mix. But I mixed it.. WITH LOVE. (And not that kind of love. Sicko.) I tweaked the recipe a bit, adding in some Pumpkin Pie spice for that little something extra. And I dunno how it will be cold and all, but the batter on the blender blades was AWESOME. Seriously. I had the urge to just say "To hell with my diet, to hell with everyone! Imma eatin GOOD tonight baby!". Luckily sanity prevailed. But if its as good in actual chilled cake form as it was in "remaining batter on blender blades and mixing bowl", its gonna ROCK. I put it in an Oreo cookie pie crust, put some soft (ish) peppermint sticks on the top (which I had to break to make it not look odd. I want my decoration to be somewhat symmetrical!) that have a bit of the old PMint action seeping into the cake, and some Christmas Tree candies as extra sprinkled decoration for something that should be festive and tasty.

This is the kind of nice things people who game with me get. Because I am awesome. (Eventually someone will realize it, right?)

This next topic is just a picture I saw on whichever rendition of the Warhammer thread Something Awful is up to now:



"Tricks Brother Michael? That's something a Sororitas turns for money. What I do is enforce the Emperor's most holy will made manifest through time and space using me as but a humble vessel for his limitless might!"

The quote is from me. I see a Space Marine Segway and I can't help but think of Arrested Development. That show was awesome.



This is how I sell stuff on Ebay. Personalized descriptions, a fair price that isn't ripping myself or the consumer off, and I am showing I care. With this item I just sold, I think I have passed the 1K mark in things sold in the last few months. Of course much of what I have sold is nerdy things that are seriously wanted by other nerds that I myself do not want anymore, but at least its (for the most part, at least one Ebay seller has bought one of listings to obviously be resold at a higher amount!) going to a good place and I am making money and the purchaser is saving money over MSRP or other Ebay sellers.

I mean I have one of those Magic 15th Anniversary 2 player life counters. I have mine up currently for 30 with a Buy it Now of 50. The only other listings are from a seller who has them in his or her store for 100, 100, and 200 or so each depending on color.

I am selling my nerd stuff I don't want and taking up space to my brother and sister nerds and I hope it shows. I even put little personalized notes in most of my items.

Those Orks? They went in under 5 minutes, though it was to someone in an IRC Chatroom I have Ops in (#tinypewtermen in the irc.synirc.org channel. SA Goon Warhams talk. Or as some say: "Cpt Rufus' personal sperg arena". I talk a lot.) who wanted em so bad he is willing to pay shipping to Australia. So my Orks get to visit Kangaroos and Koalas! He has done a pretty good job converting AT 43 Type 3 infantry suits to Ork Killa Kanz so I expect him to do the same to my "counts as" ones!

Actually I had quite a bit of interest in the channel as I was asking for price advice and such on the Boyz. I just ended up going with something a little under what I paid for them. I think. I've been buying the Orks off and on since.. 99? 2 sets of Gorkamorka (1 of which was a free gift for a year's subscription to White Dwarf, back when you got something good for subscribing AND the magazine had useful game information instead of being a commercial you pay for.), a couple trades here and there, and the odd massively good deal on ebay. I am SOOO gonna miss those Night Goblins converted to Gretchin.

But the way I look at it, I need cash for other fun things I want. (And bills. OH GOD BILLS.) I am not using the stuff, so why not pass it on, and if I can make a few bucks doing so? ROCK ON.

And I had another epiphany at the disastrous 40K game last week where my World Eaters using the Blood Angels PDF codex were the Japanese Schoolgirl to the Eldar's Naughty Tentacle Demon. (And just what is it with those Tentacle Demons? You would think they would find a nice lady tentacle demon far more attractive than some icky human. Are they like the Furries of the Demon World? Shunned and mocked by being freaks who don't find their own species that attractive?)

See I mostly play 40K for the fun of it. Its not a particularly well designed game. Its not a particularly well balanced game. Its in no way, shape, or form a particularly CHEAP game. Or even moderately priced. I like to make odd and silly lists that do odd and silly things.

But because I had Orks, Eldar, Tau, World Eaters/Blood Angels, Chaos Marines, Tyranids, and Imperial Guard I was spending what 40K money I had on bits and pieces of each army, never really gaining any skill or competence with them, and not really having enough models to do various strategies and army builds. So I was totally Barding it all out. Jack of all trades, master of none. I keep forgetting what units do, and even forgetting rules while playing. Its too many armies for one game.

Sure my Imperial Guard are mostly just a dual duty with my AT 43 games so they kind of get a pass. But the others? My Eldar are so haphazard and unfocused they seem to have eternally sucked since 3rd edition. My Tau are boring and tedious to play. I find Orks funny but I seem to maybe play them once or twice a YEAR at best. I love my Nids because I love the Alien movies (even the god awful ones. Its like Jaws. Its got XENOMORPHS IN IT. I can't help myself!) and I have enough to be flexible. My Chaos army is so old now its massively flexible too. My World Eaters/BA can mostly be used with my Chaos for insanely large Apocalypse games.

Not to mention my Ork and Tau army builds can mostly be replicated in my other armies. So why even keep them? I can pay some bills or get some stuff I might actually USE, and get more enjoyment out of the armies I do want to keep. I mean I love my Eldar even though I can't seem to win a single game with them unless I play Stinky Kid. (I'll get to him in a later post.)

See one thing I have learned the last few years whilst stupidly draining my bank account (not always on goofy junk, sometimes its bills I never knew of or expected, or emergencies, or just not realizing all those little coffees and such really do put a hit on the ol' finances!) is that while I may HAVE more stuff, I spend LESS time with each purchase and I get far less enjoyment out of them.

You know those god awful videogames we all bought as kids? In some cases we still loved them and have fond memories of them. Because its all we had so by golly we were gonna beat em and get our money's worth! And we had time and reread favorite books and comics. And even replayed our games just out of the love of it.

We had less and appreciated more.

Its why I am cutting waaaay down on what I buy. I now ask myself if I REALLY want it. Do I need it now? What use will I get out of it? If I wait a while can I get it cheaper down the line?

And the latter is a BIG thing. Do I need to play that hot new videogame NOW, or can I wait a year or two and instead of spending 60, spend 20 instead? I mean, is a great game less great if I wait a year or two? I've got more games to play now than I will ever finish as is!

Something to think about.

Well, I probably won't get time to make another update till after the Thanksgiving weekend so have a great holiday if you celebrate it and your job doesn't force you to work it to amuse the sad horrible people who do not!

Why so spergy? OR Things to do to not have a bad RPG session.

Call this a two in one post.

(The events happened with people I knew. I apologize in advance if posting about it upsets them in any way. I think we learned a few things worth sharing with the Internet. Should anyone not wish these events to be repeated here please email me and I will remove enough content to fix it.)

Last week a group I joined of people who I already knew had an RPG game. It did not go so well. Mistakes were made all round. Too many people were chatting loudly about things utterly uninvolved with the game, putzing with things not involving the game, ect.

I got an email from the GM taking me to task for building a model kit during the game. Looking back perhaps I should have asked if it would be a problem. Normally I can multitask while I play, plus as I feel I talk too much and am constantly (and somewhat hurtfully IMHO) taken to task for being too loud as well I felt the kit would keep me quiet during downtimes and give other players a chance to shine as I eased into the campaign. If the kit was causing me to fail to keep 95% of my attention to the game I would have put it away posthaste.

The game itself was kind of a disaster. Around 10 people around 1 table all talking and the GM, being one of the nicest damned people I have ever met wasn't really running the game as best a GM should.

On an RPG forum I posted about it and what happened.

The responses I got ran the gamut from intelligent things that should have happened to the most worthless, hateful things no gamer should ever do, ESPECIALLY not in a group where everyone is friends. (Or you really should want to BECOME friends with the folks around the table with you.)

There were such horrid suggestions as "Steal the best players", "The GM should have booted you for even bringing it because you were clearly a passive aggressive tool", "The GM can't run a game so boot him and take over" and a few similarly hateful things NO DECENT PERSON SHOULD EVER DO.

See for some gamers the game is the Alpha and the Omega. Its all important and anything that keeps it from some perfect gaming ideal should be horribly stomped on. These are the sorts of people who think yelling at other people will get them to do what they want and think how they think. Like Rush Limbaugh. Normal people, and people with souls and empathy for other human beings understand this in fact not only fails to solve any problems, but hurts feelings and makes things worse.

Way worse. It in fact can end friendships.

Asperger's Syndrome, for folks who don't know the term is a condition in which the sufferer largely has trouble empathizing with people and interacting with others on a normal level. Many nerds on the Internet have decided they have this condition as an excuse for being a douchebag to others. Spergin is a joking term for nerds getting angry and pissy about stupid things online or in a game setting.

The guy who flips out if you even look at his models on the table? Spergin.
The chick who starts screaming bloody murder if you make fun of her favorite anime pretty boy character? Spergin.
The rules lawyer who starts spouting rules and trying to overturn a GM call? Spergin.
The guy who builds his 40K armies only after he hears what army you play so he can beat you soundly? Possibly Spergin.

Ya know that sort of thing.

More common real life Spergy things could be not throwing your garbage away at the movie theater as you have to walk right by the trash can to leave the room anyhow. Not putting away your shopping cart, but instead leaving it in the middle of your parking space. Giving a waitress a hard time at a diner for no real reason and then not tipping her just to try to score a free meal or because you think its funny.

In fact, those real life things might be closer to Asperger's behavior than the nerdy ones. It shows a lack of consideration and empathy for your fellow human being.

And sadly, empathy for your fellow human beings seems to be in such short supply in this world that many people have becomed accustomed to other people "peeing in their Corn Flakes"!

The thread I made on this site was full of that. I consider people I game with either friends or potential friends. You DO NOT do your boys and girls wrong. You give them plenty of chances even when they bork things up. You respect them. You help em when they fall, and cheer them on when they win.

This thread I mentioned had sadly little of that making me wonder what sort of horrible draconian games many roleplayers play in. While they might get more gaming in than my groups do, we certainly are closer as friends and have generally more pleasant days even if the games themselves might not be as satisfying.

Yet in this game session's failure I take learning and knowledge and wisdom from it. And I impart not only to you my few readers who don't know who I am, but the folks in the game who do.

WISDOM FOR GMs:
1: You are the GM. Your word is law.
As the GM you run the show NOT the players. If they keep babbling off topic or being loud, you should bring them in line. If you choose to ignore a rule for speed or flair or fun or cinematic awesome the Rules Lawyers should just be quiet and accept it, maybe bringing up the correct rule after the game.

2: As the GM you NEED TO KNOW MOST OF THE RULES.
This is VERY important. Knowing all the rules is nigh impossible in these games but you should know more than your players do. Keep some "cheat sheets" handy with the main things you need to know. Have your rulesbooks tabbed to important sections so you can look up stuff fast.

3: Be prepared, but be flexible.
Have your adventure notes ready, but be capable of changing gears due to player actions.


WISDOM FOR PLAYERS:
1: The GM is God. Obey and respect them. The players are your brothers and sisters. Respect them too.
Don't cause trouble for the GM. Don't try to powergame rules or stupid actions to hose over and ruin the game for other people. Its not nice. The GM's word is law. They should be impartial but fair. If you find some lame loophole or rule the GM doesn't want to follow tough noogies. Bring it up after the game but accept their ruling for now.

2: Contribute don't distract.
If you can't keep quiet find something to fiddle with that will keep you focused on the game yet not distract anyone from the game. If you cannot do this, leave your Ipods, cellphones, artpads, toys, or whatever at home.

3: Know what your character can do.
Be as prepared as the GM is. Except you just need to know what your character can do. Jot down page numbers of your character's powers and abilities. Maybe even scan them and put them on cheat sheets. Don't expect the GM to remember every skill and ability you have. Its impossible!

Some thoughts from the game that could be useful:

1: Game size. We had 10 people in one room. This might have been too many people. For a game this big it may have been better to go LARP style and split up into rooms and move about giving us more RP with less requirements for constant GM interaction. We were all talking over each other, and rarely did it involve the game itself.

2: Assistant GM/"Rules Bitch"/Party Leader or Caller. Once you get that many people the GM is gonna be swamped. Some help or backup could be handy. This obviously requires some forethought and planning as the Assistant GM kind of needs the game spoiled a tad, and if its a Party Leader or Caller the players need to agree on how it will work. But it can make for smoother, faster games. The Rules Bitch just saves time and sanity for everyone. Because the Rules Bitch is already on the case when a rule needs to be repeated for the sake of all.

3: Giving players motivation and stuff to do. This was a problem with me. I didn't get into the game till like 90-120 minutes in, and had little motivation or story reasons to do so, yet the GM expected me to almost drive things. If you want a player to drive things, get in touch with him or her before the game and work out what they need to do. Sometimes players like myself who sort of take up the party leader roles don't always want to be the LORD OF ALL ATTENTION and want to let other folks shine. In the game we played I apparently picked a REALLY stupid time to become an awkward wallflower. The GM was used to me taking the reigns. I didn't really want to, but would have if I had known, which leads to:

4: Communication is key. Everyone should be on the same page. Campaign style, characters that work together, what is expected of everyone. It makes for happier, smoother, faster running games.

5: Talk with people after the game to clear up issues, rules conflicts, ect. We are doing that very thing, and this post and some phone calls are part of it.

6: Remember you are all friends and to treat each other as such. None of the passive aggressive ways of handling things most RPG forums seem to think is the correct way to deal with a game. Mutual respect and understanding and empathy goes a LOOOOOOOONG way folks!

Hopefully this will illuminate some people and give them wisdom and knowledge. Plus its always good to remind ourselves why we play.

To have a good time with friends.

BEST. COMIC. EVER. (Plus Blog Update Stuff)

http://community.livejournal.com/scans_daily/7069757.html

And its a fan comic. Its the second part of a 2 part series (links can be found within the actual post) that pretty much has almost everyone from DC comics showing up in some form.

Its great, and if you have a soul you should read this.

(EDIT: With Scans Daily currently down you may find the creator's work at: http://the-blackcat.deviantart.com/ )

And then wonder why DC isn't offering the creator gobs of money to print his or her amazingly fun, funny, and cute comics in a proper dead tree format.

Those of you interested in my RPG project don't worry! February will continue my work on the Adamythryl Engine. Painting my wee Elven ships for Uncharted Seas comes first, but the starter fleet should be done Monday night.

I wanna play more City of Heroes till the middle of the month when my sub runs out and I can go back to playing some other videogame of some form and shape. (Currently Arc the Lad 2 on the PS1. Unlike a certain modern overpriced system, the Playstation 2 plays all my PS1 games, and in a generally improved way to the original machine.)

I know I haven't been blogging a ton lately, but the winter blahs plus holiday hell, and the vast variety of projects and interests I have keeps me from really devoting a ton of time to any single one.

But I average at least a post a week here, and given the small amount of readership I have, its not my number one priority, though it is on my mind quite a bit. I could post more "HEY I DID THIS TODAY" stuff like I did early on in my blog, but its mostly stupid, nobody cares, and in some cases I was being nicer about game sessions than I should have been as the annoying parties in some of those early 08 games were actually reading this. When I really shoulda been talking about how badly they ruined that week's session. (As it stands I am not likely to ever play Hero Quest ever again, and its caused me to take a long break from Lord of the Rings Miniatures. People ruined my experiences in those games THAT BAD. Though in LotR's case I still really love the game itself.)

Wednesday Game Report

This week was another trip to Sarge's Comics for moving around wee toy soldiers and making pew pew noises. At least in a perfect world anyhow.

But I FINALLY got to play Warhammer Fantasy. 1500 points of Night Goblins vs 1500 points of Wood Elves. My poor Goblins, already afraid of nasty Elves and their pointy ears, (Except for Liv Tyler. She makes them feel funny...) had the absolute worst luck. They lost every combat. They failed every morale test. Their spells almost never actually worked. Outside of my Fanatics and the Rock Lobba doing some damage, my whole army basically did nothing and died horribly. When they weren't running the Hell away. It was a fun game, but a bad one for the little green blighters.

For a quick follow up game, we played a 1500 point game of AT-43. Therian vs Therian. I had my usual army, and my opponent had a 2 Storm Golem/2 Strider force. However, fitting Tiamat and the big strider in meant he had no Overseers (officers) in his forces other than Tiamat. I used my Tiamat as bait, and my Goliath squads and my Tiamat managed to take her out, giving me the win.

My playing and pimping helped one player grab the Warhammer Battle for Skull Pass set to go with some Orcs and Gobbos he already got a deal on, and its pushing Starfury who was there observing towards the Dark Elves who just got a new army book and some new models. (22 dollars MSRP for 5 Cold One Cavalry? THAT'S A GOOD DEAL.) I even bought a D&D miniature off of Starfury, cutting down what he owes me for the old car I sold him. I get a nifty Efreet model that looks like the pants wearing little brother of the one on the original AD&D Player's Handbook, and he effectively got his booster pack for half price!

I also grabbed the Operation Damocles campaign book for AT-43. I haven't had time to do much more than skim it, but its got some neat new special rules, the game errata, and a bunch of new scenarios to play.

Of course I now have Changeling the Lost thanks to a Borders 40% off coupon (and I personally blame Jess H, and the Connecticon Changeling LARPers for making me want to buy it. ITS ALL YOUR FAULT!), and a killer ebay deal for some 2nd edition AD&D books too. Quite a bit to read, and all of it purchased at a fine price.

And now with a Warhammer Fantasy player going Orc, I may finally put my Lizardmen together so I can play something different. The Warhammer talk is getting MagicDrew a bit more interested in getting his Vampire Counts all set up too.

I'm such a damned gaming instigator when I get the chance.

Now if only I could get dates this easy!

Some short thoughts on D&D 4th edition.

What do I feel about the newest, hottest thing?

My perception of 4th is a shameless, soulless money grab designed to emulate MMORPGs, which really aren't RPGs at all. I'm not even sure MMORPGs could be considered akin to cybersex to RPGing's actual sex. (If nobody minds the comparison. I guess this would make games like Fallout "self love" and console RPGs making out with your pillow.)

D20 was well intentioned, but turned out to be complicated in all new ways compared to older D&D systems, and mostly became adventures in how to make the most munchkin character and tactical wargames where maybe some RP broke out from time to time. It wasn't freewheeling and it seemed to encourage BY THE BOOK ONLY play ala early 80s Gary Gygax in Dragon articles. (The dirty little secret of AD&D is almost nobody actually played it by the book.)

Honestly as a gamer it makes my heart sink that D&D seems to have such a stranglehold on the market and that whatever new edition comes out immediately becomes the big dog, with people praising it to no end. (Though 4th hasn't had as much of it as 3 got. Maybe if 3.5 was never released it wouldn't look like so much of a money ploy?)

I just don't understand new D&D being the king at all. And I don't understand why new editions of games are all the rage. If you already loved the game you were playing, did you really need a new version? Do you have that much money burning a hole in your pocket so you want to rebuy what you had already, maybe in a form that's not as good anyhow?

I guess I will just shuffle off to oldie places like Dragonsfoot or wherever people like a wide variety of games. Too bad they are few and far between, both on the Internet and real life.

No wonder why I barely play RPGs anymore. I'm kind of sick of even feeling like an outsider in niche hobbies. I like RPGs but don't like current D&D. I like comic books but am not a huge Marvel or DC fan. I like electronic RPGs but I don't think Final Fantasy is anything better than ok. I like cartoons and anime but mostly like stuff with giant robots or more adventurous, cerebral fare. I like miniatures wargaming, but loathe painting. I like videogames but cannot stand (or at the least have a mild distaste for most of) EA Sports, Real Time Strategy, MMORPG, First Person Shooter, or that GTA Gangster game nonsense.

Sometimes I wonder if its my own brain sabotaging me.

On Nerd Stereotypes and Defending the Hobby Part 2

Back in February 08 I did an article with the above name. Over on the Fear the Boot Podcast's forums a thread has popped up about being "outed" as a gamer. As if its a terrible thing to be into geeky stuff.

Well, listening to people treat others negatively because of harmless things that don't hurt anyone REALLY ticks me off. I can't stand injustice. So I had another tirade. Here we go. I'm sure if I annoy some douchebag on the Internet and they decide to "Net Detective" me looking for ammo they will find lots to feed off of here.

CONGRATULATIONS DETECTIVE YOU FOUND MY SECRET LAIR. YOU CARE WHAT A RANDOM DORK ON THE INTERNET DOES AND THINKS. YOU FAIL AT LIFE.
(Seriously. You are the equivalent of people who read People Magazine. Why not care more about YOUR real friends, family, and community? If you have time to look up stuff on me, you have time you could donate to help the less fortunate.)

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Go read the Feb 08 post.. this is the follow up here. Ba weep gra na weep ninny bong.
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Yet I have to be ashamed of being a nerd? I have to feel bad about reading Sci Fi novels and comics? I have to pretend I don't like giant robot anime or enjoy owning entirely too many toy robots I paid for with money from my job after I paid bills and GASP! Even give some money to charity when I can?!

Because I could care less about multimillionaires playing sports but would rather read the rules to a new miniatures game instead I am the lesser person because the statistics and silly abbreviations I know aren't the RIGHT ones? The stats of Michael Jordan are honestly about as important as the stats of an Orc in Warhammer Fantasy Battle. NOT AT ALL.

I served a tour in the Navy. I pay my bills on time and am totally debt free unless something terrible happens (which should be any day now given my luck) where I have to use up all my emergency money. I do my job the best I can. I have been on a roughly 1600 calorie diet since December 06 and have lost 60 pounds doing so putting me into the correct height/weight ratio. I keep myself well groomed and even my teeth to the point my Dentist was totally surprised and my Doctor thinks my weight loss is more medical reasoned than anything I did. I treat people with as much decency and respect as I possibly can.

Yet I have spent most of my thirty and change years on this mudball being told by everyone either directly or indirectly that I suck. Perfect strangers, classmates, coworkers.. hell even my mother when she was still alive.

After a while when the only one who tells you they aren't right and you damned well know it; is you, you start to believe them.

And even with my friends' help, who are mostly gamers of some kind (and mostly married no less) its been a hard road to deprogram the lies everyone in general has decided is fact.

So I am who I am. And I want to be happy about doing things I like, being the person I want to be. And anyone who is stupid enough to believe stereotypes and hurt others who aren't doing anything hurtful just because everyone else says they should be treated poorly?

GO TO HELL.

And that's my view about being outed as a gamer. I'm tired of feeling worthless and alone because of idiots. Gaming and nerd stuff doesn't hurt anybody.

Dungeons and Douchebags: My Gaming Life Part 1

My longer term groups have had surprisingly normal people, though the odd drama bombs have happened.

However we had one fellow whose exploits are still mocked 7 years later as a warning to others.

The game was a 3rd edition D&D (Maybe another reason why I hate D20?) game set post War of the Lance Dragonlance. Cept with Warhammer 40K Tyranids, Deep Ones from Innsmouth, and other such things as I could reasonably fit into the game without making it blatant I would much rather be running a Sci Fi or Horror game instead of Elves and Dragons.

The problem fellow, who will be called Dumbass (or DA for short) for this tale had a Silvanesti Elf Paladin. A holy warrior of nobility and light mixed with Emo Elfness.

Well, that's how such a character generally would be expected to play.

There were many warning signs this was not to be. You know that Summoner Geeks Dead Ale Wives video? I made the mistake of showing it to the group. He quoted that 5 minute short ENDLESSLY. He was also known to go "DOOD!! SCHWEEET!! Like, WOAAH!!" as well. He also (currently) has 4 kids with 4 different women. I consider the fact 4 different women would even do this dumbsnot a cosmic slap to my face. At the time he merely had one, who he would sometimes bring to the game, who would be left unattended and would generally wake up the host's sleeping baby and wife by being noisy and as obnoxious as he was. (His wife of the time was also amazingly obnoxious. She would come to pick up the child or them both and annoy us, though thankfully she was there for a shorter period of time each session.)

However, it is his actions in the game that truely earned him our hatred.
The host ran a CN Dwarf Fighter whose chargen rolls were pure unbelievable heat. I saw him roll this heat. This character was vaguely the leader of the party, though mostly interested in his own skin and a personal vendetta with their archnemesis Galthik, an Aurak Draconian who somehow became the main villain after our 1 shot became a campaign.
The Dwarf tended to get into combat quickly where he mangled things about. However he tended to engage in combat alone.

Because our Paladin decided upon hearing of the FLANK BONUS that from there on out, he would merely flank anything the Dwarf charged or attacked. "ILL FLANK!! SCHWEET!!!" was heard on many a day.

Ok, so bad so far. But again, only mildly stupid.

It was during a horrific dungeon battle against the Comet Monsters 40K goons know as the Tyranids that his stupidity began to shine like a giant beacon of suck.

A player was leaving, and another had left after one session without bothering to tell anyone. (Many of our players are merely stopping by as one of our regulars is an extremely nice guy who tries to rope them into playing even though most of them REALLY aren't interested, but don't want to hurt his feelings. Thus we get short term people who muck up the works for a week or two then go away never to be seen again. But he does a better job of recruiting than myself and the host. The Internet has NOT been good for finding gamers. Sheeet, posts at game stores don't help. Of course when those folks our regular tries to get leave with no notice given I always feel like its my fault even though they were the rude ones, giving me an extra helping of I SUCK. Life does enough of that on its own.)

Thus I decided to have the drop out character killed gruesomely, and the leaving character captured to come back later as a hideous bioconstruct I let the leaving player know about since it would be a long time before he would ever come back. (Which turned out to be never, but he did become a gamer in other groups. He was also VERY protective of these little donut thingies he liked back then. But that is another tale.)

It went off swimmingly with the players investigating an underground complex connected to a well, and a splash as the leaving player's character was captured, and the droupout's killed with Genestealer claws slashing through his skull.

Naturally as an Aliens fan, when the bodycount starts, all hell breaks loose. They kill some lesser Tyranids, and meet a Tyranid Warrior, which is about 12 feet tall of chitin, 6 foot long scythe arms, and 2 other arms holding a giant gun of flesh dissolving explosive death. The surviving party defeats it, and I get ready to unleash the entire horde, causing a nifty escape sequence to the docks, where a leaping Tyranid type called Hormagaunts would jump onto their fleeing boats as their transport, a mutant shark, would be chomping through the lower hold.

This was put on hold however.

What could cause this band of bloodied adventurers to pause and not get to more of my (if I do say so myself) cinematic inspired awesome?

The Elf Paladin decided he wanted to take a victory piss on the giant monster of alien death they just beat.

I guess the only way he would attack something head on is if it was dead and he had his wang out.

Now, as a horror fan, this was too good to pass up, so I decided it had at least one good final claw swipe left in it, aimed right for the little flanker. I put a STUPIDLY high Reflex saving throw to avoid having him sing soprano, and of course he rolled a natural 20, instead merely getting a slash above the designated target and some hit point damage.

There was more stupid to come. Later on I turned Lovecraft's Innsmouth into an island town that was allying with Galthik. The party went to investigate, losing 2 more PCs, one of which was leaving for a time, the other just wanted to make a new character. They got back and reported on the nasty nasty fish people and their evil ways to the Knights of Solamnia, who were the PC's bosses. Thus they returned with lots of troops and multiple interesting missions to make sushi out of the townsfolk.

One team gets their asses utterly handed to them with a new player's PC learning the horror motto of DON'T GO ANYWHERE ALONE, and the other takes it on the chin, but holds out decently well. (The newbie would inspire new horror stories when the group had to switch to Saturday mornings for a while. Both his DMing failures and his bathing related ones.)

Enter Dagon, the 50 foot tall plus giant god leader of the Deep Ones, represented on the miniatures table by a 10 inch tall Godzilla toy that roared. (Sadly, the battery has since died out. The King of the Monsters, the Daikaiju of Daikaiju has been silenced. Till I crack him open and put in a new one.) He introduced himself by throwing down a severed bronze dragon head and throwing a ship halfway across the harbor. The surviving PCs and Knights of Solamnia set up down Main Street, bows and spells at the ready. I have an NPC on Dragonback ready to pull them out of the fire as I doubt they can handle it and the NPC who was rather beloved by the party (Doremon Ikari, the Halfling Ninja---err "security consultant" who was actually on his own agenda that would involve betraying them all in their darkest most WE ARE HOSED hour.) showed up from time to time since he was doing this and that. (Which in this case involved his other boss Galthik who he was also betraying who was in town.) (A horrible DM story involves the incredibly awful campaign Doremon came from. Another tale for another day.)

Our Elf mage goes to town with spells, the NPCs go bows and flintlock musket type guns, the Dwarf rips out the Mighty Composite Longbow. Our new thief decides to run the Hell away. What does the noble paladin do?

He bends over, drops trou, and MOONS DAGON.

Sadly he was saved yet again by a saving throw he should not have made, this time by our Elf mage. (Actually they would have both died, but I had to fudge the roll for the mage who did not deserve death for saving the dumbass. Plus he was the nice guy I mentioned above.)

The grand finale to 6 months of outstanding adventuring before a holiday break and a switch to a new game ruined by an Elf Paladin mooning a demigod.

(While the campaign will probably never be continued we have since retconned it where the Paladin became road paste under Dagon's giant fishy foot.)

It angered the host so much he wanted one final game so he could kill the everloving daylights out of dumbhead's character and we could all laugh at him before kicking him out the door. I intervened as he would be driving 40 minutes down the highway back home with his kid, and I feared for the child and other drivers' safety with a likely to be humiliated retard driving on the road.

(Oh yeah, this is another repost from another forum. Good content needs saving after all! Edits have been made in the interests of language, me never being happy with anything I do ever, and just updating since this post was made like 2 years ago.)

Tuesday Game Reports

Well given that Wednesday was a wash thanks to useless pain medication interfering with my sleep, this week Tuesday and Thursday are gonna be the game days this week. On the upside, I finished a 477 piece model kit, the Alteisen from Super Robot Taisen, and I guess I saved gas money.

The model is very impressive, though I need to add in some more paint detailing here and there to bring it out to look as good as it can without doing the full glue, prime, and paint deal. Its done in 6 colors and over the last 2 weeks or so it took around 12 hours or so to build, probably more. The fit and instructions were pretty good even though it was in Moonspeak (Aka: Japanese). A few pieces worked best with a touch of model cement, but overall everything goes in solid and locks into place. As I don't have the little pen type batteries handy I cannot test it's LED lighting, but all it does is light a giant spike on its horn and the eyes. Its got plenty of articulation, and the prepainted figure of the pilot is rather nice too. I am not sure if it was worth the 55 dollars or so it cost retail, but its a damned impressive model and was a good project to do while listening to podcasts and trying to get my mind off my troubles. Depending on how I feel next week I might try to get through the 20 or so model kits I have still sitting in their boxes.

Tuesday was more Car Wars. A small country road where we encountered 2 more of the biker gang members. We chased them off a curved side road where a number of their buddies on foot tried to set up a roadblock. My character answered them by running 3 or 4 of them over. 9IN took the heaviest hits, knocking his car out, and MagicDrew's terrible Handling Class caused him to careen off the road and even skim off the side of 9IN's ride! Rufus continued on taking out the first damaged bike 9IN had worn down, and started trading shots with the lead biker. His front armor was blasted off and his Light Pulse Laser got scragged AGAIN, but a last minute desperation wheel turn to shoot his Light Laser Anti Tank Weapon worked and the final biker fell. It was a very lucky shot given how hard it is to hit Bikes and Trikes, but a little luck prevailed this time.

With our money debts were paid, and some upgrades to tires and such happened. Rufus' car now has 18 more points of armor, 10 of it on the front, with the other 8 spread about. MagicDrew now has more handling, and I am not quite sure what 9IN did to his ride, but he has a serious amount of cash to work with.

With our remaining time we played some Three Dragon Ante, a rather fun card game that mixes Spades, Poker, and a touch of a hobby card game. I'm not as in love with the game as many people are, but its a really solid card game I recommend to anyone provided you have some poker chips.

Wednesday Game Report and AT-43 Armybuilding

Sorry this took a while to post. I've been having disturbing continuous aches and pains which have made worrying about posting stuff a little less important. Its probably nothing given all other evidence, but its enough to give me pause. I'd get these things checked out, but getting things checked out mostly seems to mean "Give us lots of your money after your insurance does and we will tell you everything looks fine. Oh, let's make an appointment for more of your money".

I swear its probably 80% stress and worry, 20% something actually in need of fixing.

But Wednesday was another of the no 40K days because everyone started too fracking early. However, I got in a few games of Magic and played some solidly tough decks to start things off. Ever get hit by 4 Lightning Bolts by turn 4? Yeah. I fought one of those.

It was followed up by me demoing AT-43 for one of the 40K players. One of Sarge's clerks has been talking with me since I have mentioned getting into the game. He isn't gonna order stuff till there is some special orders and whatnot to get the ball rolling. Sensible enough I think. However, he was able to procure a demo copy of the starter set. Thus I got to run a couple scenarios and more than a few people showed some interest in the game. AT-43 has an excellent introductory set, not really requiring a ton of rules reading before getting the demo games up and moving.

I may be getting and fielding a UNA army sooner rather than later. If other people are playing I won't need to have 2 armies built before getting things going. I will just need one. Given UNA's use for other games, I have decided on them, with Therians to be more fully built up later on. My initial plans include getting another starter set cheap, then using Sarge's to preorder everything else I need. I will most likely grab a Defender Snake and 2 Steel Troopers attachment boxes to start with. This should give me 3 Walkers, 2 main infantry squads, and 1 elite squad to get me going. A nice solid starter force.

2 Starters gives me 2 Leaders, 12 soldiers with Laser Rifles, and 4 Missile Launchers. 2 Attachment boxes adds in 2 more Leaders, 2 more Missile Launchers, 2 Machine Guns, 2 Medics, 2 Mechanics.

I'm probably going for M.Ind as my Force Pattern. This means I get up to 3 Walkers, and up to 3 Infantry units.

This means 1 Steel Trooper squad will be 4 soldiers, 1 Master Sergeant, 2 Missile Launchers, Medic, and Mechanic, with Triple Lens Helmets.
(Points Cost: 320 base, +50 for 2 Missile Launchers, +15 for a Master Sergeant. 385 points.)

The Second Steel Trooper squad will be 4 soldiers, 1 Master Sergeant, 2 Machine Guns, Medic, and Mechanic with Triple Lens Helmets and Grenades.
(Points Cost: 365 base, +15 for a Master Sergeant. 380 points.)

This leaves me enough for another squad. RAWK. 4 more soldiers, 1 Master Sergeant, and a Laser Gun.
(Points Cost: 175 base, +15 for a Master Sergeant. 190 points.)

Now in bigger games I can swap out the small squad for a unit of Steel Tacarms with a Sergeant and Laser Targeter for 325 if I want, but the M.Ind army design only allows for 3 infantry units.

For fighting vehicles I can take 2 Fire Toads, 1 as a Sergeant 415 points. (Note to self: Buy another Fire Toad so I can have a full squad.)

And my big dog, the Defender Cobra, Sergeant Upgrade. 365 points of glorious heavy combat strider.

Of course Colonel Stark for another 85 points when needed.

That gives me a maximum army points value of: 1955 if I am doing my math correctly.If I want an even 2000 I just get Sergeant Borz and add another 35 points.

Sounds good!

Tuesday Game Reports and Other Strangeness..

Tuesday morning I had medical related things to take care of that has been messing me up with worry for a few weeks now. Afterwards I was semi useful so after 5 or so hours of broken sleep thanks to AT&T calling with some BS nonsense they were selling (I had my phone on in the bedroom for once so my friends could call so we could do something and I might hear it.), so I went with everyone else to Starfury's to play Rock Band, or in my case, watch, make the odd comment, and write up an army list for Wednesday's 40K game.

And it was good I did, as when I get to that battle report, it was a double header!

But the reason there is so little for this blog this week is due to the aforementioned medical thing, the worry about doing said thing, and what I have spent most of today doing.

Preparing for the Lord of the Rings miniatures battle Tuesday. More of my miniatures have come in from the mail, netting me more 2nd age Elven Archers & Bowmen and 6 Dwarven Khazad Guard. Sarge's netted me 4 Hobbit Militia, the veteran versions of Merry and Pippin, 12 Hobbit Archers, and Farmer Maggot with his dogs. Today has so far been all about assembling and priming many of these new recruits, and properly typing up and printing out all 3 Good force army lists, with explanations of their special skills and gear. (And life stuff, but this blog isn't about my life unless it pertains to gaming. I want to keep it that way.)

I've also acquired some cheap RPG products which will be arriving soon. (Cheap is all I can really manage right now.) Classic Traveller, the legendary hard Sci Fi RPG, and Palladium's new Robotech Shadow Chronicles game.

I may talk about them when I actually get the books and have some time to read through them.

Now I want a freaking break and just want to play some damned videogames without the sword of doom hanging over my head. This leaves Monday to base a ton of figures, and type up all 3 Evil army lists. I might not get all the basing done, but the army list write ups will be all but required. Then maybe next week I can show the amazing 40K fights I engaged in Wednesday with a nice comic strip style, and talk about the chaotic scheduling changes soon to affect my little game group just as we closed on a maxed out size group.

Showing off the Collection Part 1

Given that the man whose vision is responsible for my colossal waste of money has left us, its all too appropriate to show off my goodies. It'll take a while to show it all off, but today I will display the D&D, Horror, and Retroshelf!


Top shelf has the White Box Original D&D with all the main books except for the Gods, Demigods, and Heroes book. The messy bits are hiding many classic AD&D 1st edition adventures still waiting to be run, and a fair number of 2nd edition too.


Some 1st and 2nd edition books. I have a few more here and there, and that reminds me I need to get Deities and Demigods back from Magicdrew.


My horror shelf, celebrating Call of Cthulhu and Ravenloft. The binders contain legally purchased PDF printouts of classic adventures I missed over the years. When I put all my in print White Wolf stuff up, the binders will be moved.


About 1/3rd of my D&D box sets, more adventure modules, and some Dungeon Magazine issues.


One of my "Where the hell am I gonna put this?" stacks. In this case most of my Warhammer RPG collection. Another copy of Dark Heresy, WHFRP 1st edition, and the Dark Heresy GM pack aren't featured.


The stuff from Sarge's Comics' 1 dollar RPG book thingie. Its gonna get bigger over the next few weeks. Again, I have to figure out where to put it. And my camera continues to pick up dirt, dust, and stuff my naked eye doesn't see. Time to get out the vacuum!


A mixture of stuff to find a place for (the AD&D stuff I got for a great price from a Something Awful sales thread), and my go game stuff ready to be played. The tote bag has my New World of Darkness books I actually use in play (Rulebook, Second Sight, Armory, Dark Alliance: Vancouver (oWoD). The plastic thingie is my Federation Commander collection ready for classic Trek action. The black bag is my Warhammer 40K bag. Currently my Tyranids are in it waiting to eat things for the Hive Mind.


Part of the board and wargames closet that isn't yet set. ASL, Squad Leader, some CCG stuff (World of Warcraft and Magic the Sucking), Ogre, Car Wars, and Battletech stuffage. Itll be pretty eventually. Below it not seen is a couple tubs full of Heroscape hex terrain.

I have more to show, but its too messy and disorganized for even me to show. Sigh. Project to do number who knows out of HOLY COW DO THIS ALREADY!

On Nerd Stereotypes and Defending the Hobby...

(Warning. Harsh language ahead.)

Now anyone who breathes knows that being into hobby games is wrong, sad, and evil, or at least that's what braindead morons who waste their lives watching sports and American Idol would have you believe. (Because their waste of time is allowed but ours is not.)

Apparently we all suck. Stereotyping ahoy!

While all stereotypes have a grain (ok, sometimes its more like a half a loaf of bread...) of truth to them, its not everyone, merely the flock following sheep idiots who are the type of moron who would in fact jump off a bridge if everyone else did it.

And every group bashes every other group for it. Because its an excuse to hate other people or something like that.

I'm a comics reading, Warhammer playing, cartoon watching, toy collecting nerd.

According to every other group on the planet I am a virginal emotionally stunted manchild who doesn't bathe and lives in a basement with maybe a McJob.

Why? Because a couple assholes (and EVERY group has assholes in it. Some groups are 90% asshole.) are considered to be the shining example of the entire group. Whatever you believe in, are genetically, or do for your freetime is only acceptable if enough other people do it that its public perception is OK.

Hell, there are idiots out there who expect people of their same racial stock to "act" a certain way. Even though the way they are supposed to act is generally in a manner roughly equal to "dipshit".

Its why its socially acceptable to drink alcohol, something that kills hundreds if not THOUSANDS of people a day (Its taken a cousin and an uncle from me, and its effects have damaged almost everyone in my family in some way or another) yet playing Dungeons & Dragons makes you a worthless piece of shit.

Its basically all a bunch of hypocritical nonsense spouted by assholes without the sense your god of choice gave a monkey.

My stupid waste of time and money doesn't hurt anyone and we gamers tend to be less harmful to others or ourselves compared to most socially acceptable forms of timewasting.

If it aint hurting someone, shut the fuck up. You don't have to like it or accept it, but you better damned well respect others' rights to do it even if it makes your head hurt why anyone would want to do it.

Oh, and all those nerd stereotypes? At my job dealing cards at a casino I see behavior just as bad if not worse than every gamer horror story real or imagined. For the most part the only thing nerds are a threat to is a bag of Cheetos and a six pack of Mountain Dew.

Tuesday and Wednesday Game Reports

No pictures or anything this time as there was no game played Wednesday, and Tuesday was more Heroquest. While we now have an old member back in the fold, who I will currently refer to as 9 Iron Nuke, or 9IN if you will, not a lot really happened. The Priest of Sigmar and Dwarf Slayer both seem pretty well balanced and fun to play, though my playthrough of the Slayer was anything but.

Almost everything bad that could happen to my character did, killing him off in the final battle, meaning due to bad luck I spent a good 90 minutes of gaming having very little fun whatsoever. I might as well have taken a nap frankly.

Nothing like bad luck totally ruining the game. Then again, the only luck I seem to have in Heroquest is bad luck.

Not exactly the gaming week of legend by any means.

I got the 40K RPG in and the book is HUGE. Very impressive to look at! A few of the Warhammer Fantasy RPG items showed up too. But being books, until I get some time to read them, there isn't much I can say.

Sorry few people who read my blog. I just don't have anything interesting to update right now.

I'm not sure if I need gaming antidepressants or just antidepressants period...

*sigh*

Wednesday Game Report and Other Stuff

Not a busy week for me gamewise sadly. Busy (and expensive!) lifewise however.
Another CT scan of cash wasting hell and my 24" iMac's drive deciding to stop existing in any form the computer can see made sure of that one. So now I get to take advantage of my Applecare Protection Plan and have a tech come over and fix the bugger.

Which then gives me another hard drive I need an enclosure for to make sure the drive doesn't have any personal information of mine on it. I'm a mega goody goody and use Google Safesearch and whatnot, but one can never be too careful. I can only imagine what the computer ignorant folks, the people looking for smut, and the folks who laugh in the face of international copyright laws have seen.. *shudder*

Tuesday's gameday was a fun time, but no actual gaming happened. Pico cancelled, and 5 minutes of me showing some videogames off turned into a couple hours of me playing through Resident Evil 4 and getting heckled. I really wish someone woulda told me to turn it off and get some game going! A good time overall though. And at least being on the controls kept me from eating the bag of cookies Missme brought. The other 3 folks ate the whole thing. Damn!

Wednesday at Sarge's brought a little 1000 point game of Warhammer 40K, Chaos vs Ultramarines. This week I went with 3 tactical squads, a Havoc squad, a bike Squad, my Terminator Sorcerer, and 2 Chaos Spawn. My Sorcerer fell to a Force Weapon in close combat. (Note to self: Force Weapons are EVIL) My Chaos Spawn proved their worth, being the big units on my side, and my Aspiring Champions did a fair accounting as well. Sadly, I failed a lot of morale tests and it cost me the game.

I finally got a Rhino for my Chaos boys, the Ultramarines player selling it to me for a fair price. (15 bucks, assembled but not painted) Given that Rhinos for Chaos are 35 points and my units are decidedly close ranged, its a unit I need more of. Too bad their regular MSRP is so high. Then again, so are Chaos Spawn, but just about any large monster base figure works as a proxy. (Today I used Pikachu from that Pokemon spinner minis game, and a mid 90s Chaos Spawn figure from when they looked more like an Alligator body thing. I call mine the Golden Backed Crocko Stimpy!)

I am getting better and better with my Chaos troops to be sure. And I am having fun playing them which is THE most important thing.

Of course my current 40K plan seems to be "Play army with new codex till I win then switch to a new one". The new Ork codex was available today so I picked it up. Overall Orks got a nice boost and the book looks to be filled with funny Orky bits. Sadly, Nazdreg and the Boarboyz are MIA, but the Shokk Attack Gun makes a triumphant return, and EXPLODING SQUIGS are in tow. My Gretchin mob now needs more Runtherds (1 needed for every 10 Grots), and EVERY Trukk now needs a Wrecking Ball. (S9 hit on a 4+ to a target within a few inches of the Trukk!)

Once I get some more time I will have more thoughts on the new codex.

*Sigh* I hate busy but not gaming busy weeks...

I'll hate hard drives even more if I can't recover the data off the iMac drive that is gonna be replaced..