Thoughts on the last two Tuesday Game nights

As of right now, I have no idea on whether or not James's 1E game is happening tonight due to the weather. Regardless, I figure I might as well provide my comments on the previous two sessions, 1E and Rifts.

I'll start with the last week's session which was supposed to be Rifts. Alas, two players weren't there. One of them had the crucial skill needed for the GM's plot to continue. At that point the game broke down as why continue if the GM has nothing planned? On the bright side, James finished his Crazy whom should be joining the group sometime next session. Hopefully, Mike figures out how as our characters are secluded at the moment.

James's 1E game resumed two weeks ago. The group wasn't evicted out of Homlet despite seemingly impossible odds. Then, with the aid of truthstone, one of "leaders" of the village learned the group's story from Twidorek. Hopefully, our little band of PCs benefit. Last but not least, Friar Pudge's days as a PC are now numbered. Unless things change during the next session, I probably won't be playing him anymore. My biggest disappointment is that it seems we are just spinning in circles. I'm doubting whether or not we'll actually complete the village of homlet adventure. In and of itself that isn't so bad. The problem is that no one among our merry band of PCs wants to leave. So right now the game is peetering toward an ending.

Added two game company links

Today, I added links to two game companies, Green Ronin and Kenzer and Co. Added Kenzer because I'm intrigued by the upcoming fifth edition of Hackmaster. Knights of the Dinner Table is the gaming magazine right now. It just happens to be a comic book. Along similar lines, I'm excited about Green Ronin's licenses for A Song of Ice and Fire and Wild Cards. Having previously played A Game of Thrones D20, I'm curious about GR's brand new game that uses that setting. As I have the two newest Wild Cards novels, I've tinkered with the notion of running a Wild Cards based game. Last but not least, True20 is a game that fits my criteria for a good game.

Whether or not I acquire any of these games and settings depends on fate. And no I don't mean the game system.

Fixed my problem with Blogger

For about a week I was wondering why my blogger blogroll wasn't updating itself. No problem I told myself. Its lagged before. Still the lag only lasted a day or two. Yesterday, I logged in. No change. Oh well, I told myself. Wrote and entered my latest post. Got some type of error page. So I go back to my blog. I'm logged out. In response, I go to log in again except I go straight to my dashboard. According to my edit posts, my entry has been posted. Furthermore, one of my entries have received two more comments during the previous week.

At tonight's Tuesday game, I mentioned my problem. James Mishler mentioned a possible cause. Mike indirectly added credence. Encouraged by my latest news, I followed James's advice. While that didn't correct the problem right away, I managed to figure out the fix with the use of the Blogger FAQ.

My problem is fixed.

Yahoo's 100 Movies You Must See List

Yahoo has done a 100 movies one must see list. Here's the link.

I decided to list which of those movies I've seen, think I have seen, or seen sections of. Movies that I have seen chunks or not sure that I have seen I'll bold. Those that I haven't but would like to I'll italicize. Not all 100 hundred movies will be listed. Much shorter that way.

The list:
12 Angry Men
2001: A Space Odyssey
The 400 Blows
8 1/2 - inspired one of the storylines in a LARP that I ran
Alien
Apocalypse Now
The Bicycle Thief
Blade Runner
Blazing Saddles
Blue Velvet
Bonnie and Clyde
The Bridge on the River Kwai
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Casablanca
Chinatown
Citizen Kane
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Die Hard - I never seen this from beginning to end or if I have, I forgot.
Dr. Strangelove
E.T.
Enter the Dragon - I briefly felt an urge to play or run a Ninjas & Superspies game afterwards.
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
French Connection
Godfather
Godfather Part 2
Goldfinger - There a many Bond flicks that I have never watch the entirety of the film.
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Goodfellas
Groundhog Day
Its a Wonderful Life
Jaws
King Kong
Lawrence of Arabia
Lord of the Rings
M
MASH
Maltese Falcon
Matrix
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
National Lampoon's Animal House
Nosferatu
On the Waterfront
One flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
Paths of Glory
Princess Mononoke
Psycho - I have seen the remake, but not all of the original.
Pulp Fiction
Raging Bull
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Rashomon
Rear Window
Rocky
Saving Private Ryan
Schindler's List
Searchers
Seven Samurai
Silence of the Lambs
Singin' in the Rain
Snow White
Sound of Music
Star Wars
Sunset Blvd
Terminator 2
Titanic
Toy Story
Usual Suspects
Vertigo
Wild Strawberries
Wizard of Oz

So I can say with some confidence that I have seen around 43 of these movies at this time.

Added a 4E related link

I added Dreams of a Kobold King live journal to my Comics and Games links list. At this point in time, I'm comfortable with fan made creations for 4E D&D. My change in attitude has come about because I once again I again embrace the hobbyist aspect of this hobby. Also, not playing LFR all that much helps too. Learned about the site via ENWorld when I checked out the spoilers on the Sorceror.

No Rifts for me

Despite the whole XP issue, I was looking forward to tonight's Rifts session. Alas, I had to bow out. Came down with a stomach bug yesterday and still was dealing with the after effects. Apparently, it lingers still.

Although its possible James showed up; and that they played Traveller or AD&D 1E instead.

Clariftications on the Rifts XP issue

First, I want to say that my comments in my previous post trouble me. I don't want this blog to contain negative, whiny rants.

Second, I don't plan to comment on game sessions unless one of two criteria are met. I must either have ran that session or must have the burning desire to write about.

On to the subject matter at hand, I rambled once I started commented about the experience awarded after the last Rifts session. Afterwards, I realized that I never gave a basis for my rant. In a nutshell, all characters got 1000 xp as a base. One thousand experience points is a significant amount for first level characters to receive for one session. Active participants received 200 xp as a bonus.

Honestly, the whole matter of experience awards deserve its own space. Otherwise, any comments I make about a game session regarding experience points will just devolve into a whiny rant that just spin around in circles. A post for another time.

Mishler game Tuesday?/Game commentary

Heard yesterday that James Mishler might actually make an appearance at Tuesday's game session. I have been looking forward to playing Friar Pudge and Twidorek again in his Gary's Greyhawk campaign. In addition, the other players really want to play Traveller. So I'd have to make a character. Not sure how much I want to when character creation takes longer than Palladium. If I could use Mongoose Traveller (MT) instead of Classic, I wouldn't mind. As I own a copy of MT, I could make a character on my own at my leisure. Granted that's all based on hearsay. In all likelihood we will play Mike's Rifts game unless James shows up and is prepared to run a game.

Which leads me to my commentary on the two pick up games that have occured on Tuesday in lieu of one Mishler's games.

Jayson's 3.5 D&D campaign
Honestly, I don't feel fully comfortable offering my thoughts on the campaign as whole as I have basically joined during the middle of it. Therefore, my comments would be a little unfair as I don't have the "full story". I will comment that I enjoyed last week's session. Even though my character only had one big moment which, in itself, is a bit minor. Basically, my dwarf fighter, Ebert, was disgusted by the lack of both beer and ale at a party. He decided to forgo alcohol for water because of his disgust. Other than that all three players were involved in the session.

Mike's Rifts game
And this is why my commentary has been delayed...

I really enjoyed the two sessions of the Rifts campaign that I played in. It felt like Rifts to me. Despite the lack of combat, Mike has woven two entertaining game sessions using the Rifts RPG. My problem is that I would have to write the rambling blog essay about several key points without sounding negative. No problem. But then I couldn't figure out how to write to those essays. Then I came upon the idea of the mammoth entry. I hit upon doing a likes/dislikes bit. Unfortunately, right around that time, I realized something. I was willing to forgo this Tuesday's Rifts session in order to watch the Watchmen movie. Watching Watchmen wound up not being a problem at all.

But still the idea nagged me.

Mike's Rifts game is a pick up game intended to run with little preparation. Many of the faults I find with the game stem from that. Alas, that is not the problem. Because I know that not much prep time is going into the game, I can accept that. Heck, I consider those faults to have little consequence as I enjoy the game despite them. I am sure I'd like the game even if our characters left Alliance and wondered aimlessly...

Now I understand what bothers me. Its not the game. I enjoyed both sessions. Heck, it was only after the last session that I began to have negative feelings. After the session two weeks ago. As in when experience was awarded. From my history with RPG's, experience awards are vital to long-term games. So what was my problem with the experience award?

A player that barely played received two hundred less experience points than those that actively participated. Now, that wouldn't be too much of a problem except that thePalladium system experience awards correlates with involvement. The more involved a PC is the more likely that character will receive more xp. Or at least that's my interpretation. So one PC received two hundred less xp than my character. I played my character in such a way that it made sense that he, Dirk, was involved. Dirk had no motivation to actually do anything. Let alone with the other PCs. I had to figure out that motivation myself. In the process, my character, Dirk, helped move things along. Otherwise, our characters would have left Alliance. What then? Don't know. Would there be a future for the game? Maybe.

That in a nutshell is my problem with Mike's game. If XP won't be commensurate with the contributions, then I have no motivation to be involved. That's a problem with a character with Anarchist as an alignment. They are hard to involve. Since the character is a Mystic, combat alone won't cut it. So experience points are deciding factor on whether or not I continue to play. In a Palladium game, Experience based on individual merits matter to me especially when one player doesn't do much of anything.

Sorry Mike.

One big entry to come...

I have been meaning to make several entries for some time now. I just kept procrastinating. Then this week came. A lot has happened. So instead of futiley trying to make multiple posts, I have decided to do it as one big entry. My thoughts on latest Previews offerings and a summation of the Comics Haul covering the last two weeks of February will still be separate entries. Those really can't be truncated enough.

A Problem with Blogger

Well, I was intending to go peruse various blogs this evening/morning. Unfortunately, when I closed the window that contained the page of a blog on my blogroll, my browser started loading multiple pages of said blog in the still open window. So after stopping that, I go to a different blog. Same thing. So I decide to only briefly look at several other blogs. Nothing. Everything works like a charm. It seems my problem only occurs with blogs that I'm a 'follower' of. So far anyway...

Thoughts on Marvel's GN offerings for May

Although a bit later than I would have liked, here are thoughts on Marvel's graphic novels that are solicited with the May previews.

Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Black Knight/Yellow Claw V1 HC - In a perfect world, I would so order this. As I'm collecting Agents of Atlas, I am very much interested in reading the old Jimmy Woo stories. These stories combined with the Arthurian-esque stories of the Black Knight make this very appealing to me. Alas, I can't really afford a Marvel Masterwork at this time. Unless I made serious changes to how I buy my comics I can't afford to buy one in hardcover format at this time...

Which brings me to MM: Amazing Spider-Man v2 TP a softcover version of the hardcover. This would be tempting but two problems. One, I already have a copy. Two, as much as cheaper versions of the Masterworks are right up my alley, I have discovered I'd rather own a hardcover version rather than a softcover version. So until I get over my faddish obsession over hardcovers or circumstances change, I'm going to pass on the softcover MM's. Won't stop me from talking about them though.

Hulk: World War Hulk HC - The super duper hardcover version of the trade paperback... As I own Planet Hulk, this is tempting. What concerns me is the padding that fills the rest of the page count. I mean is the Marvel Spotlight and PH saga really worth it?

X-Men: Manifest Destiny HC - Much like the Uncanny X-Men: Manifest Destiny HC from last month, this is tempting. I'm a long-time X-fan who has been turned off by how much one has to buy/read in order to follow the X-mythos. So these mega hardcovers are attractive to me for a reason that I could use an entire entry for. That aside, Wolverine involved in Chinatown action strikes me a cool.

Avengers Forever HC - About time this was collected...in hardcover format (or at all if not previously collected). I read this maxi-series when it came out. A really good story, which made me a fan of several characters. I think I have the original issues still ... so I won't be getting this. Just wait, I'll discover that either I no longer have them or they exist in such poor condition that I wish I got this when I had the chance. Sigh.

Spider-Man Noir Premiere HC - I love noir. I love Spider-Man. Waited for the trade. If I'm able to, I'm so getting this.

Spider-Man: Family Ties Premiere HC - Guess Marvel is collecting the Amazing Family title along with a one-shot. The only appeal this holds for me is the J.M. DeMatteis story along with the Man-Thing one-shot. If I acquire this, it would have to be cheaper.

I applaud marvel for the Balder and Black Widow hardcovers. Reprinting some of the older tales in hardcover is fantastic. Unfortunately, my applause of such a venture has tended to be symbollic.

Illiad TP - Want to read the Illiad without having to read the text? Well, how about graphic adaptation then? Sadly, this may be the only way I'd actually get around to reading the story.

Marvel Saga TPB - Why would anyone buy this since one could have picked up all three installments from a comics retailer for free? I suppose if you missed them at the shop I could understand the appeal. I know I don't have all three.

Ultimate Galactus Trilogy SC - Looks like the hardcover version may not last for much longer. Thanks Marvel for the incentive to pick up that version.

Fantastic Four: True Story - Paul Cornell. Fantastic Four. Voyage to the realm of fiction. Has my attention.

Dead of Night: Devil-Slayer - Like the character/concept. This story appears to be a 'modernization' of the character.