Raithe

Hm, anyone remember that rather amusing trailer of "Knights of Badassdom"? Well it's making the news round again..due to some evil happenings. 　 Buyers Beware - That's a Butchered Version of Knights of Badassdom You're Being Offered And the open letter that was sent to the Board of Directors of IndieVest... http://www.badassdom.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liaden_universe http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LiadenUniverse It's space opera, but the principle protagonists have a very serious code of behaviour, so it does tend to rely on that dialogue and back and forth between peoples sense of "right behaviour" in various situations. Depending on which books in the series you read, some have more action/thriller elements and some have more of a romance aspect. With greater or lesser degrees of deception, deceit, rogue tradery and a certain swashing of buckle.

For the general interest... ComputerActive - China is Labelled an IT Menace as Wars head to Cyberspace

Heh, my mother was in Australia a few years back to visit her sister and to deal with their mothers ashes. They were together at a cliffside facing the ocean, just by a road and emptied the ashes out. As they did, a passing truck slowed down to yell at them "Stop bleeping littering bitches!"

Heh, have you tried any of the Liaden Universe books? Best described as "Pride and Prejudice meets Star Wars..."

More references to Kotor then Kotor 2, but they do slip a few in there as the game progresses. It's all set up as Prologue then Chapters 1-3. Prologue is basically the "starter" world (there are two each to Imperial / Republic) and they depend on what class you pick, then you head to the "capital world" of the faction being played, and ends with you getting a starship.. Then onto Chapter 1. Most classes attempt to have a "linked" series of storylines over the Prologue and seperate chapters, but not all succeed as well as others.

Roughly speaking New York - Philadelphia - Washington DC - [anywhere in the south] - New Orleans - Galveston/Houston - [anywhere in Texas/Kansas] - Denver - Monument Valley - Grand Canyon - Las Vegas - Los Angeles - San Fransisco. Most of these towns only work as waypoints, i do not see myself staying in Denver for example for more than a day. We are trying to have an open mind. If there's something like a barn dance festival in one town, we'll stay there. Does that creek look interesting? well camp there. Does this place have an interesting history? lets check the museum. Does this town have the best gospel choir in the state? we're gonna be religious just for that. That's the point of our journey. Remember, you'll want lots of inappropriate stories that you can never tell your kids about...

For those who like murder mysteries set in quirky periods of time.. I have to recommend Deanna Raybourn's "Silent in the Grave". Set in Victorian London, it blends a deft touch of historical detail, the cut and thrust of polite society, witty dialogue and the matter of murder. Indeed, the opening line is a wonderful hook and presents the whole mood and atmosphere of how the story unfolds: "To say that I met Nicholas Brisbane over my husband's dead body is not entirely accurate. Edward, it should be noted, was still twitching upon the floor." So enters the principle character Lady Julia Grey and the abrupt death sequence of her husband, Edward. At first it's assumed to be the result of a heart disease that plagues his family, but in the process of learning to cope with the suddenness of monied widowhood she finds out that her husband had hired the rather notorious and strange private detective Nicholas Brisbane to find the source of some threatening letters shortly before his death. From there, this leads to a testily collaborative search between the pair for the culprit and to discover why her husband was killed. Along the way they prove servants, peers, and family members, discovering strange and varied truths about the husband she never really knew and dealing with the eccentricity of her own family. In many ways, Lady Julia starts of the story as a daughter of a duke, one sibling among many, and a wife suffering from the malaise of no real challenges, general boredom, a husband she was merely friends with, and no real self-identity beyond those elements. However with the delving into the case, she certainly grows into her own. The assortment of characters are generally free of cliche and not the expected cutouts you see so often, whilst still managing to blend in the expected victorian foibles and matters of polite behaviour even as events descend into assorted deceptions and the odd sidetrip reveal of hidden depravity. While the murder mystery isn't that convoluted, it's the array of characters and dialogue between them that makes this one a good read.

It'll be interesting to see. Exalted was a lot of good ideas, with a lot of crappy mechanics..

Sat down with a freshly made cup of tea and started poking at things on the pc. Suddenly (and for no apparent reason) I just got hit by a major wave of tiredness and completely slumped down in the chair. Struggling to keep my eyes open and wake up a little bit agian.

Eh, possibly. But I find the reason I don't use them is that I'm overleveled for the planet, so spending the commendations earned on that planet doesn't actually match the gear I should be using.. This way you should be able to spend them on gear of all levels rather then those specific points. So you shouldn't end up with saved piles...

heh. I would hazard a guess you'd get all of that as well. Hm, and I hadn't realised they were overhauling the commendations apparently. http://dulfy.net/2013/02/22/swtor-commendations-system-in-patch-2-0/ Groovy, No more going along with piles of "x planet" commendations that you never use. It's all going into one pile...

And Bioware wanting to explain what the difference is between RotHC and plain game version 2.0...

Hm, well as a subscriber I get 600 coins a month.. then another 100 per month for having the CE of the game.. So I'd have to not use any for a whooole lot of months to have enough to pick up one of those Hypercrates. I can understand people getting into the aesthetics and such enough to spend 1,400 odd coins for specific sets of armour and wotnot. But over 7,000 in one go for a whole bunch of random loot?

I still have to wonder.. Who the hell is picking up the Hypercrates? Seriously, sure it's 24 whatever packs in one mass.. but 7,000 odd cartel coins?? That's spending about $60 just to get that...

Curse of the Crimson Throne doesn't have much in the way of resource management, during the last stage the GM has to keep track of a running tally of points depending on what the pc's do. Although a lot of the Adventure Paths have that feature in the final stages. Various encounters award/take away tally points depending on their actions, and then an overall "feel/result" depends on what the score is. ie: 1-3 the pc's won, but the town was pretty wrecked, 4-5, they won, there was moderate disruption, people aren't that happy with the pcs, 6-8, x section was destroyed but the rest was saved... (you get the idea, but that's not resource management) The Serpents Skull has a lot of plunder and combat. It's very much pulp serial, archaeologist adventure, lost city, ancient evil, etc etc. Jade Regent has an extended journey, leading to a mix of combat and roleplaying to build allies before grand finale sequence, but has some minor "management" of a trade caravan during the early parts of it. Kingmaker is pretty much the one thats seriously management of assorted things, so that would be one to skip if you don't like that. Legacy of Fire has the interesting arabian nights feel to it. Lots of genies based elements and plots, mysterious magics, strange locales and the like. I think the end of part 1 and some of part 2 has a few elements of resource managent (pc's helping recover a trading outpost as part of the plot), but thats more background then major and the story soon sweeps you out beyond that.

"Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag - The irony of Ubisoft making a game whose protagonist is a pirate..."

"When I make someone breakfast in bed, all they need to do is say thank you. They don't need to make such a fuss on the 'Who the hell are you?!' or 'How did you get in my house??!'"

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-02-28-assassins-creed-4-black-flag-confirmed-by-ubisoft-has-60-minutes-exclusive-gameplay-on-ps3 Assassin's Creed goes all Jolly Roger. The next in the series is to be "Assassin's Creed: Black Flag"

Don't know if its remnants from yesterdays headache and time spent in bed, but kept waking up from weird dreams that were constantly fragmenting through the early hours of the morning.. and now that I'm up I seem to be having one of those mornings where my brain keeps firing off random thoughts that aren't actually connected with anything in particular. Definitely making it awkward to concentrate and focus on anything. I shall rely on the tradition of tea drinking to see if that soothes things down.

I'd say make a short list of a bunch of the special combat maneuvers that are above/beyond the simple hack and slash. Ie - Trip, Sunder, Disarm, etc.. with a couple of notes jotting down what they do, and the basic rules. Make sure your players have a copy and award a little exra xp if they use them with appropriately fluffy roleplaying descriptions for the combat.... Or for using them in appropriate ways. It's a way to encourage them to think beyond just "roll to hit and damage" , especially if it turns combat into something a bit more tactical.

Spent most of the day so far buried in bed with a nasty headache and trying to let my thoughts roam. Forced myself up now as it's a little better and I needed some food and tea. Now checking emails and wotnot trying to focus on figuring out what needs to be done in the last few hours of the afternoon.

The montage sequence in early Children of Dune to the Inama Nushif music was fairly damn excellently placed and executed though... To me, that music set off the whole thing to close to perfection. The birth of the children along with the cleansing of the house... http://youtu.be/IGPFB8yR6zk