Raithe

John Dies At the End. A little weird, a touch surreal, but amusing in parts.

Drive - eh, somewhat entertaining but it left me feeling like the main character was a little bit..slow. Or just way too focused on specfic things while completely blank on a whole lot of other things. But good music and some nice visuals.

I have to say, the occasions I've heard about honor killings haven't actually involved Muslims as such. The one's I remember hearing about tended to be more more from India and in a lot of ways part of the caste system as well.

Vampire Novels in the far right.. Eberron / Dragonlance / Forgotten Realms in the middle just past the Star Wars...

The art of Vendetta and Blood Feud don't get quite the same spin as Honor Killings these days. The term honor killings tends to be focused more in the behaviour used in "cleansing the family/blood line" rather then going after an external source.

I haven't been able to get the gaming urge for the last few weeks. I think I've only managed about 5 hours of TOR in the past fortnight... I just don't seem to have the gaming mojo flowing.

heh, yes, actually there's a picture from a couple of years ago that might higlight my comment about WoD books.. Note the "twin stack" towards the back of the picture. That's just WoD rpg books.... Unfortunately the D&D stuff isn't in this picture.. Although there's a glimpse of the Shadowrun Denver boxed set in the corner...

I think he's gotten "honor killings" the wrong way around. The whole honor killings is where the family of the raped girl kill said raped girl, because the fact that some **** raped her stains the family honor and it's all her fault. So by killing her, it wipes the stain away. I don't think he means that's justice...

..and the german shepard has figured out how to open the baby gate we use to block him off from areas of the house at times.. And he looks so pleased when he does it. It's that "wow! look at me, I'm smart! Aren't I good?" expression.

I really need to get my sleep patterns in order again. Generally not falling asleep till that 3-4am, and then waking up at around 8am for an hour or so of dozing in and out on the edge of consciousness... Doesn't really set you up for a focused and productive day....

Sorry to hear that Shryke. That sort of news always blindsides and leaves you blinking.

io9 - Scifi Authors Pose Half-Naked on this Genderflipped Book-cover for Charity?

I'd say that's pretty much of a non-entity beyond house rules. If you want an arcane caster with that whole force of personality behind his arcane might, you have the sorcerer. The wizard's use of spells is always about how smart they are. You can still put a high stat in charisma and then roleplay it out as being involved (especially if you're going for that enchanter/manipulative type) but it wouldn't have any mechanics effect on the way you cast spells.

Heya Raithe, I totally hear how life can completely get in the way of old school RPG! You said you picked up new books. For AD&D 2nd Ed? Heh, no, I think I've nearly got practically complete set of Ad&D 2nd edition stuff all stacked up.. I tend to pick up new books on fresh rpg's and such. Of late it's been more Shadowrun, M&M, Eclipse Phase, Pathfinder. I did go through a lot of WoD before the new edition. (I think if I put all my Vampire/Mage/Demon books on end I'd get a pile about 5 foot high). Fresh new worlds and settings that can be interesting to see how they've handled different issues, and see how they've approached similar mechanics in different ways.

Not to divert the thread from that topic.. But I woke up to yet more snowfall from some very weird and vivid dreams. Was that type where it's more the watcher of an old style 50's film rather then actually being in the dream myself. But some convoluted David Niven-esque character as an Angel taking a vacation on Earth, and somehow ending up as a kind of valet/manservant and super-nanny for a Navy Widow turned refined Pirate Queen and her kids in south-east asian waters.. and I have absolutely no bloody idea where that combination came from...

There were lots of good bits to it, I liked a fair chunk of the "Mat" sections, although apparently Brandon has a hard time writing the Mat parts. But I felt it actually helped show some of Mat's character development and growth with some of that change. Some of the death's almost felt as if they were put in just to say "yeah, even main characters can die" rather then actually needing them to be bumped off as part of the story. Maybe someone attempting to channel their inner "joss whedon".. The whole of the epilogue was apparently written by Jordan before he died, although it had a few bits changed by editing. It's one I think will have to be re-read a couple of times before I can fully decide how I really feel/think about the whole thing.

Heh, the family sort of inherited a zx81 from a cousin in the mid 80's, but the first computer that was really mine was an Amstrad 6128. 128k of ram, and it actually had a built in 3.5 inch floppy disk drive. Of course, at the time it was nearly impossible to find games and such on floppy disk so we still had to get an external tape deck to be able to play games on it... Then we managed to get an Ambra IBM compatible 286... which had a hard drive of about 20Megs. I can remember the expense of increasing the Ram on it so I could actually play Privateer when it came out...

How about "What you procrastinated from doing today?"

At least the animals seem to be enjoying the day....

Pondering on the fact that so far this year, I've been getting to sleep more often then not around the 3-4am mark, and then awake and dozing to fully conscious again around the 9-10am mark... I think I need to try getting my sleep patterns back into a more decent order. Also, it has snowed. Local traffic has been fairly gridlocked, and the dogs have been having silly fun with a garden covered in inches deep snow.

Just got back from town having picked up a new suit for the wedding. Probably spent more money then I should, but I got sucked into the Savoy Taylor's and dang it, it's a good suit with a great fit. And it works with both formal shoes and my snakeskin cowboy boots.....

I have to admit, I've definitely become a fan of both Pathfinder, and the Mutants & Masterminds 3e. M&M3e is just so flexible you can do whatever you want with it. Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Horror, Superhero, Cyberpunk, it's all easy to shift those descriptors and make it all work.