Nonek

Reminds me of playing a Chaos Champion when the rules for Khorne and Slaanesh came out in Realms of Chaos if I remember, all those mutations and powers, great stuff.

Ran a special Ravenloft AD&D episode tonight, the party fresh from escaping Strahd's wolves and running into the Mists stumbled into a down full of barrows (original eh?) and the creepy little village nestling amidst them. The party accepted the burgomeisters request to rid them of the devils from the hills, and marched into the downs. I ran a mostly story focused campaign, with a few foes that attacked and then fled back into the gloom. The story of these cursed moors and the ancient civilisation that once laid their dead to rest here was told on standing stones, carved in runes and sigils that needed time to translate and attracted watchers whose eyes shone from the darkness. Eventually they found clues leading to a distant keep, under which a king of these ancient people was laid to rest, and that stood lone on the horizon. In that windblasted place, situated at the heart of a long disappeared hillfort they found a skeletal guard still stood at attention in the tower, propped up by wooden crosses bearing their crumbling forms and rotted harness. They made camp here and as the moon rose and night crept in the skeletons began to sing a dirge, first one then the other, praising their dead lord and pledging eternal fealty to his long vanished kingdom. Double watch that night for some reason, until finally our Half Orc Grim smashed the choir to bits in anger. With that silence descended, no bird, beast or even wind stirred the night and the party got more paranoid not less, as I described a sense of presence brooding in the darkness all about them. They awoke to a blood red dawn, the sun too bright, painful to the eyes, its brightness not bringing warmth while everything seemed too clear and defined. They descended into the keep, lifting a great bronze trap door, and entering a dungeon where skeletons similar to the one they had smashed stood in alcoves, watching them pass. As they descended further the skeletons far behind them began their dirge, and from the corner of their eyes they saw glimpses of movement, skulls shifting, hands tightening around spears. The party stopped Grim from attacking the skeletons, worrying that they'd animate, and shortly after green witch light sprang to life in the corpses eyes. A single skeleton warrior barred their path at the end of the passage, stood before rune covered bronze doors, the thing intoned. "I am the champion that could not be felled, I am the blade that was never sheathed, I am my masters dread will made flesh, I am the enemies end and my lords shield. Come in peace or die!" Instead of saying they came in peace the party attacked and were almost (thanks to poor rolling) wiped out by the skeleton warrior, which for four fifth level characters should have been fairly easy. Healing up with spells, kits and potions they cracked open the door and stepped into the kings tomb. Here he sat upon an iron throne, a sword alight with witchfire blazing in his gnarled fist, his flesh black as jest, his long white hair rising and writhing in an unfelt wind and his eyes blazing with the same witchfire as that which radiated from his sword. All around him lay the treasures of his life, shining copper, bronze, silver and gold and reflecting the dread fire suffusing the place. In the walls skeletons whispered their mournful dirge and stepped down from their alcoves, clashing their spears against their shields, eyes springing to life with green fire. The king stood, his great height enhanced by the shadow that rushed forth from him seeming to leap at the characters as if eager to attack, with his left hand he pointed at the party and spoke. "So, my mortal servants at last send me my pound of flesh...come my blade thirsts for your sweet blood and my retinue must dine on your marrow!" With that the kings eyes blaze with the light of the midday sun and he and his skeletal minions step forward ready to attack, everybody roll initiative. At this point our suspicious Half Orc Grim says, "Nope!" and declares that he is running for the entrance, the rest of the party mutter various expletives and do the same. I'm amazed but play along, having an ocassional skeleton step down from its plinth to block their path and be smashed aside, telling them that they can feel a coldness from beyond the grave clutching at their backs until finally they burst out into daylight. The ironic thing is that the king was just a Wight, 5HD, a +1 sword, no real challenge, less so than his skeletal champion. His skeletal servants were just that, 1HD skeletons and not really a problem or shouldn't be. Admittedly we had a Druid and not a Cleric to turn Undead, but still the party stood a a great chance of survival. Must have done a good job on the atmosphere. Ended the session there with the party headed back to the village, intent on revenge, looking forward to the next.

Until recently I thought that Mr Chu wrote the most stupid things i've ever seen...

I'm looking forward to this. Not exactly what it seemed to be in the initial trailer, but it still seems interesting. I was really hoping for the game to be a simulation of the life and times of Oscar Wilde, the biting delivery of razor sharp witticisms, the charming and challenging of society with our risque personal behaviour, the writing of some of the most enduring works of art one can imagine, the wholesale consumption of industrial sized quantities of Laudanum, the wearing of stylish cravats and far too tight breeches, lunch at the Savoy etcetera. Alas.

Funnily enough i'd rather be imprisoned than be forced to sit through Wicked.

Caught between the rot and a hard place.

I have to say that i'm really enjoying your battle reports Melkathi, Nuffle certainly seems to be against you at time however.

I've never investigated the setting itself, other than the Vecna adventure that was set within it, think i'll pop on to e-bay and see whether there is a quality version available.

Oddly enough I recently ran through the original Castle Ravenloft adventure with my pen and paper group, still one of the best scenarios that TSR ever published.

So long as they treat every studio and product with equal attention and give them the same chance, then I don't really see any problem personally.

I really don't see the problem here, Luzarius has kindly offered to pay for all of the voice acting, let him do so. I'd upgrade his forum badge at the least though, maybe craft him a special one based on his role in funding the conversion of the game to being fully voice acted. Anyway three cheers for the gent.

Finished the Heart of Stone expansion for the Witcher 3, excellent and successfully brings its subject matter to the computer in a very faithful fashion, there are still flaws in the game but the modding scene is helping iron those out. Also finished the Age of Decadence on a combat run, the difference from my first playthrough was striking, and combat was dangerous unusually enough. Some of the better original gaming i've indulged in over the last ten years or so.

Well if innocent of manslaughter and any other charges, driving without due care and attention, reckless endangerment etc, then that is an end to the matter I suppose. I certainly hope that there is some better answer for the deceaseds family however, and that we are not seeing once again that there is one law for them and one law for us.

Interesting, do you know how much compensation Mr/Ms Jenner has paid out to the deceaseds family, if any? Also what are the state of the court proceedings for the incident at the moment, this Jenner individual has a right to self identify as anything they wish (that's nobodies business but themselves) but justice must be served, the dead represented and the guilty brought to book. That is one of the core principles of society, and we already see how often celebrities are given far more leniency than the common folk.

Meanwhile back at the ranch: Germaine Greer is now a misogynist apparently.

You know those American fraternities we see depicted in the movies, the ones using the Greek alphabet and whatnot, one always thinks of the scenes where they're beating new members buttocks, and the beaten are thanking them and asking for another blow. I've always thought that is almost a perfect recreation of the relationship between Games Workshop and her customers.

Non existence...luxury! I was suspended in a state of spiritual flux 'tween Heaven and Hell and tormented by gibbering horrors from the dark between the stars while being force fed marmite on those tasteless lumps of cardboard Americans call bagels. And I were glad of it, and thanked the tentacled horrors whose form my fractured mind could not concieve of with genuine relish on a job well done, stripping my pathetic man flesh from my bones and twisting the immortal soul within!

I think I understand that, navigational computers would be most useful at plotting more efficient courses, so a vessel that was capable of formulating the shortest route in hyperspace(?) would be the fastest at travelling from point a to b. It's not a measure of acceleration and thrust at all, as we think of speed, but how short a distance between two points you can calculate safely. Avoiding gravity wells and known obstructions, though this would require very frequently updated star charts to work in practise I suppose. Just my theory however.

That is so right on. Good movies are good movies but Star Wars was something no one had ever seen the like before. I can appreciate this but for me Forbidden Planet had it beat years before in terms of wonder and content, what Star Wars introiduced for me was Speed, and films have been getting faster ever since then. It roared out of the gates at a hundred miles an hour and never let up, perfect for attracting a child or young adults fevered imagination. Films of the period seem so plodding and slow in comparison, but that tempo allowed a lot more examination and nuance, take Taxi Driver and its slow build up to that fevered crescendo, or any other film really. I think Star Wars was the herald of a new era of cinema, both good and bad. Edit: I have to say, 13 channels of TV? The gentleman was utterly spoiled, the Wireless was an extravagance in my childhood home, there was only a phone booth at the end of the road, and a penny mix of sweets was a relished treat.

The Last Kingdom, an adaptation of the Bernard Cornwell novel about a Saxon protagonist caught in a culture clash between the invading Danes and Saxons, Paganism and Christianity. Set in the ninth century as the last Atheling was rising to power. A cracking debut, though a little truncated. One to catch on BBC America, the i-player or what have you.

I now have the Professor's eyeglasses, yes my Geralt is wearing shades, forcing me to at random moments screach out strains of the Who's vocals for some unknown reason. Edit: Playing both this and Age of Decadence really does provide a nice counterpoint.

Neal Halford is in my eyes somewhat of a genius. I read the Riftwar saga before I'd ever heard of BaK. My uncontrolled geekout over the first time I saw Pug in the game was perhaps excessive. Needless to say, I didn't earn any cool points that day. And yes, Dungeon Siege was awesome. Did Neal Halford write for Dungeon Siege? I honestly did not know that, much obliged, I was just commenting on his writing in BaK, at points superior to Feist's prose in my opinion.

Issues denied a platform? Anything not reported on, not attractive to the ideology of the reporters or their establishments, not judged as important, or that is dangerous in revealing the medias hypocrisy and lack of ethics. Anything that is not judged to be a hit worthy story really, all of these can be brought to light through other means. I'm personally thinking of the equal pay and benefits denied to our loyal Gurkhas, not a newsworthy story for decades, until a tireless celebrity helped bring it to the spotlight partly through social media and the mass media had to finally report on it. "Morally correct." A phrase used by an unethical and corrupt profession to pour scorn on a harmless passtime. Shame those whom show any thought but those we judge to be correct, Room 101 beckons for such thought crime. One wonders however how these reporters walk down any inner city street at night with young ladies half falling out of their clothes at every corner, and how morally incorrect they think these people are.

It's rather depressing, to me at least, that this image is incomplete. At the same time "video nasties" were being villified and blamed for societies and individuals ills, along with rock music, rap music etc. It spirals back far into history, with the same message repeated over and over, that of control, villification and demonisation. Novelists and satirists were shamed by society, letter writing and the royal mail that allowed women sheltered by society to experience a far wider world was denounced, film was dismissed as vulgar and crass, the translation of the bible led to William Tyndales death on charges of heresy. One can almost see a pattern here, to deny any pleasures, any knowledge or any advancement of the common man or woman. To deny them any releases or passtimes not judged worthy, and make them ashamed of themselves for indulging in anything not sponsored by those whom "know better." I do not believe this is in any way intentional, but it may well speak to how the upper classes and those in power (like the current crop of trust fund baby SJFs) look down on their fellow men. With ill disguised contempt, fear and loathing. The mob must be kept in its place, and satiated with the simple pleasures of bread and circus rather than pursue anything restricted or dangerous.

Brought to my attention by Fallout 2 of all games! Redding I believe, absolutely fascinating. Though of course games can teach one nothing but violence and sexism, ha.