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I don't usually post the movie episodes in here, since this is a gaming forum, but what the hell, here's Movie Mastery Holidayathon 2 - The Star Wars Holiday Special just because it's Star Wars.
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Dec 17, 2015 16:56
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Happy friggin' Life Day, everyone. And while we're at Star Wars: I recently got my hands on some West End Games Star Wars adventures, and they all seem to include scripts for the players to read out loud as their character as a sort of prelude/exposition. That's a very... interesting railroad mechanic, to say the least.
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Dec 17, 2015 17:15
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My first post on SA was a FATAL & Friends writeup. Sometimes you just have to dive in with both feet.
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Dec 17, 2015 17:54
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Doresh posted:Happy friggin' Life Day, everyone. I always wondered about that! A friend of mine, even worse with rules than I was, got his hands on the then-current corebook around 1990. I rolled a character, but things almost ended when we argued over whether I was supposed to read the dumb canned lines as a player, or if they were one of those lousy example-of-play transcripts. Things didn't go much further than that. The Empire attacked, I threw a grenade, and he got lost trying to figure out whether it would do anything.
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Dec 17, 2015 17:59
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theironjef posted:I don't usually post the movie episodes in here, since this is a gaming forum, but what the hell, here's Movie Mastery Holidayathon 2 - The Star Wars Holiday Special just because it's Star Wars. That giant mouse in the Cantina was literally a prop from Food of the Gods.
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Dec 18, 2015 04:03
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Speaking of diving into F&F writeups, is anyone here familiar with Degenesis? It's a game that seems like it's been around for a bit in Germany, but just got an English translation within the past month or two. I'm wary to try and write it up since I'm not anywhere close to fully familiar with it and the core rules take up 700 pages, but if it seems interesting to anyone I'll give it a shot. I'd link the website/trailer videos but I'm phone posting.
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Dec 18, 2015 07:04
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Draxion posted:Speaking of diving into F&F writeups, is anyone here familiar with Degenesis? It's a game that seems like it's been around for a bit in Germany, but just got an English translation within the past month or two. I'm wary to try and write it up since I'm not anywhere close to fully familiar with it and the core rules take up 700 pages, but if it seems interesting to anyone I'll give it a shot. I'd link the website/trailer videos but I'm phone posting. I have passing familiarity with an earlier edition (I think; I don't remember it being 700 pages long). There was also a previous attempt to review this here, but it was sadly quickly abandoned.
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Dec 18, 2015 11:53
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Draxion posted:Speaking of diving into F&F writeups, is anyone here familiar with Degenesis? It's a game that seems like it's been around for a bit in Germany, but just got an English translation within the past month or two. I'm wary to try and write it up since I'm not anywhere close to fully familiar with it and the core rules take up 700 pages, but if it seems interesting to anyone I'll give it a shot. I'd link the website/trailer videos but I'm phone posting.
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Dec 18, 2015 14:38
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theironjef posted:I don't usually post the movie episodes in here, since this is a gaming forum, but what the hell, here's Movie Mastery Holidayathon 2 - The Star Wars Holiday Special just because it's Star Wars. To answer your question, C3P0 did talk to the Ewoks in ROTJ. Which might also explain why you don't remember that part. 
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Dec 18, 2015 23:08
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Cooked Auto posted:To answer your question, C3P0 did talk to the Ewoks in ROTJ. He most likely created their new religion by telling them the Campbell mono-myth.
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Dec 19, 2015 02:47
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Well, he does recap the entire trilogy for them, complete with sound effects. We watched it tonight. Friend was indignant that Vader could just pick the Emperor up and toss him down that shaft, without him levitating out or anything. I pointed out that the Emperor clearly dumped all of his points into Force Lightning.
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Dec 19, 2015 06:02
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Bieeardo posted:Well, he does recap the entire trilogy for them, complete with sound effects. We watched it tonight. Yeah that's what I did as well last week which is why I remembered that particular scene and his lines preceding the floating chair.
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Dec 19, 2015 11:04
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Halloween Jack posted:I'm always fascinated with European games, especially when they aren't accessible to Americans. I'd love to see someone do Neuroshima. The Stalker RPG is translated now and it's on my (very very long) list.
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Dec 19, 2015 15:15
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What? Like as some sort of Cthulhutech thing where they bring it up in the fluff all the time, or like FATAL with hilarious eurogamesy rules for mutant rape? Either way it seems like a bad idea for very obvious reason of shedding even a bit of ones cloths in the zone is a very bad idea, and everything is poisonous. What idiocy did the RPG give?
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Dec 19, 2015 18:21
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theironjef posted:I don't usually post the movie episodes in here, since this is a gaming forum, but what the hell, here's Movie Mastery Holidayathon 2 - The Star Wars Holiday Special just because it's Star Wars. One of the few good things to come of that was a jab for those bothered by Boba Fett's ignominious death in Return of the Jedi: "Well, did you really expect a character from the Christmas Special to be an ongoing villain?" Of course, the litany of Boba Fett novels, comics, pez dispensers etc. had the last laugh there.
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Dec 19, 2015 18:58
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Terrible Opinions posted:What? Like as some sort of Cthulhutech thing where they bring it up in the fluff all the time, or like FATAL with hilarious eurogamesy rules for mutant rape? Either way it seems like a bad idea for very obvious reason of shedding even a bit of ones cloths in the zone is a very bad idea, and everything is poisonous. What idiocy did the RPG give? The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games always struck me as one of those "man-only" environments, especially given how most of the Zone's population is voluntary to a degree and most of the normal people who lived in the Zone before it expanded either were evacuated or mutated. It's not the place for "girly-girls". A woman stalker is probably going to resemble her male counterparts in more ways than one, like Calamity Jane in "Deadwood", and recognizable women in the Zone would be rare as unicorns, such as a female scientist or a prostitute in 100 Rads (and even they would probably get worn out after awhile, also like in "Deadwood"). If there's any rape, it would likely be homo-rape given that the whole place is like a giant prison once you get past the barricades. As well, there would probably be a lot of male-on-male hooking up, since male-exclusive environments tend to make for a lot of "gay for the stay/range" situations
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Dec 19, 2015 20:57
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Yeah, Boba Fett's role in the holiday special is basically smacking a friendly dinosaur and telling sorry lies on strawberry jelly planet. Based solely on that appearance, he sorta sucks.
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Dec 19, 2015 21:09
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Young Freud posted:The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games always struck me as one of those "man-only" environments, especially given how most of the Zone's population is voluntary to a degree and most of the normal people who lived in the Zone before it expanded either were evacuated or mutated. It's not the place for "girly-girls". A woman stalker is probably going to resemble her male counterparts in more ways than one, like Calamity Jane in "Deadwood", and recognizable women in the Zone would be rare as unicorns, such as a female scientist or a prostitute in 100 Rads (and even they would probably get worn out after awhile, also like in "Deadwood"). great post, a+
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Dec 19, 2015 22:10
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I'm reading that and all that's coming out is 'There are no women on HoL because they're too smart to go anywhere near the planet.'
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Dec 20, 2015 03:37
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I came to the Zone to wish for a woman and all I got was this t-shirt.
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Dec 20, 2015 17:53
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At least it wasn't a pillowcase.
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Dec 20, 2015 18:03
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John Wick posted:Never write a review. If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. Last time, on FATAL & Friends... Golden Bee posted:Alien Rope Burn, I'd like to officially call out whoever gave you this challenge as an rear end in a top hat. This thread is now a Wick Occupied Landfill. Evil Mastermind posted:I think this may be the first time something like this has been asked in F&F history, but... theironjef posted:No never stop. This is a billion times better than another argument about whether the skins are actual or symbolic. Golden Bee posted:
Halloween Jack posted:You guys got your eleventy volumes of James Desborough, I get Play Dirty. Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:Don't stop until your dark work is complete. See this through to the bitter(-that-he-isn't-in-charge-at-AEG) end. AmiYumi posted:This thread has gone from, like, 3-4 replies a day to over 100. The people have spoken! The Deleter posted:
One Year Later...  John Wick posted:Never read reviews. They're usually written by someone who has no idea of the blood, sweat and tears that make up the creative process/has a personal agenda to praise or condemn the product because of the author or company that produced it/or is a blithering idiot.
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Dec 20, 2015 20:01
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Alien Rope Burn posted:One Year Later... *Scare Chord*
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Dec 20, 2015 22:35
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loving hell.
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Dec 20, 2015 22:44
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That little diatribe against reviews really speaks ill of his ability to take criticism. As if that wasn't already apparent...
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Dec 20, 2015 22:49
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I'm happy he wrote a book! I really liked the movie and he saved that dog at the end and it helped make people remember that Keanu Reeves can act. Plus the sequel is coming out, so an in-character book by John Wick sounds like a win to me. (I know I know just let me believe)
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Dec 21, 2015 00:06
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I KNEW I had heard that name before. I guess I surpressed my memory of that rear end in a top hat.
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Dec 21, 2015 02:03
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John Wick posted:If you don't like something - a roleplaying game or anything else in the world - you have the right to express your opinion. You also have the right to keep your opinion to yourself. Consider carefully which right you wish to exercise. So, I'm going to start with a digression. Last time, I was like "you know, let's not be too hard on him, since this is over a decade ago and the anecdotes he cites are from before even that". Since then he went on a bitter breakup with mainstream gaming (as much as there is such a thing), broke up with his wife, worked for Neopets. It bugs me when people hold up, say Sean K. Reynolds's feat point system as an example of his design philosophy, because even he's better than that these days. Still not to my taste, mind, but better. So, has Wick changed? Well. Yes and no. And that "no" means I don't really need to put that qualifier in here. I'm going to try not to helldump but I'll be doing this as I go through it, unlike my Rifts reviews, where I write up most of the text in advance of posting. So it'll be rough(er). I don't have a time limit this time, but I want to have it done by the end of the year. I'm not much for Christmas, but if I was, you could consider this my gift to SA. And due congratulations to Wick for both funding and fulfilling a Kickstarter, something some other designers seem to struggle with. Whether or not you like what he writes, he does get it written. Is this gift a white elephant? Well, let's get to it.  Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier Part 1: "'Treacherous, honest and sadistic.' Hm. Sounds like a dream date..." First off, this book has some layout gimmicks. First off, every page has a set of dice and a descriptor at the top and bottom. The dice are different on every page so you can in theory open the book and get a die result, though somewhat weighted because the book is roughly 110 pages and there's got to be a few duplicates. Or you can flip to three pages and get three descriptors for an NPC personality. It's cute, but I don't think people bought this as a gaming aid, so we can give that feature a pass. I suppose it would be useful if you got caught without your dice and this book somehow. Forward "Forward". I'm not sure if that's a typo or if somebody's just trying to be cute.  There's a introduction by Jesse Heinig, who worked on the original Fallout and used to be a line developer for Mage: the Ascension. He talks about how "Playing Dirty" is forcing people to make hard choices with consequences where there isn't an obviously correct answer. Fair enough. But I don't think anybody opened this up looking to hear Heinig (sorry, Heinig), so we can move on. It's time for the main event.  Introduction: The Magician Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:Listen closely now. I’m going to tell you a secret. Ah, the "I'm going to tell you, the reader, something in confidence" bit. Even though you're writing it down, in a book, that anyone can read. Yes. It's a bit he's used before on a number of occasions before, and I won't be surprised if we see it again before the book is over. So Wick describe in how once, millennia ago, we believed in the power of the shaman. Actually, it turns out a great number of people still do, but from the Eurocentric perspective of most of his audience I suppose that holds true. Unless you count things like Sunday morning Christian mass. But I'm digressing. So the shaman had the power of stories to draw you into the uh... the... uh... what is it? Oh, yes. The invisible world. Okay, that totally is Christian mass. This reminds me of how a friend compared RPG meetings to Sunday mass. You know, stop, have the social catch-up with your community, maybe breakfast, then go in and participate in ritual with invisible beings. He goes on about how stories and words influence the way we think- Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:Five hundred years ago, romantic love was not going on a date. It wasn’t getting a burger at the drive thru. It was a dangerous thing. It was something that could get you killed. Five hundred years ago, the word “love” meant “lust” because that’s how the people in charge of the language wanted it to mean. Is that true? Somebody look that up, I've still got more Wick on my plate. Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:You are not just a game master. You are a shaman. I'm a wizard? Holy poo poo, when do I get to cast summon faithful bear- Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:You use language to change the hearts and minds of your players. You invoke emotion within them with just words. ... well that's dissapointing. I was hoping for a magic bear. So, yes, he's mainly just saying being a gamemaster is super special because words change the world and are also magic things that create invisible realms, etc. From there we move on to when he was writing for Legend of the Five Rings. Used to be if you wanted a good laugh, you walk up to an AEG staffer and say "when is John coming back?" Now that Fantasy Flight Games has the license, I guess you can't do that anymore.  So Matsu Tsuko was a badass samurai who, after becoming a badass samurai, then proceeded to make a mistake at every decision tree she was offered, aside from her original choice to become a badass samurai. (Even that was for the wrong reasons.) So Wick writes the end of that storyline where she gets to a point she realizes what a fuckup she is and decides to commit seppuku. The lead designer, however, is troubled by this. He points out that players from Tsuko's clan will be really upset by having her, in Wick's own words, "going out like a punk". Wick counters with that he has to, knowing the emotional reaction it'll get. It's a similar storytelling style that you see in a lot of writers I don't need to mention. "Where do I go with this story I'm stuck on? Well, what's the worst thing that can happen? Let's go with that." Wick points out that she was mostly just art on cardboard, a concept and an idea, but that she was more meaningful because people believed in her, figuratively if not literally. So he points out as a GM that's what you want out of a game, and so you have to make characters seem authentic and exciting, and to do that you have to learn about storytelling tricks to do that. He brings up that we're hard-wired to see false threats and that our minds can easily be tricked into seeing imaginary dangers. He extrapolates this into people wanting to believe in impossible things, brings up the Flat Earth Society, how we form images of people we haven't met, etc. GMs are magicians or shamans or wizards or whatever. Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:We are not just Game Masters. We are magicians. It's honestly not the worst start. Some GMs could use the pep talk (and some really, really don't) and it's not the worst mindset to look into if you can manage to cut out all the smug bullshit. After Play Dirty I'm kind of braced for grade-a cowpies, and I'm totally not down with the whole "magic = stories = more magic" angle, but he could do worse. I'm sorry. Let me clarify. He will do worse. Hey, it's the image he wants to project. It just may not be recieved by many folks the way he wants it. But we'll get to that, too, very soon.  Actually, you know what? Magicians work loving hard at their craft. Penn Gillette once described becoming a magician as being somebody willing to practice a given trick well beyond what would be considered sane, describing how he practiced a single trick for eighty hours over and over to make sure that it never goes wrong on stage. I'm not a magician and neither is Wick. Magicians - the good ones, anyway - work loving hard at what they do. Ugh. Let's not do them a disservice by claiming me sitting down and reading a book or do and doing some dodgy method acting is equivalent to stopping a bullet in my teeth before an audience of hundreds. I'm a guy that pulls out a statblock and scribbles some names and places them into a .txt file and rolls some dice. I've done it for a long time and I like to think I do well at it. But I'm no magician. Next: "I'm a bully." Alien Rope Burn fucked around with this message at 02:10 on Dec 21, 2015 |
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Dec 21, 2015 02:07
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At a guess, Wick's probably talking about the whole Courtly Love thing there, which: A: Really more of a French thing and B: Pretty much almost entirely a literary convention instead of a thing real people actually did.
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Dec 21, 2015 02:22
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Star Wars is on in five minutes. Just popping in to say that Wick wrote a long, rambling review that was mostly just him grandstanding and pretending to be Hunter S Thompson.
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Dec 21, 2015 02:57
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It was a review of someone else's "This could be better, but I really like it" review of Orkworld, because seriously, the dude cannot take criticism.
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Dec 21, 2015 03:03
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Jesus Christ, did he write that drivel while masturbating with a copy of Flex Mentallo?
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Dec 21, 2015 03:34
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unseenlibrarian posted:At a guess, Wick's probably talking about the whole Courtly Love thing there, which: A: Really more of a French thing and B: Pretty much almost entirely a literary convention instead of a thing real people actually did. This. It's kind of like people's obsession with Bushido. EDIT: Which, without even thinking about it, is another Wick thing. I can't wait to see his new version of 7th Sea. RocknRollaAyatollah fucked around with this message at 04:56 on Dec 21, 2015 |
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Dec 21, 2015 04:53
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unseenlibrarian posted:It was a review of someone else's "This could be better, but I really like it" review of Orkworld, because seriously, the dude cannot take criticism.
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Dec 21, 2015 04:55
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unseenlibrarian posted:It was a review of someone else's "This could be better, but I really like it" review of Orkworld, because seriously, the dude cannot take criticism.
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Dec 21, 2015 06:04
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Huh, I thought Bards as a thing died out with the Renaissance but apparently they continued into the 17th century. Learn something every day.
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Dec 21, 2015 06:18
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Glad to see my vague hopes that John Wick would have somehow become a better person have been dashed to the ground. What is this garbage? What does this poo poo about love have anything to do with playing games? I better find something to review in here before I'm forever remembered as "the guy who hates John Wick too much."
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Dec 21, 2015 08:03
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John Wick posted:The next time you get pissed off because someone slammed your favorite game/TV show/movie/book, stop and take a moment to remember the moment. Then, multiply that emotion by five thousand. That's how it feels when someone slams something you created. Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier Part 2: "From Mamet, to Sheldon, to me. To you." I'll just let the tape run for a moment here. Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:I’m a bully. Okay, let's stop the tape.  What am I supposed to take home from that? That there are no examples from his games where he doesn't come across as a bully? Or does he think those are the only ones that illustrate his principles? Or, most likely, those are the ones that build upon his self-illustrated image as this Machiavellian master storyplotter? Well, we don't get to find out. Once we're past the initial snippiness - geez, Wick - this chapter is actually pretty alright! I'm just going to say that off the bat. Not all of its ideas are original, mind. For example, Wick talks about the convention of "friendly games" in board games (with take-backs and the like) and brings up the idea of having "friendly games" in The Houses of the Blooded (that's his game of playing nasty nobles, in short) where players voluntarily work out who their enemies are amongst the other players. The alternative is "cut-throat" (one t plus a dash, for whatever reason) where it's every tragic homicidal noble for themselves. But "gloves on, gloves off" modes exist in a number of RPGs, it's just a different implementation for his particular game. Oh, and this is a "lesson" he learns from somebody else's boardgaming habits which is the "example"? Really? He hadn't heard of that before in games? Odd.  Origins Wick explains that he's frustrated with LARPs, because they're chiefly PVP, instead of PVE like most tabletop games. Play Dirty 2: Even Dirtier posted:(Hopefully, we've all moved past the "GM as enemy' phase. But he points out that it's hard to build fiction without trust, and LARPs often actively discourage trust. And he's going to tell us how to work around that! Open Secrets So he explains in many LARPs, a group of players investigate a given plot and basically take it aside with the storyteller and monopolize it, because the plot is often where the cool stuff is going on. However, these scenes are often secret or exclusive, while everybody else is left sitting around. Instead, Wick explains in the Houses of the Blooded LARP, these things are announced and everybody can sit in and watch, with the caveat that it's out of character knowledge. Players can use espionage abilities (which are a given in that game) to learn what happened in that meeting, but otherwise it's OOC. Basically, he wants people to have their secrets and plots exposed because it's more entertaining and investing for all the players when they get to see the story. He points out you can do the same in tabletop by making sure secrets are open - there are no private scenes, that people can know each other backgrounds, and so on, and encourages GMs to have their players share. And finally, he points out in LARP he often has OOC communications for people to talk to each other and get explanations of what was happening so people understand everything that's going on. Having run LARPs, this is pretty interesting, and I've been for "open backgrounds" in games for awhile now. It's something I'd be glad to give a try if I still did. Somewhere, sanity overtook me and I don't run LARPs anymore.  Enemies Similarly, he talks about letting people work out their own enemies in PVP roleplaying. He likens it to professional wrestling, and explains you might want to actually suggest ways or plots for your enemies to undermine you (privately? it's not clear.) if you think it'll make for a better story. Which is fair, but it's a little confusing on how it's actually implemented. The Morley-Wick Method Wick talks about going to a LARP with his friend Sheldon where he was bored, despite having worked out an intricate, exciting character (at least to him), and then realized the most popular characters were often the most shallow. Or so he thought. He then realized that their characters where icebergs (my term, not his) with a lot of depth nobody could see. Play Dirty 2 posted:I think Sheldon also nailed down the guy who could solve our problem. David Mamet. The director/screenwriter. His books and essays on “the method” approach to acting really inspired Sheldon, which in turn, inspired me. Using Mamet’s critiques, we came up with a solution to our problem. Mamet? Oy. What's Wrong So Wick talks about method acting, and the issue with it being that the subtleties of a character done through it can be lost on the audience until the author or director or whoever reveals the character's secret or backstory. But how in RPGs (LARPs, particularly), you often keep you secrets close. Play Dirty 2 posted:You are, quite literally, playing with yourself. He mentions this might make sense in PVP LARPs, but makes very little sense around the table, and that one might want to break from the "method acting" school of roleplaying. Once again, a solution is offered... Character Background Wick suggests restricting backgrounds to single pages, or even index cards, so they're easy for other players to read and pick up on. There's also a little note about keeping backgrounds slim so characters can make revelations during play. He doesn't actually explain how this relates to Mamet, but this is a very rough implementation of practical aesthetics, an acting technique championed by said director. And that's that. It's pretty long, but outside of the waaaahmbulance screaming by at the start of the chapter, it's solid advice, I think... if meandering and somewhat lacking in practical implementation. It all comes down to two things: making sure the story is inclusive and that players are encouraged to make their characters exposed. It won't fit every game, but it's not bad. "Huh.", I thought when I first looked at this. "This is looking up. This is advice I might conceivably use! Maybe he is better at this now." Well, yes and no. Next: "The most powerful item in the universe. Good luck!"
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Dec 21, 2015 08:06
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I can´t help myself but read all of his text in the voice of Emperor Palpatine (from Star Wars Episode 6). It just feels so self-righteous and like someone with a right high opinion of himself says what all the world has waited for SOMEONE to say. It´s eminently evil. That´s a nice tagline. John Wick - Eminently Evil.
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Dec 21, 2015 16:27
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Evil Mastermind posted:I think this may be the first time something like this has been asked in F&F history, but...
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Dec 21, 2015 17:08
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