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Howdy all -
The release has gone great and now I have to turn my attention to much more pressing activities: I am scheduled for fatherhood tomorrow! For more details checkout http://richaje.livejournal.com/10511.html. Blogging on the Moon Design Publications site might be a little sporadic for awhile, but fortunately David Dunham and a few other troopers are here to pick up the slack!
Jeff
PS. If you sent me an email in the last few days and I didn't get back to you, this is the reason! Please send me a gentle reminder in a few days.
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Looks like I waited too long to book a reservation. I can't find any hotel rooms in Indianapolis for Gencon. |
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Cubicle 7 Entertainment is pleased to announce that we have signed two licenses with Chaosium Inc in regards to their CALL OF CTHULHU and BASIC ROLEPLAYING game lines.
The first license covers the creation and publication of CALL OF CTHULHU adventures and supplements. The first of these is CTHULHU BRITANNICA which is released in August. This new collection of horror scenarios features five tales of horror and the weird, set within the green and pleasant land of England. Each scenario focuses upon a different time period, from the streets of Victorian London to the far future when End is almost nigh. Although each scenario can be played as part of an existing campaign, they also come with a set of pre-generated player characters, allowing all to be played and run with the minimum of effort. Our CTHULHU BRITANNICA series then continues with FOLKLORE in November. This sourcebook gives life to strange tales and strange places where myth meets mythos in Britain's darkest corners.
Cubicle 7 have also signed a license for the BASIC ROLEPLAYING system which is being used to developed a brand new game based upon the works of a popular award-winning author which we will announcing later in the year.
“We’re delighted to be publishing material for Call of Cthulhu. One of our long-held ambitions is to contribute to this fantastic game,” said Dominic McDowall-Thomas of Cubicle 7. “We’re also very excited to be able to use the Basic Roleplaying system for our upcoming unannounced licensed game – it’s a perfect fit.”
"We've known Angus Abranson for well over a decade and long desired to work together with him on something. Now he's teamed up with Dominic, and formed Cubicle 7 Entertainment, it gives Chaosium great pleasure to award them licenses to publish supplements for Call of Cthulhu as well as BRP books. We're looking forward to a long and successful relationship and many swell Chaosium licensed books to come!" added Dustin Wright of Chaosium. About Cubicle 7 Entertainment Ltd
Founded in 2006 Cubicle 7 Entertainment was set up by Angus Abranson and Dominic McDowall-Thomas, two gaming entrepreneurs who wanted to create a games publisher fostering some truly iconic brands. Since then the company has published role playing games from a growing list of properties including Victoriana, SLA Industries, Starblazer Adventures (based on DC Thomson’s 80’s Starblazer comic series), 7th Circle’s Chinese fantasy Qin and is releasing Doctor Who: Adventures in Time and Space, under licensed from the BBC, in October . In June 2009 Cubicle 7 announced it had joined the Rebellion Group. You can find out more at www.cubicle7.co.uk About Chaosium Inc Chaosium Inc. is a California based publishing company best know for the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game which utilizes the Basic Roleplaying System. You can find out more at www.chaosium.com |
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Broguht about by the damage from yesterdays Superhulk vs The Man debate, we bring you:
Top Ten Signs Your New Player Doesn’t "Get" Your Superhero RPG Game
10. Whenever the PCs catch crooks who have committed a crime, the new player rifles through the criminals’ possessions and begins "treasure division" of the stolen goods among the other players.
9. All his proposed Secret IDs are characters from Star Wars. Mostly Boba Fett..
8. He tries to reboot an old <I>Bunnies and Burrows</I> character, as Captain Furry. Who has a "mind yiffing" psychic attack. Which he describes in over-graphic detail.
7. His first ten proposed Hero names are Stab Lad, The Stalker, Bruisertron, Black Man, Gandalf, Enabler, Orange Avenger, Defibrillator Dan, Retraining Order, and Boba Fett. All ten names are for the same character.
6. When he finally settles on naming his hero Captain Crimson Confessor, he insists his secret cave-based church complex be called "The Apse-Hole."
5. The term "Rao Fundamentalist" creeps into your gaming lexicon. It is not a complement.
4. When asked if he’s playing a Golden Age or Silver Age character concept, he asks how many extra gp a Golden Age character gets.
3. The new hero pawns his Congressional Medal of Honor, and uses the money gained to pay for beer and hookers.
2. His first character concept is a "half-hero, half-Vulcan, with Mommy issues."
1. The character retires, to study the socio-economic factor that lead to citizens putting on costumes and committing illegal acts under assumed nom de maux.
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(Uoht the Younger and Uoht the Elder approach the castle at the gate. The wind and snow blow around them.) ELDER Have you seen Mother? I have heard looks as close to death as a corpse.
YOUNGER
Closer to a corpse puts us closer to the Throne.
ELDER
Your ambition is tasteless, brother.
YOUNGER
It tastes sweet to Cassilda.
ELDER
Her tastes are just as bitter as yours.
YOUNGER
How would you know, brother? Tasted her often?
ELDER
You disgust me. Listening to your plots makes me wonder if I should be so concerned when I sit on the Throne. YOUNGER Be silent! Someone approaches! (ENTER Cassilda)
CASSILDA
(CASSILDA hugs the ELDER and kisses the YOUNGER) My brothers! And why home so soon? Is the war over?
ELDER
Alas, no. It seems it has only begun. YOUNGER Our armies did not fare well against the Enemy, sister.
CASSILDA
When news reaches the streets, the strees shall not be silent.
YOUNGER
They will want blood.
ELDER
They can find it in the veins of our Enemy.
CASSILDA
They will find it in the walking corpse that sits on our Throne.
YOUNGER
Aye, if that corpse has any blood left in her.
ELDER
That is our mother you speak of, brother. You will keep your tongue civil in your head or I will cut it out for you. YOUNGER (to CASSILDA) Our brother has not taken well to the defeats our Enemy has given us.
ELDER
You speak as if they were gifts.
CASSILDA
They are gifts, brother. Do you not see? We can use the defeats and the risk of revolt to restore sanity to the Throne.
ELDER
Sister…
CASSILDA
She says she can see Carcosa on the lake. ELDER No… CASSILDA Every day, she stares out the window. Every night, she walks the halls. Sleepless. Afraid to sleep. The apothecary has given her a powder to keep her safe from dreams. She says she is eager to call the King.
ELDER
You will be silent, now!
YOUNGER
If it is true, brother…
ELDER
If it is true, I shall see it for myself!
CASSILDA
You shall, Uoht. You shall.
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http://www.dorktower.com/2009/07/14/muskrat-ramblings-updates-and-down-the-line/ http://www.dorktower.com/?p=3940 I’m trying to get back to three strips a week. While I’m still pushed for time, I’ve been really unhappy with the flow of the strip while I pulled it back to twice a week (even if that was only intended as a temporary thing during Louisa’s first year). We’ll see.
In some bad news, Comics Buyers’ Guide has had to cut back on expenses due to the economy, and alas, alack, one of those expenses was Dork Tower. The editor says this is hopefully just a temporary thing, and given the feedback I get from the CBG staff and editors, I’m hoping so as well. Yet, for the first time in ten years, Dork Tower is exclusively a web-only strip. Or “webcomic,” as I guess the kids are saying these days.
This is a paradigm I’ve yet to get used to.
This is also a business model I need to figure out. While I’m notoriously unmotivated by money, the fact that there is now a Daughter involved and a College Fund to be funded puts a spin on things that wasn’t there five years ago.
On the plus side, while there are still massive slowdowns on the Gamespy server, at least the move to the new server is expected to be VERY soon.So hopefully the site should be super-fast and super-spiffy super soon. |
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A quote from Graham Walmsley's new adventure, Watchers in the Sky. I was concerned it might not be as bleak as The Dying of St Margaret's.
"The last clue is only available by dissecting Alice."
I needn't have worried.
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http://medievalnews.blogspot.com/2009/07/was-mabinobigion-written-by-woman.html 
A new book coming out this month suggests that the Mabinoigion, a medieval masterpiece of Welsh literature, was written, at least in part, by a Welsh princess. In The Origins of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi
Dr. Andrew Breeze of University of Navarre argues that The Mabinogion's first four stories were the work of a female, which he beieves was Gwenllian, daughter of Gruffudd ap Cynan, King of Gwynedd.
In an interview with the Western Mail, Dr. Breeze explains some of his reasons behind his theory: "What we can say about these stories is that they are very good at describing children, babies, breast feeding, motherhood, and even though warfare occurs the writer is not interested in swords and daggers and axes. Then we get these small characters like Rhiannon and Branwen and in some cases they get the better of their men."
He adds, "Then we get these small characters like Rhiannon and Branwen and in some cases they get the better of their men."
Other Welsh literature scholars are not convinved by Dr. Breeze's arguments. Iestyn Daniel, of the University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, said: "I don't think he is correct in deducing it is the work of a woman.
"Personally I think it is by a Dominican [monk]. If the author were a Dominican he might well have been experienced in treating women's spiritual needs and that might have been reflected in The Mabinogi."
He added: "What he has written is valuable in that it draws attention to the feminine element but I don't think it follows that the author was therefore a woman."
Dr Sioned Davies, the head of the school of Welsh at Cardiff University, was more forthright in her criticism. She said: "I know Andrew Breeze well and he is a good academic. But he has a bee in his bonnet about the conceit that a woman wrote it.
"Nothing would give me more pleasure than discovering this, but scholars have shown quite clearly that his arguments are unfounded. We cannot even date the Four Branches of the Mabinogi so he has a rather circular argument.
"And the level (of argument) is not what I would expect of a someone of his calibre."
But Dr Breeze respond against his critics by saying, "People are unwilling to change their minds. In a tiny way I feel like Galileo."
The Mabinobigion is a collection of eleven prose stories from medieval Welsh manuscripts. The tales of the Mabinogion were preserved in two manuscripts, White Book of Rhydderch (c. 1325) and the Red Book of Hergest (c. 1400).
The Mabinogion was first translated into English by Lady Charlotte Guest. It was Lady Charlotte who gave the title of "Mabinogion" to this collection of tales. Also, Lady Charlotte had included a twelfth tale, called Hanes Taliesin ("Tale of Taliesin"), belonging to the Independent group. However, the Hanes Taliesin was not found in the two early manuscripts, so some of the later translations of the Mabinogion do not include the story of Taliesin.
The tales from the Mabinogion can be divided into three categories. The first four tales belonged to the Four Branches of the Mabinogi ("Pedair Cainc y Mabinogi"). The next four (or five, if including Taliesin) were the Independent tales, two tales of which Arthur appeared in the scene. While the last three tales falls into a category known as the Welsh romances, similar to those of the French romances written by Chretien de Troyes.
Dr. Breeze's presumed author of the Four Branches of the Mabinogi, Princess Gwenllian, is also famous for her role in the wars between Wales and England. Born in 1098, she lived in the valleys around Dinefwr, then dense with protective forests, where she married and raised four sons: Morgan, Maelgwn, Maredued and Rhys. In 1136 an attack was launched on the Normans and her husband left to join the battle. While he was away, Maurice of London and other Normans led raids against their territory, and Gwenllian was compelled to raise an army for their defense. In a battle fought near Kidwelly Castle, Gwenllian's army was routed, and she was captured and beheaded by the Normans. In the battle her son Morgan was also slain and another Maelgwen captured and executed. Gerald Cambrensis, writing later that century, said: "She marched like the Queen of the Amazons and a second Penthesileia leading her army." |
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http://grognardia.blogspot.com/2009/07/slaying-ouroboros.html  An integral part of my pathetic attempt to reclaim my lost youth is re-watching a lot of the old TV shows and movies that I loved as a younger person. I do this to see if my memories of them are faulty, for good or for ill. What's interesting is that there's no clear trend: some things I liked way back when simply don't hold up over time, while others are in fact every bit as good as I remembered -- or better.
Star Trek clearly falls into the latter camp. I've been systematically working my way through the series from Season 1 on, thanks to the DVDs' finally being priced reasonably. I'm nearly done Season 2 now and my overwhelming feeling is that Star Trek truly was awesome. I could go on at great length about its virtues but I'll save that for some other time. What I wanted to talk about today was the format and content of the series, because I think it has some relevance for discussions we often have here.
What people forget, over forty years later, is that Star Trek was, for all intents and purposes, an anthology series. There were continuing characters certainly and there was an extremely vague persistent setting, but, by and large, each episode is self-contained and makes few, if any, references to what came before. Consequently, you can watch the series in pretty much any order and it still makes sense. There's no "canon" to internalize or setting details to understand beyond the most basic ones that you can pick up within five minutes of watching any given episode. This is the exact opposite of its brandified offspring series, all of which depend, to varying degrees, on your already being invested in "Star Trek," a vast mythology constructed by mining the original 79 episodes for names and ideas that others can then elaborately build upon.
Watching Star Trek, I am continually struck by the fact that it's never about itself. Each episode is simply a science fiction adventure story, with little or no connection to anything that comes before or after. These stories are not exercises in IP mining or brand building or any of the other practices we nowadays associate with popular entertainment. I find this frankly refreshing and indeed inspiring. Perhaps this is why so many episodes of Star Trek were written by or based upon the work of genuine science fiction writers rather than professional screenwriters -- Robert Bloch, Frederic Brown, Harlan Ellison, Norman Spinrad, Theodore Sturgeon, to name a few.
It's a really remarkable thing and it probably explains why, despite having been a Star Trek fan for most of my life, I can go back and find the original series far less dated than I'd expected it to be. I hesitate to use the word "timeless" to describe these episodes -- though a few of them merit it -- but the fact that the show isn't self-referential and self-absorbed does make it far more enjoyable to me than does re-watching The Next Generation, which I loved at the time of its first broadcast. There's a simplicity and directness to Star Trek that seems utterly missing from so much genre work these days, where dreams of establishing a profitable franchise overwhelm the primal desire to tell good stories. Re-watching Star Trek has reminded me that this wasn't always the case and I'm very glad of that. |
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Although Michael Mann’s Public Enemies raked in an acceptable box office haul and scored a fresh Tomatometer rating, the film—which I quite liked—has been the subject of much concern trolling in movie blog land. Allegedly it’s too arty, too redolent of the filmmaker’s personal vision, to justify its budget in an era of tentpoles and CGI giant robots. I’m still puzzling that out: the Public Enemies I saw follows the conventional arc of an outlaws on the run flick. Mann’s adoring HD camera lovingly serves up the movie star charisma.
( Mild spoilers... )
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What's a reasonable turnaround for an email reply? I generally feel bad if I haven't answered an email - at least in some fashion - the same day I receive it. In many cases, the same hour. But I have a near-constant access to my email so I may be in the minority.
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http://www.darthsanddroids.net/episodes/0283.html 
When running a game, you should always take notes of what the PCs are doing. Ostensibly for record-keeping purposes.
But mainly so you can set up horrible, horrible consequences of the things that they do with nary a second thought.
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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheWalyouBlog/~3/1j7j5W3XDK4/ http://www.walyou.com/blog/?p=16038 
Social media is the current rage of all geek and non-geek internet users, where geeks can play online games on social networking sites too. Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Digg, Friendfeed, MySpace and other popular social media have interesting unique logos, which have now inspired some interesting Social Media Icons Pillow designs!
Social Media Icons pillow will surely make geeks feel at home and provide some relaxation, quite similar to the way social networking sites make people feel at home in their own online world with friends. Most geeks are no longer unsocial beings; they do have a virtual social world. They network a lot on social media and have hundreds of friends.
These pillows are ideal for geek homes – a place where real and virtual world always meet and co-exist. One can rest on these pillows after a long tiring day of games, work, social networking and think about next scribble on the Facebook wall or listen to some music streaming in from MySpace or can simply Tweet away!
These pillows are available at Etsy Craftsquatch for $14.99 -19.99 per pillow. The colors and logo designs look quite artistic too. These logo designs too were created by creative talented geeks and they really look nice on pillows too. There is also other Soft RSS Icon Pillow, Mac Keys inspired pillows and even Adobe CS3 icons pillows for tired geeks.
Etsy’s Via Freshome
This is a post from Walyou, who bring you the best New Gadgets gadgets, Cool Gadgets and Hi Tech News.
Social Media Icons Pillow Designs Provide Some Needed Rest
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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheWalyouBlog/~3/3bq2WLU9lvk/ http://www.walyou.com/blog/?p=16047  Although geeks are quite…. geeky, but, even they, like me, have a heart that beats for that someone special, don’t they? So, how do they make sure to give that someone a special place on their table? Do they use computer programs? – No, they aren’t always reliable. Do they use sticky notes? Even they may fall off easily. Then what do they do? They can use these alphabet computer keyboard magnets made from a discarded keyboard.
 These Qwerty Magnets are as geeky as they can get, but, at the same time they are lovably romantic. The used keyboard also makes sure there is no harm done to our beloved mother nature in the process. Available in phrases denoting the most quixotic “Love U” and “Miss U”, these magnets are sure to catch that lady love’s notice. Available from Inewidea, these magnets are up for grabs for a price tag of 4.95?, making the money worth the love you will be showered when you show your love these cheeky magnets.
Firebox Via: INewIdea
This is a post from Walyou, who bring you the best New Gadgets gadgets, Cool Gadgets and Hi Tech News.
Qwerty Keyboard Magnets For Romantic Geeks
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