Robin D. Laws's Blog, page 101
August 19, 2011
August 18, 2011
Link Round-Up: MCB Love, Rat Exoneration, TIFF Hazard
Mutant City Blues receives much love on the 2 GMs I Mic podcast.
Rats blameless in 1348 Black Death outbreak, archaeologist claims.
Among the condos implicated in a city-wide epidemic of falling, shattered glass is the one atop the Lightbox, the spanking new HQ of the Toronto International Film Festival. Valerie and I have agreed that if one of us gets taken out during the festival, the other should bravely soldier on and continue seeing films...
Korad: An Empire in Crisis
Last week's poll in our Korad world-building exercise told us about the province of Palth. The following entry now goes into the Korad bible:
Nomadic pastoralist yak-herders, the Palthians make winter camp at Bridlepost. Something destroys all other communities that get "too big". They just disappear. Palthians are an ornery bunch who just plain don't like being crowded. Palthians believe weather at one's birth mystically affects one's personality and character. Youth go on vision quests/rites of passage in the mountains. In Palth, orphaned children disappear within a fortnight, without exception.
That completes our survey of Korad's regions. Now it's time to activate its core conflicts, as it becomes a place of contending ideologies.
In order for new ideologies to arise, the old one has to show strains severe enough to grant them purchase. As you'll recall, the prevailing culture is austere, militaristic, reverent of knowledge, and covertly matriarchal. The supreme Koradi deity is the Black Goat of the Fens (whom is symbolized by the sacred goat of the marriage ceremony), a million-teated, ever-pregnant creator who spews out fragments of the cosmos, which given enactment and form by her soldier-demiurges. Her great holiday is the Festival of Ideas.
The crucial social unit is the guild, which connects family and empire. An honorable Koradi remains ever willing to spy and steal.
For more detail, review the above-linked setting Bible.
What now threatens the empire? Answer (and vote on the answers in real time) using the comment system below.
Okay, there are new rules coming up. You're gamers; you can figure out and follow rules.
This system will speed the last stages of the now-overlong worldbuilding exercise, by folding the pitching and polling steps into one post.
To add a new answer to the question, start a new main comment thread.
To add a modifying riff or detail to someone else's answer, append a reply comment.
Show your approval for an idea by liking the comment in question. Like as many comments as you want.
The original author of any main idea can count a riff on his or her idea as part of the main idea by saying so in a reply to the modification. If the original author does not make this approval, it is incorporated anyway, when the number of likes on a modification equals half or more of the number of likes on the main idea.
The three ideas with the greatest number of likes will be chosen as the primary causes of instability in the empire, to which the new ideologies must respond.
And… go!
August 17, 2011
The Final Status
The judges have received their applications, the juridical process has gone down in all of its behind-the-scenes violence and splendor, and a winner may now be announced in the 2011 Gen Con buzzword competition.
As you'll recall, the object of the exercise was to use status in a verb, as if this is a thing sane men and women actually do. Extra points were awarded for context, audacity, and fake sincerity.
Touts had chosen as their early frontrunner Kevin Kulp, who, in a swashbuckling disregard for the public trust, snuck it into his opening speech at the ENnie awards.
Yet after much debate and soul-searching, the judges have given this year's prize to a scrappy up-and-comer, that ranker from R'lyeh, Cthulhu himself. While guesting on the This Just In From Gen Con podcast, the purulent incarnation of cosmic indifference mentioned that he'd been statusing Nyarlathotep. In so doing, he scored points for all three of the bonus categories, plus a special prize for wrapping it in a joke that worked outside of the contest.
Accepting on behalf of the winged, octopoid deity will be his public relations handler, Graham Walmsley.
Don't despair, Kevin. When you're up against an elder god, it's always safest to come in second.
London oddsmakers still have Mr. Kulp down as the man to beat in '12. I have seen next year's word, and can attest that it is positively bone-chilling in its douchery. The competition will be fierce and without quarter.
August 16, 2011
Link Round-Up: Timely Review, TIFF Imminent
Dan Harms reviews Out of Time, the Trail of Cthulhu print compendium of non-1930s PDF scenarios.
Very exciting TIFF '12 announcements today: To, Tsukamoto, Lanthimos, Toyoda, Sono...and the 1st Whit Stillman in 13 years. Not to mention Juan of the Dead... Program book day is only a week away!
The Three Reveals of Gen Con (Part Two): Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff
Last week, I spilled my first reveal of Gen Con: New Tales of the Yellow Sign.
Now for the second reveal, earlier teased as "my imminent conquest, alongside an esteemed colleague, of a new medium."
This would be a new podcast I'll be launching in tandem with the Prince of Cairo, the ever-voluble, irrepressibly erudite Kenneth Hite.
Our title? "Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff." Need I say more?
I thought not.
Yet I will, regardless. We'll be trading palaver on games, film, history, eliptony and bookhoundery. Regular features will include Ken's Time Machine, in which Ken tells us how he'd solve a given historical problem, if equipped with the means of chronotravel. We've already been asked if we'll be fielding audience questions, and the answer is yes, we will!
We're aiming for an early fall launch. Simon Rogers of Pelgrane Press is executive producing. He's already lined up an impressive list of sponsors, but if you contact him right quick there might still be a slot left.
Watch this space for further details as our audio battle plan marches to inexorable fruition.
August 15, 2011
Link Round-Up: Razed Plays, Ashen Stars Themed, Terror Cloud
What Will Hindmarch learned running his post-apocalyptic GUMSHOE game Razed at Gen Con.
Ashen Stars gets theme music, composed by James Semple and Yaiza Varona.
Esoterror cloud experiment attacks rural New Brunswick.
August 12, 2011
Link Round-Up: Porgy Backstory, Pelgrane Wrap
The dreaded virus of unnecessary backstory reaches the shores of musical theater.
I thought Pelgrane's Gen Con sales were up 50% from last year. Nope, it doubled its previous take.
