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everlasting kangaroo everlasting kangaroo how do i work this sunday september 10 2017 the passing of jerry pournelle i heard yesterday that writer jerry pournelle had passed away it so happens that i had seen him one week before at dragon con i believe it was his first time to visit that convention and it was my first time to see him in person i got to know pournelle s work through larry niven who also attended the con last week niven had become my favorite science fiction author at some point during my high school and college years and inevitably i d read and enjoyed the mote in god s eye his first collaboration with pournelle not long after that i read various other books of pournelle s including high justice a step farther out black holes and king david s spaceship all great reading when the panel with pournelle and niven let out last weekend the friend i was with suggested i go up and say hi i think i was too star struck frankly and passed on the opportunity of course i regret that now but i can t help thinking i ought to do something in jerry s honor he died to borrow the words of scripture old and full of years if you know his history those were full years indeed and i have only admiration for the man and his accomplishments i ve been thinking to myself that i d get back to this blog and start writing again for myself and anyone interested in reading and i think now is a great time to get back into things jerry having authored one of the very first blogs on the internet would likely be pleased if i did so so here i go god bless you jerry for your wisdom and your fine example posted by everkang at 9 10 2017 10 16 00 pm email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest saturday april 26 2014 what the osr means to me wow it s been a while i posted a comment over at tenkar s tavern which i thought i d repeat here over the past year or two i e while i ve been away from this blog i ve been reading and listening to a lot of material coming out of the old school renaissance or old school revival a return more or less to the old ways of the earlier days of the hobby of table top role playing tenkar asks his readership what the osr means to them personally my response was this the primacy of adventure over story the primacy of surrender to the wonderful the fateful and the weird over rules mastery and appendix n not gygax s specific list nor any other but the attitude behind it in which one seeks to take the best elements of the exciting and the evocative and bring them quite literally to the table if you are interested in this sort of thing tenkar s is a great site to visit not grandmother friendly perhaps but a consistently fun and interesting read a lot of folks naturally think of old school d d when they think of the osr but it encompasses more than that seventies eighties gaming is probably a better characterization of its focus most of what we play today is really just a remix and refinement of what we played in those earlier years the osr crowd at its best seeks to recover and revitalize the finer elements of those games posted by everkang at 4 26 2014 11 23 00 am email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels dnd gaming osr rpg story monday april 2 2012 organized religion some time ago i overhead two ladies making plans to visit some religious establishment whether temple or mosque or church i couldn t say i wasn t paying that much attention i did hear one of them speak of organized religion in what sounded like a dissatisfied tone it reminded me that many folks think of it as a bad thing and this puzzles me i don t doubt that bad or ineffectual stuff happens in and through organized religion but it strikes me that knocking organized religion as such is with all due respect to those who do the knocking kind of silly folks who have any interest in religion at all would obviously agree that there is some value to it and that we seem to have some natural desire for it of course it takes many forms but all strive for things that are in some sense holy or spiritual the naturalists and materialists among us might think that it s more of an infection or disorder a la freud that we really should rid of ourselves of but those who take religious options as live options probably don t have a problem acknowledging that it s a natural impulse it s quite human now humans also have a tendency again quite naturally to organize themselves this is true on a lot of levels in our personal relationships we settle into routines establish traditions regularly commemorate events it s quite common and typically our relationships are better for it while routines can become ruts traditions mindless and celebrations empty they are a very good thing when they work right the same is true of communities we pitch in on projects we guard each other s backs we share resources knowledge and skills insofar as we hold common beliefs and embrace common values we encourage each other indeed we ll hold each accountable to those shared values and just as individuals establish routines traditions and celebrations among themselves so too do larger communities they may even establish to good effect institutions that span generations that far outlive their creators they can go wrong to be sure but they can also accomplish great good again this tendency to self organize is a very human thing it s not just important at times it s downright essential now put the two together what have you got the thing that many rail against they often do so for good reason but it shouldn t be because religion organization is some kind of freak event some mutation that is always and ever bad it s much better i think to say that organization can emerge for both good reasons and bad and that it can be done well or badly so it s not a matter of ditching religion or organizations of whatever level it s a matter of getting them right posted by everkang at 4 02 2012 11 15 00 pm email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest wednesday january 11 2012 fifth edition rules yes as noted on en world d d 5th edition or whatever it will be called is in development what do i think you ask hey you are reading this aren t you so don t complain well i ve signed up for the play test if for no other reason to get a preliminary peek i have to be upfront about it though i m not a fan of hit points as they are normally played in d d recently while reading some of the salvatore s drizzt stuff i cracked up when i realized that you couldn t actually play out some of the scenes he described definitely not with the ruleset of the time that won t go away in 5th but i was very impressed with mearles work in iron heroes and monte cook has done excellent stuff with his variations on 3rd edition now i never played any of their spin off material but when just reading the rules is fun you know you are on to something really cool i m sad i didn t get to play any of it but i do want to see what they do with 5th i m sure i ll play 5th when it s out because most everybody will want to play at least one campaign and i m sure i ll have a good time not much else to say posted by everkang at 1 11 2012 10 42 00 pm email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels dnd gaming rpg monday december 26 2011 narrative in role playing games continued theologian randy harris in his post contra narrative on his seemingly now defunct postmodern mystic blog is still available in google s rss cache so i copy it here i want to share with you one of my favorite short stories in its entirety it is written by the russian absurdist daniil kharms now one day a man went to work and on the way he met another man who having bought a loaf of polish bread was heading back home where he came from and thats about it more or less is that a great story or what you see kharms understood that our life is not a story as some contend it is not full of action and sometimes the plot is meandering or totally non existent most of life is utterly mundane to expect life to have the neatness of a well written story is bound to lead to disappointment and even anger what the mystic asks us to see is that all of those mundane moments are filled with the presence of god and that is the ultimate meaning of our lives not the story as we would have it i think this one post helped me a lot to let go of the desire for every event no matter how insignificant to have some wide ranging meaning and this carries over into what i now expect from table top role playing posted by everkang at 12 26 2011 03 52 00 pm email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels gaming philosophy rpg story theology friday november 4 2011 1st edition ish part two i stumbled upon a comment that i d made to some friends in an email which i ll also post here slightly edited because it still resonates with me now and it s a good follow up to my comments earlier a confession here although it s true that i do dislike the absence of true i e 3 x edition multi classing in 4th edition i never actually got to do that i only ever played 1st edition multi class characters and i think just one a wood elf druid thief the closest thing after that and it doesn t really count was a 2nd edition bard with the swashbuckler kit one of my all time favorites other than that i only played single class characters i wanted to do true multi classing but when it finally came around i just wasn t playing all that much for the record i m actually okay with multi classing in 4th i just hate that they call it multi classing i d be happier with dabbling or borrowing or something equivalent it s one of my pet peeves with the current game system the ever present misnomers when the effects of two weapon eviscerate last about a round or so that just makes my head explode i have no problem with the exploit as written just don t call it that it sounds like they are marketing to junior high kids look dad i can do this really cool thing though i suppose that s exactly what they are doing meanwhile dad the 1st ed player steps into the backyard and has a good cry after a while his neighbor sticks his head over the fence kid playing 4th again dad doesn t say anything he just sniffles once or twice and goes quiet it s okay he and his neighbor have been buddies for a long time i have only one thing to say to the many many watered down grossly misnamed awesomely awesome power powers out there save or die posted by everkang at 11 04 2011 11 23 00 pm email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels dnd gaming rpg tuesday october 25 2011 narrative in role playing games i ve heard it said that role playing games especially those of the indie sort are really about telling stories i don t think that s the case we do tell stories out of game about the game sessions we ve played all the more reason to play and play well and there s no question that a character within a game can relate a story to other characters during play but gaming isn t equivalent to creating a single story or even a set of stories there s no script at least not one that survives much into any given game session in role playing games the characters do interact with and within imagined situations but it s improvised the choices and events don t fully merge into some over arching cohesive plot nor should we require that they do so any given interaction or event within a session may be enjoyable or satisfying in itself aesthetically viscerally morally it need not tie into a story arc to be worth playing out in that way rpg s are like life though i m a christian i m not one who believes that everything happens for a reason as part of one big plan a great many things do happen for a reason though i tend to be pretty careful about reading meanings into events god is constantly involved in what we do but he is under no obligation to make this obvious or to explain any of it to our satisfaction it isn t one big story that binds history together it s god himself god involves himself with his creation in such a way that it can and should be conveyed as story can because god is intimately involved in events and events flow from one another should because we are story telling creatures we recognize sequence and closure and through story find and create meaning in the beginning isn t just the beginning of all things but the beginning of a story and our lives aren t complete without those stories but a single isolated event can have profound meaning simply because god is behind it so i m much more open to saying that rpg s are about drama than about story stories will emerge and our play will be better for it but there s no need to worry if a party s jaunt through the woods isn t worthy of some novel it can still be exciting amusing or even deeply touching no script required posted by everkang at 10 25 2011 09 19 00 pm email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels gaming philosophy rpg story theology older posts home subscribe to posts atom followers blog archive 2017 1 september 1 the passing of jerry pournelle 2014 1 april 1 2012 2 april 1 january 1 2011 6 december 1 november 1 october 1 august 1 april 1 january 1 2010 2 november 2 about me everkang view my complete profile awesome inc theme powered by blogger