So we celebrated the New Year with Robert, Mr. Kirk, Karrie and Joe over at Mel’s Lonestar Lanes. You know your hometown has hit it big time when it has both a bowling alley and a movie theater. And of course Kimmy is strangely cute while she is bowling.
Well I am proud to say that I made it through another year. There were some rough spots and some sketchy spots and some spots that I am certain that some one wanted to kill me but I managed to survive. Now if I can make it through the next 2 days and my baby sister’s wedding that will be a true holiday miracle. And speaking of holiday miracles, I have figured out how to force someone in the other hemisphere to respond to me; even if they really don’t want too … spam their inbox every fifteen minutes. It is a lot like nagging except with that false veneer of politeness. When I said have a “Happy New Year and thanks for the response” I really meant “what the hell took you so long, next time email me back when you claim it is urgent and I won’t spam your inbox with 25 messages asking for a response”.
And speaking of urgent, I don’t know about any of you but I busted my buttocks and helped the economy out. Now the piper has come for payment and unfortunately we don’t have any children to give em; that and BOA keeps insisting we stop paying them in children …. evidently children aren’t a legal form of currency and they prefer cash. What a bunch of whiners, I told em to sit on the bailout that the government gave em or go buy another bank … but no they insist on me paying them; how rude. Luckily not everyone got a boxed gift from a big box store purchased on a credit card; Kimmy actually took time to create works of art for people … and no they weren’t sock bunnies.
Of course the big difference between sock bunnies I make and paintings that Kimmy paints is that she hardly ever signs them. I of course always sign my sock bunnies; that is what makes them personable … that and the crappy crafting job (that’s what makes it modern art). Of course Kimmy makes up the lacking signature usually with something that is visually pretty and artistically interesting.
Have you ever read that book If You Give a Mouse a Cookie? It is a cute little kids story that starts off with giving a mouse a cookie and then it evolves following the further reasonable demands of the mouse. With that thought in mind I am reflecting on Christmas and how awesome I am that I can give my wife an appliance and further down the road that will translate into cookies for me. Of course there are conditions attached to said cookies, but they are pleasant conditions; well maybe. So like I said, Christmas has come and gone and I received the 3 best possible gifts; a broken computer, Fallout 3, and Fry’s Gift Cards. Unfortunately tonight and tomorrow we have more familial obligations so the gutting, re-building and sleep-griefing will have to wait till Sunday.
Kimmy also gave me the Adventurer’s Vault for D&D 4th Edition. The back of the book promised more magic items than you can stuff into a bag of holding; and I have yet to verify that claim …. in hindsight I could have figured that out if I brought it with me to work today; well at least I have something to do Monday. After paging through the book at 2:00 AM Christmas morning I can say I am impressed. Somehow Wizards of the Coast remembered that magic items are part of what make D&D fun. After all the only reason we adventure is to kill stuff, take said stuff’s stuff, sell said stuff’s stuff and buy better stuff with the proceeds. Brilliance, now if we can get a campaign or two under our belts I could then compare/contrast 3.5 to 4.0 and decide which I like better … lousy friends having a life outside of mine.
And while I am at it, I feel I should put a rave in for Avlis. You remember Never Winter Nights, the precursor to Never Winter Nights 2? Well it turns out that Never Winter Nights is still around, still kicking, and there are still quite a few persistent worlds out there for you to play on. After a few donations and a year of play time I can say that if you liked NWN and you like RPG come join Avlis …. and remember Chaotic Neutral translates into Chaotic Awesome!
Okay so I admit it, I am a dirty role-player, and no not one of those BSDM freaks. MasterN and LegalCounsel got me hooked on the old Star Wars RPG by West End Games. I was never sure what my parents thought of all this RPG, but I figure they didn’t mine since I was cooped up in someone’s kitchen instead of boozin and whorin my way around town. Strangely enough all the people I role-played with don’t have kids, while the party animals I knew in high school do …. life is funny that way. Oh well, there were countless hours we spent rolling dice, cheatin the system and some how managing not to die despite the fact that statistics (never quote me the odds) demanded our painful and bloody end. We took on Star Destroyers with impunity, cheated the system some more, and even shot them down all while riding around in a “piece of junk“. And if the PCs got too rowdy, the answer was more Storm Troopers and more Star Destroyers. When I got to college I graduated to D&D 3rd Edition.
Having never actually played AD&D, I had no expectations for D&D 3rd Editon. And I had a blast, the rules were great, there were some loop holes, I played a lot of wizards, slung a lot of spells, and wasted countless hours that could have been better spent studying. When 3.5 came out I was a little sad that some of the loop holes got slammed shut but the game was still fun. This brings me to 4th Edition.
Like a good consumer whore, I bought 4th Edition and then carefully set it on my bookshelf. It sat there for six months until TehJournalist got the urge to “throw down some bones”. We got together, made some characters, skimmed the rules and in about a week are going to actually play. I am a little nervous, sure the rulse are cleaner, faster, and a lot easier but I think as they loose some of their obfuscation they loose a bit of their fun, after all less obfuscation means it is a lot harder too pull crap out of your ass and befuddle your GM.
But as grandma always told me, you don’t know what it will taste like till you take a bite.
