Chaotek Thoughts

Attack of the Show

I am currently working on finishing the campaign log for a recently ended Dark Sun game I ran. As I’m writing it, I’m reminded that this campaign included one of my favorite moments as a dungeon master. This moment was a massive plot twist, that had caught the players completely by surprise.

In the game, the heroes learned that there was an artifact called the Chrono Rod, which could allow them to travel in time. The group planned to travel back in time, and kill Rajaat, the man most responsible for the post-apocalyptic setting of Dark Sun. The group was fired up to activate the rod and do this great deed. To activate the rod, the rod had to be placed in the hand of a certain statue. As the rod was activated, the group was ready to charge through the portal to kill Rajaat. Well, it didn’t quite go that way. Time had taken its toll on prophesy, and what the rod really did was awaken a champion of Rajaat who was still very loyal to his master. Instead of stopping Rajaat in the past, they were now looking at the possibility of bringing Rajaat back into the current world so that he could finish the job.

There was a moment as the champion of Rajaat was awakening, where I was looking at the players and you could see the brimming excitement suddenly get crushed by the reality of what was really occurring. This might sound a little sadistic, but the point is that the game completely changed direction in an instant. Sure, the players were pissed, though not at me. They were fired up by the situation.

What makes the story one of my favorites is that the players had become so deeply invested in the story. This wasn’t a plot twist, it was a reality twist. As a game master, the most you can hope for is to develop a plot deep enough that the players immerse themselves in the story–and this game was a great example. It is a rare game where I get that kind of energy from the players, making the experience of this campaign one of my best experiences behind the DM screen.

Now, I don’t expect that every campaign should have such a big plot twist. But I definitely encourage other game masters to develop stories and worlds which draw in players. In other games it’s been a reoccurring villain that the players hate with a passion, or an NPC that the players love to interact with. I’m specifically referencing the difference between an in-character reaction and a player reaction. If the players are not invested in the story, then you’re not much better than a video game. The goal of role playing is to develop stories and characters which allow the gamers to suspend their disbelief and feel like a part of that world.

I’ve noticed that my PCs and party NPCs more often than not tend to be be anti-heroes, rather than heroes.  Some of my favorite characters in games have been patriotic necromancers, vigilantes, addicts, grey Jedi, and a plethora of characters who barely have a handle on their sanity.  For the most part, these characters do not result in intra-party conflicts–despite their evil leanings.  The characters are always loyal to the party, and have an “ends justify the means” mentality.  The characters are always shades of grey (more like a Christmas light in a dark gymnasium).

I don’t think it’s because I’m incapable of playing a truly heroic character, because I have.  However when I do, the games tend to be less enjoyable.  Sure, this might be because I feel constrained by the limitations of being a “good guy.”  However that seems too simple to explain the entire story.

When making a character, I want the character to be interesting.  Interesting might include the shininess of being a little tasteless, but it also includes conflict.  I’m talking about internal conflict and external conflict.  It’s hard to play a conflicted character when you’re toeing the line of goodliness.  To me, a righteous character shouldn’t be conflicted by wanting to do something and not being able to because it’s bad–dark thoughts are just as evil as dark deeds.  The only conflict I come up with for truly good characters is being a lawful stupid paladin, which means your conflict is being a cop for other player characters.

Outside of gaming, some of my favorite characters are anti-heroes, my favorite comics include Punisher, Ghost Rider, Deadpool, Iron Man, Wolverine, etc.  I’m not a fan of true heroes like Superman or Captain America, not that I dislike them but I just don’t enjoy the stories as much because there is far less conflict.

I think the best way for me to play a good character, is to be faced with an enemy who is the dark mirror.  It has been said that heroes are defined by their villains.  Without a truly vile villain to measure up to, I don’t think I have the ability to play a completely heroic character.  Maybe I just have an unfair standard for my heroes…

I haven’t been posting too much lately.  I have been having problems getting Google to crawl this site since moving to b2evolution.  I was a little nervous that I’d have to move all content to new blog software, so I was a little de-motivated to write too much.  However it looks like the crawl issues have been resolved, as I figured out that b2evolution doesn’t handle obscured URLs very well (or Google didn’t handle them very well).  Either way, it’s resolved now—so I’ll start posting more often again.

I was thinking about how many groups of things have cool, yet representative, names like a murder of crows, a paddling of ducks, or a pride of lions. So I figured I’d try to coin terms for Democrats and Republicans. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far:

• A bank of Republicans
• A heartless of Republicans
• An exclusion of Republicans
• A war of Republicans
• A faith of Republicans

• A strife of Democrats
• A spend of Democrats
• A hemp of Democrats
• An illusion of Democrats
• A moaning of Democrats

Let me know which is your favorite, or what you think might be a good term…

Here’s a great email I was sent by someone who had become quite paranoid after reading. After a single read, I was quickly able to determine that this was crap:

GUYS PASS ON TO YOUR GIRLFRIENDS AND LOVED ONES!! WASH BRAS BEFORE USING. Most people do but its just a warning………to those that don’t…..Read the account first, then brace yourselves before looking at the pics………….Oh my god. This is disgusting. Forward to all females!!!! Wash your bra’s before you wear them!!! Please make it a habit from this point forward to wash your just-purchased Undergarments before wearing them. This is sensitive.

After anthropologist Susan McKinley came back home from an expedition in South America , she noticed a very strange rash on her left breast. Nobody knew what it was and she quickly dismissed it believing that the Holes would leave in time. Upon her return she decided to see a doctor after she started developing Intense pains. The doctor, not knowing the exact severity of the disease, gave her Antibiotics and special creams. As time lapsed the pain did not subside and her left breast became more inflamed and started to bleed. She decided to bandage her sores, however as Susan’s pain grew more intense she decided to seek help from a more certified doctor.

Dr. Lynch could not diagnose the infection and told Susan to seek the aid of one of his colleagues who specializes in dermatology. Unfortunately, the doctor was on vacation. She waited for two weeks and finally was able to reach the dermatologist. Sadly, a life changing event was about to unfold during her appointment. To Miss McKinley’s surprise, after she removed the bandages, they found Larvae growing and squirming within the pores and sores of her breast. Sometimes these wicked creatures would all together simultaneously move around into different crevices. What she didn’t know was that the holes were in fact, deeper than she had originally thought, for these larvae were feeding off the fat, tissue, and even milk canals of her breast.

Safe link to included picture (NSFW)

Please share with as many women and men that you know. Our undergarments are made in different countries all over the world. They sit in boxes and go through many hands and exchanges before we purchase them for ourselves. PLEASE WASH ALL NEWLY PURCHASED BRAS AND UNDERWEAR BEFORE WEARING THEM. WE DO NOT KNOW WHAT PARASITES ARE IN OUR CLOTHING WHEN WE BUY THEM.

Sure, it’s a disturbing looking picture at first glance, but the entire story doesn’t even make sense. For one, nowhere in the story did the woman buy a bra, let alone within the United States. If the story wasn’t a total fabrication, then this was caused by a visit to jungles in South America, and has nothing to do with the safety of clothing imported into the US. Customs is very careful about ensuring that foreign creatures do not come to the US. If the worms were tunneling around in her breast, why were the holes on the outside look more like the center of a fruit or flower seeds with a worm head visible in each hole?

Of course, there is a mild amount of truth to this email legend. The story is either based on or been helped by medical journal articles like this one. There are untold numbers of parasites and accidental infestations in humans. It’s also likely a good idea to wash clothing after purchase. Some clothing may have chemicals sprayed on them to reduce mildew, or could have parasites from other people who tried them on before you purchased them.

What is important to think about is that many eLegends are completely fabricated. Even a simple query about such a scare-tactic email in any search engine will likely turn up plenty of proof that it is fake.

Announced today, Remo Williams will return to the screen. I’ve always been a fan of the cult classic, and its great to see that it may get another chance!

After many years of gaming, there is one aspect of traditional D&D which I can’t stand more than anything else—dungeons. It may seem odd, as half of the title of the game I play the most is dungeons, but I just can’t stand them.

I understand why dungeons are often the core of published adventures; they are easy to write. It can be difficult, if not impossible, to design an adventure for others to use without a dungeon. With a dungeon there is a limitation on possible player choices and solid rewards for accomplishing the dungeon. This is why video games utilize the concept as well. It is a very simple, easy to document, and easy to understand method of covering adventure material.

However I feel like dungeons, and published adventures in general, are not very much fun. I like using a published adventure for inspiration, but every time I use a published adventure the game becomes very stale and boring. Sure, 5 rooms of cutting down enemies might be fun, but any more than that and I think me and my fellow players stop trying to enjoy the story and just ignore everything to just finish the dungeon. Its where dungeon crawling becomes a chore.

I do think there is a way to apply the benefits of dungeons to published adventures which do not include dungeons at all. For an example of this, check of the 3.5 book Heroes of Battle. This book includes a good example of how to design an adventure like a dungeon without including a dungeon. Heroes of Battle uses the example of an overland adventure, where player choices affect the next phase of a battle in the midst of a war. The example provided is a D-Day style invasion, where the party arrives on a beach. After stopping the initial defenses, the heroes can continue down the breach to support another landing party, or move up the cliff-side to take out an enemy fortification, and so on. There is a very good diagram of how this can be defined using a flowchart. Even better, there is a time-based flowchart which defines what the enemy forces will do, and how it could react if the players interfere.

The point here is that I believe that published adventures can be much more interesting and immersive if dungeons became a thing of the past. For those who are designing their own adventures, using these ideas for adventure design can provide a robust pre-planned adventure, without the need for a boring dungeon crawl.

I found a pretty interesting series of videos regarding paintball drills to improve your game. Check it out!

I’ve been reading a lot on TV Tropes, in addition to Wikipedia. It’s a facinating site, defining and providing examples of common media plot devices. Very entertaining. For gamers, you can use the site for inspiration, or to avoid common plot pitfalls.