Trip's Life (Recent episodes)
26 July 2014 - Saturday
Blblblblbl++.
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25 July 2014 - Friday
Yay! Not on call anymore!
Dance in the Vampire Bund: The Memories of Sledgehammer vol
1-2 (Nozomu Tamaki) is more vampiric political intrigue, but with many
flashbacks to Hama's distressing past.
Redemption Song (Craig Schaefer) is the sequel to The Long
Way Down, more modern magic noir in Las Vegas. This one is more of a
heist book, complete with explanation at the end. We get to see more home
life of demons and the humans who love them , which is way too normal. I'm
pretty sure it will turn out to have all been a horrible snare.
Make a comment!
24 July 2014 - Thursday
I managed to escape the team-building activity by hiding in my cube
until everyone left. Whew.
Stardogs (Dave Freer) has too much blood and slavery to be
humorous SF, but it's certainly not completely serious.
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23 July 2014 - Wednesday
Blblblblbl.
Volume 1 of Rocket Girl (Brandon Montclare, Amy Reeder)
makes very little sense in many respects, but it has a cute teenaged girl
travelling through time and flying a jetpack, which may or may not make up
for it.
The Hydra Protocol (David Wellington) was shelved in SF,
which was legit for the previous book in the series but not this one. It
has an unusual villain group for a modern spy adventure, at least.
Make a comment!
22 July 2014 - Tuesday
Ayse is busy tomorrow, so we played Earthdawn tonight
instead, thus confusing me utterly as to what day of the week it was.
The PCs went off into the boonies to buy get some elemental fire that had
fallen off the back of a salamander, to fix the airship of the guy who
said he would fly them to Parlainth if they helped fix his ship.
(Aspersions were cast on Lonely Hank's reliability, but only by people
who wanted money from him, so he probably won't drop the PCs into a
swamp halfway there.) The hippies with the fire to sell had a hot tub
and free love, which nice, but at least some of them (including the
crazy one who seduced Isidari with elemental debauchery) also had a bad
case of banditry. They broke out in bear elementals and electric
shields, but Isidari's mighty Taunt power overcame them in the end.
The Dread Hammer and Hepen the Watcher (Linda
Nagata) are pretty much one story in two volumes, about an extremely
antiheroic spirit of ass-kicking in a pre-medieval setting (so, oaths are a
valid excuse for committing atrocities), and people who are unfortunate
enough to fall into his orbit. Some of them even survive, and the
patriarchy gets kicked in the teeth.
Skye Object 3270A (also Linda Nagata) is a YA story in the
same setting as Deception Well, and in fact on (kinda) the
planet Deception Well. It has obnoxious adults, feats of daring,
romance, and ginormous space squids FTW.
Make a comment!
21 July 2014 - Monday
Once more unto the SPLAT!
I did not know C S Friedman wrote YA, but Dreamwalker (C S
Friedman) definitely is (of the "Surprise! You have a hunted! Oh, you'll
find out where the points went... eventually." subvariety). It seems to be
the first of a series.
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20 July 2014 - Sunday
No gaming, only Zuul. And Avalon in the evening!
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19 July 2014 - Saturday
The customers did not call today. Wumwumwumwumwumwum.
- Princess Tutu 17-18: Evil Monster has poor parenting sk1llz.
- Slayers Evolution-R 12-13: And then the monster from
the first season ate them. (Not really.) The end!
- Shakugan no Shana season 3 22: Almost the end, and
major (or at least long-running) characters are starting to die off.
Will anyone at all survive?
- Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood 58: Getting near the
end here too, but characters have been kicking the bucket all along, so
getting sucked into the Phantom Zone is only a bit of escalation.
Look, it's Avalon!
The Lost Fleet: Beyond the Frontier: Steadfast (Jack
Campbell) has some alien strangeness, some space combat, and a lot of
political intrigue which culminates in something that I thought was
completely telegraphed. I'm not sure someone of a more recent vintage
would have caught all the clues, but it would probably still have been
enough.
Yikes by Avalon (Fri Jul 25 19:12:12 2014)
That is a very fuzzy one. =)
Re: Yikes by Trip (Fri Jul 25 19:36:51 2014)
Well, camera phone!
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18 July 2014 - Friday
Boo, I'm on call again! Well, gaming has been cancelled, so I guess
it's a good weekend for it. Now I just need to exert my vast psychic
powers to put the customers into a coma until Monday.
Dark Light of Day, Fiery Edge of Steel, and
White Heart of Justice (Jill Archer) are set in a world where
Armageddon happened and the demons won, but both leaders were killed. Two
thousand years later, demons have the position of pagan gods (patron of
this city, that river, these activities); humans and angels (pretty similar
in most respects) have formed a remarkably modern civilization based at
least partly on the general spellcasting ability of angels and the life or
death magic a few humans have. Only women have life/healing magic, and only
men have death/fire magic — except the main character, who is Very
Unhappy and in denial about being a death mage (well, and her twin brother,
but he seems okay with being a healer, possibly because it means hanging
with the other healers who are all women or possibly because he's just not
as high-strung). College and hijinx ensue.
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17 July 2014 - Thursday
Gaming makes me sleepy. Bah.
The Forever Watch (David Ramirez) reminds me of Eclipse Phase with
the cyberware and repression and psionic powers, although it's not similar
in detail. The horrendous secrets of the generation ship are indeed
horrendous, but sadly I do not get the impression that anyone in the
setting ever tried very hard to deal with them in any except the most
obvious (and difficult, repressive, and wasteful) way. So, it's
not really an idiot plot, but it doesn't make me think the humans deserved
much better than they got.
Make a comment!
16 July 2014 - Wednesday
Today, Earthdawn.
Isidari and Kamakani got mixed up in a star-crossed secret love
affair that was foundering on confusion over whether half a dead
antelope left in someone's room was like a horse's head in the bed, or
like half a mouse dragged in by a cat. In the end it all worked out,
though, and Kamakani was able to make off with the ancestral shield of
shininess (to add to its luster with further great deeds, of course).
Isidari made contact with the skyship captain who Beatrice was
manipulated (by dragons! dragons, I tells ya!) into encountering, so
next week we can try to get a ride to Parlainth without any... Imperial
entanglements.
Make a comment!
15 July 2014 - Tuesday
Way #923475623990 in which current Boss S is incalculable orders of
magnitude better than old boss G3: she knocks before coming into my
cube!
It seems like Two Serpents Rise just came out, but here
is Full Fathom Five (Max Gladstone) already! This time,
it's the Carribean-analog, for offshore banking with ill-gotten gods. It
turns out that gods raise even more moral questions than banks.
Characters from the previous two books are involved, because
international finance theology is a tangled web.
Make a comment!
14 July 2014 - Monday
Boss S is in this office this week, instead of down in the San Diego
area as is her usual habit. I'll have to try extra-hard to not burn the
building down, I guess.
The heroine of The Glass Sentence (S E Grove) lives in a
world that has shattered into regions from various past and future ages, so
it's not surprising she can't keep track of time, but one so rarely thinks
of dissociation as a superpower.
Truth and Fear (Peter Higgins) is the sequel to
Wolfhound Century, set in the same cognate of early-C20
Russia with a technological revolution based on scavenging the dead
shoggoths angels that fall to Earth. From about a third
of the way into the book, it is clear what the epic doom of the climax
is going to be, but it is so Epic there will have to be another book to
hold all the fallout.
The hardcover edition of this book, being the second in a series,
helpfully has the number 2 on the spine. Why do more publishers not do
this? (Rhetorical question: I already know it's because the publishing
industry hates me personally.)
Make a comment!
13 July 2014 - Sunday
This is an Immortal
Empire week, so I trundled up to Palo Alto instead of down to San
Jose.
Dave and I both have plots that involve anomolous geothermal activity
in the capital, so we should probably come up with some way for them to
fit together into one huge pile of flaming truffid-infested doom. With
bunyips and catgirl ninjas on top. (But not bunyip ninjas, because that
would be Silly.)
Make a comment!
12 July 2014 - Saturday
Sort of conscious. I guess. Vaguely. Enough to watch terrible anime.
Also, I watch good anime! And order pizza which everyone falls upon
even though mere minutes ago they were saying they didn't need anything.
- Princess Tutu 15-16: I guess it's good that Lilie is
like that with everyone, not just Ahiru?
- Slayers Evolution-R 10-11: Pokota is brave, at least.
- Shakugan no Shana season 3 21: Subvert the dominant
paradigm incantation!
- Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood 57: It seems oddly
appropriate that someone so horrible should be nameless.
Hinterkind (Ian Edginton, Francesco Trifogli) is remarkably
low-magic for a post-faerie-apocalypse setting. It's mostly
post-apocalypse, although the cities are overgrown rather than blasted.
Make a comment!
11 July 2014 - Friday
And then my brain fell out and I spent most of the day as
non-interactive cat furniture. I fail at working.
Volume 2 of UQ Holder! (Ken Akamatsu) remains shounen and
mostly cheery, although the naked girl count is much lower than in
Negima!.
Make a comment!
10 July 2014 - Thursday
I ended up staying up until after midnight doing a thing, or at least
shepherding the sequelae of the thing. After gaming last night. Glurgh.
Dance in the Vampire Bund: Forgotten Tales (Nozomu Tamaki,
Tikurakuran, Gemma, et al) is doujinshi by the original creator. It seems
like there should be a word for that.
The print version of 13 True Ways
won't be out for a while, but Pelgrane makes the PDF available
with the pre-order (if they can send it to the printer, they can send it to
gamers!). Muahahaha.
Unlike a typical supplement, this is just more of everything that is
in the main books: more classes, more monsters, more magic items, more
setting description. (Not more icons, though.)
The new classes are Chaos Mage (for those who thought Sorcerers were too
predictable), Commander (build up command points on your turn, spend them
to make your comrades more effective on their turns), Druid (more choices
than you can shake a shillelagh at: spells, melee, different spells, pet,
healer, shapeshifter, ...), Monk (same wire-fu and 3-round sequences as in
the playtest released a while back), Necromancer (not just a spell list any
more), and Occultist (the artwork has an amorphous monster, but the powers
are all fate magic). Also, you can now multiclass, or technically
dual-class, since you only get two classes, and are effectively a level
behind in both (plus you have to split your allotment of talents and
stuff between them).
New monsters include devils, which may or may not be just cleverer
demons (there are 13 ways to include them in your campaign, plus 3 bonus
ones), and metallic dragons (which may or may not be good, but in
neither case are they sure about you, murderhobo). Several of
the major cities of the Empire and associated lands are described, for
them to rampage around in.
For the GM, there are seed descriptions for 13 dungeons and 13 flying
realms, a somewhat more detailed description of one flying dungeon, and
four NPCs contributed by Kickstarter backers.
Now I want to run 13th Age, but
most of my gamers are in San Jose. Bah!
I didn't see any of the previous ones, but the fourth draft of Magical
Burst is pretty swell. It has all the important elements for a game
based on Puella Magi Madoka Magica, like [SPOILER] and
[SPOILER] and horrible creepy [SPOILER], and also DOOOOOOM.
It's by the same person who did Dragon
World, so it's not surprising that the mechanics are powered by a
cousin of the
apocalypse, but there are plenty of mechanics for additional magical
DOOOOOOM.
I would like to be able to run this, but since every GM has to come
up with the dark secrets for their own campaign, I'm not sure I would
ever be able to.
Make a comment!
9 July 2014 - Wednesday
Look, more work. Look, less brain.
The Earthdawn
PCs finally returned to civilization, which has baths and training for
6th circle and nosy reporters and baths.
Squabbling over loot is indeed not heroic.
I didn't think I remembered all the backreferences in The
Apocalypse Codex, so I reread The Fuller Memorandum.
Oh, the doom!
Make a comment!
8 July 2014 - Tuesday
Bah, work.
Finally, in volume 7, Sankarea (Mitsuru Hattori) has gotten
to the Zombology Underground!
After reading The Rhesus Files, I realized I didn't
remember everything that happened in The Apocalypse Codex, so
I went back and reread it. Biology is so horrible. It's great.
Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea (J L Murray) is
uninspired urban fantasy, Christian mythology subspecies.
Make a comment!
7 July 2014 - Monday
I am so clever that I scheduled a day off to recover from my vacation.
Thus, I accomplished nothing of utility.
Avalon is going to Helsinki tomorrow.
As of volume 1, Gakuen Polizi (Milk Morinaga) promises
yuri-smooches but delivers nothing like sense.
Make a comment!
6 July 2014 - Sunday
Despite small-child drama, we left Roseville in good order and more or
less on schedule. They have only driven us off temporarily, however!
All paws are still fuzzy and accounted for, thanks to Marith checking
on them!
Since we got home at a reasonable time, there was enough brain to play
Fading
Suns! The PCs delved into the bowels of the ancient complex of
terraforming mystery, which contained unexpected red-hot crystals (Vau
tech?), an alarming killer robot, an easily-cowed junior priest, and a
somewhat dubious but possibly well-intentioned archbishop.
Playing a smart character is really hard and I suck at it.
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5 July 2014 - Saturday
Happy happy Josh Day!!
Al and Sherilyn's house is now tuned to the Teenager Channel, with
extra splashing.
Winner of History
of the World: Me!
Winner of Munchkin
Pathfinder: not me.
Make a comment!
4 July 2014 - Friday
I did not ever get around to going swimming today, but many other people
did. Indoors, we played History
of the World very slowly and chillaxed.
Other people probably don't pass long car rides by recounting the
Iliad. This is because they are not as cool as us.
I hadn't seen fireworks in a few years. I forgot how pretty they are.
Al and Sherilyn grilled me about Avalon, but I wasn't sure at the
time if it was okay to spill the beans about her being someone in a
multiple system, and only 17, and stuff. But it is okay! For some
definition of "okay" that probably means "arguments on the Internet".
Anyway, she is still adorable.
me =) by Avalon (Tue Jul 15 17:38:52 2014)
I am happy to be grilled or answer questions if anyone does have those things, people here have been through rounds of coming out. =)
Avalon! by Trip (Wed Jul 16 08:08:32 2014)
That is just a small part of why you are adorable.
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3 July 2014 - Thursday
Indeed, I did not go to Roseville naked, for which Ken and Dave were
probably very grateful. Wearing a swimsuit was bad enough, at least in
terms of radiation exposure.
Jus (fka Ja Baby) is getting quite good at swimming, although she
still uses floaties.
There was grilled food after swimming, and some Dungeon
World.
Make a comment!
2 July 2014 - Wednesday
Even when it's only virtual Friday, I spend my Friday evenings doing
exciting things like laundry. But I'm pretty sure no one wants me to go
to Roseville naked. Probably not even Avalon.
The Shadow Throne (Django Wexler) is the sequel to
The Thousand Names, in which the maguffin of the previous
book has almost no impact on a French-like urban revolution. There will
probably be a lot more doom in the next book, when the streams inevitably
cross.
Fifth in the "Laundry" series (Charles Stross), The Rhesus
Files leaves the Earth-scouring doom of The Apocalypse
Codex to fester for a bit and concentrates on people annoying Bob in
the office. This goes poorly for many, as one might expect.
Only by Avalon (Sun Jul 13 17:45:26 2014)
if I am in the car. =)
xoxo!
Re: Only by Trip (Mon Jul 14 09:12:04 2014)
I think you may be silly.
Make a comment!
1 July 2014 - Tuesday
I only have one more day of work this week, which makes this
Thursday, right? But the library still thinks it's Tuesday.
Make a comment!
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