Well sort of.
Recently I was invited to join a Dune gaming group, so it looks like I have made a switch from roleplaying games to board games. Whether this is a new trend or what remains to be seen, but I have just bought the Dune Trilogy, so maybe I will get into this for real.
It has been a while since my last blog post and as always I feel like I should apologize for my lack of activity. However, this time I think I will refrain from that and instead dwell a little at the fact the I have not written anything, even though I promised myself that I would do it.
First of all, I have been invited to join a group who plays the board game Dune. I was actually invited by the director of development at my work, so of course I was a little skeptical. It turned out to be a lot of fun, and tomorrow I get to go pick up the first three Dune books that I ordered from Amazon.
the fact of the matter is, that I am growing a little weary with the whole RPG scene, or rather the lack of a scene. Nothing is really happening in terms of game releases that hold my interest, and the Dragonlance novel line seems to be as dead as disco. Had I been younger and less burdened by my job, I would probably have written a lot of stuff myself, just as I intended to do two months ago. However, now it seems like I can’t really think of much to write, and I rarely experience the creative streak that spawned my interest in Dragonlance and this blog.
Honestly, I don’t know what to do now. Heck, I don’t even know if I will maintain this blog any longer. I suppose I could use the space for something else. on the other hand, I don’t feel quite ready to leave Dragonlance for good, so maybe my passion will be rekindled some day.
TORn staffer Garfeimao has some thoughts on what comes next for fans as “The Hobbit” moves into its new status as a full-fledged in-production film. She writes:
So now we have the greenlight, what comes next?
When the Hobbit was first announced two years ago, it didn’t take long for fans to start fantasy-casting the project. At the time, no one really understood the scope of how long it actually takes to get a project of this size and magnitude off the ground. And under normal circumstances, it was only supposed to take a year, which we now know stretched into more. With the greenlight on the project now, the casting can begin in earnest, or at least, once the Actor’s Equity situation is resolved one way or another. That should be the last hurdle in the way of this project getting off the ground and moving forward. But what really does come next?
I would expect the next tangible announcement to be a resolution to the Actor’s Equity question in New Zealand. Without this resolution, there is no certainty of where the films will be shot or if any actors under consideration will risk censure from their respective Unions or Guilds. My guess, and I’ll emphasize that this is a guess, is that the resolution is very near simply based on the fact that the studios felt confident in announcing the greenlight without the resolution finalized. Heck, the studios didn’t even wait for the MGM bankruptcy situation to get underway. I do not want to conjecture which direction this Actor’s Equity resolution will fall on, but it does need to happen in order to clear the way for casting to begin.
Continue at Source: TheOneRing.Net
This is very good news indeed, although it will take a couple of years before the movies are released.
So, I decided to go ahead and compile all my old Dragonlance writings into one big file, and guess what – it has happened yet. I guess I could try to come up with all kinds of dumb reasons why I never got beyond the introduction, but I am going to spare myself the indignity.The project is not really dead as I see it, but for me, it is important that I sit write when I feel the urge to do so. Right now I do not.
It’s not that I have abandoned Dragonlance, I am actually reading the annotated Legends these days, but I am doing so many other things at work and around the house, so whatever creativity I possessed is pretty much gone. Perhaps the lack of a real gaming group has something to do with this.
Anyway, I have decided to take some time off around Christmas, so hopefully I will be able to post something by then.
My wife just sent me the letter quoted below, and give the historical battle between religion and Gamers, I thought it would be funny to post it here.
Dr. Laura Schlessinger is a radio personality who dispenses advice to people who call in to her radio show. Recently, she said that, as an observant Orthodox Jew, homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22 and cannot be condoned under any circumstance. The following is an open letter to Dr. Laura penned by a east coast resident, which was posted on the Internet. It's funny, as well as informative:
Dear Dr. Laura:
Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the other specific laws and how to follow them:
When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?
I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?
I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness - Lev.15:19- 24. The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.
Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?
I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself?
A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination - Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this?
Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle room here?
Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?
I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?
My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? - Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)
I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.
Your devoted fan,
Jim
Source: Humanists of Utah
So, true to my geeky self, I have started a new project. Actually, I have started an old project, which I originally began back in 1995 and never really finished.
I have decided to pack all my old writing into one single file and create my own Dragonlance compendium. The project included a friend of mine, who has now left these shores, so I will take the liberty of rewriting some of his stuff as I see fit.
At this point, I am deciding whether the War of Souls should be part of the setting, since we originally started to write this compendium, because we didn’t like the War of Souls. However, there are so many cool changes in Dragonlance, that I think I will try to incorporate these in order to move the setting forward.
Needless to say, this is a pretty big project, and if I ever finish it, it will take me a long time. However, instead of complaining about a dead world, I will try to put my money where my mouth is and actually make a contribution to it.
I am finally sitting down with my group getting ready to play a round of Dungeons & Dragons. We are playing in the Mystara setting, so not Dragonlance this time.
Right now we are trying to find our characters and remember the rules, so I have a little time to write a blog post. Luckily I keep my character online, so I could find my wizard right away. You can see my wizard here.
Check out the table. Gone are the character sheets replaced by software applications. The flowers are not our idea by the way.
Well, I finalized my blog redesign for now. I was looking around for a couple of extra social networks to add, but I decided to stick with Twitter, Picasa and Google Friend Connect.
I played around with StumpleUpon, but I could not find any way to syndicate the feed, so I have abandoned the idea for now. I might look in to it at a later point. I am considering a new de.-icio.us account to share various links, but I think I might be able to do that using Twitter. Time will tell.
As for some content, I have been working a little bit on a few ideas lately, so with a little luck I might one day start to upload things that are relevant to the D&D game, instead of complaining about how there is no more support for Drangonlance.
As I have talked about on numerous occasions, I have been looking into redesigning my blog. I don’t think it will make much if a difference in terms of how many people read it, but I like the idea of using a customized template, which hopefully gives the blog a more personal feel.
There are many templates out there on the Internet, but I decided to use Google own tool for the mew template. The template allows me to easily change colors, backgrounds and all other stuff, and I find that important because change to the template makes the blog seem more alive, hopefully.
Currently, I am looking into setting up a social page, which will house all my social stuff such as Twitter. I have no followers on Twitter, so it makes sense to move that feed to a separate page. I might also add Stumple Upon or Del.icio.us to that page, as I tend to stumble across quite a few links that I like to share on my blog.
Finally, I am considering adding the Google friend module to my blog. I think it might be a good way of getting to know more people in the community and hopefully make a new friend or two, who share my passion for Dragonlance.
Since it is raining cats and dogs today, and my daily run might be somewhat limited, I hope that I will get around to finishing up the blog redesign today. Stranger things have happened.
I went to my bookstore today to pick up The Gargoyle King. I had my daughter with me so she could see all the cool books, but in all the excitement I picked up The Fire Rose in stead. It wasn’t until we were on the train home, that my daughter told me: “Daddy, you already have that book at home”.
Anyway, I started Dragons of the Highlord Skies, so I guess I can wait until I get a chance to exchange the book.
So, I just finished the Dark Disciple trilogy the other day, and of course I started yearning for another Dragonlance fix right away. The sad thing of course, is that there are no new books to read, so I had to go to my stash and see if there was anything that tickled my fancy.
I am a big fan of the Lost Chronicles series, and since I recently read Dragons of the Dwarven Depths I decided to read Dragons of the Hourglass Mage for the third time in a year. It dawned on me, that Hourglass Mage is my fast becoming my summer book, meaning I have to read every summer. I am not really sure why that is the case, but when I look at my reading habits, I can tell that Chronicles are my winter/Christmas books, Legends are summer books as well and I always read The Legend of Huma after finishing either Chronicles and Legends.
As it is, I have a few days off this summer, so I am planning one last trip to my book pusher, so I can get my sticky hands on the last book in the Ogre Titans series The Gargoyle King. I have already read the spoilers over at the Dragonlance Forums, so there won’t be many surprises for me, but true to my collective nature, I have to have the last book of the last Dragonlance trilogy. I am a huge Richard A. Knaak fan, so I am sure it will be a pleasurable read nonetheless.
As for future books, I think I need to broaden my horizon just a tiny bit, in order to still have a steady flow of books coming into my office. However, principles of software development does not have any black robed wizards or dragons in them, so maybe I should look for a new fantasy series.
I guess I could also get around to actually redesign this blog as I have been talking about for eons and eons.
Recommendations are more than welcome.
Well, it has been a very long time since I posted anything on this blog. In all honesty, I have not really had anything interesting to blog about, and I have been pretty busy with my “regular life”, so to speak.
Fortunately I have been reading quite a bit lately. Last night I finished the Dark Disciple trilogy, which was only the second time I read it. I enjoyed it immensely, while at the same time being a little bit sad that Wizards of the Coast has killed off Dragonlance. I think the world Margaret Weis portrays in this trilogy is very exciting, and it could have made a good foundation for further Dragonlance gaming products and novels. Alas, that is not going to happen.
So, what am I going to do now in terms of my gaming? Well, unexpectedly, I received an email from my DM, and it looks like we will actually be playing again in August. At least we are going to make the attempt. Of course, that means I have to find my wizard and give that second level he earned a year ago.
The world in which we play is not Krynn, it is Mystara. I always liked Mystara a lot, so I am fine with that. However, I have little hope or expectation that we will ever become a tightly knit gaming group, or that we will play with the frequency we used to, but I will take what I can get these days.
As for this blog, I have been looking into a redesign and I am now down to three options. One of these evenings I will make the transition, which will hopefully make the blog a little bit more appealing visually. As for the content part I am still at a loss. I have not produced any new material that I can post here, and since there are no new novels coming out there’s not much left to do but to complain about the state of things.
I’d rather not have this blog turning into something negative, so at least I will write about the campaign in which I partake. I have thought about getting more into the community as well, so I will be looking into that as well.
Should anybody feel inclined to get in touch with me, I can be reached via email: dragonlance (at) gigaboot (dot) dk. Drop me a line if you have any suggestions for the blog, or if you just want to say hi.
PS: I have created a new Gmail/Google Id, so future posts will seem like they come from a different author. That is not the case though. I am the person behind both handles.
I was looking through our shed the other week, and I came across my boxes containing all my D&D. Since it has been far too long since I last leafed through my old modules and core books, I promptly brought one of the boxes into the house.
True to my geeky self, I had to take a couple of photos of my collection for the blog. The pictures do not give the collection the justice it deserves, but since I have not had the time to unpack the whole thing yet, it will a while longer before I can take some real photos.
The Dragonlance Nexus has a post about Paizo’s Dragonlance sale. So if you have a couple of extrra dollars to burn this month, I suggest you give it a look.
Check it out here.
Well, it has come as no surprise that this blog has been neglected for quite some time now. I started a major redesign project a couple of weeks ago, but since then I have not really found the energy to actually do something about it.
Since this blog is a nice little side project for me, I am reluctant to shut it down or just let it die a slow and painful death, so here I am, back again with nothing to write about.
That last sentence wasn’t exactly right. For the first in about seven years, I have actually come up with a couple of adventure ideas, that I plan on writing down one of these days. True to tradition, I will publish my writings on the blog, and hopefully get some feedback, or at the very least inspire somebody out there to pick up the ideas and run a good old fashion game.
I am not sure when I will actually get to post anything, but hopefully it won’t take me too long.
On a totally different note, I have been so unfortunate, that my registrar has turned out to be somewhat of a scammer, so I expect my domain to die in the near future. For the time being everything is up and running, but I have no access to domains, so one day it just might be gone all together.
I just found this really cool interview with Edward Norton and Brad Pitt from the Fight Club days. Cool movie, cool interview.
So, I guess I am not really going to write a review of Clash of the Titans. There are many reviews out there on the Interwebs, and I am sure I have nothing to say that has not already been said.
I can, however, talk a little bit about what I thought of the movie.
In all honesty, the story is not all that interesting, especially if you have studied Greek mythology, which I was forced to do back in high school. As it is, the story is inspired by the legend of Perseus, who basically is a demigod who kills a whole bunch of monsters.
The reason for watching this movie is the 3D effects and the great action scenes. Another compelling reason for watching this movie is inspiration for the next gaming session. After I left the theater I was ready to go home and create a Greek inspired game with a whole bunch of demigods, monsters and all that good stuff.
So, to make a short blog post a little bit longer, I highly recommend watching this movie, as long as you take it for what it is – an action banger with some cool effects and characters from Legends and Lore.
I went to see Clash of the Titans with my wife last night. The movie in 3D and was actually pretty cool. I will hopefully have a review up in a couple of hours. I need to get my allergies under control first.
In the mean time please enjoy one of the trailers. There are more of them on Youtube.
I just got an email from Wizard’s of the Coast about updates to the community:
FEATURE UPDATE – APRIL 7TH
From: Wizards
Received: Wed, Apr 7, 2010 at 11:28am
Today we have a new Magic theme. Go to Profile > Theme Selection to see it.
We are also adding RSS feeds to the forums later today. You can subscribe to feeds for entire forums or individual threads. Look for the RSS icon in your browser. (We will be adding RSS to blogs – no date for that yet, but it’s on the list.)What’s next:
- Some Facebook and Twitter connections: Post photos and blogs to Facebook from your profile page. Automatically cross-post status updates to your Facebook and/or Twitter account.
- Drag & Drop for your home page: Customize your home page by adding or removing modules and rearranging them on the page
- Wiki link fix: Stay tuned for more information on this. We will be updating the Wiki parser to fix a few bugs, including a fix to how linking works. As part of this update, we will bulk update existing links to match the new structure. We will send more details before the change, to give you a chance to review and give us feedback.
Outage reminder:
Tomorrow we will have about 3 hours of down time for our sign-on system from 6:00 AM PDT until 9:00 AM PDT.
This will affect login to the Wizards Community site, D&DI, Wizards Help site, and Gatherer comments. The Wizards Community site will remain up for viewing content, but you may not be able to post.
~The Wizards Community Team
All in all it looks pretty exciting, so go sign up if you haven’t already.
Nostalgia is one of the most powerful feelings among the thirty-something, which is why advertising attempts to illicit this particular feeling with this segment. Now, I am painfully aware of how powerful a feeling nostalgia is, I do have a master’s degree in strategic branding, but I chose to embrace it. At least sometimes, hence this blog.
So, I have never been much of a computer gamer, I find it boring, tedious and it usually gives me a particularly bad headache. However, Heroes of Might & Magic, has always been one of the biggest time consumers in my younger days. To be honest, I could play that game for an entire day, eat dinner, and then pay it all night. Sometimes I actually missed classes just so I could play this game.
Retard! you might think. Well, I would tend to agree with you. As it turned out, I did outgrow Heroes of Might & Magic, and I did get my Master’s degree, and I did go to work for an IT company and all that stuff you have to do.
Anyway, it is Easter, and I have a couple of days off, and for once I am not preoccupied with my dumb ass job. It is such a relief, not thinking about that moronic place, that I started cleaning the office. 
Wifey and I share the office, now that we have two children, so some of my stuff has been packed away behind other stuff.
As I am looking at all the stuff I ought to throw out, my one-year-old son all of a sudden pulls out Heroes of Might & Magic: The Shadow of Death. So between the two of we decide that cleaning is for lesser men, and we pop that bad boy into the cd drive. And what do you know? We were able to run Heroes of Might & Magic on a x64 bit Windows 7 machine.
As you can probably imagine, I have been playing all day, only getting up to do some laundry, vacuum, eat lunch etc. once in a while. I am now close to completing my first quest, and I have a suspicion that I will be playing again tonight.
I loved the first Iron Man movie, and the sequel looks pretty good too. Enjoy
I was looking through some of my old files, and I found a document I started back in the day with various adventure hooks. See, I used to keep a notebook with me at all times so I could write down ideas for my campaigns. It kept me from going insane many a time. Too bad I can’t do the same thing in current job. Maybe I should start blogging at work?
Anyway, screw my lousy job, here’s the first adventure hook from my old notebook.
The Minotaur Revolt
The ogres are known for their use of slave labor. Among the numerous slaves kept in Daltigoth, a group of minotaurs, who has been taken prisoners and are currently working the mines or building new houses for the ogres. These minotaurs are yearning for freedom, and would gladly join the impending slaughter of the ogres. A powerful group of adventures might succeed in penetrating Daltigoth and free the slaves. However, due to the cultural differences it might prove more than difficult to integrate the minotaurs into the invading army. If the player characters convince the slaves that they are people of honor, the slaves will fight in the war. Given the intimate knowledge of Daltigoth they have, the slaves are valuable allies and it is believed that the leader of the minotaurs will be rewarded with a seat on the ruling council of the oligarchs.
I intended to run these adventure hooks as little interludes in a much grander campaign “The Wizard’s War”. The party was involved in a huge attack on the city of Daltigoth, and the plan was to let that be the overall theme, however, in order to let the players get a little R&R I would let them stray from the main campaign once in a while.
Alas, it never came to pass…
I just stumbled across some Twitter accounts belonging to Wizards of the Coast, so I thought I would just share them real quick.
I created this sword maybe 12 years ago for a minotaur PC, who was a member of the party for which I was DMing. The party was around level 10 (2nd edition rules), and travelled beyond the world of Krynn.
This party was basically a bunch of good guys, who fought evil with remarkable savagery. I decided to use the Ravenloft setting, so I added the Domain of Dread to my own Dragonlance setting. The wizard in the party was a Red Robe with few scruples, which made him susceptible to the influence of the dark powers of Ravenloft.
I needed a character who could pull the party in the direction of good, and as it turned out, the player, who played the minotaur agreed to provide this counterbalance. In order to empower him, and send him on a epic quest, I created the sword Icingdeath.
I stole the name from Forgotten Realms, as it is the name of a white dragon killed by Drizzt Do’Urden. I include the only write up of the sword I could find on laptop. I seem to remember there was a richer back story to the weapon, but unfortunately I cannot find it. I haven’t updated the weapon to 3rd or 4th edition rules either. I don’t have the 4th edition rules, and since my gaming days are long gone, I didn’t see any reason for me to update to 3.5 either.
I hope somebody will find this interesting and maybe update the stats. I’d be more than happy to post the stats on the blog, so if feel free to email me should you decide to update my sword. Email me at dragonlance (at) gigaboot (dot) dk
Icingdeath
Used by: Fighters, The white minotaur.
Description: This sword looks like a normal clabbard, except it glows with a faint white light when drawn.
Powers: Being a Frost Brand Icingdeath has the following natual powers:
Secrets: Icingdeath is an intelligent sword and has the following additional powers:
Special purpose: Slay fire using/dwelling creatures
Defenses: Icingdeath chooses its own user and thus does not permit any lesser fighter to wield it. The unfortunate one is subject to a cold shock doing 2d12 points of damage.
This little introduction is something I wrote for a campaign i started about 10 years ago with my old Dragonlance group. I needed an evil nation to counter Neraka and the Dragonarmies, so I made up the Hierarchs. The idea was that they should be very secretive and very violent in order to inspire fear and dread in the party. we stopped playing shortly after, so I never got to use them that much. I was planning on having the Dragonarmies butcher the Hierarchs in a orgy of violence but that never came to pass.
In the wake of the War of the Lance a group of people formed an unholy alliance, which was supposed to turn them into the most powerful force in Ansalon. Their tools were deceit, treachery and murder; and their willingness to commit the foulest deeds. Among these were renegade ogres, draconians and even a dragon or two. Other than that many wicked humans flocked to the group’s condor banner.
The groups, or Hierarchs as they call themselves, are not surprisingly followers of the dark god of vengeance Sargonnas. The Hierarchs are attempting to establish a powerbase in Ansalon and they have chosen the ancient city of Shrentek as their main city. With lightning speed and incredible precision, the Hierarchs’ forces were able to defeat the original inhabitants and take over the city and the surrounding areas. The people that were not killed were used as slaves and they were promptly put to work rebuilding the city in honor of Sargonnas.
Through the hard work of the slaves and the aid of their dark god’s infernal servants, the city was constructed in a matter of months. The Hierarchs solidified their grasp on the area, while maintaining a high degree of secrecy. They are still a rather unknown force, but whispers about them are slowly spreading across the Eastern part of Ansalon. The Silvanesti elves are concerned about an evil power so close to their borders, and are preparing for war.
For the time being, the Hierarchs do not posses the military might to challenge the regions of Khur, Blöde and Silvanesti, which is why they use spies to infiltrate and gather vital information. These spies are spread out all over the Eastern seaboard, providing the Hierarchs with an accurate rendition of the political climate.
The Hierarchs are currently considering a new foe – The Cabal. Gil-Galad has made his home in the area coveted by the Hierarchs, which has caused the two to clash on occasion. Currently, the conflict is not yet violent in nature; however, the future does seem rather unstable. If the Hierarchs decide to go up against the combined might of the Cabal, the region will surely experience destruction and death. Unbeknownst to the Hierarchs, the Cabal is reluctant to enter into an open conflict, because a lot of resources are gathered in Daltigoth.
The biggest obstacle to the plans of the Hierarchs is the tribes of Khur. In terms of military might a united Khur would almost certainly be able to repel any attacking force, given their knowledge of the treacherous lands of the region. Unfortunately, the tribes have a lot of internal rivalry, which prevent them from uniting behind one cause or leader. The Hierarchs are aware of this situation, and they attempt to fan the flames by attacking certain tribes making it look like the work of their enemies. Furthermore, the Hierarchs try to form alliances with some of the tribes that are willing to join the ranks of the Condor. However, since only a fool would trust the Hierarchs, the alliances are shaky at best. Moreover, the Hierarchs have managed to pace spies in many tribes, which give them a lot of information regarding the in fight that takes place. The spies have attained different ranks throughout Khur, ranging from common foot soldier to trusted advisor of the Zulkirs. Evidently, the Hierarchs are a major influence in the region, albeit a hidden one. The Hierarchs’ main goal is to dispose of the Khan who is currently the closest thing Khur has to a regent.
So, I never got to finish the War of Souls trilogy second time around. Work has been killing me for the last couple of months, and to be honest, that trilogy never fully agreed with me.
So anyway, I started rereading Hourglass mage, even though I read it last summer. However, when I am done with that one, I have no idea what to read next. Perhaps I should go get the Gargoyle King and read that, despite having read all the spoilers already over at the Dragonlance Forums.
It is such a downer that Wizards of the Coast killed off Dragonlance, now that I have money burning a hole in my pocket. Alas, I will have to spent it somewhere else I guess.
I recently purchased a new domain for my non Dragonlance related blogging pleasure. Since I already own a domain, which I use for testing purposes, and generally goofing around, I decided to reconfigure my DNS settings, so my gaming blog now is hosted on www.gigaboot.dk
I also configured Gmail for my domain, just for the fun of it. Hopefully this means I will start blogging a little bit more now.
