A Little Reorganization & Some Thoughts

I have been pretty satisfied with the posting so far in this new year.  I aim to keep the momentum going and add much more content in the upcoming weeks and months.  Here are a few highlights of the reorganization I have done around here and some thoughts about what I need to do from here on out.

It is almost time to revise the About Me tab again.  The final paragraph could use a little bit of updating but I will probably hold off for a few weeks to see if more changes take place.

The Collected Posts tab at the top of the page is gone.  It had grown bloated and messy so I split up the contents.  There is now a separate tab for Adventures in Fantasy and Perilous Journeys instead; of course, the contents of those tabs correspond to their respective labels.  The other information that was previously contained in the tab is still available on the blog but I just took this opportunity to clean up some of the clutter.  

The Adventures in Fantasy tab will see some expansion with posts covering the AiF Restatement project.

The read through of Perilous Journeys is complete but that is not all I have planned for the game.  Expect posts covering new resources such as magic items, new flaws, new edges, and other resources.    

I have added links to two posts focused on religion under the Toldara tab. The other posts covering religion will be added upon completion.  My goal is to offer something more than "there's a religion that people can join" by giving some actual details.  I fully expect a lot more information to be added to this tab over the next year.  There should be plenty of details on a Swords & Wizardry adaptation to come.  

The Projects & Downloads tab has several things listed that I need to get completed.  In no particular order, the SteamCraft character creation reference and the MicroToldara rules are the two I am aiming to complete first.

That is a pretty good summary of what has taken place so far and what is coming up.  The only other additions I can see that I need to mention are that I am going to start posting Steampunk Saturdays at some point and the Robotech Posts are probably going to start with the extras DVDs. 

It is time to wrap this up and get back to reading posts by all of you...

    

Quick Fire Thoughts on Film and Television

Having two weeks off for Christmas and New Years gave me the opportunity to catch up on some entertainment that I had missed.  I tried to keep my night shift hours somewhat intact so that further enabled me to watch more while they were sleeping.  Anyway, I thought I might take a moment and share a few thoughts on what I have seen recently. 

Guardians of the Galaxy: I knew the name of the team from the comic books but that is it.  I had no previous knowledge of them at all.  I watched it while my children were in school for the last day.  When they got home we all watched it again.  When my son got up the next day we watched it yet again! Guardians of the Galaxy is a big hit in my household.  The more I see of the Marvel Cinematic Universe the more I see that they have their crap together and took these projects seriously.  Guardians is probably close to my favorite Marvel movie of all time so far.  I really feel like the only thing The Avengers has over Guardians is the all-star lineup of classic Marvel heroes united together.  I am really looking forward to the sequel to see where the story goes.  DC had better get their act together if they want to attempt a Justice League movie because The Avengers and Guardians has really raised the bar while the DC moves have definitely been hit or miss.

Z Nation: Yeah, I know that SyFy probably had this thing slapped together to try to catch some of the popularity of The Walking Dead.  Of course, what better company is there to make it than The Asylum? They are well known for mockbusters such as Transmorphers.  There is a difference with Z Nation, however, because it has gained a following.  I will not try to convince you that Z Nation is better or on par with The Walking Dead because that is not the way to look at the two shows.  Obviously, The Walking Dead is a serious drama series.  Z Nation takes a different approach and goes for the wild and gonzo. Proof of that can be seen in some of the crazy encounters on the show.  There is a baby that gets zombified and suddenly can run around like crazy when it was in a car seat before being turned.  The cast also has to deal with radioactive zombies, biker gangs, zombies on Viagra(!), and it goes on.  Consider Z Nation the game sessions that take place at home after fans that are gamers watch The Walking Dead.

The Maze Runner: It seems that post-apocalyptic and/or dystopian fiction aimed at a young adult audience seems to be in fashion at the moment.  I read The Hunger Games trilogy at the suggestion of my wife and I have enjoyed the movies so far.  I watched Divergent but I just really did not get into it.  I hear the books are pretty good but I have not read any of them.  I took a chance of The Maze Runner and I enjoyed it quite a bit.  I have watched it several times since I first watched it.  The movie still continues to be engaging and enjoyable.

(Robotech) Macross Saga: I have started working my way through all three of the Robotech series.  I am still on the first series at the moment.  I can see why my buddies and I liked it at the time.  Details to come later...

Rome Season 1: I received this for Christmas and I just got started on it.  Rome seems pretty cool so far.

The Hobbit 1 & 2: Now the thoughts that will probably bring the villagers out in large groups with pitchforks and torches.  I enjoyed Jackson's take on the LOTR film adaptations.  It is not unusual for me to pull them out and watch them back to back during the weekend.  I enjoyed the animated version of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.  I was not a big fan of the animated Return of the King.  The point being that I understand there will be differences between the books and any adaptations based on those books. Obviously, print and film and are two different sorts of media and what works in one will not always work in the other.  I am also not a Tolkien purist by any means.

I received the extended version of the first two films in The Hobbit trilogy for Christmas.  I had seen them both once before but I sat down to watch them during my time off from work.  I would have thought that since Jackson was involved with these films and they were part of a larger story then I would dig them too. These two films have left me completely underwhelmed.  The dwarves just seem goofy to me.  The scene with the dishes in Bilbo's house was just silly.  The Goblin King seemed ludicrous to me.  The bridge in Goblin Town falling hundreds of feet with no injuries or death seemed more at home in an action video game. Radagast and Rastabell Rabbits fleeing from the Orcs reminds me of the old Benny Hill high speed chase scenes.  Why must Radagast have bird crap on his head?  The kung fu barrel riding is absurd.  You get the point.  The films look great but I am just not digging them.  I will see the third one for the sake of completion but that is the only reason I am interested.  Maybe I should read The Hobbit again to see if I am that far off base with my impression?       

Robotech Protoculture Collection

I discovered the Robotech animated series some time in the mid 1980's if I recall correctly; of course, there might be a few years leeway on both sides of that time because it has been that long ago.  I know people out there like to kick the corpse of the 80's around but it was a great time for cartoons.  Shows like Thundercats, Voltron, Thundarr the Barbarian, SilverHawks, Transformers, and The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers all serve as great examples of the available shows.  

I fondly remember my buddies and I making sure we put aside time to watch all of these shows.  Then one of us stumbled across Robotech after school one day.  I do not remember exactly where in the series we started watching but it was not the beginning.  I do remember quickly walking home to catch new episodes because only a few minutes would be missed that way; riding the bus would cut into a large chunk of the episode so that was out.  Other than feeling like it was a cartoon that treated kids as serious viewers instead of babying them I can not recall a lot of information from the show except for the following.

• The names Rick Hunter, Lisa Hunter, and Max Sterling. (I think?)
• The Veritech fighter jets that could transform into a robot form and another form.
• The bad guys were called the Zentraedi.  I believe they had a giant and a micro form.
• There was another Robotech series that had motorcycles?

I know that does not sound like much but it really has been that many years.  I know all of us watched it and enjoyed it quite a bit and I would think about it many times over the years.  I have seen some of the sequel shows and the Robotech Role-Playing Game was the very first licensed role-playing game that I purchased.

I have always maintained an interest in the show and was surprised when I ran across some episodes at Wal-Mart during a visit.  It was obvious that they were somewhere in the middle but I bought them anyway. I watched them and decided to get some more but I needed a place that stocked the earlier episodes so I could catch up.  I did a little bit of digging and then visited Best Buy and ran across the Robotech Protoculture Collection boxed set.  The collection includes all three series - Macross Saga, Masters, and New Generation - spread over 14 DVDs.  Typically, there are 6 episodes on each disc with the exception of the first disc of New Generation containing 7 episodes.  That makes a grand total of 85 episodes.  There is also a 7 disc collection of Extras related to each series plus toy lines, commercials, and other items of interest.  

I was lucky because it was the first weekend that the Digitally Remastered Extended Edition was available for sale and Best Buy had it deeply discounted.  I know I paid $29.99 when it sold for something like $79.99! I hurried out to the car and read the following summary on the box before heading home. 

"1999: A massive alien battlecruiser crash lands on Earth in the midst of a bloody global war.  With the possibility of a more perilous threat looming, the human race puts aside their differences and collectively undertakes the arduous task of rebuilding the spacecraft, redubbed the SDF-1, to defend the Earth should its extraterrestrial masters come to reclaim it.  Eventually, the alien Zentraedi invade Earth to collect the SDF-1 and the technology it contains, forcing the inexperienced crew, including hotshot pilot Rick Hunter and war hero mentor Roy Fokker, to launch the battlecruiser into war - a war that will cross generations, stretch across the farthest reaches of the universe and turn ordinary soldiers into extraordinary heroes."  

Of course, I started immediately viewing when I got home and have watched it several times since, right? Actually, that did not happen.  I got distracted and threw it up on the DVD shelf and there it has sat for years.  Oh, I have loaned it out a few times and received some feedback from others but I have never sat down to watch it all until now.  I am going to watch it from start to finish taking it one DVD at a time.  The plan is for each DVD to get a post in reaction and recollection.  The next post will begin with the Macross Saga DVD 1: Episodes 1-6.  Stay tuned.

For anyone that has not seen it, here is a video of the opening Robotech sequence.

Praise for Palladium Fantasy & Thoughts on Palladium Books

I have read several rants on a few message boards that stated the writer would welcome the demise of Palladium Books.  I am not a fan boy nor do I turn a blind eye to any mistakes on the part of Palladium Books but I would like to see them not only recover but make a big comeback.  Their products always felt like the company that made them were a group of fans that got lucky and hit the big time.  I think an RPG industry without Palladium would be worse by their absence.

I started playing Palladium RPGs sometime around the mid to late 80's to the best of my recollection.  My buddy Jamie and I noticed a copy of Palladium Fantasy Role Playing Game that looked really cool so we pooled our money and bought it.  Of course, we rushed back to his mother's house and started checking it out immediately. We literally spent hours flipping through the pages and taking turns passing the book back and forth between us.  There were two teenage role-players really excited that summer day about the contents of that one book.

As we flipped through the pages of Palladium Fantasy, there were several things that caught our attention.  First, we noticed the rules were somewhat similar to AD&D so it would make learning this game much easier; unlike AD&D, we played using all of the rules.  Second, there was also an abundance of "official stats" for playing many more races and classes than in AD&D.  Who would not want to try something different from the typical player character options?  Third, the alignment system was a nice touch in my eyes.  There were lists of actions in each alignment description that guided players in the actions of their characters.  Fourth, Palladium had a full blown percentile skill system in contrast to the AD&D secondary skills.  Fifth, Palladium had many small details such as the illustrations of the money.  There wasn't just a listing of the generic gold piece, silver piece, etc. as in AD&D but there were actual names for the coins with illustrations of the respective currency.  Finally, there was the biggest difference between the two games - you only needed one book to play Palladium Fantasy.  It was great to have all of the information required in one rule book.  Granted, supplemental books would add further options and adventures in the palladium world but the fact remained that you only needed one book to play the game.  In contrast, when RIFTS would hit years later we would buy up the latest source books as soon as possible.

 After learning the rules, we played quite a bit of Palladium Fantasy.  We continued to play AD&D but for a time the focus was clearly on Palladium Fantasy.  In fact, our Palladium group was bigger than our AD&D group and shared some of the same players.  One funny fact is that we never bought any of the supplemental material.  I don't know why but we just didn't feel it "necessary" the same way it did for our AD&D game.  This isn't a judgement about either game, just a noted difference in our perspective on the necessity of further material within our group.  That isn't to say that we didn't use any expansion material in our games, though.  We shared ideas and adapted rules between AD&D and Palladium Fantasy and even developed some custom Occupational Character Classes.

We had many successful sessions of Palladium Fantasy over the years.  Eventually, we moved on to play other games. Palladium Fantasy was one of the few besides AD&D and V&V that we would return to play again.  I know many people think D&D when it comes to fantasy adventure gaming but I always think of Palladium Fantasy in the same instant.  I do have the second edition of Palladium Fantasy but I have yet to do any actual play using the rules.  It seems the rules have become a little bloated from first edition but that's just a general impression.  I also noticed that it looks like the complete line of Palladium Fantasy first edition is available on DriveThruRPG.  I may have to buy them and get another Palladium Fantasy campaign up and going.

That's my experience with Palladium Fantasy and why I remember it so fondly.  The other Palladium products I have played include Chaos Earth, Heroes Unlimited, RIFTS, and Robotech; I am interested in picking up Dead Reign to see what they have done with the Zombie genre.  I know that many people have problems with Palladium due to their release schedule snafus and the stories of board room politics that have taken place at their offices.  I understand the release schedule irritation and have no defense for the delays and cancellation of products.  As far as the politics go, all I can say is that there are two sides to every story and I did not witness any of the drama so I have no opinion on that.  The one thing I am sure of is the feeling of creativity that I get when I crack open a Palladium book.  There might be problems with the rules themselves but the story and background seems to be top notch every time.

I admit it - I'm a big time Palladium Fantasy fan even without playing in years.  I also enjoy their other products that I have picked up; mainly Chaos Earth and RIFTS.  While I do enjoy their products and want them to make a comeback, I think there are several things Palladium must do to thrive:

Revision
The Palladium system has been around since the 80's. Having been revised and expanded over the years, it is time to consolidate, clean up, and clarify all the rules.  The rules don't have to be completely overhauled but putting all references on a related topic together would be a good starting point.  A further re-organization to the rules would probably helps also.  I've heard that Kevin Siembieda does not even use the rules as published, so why not a look at the rules he does use?  All of these thoughts tie into the thought of a unified main core rule book.

Megaversal Rule Book
After a thorough revision of the rules, they should be consolidated into a nice hardback rule compendium.  I know some of the fans are very vocal about not wanting hardback because of increased prices but I think this is one expense well worth it.  With the Megaversal rules in one rule book then the core book for each game line could include a small section at the beginning about rule differences for that game.  The core rule book for each game could then focus on that game instead of reprinting the entire rule system in every time.  Yes, it would take two books to play a Palladium game but each core book would just be about that game instead of half the rule book being a reprint.  While you're at it, make the core books hardback also and leave the softbound books for source books.

Release Schedule
I completely understand the excitement about a new product and wanting to share the information with your loyal customers.  In doing so, there is no reason to give a firm release date until the actual release date is a short time away.  There are several books that have been announced at several different times with the release date getting pushed numerous times.  Eventually, the book is taken off the release schedule again.  It seems that this is currently happening with RIFTS Lemuria once again.


Support
Simply put, support ALL of the game lines - not just RIFTS.  I know RIFTS is like their stallion product at the moment but you can not grow a game line without supporting it by releasing new products.  It doesn't have to be a flood of new products but just throw a bone to fans of Chaos Earth, Dead Reign, Heroes Unlimited, Palladium Fantasy and the rest of the game lines several times a year.