Wonder Woman Wednesday...

submitted by Al Bruno III

This is Kimberly Kane, adult movie actress, as featured in the io9 article on the Best Wonder Woman Outfit.

Torn From The Headlines: Tacoma Bridge Collapse...

Not happy about their casual, off-hand, reference to the death of a dog!

This Pathe News footage of the collapse of the world's third largest suspension bridge (at the time),Tacoma Narrows Bridge, Washington, in 1940 will surely make you think twice about the use of bridges in your games as more than just tools for helping parties get across rivers and chasms.

DVD Of The Week: Warm Bodies (2013)

It's eight years after an unspecified zombie apocalypse, the streets of America are awash with the walking dead and there's a single enclave of surviving humans, led by the militant Grigio (John Malkovich), tucked away behind a huge wall.

R (Nicholas Hoult) is an unusual zombie, he collects records, snow globes and other bric-a-brac which he uses to decorate his nest, an abandoned aircraft at the airport he spends most days wandering aimlessly around. He can also, with some effort, talk and it's his thoughts that narrate a lot of the movie and present the scenario from the zombies' perspective.

One day out in the city, R and some of his undead chums come upon a band of young humans, including Grigio's daughter, Julie (Teresa Palmer), on a medicine run. A fight ensues and R kills Julie's ex-boyfriend, Perry (Dave Franco), and eats his brain - thus absorbing the young man's thoughts and memories.

R leads Julie away from the fight, taking her to his home, explaining as best he can that he is protecting her.

From there a kind of friendship blossoms and although Julie is initially sceptical, and tries to give R the slip whenever she can, eventually she begins to realise that R is changing... and his change is somehow affecting the other zombies.

That is, except for the hardcore, skeletal zombies known as Boneys.

Now all Julie needs to do is convince her trigger-happy father that R, and the other zombies, are 'coming back to life'.

Warm Bodies is a light-weight spin on Romeo And Juliet (R and Julie, gettit? There's even a balcony scene) with some subtle satire - reminiscent of Romero's early zombie flicks -  mixed in along with a healthy dose of humour and the action-adventure that comes with any good man-vs-zombie movie.

Yes, it's slightly cheesy in a "love-conquers-all" kinda way, however this isn't really a horror film but a teen zom-rom-com about two kids from different sides of the tracks finding love against all the odds. You could argue that Warm Bodies isn't wholly consistent in its portrayal of the zombies, but then again it doesn't take itself too seriously, so why should you?

A pleasant change of pace from what passes for cinematic supernatural romance these days, this has none of the creepiness factor of the Twilight saga, with Julie being a strong, confident female and not the simpering imbecile that Kirsten Stewart played in those other hideous abominations while R is a sad, yet sympathetic, character who never once expresses any desire to turn Julie into one of his kind.

Another factor in its favour - and rarity these days - is the story is wrapped up in a single 94-minute episode. No sequel necessary. No dangling plot threads.

There's, naturally, a degree of violence and bloodshed in Warm Bodies, but it's pretty tame compared to mainstream zombie movies - hence the (almost) family-friendly certificate. Those who are sensitive to such things though need to be aware there is one (rather pointless) f-bomb dropped for effect.

Riddick & Starbuck Sitting In A Tree...

It's A Dungeons & Dragons Ride...

As if I didn't already have enough things to distract me from any form of 'serious' writing, I've decided to dip my toe once more in the wild waters of Tumblr.

So far I've managed to sidestep my previous 'Tumblr addiction issues' by limiting accounts I follow to those I think will supply me with material suitable for my (so far) focussed It's A Dungeons & Dragons Ride (primarily anything to do with fantasy RPGs, literature, cinema and television, Game Of Thrones, Hawk The Slayer etc).

If you're on Tumblr please pop on over and have a look.

Spider-Bed, Spider-Bed, Does Whatever A Spider-Bed Does...

I don't know where my father-in-law found this picture but he cheekily emailed it to me today asking if this bed was on my Christmas list? I replied saying: "It is now!"

I'm sure Rachel would be delighted if we replaced our bed with this!

Race Relations...

A massive thank you to everyone in the gaming community who shared their views on my question about the necessity of non-human player-character races in fantasy RPGs - either on the original post, on Google + or in the Google+ OSR group.

The topic attracted a fascinating cross-section of opinions, with views ranging from those that supported my own to those who felt these other races were key touchstones of the genre and a good shorthand to establishing the fantasy oeuvre.

While I understood most of the latter points of view, none truly persuaded me that I needed these player-character races in my mooted campaign.

In the last few years I've thrown a number of setttings at The Tuesday Knights and all failed through my own indecision and lack of confidence, rather than any lack of interest from the players.

However, out of those, my personal favourite was the one I named Tekralh II, a human-centric, swords-and-sorcery setting that collapsed under the weight of its own Game Of Thrones-inspired background. All I need to do is resist the urge to develop volumes of deep background ahead of time and instead concentrate on adventures, dungeons, monsters, villains etc

Looks Like We're Going Beyond The Wall...

In recent weeks I have become rather smitten with a new (to me) RPG: Beyond The Wall And Other Adventures, thanks to a mini-blogfest being organised by Rob Barrett of Vargold: The Wolf-Time.

Flatland Games' Beyond The Wall appears to be a streamlined version of basic D&D but with some interesting twists, particularly during character creation.

Character creation is a communal affair with the players not only creating their own in-game personas at the table, but also the village they come from.

Through the use of 'playbooks' (a different one for each character based upon the archetype he or she is emulating), the players shape their home environment and weave background stories that tie the characters to each other - and help explain why this rag-tag assemblage wants to go adventuring together.

The 'playbooks' are mainly collections of random tables so a lot of the heavy lifting is done for the players and all they have to do is connect the dots.

This is already sounding like something I've been kicking around for years, but the more I learn about the game the more boxes it ticks:

• No clerics - mages have healing magic
• Non-human character races are optional (I'm really hooked on the idea of a human-centric campaign; I also think this will help differentiate my game from Meredith's Warcraft campaign)
• Low magic - which can sometimes run awry
• Ascending Armour Class

I've ordered the print edition of the game and am waiting for that to arrive before I really get stuck in, although I have the PDF that came with the bundle (as well as the extra free playbooks that Flatland Games offers).

Straight off, I'll say my only real quibble with the rules is their version of "ability checks", which while simple fail to take a character's level into account as far as I can see. As these are the core of the minimal skill system that seems a bit of an oversight . There's also the oddity of the fact that these tests require a d20 roll UNDER a target number, whereas combat rolls and saving rolls require a roll OVER.

In this case I think I'll simply port over Castle & Crusades' method of making attribute checks, which will work fine with Beyond The Walls' nice little touches, but create a unified "roll over" mechanic (that also factors in a character's experience level).

I'm also not totally sold on the games' method of adventure creation (it's almost a step too far towards 'indie' gaming). While I may use it for the initial adventure which is included in the game I expect future scenarios - although tailored for the characters to a degree - will more closely resemble traditional D&D-style adventures.

In the meantime I've created a blogroll (in the left-hand column of this blog) of all the blogs taking part in Rob's online character/village creation exercise for those seeking more flavour. Although the best place to start is Rob's introductory post here.

I'm thinking that when it comes close to me resuming my seat behind the screen for The Tuesday Knights I'll email them a list of the available playbooks, get them to pick what archetype they want to create and then print out those so they are ready at the table when the group sits down to 'roll up' new characters.

Map-A-Monday: King's Landing

Click to embiggen

King's Landing, from A Song Of Ice And Fire/Game Of Thrones, as depicted in the gorgeous Lands Of Ice And Fire folio by Jonathan Roberts.

For more information - and detail - on the map visit Jonathan's blog Fantastic Maps - you won't be disappointed!

An OSR Question: Do We Need Elves, Dwarves And Halflings?

A simple question to my "old school" gaming compadres: do we need non-human player-character races in Dungeons & Dragons-style games to make them fun?

You can substitute the word "work" for fun or something similar, but I think you know what I'm getting at.

I've been thinking a lot about the campaign ideas I'm kicking around and keep coming back to this core issue.

My problem with these non-human player-character races is that players invariably don't play them as mystical, alien, inhuman entities but simply as humans with special powers (and fancy dress).

So why have them in the first place?

Is it simply the powergamer appeal because you get cool skills and stuff that the vanilla humans don't?

The Saragossa Manuscript (1965)

During Napoleon's invasion of Spain a pair of officers - one French, one Spanish - discover an elaborately illustrated book in an old tavern in the town of Saragossa and are mesmerised by its pictures and the story it tells.

The book chronicles the adventures of the Spanish officer's grandfather, Captain Alfonso van Worden (Zbigniew Cybulski) of the Walloon guard, as he tries to find his way through the dangerous, demon-haunted Sierra Morena.

His journey is continually interrupted by seemingly random encounters which spiral off into their own adventures.

The first half of the film - yes, there's an interlude as the whole epic is almost three hours long - primarily revolves around a haunted inn, the Venta Quemada, where the captain first meets a pair of gorgeous, seductive Muslim princesses, Emina (Iga Cembrzyńska) and Zibelda (Joanna Jędryka), who claim he is their cousin and try to get him to convert to Islam.

Further encounters include bandits who may - or may not - have already been executed, a holy man who is trying to drive a demon out of a disgraced nobleman, the Spanish Inquisition (nobody was expecting that), and an occult cabilist who leads Alfonso to the relative safety of his castle.

The second half of the film is dominated by a monumental, intertwining, tale of feuding merchants told to Alfonso at the cabilist's castle by a visiting gypsy-king (Leon Niemczyk), that eventually ties back to Alfonso himself through his duel-happy father (Slawomir Lindner).

Many of the stories told in The Saragossa Manuscript - and especially the lengthy story of the merchants - involve the characters in the stories telling stories themselves, and sometimes even the characters in their stories also tell stories, meaning the film eventually becomes a multi-layered Russian nesting doll of tales within tales within tales. And, of course, the whole thing is a tale in itself, in a book (which becomes a crucial part of the narrative in the latter stages of the film).

An earlier work than The Hourglass Sanatorium, from director Wojciech Has, The Saragossa Document (aka Rekopis Znaleziony w Saragossie) lacks the assured, smooth pacing of the later work and, at times, feels more like an exercise in clever film-making.

On the other hand, even with its multi-layered narrative and larger-than-life tale-spinning characters, the overarching story of The Saragossa Document is generally easier to follow than The Hourglass Sanatorium.

It only really steps into surrealism during the closing stages as Alfonso feels his sanity slipping away as he attempts to grasp the reality of everything that has befallen him - if anything actually has, as it it could all have been a dream... or a foreshadowing of an adventure Alfonso is about to have.

This is a film that requires attention, not only to keep track of whose story is being told at any one time, but also of events going on in the background and little clues that eventually explain what might be going on with princesses and their involvement in Alfonso's life.

I have to confess that when Alfonso is eventually told what is going on, even though it explained some brief incidents that otherwise just came across as odd, I felt a bit cheated.

Of course, the film still has another trick up its sleeve by once more pulling the rug out from under Alfonso and us, so we are left wondering whether it really was the truth or some further demonic torment of our honourable protagonist.

The Saragossa Document is the sort of work that film students' wet dreams are made of. I'm sure there are numerous theses gathering dust in university libraries trying to peel back the multi-layered onion that is the quite unique narrative structure of this story.

For a 'reasonably' straight-forward study of the movie's various threads I recommend Martin Schell's website.