Lots of topical posts this week.  Lolth, Villains, Batman: The Animated Series were some common topics.  The Shiny Technology just grabbed my attention, there are some nifty ideas out there.

Other than that, I’m not sure if it was a slow week blogging, or I was too busy at work and writing my own stuff to find more to list here.  I suspect the latter more than the former.

Topic: Lolth

There have been a few revisionings of Lolth, Queen of the Demonweb.  Never mind the different incarnations she’s had in ‘official’ material, the different interpretations I’ve seen from bloggers tend to be rather more varied and interesting.

• Theodric the Obscure has the most recent, Respinning the Demon Queen.  He manages to mix the histories of the elves, vampires, and demons.  Nicely done.

• And a follow-up, Lolth’s Web Grows, collecting art of Lolth and Lilith.

N. Wright’s article about Lolth: Spider Bitch of the Abyss.

Tim Brannan wrote about Lolth, and a heretical cult of her original form, before she was betrayed.  The Church of Lolth Ascendant.

Topic: Villains

A couple of blogs this week have talked about what makes a ‘good villain’.

• Joseph at the Greyhawk Grognard points out that the Best Villains Aren’t Evil, that (psychotics aside) they often have some kind of justification for their actions.
• The Secret DM discusses much the same topic in Building Better Villains.  With many ‘good bad guys’ you can see how they went wrong.  Whether it’s as simple as “the end justifies the means” or being ruthless enough that nothing will stand in the way of a laudable goal, or something else, you can often see how and where Things Went Wrong and at what point they crossed the line.
• David reveals another source of villains at Dungeon’s Master: retired PCs, in Curse Your Sudden, Yet Inevitable Betrayal.

Topic: Batman: The Animated Series

A couple of bloggers talked about Batman: The Animated Series this week.  I never had the opportunity to watch much of it, but what I saw suggested it was put together well.

• Joseph (Greyhawk Grognard) talks about how character design in Batman: The Animated Series can apply with good effect in roleplaying games in Batman: TAS and RPG Campaign Design.
• The World’s Finest provides a link to the writer’s bible for the series in Backstage – The B:TAS Writer’s Bible.

Topic: Shiny Technology

I don’t understand how some of these work, really, but what they can do ranges from pretty cool to downright exciting.

• The Wirecutter presents a Magic Camera [that] Can Refocus Your Blurry Photos, Later.  I don’t pretend to have any idea how this works, but it looks really cool.
• Extreme Tech presents an article on a Throwable 36-camera ball that takes perfect panorama photos.  There’s also a YouTube video of the ball in use, and what it looks like to use the software it comes with to pan around the panorama created.
• A TED presentation, Justin Hall-Tipping shows how nanotechnology can capture energy.

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So.  Many.  Links.

I’m surprised, according to the thumb on the scrollbar, this is actually about normal.

I think perhaps I need to be a little more selective in what I read, so I actually have time to write.  But there are so many good articles out there, and I’m finding more blogs every week.

Akratic Wizardry

‘Swords & Sorcery’ House Rules Index

(http://akraticwizardry.blogspot.com/2009/07/swords-sorcery-house-rules-index.html)

This page has links to the rules mentioned in the Wrath of Zombie article linked below.  These rules attempt to capture classic swords & sorcery using the Swords & Wizardry rules (which I don’t have a copy of yet, should probably fix that).

Between Are the Doors

No Printing Press

(http://fictivefantasies.wordpress.com/2011/10/13/no-printing-press-blog-carnival-loot-as-part-of-the-plot/)

Books as treasure.  Not necessarily even magic books.

Those who know me, know I love books.  I like where this post goes.

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I’ve been busy this week and haven’t been able to spend so much time reading other blogs… but I think I found some good links this week anyway.

Topic: “My Edition of D&D”

• The Rhetorical Gamer goes into how he might change races if he were redesigning D&D.  Short form: your race should grow as you do, becoming “more archetypal” as you reach higher levels, in parallel with your class levels.  I can’t disagree, my early class framework had every third (or fourth?  it’s been a while) feat drawn from “race-appropriate” feat groups, and Dawnforge had development paths for all races.  Echelon certainly includes this concept, though it’s optional for most races (you can stick to the base racial abilities, or further develop them; in some cases the race is ‘big’ and may require that you keep it up).
• The Rhetorical Gamer also goes into “stuff“, focusing primarily on the dependency on magic items and the consistent churn as better items are found.  I agree with him that this takes something from the game and that it can and should be improved.

Berin Kinsman’s Dire Blog

[World Domination] Composition Book Hacks

(http://berinkinsman.wordpress.com/2011/10/03/world-domination-composition-book-hacks/)

A Lifehack-quality post for capturing day to day information, including project-specific ideas and content.  It’s a little more rigid than the way I’ve been doing it, but I have to admit it looks like it would work rather better.  The only other addition I can think of would be to transfer the information from the raw format (written in the book) to a ‘better’ format (project-specific documents/web sites, say) on a regular basis.  I know I’ve got a shelfful of personal notebooks that I frankly dread trying to delve into because of the work now involved.  It would have been rather easier to do on an ongoing basis than as a single migration project.

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