Well, looks like I’m gaining — I’m only a week behind now. It’s getting quicker, though.
Technology
Google to launch pilot program for Android-based HUD glasses… I honestly don’t have much to add to this. I want to see how they work and how well they do their job, and if it all comes together and the price is reasonable, I expect I’ll want a pair. Because.
Not ‘Because anything’, just… ‘Because’.
… and the sky full of dust
Butterflies & Death examines the idea of the souls of sentient creatures being represented with various smaller things (butterflies, small dark stones, maggots) that manifest as the physical body breaking down and disperse on death. An interesting idea, but I think it’ll make raise dead somewhat more difficult than normal.
Comma, Blank_
LS explores Monstrous Culture, and suggests ways four common monstrous races could be made more interesting and perhaps more credible.
Dwarven tanks, a cool idea (though I don’t doubt they get more than a little sweaty in there, 11 of the short buggers crammed into a steel shell like that). I’ve had a campaign where dwarves had steam engines — useful for driving pumps in the mines, if nothing else, though a clever dwarf about a century ago managed to improve the design until it was light enough to be portable. This led to steam trains, and later ironclad — dwarves didn’t trust wooden boats so much because they were easily broken.
Old Guard Gaming Accoutrements
Digging back a ways (2009), I found (was directed to) the Unexpurgated Dragon Generator.
I’ve been meaning to go back and mine this site for a while. I have come to the conclusion that while I tend to be good at composition and synthesis, my innate desire to have things make sense limits my ability to create things from scratch that are weird… which can limit me when it comes to adventure design and the like. Random generators as are found on this site can be quite helpful to me.
Shatterworld
Niccodaemus brings us more godly goodness with Kronos, God of Time and Phusis, God of Flora.
Tenkar’s Tavern
Erik passes on what it might look like if you lift rocks in different RPGs.
The Zombie Nation
How to make your own mythos book, in two parts. Requires some craft work, but looks like it’ll make some wonderful props… and the great thing is, if you get the sculpting wrong it probably looks better!
They Might Be Gazebos
An interesting challenge: devise a campaign setting using only twenty different monsters. Presumably mundane creatures (animals) and humans are still fair game, or this will get really, really hard.
Re: Death & Butterflies: in respect to Raise Dead & similar spells; personally, I’d ditch them; or at least make it more of a quest, hunting down the swarms (or at least some or most of it). I also imagine a distant jungle, where all these butterflies swarm to; a sort of ‘heaven on earth’ if you like.
Which is pretty cool in my mind. I’ve sent PCs off on quests in order to bring back someone who died. I just thought I’d mention it as a potentially overlooked consequence of the change. I know I sometimes overlook consequences (this is why I have people review my work — I may or may not agree with them, but at least I’ve had someone point out where they think I’ve made a mistake) and I’ve known players who get kind of upset when one-up magic isn’t available for easy use.
Not that I have a lot of patience with them. Getting killed is supposed to be somewhat more troublesome than ditching a curse, and I honestly have had players decide that it was easier to have their characters die and get revivified rather than lose their stuff.
I think limiting the ‘save’ option of such spells makes the adventurers more meaningful, more dramatic, and ultimately more satisfying. Whenever my characters die I generally prefer to let them go and create a new one; but I do have players who would rather be raised. It also depends on the setting and campaign, and what the expectations are. I haven’t implemented this idea yet, waiting for the right game, but I do like the idea.
Much the same here, especially if the death is appropriate to the game.
Catching it in the neck during a routine skirmish is kind of disappointing in a game where you are supposed to be a great hero — but entirely appropriate in a gritty world where Shit Happens.
Most of the time I’d rather leave PCs dead (even my own), though as Steven Brust shows in the Dragaera setting, relatively easy revivification does have its place in some games.