I already covered my disgruntled teen sports rant here. But the weekend was bookended by Millie's team playing in Lancaster so here we go...
I drove Millie down to Lancaster for 9am and 11am games. I'm honestly surprised they split their games, not the fact that they won a game, but I expected the split to go the other way. Millie had good play both games, plus a classic Millie strip of the opposing team's towering center, and going end-to-end for the score.
By that time, Millie's mom arrived and took over custodial duties for the weekend, and I went the opposite end of the family tree and drove to my Mom's to cut her grass, and general maintenance.
But first there was a side trek.
Saturday was Free Comic Book Day, and the closest, safest Friendly Local Comic Shop was The Portal in Bethlehem. I missed the morning rush, wandered to the back gaming room, picked out some books (plus one or two for the girls), and wandered the store for deals.
None of the deals on comics and graphics seemed appealing, the customer base gave me flashbacks from 30 years ago when I worked behind the counter (a few more tattoos, piercings, gauges, and socially awkward moments, but not by much), and in an odd turn of events, they were phasing out their WizKids D&D minis in favor of... Reaper. Up until a month I'd celebrate that move, but recent painting projects have let me to selectively favor the Wizkids figures.
The fun part of the visit, was an oddly filled shelf labelled (Used Gaming .... $5 each). It was a proper assortment of gaming magazines, gaming related trade paperbacks, some wargaming books and an odd assortment of old White Wolf and d20 sourcebooks and hardcovers.
I picked up three odd items:
AD&D 2nd Edition Character Sheets: Pure Nostalgia. Half of the character sheets were still in there, the dark rich green, which either denotes the original printings, or the tail end before 2nd Edition went with the black hardcovers.
Cosmic Odyssey - Pirates of the Starstream: A 3rd party Starfinder supplement. Not worth the $19.95 MSRP, but a $5 pdf, maybe, making a $5 hardcopy a worthwhile addtion.
The Frostgrave Folio: A softcover book that collected a number of the online articles, include a few mini-campaigns. I dipped my toe in Frostgrave and left, so this may kindle some ideas for Brutal Quest (FrostQuest? BrutalGrave? BrutalFrost?) It looks like I need about a dozen and a half minis for "The Granite Golem" and even few for the other games.
Once I got to my mom's I knocked out a pretty thick lawn in 40 minutes (I seriously only missed one week) and proceeded to take a quick nap. Rested, with the prospect of an evening of watching bad digital antennae TV, I dashed out to catch a showing of Thunderbolts at the local theatre.
I honestly haven't been at the Regal Northampton Crossings in over 21 years. The regular seats are all ripped out for recliners and the ticket price and a medium soda gave me sticker shock I normally get for regional national recruiting AAU tournaments. Still, I had space and my feet appreciated it, after a day of driving without my orthotics.
Some people complained that Captain America: Brave New World was a long episode of Falcon and the Winter Soldier with an FX budget (which I was fine with). Thunderbolts is some of the great parts of Hawkeye (Yelena), enough tie-in with the Marvel TV and the second-tier movies, and enough of a teaser in the end credit trailer.
Minor Gripe: They had over a year in the flash-forward and they couldn't recruit anyone, even some nobodies?
Content with my relaxation, I headed back to the Mom's house to catch the last hour of Mysterious Island on MeTV. Good times.
Sunday was an excellent late morning breakfast with a particular lady friend, and a drive back to Lancaster for one, perhaps two games for Millie's team.
Spoilers: It was only one game. I have many questions about experienced coaching, teenage girls who can't break, or assist in breaking traps, when I covered that stuff in 3rd grade rec league.
I collectively made a verbal comment about everyone's passing equating to wilted celery, and the next time I opened up social media, this popped up first.
And yes, it was Mysterious Island on MeTV, with Svengoolie.
When I left for Historicon this year, I didn't have a look list of "must-haves," but with my final acquisition of the weekend, I made sure to pick up Veteran with Pick and Pistol from Brigade Games. It had been the first picture on a recent email blast and it was just a cool pose.
Of course, once I got home and looked him over, I realized, "What nationality is this dude?"
He was advertised as above, and alongside fairly generic armed civilians.
He is wielding a Luger, so that might make him obviously German, but the Wolfman Jack look seemed out of place.
If he was a veteran of the Great War, filling in the lines from the deep reserves, I could buy that.
But during my research, a Soviet soldier seemed to fit better. With a little more research, a Soviet political officer fit the look. Combine that with Ray Stevenson's character in the first episode of Ahsoka, and I think I have my dude, Alexander Mikoyan.
And after yesterday's Tabletop Inquirer post, I darkened the eyes, no detail.
Definitely not your normal WW2 figure, rather I'm seeing him as a leader of a deranged Pulp faction of Soviet oddballs and secrets man was not meant to know. He's been around since the discovery of Lovecraftian Ghouls during the Russian Civil War, he jumped sides and joined SV-8 during the Purge, and he's either so deep into occult research that he's eluded Stalin's purges or Stalin's minions are too afraid to try anymore.
By the time of this picture, it's the pinnacle of the vicious fighting in Stalingrad. No man of his pedigree should have been with 300 kilometers of the battle, but reports of agents of the Karotechia moving to the city caused him grave concern. His fears were realized, as they were able to release some sort of ritual to turn the piles of corpses into re-animated killing machines that no human was able to control.
One of Alexander's allies is a Deep One he calls Adrik the Rusalki. A hybrid almost nearing his complete transformation, Adrik was picked up from a remote fishing village on the Pacific coast.
Alexander knows that Adrik will either go fully feral and attempt to slaughter him, or simply skulk off into the waters one day, but for now, whatever sliver of its humanity is still willing to help him, especially reading all those infernal books.
I have little use for either figure at this time, so I'll add them to the list of potential inspirations for the #CharacterCreationChallenge in January.
(Edit: I got some responses back, to help connect the dots on the pick guy. Not only might my observation on German firearms be off, but these and the figures he was announced might be part of a little movie called Sisu. (Note: Red Band Trailer, NSFW) It's John Wick killing Nazis, if John Wick was a Finnish gold miner in 1944. Heck, there's even a dog.)
I'm sticking with an Soviet SV-8 agent for now, and building up his league for Pulp Alley.)
In the Painting Queue - The bench has been a dumping ground for anything and everything over the summer, but five things catch my eye:
Pulp Season 4 - One of two major roadblocks are actually getting completed. Watch out!
Mouslings of Yore - The Heritage Dungeon Dweller Mouslings from Reaper in the 90's are staring at me right now, with their big sad eyes.
Gnomish Space Marines - The latest Macrocosm Kickstarter was the last thing I was working on before the bench became overwhelmed. Gotta dig them out
Zombie Car - No, not animated cars, rather, vehicles that need to be weathered for a zombie/apocalypse game.
Inflatable Yard Pirates of Doom - I think I figured out our Halloween game for the year...
Project: 350 - After surviving #RPGaDay2023 and a month's worth of posts to write, we emerged in decent shape with 461 posts in the queue (308 drafts/153 scheduled) from 464 (312/152) back in July. Actual plays are very caught up, so it's a bunch of games and painting for the near future. The horror!
So apparently, in addition to the traditional Bill & Ted Day (of Excellent Adventure fame), there's a comic book, Bill & Ted Roll the Dice, coming out next week.
The reason the cover of issue #1 looks most triumphant (and familiar) falls in this quote from the original Gizmodo announcement: “For the first storyline, we wanted something that hadn’t been done in the comics before, that was a fit for the era yet still relevant today, and that had—as with all things Opus—a strong musical connection,” he said, “During those years, I spent many hours playing tabletop RPGs, and D&D has never been more popular than today. The ‘80s also spawned the Satanic Panic, when parents and religious groups railed against those games, and heavy metal music, of course.”
The biggest fact from the comic series that totally me is the fact that this mini-series (and any other series produced by Opus will be totally canon, and will take place during the 16 months after Bogus Journey where Future Bill & Ted got "awesome from practice."
Day 5 of #RPGaDAY brings us to the first one-word prompt that gave me a lot of options other people might take, but personally stumped me: "TRIBUTE."
I've done a lot of tributes to my friends and fellow players over the years, but none of my remaining, awesome friends jumped out to me for an "Ode to."
So I'll write a short tribute to actress Kim Cattrall, the woman who saved my Christmas in July RPG session.
But not from this movie....
I usually don't run holiday games, but with our online game, I've regaled enough tales of Christmas-themed games I've played in the past, and Krampus-related games yet to come, that I offered to run one last year. It was a 5e game using the ongoing campaign's characters and went quite well.
That allowed me to pencil in a Christmas in July game, and at the time, I had this for my inspiration.
God Bless the internet
I did some "research," outlined a revised version of the movie, and despite the concept, I wasn't getting things to gel, and it languished over the months of COVID.
As July neared closer, I did two important things.
I made the characters the Spice Girls. I had run a secret-agent/Charlie's Angels-style game in the Fall using the Spice Girls, with the punchline in the title, "The Search for Pumpkin Spice." The best problem of all? Using Risus, it was near perfection. Using a bit of Girl Power and some new characters, rescuing either the truck, the hero, or heroine seemed to lack some depth. And yes, I understand I'm complaining about depth in regards to the Spice Girls.
Gracie Law (Kim Cattrall's character from Big Trouble) was not going to be the damsel in distress or the heroine who needed support, not in 2020 dammit! In fact, to allow some plot progression, I reached back into Kim Cattrall's TV and filmography for some basic plot hooks.
As a man who dated women in the late 90's and early 00's, I've spent many hours sitting on the couch with them, watching Sex and the City. Samantha Jones is a perfect character to get involved in some weird high-stakes/kidnapping intrigue. Let's queue her up as the missing person the Spice Girls must find.
And after dealing with the Sex and the City vibe, we throw a curveball and have witnesses put her in the direction of an old department store with an inordinate amount of mannequins, a fight sequence with the rival department store's staff, and some more clues with Sam's long-forgotten ex-husband, who is now the manager of the department store.
A few more clues and role-playing, and we can get them seeking out, and tailing a truck full of toys into a strange part of Chinatown. Insert big fight at the beginning of Big Trouble, with a twist and it satisfactorily made for a great session.
A quick view of Wikipedia reminds me how many more movies she was in and how much more I can use in future Spice Girls games. It also questions my moral core why I haven't cobbled together a Police Academy game.
...And just in case anyone wants to read all my Odes to my fellow players, from 1979 to present:
One day I'll cover my Top 10 Movies List, but #2 on that list is Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. The right mix of history, time-travel, and casual references of the word "Dude," Bill and Ted launched a ridiculous but entertaining sequel and a short but acceptable cartoon series.
But we all now the ending of Bogus Journey was so over the top that they needed to make it a triology.
And the first official trailer for Bill and Ted Face the Music is finally out.
One 6/9, Dude...
I'll take some Gen-X middle aged angst trying to save the universe... on 8/21/2020 (8+21+20+20 = 69, Dude!)
