Dave's not here.

Look elsewhere.

Happy birthday Melissa!

Friday evening, we take off. A week and a half of no web design quandaries. A break from the grind. No web surfing or D&D either, but I'll manage. :) Time to... invoke the cliches, I guess: time to get away from it all and recharge the spiritual batteries.

I thought about packing the D&D books to rewrite that Divine Servant prestige class while I'm there... but then I realized the utter goofiness of that. Real servitude to the divine is going to be quite enough to think about. :)

(Just for the curious and to get it out of my system, here's what I have in mind for changes: no "union" stuff, simpler channeling or none at all, a modest spell list, and gradually increasing celestial and aspect of the deity type traits.)

I'm drinking me. I would never have bought "green tea with hemp, ginseng & royal jelly" if it weren't named Dave. But since it is, how could I resist?

Actually the stuff is pretty good. What the description on the front doesn't mention is the pear juice, which makes all the difference. :)

I should nag my sister to send a photo of Pyewacket to Jones Soda. All my own interesting photos are sized for the web, too small for their requirements.

The latest miniatures order arrived, this time with figures to represent Few and Livia 2: Enter the Half-Dragon. Gengh and Ivy are finished (I forgot to scan, doh!), Saris is nearly so, and Lisanna has just begun.

I had Livia's human-sized, wingless half-dragon figure picked out and the colors planned. (Granted it looks like a not-overdressed human sorceress, but the market is not exactly glutted with half-dragon halfling figures.) Slightly blueish silver skin, deep blue-black leather... and then Mike ruled that chaotic neutral Livia wouldn't have the blood of a lawful good dragon. The dragon blood exerts a certain influence on the personality. Makes sense. So now she's copper, with really bad hair that I need to redo, and is going to wear white leather. It'll be pretty striking if I can get it right.

But she still won't have eyes. :P

A mostly pointless argument I've been having with a guy on the official Dungeons & Dragons boards has made me think about how I think. His contention is that Paladins are these ultra-conservative, straight-laced, idealistic, strict, elitist, stoic, anal-retentive guys. He doesn't like the idea that in 3rd Edition, non-Humans can be Paladins. He abhors the idea that some DMs allow for non Lawful-Good Paladins. If he could get away with it, he would probably say that Paladins have to be white males between the ages of 25 and 40, with a strict dress code and grooming standards. (Okay, maybe I'm being a little unfair to the guy with that...)

I gave him the examples of Joan of Arc and of Paksenarrion. It was pretty clear he didn't read The Deed of Paksenarrion, says Elizabeth Moon doesn't know what she was doing the couple of hundred times she called Paks a Paladin, and if he had to choose a class for Joan he'd pick Fighter. Uh, okay. We're not going to agree on the subject, I can tell. :) If Few -- champion of his god, avenger of wrongs, kicker of the shins of evil, and defender of Them What Needs Defending -- is not a Paladin, at least he's in good company. :)

What's been interesting though, is that the argument has called out the literalists and those who rely more on their own judgement. According to some, what is written is meant to be taken literally and neither questioned nor changed. I find myself wondering if this is their philosophy for the real world and not just the microcosm of gaming... because I recognize my own philosophy in my approach to the game. I don't think that "alignment" is an absolute, because I don't believe in absolute good and evil in the real world either. Granted, there are some things that are so far across everyone's line that they might as well be absolute -- but there's a lot of room in the middle.

As I posted over there, no text can possibly list every right act and every wrong act. You're screwed if you can't figure out the difference yourself.

And with that lovely thought, I'm more or less off... there's a D&D session after work Thursday and we head from the office right to the airport Friday, so no more time to update. See you in Regnal Year 9 of the 196th Nisut-Bity! :)

The end of the Kemetic year is here coming up on July 30. The new year begins August 5. In between are 5 intercalary days, rogue days that a part of no year at all.

It is a part of our faith that things go increasingly awry over time, but are renewed at the New Year -- like a sawtooth waveform. The low point is right now, and we see that in miscommunication, mistakes, emotional weirdness, and things that just aren't quite right.

My mood has been generally reflecting that. I've been thinking about how things decay, or appear to decay. Everything decomposes. Entropy eats away at the order we create. Clean things get dirtier, neatness gives way to mess. The novelty wears off of new things and they become old. Work we once took pride in now stands as an example of how much our skills or insight were lacking back then. Things we did years ago are now a source of embarrassment. The computer that was so cool last year is now barely adequate to run new software. My car sits in the driveway getting worse instead of better, and Jeff's shiny new Tracker will be in much the same condition in 2011. Bodies age... I didn't get a great one to start with and I don't take good care of what I have, and expect I'll be half-blind, bald and toothless by the time I'm 50.

I seem to remember Steven Hawking saying that entropy is what defines the passage of time. It could be a blatant misquote, because memory degrades over time as well. ;) But our lives are the constant struggle against that entropy. When we run out of energy, we eat and sleep to regain it. When things get dirty, we clean them. When they break, we fix them. We have not yet figured out how to entirely stop our own bodies from falling apart... but we're working on it.

My Mother's various functions seem to have a thing in common: the struggle against decay. The preservation of knowledge through writing. The promise of a span of time to live in, and a secure place in the universal history even after that lifespan ends. A solid foundation for a building meant to stand up to the ravages of time.

Time brings other things as well: experience, wisdom, growth, new opportunities, new friends. Not to mention, being a "space" in which we can do things. :)

Today was a company Six Flags outing day. I skipped it this time, not lured by the call of the water park as my roommates were. Instead I worked on the previously mysteriously missing DR wedding page, among other things.

I don't know about the weather at the park, but here we had all kinds of nasty heavy thunderstorm action around lunchtime. I was trying to find the new location of Wizard's Wagon (which moved out of the mall, supposedly to somewhere near the Hwy K exit on 70) in hopes that they'd have the latest Dragon issue (from what I've heard, my Sage Advice question appears in it) and some interesting miniatures, but as the clouds began to unload I gave up and turned back to the office. I was kind of expecting refugees from the theme park to show up on my heels, but it didn't happen. Guess they stuck it out.

I note that last time the company went to Six Flags, the same weather happened. Lots of heat, then lots of rain.

$300 coming back from Uncle Sam. As the Kai-Imakhu wrote, I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, it will help pay for retreat, which means I can take care of things like new lenses and car fixes (or replacement... I'm kind of jealous of Jeff's new wheels and such that much sooner. I'm not complaining. But where does the money come from? It seems to me like the powers that be are buying our votes with the country's money. If we have a surplus of tax money, shouldn't it be used to reduce the national deficit or something?

Retreat is coming up -- in fact we're getting on a plane next Friday. For some reason, it seems hard to believe. The spiritual side of my life goes in cycles, and has been on a downswing lately -- it always picks back up eventually, but that is never more true than at New Year. Journeys begin there. At the '99 retreat I was named, which gave me a big clue on where to go with my life. At last year's retreat I went through the Shemsu Ordeal and started serving as an assistant scribe. This year, there's Wab (lay priesthood) and divination training, and probably something beyond that... I have half a clue of what to expect, but one never really knows.

And of course there's the too-rare chance to meet much of family #3 (office folks being family #2), have a lot of great discussions, drum like a maniac, and eat (superior-to-St.-Louis) Chicago food. But that's really a side benefit to the spiritual jumpstart.

With all that coming up, I'm still thinking more on games. High-level design concepts for HJ (not as in high character levels, as in wider and more abstract). Possibile setting and story for a D&D campaign. Thinking about my characters -- I have a real attachment to them, and though playing 4 nights in a week takes up a lot of time, I still find myself wanting to make more things happen with three of them (poor Gengh has not found his niche yet). What's with the jewels embedded in people in Steph's campaign? Who wrote those mysterious notes in Jeff's campaign? How is Livia going to deal with the whole dragon thing, and how are other people going to deal with it?

Next (prestige?) class project will probably be the Brawler. I have this image of a Gor'Tog, earth genasi, or just a big human, specializing in unarmed fighting without actually being a monk. From what I see on various boards out there, I'm not the only one -- though I'm less into the idea of a "pugilist" per se. I figure one of these will be my next character in whatever campaign that happens. :)

Someone probably doesn't realize how nice I'm being because he's playing Anarchy Online. Post your news before someone else does!

A busy week, at work and afterwards. Lots of web 2.0 content work from me, technical stuff from the rest of the team, plus meetings. Jeff's game Tuesday night, a naming ceremony Wednesday night (due to a slight mixup I stood in for Taihyeninpu (Jonetta) and Meres stood in for Tashenutnit (Bonnie), but it works anyway), Mike's game #2 Thursday night, Steph's game Friday night, Mike's game #1 Saturday night.

And then there's the Diablo II Expansion... yeah, I bought it at full price after all. Couldn't find an online deal that would have come out better after shipping.

I quickly found that the new 800x600 mode is unfriendly on a crappy 14" monitor (I need to find the warranty info on the big one). I started off with the Assassin, mainly going up the Martial Arts skill tree because I thought it'd be cool. It was... but it was also kind of a waste, I found. Why spend 9 mana charging up and 6 more to make a devastating kick, when you can kill things faster with a bow anyway? The novelty of the style thing wears off quick -- it's still Diablo, not an Ang Lee film.

So I tried the Druid. I'm sticking more with shapeshifting and summoning this time around, and though I've made some training "mistakes" because I wanted to check out lots of possibilities, up until recently (beginning of Act 3) I've had no trouble with this character... almost no challenge in fact. Maybe my view is skewed by the much more difficult fighting in Eastern Sun, but Andariel, Duriel and the lesser bosses were all a piece of cake.

The coolest features may be the "fixes" rather than all the new items and stuff. The weapon switch is a great idea, if unrealistically instantaneous. The fact that hirelings are actually worth using now... give a bow that does cold damage and armor that casts Frost Nova when hit to a hireling rogue, drop the occasional healing potion on her, and she's actually helpful... she'll even cast the occasional spell to light up targets. I can't wait to give a Fast Cast Rate sword or wand to my ice mage hireling. <cackle>

Lots of possible training options. A druid specializing more in elemental magic, summoning only ravens and vines. A druid specializing completely in shapeshifting. An assassin who specializes in Traps with some Shadow Mastery. A necromancer specializing in poison (now that it's been fixed).

We finally made it to 2nd level in Mike's Thursday game. It's a less serious campaign than the rest, which has its good and bad points. The party members don't cooperate well, but there's a good dose of comic relief. "The coolest part of this door is the trap. Watch this!"

Steph's campaign is off to an odd start. It's not a party yet so much as a group of six dazed individuals who had a bad situation thrust upon them. The start of a campaign always seems to be the most awkward for the characters as well as the players, and this is no exception. But it's going to be an interesting time :)

There was a lot of tactical planning in Mike's Saturday game, which I enjoyed... though it carried on to a length that started to annoy some. When Mike got out the timer we quickly settled on a plan and got to work. It was a tough battle, and when reinforcements arrived we got out of there. Once before this lizardman druid entangled us and ran away, and now we've returned the favor. Next time, I want him dead. And I'll try and be a little more paranoid about people who flee the battle to get help. :)

I know, it's been a week since I updated. Between working on informational stuff for the new website, and various D&D related things, I've actually been writing a fair bit lately though.

100 degree heat and 90% humidity. Dog days, woof. There are supposed to be some storms tonight and tommorow which will cool things down slightly, but according to the forecasts, still not into the realm of comfort.

Tuesday night's D&D game presented our group with lots of varied challenges and no really long drawn-out battles. Our audacity exceeds our tactical sophistication, but we made it through okay. Logs are being kept both by Jeff and my character Marabi. I'm not quite as happy with my second entry as the first; I think I put more effort into remembering what we did than in really trying to write with her "voice".

Wednesday night I rolled up my character for Steph's campaign, which is indeed going to be set in her pre-DragonRealms era Elanthia. She ran my character through his background and up to the point where the campaign will begin. It's great knowing a character's past so well, knowing what drives him and how he is likely to react to things, even before the first game session. He already has a couple of mysteries he wants to sort out and some enemies to deal with when he can. (To adapt a line from an EverQuest comic, revenge is a dish best served 15 levels later.)

You can guess what happens when you get game designers hooked on an open-ended game system like this. Mike has been evaluating and rating prestige classes, and I've been building new ones. Fan Dancer is in a more or less final form, and the first draft of Divine Servant is up. The mid to high levels of the Paladin class don't seem very interesting and none of the official prestige classes really fit my character's story, so I'm making my own. Of course I'll have to get Steph's approval, but it's nice to be able to post something publicly and get comments on its balance from a wide audience. 3rdedition.org has been good for that, and has made me pretty confident in the Fan Dancer class and my grasp on things.

Other ideas I may pursue as classes or prestige classes: variants of the Empath and Moon Mage from DragonRealms (perhaps even different Moon Mage sects), Engineer or Saboteur, Brawler, and if Song and Silence doesn't have one when it comes out, Sniper.

All the Paladin stuff has got me reading The Deed of Paksenarrion again. Though a few obvious D&D influences show through, it's good overall. It sure gives TSR Book-Shaped Objects a sound thrashing in the Does Not Suck category.

We opened up the almost-done new website to preview and commentary by staff members. The reactions were very polarized. Some people had nothing but love for the new site, despite the glitches, typos and stuff that is still missing. Other people were... well, let's just say that GMs have the same diversity of personality that players do, including the 5% that generates 95% of complaints.

We'll be welcomed by full mailboxes tommorow morning...

A.I. is a good movie. It doesn't get bogged down. I think it's safe to say that, while it's obviously based on a well-known story, there are no stories quite like this one. Give it a go. :)

Kemetic Orthodox moviegoers might find references to some of the Names and myths, or else maybe we're just trying too hard... probably every culture has a myth they can see in this story somewhere.

My war fan arrived Friday. It's obviously not an artistic masterpiece, and is probably (as-is) a less dangerous weapon than a broom handle, but it's not bad. We'll see how good a prop it makes. If nothing else, it looks nice on the wall and moves a lot of air. ;)

The painting is going... not too well, not too badly. Gengh's skin color has changed from a mustardy yellow-green-brown to a purplish tone that isn't much better. I'll probably just go for a standard tanned color on the third try. Meanwhile, I sprayed a couple layers of clearcoat on Livia and Marabi and brought them in to last night's game... and Marabi got chipped anyway, right at the belt thingy in front, and I'll have to fix tiny red and gold areas.

I ordered some more miniatures. One reptilian humanoid quasi-sea creature and one flashily dressed "sorceress" who could be anything; one of them may work for the altered Livia or not, but they look cool anyway. A bald Chinese monk with a staff, who could easily be a sorc or wizard as well, might wind up portraying my character for Steph's campaign. And a lich queen and an Angel of Death, just for grins. I still have other minis half-done or not started as well, but I wanted to find ones appropriate to my characters :)

The Thursday D&D session went better for Gengh... no kobolds this time, just Rodents Of Unusual Size (and one of REALLY unusual size), so he managed to stay conscious. I have a feeling that the kobold encounters we had before were not really intended for a first-level party, but their hostility was thanks to Poobles' theft of their idols. I'm not complaining... Poobles gets us in lots of trouble, but trouble is what makes D&D fun. ;)

The Saturday game went pretty well too. This group not only "encountered" some kobolds, we burned down their fortifications, wiped out a good portion of one of their villages (we couldn't catch all the fleeing noncombatants, which is fine), and took out their royalty.

Looking forward to the Tuesday game... and to Steph's campaign. I've been suggesting she run one in pre-DragonRealms era Elanthia, mostly because it's nice to know something about the setting in advance. Some people don't find it important, but I like knowing who the gods are, what the overall political situation is, and so on.

One thing I have finally gotten through my head is that you have to have an idea of what your character is going to do. Just saying "I'm going to be a Halfling Rogue" or "I'm going to be a Half-Orc Barbarian" isn't enough... not with all the different feats, skills, weapons, prestige classes, multiclassing, and so on.

Don't even think in terms of classes right away, but of what you want to do, or who you want your character to be like. The rogue Bilbo Baggins isn't the character I would choose to play, but the rogue Indiana Jones is completely different. Or the rogue-monk Jen or rogue-fighter Dark Cloud from Crouching Tiger, or the rogue-barbarian William Wallace from Braveheart, or the rogue-paladin Batman... heh.

Livia evolved from being "a rogue" to "a sharpshooter" to... well, she's going to pick up one more Rogue and one Cleric level (as a priest of Chronepsis or Io), and then become a Dragon Disciple. By the time she's level 20, she will probably be something like a Dragon Disciple 10, Rogue 5, Fighter 2, Sorc 1, Cleric 1, Gladiator 1. That could actually be a very kick-ass character if all of it was focused on melee combat... as it is, she'll be a jack of all trades, master of none. Nothing wrong with that -- in almost every situation she'll be able to do something useful. But it lacks a certain focus.

My thought for Gengh is to get one level of Barbarian, because he acts like one, but mostly stick with Druid. The temptation to get Monk or Fighter levels, or alternate Druid and Barbarian, is strong... but the lure of those higher level spells is stronger. ;)

Marabi is focused. She has two levels of Fighter; she can either get three more, or (more likely) two Ranger levels and one more Fighter. Either way, the intent is to qualify for Fan Dancer, which she'll take all 10 levels of. After that, Gladiator and Devoted Defender (if there's someone in the party who needs defending, like maybe our wizard Ivy) look like good choices.

For Steph's campaign, if it's in Elanthia I'm thinking either a River Elf cleric of Eluned who uses harpoons, nets, etc. for his weapons (and probably never multiclass or take a prestige class unless I come up with one), or an Elothean conjurer who'll go for the Alienist prestige class. And if it's a different setting, probably something similar with the serial numbers filed off. ;)

The saga of Diablo II is far from over. Lady Ne has begun Hell difficulty in Eastern Sun, at level 54. She probably won't continue on to kill Diablo again, because the expansion is on the shelves. So far, I haven't been able to make myself pay $35+ for it when it invalidates Eastern Sun (which is free)... but from what I've heard so far it sounds like a lot of fun. I'll probably go for it eventually.

Lots of stormy weather today... which means less fireworks. Yay!

Does it ever strike you as ironic that this most American of holidays helps to bolster the economy of a communist, tyrannical nation? Hmm...