Do not play after dinner!

Finally got to play Talisman last night! This is a game I have been wanting to play for as long as I could remember. During the peak of my game buying days, this bad boy was out of print. By the time it had came back into print, my interest had waned considerably. Lucky for me, Jum bought a copy.

We all knew this game would take a long time to play. Hours and hours, by all accounts. When dealing with a game like that, you need to start it in the afternoon, make a day of it. Not gonna happen. Nobody wants to sit down to play a game before seven o' clock. That's just the way things go.

So after dinner, and with beers, we tried to blast through this one. Of course everyone was going to get too tired to finish. It was loads of fun though, and I keep obsessing about playing it again. Even though we didn't finish, we at least learned how to play, and got a handle on what it would take to win.

I read that they are going to start releasing expansions for it, like Talisman Dungeon. The only expansion I want to play is Timescape. That's the one least likely to get released. Guess I'm never going to get to play as a Chainsaw Warrior or Astropath.

Labyrinths and Lizards!

Jum and I drove out to Champaign to play in Labyrinth Lord at the Armored Gopher. Been wanting to do that for a while, the two and a half hour drive was a bit of a deterrent. We both played in J. Rients Big Stupid Dungeon Party at Winter War in 08, and had been itching to do some more of his brand of dungeon crawling. We both made up characters before hand, but ditched them to see what we could roll up on the fly.

Jum rolled up a fighter, with a scottish name. Seamus I think? I made a dwarf with 6 strength, Fonkin Wurp. With a six strength, I figured my role would be to shoot a crossbow and set off traps. We each got a random bit of useful gear. I got leather armor +1, Jum got a net. The net never got used, surprisingly. My fifty feet of rope got used tons though. Another party member swung me by it as a weapon, and a pair of kobolds we captured ended up being tied to each end.

I think four other players showed up besides me and Jum, to make a beefy six man party. Spent the night attacking shit, making jokes, and getting loot. That is gaming right there. I've decided I really couldn't give a hoot about "Roleplaying" unless it's funny. Crunchy tactical combat systems are a bore as well. If I wanted to play hero clicks while occasionally using funny voices, that's what I would do.

Might take Thursday off next time to make it out there, hopefully hit second level before we get a TPK. Which I am looking forward to. Lets you know the stakes are high when everyone dies!

Football for dorks

Played a game of Blood bowl tonight. It's been years since I've even thought about playing. In the mid nineties, a buddy of mine convinced me to buy a team. We were going to play at a league up at Excalibur in Merrilliville. That never panned out, just ended up buying a skaven team and playing a few games with him against his undead team.

Blood bowl was also another reason to make an excursion up to Friends Hobby back in the day. Even now, when I play any older game, it becomes a reason to make a trip up there. This is a hobby shop run by pack rats. I mean that in the nicest way, because they still have EVERYTHING. Silent death minis, Al-Quadim boxed sets, Avalon hill wargames, man, it's mind boggling.

Anyway, we went up there in about 1994, he got the hardback blood bowl companion, I bought a couple blisters of star players. I like how they used to package them, in a blister labeled star players. You got a random assortment, so if you were playing skaven, too bad, you got one mutant, frankenstein, and a dark elf. I believe we used some sort of variant from there to play dungeonbowl? It's been a long time, memory is foggy on that.

About the Blood bowl tonight. It was Orks vs. Orks, and I got mah Teef kicked in. My guys spent the whole game flat on their backs. It was fun regardless. All kindsa chances for fumbling and game changing events. Feels good to foul a player when they are down, step on their squishy parts when the ref isn't looking.

Palladium, now with less Rifts!

One of my FLGS, Critical Effect, has specialized in gaming. No comics, few collectible toys, just gaming gaming gaming. It has a back room, and two wargaming tables with a respectable amount of awesome looking terrain. They seem to have something going on every night, and last night, it was Palladium fantasy.

Played Palladium fantasy once before, ran by Jum Jum. Figured if I was going to go play, he was the one I would get to tag along. Didn't get around to making a character before hand, so just whipped up one right there at the store. Preist of Light! Yay goodie two shoes!

The pre-existing party was made up of a troll, and elf, and a "human". Mmmhmm, changeling. Does every PalFan party have one? Jum rolled up a Long bowman, so we joined this party as the most vanilla human duo ever. Had to hunt down an alchemist, led to some mishaps with teleportation circles and monster infested sewers. Good times. At one point the "human" decided to sneak into the palace and impersonate the king while the rest of us tried to find the alchemist.

Think my opinions on player death have shifted GREATLY in the past few years. I like it, and I like it alot. Not in the gm vs. player punishment sort of way, but a way to affirm reality. Impersonating a bar keep? No biggie. The king? Your dead. He is the king after all. The style of the game seemed to be more of a free form by the seat of your pants thing. Death occurs less frequently in that sort, just by the fluidity of outcomes and events. I guess death would be a gm induced punishment in free form style.