Also I should write more

I write for shit, but upon a rereading of the below, it's almost exactly how I talk.  Full steam ahead what the fuck are you talking about 'pause for breath' or punctuation or somebullshit like that?  When I say "describe", I want that fucking sentence to be filled with so many adjectives that the ones on top are torn between fighting for a clawhold to stay on the pile or grasping at their friends who may not have been so lucky in their positioning and need a helping hand to stay aboard or be flung into the abyss of the mind, never to be seen again.

New year, new goals for gaming?

There are so many things I find myself urgently wanting to do.  Like play the flute more often, so I don't forget how, and run more, so I can stay in shape and maybe some parts of me could weigh more but wobble less, and wanting to organize my limited belongings so they all fit into one tiny space as a [probably passive-aggressive] method to gloat about how all MY shit is tidy and all of someone else's shit is NOT TIDY IN THE LEAST.  In fact, it has never seen or heard of this concept of "tidy", and wouldn't believe in its existence if you invented a religion and performed passion plays about it every year.

Another kicker is that I really need to get started on my Fae campaign, because I love the concept in my head, but setting it on tiles and letting other people play around in my headspace is both intensely, deliciously manipulative and also highly annoying and intrusive.  I have only the most basic of concepts for the world itself, because I have to reject any sources that are universally available Note here:  This is the #1 easiest method to prevent meta-gaming -  Fuck the players out of a way to learn the history or backstory from the same source you're using.  It's labor-intensive, sure, but it does prevent the village idiot from spontaneously knowing how to kill the monster you've carefully chosen for the PCs to fight, despite the fact that VI there, as a character, has never seen or heard of this monster and really has no way to justify this knowledge.

(Minor side rant:  WHAT NOW, BLOGGER?  I can't indent a paragraph?  You can go suck a sweaty ballsack.  I'll indent if I want to.  YOU DON'T KNOW ME! YOU'RE NOT MY REAL MOM!)

        So, back to the world.  I know I want it to be indescribably beautiful (an impossibility when you have to describe it for the players, yes, but I'd like to try.) and constantly deadly.  That field of sunflowers?  Lovely, yes?  They're taller than the species you're used to, true, and they sway with a rhythm you wouldn't expect, and isn't that a lovely tune coming from that scarecrow-looking thing!  Oh!  It's got some sort of reedy instrument thing strung from it's form here, so the wind blows through it and makes that sound.  Let's take this little reed flute/recorder/ocarina thingy with us, in case we need to charm some plants, ha ha. OH HOLY SHIT!  Sunflowers gone wild or someshit!  AAugh!  Vines!  They've got the cleric! Fuck! Fuck this! Fireball! Someone jesus baby help oh man! *ACTION FOR DAYS*

        Later, while panting and bandaging up the wounded and checking over their supplies while the war-minded and angry party member sees to it that the fire of wet plants is constantly fed, they'll wonder.  Hrm...What was in this field that was worth protecting, or was it the plants themselves that had/have value?  What are these seeds like, and should we take them?  Who can we convince to eat these to see if they're poisonous?  I want them to gradually realize that this entire lovely world is very fairytale-esque, with the picturesque and idyllic villages and smiling, vapid townsfolk and possibly the random flashmob that sings about being the only smart girl in the village and so forth.  And also very dark farytale-esque, like a poisonous version of Alice in Wonderland.  "Drink me!", they'll read.  "I think NOT, Sir!", they shall decide unanimously.
     This ought to result in forcing rations and drinkable water to finally become a necessary commodity of gameplay.  Favors from townsfolk will be approached with caution, and marketplace interaction only sought when all other avenues have failed.  Because they can't trust the surface words of any bargain, and every fishmonger could be an Unseelie in disguise.

I've even thrown in a villain (as if something in a land of dubious morals could recognize deliberate evil in a mere few centuries) by the name of Dalv Lucard, and the tithing of human youths and so forth.  I want them to enter this place like it's Disneyland and spend the latter sessions desperate to escape this living, breathing, technicolor hell, and its beautifully twisted claws shall pursue them up to the very breach they entered by.

        So aside from the firming up of landscape and the deliberate planting of plot lines, I only have a few issues  and most of them revolve around Players and their PCs.  Some Players don't have the grace and civility to create a PC with a malleable mindset who will adapt to the situations presented rather than staunchly refuse to enter the proceedings unless clubbed, drugged, stuffed into a sack and dragged to the forefront of an NPC encounter.  Others can.not. let go of their favorite characters from games past, and while I'm fine with Players having a favorite 'type' of character or a certain theme they like to include, and that's all fine.  Really.  I am not okay with yet another revamp of a past character whose backstory and eventual evolution has been set in their own personal mind-canon for YEARS.  I have heard the stories, sir, and while I was at first amused by retellings of actual gameplay antics, I grow weary of your continued insistence that anything that happened outside of the killing field of d20s and damage has any importance to my actual, real, life.

For gods' sake, just write fanfiction about your OC and be done with it, like the rest of the internet!

        Another hurdle with playing using an established group of Players is that they're used to being high level.  No one wants to start at the bottom, and while I respect and understand that, I'd like to have some kind of realistic balance between  
a. handing the farmboy an enchanted sword and flinging the poor dear into a burning barn filled with angry owlbears and
b. 7 war-hardened battle-scarred steam-panting individuals who eat NPCs of 6th level or lower for BREAKFAST, can kill a troll with each hand while simultaneously reciting the spell that blackens the sun and forces their personal aura to explode and paint the world in the blood of their enemies.
        I want to make the story the important part, and throw in some believable fights and have those fights be a challenge that makes the Player more invested in the campaign as a whole. (I, too, know how irritating it can otherwise be.  One minute you're walking to the next town, traveling past the boredom that probably represents some inanimate and uninteresting landscape when BAM!  Thirteen goblins, with nothing better to do than attack travelers who carry nothing of immediate value, attack you from nowhere, dying easily and with very little to say in the way of badass last words, and strangely their murder at your hands nets you 30 gold, a sword with a ruby in the hilt, and some goblin meat.)

I need my mojo back, please

I need to knit that sweater. NEED IT.

It's not often that you can so faithfully recreate a piece of your favorite show in such detail and by hand, and so I NEED the John Watson sweater.  I've saved the pattern, the yarn won't be much, really, but I just have to finish these fucking commissioned gloves first.

WE HATES THEM, PRECIOUS.

Someone explain this crazyness to me.

Yes.  I spelled craziness with a "y". 

So!  I stalk tumblr.  I haven't committed yet for a few reasons.
1.  I don't have the internet at home, and tumblr is FILLED with delicious panty-melting images, so that's no good.
2.  I have deliberately painted myself into a largish corner with my online profile, because anonymity turns me into a different person and it creeps my shit.  It is ME, and it creeps MY shit to compare what I say/do online to real life, provided I was able to say/do it under the guise of someone not-me. 

Still.  I stalk tumblr.  And one person I stalk on it has been in the same location as a favorite actor of mine several times.  She has seen him in REAL LIFE.  And she posted in a little tweet-like post that she was finally in the same room as him and did not bump into him.  She later clarified, after receiving many responses about how lucky she was to be near his awesomeness, that she honestly could not care about it.  She has no interest.

I got that.
No, really, I understand.

Sometimes I really get sick of having to sidestep my backyard pool filled with gold pieces, jewels, and disgustingly hot people wearing no clothing and just begging for attention while my incredible sound system projects solid holograms of my favorite singers and bands that are programmed to provide a perfect soundtrack to my every mood.  The the walk to the end of my jaguar-filled personal parking garage is SO LONG.  God.  Some days I just want my personal retinue to carry my silk-draped litter faster but with less jostling as they traverse the indoor hallways filled with rescued kittens who all get along and none of whom shit anything but rounded precious stones and never track cat sand out of the box.

It's great that there are people who are not attracted to those who literally exude sex.  I mean, less competition for the rest of us poor saps, but really?  Honestly? WHAT IS THIS I DON'T EVEN

So....DeeDee it is

I've found go-go boots for about $20, and a pattern for the hat won't be an issue.  The shorts are likewise a non-issue.  My big thing is making sure the boots arrive first, so I can match the color to the top.

Also:  Geek Prom 2012.  I want EVERYTHING prom should've been, but I'll settle for a fun evening, I suppose.  I have a dress, and a year to get the boots and accessories.  I have co-conspirators, (one of whom really ought to take the opportunity to get an awesome dress/outfit and go TOTALLY sexay with it), and we'll make do, I suppose.  Why is no one as excited as I am about part one of The Hobbit?

Healing Surge vs. Second Wind

So, in D&D, my people die. A lot. We fought a fucking DRAGON in Encounters this week. Just sayin'.

As the cleric, it's my task to be there to help them. Not to "help them on their way to post-mortem existence", but to use my clerical skills to bring them back to fighting status.

UNFORTUNATELY, it seems to me that my powers are pretty limited in this respect. I can heal someone twice, and am learning to pay special attention to the difference between "healing surge" (which any character can do a specified number of times per in-game day) and a "second wind" which a character can perform only once during an encounter.

However, I'm still having trouble wrapping my head around the apparent fact that when someone is neg, I cannot in any way, do something more than stabilize if I've already used healing word twice (per encounter). It's like getting over there, staunching the bleeding wound, and then giving them a nice pat on the head. There, there. It's fine. I can perhaps do a heal check next round and help you out, but for now, let's just sit in the path of utter destruction and hope for the best.

Urgh.

Halloween Prep

I want to be a million things! Argh!
And I have to pick just one (or two) so it'll be easier on the budget.

Items to consider:
1. Jem
2. Rainbow Brite (not a skanky version with cheap ass leg and arm warmers)
3. Sherlock (BBC)
4. Dalish elf from DA
5. ANY character from Dance Central