Relinking APs

The RPG.net forums are back. It’s good to be home, even if home is now sort of blocky and defaults to 200 replies per page.

And all my Actual Play links are now edited, starting with TWH season one, and hopefully everything on my signature will work. I’ll tackle revising links in these blog posts tomorrow.

Have also remade the TWH icon in high-def, because I am me.

The art of Castlevania

Characters, animation roughs, and matte paintings for all your stealing to show players needs, from the two seasons so far of Castlevania on Netflix.

Stan Lee's legacy

Stan Lee did a lot to push superheroes back into the mainstream after the end of the Second World War, and to make them relevant to a much wider audience after years of being aimed straight at kids.

Chris Sims covered arguments over his creative claims and business well at Comics Alliance, though I would have mentioned the Atlas Seaboard fiasco as well. But all that aside, his writing and editing, along with collaborations with the likes of Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, made ongoing serial storytelling a much stronger part of the business as well as starting with stronger worldbuilding as part of the Marvel brand. See also this AC on DC’s reaction, as well as this on the teen hero. And Quarter Bin on the Marvel Silver Age model, and on Spider-Man in particular.

He also used Stan’s Soapbox for a lot of good through the years, as well as creating characters who championed courage, kindness, and resistance to intolerance.

Stan Lee

With great power comes great responsibility. ’Nuff said.

Nosferatu-ing it up

Everything assembled for next Storytellers Vault project, which I admit is slightly insane... making and photographing busts of a variety of Nosferatu characters, so that I and other STs can use the pictures as visual cues when using photos for everybody else.

Last piece of the puzzle: toothpicks for, ironically, teeth.

Armistice Day

The Great War officially ended a hundred years ago. Fighting stumbled on here and there as communication broke down, and then there were problems for many getting home.

The Classics

The Buffy episode Band Candy aired twenty years ago today, and the Angel episode Spin The Bottle sixteen years ago.

November 10th is Regress Adult Characters To Teenagers At The Worst Possible Time Day.

Mark your calendars.

Widows

Widows was really good. And pretty much entirely outside of the genres I discuss here, apart from the heist part. But as reasons to bring together a party go, “you all lost someone you love to the same thing, and now have to deal with the fallout together” is a pretty strong one.

An unfamiliar viewer on Serenity

“What’s a Reaver?” from the introduction.
“Aww, no!” at a certain plot point that those familiar with the film can likely guess.
“That was most enjoyable!” Which was a relief.

Daredevil Season 3

Daredevil Season 3 uses the length of the season better than a lot of the other Marvel Netflix series (not least Daredevil S2) with several slow burn plots which pretty much all dovetail together rather than having a side plot taking up a chunk of the middle. I could have lost the imaginary conversations, but hey. It also managed to come back from S2 and The Defenders and go from Magic Ninja Apocalypse back to a straight-up crime story with one weird power on each side. And there was a moment that made me gasp.

V5 Anarch and Camarilla

Congratulations to Roger de Camden on becoming Prince of Edinburgh! I’m sure the Toreador and Dunsirns are delighted.

Anarch addresses a lot of subjects mostly in-character, for a feel of the messy unlives of modern vampires all over the world.

Camarilla talks more out-of-character, and goes more into the structure and restructuring of the sect, as well as outside influences like the Church of Caine and a big section on the Second Inquisition. To me it feels like the more broadly useful of the two.

The Banu Haqim and the Ministry (nee Setites) don’t get entire unique Disciplines any more, though they do get special powers and styles. I am cool with this, it always bugged me that all the non-Camarilla clans got their own personal Disciplines.

(Edit: At the time of writing I hadn’t looked closely at the Chechnya section. I don’t think that was a good call.)

What do you do after evil is defeated but not destroyed? Keep at it.

Star Trek with Michael Chabon

The latest Short Treks one-shot (starring Aldis Hodge) is written by Michael Chabon, who is also in the writers’ room for the new Picard series, like the original series featured episodes by Harlan Ellison and Robert Bloch as well as more TV-based writers. More recently we’ve seen the likes of Neil Gaiman writing Doctor Who.

What means this... Camarilla?

The Anarch and Camarilla book PDFs for V5 are out to backers, and go on general sale on Wednesday. I will say more then.

And the award for spoiler of the year goes to...

And the award for spoiler of the year goes to... it would be a spoiler to say.

All Tomorrow's Parties

Went fairly low-key with the Elysium Halloween party in From The Dust.

The Watch House 15th Anniversary!

Tonight is the fifteenth anniversary of the first Actual Play post for The Watch House, which I put up not long after the first session.

This game changed my life, and not just mine.

This is why this here RPG blog has such a baffling name.

L.A. By More Nights

L.A. By Night will be back for season two in the new year, with one-on-one sessions starting at the end of this month.

And yes, it will be on Youtube as well. As a really good advertisement for Vampire and specifically V5, that seemed likely but confirmation is welcome.

V5 The Stareturns to a grand tradition

Geek & Sundry Alpha is following L.A. By Night with another V5 game on Starter Kit. Starter Kit games are designed for interested new observers to show off the rules a bit more - the launch this time includes character generation videos as well as the first episode, which I think is a great idea. They normally run for six episodes, each being about forty minutes each rather than a full three-hour or longer as-live session. This time out Jasmine Bhullar is Storyteller, with regular Starter Kit GM Jason Charles Miller as one of the players, the other four being new to the setting.

November

November... Bonfire Night, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and of course midterms in the USA.