I've been debating on whether to say anything about this here, because it's kind of private, but I don't have a whole lot of readers and most of the ones I do have will go away as soon as they figure out that this isn't a gaming post. I need to get this out SOMEWHERE.
I work at a weekends-only camp for kids with terminal diseases-cancer, mostly, but we have all types here. I love working with the kids, and if it is a little depressing thinking of how many of them aren't going to make it, I try and make up for that with remembering that I'm brightening their lives.
This is my third year working at the camp, and honestly it's the only reason I came back to Tampa this year instead of doing summer school like most of my friends. The credit hours I get are nice, and as pediatric nursing is my chosen field I love the experience I get.
That's... that's not the problem part. The problem is with one of my campers. A little eight year old I'll call Kaylee. The first weekend I found her crying in her bunk and took her for a walk to cheer her up, and ever since, she's been my best friend among the kids. She has a heart defect, and before she got to camp she'd never really been allowed to run and play outside for fear of overexerting herself. She loves it, and she's always SO EXCITED to arrive Friday afternoon.
Saturday night she was feeling rather down so I took her for another walk before lights out. I remember the two of us leaving and laughing as we strolled into the woods, and then I remember her being on the ground and frantically calling everyone to help as I tried to keep her heart going. I wish I could remember what happened to give her problems.
She's in the hospital now, and she's in bad shape, but she'll last a while longer. It got her bumped up the transplant list, which is good, if scary. I went to see her this morning, and she seemed terrified. Wouldn't talk about what happened, said she didn't want to go back to camp. It's probably nothing-odds are high she hallucinated when she went down due to a lack of oxygen to the brain. If it were something scary, it would explain everything.
But still. I worry. It just doesn't feel quite right, and I don't know why
Showing posts with label doesanyone even read this?. Show all posts
Showing posts with label doesanyone even read this?. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Friday, July 15, 2011
Passing out Fliers
Spent all day yesterday sweating my ass off in a hoodie handing out fliers at the park. I had two friends helping me out, my Co-GM Damon and his girlfriend Penny. All of us were dressed in hoodies and old ratty clothes, doing our best to look homeless and stricken.
A few people thought we were begging, but mostly we did pretty well. We gave out ALL the fliers, which had the link to Seeking Truth, Dreams in Darkness, and of course to here-hello burst of traffic!-as well as a date, time, and location for the game.
Wednesday, August 3, 4PM, the old shed at the park I handed the fliers out in. They all have this blog, which has my email on it.
Hopefully I'll have some people getting in touch-I really want this to be a good game.
A few people thought we were begging, but mostly we did pretty well. We gave out ALL the fliers, which had the link to Seeking Truth, Dreams in Darkness, and of course to here-hello burst of traffic!-as well as a date, time, and location for the game.
Wednesday, August 3, 4PM, the old shed at the park I handed the fliers out in. They all have this blog, which has my email on it.
Hopefully I'll have some people getting in touch-I really want this to be a good game.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Okay, So, I've Been Busy...
Sorry about last week. Things have been going a little nuts here. Getting ready to move back to school in a month, and as always, I forget how much there is to be done.
I'm thinking I'm going to leave the reviews as they stand. Maybe at some point I'll come back to it, but for now I'm just going to work on my newest project. One last hurrah before the summer ends and I go back to finish my degree.
My new project is working on combining all of my recent interests. I've been working on making a Slenderverse LARP/tabletop system. Last week I spent largely pouring through the Call of Cthulhu larp system and Mind's Eye Theater (which is the World of Darkness larp variant) for ideas. As of now, I have a rough ruleset in mind for the LARP, at least. I'm having a hard time picturing this as a sit down game for now, it seems like something that should involve running about and investigating and getting chased through the woods or something.
To that end, with a tentative rulebook settled I'm working on putting together a basic plot. I'm hoping to get a group together to playtest it, see what needs changing. I don't really know a lot of LARPers, so I may have to open it to the public and take potluck. We'll see.
My new project is working on combining all of my recent interests. I've been working on making a Slenderverse LARP/tabletop system. Last week I spent largely pouring through the Call of Cthulhu larp system and Mind's Eye Theater (which is the World of Darkness larp variant) for ideas. As of now, I have a rough ruleset in mind for the LARP, at least. I'm having a hard time picturing this as a sit down game for now, it seems like something that should involve running about and investigating and getting chased through the woods or something.
To that end, with a tentative rulebook settled I'm working on putting together a basic plot. I'm hoping to get a group together to playtest it, see what needs changing. I don't really know a lot of LARPers, so I may have to open it to the public and take potluck. We'll see.
Monday, July 4, 2011
I'm an Idiot
Sorry to scare any of you watching this. Last week was a little test. I wanted to see if I could pull off writing a slenderblog. The answer is no, I'm thinking, so I'm going to go back to my normal reviews. Starting Wednesday.
Sorry for the insanity. I didn't mean to scare anyone.
Maybe if I tell them it's a lie I'll start to believe it.
Sorry for the insanity. I didn't mean to scare anyone.
Maybe if I tell them it's a lie I'll start to believe it.
Friday, June 24, 2011
DnD Week!: 4.0
Fourth edition has been highly debated since it came out, in the grand tradition of DnD fanboys and girls everywhere. Every edition isn't as good as the one which came before-especially for the first year or two.
hespeakstome
What fourth edition is best at is random encounters. It's a system that's MADE for one shots and minis-style battles, whatever it lacks in the rest of it's gameplay. If you're looking for good fighting fun, 4th edition might be just the system for you. If not, I'd give it a pass.
hespeakstome
What fourth edition is best at is random encounters. It's a system that's MADE for one shots and minis-style battles, whatever it lacks in the rest of it's gameplay. If you're looking for good fighting fun, 4th edition might be just the system for you. If not, I'd give it a pass.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Monday, June 20, 2011
DnD week!: ADnD/2.0
Think back to the old cliches of unwashed teenaged boys playing DnD in their basement with vague costumes. This was back in the days where DnD was still complicated and confusing enough to feel like an exclusive club.
Back when THACO was the order of the day and you couldn't play monsters.
This, ladies and gents, is exactly what they would have been playing. ADnD has survived to this day as a game people play, despite three editions afterward-an honor which First ed and third ed never achieved. It's got a different feel to it,
Back when THACO was the order of the day and you couldn't play monsters.
This, ladies and gents, is exactly what they would have been playing. ADnD has survived to this day as a game people play, despite three editions afterward-an honor which First ed and third ed never achieved. It's got a different feel to it,
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Slender Man
So I missed doing yesterday's review. I got a little distracted. I confess. Instead of spending my afternoon writing up a proper review of Mutants and Masterminds, I spent it reading. I was doing some research for that Scion game that I'm currently running, looking for interesting monsters to throw at my party, when I found something fascinating.
Slenderman.
Some of you theoretical readers might already know about him. He's apparently something of an internet phenomenon, ever since Something Awful came up with him a couple years back. Tall, faceless, wears a suit, he's a simple, primal image that is all too easy to start seeing in the shadows at night. So of course I decided I wanted to make a Slendy arc for my players. Pants shittingly terrifying is totally fair game for a SRS BZNS Scion game where they're in the process of changing all the rules and challenging divinity itself, right?
It is now. But I wanted to do my research first. So I started reading. Seeking Truth, Dreams in Darkness, A Really Bad Joke, Records of an Impossibility... You should see my favorites folder for this stuff-it's HUGE. Apparently they've made this an ARG? I'm amazed at how much work these guys put into this stuff, it's incredible. Maybe once I've run out of systems to review I'll look at starting a blog of my own.
For now, I apologize for the delay, I'll try to get back to my normal routine tomorrow. Not sure what I'm reviewing yet, but I'll tear myself away from the blogs long enough to do it
Friday, June 10, 2011
Scion
Continuing my reviews with another White Wolf system, Scion. Mechanically it has a decent bit in common with WoD, it is also a d10 system, with many of the same stats and a similar looking character sheet. In Scion, however, you're playing the children of various gods. The main book includes the Loa, the Egyptians, the Norse, the Greek, the Japanese and an invented Atlantaen pantheon, where expansions add China, the South Pacific, the Celts, and an invented 'American' pantheon.
It has rules for artifacts and for powers, as well as more passive supernatural effects you'd get from being super smart or fast or charismatic or whatever that are called 'knacks'. Mechanically, you have Hero, which is the lowest powered, then Demigod, and then God.
It's a system I've played in extensively and ran once, and I'm remarkably fond of it.
On the positive end, Scion, like all White Wolf games is very story-centric, designed to make the storytelling flow and non-combat activities feel just as important as combat. It does this very well, the Skills/Knacks/Boons system makes it easy to choose things that are useful on and off the battlefield, and to use them in either place effectively. There is a wide assortment of power trees to choose from and the system doesn't penalize you for mixing and matching.
The system of Birthrights-gifts given to you by your divine parent, is an interesting and mostly well made one. You have the choice of artifacts, followers, creatures, or mentors, and all have distinct advantages and disadvantages that are pretty well balanced.
Combat in Scion is a little more polished than in WoD, possibly because in Scion it is expected that combat will happen, whereas WoD is in a large part designed to eliminate the need for it.
On the negative end, the actual treatment of the deities in the books are pretty bad. Some are oversimplified, some are flat out changed for convenience, some are even alignment shifted for fuck's sake. The God/Titan breakdown means that in some pantheons beings that were considered forces for good are now firmly relegated to the villain side(though this is easy to ignore for one's own story).
In addition, the creature rankings are TERRIBLE and badly balanced with each other-though they still balance alright with everything else.
The Atlantaen pantheon is just weird and unnecessary. Again, easily ignored and as a supplement I would've had no problem, but they put it in the main book. There's a lot of perfectly good pantheons in the world that people actually care about, use one of them?
Overall, though, I am quite fond of Scion-though I do have a system of house rules my group plays with to make it a little more manageable. I would still very much recommend it to anyone who loves mythology in any form.
It has rules for artifacts and for powers, as well as more passive supernatural effects you'd get from being super smart or fast or charismatic or whatever that are called 'knacks'. Mechanically, you have Hero, which is the lowest powered, then Demigod, and then God.
It's a system I've played in extensively and ran once, and I'm remarkably fond of it.
On the positive end, Scion, like all White Wolf games is very story-centric, designed to make the storytelling flow and non-combat activities feel just as important as combat. It does this very well, the Skills/Knacks/Boons system makes it easy to choose things that are useful on and off the battlefield, and to use them in either place effectively. There is a wide assortment of power trees to choose from and the system doesn't penalize you for mixing and matching.
The system of Birthrights-gifts given to you by your divine parent, is an interesting and mostly well made one. You have the choice of artifacts, followers, creatures, or mentors, and all have distinct advantages and disadvantages that are pretty well balanced.
Combat in Scion is a little more polished than in WoD, possibly because in Scion it is expected that combat will happen, whereas WoD is in a large part designed to eliminate the need for it.
On the negative end, the actual treatment of the deities in the books are pretty bad. Some are oversimplified, some are flat out changed for convenience, some are even alignment shifted for fuck's sake. The God/Titan breakdown means that in some pantheons beings that were considered forces for good are now firmly relegated to the villain side(though this is easy to ignore for one's own story).
In addition, the creature rankings are TERRIBLE and badly balanced with each other-though they still balance alright with everything else.
The Atlantaen pantheon is just weird and unnecessary. Again, easily ignored and as a supplement I would've had no problem, but they put it in the main book. There's a lot of perfectly good pantheons in the world that people actually care about, use one of them?
Overall, though, I am quite fond of Scion-though I do have a system of house rules my group plays with to make it a little more manageable. I would still very much recommend it to anyone who loves mythology in any form.
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