RPG character quiz
Taken from funwithrage, since it looked entertaining.
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Out of all of your characters from any game, who would you…
Take to lunch?
I can’t remember his name off the top of my head, but my Deadlands character was a cross between Abraham Van Helsing and Egon Spengler. I think he’d have some fascinating stories and insights, and the fact that he’s slightly mad wouldn’t hurt a bit.
Want to rescue you?
“Professor K”, the mysterious mentalist I played in some Shadowrun sessions. He’s appeared in lots of fic written by our crowd, and he’s pretty good at the whole rescuing thing – plus he has some interesting resources at his disposal.
Never want to meet in a dark alley?
I don’t really play many scary or disturbing characters, but after thinking about it, I’m not sure I’d want to meet “Circy”, my World of Warcraft warlock. She looks pretty friendly most of the time, but even when they’re the “good guys”, warlocks in this game are not nice people. Besides, she’d be backed up by a Voidwalker demon or something.
Hug?
“Mirandala”, the gnome mage I play in WoW. She’s adorable, and I think of her as pretty sweet, if a little butch at the same time.
Be for a day?
“Professor K”, definitely. Knowing his backstory info that never made it into the game, I’d love the chance to play with some of his tech toys and visit some of the places he had access to… such as Federation starships. (Yeah, our Shadowrun games could get weird.)
Steal powers/skills from?
I’ve played “Nebula” in several game systems and worlds, and she’s almost always an accomplished musician, generally as a singer and keyboardist. I’d love to have those abilities gifted to me.
Take to an amusement park?
In the post-apocalyptic Deadlands: Hell on Earth, I played a powerful Wiccan whose personality and look I created by trying to imagine a very angry, bitter tzel. I think a trip to Disney World, or even Busch Gardens, would have done her a lot of good. At least she’d have some good memories to help bolster her the next time she fought techno-zombies.
See their story made into a movie?
“Professor K” and “Nebula” would require their own high-budget series, with possibly several spin-offs. Actually, I think the flying armored “Eclipse” from ptownhiker‘s Marvel Super Heroes game would be a fun movie subject, especially once the “ancient astronauts” part of his backstory came back into his life.
Never trade places with, ever?
In a Technicon LARP, I played the Prince of Russia in an alternate 19th century of Imperial expansion and high-stakes diplomacy. Given the constant backstabbing, betrayal, and threats of war, I’m not sure how he ever got any sleep.
Get stuck on an island with?
Well, the flying mage “Bombardier” from Shadowrun and “Eclipse” would each be useful, as they could fly us home. “Mirandala” could teleport us out, and “Professor K’s” friends have hi-tech ways to find us and retrieve us. If I’m really seriously stuck, though, I think “Nebula” would be a pretty charming companion.
I do still make Lego buildings
I feel like this xkcd cartoon all the time:
I’m so often afraid that at some point, someone will notice that I have absolutely no clue what’s going on and have just over the years gotten really good at pretending otherwise.
Eventually, I get over that and move on with my life. Sausage pizza or chocolate chip ice cream usually helps a lot.
My first fan convention
RoVaCon (the Roanoke Valley Convention) Seven was held at Northside High School on the other side of town from where I lived. Since I was only thirteen, and had neither a bike or many friends back then, I had to count on my dad for a ride there. (At thirteen, I was convinced that I couldn’t possibly stay upright on a bike for longer than a few minutes. Eventually, I figured out otherwise.)
I had read about SF conventions in books about Star Trek fandom, and this sounded exciting as heck – I wanted to go so badly. The advertising I’d seen said that the event ran for the whole weekend, but for reasons I can’t remember, my dad wouldn’t take me on Friday. He then wouldn’t take me on Saturday, either – I don’t remember whether there was a scheduling conflict, he didn’t feel well, or he was being obstinant; these things don’t matter when one’s an overeager thirteen-year-old fan. Finally, though, he took me to the con… on Sunday… at around 2pm. Yep, I paid a day rate to get into a con that was already shutting down. What a way to start my fannish life, eh?
The only guest I remember was Laura Banks, an actress with a small background part in that year’s Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. I didn’t get to see her speak, she was already done for the weekend, but I remember her on the con posters – I was thirteen after all. I do remember seeing a fan who’d already obtained or constructed a “monster maroons” uniform.
The total con experience for me was seeing a few costumes in the halls, and wandering through the dealers’ room, in which I only remember Hitchhiker’s Guide LPs, Starfleet Battles miniatures, and exotic gaming dice, none of which my dad was in the mood to purchase for me. Crushingly aware that there was nothing else to see, I told my dad to go ahead and take me home.
Thankfully for the path I’d take in life, RoVaCon Eight would be much better.
30 Con Questions
Bob Snare put this test up on Facebook, and since it didn’t ask me for all my FB profile data first, I decided to go ahead and take the test:
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1. Fan, fen, geek, gamer, otaku, or other (if “other,” what)?
Gamer geek fan.
2. First con attended?
RoVaCon 7 (1982), late Sunday only. Took a while for me to forgive my dad for that one.
3. At what age did you attend your first con?
I’d have been in my late thirteens.
4. Suffer from “post-con depression?”
Not so much. I’m often kinda relieved to turn life back down a few notches.
A warm morning at Pad 39A
The website We Choose The Moon is covering the Apollo 11 mission “live” (with a 40-year audio delay). There are countdown and mission timers, Flash presentations of facts and images, and Twitter feeds of CapCom’s and Columbia’s (and eventually Eagle’s) statuses. Looks like they’re planning to follow the mission all the way to the landing, at least. I’ve got the audio feed running in the background at work.
Launch is in just under an hour, and I’m spamming this to all my social networks, because that’s the kind of dork I am.
Corporate Shenanigans
Seems that I have two VHS copies of the “Gentleman’s Agreement” Shadowrun movie. I found the better of the two, but I still played with the brightness settings a bit in iMovie to make Jerry’s Toaster work show up better. The initial team meetup scene remains dark as heck, though.
This is Part One…
Starfleet 101
I suppose this had to happen eventually.
A new friend down here in Virginia Beach and I speak much of the same fan dialects: anime, gaming, even art and writing. But she’s never seen a single episode of Classic Trek, or even any of the movies. (Yes, I can hear joints creaking all over my flist from here.)
She’s interested, though, and will get a dose of Khan’s Wrath as soon as we have two hours to set aside. But, she wants to see some episodes too, and I’ve never sat down and watched the show with a complete newbie; I’m not even sure where to start. We all know the legendary episodes: City on the Edge, Doomsday Machine, Tribbles, and more. But I’m not sure any of those is right for her first experience. On the other hand, “The Cage” and “Where No Man Has Gone Before” might not be the best, either.
So, I’m turning to you, Friends List. With which Classic Trek episode would you start a noob, someone who doesn’t know Balok from Sarek, impulse drive from warp?
Grace me with your input!
You can’t make stir-fry without breaking a few chickens
Catchup gaming session last night to get back on our two-week schedule. I had the first episode of the new adventure plotted out, so of course we spent the evening copying characters to the new sheets and spending karma and nuyen. Still, the socializing was good as always, so it wasn’t a wasted evening. Must remember to give fixitup and/or ptownhiker ‘gamemaster bribery’ karma for bringing the Oreos.
The new sheets went over pretty well. I still have to fix the cyberdeck section before I’m at the 1.0 version, but since none of the players physically present are deckers, I can finish that before I send a copy to Amy. Celia came over with her guy Rip to get character descriptions from folks; she wants to do portraits of our runners to get back into her art groove. Looks like she’ll start with Jesse and unit_9. She may play some NPCs for me or do ‘special guest star’ duties when we’re missing a player.
Inspired by a comment of rattrap‘s, I ran the old “Gentleman’s Agreement” Shadowrun short film to close the evening. People were exclaming, “That’s Kim Green! That’s James Dunson!” The Video Toaster CGI received compliments as well. Sadly, the copy I showed is overly dark and heavily compressed; if I can find a cleaner one, and no one involved in the project objects, I’ll try to put it up on YouTube.
We still need a team name for this group. Maybe we can come up with one in the next two weeks.
Play them off, keyboard dragon.
Finally finished running “Maria Mercurial” for the new Shadowrun group Monday night. I have learned many things doing this. For example, the adventure plotline fit the old TeeFivers better than they fit the new group. Frankly, I think this group had the most fun when I threw out the last remnants of the old plot and wrapped it all up my way.
They did get to kill a dragon (well, were involved in its death) and scored some nice boomsticks, nuyen, and Karma. I think I need to give them fewer, but more epic combats, and definitely more role-playing opportunities. (I know, gamers role-playing. What an idea!)
We definitely need new character sheets, though, and backup copies of the characters too. I’ve given up resurrecting the file with the old TeeFive Shadowrun four-page character dossier I constructed, and I’m rebuilding it from the hardcopy. This means of course that it’s not coming out quite the same, as I’m using Quark instead of PageMaker, and not quite the same fonts. But I did the first page and it looks pretty good so far.
Yeah, that was probably the best night of GMing I’ve had in half a decade. I just got a reference book for the next little adventure I’m sending them on, which hopefully will be even more fun…
