boreders

An adventure ’snippet’ for Maelstrom.

Synopsis: Beggars find something of value, but need to get back to civilisation to make anything from it.

Adventure Outline: The characters go scavenging in the fields around the city, wandering the paths and lanes in search of anything valuable. In tough times, you have to be prepared to do what you can to make a few pennies. They have a small scuffle with a couple of ruffians in the morning, out to cause trouble; but by lunchtime nothing of value has come to light.

Following a short rest, they decide to head back to see what scraps they might pick up around the markets, and stumble across a corpse in a ditch at the side of the road. As luck would have it, this scene – though gruesome – is not a murdered soul, but the carcass of a dead pig.

On closer inspection, it looks like it may have died from a hunt related injury, a slow bleed. The carcass may have been there for a day or three, but the flies swarming around aren’t too bad. Back in the city, you could get a shilling or more for meat like this from a pie-maker.

Trouble with stuff like this, the authorities don’t approve of people bringing uncontrolled foodstuffs into the city. Disease runs rampant, so controls offer some measure of protection. They wouldn’t know a nice bit of seasoned meat if you slapped them around the head with it.

Complications: Guards on the city gates will not allow anyone to openly walk through with a carcass. Secondary gates or waterways may provide an alternative, but they provide their own hazards. Beggars tend to gravitate towards suspicious activities, so the characters may face nosey competition trying to claim the carcass for their own.

Adventure Preparation: The adventure provides a little entertainment for a band of beggars, so you may want to run as a one off – or perhaps engineer a situation where non-beggars fall on really hard times and need the money badly enough to consider smuggling condemned meat!

I have a doubt. I have a doubt that inhabits a dream. I have every reason to believe that this doubt haunts my dreams out of some kind of guilt.

To build a tad of context for this doubt, I got a 2.2 degree in History and Political Studies at university. I have no regrets in this regard. Well, no – that isn’t true. I do have regrets, because a 1st Class degree would look far more impressive framed and hung from my wall. When I explained what a 2.2 was to my wife, she questioned why I would ever want to reveal such a qualification to anyone, never mind have it framed and hung on any visible wall within the house. Perhaps this certificate might better be displayed next to the planning permission for the demolition of Arthur Dent’s house.

Anyway, I have a recurring dream about not attending History lessons at school. In these dreams, I do all sorts of other things, but end up looking at a timetable and realising whatever it is I’ve been doing it has meant I’ve utterly failed to attend a History lesson. In most instances, I have missed history lessons at school rather than university.

However, I also have a recurring dream that I have failed to pay the rent on my digs at university – and left one or more personal items behind. Last night, this fact managed to slip into a dream that didn’t even seem to have anything to do with school or university – and involved all manner of other people and places ranging from my wife through current work colleagues to rooms in old places of work.

Anyone with theories about why either of these doubts should haunt me so can freely comment!

Oh, like I’m going to be able myself. I mean, I don’t have the money – but I can dream right. In the UK, I suspect we won’t see these in the shops for a few months yet, but I can desire, right? I can envy those who have touched this device of apparent beauty. I trust Stephen Fry when he says that seeing it online cannot prepare you for what it’s really like to touch and use. I cannot ignore the fact that when I saw a picture of it for the first time, a few hours ago, I had a feeling like a giddy schoolboy. Like one of Charlie Higson’s characters from The Fast Show, I had to apologize because I just came.

Yes, iPad doesn’t sound quite as impressive as the iSlate (the pre-launch guess at a name); but, iSlate sounds heavy, and Apple clearly have this aimed at a ‘lighter’ market, a casual device that provides the gliding, easy functionality of the iPhone with the size and convenience of a small laptop. Really, it looks like the base of a MacBook with the monitor embedded where the keyboard should be. I love the prospect of a ’slide-out’ keyboard, as featured on the iPhone. A keyboard can be so damned redundant, at times you only need to shift the cursor or slide the page… so, why not have the option to make the keys vanish.

I enjoy reading on a laptop, a page rotated sideways on the screen and zoomed to the max so I can sit it on my lap, or lie back, bend my knees and lean it against my legs. I perceive no barrier in possessing books purely in digital form, as my wife would certainly appreciate the opportunity to reclaim some of the space in the house currently occupied by bookshelves.

So, well done to Apple. Congratulations, Steve, on presenting such a thing of beauty to the world. Please bring it to the UK as soon as possible, so that I might venture forth to the Apple Store and stroke it in silent, awe-struck wonder. I promise I will save my pennies – and one day I might own it myself. Pretty thing. Pretty shiny-shiny iPad.

I have, as usual, started to read multiple books. January 2010 currently looks like a bumper month. Mind, I don’t appear to be reading anything off of my intended reading list for last year.

There’s “Ahistory” by Lance Parkin, which attempts to make some sense of the timeline of the Doctor Who universe. Also Who-related, I’m reading “The Face of the Enemy” by David McIntee, a Doctor Who novel without the Doctor, featuring instead those excellent chaps from UNIT and the Delgado Master.

Aside from Who, there’s the time hopping play “Arcadia” by Tom Stoppard, the various booklets of the new Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying game, and also “The Night Watch“, the first of the vampire triology by Sergei Lukyanenko.

Quite why I need to book hop so much, I’m uncertain. I’m not sure whether it detracts from my reading experience or somehow heightens it. Possibly, if left with only one book to read I would grow bored too quickly. On the other hand, perhaps I dilute the experience by trying to digest so diverse a set of materials.

Whatever the impact, I remain frustrated by my own inability to read at greater pace. I feel like a runner aiming for a goal, and yet I constantly fall short despite my best efforts. I try to speed read by take in only the first sentence of each paragraph and at best glancing at the rest, but almost certainly this has it’s own downside that I don’t actually read evrything. I could so easily miss something using that method that it only seems worthwhile where I read casually and the material involved is just a set of game rules.   

Just watched Defiance. The Jews suffered incredibly in their efforts to survive – I’m thankful not to have been around during that dark time. As a retelling of a true story, it made harrowing viewing. My wife seemed stunned that it was based on true events. I’m stunned that we live in a society that stones fire engine crews and rapes old women… the lessons of intolerance from events such as a the Second World War seem to have fallen on deaf ears and ignorant minds.

Despite the fact Slumdog Millionaire has an uplifting conclusion, I don’t think I could stomach two movies with such a weight of woe in one evening. My fragile personality already sits on a grey and depressing precipice at the moment.

I’ll record ‘Slumdog’ and watch it later in the week or something. Instead, I shall retire and get some much needed rest. I have a copy of Arcadia waiting for me to finish it. My wife considers reading plays before bedtime a little odd, but I have to read it somewhere and somehow the lavatory doesn’t seem to be appropriate. Are there certain works unsuitable for toilet reading? Do some books warrant more respect? Or more refinement, at least?

The weather seems set to make January 2010 memorable indeed. I can’t recall the last time the snow fell so deeply – though I daresay it has in the past. I have a vague recollection of deep snow in the 70s or early 80s – and trudging through it on the way to school. I know, back then, people just got on with it. You went to school waist deep in snowdrifts and gave thanks for the opportunity to test out your survival skills. These days, people stand outside the doorstep, fall over and lay siege to the Council because they didn’t grit all the pavements.

I had extended my holiday until tomorrow to give me the chance to spend a couple of days with my wife, children safely back at school. Now, I can see that isn’t going to happen. We even have a friend of the boys staying overnight rather than risk driving him home – largely because his school has already posted that it won’t be open. They started building a snow fort in the back garden, so now they’ll be able to add turrets and crenelations come the morning and set about declaring war on the neighbours.

Ah well… I shall hunker down and ward off the cold with blankets and copious hot drinks. I wonder, with a 70+ mile round trip, continued snow fall and crazy drivers on the roads whether I’ll be returning to work this week or the next?!

Yeah, I have finally managed to start the torturous process of replacing my video tapes with DVDs. Mind, I’m not talking about replacing official tapes with discs…

In my youth, I had the habit of recording almost any noteworthy comedies or films on blank tapes. I have treasured copies of ‘A Bit Of Fry & Laurie‘, ‘Magic Roundabout’ and various versions of ‘Reeves & Mortimer’. Admittedly, I didn’t always manage to get whole series – I’m watching the first series of the ‘Smell Of Reeves And Mortimer‘ and I only had the vaguest recollection of episode 3 n’ 4, because I hadn’t recorded them at the time. The delights of Greg Mitchell and Corkie, “Noel’s Addicts’ (with the freakishly naked Noel Edmonds) plus the live appearance of Mulligan and O’Hare lamenting the loss of Rose.

I’ll have to root through the rest of the blank tapes now and see what else I’ll need to replace. Mind, some items will never be replaced, most likely… like Reeves and Mortimer’s comedy turn in “The Weekenders” pilot episode ‘The Meat Festival’.

Would it be an abuse of time travel to go back to the 80s and 90s with a DVD recorder to catch the stuff I’ll never get copies of anywhere else?

I suffer from a persistent cough. Some suggest I take up smoking just to make all the coughing worthwhile. I take such comments in good humour. In fact, I have only smoked a single packet of ciggies in my life, and that was some seventeen years ago. About nine years ago I had a lung infection, which seems to have weakened my resistance. Last year I got pneumonia, which wasn’t pleasant at all!

I have been feeling a tad rough for the last couple of days with sinus pain and an upset stomach. My appetite has faded somewhat and I’m plagued by a tickle in my throat. I daresay it’s a cold to be, or some ailment without the energy to put up a proper conflict.

Last night I got a jab for flu and one for swine flu. Now, I really feel stuffed up and my shoulders feel like the worst kind of sunburn. Prickly discomfort combined with sore muscles. I realise I should have better protection now against infection, but that’s no compensation with the headache I’ve got!!

I have been getting up 5am every morning this week. I know I should be getting up at that time anyway to get in some writing, but it rarely happens. In this instance, it has been a matter of necessity rather than choice. Someone has ruined my already horrible commute.

I travel about 75 miles every time I go to work. That represents a round trip. In theory that should be 50 minutes in each direction, fair weather and sensible traffic permitting. In reality it can be as much as twice that in bad weather and heavy traffic. Last week someone thought it’d be a good idea to complete work on the Runcorn Bridge and reduce it to a single lane in each direction.

Heading out from Liverpool, four lanes of traffic get on the bridge, so last week that meant a phenomenal amount of congestion. It took me about 45 minutes to travel a few hundred yards at one point. I tried alternate routes, but each seemed to be clogged with congestion all of it’s own. I didn’t do anything less than a 90 minute return journey and in one instance it took more than 2 hours. At the end of a long day, that can be soul destroying… It isn’t as if you have a lot of beautiful scenery to lighten the experience.

This week I hope all will return to normal. Work on the Bridge has been confined to overnight activities, so now there’s just the standard traffic to contend with. I’m done grumbling for the moment…

We played a game of Power Grid yesterday for the first time. Bought the copy at a gaming event over the summer when we were looking for recommendations on a good new game. Unfortunately, gaming evenings have been few since then, so yesterday was our first chance to give it a go.

Basically, you buy power plants, acquire the rights to power cities, and then make money from supplying power with resources you purchase from the open Market. Well, something like that.

You get the power plants from an auction, so there’s increasing competition in that area to acquire the most fuel effecient options – one player got an all wind power power plant, which powers for no resources at all. The auction gets complex when you’re trying to plan ahead for city growth, while balancing against the cost of buying resources and building into cities to begin with. Do you drive to outbid someone for a more fuel efficient station or go for something dirty and resource hungry to save for greater expansion? Once you have a plant you can’t bid again and there’s nothing more frustrating than finding a more fuel efficient plant than you just bought comes up for auction next!

Once everyone finishes acquiring a plant, you then acquire resources in reverse player order (based on the number of cities you’ve built into). Rules of supply and demand dictate the value of resources – so being first matters. You can buy as much as you want, providing your plants can use the resource and you can’t store more than double the plants consumption. So, more planning – buy now or maybe pay extra later.

Building into cities comes next – in reverse order, too. I’m reasonably certain you can pick a good spot from the outset. Maybe I chose wisely or simply lucked out. Suffice to say, if you’ve planned well in the previous two phases of the round, you’ll either have the resource to build or you won’t!

In the end you get paid for each city you supply with power, expending the resources at your plants. You can choose to power less, but you make less money, which will impact your activities in the next round.

There’s more complexity to the game, but suffice to say, as a first timer, I enjoyed it and the other players did too. Recommended. A good balance of thought, skillful planning and a dash of luck.