Land Tax Issues, Uranium, Gaming, Evil Awards

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Green Left Weekly published my letter on the land tax cuts for the rich. Meanwhile housing affordability hits a new low. Compare land and house prices and housing affordability (links via erudito). An international phenomenon Slums Growing Around The World.

I will be presenting on all these issues on Wednesday June 28th at 6.30pm at the Hume Global Learning Centre, 1093 Pascoe Vale Rd at a forum entitled "Please Explain Mr. Brumby"; please come along.

Martin Ferguson spoke at the Unitarians last Sunday on the global energy debate; possibly presented the best arguments for expansion in uranium exports I have heard - and was steadfast in his opposition to it in Australia. This follows a presentation by Jim Green (who has a rather different opinion) on the same issue.

Ended up continuing to play GURPS Australian Noir, rather than the Retro AD&D game which I set up to balance the numbers. Meanwhile droog64's Arthurian HeroQuest game just gets better and more devious. Next Sunday is my Paranoia/Cyberpunk crossover alongside Middle-Earth Role Playing. Have noticed that Mongoose are getting seriously canned on the various RuneQuest mailing lists. On topic, scored big time at the local opportunity shop last weekend; someone had donated their roleplaying collection. Several Kult supplements, three copies of Empire of the Petal Throne (a roleplaying game designed by a Muslim convert and professor of linguistics), Atlantis, and some D&D supplements.

Two awards of evil this week. One to korgmeister who believes that Australia's indigenous people lost to the British and they should just put up with it, stop whining and appealing to pity. Number two to Japan for leading the charge to declare the IWC moratorium on whaling invalid.

Comments

[cardinal-sodom.livejournal.com]

The template system is very nice. Designing a generic orc fighter consists of combining the "Orc" and "fighter" (depending on just what kind of fighter, you would obviously choose between a half dozen appropriate ones like "Archer" or "Heavy Footman") templates. Clean up overlapping traits, and your character is complete.

I (and I assume most other GMs) have been doing it that way for years, but they finally formalized it in two template books and templates included in most of the newer sourcebooks.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Presumably however the templates are sufficiently minimal to allow the standard starting point cost for race plus profession plus some player choice?

[cardinal-sodom.livejournal.com]

Racial template costs vary widely. Kobolds (not the D&D version, more like borderline retarded humans) and a few other races have a negative cost, and others are over 100 points. The occupational templates from Warriors are mostly 75 points, since they were mostly designed for 100 point campaigns.

Occupational templates usually have an interactive format that allows the player to choose from a list of options (usually # points chosen from a short list) for each category. They're pretty well-designed overall.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

Do I have you on my RPG design list? If not send me an email. You should be there. You know this stuff.