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Diary of a B+ Grade Polymath ([personal profile] tcpip) wrote2009-04-07 05:19 pm
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RPG Review Issue 3, IT News, A Nuclear Weapons Free World?

RPG Review Issue #3 has just been made available. It includes reviews of Mouse Guard and Houses of the Blooded, designer's notes for Fire & Sword, Summerland and Gulliver's Trading Company, an interview with Steve Long, the use of classic AD&D scenarios in a Middle-Earth campaign, a Paranoia scenario and a GURPS Bunnies & Burrows easter special scenario "Return to Druid's Valley" (derived from Different Worlds issue #3), Sexuality in Blue Planet, a rewrite of the core mechanics for Palladium, QAD; a complete roleplaying system, an RPG crossword puzzle and, of course, more friendly advice from Orcus. On a related note (news from [livejournal.com profile] allandaros), two classic game designers, Aaron and Allston and Dave Arneson are both seriously ill. Allston is recovering from a heart attack and quadruple bypass surgery and Arneson is losing his battle with cancer. Played another session of Dragon Warriors on Friday night, Hacker with [livejournal.com profile] ser_pounce and [livejournal.com profile] hathalla on Saturday and Gulliver's Trading Company on Sunday.

Already mentioned heavily on el-jay and elsewhere is the Federal government's decision to establish a public-private company to the tune to provide fibre-to-home service. Contrary to the hyperbolic claims, the $43 billion dollar over eight years price tag is fairly modest; indeed it is somewhat less than the personal income tax-cuts announced in the last (2008-2009) budget which occur over five years. On a much more personal scale, I've finally started adding new content on my IT website, after many months of being a content-free zone - installation steps for scientific software, probably of minimal interest to only the few who use these obscure (but important) programs. Going to the Linux Users Victoria meeting tonight; will be interesting to hear [livejournal.com profile] arjen_lentz explain why failure is not an emergency.

Two days ago, in Prague, Obama called for the abolition of nuclear weapons: "So today, I state, clearly and with conviction, America's commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.". I haven't seen a statement this strongly worded since the times of Gorbachev, and hope that something comes out of it. Of course, ending nuclear weapons isn't necessarily a path to peace and security as the President claims. I tend to think that path is a world without standing armies (I must elaborate that letter into a general article).

[identity profile] tcpip.livejournal.com 2009-04-07 12:35 pm (UTC)(link)
What you say about MG is true; it is somewhat simplistic and verbose in the writing. The ordering of the chapters is a little odd as well. It struck me very much as a way of getting readers of the comic into the RPG, rather than the other way around. And whilst there might be character sheets on the BW site.. But there isn't on the Mouse Guard RPG site. All pretty odd.

[identity profile] curufea.livejournal.com 2009-04-07 09:54 pm (UTC)(link)
Posibly because they were BW players first and haven't yet thought to make the site as easily useful for MG.