Swimming With Sharks Vs. Dog Day Afternoon

* = I'm so glad that's over for a while anyways...












What a relaxing couple of days! Saturday I was up early, so early that I buzzed through the next Dresden Files book, Death Masks (**** out of 5) in about 4 hours.
It was a decent read, better than Midsummer Knight, and really resolved a lot of the dangling issues from previous books. We received some ‘closure’ with Susan, Dresden showed some serious balls in dealing with the Red Court, going so far as to earn himself a serious nemesis, and he finally ‘got over’ on ‘Gentleman’ Johnny Marcone. I will say I however was not a fan of the main antagonists ‘getting away’. It felt a tad bit like a cop out. That being said I was interested in the developments that took place at the VERY end of the book with Dresden getting one of the coins and what a sneaky F’Ning way Butcher snuck that in there. It was really quiet genius. I don’t have the next book so I’ll be on a bit of a Dresden hiatus.



The rest of the day was a lot of relaxing, some Thai Food at Lemongrass, ‘cuddlin’ in the ‘nook’ on the couch. Overall it was glorious. There was no real pressure to get anything done, no real time table, and it was just Cassandra and I enjoying each other’s company. We watched some stuff on the DVR, caught the unbelievable 49ers Vs. Saints game, and enjoyed Tim Tebow getting throttled by the Patriots. It’s always good to have days like this; it’s even better when you get to share it with someone else.

It was good to get that out of the way since Sunday was busy. I was up early and knocked out some household chore crap that needed to get done. I then decided that it would be a good time to get some Solo play done for the D&D Adventure System. It was a battle of being indecisive over what Hero to choose, which Monsters to give a shot, and what sort of scenario to play. Not to mention it’s a little strange to play a game alone, or technically against one’s self. All that being said I had a hell of a good time, here’s how my two games broke down;

- So I went with the Dwarf Runepriest, Beltharic (I kept the name on the card), the Githzerai Duelist Tzin Tau Tzing (I changed the race from Githyanki & of course the name), & Ceriss Celazar the Elf Seeker (I just changed the name). I have to say that after two games all three were entirely TO ‘squishy’ for my tastes. So my three intrepid adventurers went into the old keep looking for a map, upon entry their way out of the catacombs beneath were blocked by cave-in so they were forced to find another way out. Early on they came across a Bugbear Strangler, who gave me some problems with it’s two hit points and ability to use Heroes it is strangling as a shield, but in the end Ceriss finished him off with an arrow shot. Next in their exploration was the Blackthorn Dryad, not an overly difficult 2XP Monster, but damn if Poison isn’t a pain in the ass. In fact I’d have to say that overall between Monsters and Encounters the Poisoned condition was the real killer. It just dwindled my Hit Points constantly. Eventually, Ceriss had to use his Daily Power of Deathly Arrows to finish the Blackthorn Dryad. Then came the real ‘Crapfest’! First I drew the Ghaele Of Winter, a 5XP, Fey ‘nasty’. She has both a ranged Cold Attack & a melee Cold Attack both of which have conditions that are associated with them, not to mention a decent Armor Class and 6 Hit Points. This combination makes her difficult at the best of times, but in a case where I was also trying to deal with the 3XP Raging Barbarian & the 4XP Dwarf Mercenary I knew that I was in trouble. So I ran. I figured if I could make the Monsters chase and keep popping tiles I might just get lucky. Well I wasn’t. The next card I popped was the Ettin Brute.
This is also a 5XP Monster. Thing is the Ettin Brute is easy to hit, and has a low Attack score, the problem lies in the fact that he has 12 Hit Points, which is a TON, and when he does hit it’s devastating. Eventually I fell, first to the Ghaele Of Winter & her Freezing Touch on Beltharic. Then Ceriss finally was consumed with the Poison I’d been dealing with from the Black Thorn Dryad. That left me with no Healing Surges, meaning the next death was the game. Tzin succumbed to the barrage of the Raging Berserker’s throwing axes as he tried to engage the Ghaele. I was disappointed in the outcome, but had a good time and realized just how N-A-S-T-Y I’d made some of these monsters.

- For the second game I decided one 5XP in the deck was MORE than enough, I randomly shuffled the two and one went in the Monster Deck. I went with the same three Heroes in the hopes of maybe just playing them a little smarter this time around. I also had to remind myself that I didn’t draw a SINGLE Ally out of the Monster deck the first game, so I had hopes that the brutality of the first game might be off-set by a tad more luck. I was sort of right. The Blackthorn Dryad was first to the party, but was dispatched in two turns by Tzin’s Throwing Knives attack. Then I drew a Bloodghost Berserker who gave me some problems. I was lucky however and drew out the Iron Defender Ally, and sacrificed the Potion Of Speed to afford adding him to my group. He in turn helped to finish off the Bloodghost Berserker. The Mezzodemon Warmonger and its Poison Breath attack came up next along with a Bugbear Footpad. Around that same time I drew the Warforged Blacksmith and sacrificed the Lucky Charm item to recruit him. The Blacksmith was a great deal of help as it took care of Bugbear Footpad. Rather than go ‘blow by blow’ through the game let me just state that I really did see most of the Monsters in the deck throughout this game. Including the annoying Frost Dwarf whose ability to Immobilize Heroes on a successful attack as well as Slow Heroes on its tile made a huge impact. I also drew the Dwarf Mercenary Ally card this time, which was a TANK! The thing with the Allies though was they are a tad fragile. The Dwarf Mercenary really was done in by my inability to make a flippin’ Saving Throw versus the Poisoned Condition. Oh well, the game came down to the last tile and I drew out the dreaded Ettin Brute. The fight was pretty cool, I did a ton of damage and had him on the ropes but he finally connected and Beltharic, the Dwarf Runepriest died my final death.

- Final Thoughts – Playing solo is difficult. There are a lot moving parts, you have to pick your Hero or Heroes carefully. I did not. The cards, that myself with the help of others, created are nasty. I would say what really did me in though were those damn Encounters. I might make that one of my next goals, a set of 52 Encounters that are basic enough to work in any ‘setting’ without being so game altering that you die based on circumstance rather than bad decisions or crappy dice rolling. I think that was the most frustrating part. I didn’t feel there was a cool narrative or story, I just felt like I was getting crushed with traps and random crap. I hope to get a few more games in with some different, less ‘squishy’, Heroes this week.

Hmmm, I wrote way more than I meant to, but less than I planned, how ‘bout that?

RANDOM CRAP!

- Stephen Gilpin’s Billy The Squid, Inc. T-Shirts is having a sale;
o http://www.etsy.com/shop/billythesquidltd
Go forth and shop! Stephen is an incredible artist, creator, and pal. Be assured that when you get a T-Shirt from him that it’ll be pretty amazing, so take advantage of his desire to clean out his inventory
- SUCK IT PACKER FANS! Oh and Broncos & Saints fans, you can SUCK IT as well.
- I’m rooting for a 49ers Vs. Patriots Superbowl. And of course I want Tom Brady to take home the Lombardi trophy like he would a super model.
- This week’s Metal Evolution was pretty interesting. I found it fascinating the overall feeling artists had regarding ‘Nu-Metal’. It didn’t gain universal scorn that ‘Glam Metal’ got, it wasn’t as controversial as ‘Grunge’, nor did it get the ‘sell out’ hate that ‘Thrash’ got, but there was a underlying theme of it not being widely liked by the masses, especially post-Limp Bizkit. In fact I’d say that was the interesting turning point; Limp Bizkit. They were sort of the controversial transition between it being a bit of an outsider take on Metal to a MTV produced ‘light metal’ with rapping. All that coupled with the instigation of a riot at the 2nd Woodstock really painted them in an ugly light, and for the most part Fred Durst just talking doesn’t help. It was a nice lead up to next week’s ‘Shock Metal’ episode where we’ll see the evolution from Alice Cooper to King Diamond to KISS to White Zombie to Slipknot. I look forward to it.
- Mulled Cider never ceases to ensure I’ll have a good day, even at the place that pays me.
- We did pick up a new monitor for the ‘puter in the office, and it’s pretty nice. With that brought on a cleaning/organizing bin by my lovely wife. That corner of the room looks significantly better than it has in a long time, and it’s really well put together. On the other hand it just highlights how messy the rest of the room is.

You know I think that’s about all I have to say today…

“Long days and nights you fought for truth
got to hand it to you
uprising paid for in blood
only to lose

we're gonna hang you up
you've got bells but
we got the whip
we got a better bommb
we got the whip
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got the whip
we got a better bomb

Heartache and stuff is all you've known
slaves since your youths
and only one life to bargain with
and erase your miss-do

we're gonna string you up
you've got balls but
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got the whip
we got a better bomb

fearless now in the face of death
there with a smile
braving the fight until the end
i know i will never be like you but

we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got a better bomb
we got the whip
we got the whip
we got a better bomb”


* = So nice to send the Dirty Packers home for the year...