Bamboo Biscotti

So apropos of nothin' in particular, I got a PM from a guy I've known for ages out on a certain gaming forum.  In brief, he wrote something along the lines of "have you heard of this?  It seems to be relevant to your interests" and tagged on a URL.   This URL, to be precise. Well, no, I hadn't, and I spent part of my lunch hour looking up the site over at Evil Hat.  And then my feminine side, who you may have gathered is a frisky little Anthro at the calmest of times, imaginarily grabbed my collar, gave me a vaguely predatory grin, and in my mind's ear said, more or less, "do it for Steph!" And that , dear readers, is how I volunteered to help playtest something called Thirsty Sword Lesbians, once again finding myself looking over a game that my dear friend would have enjoyed quite thoroughly.  Because yes, it is more or less what it says on the tin: Lesbians, with swords, thirsting for relationships and romance and all that shojo-ai cuddly goodn...

So of course while I'm working on my in-house adaptation of the world of Barsoom for a certain project involving blue Martians (cough*asari*cough), returning oceans, and a much older Carthoris and Tara (played in my mind's eye by Anthony Hopkins and Rene Russo, reprising their roles as Odin and Frigga) I found the need for a proper cameo for my old friend. I'm not really happy with the choice of flaw--too many good options that would work--but for all her swashbuckling bravado, Bish's characters always had a good dose of devotion to social justice in their outlook, so I'm going with the 'anti-bully loadout'. So here she is. Give her a good ship in need of a steady hand at the controls, would you? Stafi Ruk Dashing Red Martian Airship Pilot Stats Cunning 4 Daring 8 Empathy 5 Might 4 Passion 5 Reason 6 Talents Lords of the Air (Grade 4) Your people are the undisputed masters of flight and you are among their most elite fliers. You can...

I've held off on opening my mouth about this mostly because there's been enough Angry White Guys opening their yaps and sounding off without much thought as it is...but a couple of years back, I wrote something about an argument that was going on in the overall gaming community at the time (and has flared up now and again since) that left me scratching my head.  Thanks to certain recent revelations, I now kind of get what was going on behind all the fuss, the person who had kicked things off into a  state of high dudgeon, and a few other things that were involved.  (I'm not naming names because That Guy has already had his ego stroked by bad publicity.) My feelings on the utter absurdity of the entire exercise haven't changed.  For the sake of some self- important jerk's ego, an entire community threw itself under the proverbial bus.  Not the first time we've ended up living down to our worse reputation.  Our track record on this is not something in which...

Many many years ago I wandered into the bookstore at the Palouse Empire mall in a little town with a big name.  The manager at the time, who was a fellow member of the Palouse Empire Science Fiction Association, spotted me, grinned ear to ear, and said something along the lines of "wait here!  I have something for you!"  She disappeared into the back room for a few minutes, then emerged with this green softcover book. She thrust it into my hands.  "I just played this for the first time last night and thought of you.  I will sell you my personal copy of the game on the condition that you run it!" That was my introduction to Al Amarja*, and to this day it remains one of my favorite games.  I still have that old, battered, dog-eared first edition copy, and a copy of the better organized and slicker second edition as well as the special hardcover twentieth anniversary version of the second edition with some additional asides. (OtE is part of what gave us the ...

Okay, so there's this new tabletop RPG called John Carter of Mars that's out (at least in PDF) and which of course I backed because my Inner Child took one look at the KS campaign and promptly went running amok in nothing but a gladiator costume, flip-flops, and waving a wooden sword around giggling like the maniacal little trash panda that he is.  The original novels are one of the guilty pleasures of my distant adolescence in a place as strange as Boise, and every so often someone's done something trying to approximate the planetary fantasy that Mr.  Burroughs brought to life. It took me a bit to decide whether or not I was going to do this because a) too many games on the bookshelf already, b) expensive, and c) yet another goofy system which may or may not be a good fit...so this was a gamble, and it was either going to suck or I was going to seize on this and join my Inner Child in running amok.  There were a couple of details that sold me on this.  First, poss...

This is a post about a dog who, were she a human, would be rolling her eyes at me right about now. Ever since our friendly local game store shut down a few years back, my Friday night tabletop group has been meeting at the home of our oldest and youngest members.  This means that we have been greeted at the door by the ever-cheerful and rather loud Canine Welcome Chorus as their collection of domestic canine companions have always been swift to share the traditional songs of their people.  Of these, the loudest voice belonged to Piper, the lone female in the troupe. In spite of her somewhat intimidating size, which cannot be helped when you are a Saint Bernard and German Shepherd mix, and a bark that could rattle the neighbors' windows, Piper was a big softy.  Just a big bundle of happy, friendly, playful doggy goodness who was always eager for a headskritch or a belly rub, at least once she got the impulse to greet you vocally out of her system.  She was always ...