Tweaked My Back...

...doing laundry. More evidence that I am an old man.

*sigh*

No Small Parts

My internet's back up...enough said about that. I plan on writing at least one or two posts today, but they probably won't have as much "game related" substance as people like. Probably. We'll see.

The second planned post is one I've already started writing, a little rant/rave about the latest Captain America film. Normally, that's what I'd be finishing up this morning. However, I am currently unable to get last night's Game of Thrones episode out of my mind, so I'm going to subject Ye Old Blog readers to my thoughts on it.

First, though, I'll give you a little view into my "real life" world. My kids are young (ages 5 and 2), but they tend to go to bed late. We shoot for 9ish, but it's usually closer to 11pm. My family's a bunch of night owls (we like mid-day siestas). Nearly every night, my wife watches some television after the kids are down, and more often than not I join her, even though I'd prefer to be writing or sleeping (I get up earlier than she does, and I'm the one that gets up with the toddler at 2am or 4am or whatever). But Sunday night is Game of Thrones night, so there's no arm-twisting involved.

[my wife, BTW, is delightfully obtuse about all things fantasy-related. It put a smile on my face when she reminded me, "Don't forget, the new episode of Lord of the Rings is on." I generally don't bother to correct this kind of thing; like I said, delightful. Plus, I more than ably fill my household's "nerd quota" all by my lonesome]

So, after reading the 5 year old to sleep (Treasure Island), I made it down to the sala and tuned into GoT...only to find it was already 40 minutes into the episode. I don't know why I assumed it was on at 10, but whatever. The wife came down a few minutes later, and we clicked over to another channel about 5 minutes before the end...since we'd watch the re-broadcast at 11:30, I figured I wouldn't spoil the end for myself.

Wow.

It's the end of the episode that I'm thinking of today...that I keep replaying in my mind's eye. The sadness of it, the tragedy. Honestly, it keeps making me tear up, though I'm always a bit more emotional when I've had a short night's sleep (plus, I've been nursing a caffeine headache since yesterday...that's another long story). No, I'm not going to spoil anything by describing what happens. The thing would only hold an emotional impact for those who are diligent watchers of the show, while the casual or non-viewer would be less interested in the trials and tribulations of a minor character.

A minor character.

There's some semi-epic foreshadowing in an earlier scene in the episode that takes place backstage of a theater production. One of the actors is bitching about only having two lines in the production (ironic, considering the end of the show), to which she is told "there are no small parts"...which she, of course, doesn't get.

There ARE no small parts. Well, okay, there are (I'm supposed to be appearing as "American #2" in an upcoming Paraguayan film...again, long story...), but that doesn't mean they're unimportant. It doesn't mean they can't have an impact. The last stage role I had was in Moliere's Tartuffe, and I had zero lines. In fact, I played the butler...a character that is not listed in the cast role at all, but was rather created for the show. I was on stage through the entire play. I did all sorts of humorous business without speaking a single line, directing household servants, aping the residents, announcing people with an absurdly large gong...getting laughs, in other words, and being integral to the production. Despite not being one of the "principals," I was important to the show...I mattered.

And I had a blast doing it...though as a younger man, I probably would have chaffed at the part, just like the young actor in GoT. Here's the thing: in real life, we are all just "small parts," folks. This is a big old world, and human history stretches thousands of years behind us and (hopefully) thousands of years before us. Even if you can put together enough scratch to take care of your family two to three (or more) generations down the line, there's no guarantee your children or your children's children won't just blow it all...there's no guarantee some unforeseen catastrophe is going to mess up your legacy or wipe out your family line. No matter how grandiose we are in our sphere of influence, we are still very small cogs in the wheel of life.

And likewise, we are all important. We all have impact...direct, emotional impact...on those who know us, those who come in contact with us. Each of us has the chance to make a difference (for good or ill) on other people, no matter how small we seem in the overall scheme of things. We will never know just how much people care about us, truly, because the measure of a person's impact is often felt in how much they are missed after they're gone...it's impossible, really, to know how much one is appreciated by those around us, because we can't put ourselves into their thoughts and feelings and see what we mean...and even the most eloquent of communicators can hardly communicate their appreciation in a way for us to grasp, even if they themselves can grasp the full extent to which they appreciate.

I read an interview with comic book mastermind Stan Lee a couple years back...something throwaway, in a Costco newsletter or something. He explained that the reason he'd published comics under the name "Stan Lee" (his actual name being Stanley Lieber) is that he'd always looked down on his work, and felt that he'd save his real name for the Great Thing he would someday do...the Great American Novel or whatever. It wasn't until decades later in life (like LATE in life) that he realized, from talking to other people, how much people respected and appreciated the work he did. That his pulpy, throwaway entertainment that he'd done "to pay the bills" had had a profound impact on people's lives. That it had meant something to them. That it had changed them, influenced them, mattered to them.

But Lee is perhaps a poor example of what I'm writing about. He IS a big deal, and I'm sure he understands and appreciates (now) his value and legacy. Many of us don't. Most of us don't receive the adoring fan mail or bouquets of flowers thrown at our feet and the only time we feel really, truly appreciated is when one of our kids runs up to us and gives a big smiley hug. But we shouldn't feel our children are the limit of our "sphere of mattering." We have the opportunity to touch lives every day...to interact and build relationships and impact others. That matters.

I know that part of the appeal of playing a role-playing game like Dungeons & Dragons is the chance to be the protagonist or "hero" of an epic fantasy adventure. To take the role of a larger than life character having a profound impact on the game "world." Some folks might crave this in part because they feel a lack of power to impact the real world...a lack of "mattering" in the grand scheme of things. Today, at this moment, that seems to me to be a poor way to approach the game. RPGs, even light-weight ones like D&D ("light" with regard to tone and theme), have more to offer than just that. If that's all you're searching for, there is a lot of opportunity to experience disappointment in the game. Your character can die. Your character may fail. Your character may prove less effective than other characters. I suppose that a lot of the latter edition changes to D&D have been created in part (consciously or not) to head off this type of disappointment...carefully balancing encounters and character builds to ensure maximum heroic "mattering" through all levels of play. But even if it succeeds at this design goal...isn't that then just reinforcing the illusion?

The illusion you don't matter unless you're a world-shaking hero?

I was very moved by last night's Game of Thrones episode ("The Door"). It's not just the major protagonists...the Ned Starks and Tyrion Lannisters...that experience tragedy and sadness in Martin's cold, unforgiving world. It's not just the principals who have the chance to impact us emotionally. And, silly as it sounds, I think there's something that can be learned from that.

"A Hot Mess"

That's how I'd describe Ridley Scott's new film Prometheus.

I'm not sure if I'd call it altogether disappointing, though. Steve-O and I caught a midnight (or rather 12:30) showing on the IMAX 3-D screen and the main thing I was looking for was some hard core science fiction, complete with cool visuals and logical world/setting. Story and plot? Well, I already figured out it wasn't going to be any great shakes as the commercials/previews have pretty much given the whole thing away (and no it didn't "intrigue" me in the slightest).

Here's the best thing I can say about it: it was never boring.

That might not seem like high praise to you, but let me put it in this light: I didn't fall asleep. And I went into the film plenty exhausted, having worked a full work week (well, except for the all day traveling earlier which was its own brand of stress and exhaustion), plus I was feeling pretty out of it from being at the end of my second day of a detoxing fast (don't ask), and I have become somewhat notorious in recent years for falling asleep during movies that are boring or dumb (in my opinion) in the slightest...at least when I'm watching 'em late at night.

Prometheus is a hot mess...it just doesn't know what kind of movie it wants to be. Is it horror? Is it sci-fi? Is it action? Is it an homage to Alien? Is it trying to say something about faith? Is it trying to say something about the origin of the species? Is it trying to say something about the perils of investigating Life's Deepest Mysteries? Is it trying to put a boot to Graham Hancock?

I don't know...I mean, I really don't get what the director (and writer(s)) were trying to do. I guess make money, judging by the amount of advertising/marketing the film got leading up to its release. However, if there was a point other than that...um, it was lost on me. It tried to hit all these notes at once, and kind of pooched it from what I can tell.

And yet, it was NOT boring. It provided enough eye candy and suspense and balls-to-the-wall crazy that I didn't nod off even once. And the visuals were fantastic and there was some neat sci-fi stuff in it. Hell, I even thought the aliens were pretty cool, despite looking like a 'roided out version of Billy Corgan having an emo moment.

Would I recommend the film to someone else? Um...

Speaking of "hot messes," I am a wreck at the moment. Went to yoga this evening for the first time in God knows how long and it completely kicked my ass. Turns out I'm not as stretchy as I used to be. I could barely walk out of the studio afterwards; thank goodness I decided to drive instead of biking, like I'd originally considered. Right now, I think I'll throw on a Star Wars DVD and chill for a couple hours...followed by an Epson salt bath. The physical discomfort has (temporarily) displaced the melancholy of missing my family (still in Mexico)...but it's no freaking picnic.

In gaming news (just before I sign off), I decided NOT to re-do Pendragon, Game of Thrones-style. It's just too much work for too little pay-off at this point. I did do a serious read-through of the A Song of Fire and Ice RPG from Green Ronin today and I have to say: just not very impressed. Sorry, I'm not. It's a beautiful book, with a simple base system and thoughtful design...and then a bunch of extra stuff that seems totally unnecessary. Why-why-why to game designers START HUGE and tell people ix-nay what you don't want? Why don't they START SIMPLE and let players add on any extra stuff they feel is necessary? Just to pad the page count? I really, really don't get it.

But that's another post. Maybe a little later tonight. After my bath.

Sunny Weather and Injury

Last night I started composing a fairly looong post about the Mother's Day, The Avengers, sunny days and bicycle riding (and purchases). I fell asleep halfway through the thing...literally. I've been spending a lot of time outdoors lately due to the excellent Seattle weather the last few days, and the busyness during the daylight hours have precluded me keeping my eyes open at night for posting.

That and the pain.

DeQuervain's tendonitis is the diagnosis, according to witch doctor #1, and I'm pretty sure it's the correct one, as he was able to bend my thumb and apply pressure in exactly the right spot to make me howl in pain. A couple tendons in my (left) hand are totally f'd...most likely as a result of schlepping too many suitcases in California with a bum right arm...and now I'm trying to type with a thumb brace without hitting too many of the wrong keys. Ah, well...at least now I know what's been causing me the pain the last couple weeks. And a thumb brace with some anti-inflammatories for a week/ten days is a damn sight better than cortisone injections directly into my hand. Not that I'm afraid of needles...I'm a regular donator of type A+...I just don't like the idea of injecting "stuff" directly into my tendons. Kind of a "principle" thing.

ANYway...I'm trying to work out a little design problem with which I've been agonizing the last few days, and I'm just not sure how to put the issue into words. I mean, really it's one of those things where figuring out the question will go along way to determining the solution. The Douglas Addams kind of thing, ya' know?

Unfortunately, it's way past my bed time at the moment (I paused in the middle of posting to watch Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady...only fair, since I've devoted so much time recently to Iron Man. Haha, yes that's a terribly lame attempt at humor. I've been in pain, lately, didn't I say that?)...so I'll have to broach the subject tomorrow.

Nighty night.

: )

Working Backwards

Actually, I haven't been "working" much at all, due to illness and injury. The illness appears to be allergy-pollen driven, and seems to be clearing up with the return of the rain. The injury is that damn, nagging back pain that I've had for about three years now...but after a couple sessions with the new witch doctor I finally seem to be getting to the heart of that particular issue. Turns out I've managed to knock most of my ribs out-of-alignment where they connective tissue joins the...well, nevermind. Point is, I've been a mess and caused myself all sorts of neurological stress and muscle damage that is only now being untangled, one layer of pain at a time.

Oh, yeah. And I got my taxes done.

I wish I had something to say about the new game idea, but I've done precious little work on it, besides re-reading a bunch of other game books (mainly Rifts, Revised Recon, and Twilight 2000). Even trying to "work backward" from what I want the game to look like is proving problematic: I don't have a good idea of what the end result would be. Tomorrow, I'll be heading back to my normal job for a normal work week with a normal commute (this is different from last week) so perhaps I'll get some brainstorming done...often, it's during this normal commute that I get some of my best ideas. Then again, perhaps I'll get side-tracked by some new bit of sports news on the radio...

ANYway, I did have a bit of excitement today when I found out that someone is playtesting my RPG of the dark mythic future...that's exciting since I haven't even been able to get a playtest group together (I've got several interested parties, but they all want to do it a different night of the week...sheesh!). The first night of the play-test is scheduled for tomorrow, and the GM-to-be has informed me that there's been much excitement and her group plans on spending at least three sessions on the thing...which is pretty cool, since the group's usual game is Pathfinder or Mouse Guard. Nice that they're willing to take a break from the same-old-same-old.

She also said she found the magic stuff to be well-done and there's already a player interested (and totally enthused) in playing a demon-summoning sorcerer. Which was kind of the reaction I was hoping for when I re-wrote the damn magic section. Hopefully it will work in practice...that's not just throw-away rhetoric, either. I am really hoping that is works...if only so I don't have to start over from scratch (again!).

But that's what the testing's for...I am expecting critical feedback (bad is as welcome as good), and KC has promised she will give me some.

All right, I'm done for the evening. It's time to change the ice pack on my back anyway.

Oh Yeah, So...

Remember how I disappeared off the blogs for a couple weeks? I'm going to be (probably) vanishing again for a few days due to stuff happening around the home front.

Which is just as well, really, since I've had excruciating shooting pains in my upper back and right arm lately, making it difficult to sleep at night, let alone write or compose coherent thoughts for a blog (I am seeing someone about it tomorrow, hopeful that she can "fix me up").

While I could try to type up my thoughts on the whole "alternative combat thang" it's going to have to wait, I'm afraid...there's a lot I want to say on the subject, including addressing certain issues folks brought up in the comments before. I've got some (I think) cool ideas, but unfortunately, they're not things that model well with ALL role-playing games...and if adapted for D&D (where they would work, I believe) the game would cease looking much like D&D, seeing as how they drop the use of the D20 from combat.

[well, I never said I was trying to come up with a new version of the D20 system, right?]

In other news, I picked up a couple new RPGs this week including Ellis: Kingdom in Turmoil and StarSiege: Event Horizon. StarSiege is Troll Lord Games' generic SciFi "tool kit" using the same system as Castles & Crusades. There are a lot of good things to say about StarSiege, mainly with regard to it publication style...but in the end it simply reminded me that there's still room in the market for my space opera game, and that I should get that knocked out now that I my other products are in their final stages.

Ellis, on the other hand, is a pretty different animal...and I mean, different from your average RPG. It requires its own separate blog post...once I've had a chance to read a bit more of its 600 pages. This is easily the largest RPG I've added to my shelf (Champions doesn't count as being "on the shelf" as I only use it for a doorstop...even so, I think Ellis beats it in page count)...though bigger has never necessarily meant better.

Anyway, more on ALL that stuff later...and by later, I mean(probably) in a week or so.

Wiped Out...

...and it's not even tomorrow yet.

That is to say, I generally feel wiped out by Friday, especially after a Thursday night of gaming and carousing (and I'm sure tomorrow will be no exception). Today, however, I'm already feeling a bit crushed, due to a rather late Wednesday night.

Oh, well...it ain't going to stop me from going out tonight. I've got a super-kick-ass RPG to play-test and I'm pretty darn excited at the prospect. I mean, it looks "kick-ass" on paper, and I'm "excited" to see how it rolls. However, I think I've got it tweaked just about where I want it. I shall be writing more on the results (and possibly making the thing available for public consumption/download) in the next couple days.

I will say this: for a post-apocalyptic game, I think I may like it better than (any edition) Gamma World. And that's saying something, as I really like the 1st and 2nd editions of the latter game (specifically, the combat system and how it works in conjunction with the "theme" of the game). I mean, we'll see, okay...my system is kind of an orange to GW's apple anyway, being a non-gonzo version of the PA setting. And that's not necessarily a good thing (as mutant survivors of a nuke war is kind of a "gonzo setting" begging for gonzo rules). But, whatever...my goal is to do some of the things I've talked about in the past, specifically with regard to both post-apocalypse stories and game objectives. I'm hopeful for some good stuff.

Anyway, I really only get one shot to make a "go" of it as it appears I shall be playing in (not running) a B/X campaign starting in the very, very near future. My character(s) are already rolled for that one, and may even get some playtime later tonight (if not, then next Thursday for sure). That, too, is exciting...but I'm still salivating mostly over the thought of blowing away spear-chucking mutants with a shotgun from the back of a three-eyed horse.

Yeah, we'll see how it goes.
; )

April 28th

I am totally aware of the date.

A few months back I set a deadline of May for the release of my B/X Companion and I fully intend to keep that release date. I realize there’s only a couple-three days left in the month, but I promise you won’t see another month go be without the Companion being released in SOME shape or form.

And by the way, it IS shaping up nicely.

Even so, I’m feeling a bit behind the 8-ball due to my recent illness/injury (excuses, excuses). But I am finally on some good drugs thanks to my medical doctor, and I am pleased to announce my first pain-free full night’s sleep last night.

[side note: why is it I can get $500 (street value) worth of Percocet for a 54 cent co-pay, but my insurance only pays peanuts for chiropractic care, limited to 10 adjustments per year? THIS is the problem with health care today…keep ‘em on drugs rather than fix their spinal-nerve damage]

ANYway…I hope to be able to do some work in front of the computer this evening (before drifting off into a narcotic slumber), but it still looks to be a fairly busy week for me. My brother, AB, is arriving tonight on a 10pm flight out of the Deep South where he’s been fighting the good fight against the coal companies (and who have apparently started to thump back, forcing his exodus)…homeless and jobless once again, I will be picking up the Rainman from SeaTac and bringing him home for a little “beagle therapy.” THEN my father is breezing into town tomorrow night, and we’ll all be meeting up with him and his wife for dinner (after a therapeutic spinal adjustment).

Of course, April 30th is Friday, so I should have the whole day free, right? Except it appears I’ll be baby-sitting our friends’ five month old baby while they celebrate their anniversary. Hmmm…

Ugh. Well, May is the deadline for release, and I’m doing what I can to have everything finished up, regardless of distractions. Wish me luck, folks.
: )

More Goofy Woo-Woo Hocus-Pocus

Or, as my nephew would say: "how I spent my day looking for a voodoo doctor."

Today was (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday) Day 5 in our week of Serious Intense Pain and decided to seek out an acupuncturist as a desperate attempt to try something, anything that might get me well enough I could at least sleep through the night. After once again driving to Lake City (God help me) and getting help from at least two people that spoke NO English (they had friends on cell phones that could better direct me...my Chinese skills are zero), I finally managed to track down a doctor that was open on a Sunday afternoon. While the experience did leave me with a pair of giant purple welts on my back ("the color should fade in a week or so") from the post-needle "cupping," the volume of my back pain seems to be turned down about six or seven notches...enough that I should (hopefully) manage some shut-eye. I was even able to sit on the couch for an hour or two watching TV without squirming in agony.

On the other hand, I took the beagles for a walk this evening (the first time in several days) and they jerked my arm practically out of my shoulder socket. So crank the pain volume back up a couple points.

Why am I writing all this down (aside for posterity?)? Well, actually, I'm thinking of at least one or two AD&D posts (for a change) that I want to write and I figured I'd warm up to it by blathering on a bit about the Monk character class. Ah, the monk. While others have noted (and sometimes griped) that its inclusion in the AD&D fantasy milieu is a bit...um..."jarring," to say the least, but I've never had much problem with it. Reading Gary Gygax's Gord novels, specifically regarding the Scarlet Brotherhood adversaries goes a long way towards putting monks in the proper "Greyhawkian Perspective" for me...and anyway, what's wrong with having SOME type of Zen-like martial artist in a fantasy world? Even without a "mystic Orient" (c.f. Oriental Adventures, Kara-Tur, etc.) who's to say that SOME group of people wouldn't have gotten together and meditated on the proper way to use one's own body as a weapon.

The powers of the human body ARE amazing after all, and demonstrably harness-able by those with both the proper talent and discipline; why not include a class that addresses it?

After all, nothing says your D&D campaign HAS to be set in a pseudo-European-Earthlike environment, right? It is perhaps our western civ conceit that we presume that's how the game should be played, despite the DMG listing a number of different NPC governments that can be used besides feudal monarchies. Of course, it's what we (and by we I mean North Americans) know, and the first thing we think about when we hear, oh say, "dragons" or "wizards." The East has long had their own legends and folklore with dragons and wizards (and fighters and thieves and demons and familiars and castles and swords, etc.).

Personally, all my old AD&D campaigns were in completely fabricated, non-Earth, non-European worlds...despite the occasional appearance of dwarves and elves (and admittedly, our games were almost entirely human-o-centric also, just based on the whole "level limit" thing).

So problems with monks? No.

HOWEVER, after all the kung fu action films I've watched over the years, I am completely surprised by the monk's inability to heal other people. Where are the acupuncture needles he should be carrying around? Haven't you seen Iron Monkey? Or Crouching Tiger? Or Kiss of the Dragon? All those dudes can use their knowledge of pressure points and the human body for HEALING, not just laying the bare-handed beat-down. Now THAT'S something that could have been added to the ol' Players Handbook.

; )

Okay...going to bed now. Wish me luck!

Live From Hell

There is no pain quite like back pain.

Oh, there are lots of painful things in this world that are probably of equal or greater intensity. Childbirth. Getting knee-capped with a 9mm. Having white-hot pokers used to put out your eyes. Being kicked in the balls repeatedly.

But as far as pain with no obvious source of external stimuli? Back pain is right up there at the top. At least with other illnesses and injuries, you can pass-out and sleep for awhile. I've been unable to sleep for two days as there is no position I can lie in that doesn't cause intense, shooting pain through my upper back and neck...well, at least when I "relax."

A couple years ago, my wife and I did a pilgrimage/hike with my father-in-law in Mexico. We later calculated the distance was about 60+ miles, all of which is walked in a day and night without stopping except for the occasional short meal break. I had thought, no problem, I walk a lot and I have the endurance to go for 20+ hours without sleep. I'll be tired, but I'm in good enough shape to do this.

In retrospect, it was the craziest, most dangerous thing I've probably ever done. There was no trail, no road...no path. People knew the way because they followed other people that did it for years, or who lived indigenously to the area (and didn't own vehicles), or because people from nearby towns/villages would come set up stands along "el camino" to sell snacks and drinks.

We crossed several mountains. In the pitch blackness with fading flashlights (no stars because of the cloud cover...it was rainy season). On sheer, flat rock or loose rolling gravel. Just hoping there would be no rain and no flash floods. And hoping there would be no injuries...because there was no way an ambulance would find you or that any chopper was going to land and airlift you out.

So anyway...I started the trek in heavy duty "blister-proof" hiking socks and boots from REI (these were worn through by the end, by the way). Stupidly, I was favoring my left leg through most of the day due to a slight tenseness/soreness in my right ankle and my problem "trick right knee" (it gets "tired" quickly due to starting the fencing sport a little too late in life - my mid-twenties). By midnight/1am, my left leg was shot to shit...I could not bend it or put weight on it without collapsing in pain, and so I was forced to rely on my right leg...my bad leg.

Around 3am or 4am we finally made it down the last, longest mountain. I don't know if the thing had a name or not; I just called it Goddamn Mountain. Because every time I stepped down on my right leg I would swear and curse the f'ing thing. By the time we finally rolled into the town at the end of the line, both my legs were shot to hell, and it would take more than a week for my right knee to fully recover from the experience.

The thing is, it was the longest and most excruciatingly painful experience I ever had. Normally, when you are "in pain" you stop what you're doing. You take your hand out of the fire and ice it. You walk off the sports field and take a break. You sit down and have a glass of lemonade. You pop an aspirin and try to take a nap.

On the pilgrimage, I couldn't stop...there was no option. The busses that would take us back to our original town was at the end of the trail...and as I said, no team of medics was going to air-lift me out of the jungle. I just had to keep walking, and keep feeling the pain. I wouldn't call it a "character-building" experience. Would you call being a tortured P.O.W. a "character building" experience? No...but it's a testament to the limits of human endurance that people can survive and sustain on-going physical suffering when there is no other option but to do so.

My back pain of the last couple days has been nearly as bad. Despite seeing a chiropractor for the last six weeks (three times this week!). Despite the emu oil and super-strength muscle relaxant ointment and popping Ibuprofin like candy and drinking lots of water and drinking lots of alcohol and acupressure release and...shit it hurts!

So what's the point of all my whining? Well, it seems to me that, in general, RPGs don't model pain very well.

Which to me is well...nearly an unforgivable sin. I mean pain and suffering is so much a part of the "adventuring experience." We stub our toes, or our thumbs, we get blisters and headaches, pull hamstrings and groin muscles, suffer all sorts of pain and injury and illness. Haven't you ever picked up a bit of a sniffle camping outdoors? I have...and it colors everything you do the whole next day.

Real life adventures can be a pain in the ass. And part of the heroism inherent in partaking in an adventure is enduring these aches and pains and inconveniences.

I always think of the early chapters of Tolkien's The Hobbit...how everyone, especially Bilbo (but even Gandalf and the sturdy dwarves), are miserable and complaining once the weather turns foul. As a kid I could totally relate to this, because every single camping trip I went on it poured rain. Cub Scout and Boy Scout outings or family trips, regardless of the time of year, it was always wet and miserable. That's just part of growing up in the Pacific Northwest (at least on the west side of the mountains). And while we could laugh and have fun reminiscing once we were back home, it was always a damn miserable time out in the woods. Especially if you added injury on top of it all (burns, cuts, scrapes, blisters...as well as the occasional concussion or broken limb).

Most players look at their hit points on a character sheet kind of like we look at our gas tank on a car. "Uh-oh...getting close to Empty. Better pull over at the next station and fill up." You don't want to run out of hit points in the dungeon anymore than one wants to be stranded on the highway with an empty tank. But as a simple resource, "hit points" don't do justice to the pain and suffering of the adventure experience.

Likewise, hit points are, in the main, a measure of the combat/fight-worthiness of a character. Once your hit points are depleted, you're no longer able to fight effectively...you're out for the count and probably winging your soul off to its final reward. Things that do hit point damage (falling, traps) reduce a character's ability to put up a fight...but that is ALL they measure. They don't measure fatigue (which is represented, in B/X D&D, with some small penalties for over-exerting oneself). They don't measure one's willpower or ability to withstand toxins/intoxication (these are in part represented by saving throws and sometimes by ability rolls against Con or Wis).

I've seen some RPGs that try to measure pain and suffering, all with mixed (and for me, unsatisfactory) results. Deadlands (1st edition) couples pain with fatigue in its Wind resource. White Wolf's early games (Vampire, etc. al), had pain and movement penalties associated with levels of damage (At "mauled" person loses two dice and can "only hobble." At "crippled" you lose five dice and can "only crawl"). Albedo has both physical damage levels and mental (stress) damage levels caused by firefights and combat. Violence had both life points and pain points (and each weapon in the game had a different dice roll for each).

But none of 'em really capture the debilitating nature of suffering. And certainly my favorite adventure RPG (D&D) has none of these. Which I think is too bad.

I know some readers have no interest in modeling the minor aches and pains of "real life" in an RPG adventure game, just as I have no interest in forcing PCs to "roll to see if you have a full bladder and need to find a bathroom." It's not "important" enough. It's not "dramatic" enough. It's not "heroic" enough.

Damn it...there IS heroism in pushing through the pain. I feel like a goddamn hero just sitting here and typing this meandering post! Aaarghh! My frigging back!

All right. I'll drop the subject for now...especially as I have no idea (at this time) at how I would model pain and suffering in an RPG. But I will be thinking about it, and if I come up with any scratch rules, you better believe I'll be returning to the subject.

Though I'll try to keep the whining to a minimum.

; )