Michael Crichton - State of Fear

Michael Crichton's latest book deals with the hype of global warming and mines it for an interesting storyline. Care of HarperCollins, here is a preview of the novel:

Tomb of Horrors: Revisited

The Tomb of Horrors is a venerable old lady of adventure modules, the grande dame of horror-themed 'no one gets out alive' adventures, as Wikipedia puts it:

The Tomb of Horrors is infamous among players of the game as a "killer dungeon," filled with all manner of extremely deadly traps and monsters that are capable of easily wiping out high-level parties of player characters. Indeed, some players consider Tomb of Horrors to be "unfair"; many of the traps within largely ignore game mechanics and story logic in their operation.

I got to delve into this pit of dead PCs with my gaming buddies this weekend. We were playing good old 'Advanced" Dungeons and Dragons, the ruleset that was for so long king of the castle, until it was toppled by the (now) ever-present d20 System that lies behind D&D 3rd Edition (or '3e' for short).


Personally the weird mix of Egyptian-themed tomb that should not be opened and typical AD&D dungeon crawl makes this a deliciously scary adventure to play. Getting to do it with my suitably paranoid gaming group made it all the more fun - especially as two of us had read the module at some point (>2 years ago).


It helped that we had player characters that were at the upper end of the recommended level range (14) and in fact far beyond the 'typical' strength of such characters (too many late nights playing find-the-artifact or other examples of extreme-adventuring. We've survived the first level through judicious use of Limited Wish, some well applied thieving skills and disposable gargoyles (thanks to a Ring of Gargoyles). Now I'm really looking forward to getting back into it and cleaning up the next level!

Roleplaying Groups/Cons in Sydney

To clear up my browser tabs here is a brief list of some of the roleplaying conventions and groups in Sydney, Australia:

SydCon
Only con I ever roleplayed at, won an award ...

MacquarieCon
Good con, great location, had fun wargaming ...

UNSW Gameplayers
I used to belong to these guys when I was at uni ...



RPGA Asia-Pacific
The 'official' roleplayers group - IMO does not carry much weight compared to local groups ...

GenCon Oz
Not due to happen until 2008 - but if it is as big as the North American one, then it will be HUGE!!!

Necronomicon
I've only ever played CCGs at this event, was good fun though ...

Le Parkour

I investigated free running today, something I knew was in the early scenes from Casino Royale. It looks like an exciting sport, but also something with practical applications either in my own life, or that of a (more active) character. That led me to the Wikipedia Parkour page which explained the difference between parkour and free running.

Parkour, the name of the discipline, was thought of by Herbert Kuonde, — a friend of David Belle's, but not a practitioner — and it derives from "parcours du combattant", the military obstacle course of the French marines. Kuonde took the word "parcours", replaced the "c" with a "k" to suggest aggressiveness, and removed the silent "s" as it opposed parkour's philosophy about efficiency.

Traceur is the substantive derived from the verb "tracer". Traceur normally means "to trace", or "to draw", but also translates as "going fast".

There is an Australian Parkour Association, so I might have to attend a few beginner training sessions to experience it myself. Although I will certainly have to a) get fitter, and b) get my joints and back stronger if it's to be truly enjoyable.

I've added some Parkour clips below to demonstrate how it works.

BBC ad using parkour:


Aussie parkour traceurs:


UPDATE: There is an active online community for Australian traceurs as well.