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rpgsandbox · 3 years

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Blue Planet is a compelling RPG journey into humanity’s precarious future on a distant waterworld where political unrest and a hungry alien ecology threaten the nascent colony effort. A planet where GEO marshals struggle to maintain peace, Incorporate mercenaries wage amphibious proxy wars, and native insurgents fight for their adopted world. A frontier where human desperation and corporate greed ravage an uncanny ecology, threatening to plunge humanity into a war of survival with an ancient, alien legacy.

Though the original Blue Planet predates many of these titles, the setting is evoked by the movies Avatar, Blade Runner and Outland, the television series The Expanse, Firefly and Earth II and the books Legacy of Heorot, Songs of Distant Earth and the Mars Trilogy. A reviewer once gave a glib but accurate elevator pitch for Blue Planet as "Space marshal Cowboy and his cybernetic dolphin sidekick fight eco-crimes in alien Hawaii."

The Full Premise

Blue Planet's uniqueness and enduring appeal are in its deep, realistic, hard science fiction setting, and to really describe it requires more than a few sentences. For those new to the waterworld, we recommend exploring the more detailed premise here.

This campaign will fund the production of a new third edition of the critically acclaimed Blue Planet roleplaying game. We’ve brought Blue Planet to Kickstarter because we're excited to make the definitive edition of the game, but we need your help to do that.

We want to design a uniquely beautiful, full-color, two-volume, 600-page masterpiece, overflowing with evocative art, captivating text, and exceptional production values. We want to make the books themselves works of art with UV cover highlights, endpaper maps and page-marking ribbons. We want to fill them with a new rules set, stunning art, expansive color maps and compelling new locations, social structures, future technologies and alien secrets.

These features and content exceed our capacity to resource on our own, so we are here asking you to join the Blue Planet team and help us make the new version of this classic game truly exceptional.

Download the Blue Planet: Recontact Quickstart Guide here. This 80+ page, full color primer is free and contains the new version of the rules, a setting sampler and a demo scenario called "Trouble in Paradise," complete with ready-to-play characters.

The Recontact project includes

• An extensive evolution of the core mechanics, taking advantage of two decades of RPG development. The new system can be found here in our free, 80+ page Recontact primer.

• All new, full-color artwork bringing the waterworld to life in stunning, evocative imagery.

• Full-color world and regional maps, including submarine geography, redesigned and rendered by professional cartographer and game designer Mark Richardson (Green Hat Design).

• A series of campaign archetypes to help moderators jumpstart their games in the vast adventure space of Poseidon (see below).

• Updated speculative technologies.

• New sociopolitical systems, organizations, institutions and conflicts.

• New locations, settlements and facilities.

The Recontact project does not include

• Fundamental changes to the core sociopolitical tensions - the themes will remain staunchly pro-environmental and anti-colonial.

• Timeline advancements - the setting was originally - and intentionally - poised on a sociopolitical precipice, rife with plot and storytelling potential, and we want to maintain that same narrative tension.

• Global rewrites of the setting material - though updates, sensitivity edits and additions are being made throughout, we believe Blue Planet’s deep setting is why the game has endured, and so we are not making major alterations to that essential content.

A word about the delivery date

We know a reward delivery date of October 2022 seems unexpectedly far away. Though we intend to deliver Blue Planet sooner, our experience, and the last year in particular, have proven an essential truth about Kickstarter management - set a generous delivery date, then add six months. We hope this date does not discourage folks from becoming backers, but instead demonstrates our commitment to realistic planning and transparent communication.

All reward tiers (digital and physical) will receive PDFs of the out-of-print Blue Planet books the day after the campaign ends. Single book pledges will receive the corresponding v2 PDF, and book set pledges will receive copies of everything ever published for the line. All 10 past Blue Planet titles - over 1700 pages of waterworld adventure - as immediate rewards!

First edition Blue Planet, Archipelago, Access Denied, v2 Blue Planet Player's and Moderator's Guides, Fluid Mechanics, First Colony, Frontier Justice, Natural Selection and Ancient Echoes.

Blue Planet has received broad acclaim, particularly for its deep, detailed, and realistic setting, and has remained well regarded since its original publication. However, that publication was almost 25 years ago, and in the intervening decades, all versions have gone out of print and game design has evolved dramatically. We are therefore excited at the prospect of giving the game system an overdue overhaul and the opportunity to share Blue Planet with a new generation of players.

More personally, Blue Planet features critical environmental themes, presenting a precarious future threatened by the dire consequences of ecological collapse. If issues like biodiversity loss, ocean acidification and climate change were only obscure concerns within the scientific community 25 years ago, they are now clear and present existential threats to the human species. This new edition will let us add our own small voice to those demanding true stewardship of our original blue planet.

Compelled by these reasons, the original creators at Biohazard Games have teamed up with publisher Gallant Knight Games to produce a modern edition of this classic RPG.

Recontact is the in-game term for the fateful day in 2165 when the UNSS Admiral Robert Perry entered orbit around Poseidon, “reestablishing contact” with Earth 69 years after the original colonists were abandoned. Given that more than two decades have passed since the publication of the first edition of Blue Planet, RECONTACT seemed a fitting subtitle for this new version of the game.

Anyone familiar with Blue Planet v2’s Synergy rules will recognize the new system as a modern evolution of those mechanics, sharing a little of that design's genetics and the same intent to support the hard science realism of the setting. Players will also find the new system is simultaneously simpler and more robust, while supporting richer, more evocative character creation that's focused as much on who characters are as what characters can do.

Characters have 4 attributes with optional foci and up to 8 skill sets - areas of expertise based on player-generated descriptors that evoke a character’s origins, training, occupation and experiences. The core mechanic is roll ≤ (attribute rank)+(skill set rank). The roll is made with either 1, 2 or 3 d10, depending upon whether the general, core or specialty in a given skill set is being used. For those who know v2, these elements should seem familiar. There are fewer attributes, but they work similarly, and the variable dice pool is a streamlined take on the aptitude mechanic. The skill sets are simultaneously simpler and more robust than the long list of specific aptitudes and skills in the 2nd edition.

Blue Planet does remain a realistically dangerous game, keeping the wound levels and trauma tests from the 2nd edition. Weapons and sea monsters are therefore quite deadly, so characters should try to avoid getting shot. Or eaten.

The new mechanics also lean in to the qualitative roleplaying aspects of modern character design, providing Tags, Tracks and Ties unique to each player's character concept and each moderator's campaign. The emphasis is as much on who a character is as what they can do.

Tags are specific consequences, benefits, convictions, motivations or other active descriptors that a character incurs during their adventures - generally the result of narrative events, important tests, fallout from interactions with other characters and injuries.

Tracks model the range of specific character emotions, attitudes and mental states. They are usually campaign or party specific and can be offered by the moderator or created by the players for their party or their individual characters.

Ties describe a character’s primary relationships, identifying the people and organizations to whom the character is connected, as well as the nature of the obligations they must meet to maintain those relationships.

The only consistent criticism Blue Planet has received over the years is that the setting is so vast and wide open, it’s often challenging for game moderators to know where to start. They struggle to choose a single campaign current from among the sea of ideas in the setting. Blue Planet: Recontact will therefore provide a diverse set of campaign archetypes to provide ready-made options for GMs new to the game.

It’s common practice for RPG books to present a range of character archetypes, providing players with detailed examples of the kinds of PCs available to play. These campaign archetypes are similar in that they offer guidance for a variety of different adventure types that can be run in the world of Blue Planet, providing GMs with starting points, directions and enough details to get a variety of different campaigns underway. Each archetype outlines a premise, PC suggestions, unique NPCs, key locations, resources, themes, and plot threads from which a GM can build their perfect Blue Planet campaign.

Read the full first example - Red Sky Charters - in the Recontact Primer here.

Kickstarter campaign ends: Wed, May 5 2021 3:00 AM BST

Website: [Biohazard Games] [Biohazard twitter] [Gallant Knight Games] [Gallant Knight twitter]

#RPG #kickstarter #Blue Planet #Biohazard Games #Gallant Knight Games

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365days365movies · 3 years

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May 9, 2021: A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001) (Recap: Part One)

Welcome to the future.

At this point, we’ve mostly looked at the past, present, or the near-future (as in, the next ten years, if that). Additionally, we’ve looked either at nonexistent technology in a contemporary setting, or an extension of existing technology taken to a logical next step. But no more. No more realism, no more real-world rules, and nothing that we’re even close to in this reality.

Well...mostly.

That’s genuinely impressive, not gonna lie. Anyway, yeah, from here forwards (for a bit), we’ll be looking at the future and futuristic technology. Now, there are a couple of ways in which these films tend to go. The first big way that we tend to represent the future in film is the same way we always have: flying cars, futuristic technology, smart houses, and robots.

Now, there are countless examples of this future, and it always changes a bit depending on the present. Which, yeah, makes sense. After all, what I’m doing right now, at this moment, would’ve been seen by many people as a massive technological achievement, even around the time that I was born. Which, yes, I’m old, deal with it (because I can’t). Anyway, the way that this begins is with the first major filmed view of a seemingly idyllic future: Fritz Lang’s 1927 film Metropolis.

The overly mechanized (and politically dystopic) society seen in this film, as well as the visuals and technology, would inform our ideas of the future throughout the next century. Multiple themes and common objects reoccur throughout futuristic fiction. You know the stuff I’m talking about. Flying cars, automatic food machines, robotic assistants, video watches, holograms, jetpacks, so on and so forth.

But here’s the thing about the future. It’s always ahead of us, and eventually...well, we’ve gotten to most of those things to some degree. Either they already exist...

youtube

...or is currently being developed.

Well, one of them we’re still working on. And the development of more advanced AI is something we have yet to perfect, or even fully develop. However, the development of A.I. (and the consequences of that technology) are ALL OVER science fiction. Sometimes, they’re merely used for flavor to help establish the futuristic setting.

Sometimes, they’re characters with their own agency and conflicts, which may or may not define the plot. In these cases, they’re often simply there to back up the main human characters, and help with their development, and sometimes their own. You know, manic pixie dream robots.

And then, possibly most often, they’re the abject villains of the piece. they can be mysterious alien technology, like in The Day the Earth Stood Still, or a man-made danger that turns on the race that created and/or abused it.

But then, on occasion, an A.I. is given the chance to develop as a character, without being used to define the development of a human character. Sometimes, the question of what life truly means is raised through these characters, and we become attached to them outside of any other character. This isn’t nearly as common as the others, but it’s definitely not unheard of.

And for the record...things don’t often go well for those AIs. But still, some of those characters have quite a lasting impact. So, there’s quite a lot of potential for this type of character, from a dramatic standpoint. And that potential leads us to the guy who made this.

I WILL MAKE A JURASSIC PARK REFERENCE AS OFTEN AS POSSIBLE

Steven Spielberg gives us today’s entry, and this director of a classic science fiction story about science gone awry teamed up with the director of a science fiction film where an artificial intelligence went awry. You know, this thing.

I didn’t forget about HAL. And I won’t forget about him later, either.

Director Stanley Kubrick is pretty well-know for his mind-bending films, especially The Shining and 2001: A Space Odyssey. But he also worked with Spielberg on this film before his death in 1999, as this was one of his dream projects for many years, and the two directors were well-known friends.

And so, eventually, Spielberg was given the reins from Kubrick, and results were...mixed. It’s funny, because I’ve never actually seen this movie, but I remember it through its surprisingly widespread ad campaign. I used to go to NYC as a kid a lot, and there was a massive building-side plastered with the iconic logo of this movie. So, I’ve been hovering around this movie for a long time. Enough navel-gazing!

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap (Part One)

It is, unsurprisingly, the future. A marrator informs us that climate change has caused the ice caps to melt, and global flooding drowns several countries. You could say that it’s a...Waterworld.

I genuinely considered watching that movie at some point, and then I decided I liked myself to much to watch 2 hours of Kevin Costner’s emotionless acting. Granted, it’s not much better now, listening to the emotionless acting of...

Professor Allen Hobby (William Hurt) is a straight-up sociopath. OK, technically, he’s a robotics engineer, but dude’s making a speech, right? He talks about how far robots have come, dissing my boi Deep Blue in the process, and notes that pain-memory response can also be demonstrated by robots. He proves this by stabbing a woman in his audience, like RIGHT through the hand. Jesus, man! Why the hell would you do that?

Oh. Holy shit, I got fooled. Advanced technology indeed. But OK, so Sheila’s a robot, and a very advanced one...to us. But Hobby wants more, and proposes to his workers to make a robot that can really TRULY love. And through love may come a true subconscious, which means making a robot that can dream. And what better robot to make than a robot child? After all, all child conception requires a license in this futuristic world, so many childless couples are yearning for a child.

Which is why, twenty months later, the first robot child is offered to Henry and Monica Swinton (Sam Robards and Frances O’Connor), a couple...with a child. Um. Guys. You JUST SAID that there are legit childless couples who need a child, and those people would be best suited to love that robot child back (a VERY GOOD question raised by one of Hobby’s subordinates). So why give it to a couple whose son is still alive? Yeah, he’s got a rare disease that they don’t have a cure for yet, and is currently in cryostasis, BUT THEY HAVE A KID! Surely, that’s going to be a potential emotional conflict! And what if the kid wakes up or some shit? This is a TERRIBLE goddamn idea. Think this shit through, guys.

And yet...

This is David (Haley Joel Osment), Cybertronics’ first child robot, brought home by Henry to essentially replace their son. Which is AMAZINGLY FUCKING TONE-DEAF AND INSANE, GODDAMN. That’s extraordinarily messed up. And, for the record, I totally get what Spielberg’s going for, but Jesus Christ, man. This was a terrible way to go about this. And it gets fucking WORSE.

See, Henry (who actually works for Cybertronics) tells Monica that, once they sign the papers and complete the updates, David will imprint on them and see him as their true parents, loving them unconditionally. Which...yeah, fuck, that’s an entire DUMP TRUCK of ethics issues right there. And, while we’re at it, David is...creepy as shit. I mean it, dude, Haley Joel Osment is a VERY good child actor, but he’s laying on the creepy robot child thing THICK. And yeah, this is BEFORE he imprints on them. Jesus fuck, man, there’s a scene where the still uncomfortable Monica is outside of a glass door, and he looks back at her THROUGH THE DOOR like a goddamn SERIAL KILLER.

And I gotta tell ya, dude does not lay off that creepy-ass dial one iota. And for that matter, the music by John Williams ISN’T FUCKING HELPING. LISTEN to this shit, and imagine a robot child that you don’t know wandering around your house. It’s amazingly fucking creepy.

AND IT JUST. KEEPS. GETTING. WORSE. There’s a scene where they’re all at dinner, right, and David’s just staring at them as they eat, mimicking their actions. After all, he’s a robot, he can’t actually eat or drink anything because of his internal working. And then, out of FUCKING NOWHERE, he starts laughing like the FUCKING JOKER, and it scares the EVER-LOVING SHIT OUT OF ME. And somehow, they laugh alongside him, in the never-ending Stockholm syndrome that is this movie! And as soon as its over, he just STOPS laughing, spontaneously. Fuck me, man, I’m tempted to stop watching here and now, and I’m only TWENTY MINUTES IN! I need a fucking break.

And after that...OF COURSE she decides to activate his imprinting protocols to make him, let me remind you, LOVE HIM FOREVER! She reads out a series of words, and after “FREIGHT CAR”, he knows his mission is to kill the Prime Minister of Sokovia. But first, he’ll settle down and love Monica unconditionally (again, FOREVER), calling her Mommy and making me shit my pants in fear. IT WASN’T ME, IT WAS FUCKING DAVID

Oh, and by the way, isn’t it kinda shitty to do that without Henry being involved AT ALL? Like, cool, he has unconditional maternal love, but Henry wasn’t a part of that conditioning at all! And he still refers to him as “Henry” instead of Dad! However, Henry definitely doesn’t care about that, because he still sees David as only a robot. Hey, guys, maybe using these two as your first experiment with a robot child WAS A TERRIBLE FUCKING IDEA, YOU IDIOTS! No wonder William Hurt was cast as Thunderbolt Ross in the MCU. Already shown he can play a character with shitty ideas before.

Anyway, after this terrible series of events, David prevents the parents from leaving one night due to his childlike antics. When Monica goes to comfort him, he asks how long she’ll live, and tells her that he hope she never dies, a COMPLETELY NORMAL THING TO SAY. Look, I get that he’s a robot, but only a goddamn emotionless sociopath would program emotional responses like this into a robot. Which, given what we’ve seen of Hobby, makes sense.

In response, she gives him Teddy (Jack Angel), a technologically advanced teddy bear with sentience, a personality, and the voice of Astrotrain from The Transformers TV series. Because, yes, I am THAT MUCH of a goddamn nerd.

Soon after, the house gets a phone call, which David receives...literally. He takes the phone and allows it to speak through him. It turns out that, shock beyond shocks, THEIR SON IS CURED! Yeah, fuck. Maybe giving David to a family with a STILL LIVING SON is a fucking ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE IDEA, for about a thousand reasons.

And, fucking understandably, Martin Swinton (Jake Thomas) is a little upset to find out that he’s essentially been replaced by a robot kid. Although, to be fair, he’s also kind of a dick to David, holding his humanity over him and treating him as a toy that he attempts to manipulate and bully. My Lord, this is a massively stupid idea. And Martin immediately shows his dickishness by asking his mother to read Carlo Collodi’s The Adventures of Pinocchio to them. Which is meant to be a punishment for Pinocchio. However, of course, David loves it.

Still, however, there’s trouble in paradise for David, as he tries to compete with Martin for being a real boy, and eats spinach at dinner one evening. Despite Teddy’s mildly ominous warning to him (”YOU WILL BREAK”), he keeps eating until he basically has a stroke and breaks, forcing him to be repaired by some of Cybertronics’ technicians. Monica has a bit of a break down as a result, which Martin notices. This causes Martin to go pure supervillain, manipulating David to do creepy things in order to insert doubt into Monica about David. Jesus, Martin’s a creepy kid, too. No wonder Monica grew to be cool with David, her actual son is a FUCKING SOCIOPATHIC MONSTER! Are there ANY truly normal people in this world? IS THIS WHAT THE FUTURE IS?

Martin convinces David to cut a lock of Monica’s hair while she’s sleeping. And lemme tell ya, a little boy holding scissors over someone while they sleep is not exactly comforting. Henry agrees, and after stopping him, believes that they need to return him. Monica disagrees, knowing that they’ll destroy him if brought back. But David, ever the semi-sociopath himself, ignores any signs of humanity in David and dismisses Monica's feelings for him entirely. He also says this thing about “IF HE CAN BE PROGRAMMED TO LOVE, CAN NOT HE BE PROGRAMM-ED TO HATE?”, which...no. No, he cannot. He didn’t learn to love, he was programmed to. And, again, that’s ethically FUCKED, but taking that into account...no. HE WASN’T PROGRAMMED TO HATE, HENRY. Goddamn, buddy, use your head here.

It’s Martin’s birthday, and his friends at the pool party expose David to the fun world of anti-robot (or Mecha) racism, and test to see if he has Damage Avoidance Systems by threatening him with a knife. And he does. Buuut, when those systems kick in, he goes to the nearest point of safety to keep himself safe. That point is, unfortunately, Martin, whom he gets behind...and accidentally drags into the pool.

Thing is, because of Martin’s recent illness, he can’t exactly swim, meaning that David almost drowns him. When Henry and other partygoers go to save him, they abandon David in the pool completely. And now, David’s fucked. Because although this situation isn’t even a little bit his fault, he also just nearly killed Martin. And so, after seeing notes that he’s been writing to her, Monica offers to take for a “ride in the country”. Which definitely means something good. In reality, she’s planning on taking him back to Cybertronics. But once in the car, there’s a change in plans. And hear me out...it’s arguably far more horrifying.

She decides to abandon him in the woods completely, despite how hard it is for her to leave him. She’s sparing him from death, sure, but also throwing him into a world he doesn’t understand, and for reasons that he doesn’t understand. It’s genuinely terrible. And then...yeah, she leaves him forever, to an uncertain future.

End Act One.

I think this is a good place to stop. It’s early, and I need more coffee to handle this shit. See you in Part Two. Of Three. Yup. It’s a long one.

#a.i. artificial intelligence #ai artificial intelligence #steven spielberg #stanley kubrick #haley joel osment #jude law #frances o'connor #brendan gleeson #william hurt #science fiction may #sci-fi may #user365 #365 movie challenge #365 movies 365 days #365 Days 365 Movies #365 movies a year #movieedit #filmedit

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fnorazril · 5 years

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I just had a daunting thought while sitting here and throwing words to paper. The cost of books. The amount of time and effort put into them is staggering. If you commissioned an artist you’d be looking at like 60 bucks minimum (I know some folks under sell their art, but that’s another story for another day) to hundreds of dollars. But most books? Like, 8 bucks. A dvd? 20 bucks. Not to mention the initial swell of money comes from a one time viewing experience. Albums of music... well that I honestly don’t know, the last thing I physically purchased was a cd back in the early 2000′s. I think it was 15 bucks. (American dollars, all hail the failing dollar bill. The King is Dead, All Hail the King.) Triple A video game? 60 bucks, plus depending on the company, DLC out the wazoo. Makes me really appreciate the cost of books and the relation to time spent and the return. Depending on how fast you can read, it’ll entertain you for days. Plus you can always go back to it at a later date. Some of my favorite books I read at least once a year. All for cheaper than a meal at a burger joint. Hell, campaign modules for tabletop games go for 20 bucks a pdf. That’s art and story and a social element mixed in (whenever you can swing your stupid schedule, Bob.) I guess it’s one of the reasons I’m not concerned about shelling out 20 bucks for a book. It’s money well spent. Books good. Brain need books. Make brain smart again.

Just a weird thought that popped into my head, whilst hemorrhaging ideas into a bucket that is a word doc.

Oh and writing? I’m terrible at it. I just went and looked back at what I had written. It was a bloody nightmare. I should know this from making my own campaigns. I just tap a vein and throw whatever is in my head out like a hoarders house being cleaned out by horrified relatives after they find the mummified remains of the former occupant surrounded by hundreds of empty boxes of cat litter filled with useless paraphernalia. Like twist ties. Who saves twist ties? It gives me huge amounts of information that I’ll later sift through, organize and put into a plot. Organized? No, not at all. Oddly cathartic and feels like you just cleaned out what feels like hundreds of pounds of yammering jumble in your head? Yes. Anyone else write like that? Like poltergeist spewing alphabet soup that is later mucked through by an ancient oracle performing an augury looking for portents of the future. Yes? If so I feel sorry for you, I know the pain. No? Lucky bastards, you should feel my pain.

Side note, I like (post)apocalypse fiction. But I like really wonky (post)apocalypse fiction. I mean, I like movies like Waterworld and adored the Tank Girl comics. Plus I’m a big fan of Fallouts 1&2 and New Vegas. I like satire and tongue in cheek humor. I like weird (post)apocalypse. I like 80′s (post)apocalypse. So whenever I go into a book store I see a huge dearth of (Post)Apocalypse fiction. And when I do finally find something, it’s almost always some doomsday prepper kind of thing. Or zombies. Like, give me radioactive pig men crawling out of some nuclear slurry stirred up in a toxic waste dump that bled into a nearby North Carolina pig farm where they have literal lagoons of pig crap. Where the pig men weaponize their effluvia and wage biochemical war on the remnants of humanity. You know. Absurdity.

So, yeah. I’m writing an (post)apocalyptic story to my liking. Gods, above and below, help us all.

Anyways. Happy Friday. Support your favorite authors. Go buy their books. Or Ebooks. Or whatever. They deserve it.

#blathering #happy friday #Postapocalypse Absurdity #books and pricing

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riderdrauggrim · 5 years

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Political Rant

I really love Election Time in Canada, because now I can easily see all the racist, xenophobic assholes who dont care about anyone but themselves and their immediate wealth and comfort, by any means.

I mean, in this day and age? If you've got a Conservative sign, you are literally against everything Canada represents in the eyes of the world.

The party leader buys a private jet - A JET - and boasts about it, espousing the traditional campaign bus. And then brands himself as 'one of the people'. Maybe he means '1% of the people'? Nevermind that since he needs a landing strip for said jet, he's skipping over any municipalities too small or poor to accommodate an airport. Nevermind that recent studies show the carbon footprint of personal jets is off the fucking charts in terms of climate damage. Nevermind that - what the hell does he do when he gets to his destination? Just stand on the tarmac? Or, dare I say it, does he still need a BUS? Or do they all pile into personal vehicles? Maybe a fleet of Hummers?

Short sighted bullshit. Fuck you Andrew Scheer.

This blogger is:

Pro-Immigration - We're all immigrants. Deal with it.

Pro-Spending (deficit?) - You have to INVEST to build the future. The returns will come.

Pro-Natives - They got fucked over, are still getting fucked over, and it's not fair.

Pro-Choice - Your body, your life, your choice.

Pro-2SLGBTQIA+ - Yep.

Pro-supporting Medical, Schools, and Infrastructure. - Hire more nurses, pay teachers better, rebuild some damn roads.

Pro-supporting nations who need help - I used to be so proud of Canada's involvement in UN Peacekeeping missions. I may not have known what they entailed, but the notion of blue hats going in and helping after other countries went and ruined everything, or horrible disasters struck... That seemed like a good legacy to follow up our defining contributions to the World Wars.

Look, I just want a future for the kids of my coworkers that isn't some wasteland Mad Max Waterworld spin off.

I want a place where people can identify how they want, love who they want, and believe in who they want without some random person saying they need to die because of it.

I want a land of equal opportunities, regardless of race, gender, heritage, birthplace, religion, or orientation.

I want the image of 'Canada' that I loved as a child back. The one we learned about in History and Current Events, that was a world leader in human rights and compassion. Unassuming politeness that could whup ass when needed.

Sure I was naive and ignorant as a child, but would living up to such ideals be a bad thing?

And I don't see any of those hopes ever happening if we fall back under a Conservative Leadership, not with what they idealize in this current era.

Cat tax:

#political rant #canada #politics #personal views

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thedungeonofbaddecisions · 5 years

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Next campaign playtest!

Its been snowing really hard here lately, which means most of our party wasn’t able to make it out to the bar we game at because it was blizzarding near where they lived. So, since we didn’t have enough people to continue the main plot, Matt decided to playtest a one-off version of the campaign he plans to run after we finish the Journey of the Cursed King, which has been tentatively named Waterworld, even though we spent the whole session 1,000 feet in the sky. I will be tagging it as #waterworld playtest. Also, there’s a guest star. His name is also Nick, so he shall be henceforth known as “Nick 2.”

Featuring:

Matt, as the DM,

Me, as Magya “Mag” Gruul, centaur barbarian,

Nick, as Shalidar, sea elf rogue,

Ken, as Carkan TruthHorn, minotaur fighter,

and Nick 2, as Lucius Torment, tiefling cleric of light.

Enjoy!

#d&d #5e #this is not the dungeon of good decisions #waterworld playtest

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mayflydecember · 7 years

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dm: you see that the giant ram’s horn you are clinging to is connected to a colossal skull.

@thebatmanequation: i’m goNNA FUCK IT.

#campaign: waterworld

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criticalrolo · 5 years

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So, after the Steampunk campaign I'm currently playing in(the one with my Warforged Chronomancer, whom I love and has unfortunately developed a "crush.exe" on the party lesbian), our DM said he's aiming to do a Waterworld style game, with the same players. Us being the excitable nerds we are, most of us have already made our characters. (1/5)

For example, one of us is 37 individual Goblins, lead by Bombardier, an affable who speaks with a Brooklyn accent. Another is Peach, a Tabaxi Rogue who is literally just his players pet cat. Anyway, we also have mine, a Triton Barbarian, because water and because first Hit Boi class. (2/5)

His name is Koshal, and he's from a hidden city-state that hid itself away from the rest of the world centuries ago. Due to recent political shifts, tho, he was one of the ones chosen for an envoy party to see the state of the outside world. (3/5)

Unfortunately, soon after leaving, Koshal fell majorly ill, like delusional fever, whole 9 yards. In the time, his craft was captured by pirates, who tortured and killed the rest of the party and crew. Koshal recovered enough to go into his first Rage, and slaughter the pirates. (4/5)

After he came out of his Rage, he realized that, since he'd been feverish during much of the transit and capture, he had no idea where he was and where his home was. So now, he's serving as a mercenary, learning what he can of the world, and all the while seeking his homeland. (5/5)

omg this is a TALE you’re usch a good character maker.......

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sugaryspirits · 3 months

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tagged by @jojonila Thank you for the tag! I LOVE getting tagged in these heheheheh

WIP WEDNESDAY!!

This is actually hilarious, the differences between my wips are stark.

I got portraits of npcs from my campaign that I've been waiting to post- until I have the rest of them finished

then there's T h e C a v e s. These are specifically for my players, and probably won't be seen by them until a year from now ngl.

tagging @booping-noses @queerture @yaboibells <3

#hey my players who are seeing this #just know I'm putting out more secrets as we speak #hehehehehe >:)#my art #dnd #dungeons and dragons #wip #wip wednesday #waterworld campaign

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ryderdire · 6 months

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zal Making a bad descion hopefully they don’t die

#ryders rambles #art #dnd oc #zal my dnd oc #dnd #oc:zal #waterworld dnd campaign #dnd oc:Zal

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ryders-lil-dudes · 6 months

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About Zauber,

Population 9000

Three distracts and a Magocracy/Oligarchy.

The districts are

ClayWalk 5.5% of the population lives here

SliverMile 35% of the population lives here

Lower Vol %59.5 of the population live here.

The city is housed on a massive sky island that floats with the power of the heart of Zauber an unknown magical artifact that supposedly sits in the center of the island. Because of the elevation it is very cold in Zauber.

I’ve got more lore then this but that’s the gist. I’ll answer any asks about it! As I’m still working on hammering out the finest details of life in the city and logistics of how living there works, so honestly questions about this could help haha

Also feel free to ask about the world it takes place in too but I might not have answers as the dm just let me make a city for fun and I don’t know everything about the world. I will say that it’s the same one I’ve been talking about with the serpent and the flooding

#dnd #dnd oc:zal #the city of Zauber #waterworld dnd campaign #Orin if your seeing this plz don’t reblog cuz atlas is still in the campaign and I don’t wanna spoil it for her #also

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lushscreamqueen · 3 years

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Slipstream 1988

*OPENING: *Good Evening Hi’ya yes, it’s me NIGEL HONEYBONE. Yes I'm so hip I can't see over my pelvis...bones. Welcome once more to the SCHLOCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW. Tonight we really dig down deep in the foul pits of the Public Domain to bring you a surprisingly modern film from 1989 that I found festering in the bowels of the TVS studios. A movie so bad it has never been given a cinema release in the USA. And this is from a country that gave us Waterworld. So suspend the belief that you are here for entertainment values and sit back in a nice comfy chair to watch “SLIPSTREAM”

BREAK: From the depths of the earth..... To the edge of existence... The hunt is on!...And then after the break we will return you to your regularly scheduled program, “SLIPSTREAM” *MIDDLE: *Welcome back to the SCHLOCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW. As you might have noticed by now, *SLIPSTREAM* is a 1989 post- apocalyptical ikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalyptic_and_post-apocalyscience fiction adventure film with a huge emphasis on aviation and things that ...um.. Fly as most thing aviationary do. I MEAN the film opens with a mysterious man, later referred to as "Byron" portrayed running down a canyon, being harassed by an airplane. You just know it’s going to be downhill from there. Slipstream was directed by Steven Lisberger who had previously directed the cult classic 1982 science fiction film Tron . I guess he learned something from SLIPSTREAM as he hasn’t directed since. On the downside he is attempting to re-live his early glories by writing TRON TWO. SLIPSTREAM is produced by William Braunstein whose only other film is some post production work on ElimiDATE, Nigel Green who went onto Run Fat Boy Run and Fat Slag, and St Trinians as well as Gary Kurtz whose prior list of credits include Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, The Dark Crystal, Return to Oz , and American Graffiti.

> SLIPSTREAM is a far cry from anything that could be called, well...good. Why Gary, why?? Slipstream reunited Gary Kurtz with Star Wars star Mark Hamill who portrays the central antagonist in tonights film. Do I need to mention Mark Hamill was Luke Skywalker?? Well do I?? Where have you people been all these years, in a broom closet? He was originally cast as David on "Eight Is Enough" but asked to be released from his contract before Star Wars came out because he sensed the movie would be successful, and Hamill wanted to focus on his movie career. ABC refused to release him from his contract, thinking that having a successful movie star connected with the show would help "Eight is Enough" luckily for him, Hamill was in a car crash in December 1976 and injured his face. This made him unavailable for shooting the TV series, and ABC was forced to recast the role of David, which then went to Grant Goodeve. Aren’t we glad we knew that! After all that there are other stars in SLIPSTREAM. Bill Paxton plays Matt Owens, but you may recognize him as that nice married etc man from Big Love. Aka That Mormon show on SBS. Bob Peck plays Byron and tried hard to make it work but still went on to do Jurassic > park and Lord of the Flies and While Kitty Aldridge from Porterhouse Blue and The Paradise Club is probably better known as Mrs Mark Knofler. It’s the cameo appearances from Robbie Coltrane as Montclaire that is to watch for as well as Sir Ben Kingsley as Avatar. Its well after Ghandi was made so guess he must have been slumming it. It sure as heck wasn’t for the money, and F. Murray Abraham just turns up in just about everything so it’s no surprise he’s in this as well playing the beautifully over acted Cornelius. Thats it, I can’t wait any longer...Roll the movie. CLOSING: SLIPSTREAM had a very short cinema run in the United Kingdom where it was considered a flop, and Australia where the film grossed just $66,836 during its entire theatrical run. These failures were perhaps due to the fact that a promotional campaign for the film was non-existent. Subsequently the film was never released in theaters in North America meaning it remained relatively obscure and why it only enjoyed moderate VHS sales. Fans, and I use the term loosely here, have been awaiting a director's cut on DVD but been disappointed after legendary producer Gary Kurtz said in an interview that the script was originally much more violent, but that these violent scenes that would have made the plot more coherent were never even filmed. SLIPSTREAM has many common sci-fi themes, such as taking place in a dystopian future in which the landscape of the Earth itself has been changed and is windswept by storms of great power. There are also numerous sub-plots, such as free will and humanity amongst artificial intelligence. This said, overall, the movie is entertaining, and interesting. “NOT” If it was based on a book, I'd love to read it. I came away from the movie wishing I knew more about the characters involved, and curious about what would come next for the main characters. Actually, I’m a *FIBIA* but really now I’m being *HUMERUS,* I’m wishing I’d had a book and not watched the movie at all, Partially because this desk needs propping up but mostly because someone has to make sure the public Domain is safe for you young things. So until next week when I find even more lint in the belly button of the TVS vaults “TOODLES”

by Lushscreamqueen 17th July 2009

#Nigelhoneybone #schlockyhorrorpictureshow

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dweemeister · 6 years

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Braveheart (1995)

The summer of 1995 provided moviegoing audiences with a third Die Hard movie, Casper, batnipples, Disney’s problematic Pocahontas, Apollo 13, Waterworld, and one of the most understanding children’s films of all time in Babe. That is a busy summer to say the least. Amid that clutter, one of the most successful movies of that period could not possibly have been made now, let alone find the audience it did twenty-three years ago. Released by Paramount in North America and 20th Century Fox internationally, that film is Mel Gibson’s Braveheart, a thirteenth-century war epic about Scottish knight William Wallace (played by Gibson) taking arms against King Edward I of England in the First War of Scottish Independence. Braveheart was Gibson’s second directorial work after more than a decade as a figurehead for 1980s Australian cinema and presence in the Lethal Weapon series. This is a visually striking, technically accomplished film rife with homophobia, misogyny, and historical howlers that continues to sharply polarize viewers about its cinematic merits. Through the fires of these controversies, the extremely violent Braveheart has bludgeoned its way to becoming an iconic fixture of 1990s Hollywood.

It is 1280 in Scotland. As a child, William Wallace survives King Edward “Longshanks” (Patrick McGoohan) invasion of Scotland. Following Scottish defeat, Wallace is taken on a European journey by his uncle Argyle (Brian Cox). Years later, Wallace (Gibson as an adult; James Robinson as a child) will return to his village and marry childhood friend Murron MacClannough (Catherine McCormack as an adult; Mhari Calvey as a child). But Longshanks has granted his English nobles in Scotland right of the first night, and Wallace’s successful attempt to save Murron from rape eventually ends in her execution. Enraged, Wallace – assisted by his fellow villagers – massacres the English forces sent to his hometown and drives the remaining English military from Scotland. Longshanks will not take military defeat without response, ordering Prince Edward (Peter Hanly) to quash the rebellion. War and royal intrigue breaks out, leading to Edward’s wife, Isabella of France (Sophie Marceau), being sent to negotiate with Wallace and the two falling for each other far too quickly.

With that plot in mind, viewers should understand that the only historically accurate aspects of Braveheart are the names of the historical figures involved and place names – really, that’s it. The Scots wear kilts, despite the fact kilts would not be invented for another several hundred years. If one wants to understand the First Scottish War for Independence and the history surrounding this era, read a book instead. Screenwriter Randall Wallace admitted that his script was based less on history than on the epic poem The Actes and Deidis of the Illustre and Vallyeant Campioun Schir William Wallace, written by Blind Harry in the fifteenth century.

In its medieval swordplay, Braveheart has more to do with Spartacus (1960) than anything in a 1930s-40s 20th Century Fox or Warner Bros. swashbuckler. The film’s enormous battle scenes – shot in Ireland with over 1,500 members of the Irish Army Reserve participating on both sides of this cinematic conflict – are excellent collaborations in deploying men on foot and horseback smashing into each other on a grassy plain with a frantic camera attempting to make sense of the scrum. The use of 200-pound mechanical horses running on nitrogen cylinders even fooled an animal welfare organization that decided to investigate the film because of the effect’s realism. When not indulging in ill-advised slow-motion, these battles, perhaps too frequently placed into the film to the point they becoming fatiguing, are spectacular in their choreography. The collaborative effort between Gibson, cinematographer John Toll (1994′s Legends of the Fall, 1998′s The Thin Red Line), editor Steven Rosenblum (1989′s Glory, Legends of the Fall) and second unit crew members contributes to a blood-soaked, crashing symphony of mangled limbs and human brutality that no other film depicting medieval warfare has since equaled – especially the Battle of Stirling Bridge, which is horrifying in its impact despite the absence of the crucial, eponymous bridge. Many films since Braveheart portraying contemporary war likewise pale in comparison.

Braveheart would be a disastrous film without John Toll’s cinematography, whether in action sequences or peaceful moments. The use of natural lighting and the on-location shooting in Ireland and Scotland appeals to Toll’s strengths for exterior shots, lending Braveheart a near-mythical angle amid large landscape shots blessed with eerie cloud covers and looming, verdant mountains. Toll makes Scotland a place of dreams – especially in the blue of twilight when the sun’s reds have retreated westward, welcoming the cool and comfort of the evening. This suits the film, as Gibson is not filming a historical drama. No computerized flourishes or too many swooping helicopter-aided vistas pry the viewer from the film. Toll’s camera for these landscapes and shots of the village (reportedly built by the production crew to Toll’s specifications) remain still or are gently heightened or lowered by crane shots. Close-ups are mercifully spare, reserved almost entirely for violent scenes.

The word “freedom” is tossed around with such promiscuity and depthlessness that Braveheart’s 178 minutes cannot be justified. Wallace’s screenplay touches lightly on the era’s politics, Wallace’s love life, and the ideas why Scotland should be independent from England. Political philosophy this is not. Look elsewhere for films of military leaders with a wracked conscience, psychologically impacted by the slaughter they have initiated. Instead, we are presented with anachronistic dialogue like this:

WILLIAM WALLACE: Before we let you leave, your commander must cross that field, present himself before this army, put his head between his legs, and kiss his own arse.

Sure, dude. If possible, maybe that commander might have a future as a contortionist.

Braveheart presents William Wallace as a man on a revenge-fueled mission who will consider all possible means to liberate his people – he has an irreverent sense of humor that makes given scenes a tonal mishmash. Wallace’s romantic interludes with Murron and Isabella? Gibson, McCormack, and Marceau, respectively, are all unconvincing – despite an enormous assist from Toll in these passionate scenes.

Casual homophobia is directed toward Prince Edward (later King Edward II), the son of Edward Longshanks (Edward I; who was a bellicose monarch, but becomes a cartoonish archetype in this film). Prince Edward is depicted as effeminate and gay, and his lover Philip (Stephen Billington) is killed by defenestration. The film further compounds this depiction by associating the Prince’s homosexuality to his ineffectual character – Longshanks constantly chastises his son’s lack of masculinity and Princess Isabella also disapproves of her husband for those qualities. This is not to say homophobia did not exist in the late thirteenth century, but that Gibson and Wallace are doubling down on the Prince, making him a punchline puppet of a leader because of who he is. Aggressive masculinity and sexual expressions inundate the battle scenes, too – swinging swords should be interpreted as one might think.

Women have almost zero agency in Braveheart, as they are depicted as sexual vessels to remain pure and chaste while the men fraternize and fornicate all they wish. Wallace’s campaign of violence begins not because the English lords have invoked right of the first night (prima noctis) for other women, but because prima noctis has been invoked for Murron (whose sexual faithfulness is idealized after her death in a pair of visions Wallace – who, by sleeping with Isabella, does not return that same faith – has). One of the few topics that women speak of throughout the film is sexual interest/satisfaction or lack thereof – Isabella’s only purpose in the film is to bang Wallace so that she can deliver an inflammatory piece of news to Longshanks on his deathbed.

Other than Toll, another craftsperson showcases their mastery in this film. That master is composer James Horner (Glory, 1997′s Titanic). 1995 proved to be a career year for Horner, having composed the scores for Apollo 13, Balto, and Casper. His second-best score of the year behind Apollo 13, Braveheart’s score is mostly devoid of the wanking masculinity described above, combining cultural elements that might seem inappropriate for a film about Scottish warriors – given the use of Japanese woodwinds in Legends of the Fall (a generational epic drama about a Montana ranching family), Horner’s instrumental appropriation knows no bounds, for good and ill. Along with the requisite bagpipes (rather than the Great Highland bagpipes that are generally associated to be “bagpipes”, Horner utilizes Uilleann pipes – Irish in origin, Uilleann pipes are softer and considered to produce a less harsh sound than Great Highland Bagpipes), this heavily orchestral score also benefits from a boys’ choir reminiscent of Casper, Horner’s affinity for Irish music, and quena (an Andean flute) for “The Secret Wedding”.

Three major motifs exist in Horner’s score: for Wallace, Murron, and Isabella. Wallace’s motif is first in the main title through the Uilleann pipes and will be the most-repeated theme in the film, fragmented up by percussion in the battle scenes, and often accompanied by strings in melodic unison (most heroically at 6:05 in “Freedom/The Execution Bannockburn”). Murron’s motif assumes melodramatic, (and very quickly afterwards) tragic connotations upon its most memorable appearance on quena in “The Secret Wedding”, chorally reprised at 3:10 in the “End Credits”. Dominating the final third of the film is Isabella’s motif, best outlined in “For the Love of a Princess” by the entire orchestra, and containing echoes of “The Ludlows” from Legends of the Fall. Credit the London Symphony Orchestra for providing a gorgeous recording, even if Horner’s score to Braveheart is not the most musically interesting effort of his career.

Producers Bruce Davey (Gibson’s longtime producer) and Alan Ladd, Jr. (son of legendary Paramount contracted actor Alan Ladd) navigated numerous obstacles at 20th Century Fox and Paramount to complete the film. This enormous, nearly three-hour production of a time period unfamiliar to North American moviegoers could not be produced at this scope today. A 2018 Braveheart would require even more major studios from various nations to finance the project, as epic films have all but disappeared from the multiplex because of their forbidding costs and lack of action star/superhero connections. Gibson’s ambition is staggering here. Yet Braveheart is let down by Gibson’s hypermasculinity and homophobia – reflective of his troublesome political dimensions.

The film’s cultural importance when it was released is unquestionable, but it remains to be seen how time will treat Gibson’s directorial breakout work. By being released in the mid-1990s, it is among the last Hollywood epic films largely untouched by excessive CGI – the effects are gruesome because they are practical. Though the characterizations are simplistic, Braveheart is an effective character piece for many, if not for this writer. Caught between the praises of fanboys of a certain demographic and those who loathe Gibson and/or Braveheart, I can neither adulate nor dismiss this movie outright. Bring on the insults on my manhood, but say it with a Scottish accent, would you kindly?

My rating: 6.5/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. Half-points are always rounded down. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found here.

#Braveheart #Mel Gibson #Sophie Marceau #Angus Macfadyen #Patrick McGoohan #Catherine McCormack #Brendan Gleeson #Peter Hanly #James Robinson #Mhairi Calvey #Andrew Weir #Randall Wallace #John Toll #Steven Rosenbaum #James Horner #Alan Ladd Jr.#Bruce Davey #TCM #My Movie Odyssey

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