LEGO Batman: Kid-Friendly Video Game or Dastardly Commercial Plot?

So I have to completely agree with this comment
James' interest in Lego, especially Star Wars Lego features, really takes off with the playing of Leg Star Wars. He loves to recreate the scenes and figures in the games in 'real life' so he can set up similar sets

Learning Risk

 
 

So Sunday, before football, I sat down and taught James to play Risk. He did a pretty good job of following along, and had little problem with basic play. Obviously strategy and the little nuances are not there. And of course we had one major breakdown when James realized at one point the he was in a losing position. But I just let him sit and cry for a couple of minutes, asked if he was ready, then told him what he needed to do next.

It was a teaching game, plus I was managing 2 colors (Daniel doing the rolling for one). So I took the time initially to help show James what to do, then had to repeat the lesson a couple of times. We didn't finish the game, it had reached the insane point where people are turning in for 25 or more armies, and every color is stretched to the limit so no one would really be safe.

James enjoyed it overall though. I think that with some work he will learn to enjoy it. The key will be finding times to play and get more people involved. Because Risk is infinitely more fun the more players you have.

Some excitement for the weekend

So I just found out that some members of the 501st Legion will be at the library tomorrow afternoon. So I get to combine a trip to the library with a chance for the boys to see Storm Troopers! Yay!

It turns out an old CSS class mate is part of the Legion, so he can keep me informed when they do appearances. Which is cool for James especially. I will try to make sure to take the camera and get some pictures and post them.

Risk

We have taught James some games, primarily card games, although he understood the main concepts behind the Star Wars Pocket model game. So I have decided that he is ready to learn how to play Risk.

I love Risk, some of my fondest childhood memories involve massive family games of Risk. With lots of deal making, table talk, more than a little ruthless diplomacy. Who can forget the immortal stands made in Quebec? Or Dave's infamous Yellow Horde?

Like most table top 'family' games it can be loads of fun, and it can also be brutal and no fun, depending on how it is played. I learned the good and the bad sides of sportmanship playing Risk with my family (the infamous flick of the finger to your last army when it is unceremoniously swept from the board, or the horrible imitations of the Chris Schenkel laugh). And I think it is time for James to learn. We have played some games of Uno (which can be particularly brutal) and I think I have taught James how to have fun even when you are being crushed.

And one of the side effects of playing Risk is learning geography. If someone is talking about a country and I am not sure where it is, all I need is to associate it with a region from Risk and voila, I can point to it on a map. And since geography is one of those things that kids seem to falter in nowadays I think it behooves me to give James a boost whenever I can. So that's my intellectual plan for the coming extended weekend: teach James to play. Now I know Daniel will want to play, and since he is only 3 he really isn't able to play I have a cunning idea. I will play myself, and play Daniel, letting him roll the dice when it is time. I think it will work, I have played enough solitaire games that I can be pretty honest about not taking advantage of the situation and hammering James.

Why Savage Worlds?

People who know me and are also gamers know I have been a proponent of GURPS since I first came across it in my gaming renaissance in the early 90's. I like GURPS, it is a wonderful, powerful system that you can do just about anything with, recreate virtually any game world or fictional setting. And in the hands of experienced players it usually just flows very smoothly.

However, my current gaming group, while made up of some very experienced gamers, do not approach their games with an overly critical eye. The emphasis over the years has become almost purely role playing, with less and less reliance on rules and a set of rules. Our primary GM has never been one to be overburdened with rules where they slowed down the story. Which is entirely different from some other groups I have been in, where knowledge of the rules was almost a prerequisite.

When Forrest introduced Savage Worlds I was familiar with it from reading about it's creation on the web site, as well as having played Deadlands for a very long time. But I was leery of it's ability to model pretty much any setting. Until I bought a copy, sat down and read it cover to cover. That was when I realized that Savage Worlds was the perfect tool for me to create the setting I wanted for this group. I couldn't use the same rule set for other groups I have played with, it wouldn't be beefy enough or detailed enough.

But with this group I don't need the game details, I just need to create the proper setting. And since my setting is a conglomeration of many other settings, picking a little from here, a little from here, I needed a generic rules set. Plus, I am creating a setting where I can throw in all kinds of different scenarios, and this rules set allows me to do just that. So if I want to throw the group into a Jurassic Park scenario I can. The basic rules won't change, I just need to have a reasonable story line, which is much easier to come up with.

So for people who emphasize the story telling aspect of Role Playing Savage Worlds is a great system. If your group wants to know and cares about how many Hit Dice that monster was, and how many damage dice this particular rifle does when fired from the hip while running across a swamp, this is not the right system.

Savage Shadows Description

Savage Shadows is the setting for the role playing campaign I am planning on running for my role playing group.  The title is derived from the fact that it is using the Savage Worlds  rules set and that it is in a similar setting to Shadowrun.  I am putting a significant amount of work into this campaign, more so than I usually do.  My campaigns are normally short run affairs, 1-2 night runs.  But I want this one to actually last a while.  Because I want to prove that I can create a sustaining campaign.  And I want to give our normal GM an extended rest.

The Set Up

The characters will all start as a working SWAT team in our current day & age etc.  This gives them all a base line for skills and attributes.  They are piloting their police helicopter to a training session when they run into a freak microburst storm.  This leads to a crash, with all of the players going unconscious.  This is an intentional maneuver on my part to get the group into the proper setting.

Often players and GM's have a hard time getting things started.  In particular our group, because we have players who will stretch the backgrounds of the players in order to create interesting characters.  Which is ordinarily good, but can be extremely hard for the GM to find an excuse for everyone to be in the same place at the same time, and get them to cooperate.  Because it is one thing for a bunch of human fighters and thieves to all be in the stereotypical bar at the same time.  But why would the Priest or studious Mage or Paladin be there? And once a fight starts what motivates a disparate group to stay together?  

In our current game this problem was solved by forcing us all to be members of a university club, with at least one common skill.  Which works in a setting which everyone is more or less familiar with, like our Victorian Horror setting.  However, I am putting together a setting that is a patchwork of a number of other game worlds, but not enough like any one so that players can really create something that is native.  So I have to set them up.  Have them create characters with a similar purpose and common skill set, then drop them into this game world.  It's a little contrived, and after they have been playing long enough, if a player wants, then they might create a character native to the setting, but that is far into the future.  

One thing I will do, just before they start is have each player draw some cards, this will represent the chance that their character has of transforming or gaining special abilities once they awaken in the new world.  This is something Forrest did in a game a long long time ago.  And we never really got a chance to role play the transformation.  But I think it makes for an interesting element of randomness and will encourage some better on the fly role playing.  It could be all kinds of fun to have the player who is normally known for playing the straight laced super smart characters wake up to realize he has been transformed into a Troll.  Or have the player who normally just plays the dumb brute wake up to find they are forced to play an Elf.  

The Setting

The players characters will wake up on the eastern plains, with no transportation other than their feet.  Although they will have their basic equipment (providing it fits).  As they make their way west they will come across some deserted farms and ranches, in some places they might even find signs of destruction and fighting, although any bodies will have been picked clean.  Eventually they will be picked up by one of 3 groups: Metro Police, UCAS military or Nomads.  Each of the groups will give a slightly different version of the history and current situation.  

To sum up what happened: The Awakening was starting, people were transforming into Elves, Dwarves, Orks or Trolls.  The world was having a hard time adjusting but it was doing so, up until the Zombie invasion occurred.  For a description of the Zombie war read World War Z, which is as good a description of the events in this setting, minus the Awakened Races.  However the ending was not quite as final.  There were more stories of the zombies being around, and being under control of Wizards from Aztlan (formerly Mexico).  And Magic came into play as a weapon at the end of the war.  

Soon after the end of the War the first Randoms appeared.  Randoms are beings or people from other worlds or time frames that appear in the world in seemingly random places and times.  The player characters are Randoms.  The first recorded appearance of Randoms was the arrival of the Great Dragons.  Huge flying creatures out of legend, filled with awesome power and magical talent.  

When the players appear it will have been a few years after the conclusion of the Zombie war.  Life is sort of settling down.  Although most third world nations are still in chaos.  The United States and Canada have merged their governments as the populations of the 2 countries became completely mixed together in the chaos of the initial invasion.  The combined populations is roughly 25% of what it was pre-war.  Although exact numbers are not known yet as there are a numbers of undocumented people living in the open areas between the urban centers, as well as who knows how many squatters in the deserted suburban areas.  The majority of the population lives in semi-fortified urban areas with heavily patrolled security areas around them.  

Agriculture and farming in general is mostly handled through automation in vast corporate farms.  Transportation between the cities is either handled via aircraft or heavy armored bullet trains.  The Interstate highway system has fallen into despair in most areas and is really only used within the metro areas.  Most areas between the cities are lawless outlaw territories.  Controlled by gangs in the eastern half of the country, with some of them being given near legal entity status.  The parts of Texas that haven't been swallowed back up by Aztlan is patrolled by the Texas Rangers.  The Southwest has fallen under the control of a resurrected Native American Nation, comprised of many tribal councils.  The NAN patrols the area and handles most of the border patrols with Aztlan, in exchange for extended sovereignty.  The NAN forces are rumored to be heavy users of combat magic.

The South is mostly controlled by the government however the coastal areas were hit very hard by the zombie invasion which was followed by 3 years of record breaking Hurricane seasons.  Florida is a war zone between the UCAS forces and the Aztlan-Carribean League.  Louisiana, and especially New Orleans, is essentially a swampy Necropolis, ostensibly governed by a shadowy warlord who plays the Aztlan league against the UCAS.  

So the world the players will be dropped in has very much of a wild west atmosphere.  With a wild and woolly ethos ruling the areas between the  cities.  And the cities themselves are still sorting out the chaos of post war, emerging races, and new and frightening powers being wielded by all manner of people and beings.   

Star Wars

So I have written about this before, and argued it in many different arenas, I really like Star Wars. I like the old movies, the new movies, the cartoons, the new Clone Wars, some of the books, I like it all. And this is something that I have passed along to my kids at least James and kind of with Daniel.

We have really been enjoying the new Clone Wars series on Sci-Fi network. It has been good, with interesting little moral puzzles each week, or lessons. It is not written with some serious depth to it. But it is fun, diverting entertainment, which is all I ask.

Because that is the point I get to in most of my discussions of Star Wars: it is fun, diverting entertainment. I don't expect Epic Drama or Shakespearean level writing from a movie abut guys in outer space running around with laser swords and spaceships. I want to be entertained, and Star Wars accomplishes that.

So I will write more about it on a regular basis, generally more specific things, like a particular episode, but I wanted to establish that anything I write will be from the perspective of a fan, not a real objective critique.

My Role playing

To start let me make 1 point perfectly clear. I do not consider video games to be role playing games. To me role playing games are a shared experience of people sitting around a room or table, interacting personally, face to face. Playing a video game with other people, even if those other people are thousands of miles away, is cool, but it ain't role playing.

I have been playing role playing games since the summer between my 6th and 7th grades when my then cousins (my aunt's 2nd husbands kids) introduced me to Dungeons & Dragons at a family reunion. I have been playing these games in some fashion or another for almost the entire time since then.

I have been in the same core role playing group now for something like 10 years. The core of the group is myself, Forrest and Carl. Over the years we have added Stephan, Dale, Justin, Nancy and occasionally Jennifer. Other people have come and gone but this is the core. Traditionally Forrest runs the games. We have played Deadlands, 7th Seas, a Firefly variation of Deadlands, D&D, Shadowrun, and various other games. It is a very good group, very tight and very friendly. We normally play every 2 weeks, although that varies depending on the seasons (we play less during the holidays).

Since we have been playing so long as a group we generally feel free to stretch our limits when we want to with our characters. As a long standing veteran I feel very comfortable with the rules for most systems, and usually I am Forrest's back up when he doesn't know a rule.

Overall it's a lot of fun. There's a lot of table talk and just normal interaction between the players, both as part of the game and outside the game. In fact, if we have missed a couple of sessions we often will end up talking more than playing during a normal session.

Free Range Geek

A blog dedicated to my various 'geek' interests, and the ways I get my kids involved.

Post types

1. The Savage Shadows campaign: creation, new ideas, eventual chronicle of the game.

2. Star Wars: reviews of the Clone Wars TV show, new toys for the kids, Lego items

3. Role playing: ideas & thoughts on role playing in general

4. Board games: the games I like, and teaching the kids to play

5. TTMG: Table Top Miniature games that I have played, and my eventual return to them.