hairylarry's blog

This is from Gamer+ Inspired Unreality, July 29, 2019. My suggested topic was Fantasy Fiction but we spent more time on the soon to be released World Anvil for Lost Worlds. Actually kind of closely related.

---

First suggested topic - fantasy fiction. All gaming is on topic. Anyone can suggest a topic.

I'm reading Stephen Brust, the Vlad Taltos series. I'm on Jhereg, the first book. Currently 15 books in the series, 19 planned.

Stephen Brust - he's a musician.

In the Brust there are two kinds of magic, witchcraft and sorcery. Witchcraft is spells. Sorcery is reaching for power and projecting your will.

There is also teleportation, psionics, telepathic communication, familiars, all in their own coherent systems.

I think it would be a great foundation for a gaming world.

There's a fandom wiki - https://dragaera.fandom.com/wiki/Main_Page

They say "Dragaera is a fictional world, the setting of a number of books by Steven Karl Zoltán Brust. It is inhabited by two major intelligent species, generally known as Dragaerans and Easterners, as well as several other races such as the Serioli, cat-centaurs, and the gods."

So you can see; races, classes, two types of magic, two styles of combat, rapiers and swords, perfect for a gaming world.

And I'm only on book 1.

---

My friend, the librarian, recommended this series and I'm enjoying it. He also plays jazz bass and I enjoy that too.

Me:

I will be on chat again tonight. What I would like to do is open a Gamer+ chatroom to be used anytime. The Monday night open game chat will be the first event. I hope there will be others in the future. Sometimes with guests. I will still post into the Dungeon Show channel to let people know where we are.

I tried reaching you on Facebook but I'm still not confirmed. Thanks.

Pexx:

Would you like to rename the Dungeon Show to something else? And what start time would you like?
Do you need help getting guests?

Me:

No, I would like to leave the Dungeon Show up for a few weeks so I can post info in there Monday nights. After that I have nothing to say about it. It's Carl's show and it ended so that decision will be up to you. I just want it up for a few weeks to help with the transition.
I would like to start the Monday Night Open Game Chat at 9:00 and end it when it peters out. I will be there posting for at least an hour, sometimes longer and I will try to continue chatting as long as it's happening.
I would like the Gamer+ room to be available anytime so I can promote it as available on gamerplus.org. I would like to add other events as Gamer+ gears up. One time and weekly. Maybe even some actual game play events.
I would definitely like to have help getting guests. We won't be recording a podcast so it will just be Q&A with the guest as well as open game chat.
My idea for tonight and other nights without guests is to post text on topics I've been thinking about, like the OGL last week. Just to try to get a discussion started. Also make it clear that it's open game chat. All tabletop games are on topic. And also encourage others to text chat about things they would like to discuss.
If we could work around to having guest about half the time that would be fine. Thanks for your help with this.
9:00 CST - same as the dungeon show - that's the schedule I'm used to and it's been working for me so why change it?

Vivian and I are trying to come up with a title for the Monday night event. We would like to emphasize creativity, game design, mechanics, writing, art, cartography, etc. We don't want the title to be RPG centric although I expect most chats will be.

Creative Conquests, If You Play You Win, Inspired Unreality, Inspired Ingenuity
Something better than Open Game Chat.

by Larry Heyl

"For a while there the universe was clockwork. All cause and effect. Every action had an equal and opposite reaction."

Dr. Shengwei was lecturing his class. Physics 101. He hadn't started in on the math yet.

"But the more we tried to describe the more complicated the descriptions became. The systems outpaced our equations. We could no longer make valid predictions. Since we saw chaos we described it as chaos. Chaos Theory became the new thing. But it was more of an excuse for why our predictions were failing than a way to make predictions."

"Is the universe clockwork and completely predictable? Or is it a chaotic mess with no prediction possible? Or is it both? 'It can't be both!' you say. But we are looking through the eyes of man. Maybe the human mind is the limitation here. Maybe in the eye of God chaos is simple."

He could tell he was starting to lose them. He could see the big question forming behind their eyes. What does God have to do with physics? They were expecting math but they were getting theology. Einstein said, "God does not play dice with the universe". The students were getting anxious. Uncomfortable. He would have to start on the math soon. Then they would wish he was still talking about God.

"Godel proved that in any formal system complex enough to describe itself, even systems as simple as axiomatic algebra, There would be statements that can't be proven or disproven and statements that hadn't yet been proven or disproven. Godel also showed that there was no way to distinguish between the two. Only God would know whether a statement that hadn't been proven could be proved or not. At least until a man or woman could prove or disprove it."

Dr Shengwei turned to the board and started in on the math. When he looked out at the class the uncertaintly and anxiety was gone. This was what they had been expecting. Now the uncertainty and anxiety was replaced with confusion.

Behind every pair of eyes there was a chaotic system known as a human brain. Was the human brain essentially chaotic or was it only chaotic as perceived by the human brain? In the eye of God even the human brain is simple.

---

Originally published at SFF Short Stories

sffshortstories.com/?x=entry:entry190109-101203

I just turned this into a Mini Zine.

Some stuff I wrote about Milyagon during the Gamer+ Voice and Text Chat at Tenkar's Tavern on Discord.

---

Vivian and I are writing modules and we are using OGL monster stats, etc. We put them in a separate zine

So now we're writing a little background story to get our next module started.
It's about the Milyagon witch.

So the background story sets up the problem and then when the player characters get involved it becomes a sandbox.

We've been cowriting on Gamer+ and on another social network I wrote called Collab. It's a ground up design specifically for a cowriting game.

I think the background story will help with player motivation.

We didn't really have that with Caves Of Doom. The characters come to town and hear about the Caves Of Doom which coincidentally happens to be the modules title so they know that's where they need to go.

So our modules are one offs. It could be you could run several consecutively to make a campaign. If we write more than two (which I plan on doing).

There's a woodcutter story where the town's woodcutter also sculpts figures that come alive at night.

And there's telescope hill with a tower and a telescope run by a pensioner called the keeper.

The blacksmith, Yon Rogar, is also turning into an interesting character. He also makes weapons and trades in them.

Last week I did the Delta Jazz Workshop. I'm still recuperating but you can tell I'm itching to work on these modules.

There's a bunch of Rogars. One at the docks. One at the stables. Big family of non farmers.

So you saved your blog in progress as a draft and now you want to finish it. How do you find your draft?

Go to your Dashboard by clicking DASHBOARD on the main menu.

Under Quick Links select My Blog.

Then click on MY DRAFTS.

Easy if you know how but it took us a little searching to find the exact right path through the nested menus.