Doctor Who: The Stories that Created “My” Doctor
Whenever fans talk about Doctor Who, or any other long-running work of fiction, they’re really talking about “their” version of the franchise. Relatively few people have seen all the episodes, and even fewer have gone through all the spinoffs and related media. Moreover, people put their own subjective weights on different stories. I personally despise the Doctor’s decision to turn humanity into soldiers against the Silence at the end of “Day of the Moon,” while others see it as an awesome moment for the character. The Doctor, like most people, is a mass of quirks and contradictions that can lead different people to have different interpretations of them.
With that in mind, here’s a list of some of the stories that most influenced my personal take on the Doctor. When I give my opinion on who the Doctor is or what they would/wouldn’t do, these are the tales that helped shape that point of view.
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Gaming Stories: The Raccoon Murder Mystery
My group has a habit of getting caught up on dungeon dressing and minor descriptive bits. Sometimes they spend an hour chasing down a bird that I mentioned flying overhead in the forest, or poking at some strange bubbles in a river. There’s no rhyme or reason as to what might catch their attention, but in my most recent Pathfinder session I decided to roll with it. What was supposed to be a snippet from downtime turned into a full-fledged side quest as the group solved the mystery of a mossy rock and a suspicious raccoon.
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What Are We Saying When We Call a Dad a Babysitter?
Originally published on BabyCenter.com May 4, 2016
Some time ago, Al Ferguson of The Dad Network posted a picture of himself wearing a t-shirt that read, “Dads don’t babysit. (It’s called “parenting”)” This being the Internet, it has since resurfaced and sparked a debate about a dad’s role in the parenting process.
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Comics & Quests: Down
I have a special spot for dwarves in fantasy RPGs these days, largely because I wrongly ignored them through most of my teen years. AD&D had a million supplements on elves, and I loved the idea of playing nigh-immortal magical beings. Dwarves, gnomes, and halflings got largely overlooked in those days (the Player’s Handbook Reference Series, which had a book for every race and class in the game, even shortchanged the latter two by shoving them together in The Complete Book of Gnomes and Halfligns rather than giving them a chance to really shine).
In my later years, I’ve come to appreciate foul-tempered, beer-loving, hairy people–and not just because I have become one. In the Fell’s Five comics, Khal became one of my favorite characters thanks to the juxtaposition of his stoic warrior nature and the gentle poet within. So if the comic had to get canceled before its time, I’m glad it went out on a note that highlighted these qualities.
Without further ado, let’s check in on Khal’s love life with the final storyline of this series, “Down.”
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Controlling Your Destiny: A Look at the Fate RPG
Originally published on Sidekickcast.com April 19, 2016
The d20 System is the 800-pound gorilla in the RPG industry, powering the top-selling games like Dungeons & Dragons and Pathfinder. It’s a very good, very flexible system that is most ideal for games where combat is the cause of and solution to most of life’s problems. Today, we’re going to look at another robust system that powers multiple RPGs – one I consider to be the opposite of the d20 System in many ways. That system is called Fate.
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Comics & Quests: First Encounters, part two
Since we spent the first half of this volume of Dungeons & Dragons in the past, I thought it made sense to break the summary into two parts. We’re now back in the present, with our heroes trapped in the Feywild.
I’m not pumped about the word “Feywild,” which originated in 4th edition D&D along with its counterpart, the Shadowfell. However, I guess they’re catchier than the previously-used “Realm of Faerie” and “Plane of Shadow.” More importantly to Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro, they are trademarkable terms that the company can monetize.
In game terms, the Feywild and Shadowfell were meant to be more accessible than they used to be, allowing for lower-level adventurers to travel the planes without requiring high-level magic or bespoke magical gates. Almost every setting decision in 4th edition D&D was to create a world (and multiverse) full of perils where adventurers would find fights anywhere they went. So far, Fell’s Five are carrying that spirit with them well.
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Starships and Space Hippos: The Spelljammer Setting
Originally published on Sidekickcast.com April 5, 2016
The 1990s were a time of terrible business management for TSR, the company behind Dungeons & Dragons, but it was also a time of great creativity. Few people argue that the 2nd edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons was a really good system, but just about everybody loves the campaign settings.
Every other edition of D&D has stuck to pseudo-medieval European settings – stuff like Dragonlance, the Forgotten Realms, and Greyhawk. Even in the more modern Eberron setting, with robot PCs and magic-powered trains, a group of adventurers heading into a dungeon to recover an artifact is pretty much the assumed standard.
2nd edition created settings that broke the normal D&D assumptions. You had a setting where the PCs were dragons, a setting where magic destroyed the environment with every spell, and a setting where a character’s beliefs could literally reshape reality. Then there was the Spelljammer setting, which is what I’m going to talk about today.
Supposedly, the concept of Spelljammer came from a picture of an armored knight standing on the deck of a ship that was sailing through space. Rather than pick the concept apart because of things like gravity, air, and the merciless vacuum of space, the designers started to develop a setting where that picture could be a possibility. The result was a mix of Ptolematic physics, monster-run galactic empires, giant space hamsters, and more.
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My Kids Became a Butt-Kicking Princess and a Friendly Zombie
Originally published on BabyCenter.com March 9, 2016
I don’t try to get my kids interested in my hobbies, but it’s inevitable to a certain degree. I spend time watching Little Einsteins and drinking imaginary tea, and in turn they want to join in my card games and help me write. That’s how they got involved in a role-playing game with me this past weekend.
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