Xaxaxe wrote:Swords & Sorcery, right?I'd forgotten about the penguins, but X the Unknown was definitely the villain from that game.
silver_beetle wrote:AH's Magic Realm was pretty bad, but only because it purported to be a RPG, but was more of a board game. Great artwork, I thought, and great components, but then, it was AH.But by far the worst actual RPG I've ever played was Serenity. The only thing good about it was that it gave you a reason to use a D12. Bonuses, for, say, hitting something in combat were based on dice levels, so if you had a D6 to hit and got a bonus, it was now a D8. After D12, it became D12+D2, D12 + D4, etc. There was no D20, and I think they made this system specifically anti-D20. I was thrown off the message board for it because I was so critical of the game, and everyone else on there was freakin' in love with it! Great setting, though. I'd like to adapt it for Traveller.
Badmike wrote:I've always disliked the "one and done rulebook" settings like Serenity. They seem to appeal to a very narrow audience of fanatics who don't play any other systems and merely enjoy going over and over the same material as was in the TV show/movie/comic book/novel, etc.Mike B.
I think there might have been some Serenity supplements
FormCritic wrote:I just recall the cost on the Serenity RPG. I was put off.Serenity is one of those Science Fiction settings that people look back on and say, "Wow. I guess that was brilliant. Why didn't we appreciate it?"I loved the TV series. I couldn't figure out why no one else was watching it.
Nice Hantlers wrote:Yeah, they released Out in the Black, an adventure/source book, and a GM screen. I think it died out after that.
"On its third dice-rolling table?" The tables in question aren't actually part of the rules, but are part of a three page section of the rulebook, which includes three tables and five graphs, showing the reader how the d10x system is the best possible dice system for a game. This tone is symptomatic of the rules. At several times the reader is lectured on how they should use the metric system in play, rather than the "archaic and unwieldy English [sic] system". The rules, of course, go on to tell you that the standard units of measurement can be either miles or kilometres; they are, apparently so similar as to be interchangeable. Rather than using a single system of measurements, the rules lecturer the reader on what they should be using, but provide poorly matching approximates in both systems and end the GMs book with a useful reference table of weights and measures, including conversion equations of troy grains to troy ounces because we're apparently playing the game of cyborg f***ing jewellers or something.For a game with such attention to detail, character creation is remarkably simple. The player selects their character's stats and skills and then apply the modifiers imposed by the cybernetic body. There are games which elegant in their simple execution. This is one of the other games.
Fundamentally, the problem with the Cyborg Commando game is the idea that playing cyborgs shooting lasers out of their fingers, in a world overwhelmed by aliens, was in some way cool. The writers were sadly mistaken in this. The background seems ridiculously silly and contrived. The alien race has invaded earth "just because" and is virtually undefeatable despite the fact that the book points of there being only one alien for every 11,600 humans. The aliens may be tough, but, at those odds, it is hard to believe that the various world militaries shouldn't be able to defeat them.
FormCritic wrote:For instance, I first learned what an oligarchy was from the Dungeon Masters Guide.
I recently received an e-mail from a correspondent who noted that my list of forms of government lacked the word magocracy. I was slightly bewildered that it was not there, for two reasons. I'd thoroughly searched the online Oxford English Dictionary and other sources for all "-cracy" and "-archy" words, so in theory, there shouldn't be any omissions. What's more, it was a word that had been familiar to me for many years. You can imagine, then, my chagrin when I determined that there is no such word - at least, not in any dictionary. That is to say, magocracy is properly *magocracy, using the linguist's convention of an asterisk to represent irregular, improper or non-existent words.This revelation left me, if not shaken to my lexicographic foundations, then at least perplexed that I had possessed in my vocabulary for many, many years a word that simply did not exist. This admission is rather embarrassing for someone who takes great pride in his knowledge of obscure English vocabulary. How could this happen?The answer is that for over twenty years, I have been a participant in role-playing games (RPGs), most notably Dungeons and Dragons (usually abbreviated to D&D), an extremely popular game with millions of players worldwide (mostly in their teens and twenties), and also one with its own curious jargon. If you are a non-gamer and have ever had the (mis)fortune to sit in on a game or game-related discussion, you may have been baffled by all the talk of PCs and NPCs, THAC0, non-weapon proficiencies, character alignment and hit points - and, very occasionally, a reference to *magocracy.
From its inception, Dungeons and Dragons has provided a cornucopia of new vocabulary to its mostly younger audience. As a child, I was filled with wonderment at my first encounter with electrum coins, potions of diminution, and lycanthropic foes. What joy to find treasure hoards full of sardonyxes, olivines, and my semi-eponymous favourite, chrysoprases. How delightful to slay one's imaginary foes with a halberd, guisarme or bec de corbin (this last one was particularly amusing because one of the guys in my gaming group was named Corbin, although I don't ever recall his characters using one). And without the game, thousands of youths would still be holding on to the misconception that a brazier is a support undergarment.
The first occurrence of *magocracy in print, anywhere, as far as I have been able to determine, is on page 89 of the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Dungeon Master's Guide (1979), by Gary Gygax, in a list of forms of government. Many of the terms on my own list of governmental types are found there, naturally, such as gynarchy, oligarchy, and theocracy. But also included on the list are five neologisms:*geriatocracy: government reserved to the elderly or very old*militocracy: government headed by the military leaders and the armed forces in general*pedocracy: government by the learned, savants and scholars*syndicracy: government by a body of syndics, each representing some business interest*magocracy: government by professional magic-users only
