In all, the game is just awesome, and I’m sure that you just forgot to mention it. I sure hope so, because if you are ignorant of this gem of a game you need go throw yourself into the path of the Level 14 Insurance Salesman.

Casino 491f4e2ad8…

I will return to the home country for Port Con Maine.

You had me at “Tee hee.”

You better come to PortCon and do a live podcast or something! I’ll make sure you have space and what not if you’re willing. Oh! And in Extreme Geek: If you point out you’re the biggest whore from PAC I’ll make sure we do something ’special.’ Extreme Geek is almost like a cult at PCM. We amp that shit up, son.

I was the one in the pink dress. And I’m the con chair for PortCon. The other person was Jekka- she’s on guest staff. Sometimes she dresses up as a maid. Yeah, life’s wacky like that. There are a *lot* of girls who I think are hot who work at PCM. So yeah. You better come back to the old country of Maine.

Anyhow, you made my night. Thank you!

Your comments about stereotypes of female characters reminded me of a female player in the group I once gamed with. She played EVERY character as a vamp/slut/seducer. No matter the game system or campaign, all her characters were basically ’sexy bimbos’ who tried to solve every problem by sleeping with an NPC (or PC). And I do mean EVERY obstacle…the primary recurring villain during the climatic battle…the Puritan reverend trying the party for witchcraft…the police officers investigating a noise complaint….the other members of the party that didn’t agree with what she wanted…EVERY one.

And if her vamping didn’t work (generally when someone other than her hubby was running the game) she would pout and bitch about how unfair it was, since she had so many stats/abilities/powers focused on it. I always found it amusing that she’d complain about how ‘chainmail bikini’ fantasy art was sexist…and all of her characters were walking stereotypes as written by a teenage boy (or Robert Heinlein).

On another note, you mentioned the the medical examiner on CSI. I also have always appreciated the fact that his disability is an element of the character, not the focus. I only found out after I’d watched the show for a while that the actor is actually disabled…both of his legs are prosthetics.

This episode you had me laughing out loud as I went through my menial work routine. I totally agree with you about the state of reviews, and had given consideration to doing them myself, but have put it off due to bridge-burning. This makes me very curious to read about Zeke’s experiences with this burning phenomena. I can’t find it though. Am I stupid? Is it right in front of my face? Please point me in the right direction?

We’re working on getting the file size down. I think we’re much higher than we need to be and we are looking into that, yes.

Great meeting you too!

Downloading now, can’t wait to listen!

1) No one in their right mind should ever drink a drink named “The Turd Burglar”. Especially if it has a tiny peanut at the bottom. At least it wasn’t a piece of corn.

2) You guys have big files and nice sound quality. Kudos for the high quality, but as I am on the road and frequently subjected to the abuses of low bandwidth hotel internet connections, do you think a lo-fi file size is also in order?.

Have fun while you are there.

…

oocwbrgc…

I have to call you out though. You may have “Cuntflap”, but This Modern Death totally beat you to “cunt”. We’ll accept a written retraction via email but we’ve ruled you get to keep “Cuntologists”, as much as I wish I could claim that. Brilliant Cuntolgist by Proxy? I can only hope. It did, however, earn you both a mention and a rant on our episode #16

Also, if you’re ever grasping for material, I propose an “orgasm-off”. We are, or at least use to be, Home of the Porn Voice. But for you, I’d bring it back for one last show down.

Enjoying listening, waiting for more…
<3
Kristin

[…] in the first issue of Serenity: Better Days? Well now you can. A huge pile of Alliance cash and other prized Serenity collectibles will be awarded in the Serenity: Better Days Big Haul Giveaway from co-sponsors Quantum Mechanix Inc. […]…

We’re in the process of putting together an outline and taking submissions of topics.

I’d love if you could come too Daniel!

As for being professional I feel the need to point out that we offer a genuine critical review of Cortex/BSG, just as much as we have of every other system we’ve reviewed. In fact, I would go so far as to say we offer the most “professional”review of the system ever done. Please take this as an invitation to prove me wrong.

For your edification I discuss the fallacies present in the article.
[quote]
My Group and I have been playing RPG’s for 20 plus years. [/quote]

Length of play has little to do with skill. For example I know a number of co-workers who have played golf longer than Tiger woods. Does that make them better? It is the case that each group is better then when they started. Tiger Woods is much better and my co-workers are a little better.

All I could tentatively state is that you are possibly better at role-playing than you were 20 years ago. Of course so am I. So how would we compare? The evidence does not speak in this regard, but I am willing to grant that you are certainly better then you were 20 years ago..
[quote]
We have been using the Cordex system for the last year and like it a lot. [/quote]
Again, this proves nothing. You could have been playing a better system. You could have made a bad game fun. Of course if the game is good you could offer some reasons why, or you could respond to the points I made.
[quote]
We got over the need to have a complicated system were you have to roll to open the fridge years ago, Cordex is a good system. [/quote]
OK. Except that Cortex is a relatively complicated game, compared to the other choices you could make. And the few games that are more complicated offer significantly more play.

What advantage does the game offer over any of them??

If you know anyone who likes BSG the RPG let them know about the podcast. Maybe they can let me know more.

My Group and I have been playing RPG’s for 20 plus years. We have been using the Cordex system for the last year and like it a lot. We got over the need to have a complicated system were you have to roll to open the fridge years ago, Cordex is a good system.

As you the way you did the review. No matter what you think of the system please try to stay Pro, you sounded like three kids with they dad tape recorder

Storytelling is too one-sided and that’s our point. This is a group activity. The end result is a story, but the path to it involves group dynamics, plans, choices, and randomness and those aren’t elements of storytelling.

Our take is that to call it storytelling is loosing all of the other great things about gaming.

We’ll also probably have an episode just about this.

But to clarify, I think Grimm is written very well. It’s got the right mix of casual narrative mixed with creativeness and overall very good. The layout/ structure though needed work with just some additional charts, formulas, graphs, etc.

On another note, I did notice that you seemed to be assuming that gaming = GMing - that is, not much of what you said seemed to be coming from the player’s point of view. There was a lot of directing/organizing/supervising language. I’d be interested to hear what you think gaming is like for the player.

I would say that it’s like…shared storytelling :). But I’m curious to hear what brilliant-er comparisons you guys will come up.

…

It is yet another dark gritty setting that has tactical combat mechanics. I kinda like the mechanics and but why use them over any of the other systems?

Some more gritty movies - Most spaghetti westerns. Yojimbo, Seven Samurai, Dark City. Some books - Most stuff written by Raymond Chandler (phillip marlow series for example) & the movies based on them.

Very gritty TV series (more than the shield) the Wire

Another very gritty RPG from a setting perspective - Tribe 8.

This kind of character is known as a “One Hit Wonder.” They have just one trick, but it really kills if it goes off.

The problem with this character is their vulnerability. They took too many penalties and that should shut them down, the problem come up when it does not.

This is a topic that will be addressed in an upcoming podcast on min/maxing. I am starting to belive our listeners might just be psychic.

This topic was intended to offer many sides of the debate, as opposed to simply promoting one point of view. So I am not going to be surprised if people take issue.

For me, this lacks the idea of what I think of as the “min” in “min-max”. For example, take the Gimli test-case. To me, a min-maxer would do something like that an Intelligence and/or Charisma score of 3 so that they can jack up their Strength to 30. A min-maxer might also, say, spend no money on food or clothing when buying equipment so that they can afford a masterwork or magical weapon instead. So you get a naked, drooling moron who reeks, but who obliterates his foes with every swipe of his axe.

I used to game with a guy named Yul who was a min-maxer in the way I use the term. We would play Vampire, and he would create characters by maxing out things like Firearms and Dexterity and Strength and Melee while on the other hand having Intelligence, Charisma, Manipulation and/or Appearance scores of 1. Then he’d play this character who was a walking combat machine and had nothing else he was functional for. He was using the rules, in the loosest sense, so he wasn’t cheating, he was just…a crappy player; a min-maxer.

To me, that’s min-maxing - when you make choices based solely on what you see as system advantages for their own sake, rather than making decisions that result in your character being good at what they should be good at, rooted in your concept and plan for the character. It also involves taking unreasonable penalties that don’t make your character more interesting, just for the mechanical advantage.

So I don’t really see you guys as min-maxers at all (Cuddles and Bobo notwithstanding - and even they at least sounded hilarious).

I look forward to your future podcasts.

Jaylene