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Apocryphal
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THE NEXT SEVEN YEARS Monthly Selections 72. Sword at Sunset by Rosemary Sutcliff 73. Lyonesse by Jack Vance 74. Dark Orbit by Carolyn Ives Gilman 75. The Tombs of Atuan by Ursula K. Leguin 76. Mission of Gravity by Hal Clement 77. Hiero's Journey b…
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@kcaryths Looks like you're up in September. Anything brewing?
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😂
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UK is the 51st state - I heard it in punk rock. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Dw_aj68Gqg
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But surely you agree an invasion Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Finland, Kaliningrad, or Greenland is not entirely off the table...
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Cool!
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Getting lost in real life is one thing, getting lost in an RPG is another. What choices to the players have if they get lost, and do all those possible solutions result in good gaming? 1. Pick one of these paths and keep going - presumably if they p…
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I’m not really that keen on the random encounter method. For one thing, it pays no respect to pacing. A GM will know better when an action scene is needed than the dice will. But in general I much prefer some set-piece encounters in specific plac…
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Yes, as Neil says, the investigation aspect is well-trod in gaming. Emulating travel is less so. It’s usually abstracted and glossed over. With the resource depletion examples Neil gave, the actual travel is glossed over. Terrain descriptions get bo…
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I think it’s a thriller, just a low key early version. The moving with Michael York did a better job at ramping up the tension, with dark mysterious characters skulking in the night, near boat rammings, a chase scene on a catwalk etc. Whatever you …
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I found the characters convincing for the most part.
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I can see it coming into vogue again, given current circumstances. The other kind of invasion sometimes explored is the immigrant invasion (like Priest’s Fugue for a Darkening Island. It’s not super common, but it exists.
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I liked it and didn’t find it excessive, but I like sailing and I like reading fiction and history books about sailing, so I am very much atypical.
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I agree with Neil. This felt very much like a slightly earlier version of Buchan’s 39 Steps, or a Hammond Innes novel, which mostly featured workaday people or ne’er do wells, or people trying to hide an ignominious past. Also a bit reminiscent of S…
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I do agree there was verbal conflict, and this also was more intense in the film than the book - maybe because the action was more condensed in the book. But I thought the movie ramped up the tension quite effectively, especially at the beginning wh…
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Very nice - enjoyed that after reading the book. In the film, Davies boat was a gaff-rigged yawl, and Dollman's was a gaff-rigged schooner. Can't remember if they mentioned the boat riggings in the book.
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Sounds interesting.
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What are we doing in August, @clash_bowley
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@BarnerCobblewood I did read the whole trilogy. It left me underwhelmed, and I kept comparing it to Roadside Picnic, which I felt was roughly the same in concept - an alien presence appears in a certain place (The Zone in RP, Area X is The Southern …
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Oh stop. Here’s a list. They are a mix of military history inspired games (In Harm’s Way etc) which are not necessarily about fighting so much as military culture. Then there are a bevy of SF games and settings that, much like Traveller, can be what…
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Snowpiercer did have an internal plot about class from front to back of train. And it was an enclosed environment, like this train. Snowpiercer ran perpetually through a post apocalyptic, snow-laden world; it couldn’t stop or freeze in place. This i…
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According to TV shows about first responders, their lives are basically filled with first-responding and sex - the later of which gamers usually shy away from in games lol. But I do like the idea of a game about dramatic healing instead of fighting.…
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That pretty much confirms what I was thinking - that despite all the hype, there is no actual AI at the moment, and we still might never even see a true machine intelligence (however that gets defined). What we have now should probably not be called…
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Yeah, I’m not sure I buy PKD’s take on it either, but it’s interesting to think about.
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> @NeilNjae said: > That's a question I was considering asking: is the idea of "found family" and community a significant element of the narrative? People in the book are often doing things for others, not themselves. The Crows and …
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This reminded me of a T-shirt I once saw that said: "I may not look like I'm doing much, but on a cellular level I'm really quite busy."
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@BarnerCobblewood I think that depends on who spoke the words, and their context. I don’t recall the exact quote, but I think something similar to this was said toward the end, just when they were deciding whether to break through the barricades - p…
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Yes, sure - probably all of these. Since the train is metaphorical it would easily be swapped out for any enclosed environment which is keeping out an outside environment. A sailing ship or a space ship would do. Putting it in that light, think of t…
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I always like it when chapters get short toward the climax - it gives the feel of momentum. Also especially suitable for a runaway train metaphor. The first time I noticed this writing technique was in our reading of The Windup Girl, lo those many y…
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Here this might mean that (a) industry must go on, or at the end of the book that (b) nature’s reclamation must go on, or that (c) time will go on, regardless of anything else. I don’t think it says much about the characters in the book, except f…