Caramel Apple Brownies

As always, told in pictures! Recipe from here. I added marshmallows and substituted cinnamon sugar butter for plain butter.

Everything you need (Plus Cake!)

Cherry Blossom Parade Photos: 2013

Hooray for parades!

Why Aren't Matt and Sullivan Blogging?

Because of Carrot Cake: The Bakening.

Start with various white powders and things...

Seen on the Metro

Since I'm stuck in a spot where I don't know what to write next, I have posted this without comment.

Seen on the Metro.

I Have a New Assistant

No fiction to be posted today. We're at 32 pages and the next few sections need more TLC before they are ready, so I'm far enough ahead of the curve for a page-a-day that I think I can take a break until Monday evening to make them perfect. If you have any complaints, bring them up with any of my assistants.

Sullivan the Cat, Junior Assistant, is standing by.

The Dwarf Lord and his shield bearers are working on their customer service skills.

Charrlie is now Senior Assistant in Charge of Thrashing.

For the most recent Lucy and Sam chapter (and links to past ones,) click here. For all previous fiction, check the blog year in review post here.

Squirrel!

For all your distraction needs.

Squirrel!

Final Fantasy 2: Complete

I finished Final Fantasy 2 yesterday evening. One of the most interesting things about this is that it was actually, for all its NES-level story-telling capability, a fairly dark game. A lot of heroes end up dead, and our heroes do not reconcile with each other at the end. Leon is sort of a proto-Kain, but he pulls it off better since he doesn't seem to slip in and out of mind control as easily as a cartoon character. As with FF1, the early limitations really showed in the game; grinding by hitting yourself and your friends in the head is... thankfully a system Final Fantasy dropped. The other problem with FF2 is that, much like some of the later Final Fantasies, your characters start to blend together, ability wise, if you're going for max effectiveness. By the end of the game, Firion, Mariah and Gus were only different in that Firion swung two lances, Mariah used two swords and Gus had two axes. All three could heal and buff effectively, and attack magic was of nominal use.

This is another game that is fun in the sense that you get a feeling of overcoming challenges, until you hit the mid-game when some odd combination of equipment and spells lets you sit on easy street until a random encounter in the final dungeon with monsters that do a percentage of your max HP as damage. Then, once you clear the two floors they are on, it is smooth sailing. I expected the boss to actually transform into a super powered. final true evil form. He did not. Oh well, on to Final Fantasy III, which brought us the Job System as we think of it.

Below are some pictures from my failed adventure to the Air and Space museum today, as the lecture I was hoping to attend was canceled.

Birds!; Mice and Mystics; NaNoWriMo

Birds!

I apologize for lack of blogging, especially for the next few weeks. Here is my one-paragraph review of Mice and Mystics. First, the minis, rulebook and physical stuff is pretty awesome looking. The cards and map tiles aren't extremely durable feeling, but they held up to a day of play just fine. The rules are crisp, easy to pick up and relatively intuitive. Having only played through the first two scenarios (and only partially through the third), one thing I thought was odd was not letting everyone have access to all six heroes in the first scenario to pick from. Splitting the party in the second scenario also was awkward feeling because the player who played Lilly had a pretty boring experience until we got there. Overall, I approve. Next time I play, I'll try and take some pictures of the board and give you some more important thoughts. Below the fold is my NaNoWriMo update.

Mice and Mystics

I finally got to open my box of Mice and Mystics. From the rule book and the training video, it looks like a nice cross between Super Dungeon Explore and Warhammer Quest. This is a thing I can get behind. Pictures are below.

Fergie Goes Home

I haven't blogged recently due to work and a special guest.

She was deciding if she should stay or if she should go.

Panels on Preserving Playing Pong

The lecture I attended today was called "Playing Pong in 2100: How to Preserve Old Video Games." There was a live stream, but I've been unable to find it anywhere online. If I do find it, I'll put the link here. Before you read below the fold, you may want to get up to date on The Art of Video Games exhibit at the Smithsonian. Luckily, I have some insights on that front already. Once you've read that and seen this wonderful squirrel a nice young woman was feeding, you can click below to get actual coverage of the lecture.

So adorable!

New Concept of End Game

Part of the problem with MMOs, I think, is that there needs to be a new concept of "end game." Everyone (including me!) wants "end game" gear, this is reasonable. Not everyone (including me!) wants to do end game raiding. The main catch, I think, is that we need to define end game the same way we do in a single player game.

Unscripted Random Images

You are lucky that this random picture does not involve unexpected goose poetry.

I did not touch this. This is what I saw on my way to work.

Geese in Chantilly

I was in Chantilly today to see a show, which if you are in the area, I suggest you try and see it too. Less impressively, I saw geese. Clearly, it is time for some goose poetry.

Evolving My Dragon Dice Army

I played several games today; I learned that I do need magic. I managed to win a few games, due to an excellent alpha strike with the wolf pack and vindicators smashing 15-18 points of my opponent's army. That is not something I can rely on every game, sayeth Charrlie. I decided to branch out a little and settled on Fire Walkers, since they share a color. Here is the current collection:

Monsters:  1 Wolf Pack; 1 Remorhaz; 1 Cryohydra | 1 Phoenix; 1 Genie
Melee: 3 Vindicators; 2 Defenders; 4 Advocates | 1 Expeditioner; 3 Explorers; 1 Adventurer; 1 Guardian
Cavalry: 2 Wolf Masters; 1 Hound Master | 2 Shadowchasers
Missile:  1 Assaulter; 1 Dispatcher; 3 Destroyers; 2 Attackers | 2 Fire Masters; 1 Fire Starter
Magic: 2 Apprentice | 1 Ashbringer; 1 Sunflare; 1 Sunburst

As before, melee, cavalry, missile, magic.

Join me below as we get down to business of paring these 75 points of dice down to a lean 36.

Dragon Dice: Frostwings

I mentioned that some Dragon Dice were coming in. I got my three kickers of Frostwings. I opened them, indexed them, and now, I want you to join me as we go through the process of building myself a 36-point army out of the three kickers. There.... will not be much that is fun for non-Dragon Dice players and/or gamers. Except for this picture of my current collection.

Melee on the left, maneuver/missile in the middle... magic on the right.

Veritech Model

They turn into robots.

I wanted a new picture to be on the front when I linked to the front page, as the Charr was boring me. So, now we have this Veritech. Before you go look at a few other pictures of Veritechs, have you called your mom yet?

Defining History for Fiction

Fiction needs a strong sense of history to it. However, let us not confuse ourselves. The history we're normally talking about when asking "How much history does my fiction need" involves history completely outside the stated canon of a given work. For example, the fact Charr are jerks is not part of Guild Wars' history, as we explore their jerkish tendencies in Prophecies.

Some Charr even learned how to use computers.

Bragging and Boasting: It Is Science!

Ann Althouse linked to this story. Now, as you can tell from my Google+ page, I don't brag. Anyway, the thrust of the article, like any good article, is right in the front: "Talking about ourselves—whether in a personal conversation or through social media sites like Facebook and Twitter—triggers the same sensation of pleasure in the brain as food or money, researchers reported Monday." Which clearly means that I should try and blog more frequently.

Unexpected Geese!

Apparently, Macy's at Fair Oaks Mall did not get the memo about meter sockets. Some geese have apparently decided that, much like zombies, they will hunker down at the mall to multiply and hope for free eats (provided by people!) As before, here are some goose-y couplets.

A goose took wing and sought savings and deals.