A Defense of Roll Under

I've said it here before, I'm a big fan of GURPS. GURPS stands for "Generic Universal RolePlaying System", and has been part of Steve Jackson Games' product line for more than three decades.

So, it may come a surprise that my first experience with a "roll-under" system came from a relatively unknown game called "Cascade Failure". Where GURPS is a mechanically unique, long-time mainstay of the roleplaying game industry; Cascade Failure is a Sci-Fi d20 game in most respects. In fact, the major deviation from the d20 model is in the fact that the system uses a "roll-under" dice mechanic.

The average player of something like D&D is probably used to the idea of target numbers. You have to roll a 15 or better on, let's say a stealth check, you roll a 20 sided die, add your stealth score, and if you meet or beat a 15, congratulations! You did a sneak!

In a roll-under system, the same logic is applied in a wildly different order. Instead of a DC 15, you might be rolling at a -3. Subtract three from your sneak score, and then try to roll at or below the modified score.

In fairness, this system is a little less intuitive in a couple of ways. Firstly, having to add OR subtract to set the difficulty might feel a little more daunting than just adding your roll to your score. Secondly, for players who are used to hoping for high numbers on a die roll, it can be tricky to flip that switch and think of a 3 (in GURPS) or a 1 (in a d20 system) as a critical success.

Still, I'd argue that in my experience, the benefits have outweighed the negatives. Players who get used to this style will quickly pick up the narrative difficulty of the tasks based on the plus and minus modifiers you call out. It also gives you a good "default" difficulty by having them roll an unmodified check.

More than any of that, and I have no real explanation for this, roll-under combat moves faster. I'm not sure the math behind why it does this, but something just seems to click right when the players are rolling low instead of high. Combat skips along at a wild and cinematic pace, as opposed to the long draw that more traditional systems tend to bog down into.

If you've never tried to re-imagine your gaming in a roll-under model, I'd encourage you to give it a try, and let me know in the comments what you've found to work at your own table.

Happy gaming, all.

Foreshadowing Done Right

Hey all,

Today I'm going to be talking about one of my favorite pieces of foreshadowing from one of my favorite games: Portal 2. This post will include Portal 2 spoilers.

Somewhere past the halfway point of the game, you begin working with conversion gel. This is a white fluid that can be used to solve puzzles by making surfaces that cannot normally take a portal into surfaces that can.

Through dialogue, Cave Johnson reveals that this substance is made from moon dust. The surface level payoff of this is his reveal that the moon dust has given him cancer, and this leads into the "lemon" speech Which is probably one of the most iconic pieces of dialogue in the series.

The fact that this element of the world-building is played for laughs, combined with it's place shedding some light on the composition of an in-world substance; means that most players will assume that this information has served its role in the story and move on not expecting anything else to follow.

Except that something else does come of this.

Portals can be made on conversion gel. This is a special function of its make-up. The only ingredient we know of conversion gel is moon dust, and what else is covered in moon dust? What else can, presumably, support a portal?

Why, nothing else except the cinematic solution to the game's final shot of the portal gun. With the world falling to pieces around you in a dramatic final showdown, what seemed like a throwaway line of comedy foreshadowed the game's climax, the one puzzle that takes you beyond the walls of Aperture Laboratories.

Happy gaming, all.

Where were we then? 2008

Hey all,

I thought it might be fun to look at how everyday objects have changed over time. Ten years seems like a decent increment (though my Back to the Future fanboy REALLY likes the sound of 30: let's do one step at a time). So let's look at 2008, when the Giants won the superbowl, and Miley Cyrus was a squeaky-clean Disney starlet.

The Phone of 2008

The biggest change in phones in 2008 was the iPhone 3G. The year 2007 had seen the first touch screen smart phones in the form of the LG Prada, and the original iPhone. The original iPhone didn't even have the GPS function that came with the 3G!
While the device we think of as a smart phone had some predecessors, in the form of things like the blackberry, the touch screen interface we know today was still relatively new only ten years ago.

The Music of 2008

Many popular artists of 2008 will still be familiar names today; including Taylor Swift, Carrie Underwood, Kanye West, and Rihanna.
In 2008, My Chemical Romance and The White Stripes were still together and making music, while today, both of these names have faded into history.
Interestingly, Beyonce had left Destiny's Child only three years prior, and her solo career was still a fairly new development in the grand scheme of things.

The Politics of 2008

In 2008, Barack Obama beat John McCain for the presidency. This win secured Barack Obama's first term in office, and today it's easy to forget the fact that, very suddenly, Americans lived in a world where an African-American man could provably become president. What today seems inevitable was, at the time, a landmark moment in American politics.

Video Games of 2008

Some big series started with a 2008 debut, including Dead Space and Valkyria Chronicles; while Fallout 3 brought the Fallout franchise into the modern era. This is also the year of indie darling: Dear Esther. All of this, in a year where the public was still seeing expansions for The Sims 2.

The Playstation 3 had come out two years before, but the PS2 was still in production, and would continue to be for another FIVE years. The XBox 360 was three years old, and the original XBox still had another year before its retirement. The Gamecube had been retired, but with the Wii breaking sales records left and right, and the incredible sales of the Nintendo DS in Japanese markets, Nintendo wasn't suffering the lack of Gamecubes on store shelves.

Health in 2008

"Hot" yoga, nettle tea, and Goji berries were just some of the fads and buzzwords surrounding health in 2008. Low Sodium and Probiotic reared their heads, and, in defiance of today's feelings about the dreaded gluten; whole grain was a go-to for the health-minded individual.

Top Selling Car of 2008: The Toyota Camry

I'll be honest, I don't know much about cars. Anyway, here's a picture of a 2009 (because cars come out a year early of their model number for some reason) Toyota Camry.

Looking around, it looks like the Camry is known for comfort, safety, and fuel efficiency. So, I guess those must have been things that people liked in 2008.

The Movies of 2008

Iron Man kicked things off in what we now call the MCU with an after-credits scene that changed audience expectations of what movies could do. The Dark Knight contributed to make 2008 a watershed moment for superhero movies. The Incredible Hulk was there, too, I guess.

Kids movies brought Kung Fu Panda, which sparked off a sprawling franchise, and Wall-E: an instant classic with genuine artistry in its execution.
Taken, Tropic Thunder, Cloverfield, and Slumdog Millionare also came along to make this a year to remember in movies.


Overall, the last ten years have seen some tremendous changes, and a few surprises in what has stayed the same. It'll be interesting to see where the next ten years might take us. Thanks for reading, all.

Can we find Poetic Justice Horror in our Zombies?

Let's talk about zombies.

Prior to Romero's Night of the Living Dead, the idea of a zombie was steeped in magic and voodoo. The name even comes from an African and Caribbean term for a magical servitor made from a cadaver. However, this fear of the magic of tribal groups doesn't really play into our modern zombies. While the modern zombie no longer fills this role in the public mind, it's interesting to note that there's already an element of poetic justice in stories of tribal peoples visiting magical horrors upon their technologically advanced conquerors.

Still, the modern zombie veers more toward the idea of a plague. Thematically, we can see the zombie as a condemnation of human foibles. In Night of the Living Dead the risen corpses turn on humanity, to devour it. Meanwhile, the human characters turn on and, metaphorically, devour themselves. Each human character sees the group for what it can do for them, and "feed" on their fellows. In the end, the authorities can't tell the difference between the zombies and the men. The mall setting later in the franchise more directly condemns consumerism.

They can also represent a fear of death, and sometimes this can be pretty on the nose. During the cold war, the zombies were a looming threat that could be staved off, but never gotten rid of. Death was an inevitable march that would come eventually. Meanwhile, with the rise of terrorism in recent years, we see faster zombies that take their prey by surprise. The death we fear now is fast and unexpected. An age of dreading war gave way to an age of being terrified of war, and this difference between dread and terror is reflected in our portrayal of the hordes of undead.

So, how does this relate to poetic justice?

First, let's look at how poetic justice feeds into horror. The influence of Judeo-Christian thought on western literature is felt here. The horror of Christianity is that hell is waiting, and that hell is deserved. Because of the prevalence of this thought in the western world, the idea of punishment evokes hellish themes, whereas the existential horror of impassive suffering has historically held less fear, having, in the minds of religious communities, less basis in reality.

With this understanding underscoring western thought, it makes perfect sense that our slasher films "punish" promiscuity. It's why fairy tales tend to have two themes: don't go into the woods alone, and don't be cruel or inhospitable to a stranger. Retribution will come when the beggar you kicked reveals themselves to be a witch, fae, or djinn. These themes resonate in a western concept of horror.

This is why America, who committed dehumanizing atrocities in the frontier, still sets our horror in the wilderness; and it's why England, who committed dehumanizing atrocities in the factories and alleys, still set their horror in the cities. That is where we've respectively "earned" the horrific consequences shown in these movies.

This leaves the question; do modern zombies feature a form of poetic justice? Is the zombie in any way an ironic and deserved punishment for our actions?

Well, let's ask what humans, as a species, have done to other species. We hunt them with zombie tactics. As a species, we form larger and more unified groups than any of the packs and herds we compete against; and we are unflagging. Surrounded by species faster than us at a sprint, we have historically hunted as a slow horde. A mastodon might be able to run faster, but it can't run for three days straight while we chase it down. Compared to other species, we don't rest, we don't slack, we don't lose the trail. Slow, shambling death has chosen its prey, and humanity will not give up the trail until the panting and exhausted victim lies gasping on the ground: it's strength spent: watching the untiring horde close for the kill.

That is the horror we have visited on the other species of this world, and it's the death we deserve, when a new hunter emerges at the top of the food chain.

Thanks for reading, stay safe in those dark woods.

Graffiti Generator Table

Hey all,

Today I'm taking inspiration from a tremendous post by Improved Initiative. Go check out his blog, it's some great stuff.

He was talking about the role of graffiti in making a town feel vital and lived in, and I thought it was a fantastic jumping off point that just needed one thing: a generator table. I took some time to put together a first draft of a graffiti generator table for a typical fantasy world. It's a mix of rumor mill, plot hooks, and flavor text; and any of it might or might not be true, up to date, or accurate in your game world. Try it out, comment below with your own contributions, and have fun.

Graffiti Generator Table

1 "Sardin McClint's store sells stolen stuff."
2 "Albion knows every girl at Miss Hattory's"
3 This is a strange symbol in a single color (a successful streetwise or similar check will identify this as a gang tag, and will allow the players to search the city, surveying the borders of various rival gangs)
4 Ornate lettering spells out "This is Vandalism"
5 There is a crude portrait of the town sheriff, made to look cartoonishly obese. 
6 "Nearland steel is a hoax"
7 "Jericho was here"
8 "Flora Cooprider hexes hogs"
9 You find a crude drawing of, . . . let's just call it anatomy.
10 "Nymphs dance at Ash Cay"
11 You see a very simple symbol (a successful streetwise or similar check will identify this as a hobo sign indicating a safe place to beg)
12 You see a very simple symbol (a successful streetwise or similar check will identify this as a hobo sign indicating that the police harass beggars here)
13 You see a very simple symbol (a successful streetwise or similar check will identify this as a hobo sign indicating that there's an aggressive dog in the area)
14 "Trinkets for sale, inquire inside"
15 You see a portrait surrounded by an ornate painting of a frame. At the base of the wall is a small pile of flowers that have been left by others.
16 "Buy Enid Pott's Meat Pies"
17 You see the symbol of a defunct and near-universally hated army, defeated nearly a century ago.
18 "Dwarves not welcome"
19 "Tam Beck summons dead"
20 A well composed piece of genuine art, painted on a wall around fifty feet above the ground. 

Book Review: The Midnight Line by Lee Child

The Midnight Line
Author: Lee Child
Publishing Date: 2017
Setting: The American Great Plains
Narrative Genre: Mystery, Thriller
Themes: Military Honor, Addiction, Gray Morality
Series Information: Book 22 (in publishing order) of the Jack Reacher series. It should be noted that the novels have limited cross-over and can be read in any order.

Subjective Length: A day or two

Score: A work of entertainment value The Jack Reacher series has become a mainstay of realistic adventure fiction. If you've enjoyed any of the previous entries in the series, The Midnight Line will not disappoint.

Controversial Themes
Addiction: This book handles the subject of addiction with surprising tact for a series built on the appeal of violence and action. It takes care to highlight the role that once-prevalent prescriptions have played in the current addiction epidemic, and seeks to shed light on the struggle of addicts.
Sexual Content: There are a few attempts at seduction by a married woman; as well as a sex scene that neither veers into completely obscure euphemism, nor graphic description. There is also a scene in which a woman's skirt rides up while she is being restrained.
Violence: The Jack Reacher series has always contained the heavy use of violence to drive the plot. This particular entry in the series has a little less than some of the others, but it is still noticeable.

**SPOILERS AHEAD***SPOILERS AHEAD***SPOILERS AHEAD***SPOILERS AHEAD**


The story opens with Reacher thinking back about the woman he left behind at the last town. He steps off of a bus for a stretch and spots a West Point graduate ring in a pawnshop window. Reacher examines the ring, buys it, and sets himself the goal of finding the original owner. The novel is intentionally vague about his motives, as Reacher himself expresses a little uncertainty as to what's calling him to get involved in this situation. It seems to be a mix of military honor, curiosity, a touch of what might be chivalry (he quickly identifies the ring as belonging to a woman), and perhaps projected guilt or regret from walking away from another woman only a day or so before.

His quest sends him back up the supply chain, from seller to seller, as he tracks down the woman in hard enough straits to sell something symbolic of so much hard work and effort.

This novel adds more likable and memorable side characters than many previous entries in the series; and really sold the cast well. The ending was less climactic than some others by the same author, but that seemed to underscore the quiet sadness in the themes of drug addiction. There is no grand showdown with two unstoppable juggernauts squaring off in battle; and the threat is not in powerful enemies, but in stealthy and unknown enemies.

There's also a good moment of seeing a character like Reacher --someone of quick decisions and solid resolve-- faced with a situation more nuanced than "find bad guy, kill bad guy". There are moral dilemmas presented here that enrich the experience.

Overall, not required reading, but a solid read. If anything in the "lone tough guy" genre piques your interest, then The Midnight Line will be a page-turner far too late into the night.

Happy reading, all.

Beastiary Supplemental: Slide-Rock Bolter

High in the mountains lives a massive beast. First seen by miners in the area, the creature came to be known as the slide-rock bolter.

This creature most resembles a whale. It hunts by gripping the mountainside with it's tail and lying in wait. The creature seeks out slopes of at least a 45° angle with a relatively clear vantage of the lands below. The slide-rock bolter drools a slick substance, which helps it to strike at its prey. When a suitable target passes into the beast's path, the beast releases its grip on the mountain and comes charging down the slope with its enormous maw agape to capture its prey. 

In combat, the beast is a one strike and gone type of predator. It has both high natural armor and a deep pool of hit points. Avoiding the attack would require a reflex save to jump out of the path of the creature's strike. 

The creatures are about 25 feet long at the end of adolescence, and can grow to around 60 feet if they live long enough and have access to substantial hunting grounds. 

Mature bolters can be more wary, and tend to avoid heavily armored parties that could be harder to digest; but may still attack when driven to hunger. Juvenile bolters on the other hand tend to strike at any movement. This can expose them to attack, and, in fact, while several bounties on young bolters have been collected over the years, older members of the species are almost never brought low by adventurers. 

Bolter-territory is recognizable by once-well-trod paths that have been allowed to grow over. An absence of local tribes, packs, and herds can mark dangerous areas as well. However, small birds and rodents do not tend to leave the area, as they are too small to draw attention from something the size of a bolter. 

Best of luck on those desolate mountain paths, and happy gaming, all. 

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