So the first 2/3 of day one are over with. I’m back at the hotel, getting a little bit of rest before getting ready and heading out for the Vampire: Requiem LARP tonight.

My Earthdawn session — Journey to Lang went well this morning. I had six players; four of them were more-or-less familiar with the game, one had played a bunch of Shadowrun, and so knew about Earthdawn, but had never played it, and the last guy had never played it at all.

We had a good time; my dice were pretty hot at one point, and a handful of berserk cadaver men went open-ended on several rolls, knocking out the troll Sky Raider. The party changed tactics, ganging up to take out one enemy per round, and managed to avoid actually losing anybody.

The final battle in the session (against a pair of corrupt obsidimen) went very quickly (which was good, because we were running up against time at the end there). The archer scored the highest die roll of the session in that fight, doing 43 points of damage in a single hit.

I did learn a few things from running the session, which should make the next events go more smoothly.

Pictured (from left to right): Theresa, Poorht, windling Thief; Dylan Norris , Targ Boneslicer, troll Sky Raider; Rob O’Meara, Corelian Sandilar, elf Archer; Dave Kirkhart, Norasu, obsidiman Warrior; Matt Johnson, Onnaro, obsidiman Wizard; and Linda O’Meara, Chiall Nevarra, t’skrang Swordmaster.

I also got the chance to meet Kathy (Charcoalgrin) Czechowski who I’ve known through the online ED community for a number of years. (I met her husband Ed, too, but I don’t think I know him from the boards.)

I also played a demo of the new Serentiy game, coming this August from Margaret Weis Productions. It’s an interesting little game, and while the session itself wasn’t great (due in part to a GM who wasn’t totally prepared, and some players who weren’t really playing their characters).

Still, I am intrigued by the system, and may pick it up when it arrives in August.

Well, off to get ready for my game tonight! I’ll give an update later!

Gearing up for the first day. I have my first demo in… two hours, and we’re taking care of the “5 S’s” — shave, shower, sh*t, shine, and shampoo — grabbing a bite to eat, and then heading out to the convention center.

Last night we picked up our badges, poked around a bit, and got an idea of where we needed to be for our events.

Quick update — the books are coming!! — we got an e-mail this morning that CafePress has shipped the copies of the EPC, and UPS tracking indicates they arrived in Columbus at 5:30am (or so). They should be delivered to the hotel sometime today.

After the trials and tribulations of getting these done… well, it will be nice to finally see them. I’ll post some pictures, just as I did with the demo version of the EGC.

Well… off to grab some breakfast, and get in a bunch of gaming!

After several hours in the air, we’ve made it to Columbus (along with our luggage) and have checked into the hotel. We’re getting ready to head up to the convention center to check in and get our convention information.

Of course, we did a touch of sightseeing before we headed out — here’s James and Carsten in front of Stephen King’s house.

The trip to Columbus was interesting… thunderstorms were moving across the area, and our first landing attempt was aborted due to turbulence and heavy winds. We circled for another half-hour or so, and finally came in behind the storm. A short cab ride later… we’re at the hotel and checked in.

Stay tuned for future updates!

Hello again. Just dashing off a quick update before we head out to the airport this morning.

Yesterday, we drove down to Massachusetts to visit Lou Prosperi (the former line developer for Earthdawn). We picked his brain, and had a very productive (if too brief) meeting with him.

We’d like to thank Lou (and his family) once again for his time and hospitality.

On the way back home, we stopped in at a restaurant and I exposed James and Carsten to the joy that is Maine lobster.

James has a mild seafood allergy (it makes him nauseous — tough luck for a guy from an island nation), so while he was eager to give it a try, he wasn’t able to eat more than a couple of bites. Carsten, however, enjoyed it, and it certainly didn’t go to waste — James ordered something else, and Carsten and I split his lobster.

We’re just packing up now, off to Staples to pick up the character sheets for the demo games, then over to the airport to check in and fly to Columbus. I plan a quick stop on the way — do the tourist thing and take a picture of James and Carsten in front of Stephen King’s house.

If you’re going to Origins, I look forward to seeing you there! If not, stay tuned… I’ll post updates about the convention, and what we cover in the seminar.

Well, the package from CafePress arrived this afternoon… sans the copies of the Earthdawn Player’s Compendium. They’ve been having some technical problems with the prinout, and James is in the process of trying to get the file size down small enough for them to run off a copy (or three) and overnight it to us in Ohio. If all goes well, we will have them for you to drool over at the seminar on Friday.

We did get the Gamemaster’s Compendium, so even if we end up not getting the EPC in, you’ll have some idea what the final books will look like. Here’s a picture of the new book:

PS — The final product will not be ring-bound. It will be hardcover (and a hefty one, at that — about 500 pages).

Well, the luggage finally arrived, which is a good thing. Of course, it didn’t arrive until after we had made a quick run out to Target to pick up some necessaries… but the airline delivered it to our door, so that’s good.

Had an enjoyable evening. A bunch of my friends came over, we had a cookout, drank a couple beers, and — after much persuading — my brother-in-law Sean managed to get James to try Dance Dance Revolution. Here’s a picture:

(James is the tall one on the right. The shorter one on the left is my wife, Mary.)

I now expect some sort of bloody Kiwi vengeance for publishing this picture.

Dammi gets in this evening, and tomorrow we drive down to visit Lou. Today will be spent finalizing the PCs for the demo games we’re running at the con later this week.

Stay tuned for more updates!

Jim got in this morning about 10:30am… but his luggage did not. We’re currently waiting for the next flight from Boston to get into Bangor (in about an hour) to see if his bag is on it.

Jim is currently napping — traveling a few thousand miles over the courseof twenty-something hours, and crossing multiple time zones is bound to take it out of you (especially when you only get about 4-5 hours of sleep during the trip).

We had a nice chat when he first got in, though. It looks like it’s going to be an interesting week.

In case you didn’t know, I am a big fan of award-winning writer Neil Gaiman. This fall (current release date is September 30) a new movie written by Gaiman and directed by his long-time collaborator Dave McKean will be released.

The film is called Mirrormask, and it looks absolutely gorgeous. It’s produced by the Jim Henson Company, and is in the same vein as Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal. You can see the latest trailer here, and learn a bit more about the movie at the official Mirrormask website.

I bought the Illustrated Script Book a couple of weeks ago, and I am really looking forward to this film. The story is fantastic, and the visuals are exactly the kind of unique vision you would expect from the mind of Dave McKean.

September is going to be a busy movie month for me… both Serenity and Mirrormask. With all the other films I’m looking forward to this summer… my entertainment budget is going to be a bit strained.

And the rain rain rain
Came down down down…

Sweet baby Jane, enough with the weather already! Today it absolutely poured for five or six hours, and most of the state of Maine is looking at a flood watches and warnings into tomorrow.

The wet is really starting to take its toll on people. After several months of short-daylight winter, we were looking forward to the long, warm days of late spring and early summer. Instead, we’ve got gray, wet, cold, misery.

I hope things clear up soon; I want James and Dammi to have a positive impression of our lovely state when they visit next month. At this rate though…

There’s a short story by Ray Bradbury called All Summer in a Day. It’s about the one day every twenty years (or whatever) where the perpetual storms on some alien planet (Venus, if I recall correctly) break and let the sunshine in. I’m starting to get that vibe here.

Oddly enough, I’ve been feeling rather… elemental the last day or two. I want to walk outside in this weather, embracing it… kind of a nautical ‘sea spray on the face’ kind of thing. I love wind and water… and while the seemingly perpetual gray is a bit of a bother, there’s a certain primal vibe that I’m pulling off of it.

I wish I were down at the lake, watching the whitecaps dance (well, not right now, because it’s dark out, but you get the idea). I find a certain peace of mind there… one that has, in some ways, been missing from my life recently. I’ve tried not to dwell on it too much (thre’s too much other stuff to get done!), but it keeps rising from my subconscious, and I can’t shake it.

That deep part of my brain is telling me there’s something I need to deal with. I’m just not sure what it is.

*sigh*

I finally saw Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith last night. It didn’t totally suck… in fact it was pretty good. Not great, but not bad either.

By the way, some spoilers may follow. I don’t think there’s anything that fans of the series wouldn’t know, however.

The one thing I noticed was how… sterile it felt. Especially the opening battle sequence over Coruscant. It reminded me of the massive starfighter sequence over Endor from Return of the Jedi, but it lacked the charm and drama of the sequence in Jedi… at least in my opinion.

Not to be nitpicky, but speaking of Jedi… in the Ewok village, Luke asks Leia about her mother; her answer (“She seemed very sad” or something like that) gives the impression that she’s talking about their mother, Padme.

But then, in Sith, Padme dies in childbirth and the infant Skywalkers are given to their respective adoptive parents — Bail Organa and his wife, in the case of Leia. That being the case… why would Leia’s adoptive mother be so sad?

And if Leia is talking about Padme… how the hell would she have any impression of her?

I don’t know… I guess I’m generally unimpressed by the newer films, and my storytelling brain is picking apart the inconsistencies.

There is some good stuff in the movie, don’t get me wrong, and I enjoyed it, but the pacing is rushed, and it lacks a certain something that I feel in Episodes IV-VI.

Unleashed, on the other hand… is a good movie. But that is a post for another time.