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Legion of Bitter Alumni 07
Legion of Bitter Alumni #7
-- The Online Edition --
"The Top Ten Cheeziest Songs of the Eighties"
-- by Tom Tomlinson
Against the Void: "Nuts and Bolts"
-- by Dan Sissman
"Dialing for Dimwits"
-- by Gary St. Lawrence
"ST:TNG vs. B5: a Sociopolitical Ramble"
-- by Jason Kapalka (jkapalka@gpu.srv.ualberta.ca)
"Why I Don't Like 'Dungeons and Dragons": A Player's View"
-- by Bill Ayres
Rants and Raves #4: "Religion, Human Nature, and Roleplaying"
-- by Tom Janulewicz
On Being A Minor Star General: "Series Replay"
-- by Jon Howard
Review: "Magic: the Gathering"
-- by Douglas R. Briggs
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"An Incredibly Brief Editorial Rant"
by Chris Aylott
Well, here it is, several months late (on the online version only --
the paper version did go out) but unharmed by the experience.
LEGION OF BITTER ALUMNI is the product of various twisted minds, all
of whom are solely responsible for anything they say. Sent comments,
raves, brickbats and articles to me at either 190 Holland St. #1,
Somerville, MA 02144 or "aylott@world.std.com".
Enjoy . . . and look for LEGION OF BITTER ALUMNI #8 to be posted
shortly.
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"The Top Ten Cheeziest Songs of the Eighties" by Tom Tomlinson
In an attempt to even further diversify the broad-reaching and
ever-topical nature of this fine publication, I have managed to persuade
the fine and lovely people down at LOBA headquarters that it would be
appropriate to range into issues involving t he fast-paced and
far-too-often kinetic world of the recording industry. As you may have
noticed, I am also pushing hard for longer sentences.
In any case, this article is the result of a lifetime (albeit a
12-year lifetime) of in-depth investigative research, philosophical
speculation and far too much time spent listening to my inner child.
Spanning the globe to bring you the bet in qualit y entertainment, the
Legion of Bitter Alumni presents: THE TOP TEN CHEEZIEST SONGS OF THE 80s.
First, the ground rules. Although each and every song that ended up
on my list should be easily recognizable by anyone who was a regular radio
listener in the days that led to the creation and proliferation of "Top
40" stations, no special allowance was given for popularity. All songs
have been graded on cheeze value alone; while particularly esoteric songs
have been avoided, Cyndi Lauper was not guaranteed consideration either.
The debate over how to define cheeziness has been the subject of
passionate argument for countless milennia, and it is not my goal to
attempt to answer that question for the ages in this article. To me,
cheeze is a certain feeling we all get at one time or another. Some
embrace it; others are repulsed.
10. "If You Leave" -- OMD
The name of the group alone was enough to give Junior High school
students pause. Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark. As for the song itself,
its popularity was at least somewhat assured by being associated with the
inexplicably popular movie Pretty in Pink, which was yet another John
Hughes effort at establishing Molly Ringwald as some sort of 80s sex
goddess, contrary to all the observable evidence.
The song qualifies for my list under its own merits, however. The
light, ethereal tones completely devoid of any apparent rock influence are
the natural extension of such cheeze masterminds as Frankie Avalon. The
impassioned breathy vocals whisk the listener away, entirely masking the
fact that the lyrics themselves make no sense whatsoever. The song is
also graced with two elements essential to 80s cheeze: mindless repetition
and an ability to take oneself far more seriously than one should.
9. "99 Luftballons" -- Nena
"Der Komissar" -- Falco
Hey, on any list involving the 80s, a tie is inevitable. In this
case, the special nature of these songs pays tribute to the quality of the
American listening audience. Both of these songs were immensely popular
despite the inability of the typical American to understand what either
song was saying, since, as you well know, they were in German.
Although English version were eventually broadcast as well, the
German versions deserve special notice for pointing out the irrelevance of
anything other than having a good beat to a song's popularity. In both
cases, listeners were inevitably disappo inted when after an auspicious
opening, the English versions were played. The pervasive German influence
will always have a special place in this writer's heart. Nothing beats the
thrill of suddenly hearing "Kool and the Gang" in the midst of a foreign
la nguage.
8. "Like a Virgin" -- Madonna
I like to think that her first two albums reveal the true Madonna:
someone who isn't afraid to simply have fun without bothering to think
about the "quality" of her music. All too often in the last few years, this
one-time paragon of cheeziness has shown signs that she is taking herself
far too seriously and that she has begun to think of herself as an
"artist".
Whether or not the real Madonna is the cunning businesswoman we have
seen in the last five years, Madonna's emergence in 1982 also ushered in
the era of cheezy 80s music. Originally intended as a workout aerobics
album, this debut showed signs of her coming dominance over the genre, but
her particular talents were never exploited so efectively as in this
anthem for high-schooler-infested malls across America.
7. "Safety Dance" -- Men without Hats
One has not truly experienced life until one has seen a group of
people (almost certainly intoxicated) attempt to spell out S-A-F-E-T-Y
with the music in the manner of "YMCA". While OMD, Madonna and to a
certain extent even Falco had some staying pow er, Men without Hats was a
prime example of the American one-hit-wonder. Although the group has
reportedly recorded more than three albums, most American citizens are
unable to even remember their name, although the song lingers yet in their
memory.
The theatrical nature of lead vocalist Ivan Doroschuk is particularly
noteworthy, although the key to the song is indisputably the choral
repetition and helpful spellling guide to those who may be
higher-brain-function-impaired. Also notable for the memorable video
featuring dwarfs.
6. "Freeze Frame" -- The J. Geils Band
The annals of history are filled with classic struggles for
dominance: Capone vs. Ness, Frasier vs. Ali, Kirk vs. Khan, "Freeze Frame"
vs. "Centerfold". While both songs are true bastions of cheeziness, it has
long been my opinion that the fake camera sounds in this song (much worse
than even those in "Girls on Film") put it over the top.
With the lyrics seemingly shouted by the entire group, the J. Geils
Band wasn't afraid to put the emphasis squarely where music-buyers in the
mid-eighties wanted it -- on the mind-numbingly simplistic synthesizer
chords that composed what passed for a chorus. I challenge the reader to
try to forget that pounding electric sound . . .
5. "Karma Chameleon" -- Culture Club
Somehow, without anyone much noticing, Boy George has begun to sneak
back into American culture. Starting with The Crying Game and moving to
"Entertainment Tonight" and semi-regular appearances on E! ("the
Entertainment network"), Boy appears set to re-emerge. With has more
somber contemporary musical forays, perhaps the time has come to belatedly
acknowledge the contributions of the rest of Culture Club to the cheeze
culture.
This song had it all.A controversial front-man, a fun fast-paced
song, and an acutal hint at the idea that the song meant something even if
the vast majority of listeners had never heard of "karma" in 1985
(obviously it had something to do with color -- "red, gold, and green"?).
While Culture Club became a temporary fad and they had some other hits,
this song remains a tribute to the things that made the 80s great.
Musically, anyway.
4. "Can't Fight this Feeling" -- REO Speedwagon
One of the two consumnate prom songs of the 80s (the other being Phil
Collins' "One More Night"), this song inspired strong emotion in those
that heard it (it was my first girlfriend's and my prom song . . . --ed.)
-- often repulsion and nausea (she ended up feeling that way about me,
too. -- ed.). A love ballad with every tried-and-true metaphor the band
could dredge up and complete with rhyming couplets, only the most
obsessively thick individuals of the era could take this song seriously
(uhh . . . -- ed.) Still, I have always been entertained by it, primarily
due to the realization that people were willing to record it and perform
it in public.
Although they tended to be less blatantly cheezy, love ballads
proliferated on the 80s music scene much like any other period. While
earlier balladeers tended to acknowledge the somewhat silly nature of
their undertaking, however, 80s groups went for a straightforward
earnestness which only served to underscore their ridiculous nature. Those
who know me are aware that I am unable to speak of this song without
pointing out lead singer Kevin Cronin's amazing ability to hold his "r"s
far beyond the limits of normal human endurance.
3. "Hungry Like the Wolf" -- Duran Duran
No discussion of 80s music could possibly be complete without Duran
Duran. Although their latest album suggests that actual music talent may
have been lying dormant withing them, they were the banner-carriers of the
cheeze generation throughout the 8 0s. The group's popularity led certain
over-excitable record executives to compare them to the Beatles and had
enough left over to support both Power Station and Arcadia (not to mention
the solo career of Andy Taylor) after their breakup.
Picking among Duran Duran's many songs ahs always been a source of
strife among 80s aficiandos, with contenders the like of "Rio", "Please
Please Tell Me Now", "The Reflex", "Girls on Film" and "Union of the
Snake", just to name a few. This list is personal in nature, however, and
this song has always been special to me. From the woman's laugh at the
start to the solemn "Doo-doo-doo" chorus, Duran Duran proves that guitar
too can be cheezy.
2. "Wake Me Up (Before You Go-Go)" -- Wham!
Wham! -- a group so important that its name needed punctuation.
George Michael and Andrew Ridgely ("the luckiest best friend in the
world") had people rhythmically rocking back and forth (what passed for
dancing at the time) with enthusiasm. Wham! and later George Michael
alone went on to immense popularity but it was this quirky little song
from whence it all sprang. Based primarily on Michael's uncanny ability to
stretch his voice considerably higher than the standard male range with
the traditiona l synthesizer and drum machine thrown in for good measure,
"Wake Me Up" helped the emerging 80s form a sound all their own.
The song's immediate embrace by an eager populace was a sure signal
to important record executives of the triumph of form over substance.
Clearly, musical mastery and technical competence was no match for a
simple repetitive beat and a good hook. Few songs could ever manipulate
the formula as well as this one, though.
1. "Don't You Want Me?" -- The Human League
Like a force of nature, this song maintains its stranglehold on the
top spot as the cheeziest song of the 80s. Long acknowledged as the
paramount exemplar of the style, "Don't You Want Me?" has been the cheezy
song of choice for reviewers from Tim Culler to Scott Martin. Coming from
a band which admitted that they didn't really know how to play their
instruments, this song was an anthem of would-be swingers and sexual
optimists everywhere.
The story of a cocktail waitress and her narcissistic ex-lover tapped
into the American subconscious in a way previously exploited only by
"Copacabana". Perhaps the simplicity of the song left listeners awed by
the idea that they too had all the talent necessary to become pop
superstars. Perhaps its unchallenging beat and easy-to-sing-along vocal
simply remind us all of a simpler time. Whatever the reason, this song is
destined to live on in the hearts and minds of cheezy music lovers
everywhere.
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Against the Void: "Nuts and Bolts"
How Things Work in the Void
By Dan Sissman
-- part of a continuing series on constructing a science-fiction
television show called "Against the Void" -- ed.
The future must hold toys. Lots of them, with plenty of power-user
features. This article will be an exploration, but by no means an
exhaustive one, of various bits of technology in the Against the Void
universe. While it is pointless at this stage to attempt to describe
every possible gadget in the Void universe, it *is* in order to establish
some firm guidelines regarding the creation and dramatic use of
technological items.
THE AUDIENCE DOES NOT NEED TO KNOW EVERYTHING. In fact, in most
situations, the less they know, the better. In the case of the decay of a
spaceship's orbit around a planet, only three things carry any weight
dramatically. One, that something unusu al has happened to place the
ship's crew in this situation. (After all, people stupid enough to put
themselves in such a situation as a matter of course would never last long
enough to have stories told about them) Two, that the people involved can
not i mmediately solve the problem at hand. (If a seemingly serious
problem only takes a minute to solve on average, then protagonists will
have to face about 60 different really dramatic problems per episode. The
average audience member probably faces less t han one really dramatic
problem per week. Credibility will begin to suffer.) Three, that unless
the crew does something to solve the problem within n minutes, they will
all die in unspeakable agony. It makes no difference whether they have to
re-format the quantum matrix bypass or zero-boot the delta core memory of
the propulsion subsystem. A general understanding of the situation is
infinitely more important than an encyclopedic grasp of technobabblistic
minutia.
Consider the automobile. Millions of people drive them without
referring to them as internal-combustion driven, feedback-piloted,
quadra-rotary land vehicles. Very few understand the chemical
interactions which convert petrolium products into heat, the mechanical
processes which convert heat and gaseous expansion into rotational kinetic
energy, the way in which friction converts rotational energy into linear
motion, or the process whereby some of the energy is converted into
electricity to re-charge the battery. Hell, it's difficult enough to get
directions to the nearest Mobil station. Real people are not experts in
every aspect of every type of technology which affects them in their
day-to-day lives. There is no reason to expect the people of the future
to be substantially different. (This idea is a fundamental postulate of
"Against the Void".)
TRENDS: Technology changes in two distinct ways--evolution and
revolution. Evolution is easy enough to understand--a particular device
is refined and improved incrementally over time. Consider the automobile
again--it's safer, faster, and more eff icient than it used to be, but the
fundamental process, internal combustion, is exactly the same in a 1994
Lamborghini as a Model T Ford. Revolutionary advances are those
consisting of a more or less unpredictable breakthrough. Nobody could
realisticall y have predicted the microcomputer revolution before the
invention of the photographic processes which led to themicroprocessor.
As recently as the early 1970's, the most optimistic predictions of the
computer revolution involved dumb terminals in the ho me connected to a
Big Iron timesharing system at a local computer center. Although
revolutionary technological change is by nature unpredictable, it is
subject to the same pressures as evolutionary change. Regardless of the
type of change, technology develops in certain *directions*. The tools
required to perform a given task will become faster, less expensive,
safer, smaller, and easier to use. So technology in the Void universe
must mot be slower, more expensive (per unit of work), more dangerous,
bulkier, and less user-friendly than what we've got today. Another
characteristic of technology is that it spreads. Information wants to be
free.
ANGORA, MONOMOL, THE YARN'S THE THING: None of these observations
amount to anything unless they lead to entertaining stories. A good piece
of technology creates and preserves a wide range of dramatic
possibilities.
So with these ideas in mind, here a few examples of the gadgetry that
makes Against The Void run:
FTL Travel. Can't visit distant star systems in a human lifespan
unless you've got *some* kind of gimmick. In ATV, said gimmick is the
MacGuffin Drive. The Drive, brainchild of Dr. Angus MacGuffin, opens a
window into "i-space". For anyone who cares, the "i" is the same one used
to represent the imaginary square root of -1 in complex numbers. If
anyone really gets curious about this, we can say it has something to do
with fractional dimensions. The hypergeometry of i-space is unbelievably
complex. A trip from A to B through i-space may take considerably longer
than an immediate return trip from B to A. Furthermore, the length of
time required for a given trip may vary c onsiderably from one week to the
next. Adjust as situation requires.
When a ship enters i-space, it becomes the only object in that
universe for the duration of the trip. (This may change later on, but for
now, take it as law that there will be no i- space chase scenes.) Anyone
looking outside during an i-space jump sees a wash of brilliant color, the
result of photons emitted by the ship zooming through the local i-space
pocket, being shifted wildly by that wacky hypergeometry, and returning
eventua lly to the ship. Because of the horrifically complex , dynamic
shape of i-space, accurate jump calculations can only be made from a
relatively low gravitational gradient. (i.e. away from any massive
objects.) Any attempt to jump from within a gravitational field will
produce unpredictable results . . .
FTL Communications. What good is being able to travel from Earth to
Rigel in two weeks if the Hilton there can't call you before you leave to
tell you they've already rented your suite to a visiting diplomat from
Targus 62? FTL comunications open a lot of dramatic possibilities, but
close a lot of others if they're available at all times. This has
traditionally been handled by having the equipment break down or by
encountering the Radiation Interference Of The Week. Not so with Void.
Because of the Wacky Hypergeometry of i-space(TM), traditional radio-type
broadcasts require prohibitive amounts of energy. (they're working on it,
but it's a while off yet.) Point-to-pointnarrowcasts, however, are much
more energy-efficient, and are therefore in widespread use. There is a
network of repeater transmitters scattered through settled space. What
this means is that FTL communications are available and extremely reliable
in well-settled regions, but are a lot less reliable in sparsely populated
regions.
Computers are fast and smart in ATV. They still only do what they're
told, however. A computer can make judgment calls and initiate action,
but it won't do so unless so instructed by a human being. The main factor
limiting our heros from using comp uters to solve every problem is
software availability. For any given task, software probably exists
somehere to accomplish it. The problem is obtaining a copy.
One side effect of the increased complexity of a Deus X machine as
opposed to, say, an Amiga 4000 is that abberant behavior is much more
complicated. Consider a virus. Most mid-1990's vintage PC's have less
than 8 megabytes of memory, with the vast majority in the 2-megs-or-less
range. This means that the maximum amount of memory a virus can grab for
itself without being completely obvious is about 10K. A 10 kilobyte
program can do quite a bit of damage--even a 1K program can ruin your
life-- but there are sharp limits to its behavioral comlexity. While the
exact specifications of ATV computers should never be revealed, they are
clearly many orders of magnitude beyond anything a vailable today. It has
been estimated that the human brain contains about 100 terabits of
information. When memory capacity on the average home computer has
increased a thousandfold over the last decade or so, it's not difficult to
imagine machines a few centuries hence where 100 terabits could disappear
without notice. This would make it possible for a virus to have the brain
of a human psychotic. Not fun. Except for the audience, of course . . .
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"Dialing for Dimwits"
By Gary St. Lawrence
You'll have to pardon me if I sound out of sorts. I'm feeling a
little ill. You see, I just happened across the Home Shopping Network and
one of their episodes on comic books.
Tonight's particularly infuriating "fantastic offer" from HSN was, of
course, focused around Batman, presumably because there is currently no
other single "hot item" for them to hype into oblivion. Believe it or not
(I hope you're sitting down), HSN was hawking Batman #500 (you know, that
pathetically over-printed die-cut piece of crap that your dealer still has
plenty of copies of and is still selling for cover price? The one that
brought us the new Batman nobody this side of Rob Liefield can stand?) for
... urgh, there's that pain again ... for $79.95!
But wait! Before you scoff. Keep in mind ... it was signed, which is
always clear reason to super-inflate a price by 1,600 percent of market
value (I suppose you can find someone who isn't selling it for $5?!?)
Isn't there some law or regulation in the Consumer Protection Act that
can put a stop to this blatant touch tone travesty?
I figure this is how it started: Someone at the Home Shopping
Network, some time ago, must have overheard some kids at a comic book
convention talking about getting certain books signed by the artist or
writer who did them. He probably also overheard the kids say how the book
became more valuable after the autograph. Sadly, whoever that grossly
naive person was missed the mark like Oliver Queen on his first day on the
island.
The way the Home Shopping Network skyjacks prices on comic books
simply because the book's second assistant to the assistant coffee gopher
signed it, is the sickening travesty. The fact that there are simpletons
out there who are stupid and gullible enough to buy these ridiculously
overpriced "bargains" is just a shame.
If you're reading this column, you've seen what I'm talking about.
They have some kid in his early 20s -- obviously HSN's resident comic book
"expert" (most likely because he was the one who most looked like Rob
Liefield) -- droning on and on about w hat a bargain and
once-in-a-lifetime opportunity it is to shell out the cost of a major
kitchen appliance for a comic book that isn't even old enough for the acid
in the paper to start yellowing it. Not only do these clowns schlep ONLY
the latest fanboy drool fests, but the idiot who hosts the segment
doesn't even know what he's selling, let alone why.
Something I find particularly insulting is that each episode features
someone from the industry professional pool (strangely though, always from
DC Comics) who sits there and hurls this carney barker barf right along
with him.
Don't Jerry Ordway and Curt Swan realize how insulting it is to see
them on television, taking advantage of the cranially rectumized, pumping
sales for material they know isn't worth a fraction of what is being
charged as the "exclusive HSN bargain price?" Do they have such whole
contempt for us, the people who made them famous, as to not care that
they're bilking stupid people out of hundreds of thousands of dollars?
Apparently not. They've both done return appearances.
During the week that the four die-cut "Reign of the Supermen" books
came out, introducing the cyborg, kid, steel and Son of Krypton Supermen,
HSN was there, shamelessly offering "incredible deals" on the set of four,
autographed by each book's artist and writer ... for only $159.95!
Amazing. I bought the same books that same day, and only paid $20.70 with
my discount. Of course, I got two copies of each of the four die-cuts and
two each of the newsstand versions, but I did have to wait three long, gr
ueling months before I got them all autographed. And I did have to pay $3
to get into the convention where I got them autographed. Funny thing
though ... I still can't seem to sell them for more than $4 a pop,
autographs and all. Sheesh. Those HSN guys mu st be incredible salesmen.
I'd like to hear HSN's justification for their prices. I mean ... I
have several "big ticket" books in my personal collection -- books that
are in the four-digit column of Overstreet's Price Guide. I paid cover
price for most of them. And now they're worth a lot of dough. But those
books are nearly all between 15 and 30 years old, and they're landmark
issues in which something significantly universe-shattering occurred.
HSN's "prize stock" consists of nothing that's more than three months old
and ... let's face it ... some thing considerably short of spectacular in
their contribution to comicdom.
In fact, as I'm writing this. HSN has, for only $69.95, you can buy:
Cable #1 (lists for $3.50)
X-Men #1 (new series - lists for $2)
X-Men 2099 #1 (lists for $1.75)
Uncanny X-Men #300 (lists for $3.95)
X-Factor #71 (lists for $7)
Now, basic math tells me that's $18.20 at the maximum guide list in
Wizard #27. This means the people who bought that crap spent $51.75 for
the four signatures (Brandon Peterson, Art Tibier, etc.).
Shouldn't this clue you people in that HSN believes the value is in
the signature (they emphasize that word every time they use it) instead of
the actual comic book. And given that the only items in their "prize
stock" is the latest fanboy drool mate rial, it should tell you that
they're concerned with flash, and I'm not talking about Barry Allen or
Wally West (and certainly not Jay Garrick).
People, you're getting screwed!
Not that I'd ever want to make waves. But I would certainly endorse a
nationwide letter-writing campaign to HSN to express our displeasure with
their operation. I would even dare say that there's got to be some legal
eagle out there who can nail these thieves on a misrepresentation rap.
After all, they're selling cheap crap at incredibly high prices,
promising that the books' values will mushroom as "rare collector's
items."
Now, given that every single book they've sold hasn't even doubled in
market value, I'd go further still and say that they're lying to viewers
who are apparently too ignorant to realize that what they're buying will
never be worth what they paid. Still, there is the "Caveat Emptor" angle.
If the buyer doesn't beware, he's got no reason to complain when the hook
is firmly embedded in his lip.
But, then again, there is what P.T. Barnum said ...
Gary St. Lawrence can be reached at saint@express.ctron.com
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"ST:TNG vs. B5: a Sociopolitical Ramble"
by Jason Kapalka (jkapalka@gpu.srv.ualberta.ca)
reprinted from an Internet posting . . .
First, let me say that the following comments are just random thought
noodles, based largely on B5's pilot. So don't bite my ass off if I'm
wrong or misguided, please.
Okay, the basic assumption: both STTNG/DS9 and B5 present their
future Earth societies as American. Primarily caucasian, English-speaking,
etc. No big surprise here... this is American television, after all. I
kinda doubt Pakistanis in Space would float in syndication.
BUT... the two shows seem to have widely varying visions of what this
America-in-Space *is*. And if you buy William Gibson's opinion that
science fiction is more about the present than the future, then what we
have are two different perceptions of mo dern America.
TNG seems to favor a Bush/Reagan-style America, or, as a recent Time
cover put it: Globo-Cop. The Federation is the most powerful space-faring
nation, and in their benevolence seek to keep the unruly Japs and
Arabs...er, Ferengi and Cardassians from mucking up the wonderful
intergalactic peace. It doesn't hurt that all these benevolent Federation
folks go about their happy peaceful mission on the mother of all
superbattlecruisers... but hey, that's whythey call it gunboat diplomacy.
Sure, the occasional
All-Powerful-Energy-Being-with-an-Infantile-Sense-of-Humour or Dalek-clone
("Exterminate! Exterminate!" "Assimilate! Assimilate!" Am I stretching
here?) will show up to muddy the waters, but they never seem to affect the
political situation. Surely Q could make himself President of the
Federation, couldn't he? Or does he just have too much of a homoerotic
thing going with Picard to bother?
Despite their "to-boldly-go" split infinitive, there doesn't really
seem to be anywhere new to go *to* in the STTNG universe. It all seems
paved over and sterilized. You can almost picture the Federation
developers moving along in the wake of the Enterprise,, working out plans
to convert the latest Slime-Beast World into another Luxury Planet of
Scantily Clad Aryan Chicks.
B5, by contrast, seems to have it's future America in a much more
precarious position. Where the Feds usual dilemma goes along the lines of:
"We sure don't want to have to blow up these crazy aliens. Got to get them
to see reason!" the B5 crew seems to be more concerned with: "Gee, we sure
don't want these crazy aliens to blow us all to hell." B5's setup is
certainly more tension-inducing; the Federation is safe as houses, while
the Babylon station is surrounded by touchy and weird aliens who have
(probably) scragged the last four such ventures.
But (wait for it) the political implications are at least as
interesting as the dramatic ones, or they could be. Where ST envisions
America as ye old somewhat-condescending Global (or Universal)
Peacekeeper, B5 has its society in a position where condescension is
neither practical nor wise. Obviously, the space station's future, and
Earth's, depends not on outgunning a bunch of goofy tribalistic clans, but
on working out some sort of feasible compromise, which requires a deeper
understanding of what the other space-faring nations are all about. Not a
simple chore, considering the B5 Earthlings don't know what some of the
aliens even look like, never mind what the hell they're thinking about.
The B5 setup reminds me somewhat of David Brin's Uplift series, with the
rogue "Wolfling" humans being a considerable irritant to the much older
and more civilized races, most of whom would just love an excuse to scrub
the stupid Earthlings off the galactic disc.
To be sure, B5 still has its space-opera elements-- spaceship
battles, raygun fights, square-jawed cosmic hero types-- but, insofar as I
can tell from the limited material at present, it does have the potential
for much more interesting cultural and political commentary than the ST
warhorse. Please! Not another thinly disguised Vietnam or Gulf War
parallel! And while we're at it, no more abortion/ single parent/ Nazi war
criminal clubtexts.
Blah. I think I've spewed at greater length than I originally
intended. Momma told me never to look for socio-political intertexts in
sci-fi TV shows...
Joe Straczynski (straczynski@genie.geis.com) comments:
Your assumptions regarding the differences between the two universes,
and our political/social setup, are quite correct. We've taken the idea
of a planetary government (not necessarily American in nature; we've gone
back to some older ideas on the operation of a republic) with a senate and
a President that is not looking to take care of everybody else's problems,
and has enough problems on its own. (In fact, at one point in the pilot,
a Senator tells Sinclair "The Earth Alliance can't go around being the
galaxy's policeman.")
I read, a long time ago, that what you have to do in a story is to
get your character up a tree and then start throwing rocks at him. So
instead of making everything easy for our characters, I've constructed
universe that is difficult, where you have to work for everything you get,
and nobody wants to cooperate unless they have to. Never arbitrarily,
though; characters have to have good reasons (or at least what they
consider good reasons) for what they do.
For me, the process of overcoming a problem is more dramatically
interesting -- and in a way more positive -- than a universe in which all
over the problems have already been solved. I want to show characters who
have to deal with the same BS as the rest of us, but who manage to
persevere regardless.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Why I Don't Like Dungeons & Dragons: A Player's View"
by Bill Ayres
In a recent article on the connections between politics, economics
and fantasy role-playing, I fingered TSR as being in egregious error on
some of its attempts to manage technological development in its
pre-generated fantasy worlds. This jab was but the tip of the iceberg;
the purpose of this article is to take you (the unsuspecting reader) on an
underwater journey to examine some of the remaining 99% of my pet peeves
with TSR's D&D system. If you are an ardent fan of D&D and have a weak
heart, I suggest you stop reading here.
Let me preface the rest of this article by saying that I was raised
(as an RPGer) on D&D. I started playing around 5th grade, seriously
around 6th grade, and didn't stop until halfway through college (when I
discovered that there ARE other systems in the world, but that's another
story). And I also firmly believe that, given good players and a good GM,
ANY system can be made to support good and fun role-playing (anyone who
participated in Scott O'Callaghan's Magic Factory one-shot some years ago
ca n testify to this; even veterans of the Holdercruz saga were known to
have a good time now and again). D&D, in the hands of a good GM and with
good players, can be a grand time and good roleplaying. Which is why I
still play it occasionally.
That having been said, I also firmly believe that as fantasy
role-playing systems go, D&D is not a very good system, and seems to be
getting worse (or at best, balancing its gains with losses) as it ages.
My opening paragraph (and the previous article to which it alludes) should
not be taken as indicating the extent of my distress (as GM) at their
feeble and misbegotten attempts to introduce politics and economics into
their realms; far from it. Recently I ran across an article in Dragon
magazine ( Official Motto: "The Mouthpiece of TSR"; #190, if anyone's
interested) entitled "Economics III: Population and Deforestation". This
article, third in a series (someday I will track down the first two to see
if they're as silly), was an attempt to provide DMs with a framework for
understanding how populations would grow over time, given certain
conditions - a useful tool for a DM who is running a campaign over a long
span of time and wants that to reflect some dynamism. The article did
this by producing Tables (of course - everything MUST be in a Table to be
Official D&D) of growth rates, given initial population size and
geographic location (urban, borderlands, etc.) Rates in this table varied
between -6% and +15%, most of them positive and above 4%.
This is outrageous. Clearly, the author has confused birth rates
(how many people are likely to be born in a year) and growth rates (birth
rate minus death rate). A population of 350 people growing at a rate of
8% per year (which is the example they use) would double EVERY 9 YEARS.
This is not only massively inaccurate in a historical sense (growth rates
until the 19th century throughout the world were very, very low, below 1%
in most places), it's insane. Even the present-day Third World, which is
widely recognized as having very large population problems, only grows at
a maximum rate of 8% per year, and this only in the worst of places
(sub-Saharan Africa comes to mind). Clearly, TSR's authors haven't done
their homework on this one. Granted, the piece in question appeared in a
magazine, not a supplement, and is therefore
less-than-completely-official; but it is, for me, an illustration of a
more general failure.
But I digress. My original intent was to provide a PLAYER'S critique
of the system, and so I shall. I just had to get that off my chest.
Really, I'm done now. On to bigger and better things. I want to address
two issues related to character creation in D&D: the determination of
character skills, and the arbitrary nature of the saving throw system.
In criticizing the TSR approach to the first of these I must admit up
front that the D&D game system has made some progress over the years. Way
back in the dark ages of First Ed. AD&D, skills outside those normally
given to classes (which consisted, and still consist, solely of fighting
abilities, spells, and thieving abilities) were almost nonexistent.
Players who wanted their fighter to know how do something else besides
bash things over the head could roll on a random table (again, those
random tables...) to determine a "secondary skill" - basically, one
single, solitary thing your fighter could do outside the general realm of
hack-and-slay. This led, naturally enough, both to a tendency towards
cookie-cutterism in character creation (since all characters are
essentially equivalent within classes, especially fighters); and a
distinct push towards the dreaded disease of Munchkinism, as naive and
malleable minds, clearly given the message that non-combat skills didn't
matter, pushed to optimize their characters for combat. We were all
guilty of this at one time or another, and I'm the first to admit it. My
claim is that the system pushed us to it, at least in part.
Clearly, Second Edition, with its long list of Non-Weapon
Proficiencies, is superior to this early failure. It is not, however,
sufficiently better to make it a good system. PCs are still limited to an
extremely small number of skills (usually around 3 or 4 for first level
PCs), which is not an impressive number. Additionally, getting better in
any one skill (particularly one that doesn't happen to be based on one of
your best attributes, which are randomly determined) is prohibitively
expensive; it makes much more sense to spend earned slots on new skills
than to spend them on feeble 5%-per-slot skill increases, especially when
those extra slots come along so rarely. Incidentally, this makes
non-hack-and-slash adventures more difficult to design, since the bulk of
the PCs abilities are still combat-oriented, and PCs tend to like to use
all the nifty stuff they've got written on their character sheets.
My second objection is to the completely arbitrary nature of the
saving throw system. Clearly, saving throws are a necessary and good
thing - who among us hasn't had a character saved from certain death by a
timely roll of the die? In addition, saving throws represent something
that makes sense in the "real world" of fantasy: sometimes, characters can
resist spells, dodge lightning bolts, have sufficiently stiff
constitutions to fight off poisons, etc.
However, the relationship between these concepts and the numbers
appearing on the saving throw table is practically nil. With two small
exceptions (high Wisdom adds to saving throws against certain spells
attacking the mind; a high Dex will add to saves involving a dodge -
whichever those are, which isn't clear), these saves are predicated
entirely on character class and character level. This means that a Cleric
with a sickly 8 Constitution (but at fourth level) has a better chance of
surviving a poison attack than a fighter with an 18 Con. (even if the
fighter is four levels higher). Dodging-type saving throws (primarily
against Breath Weapons, wands and certain spells) are similarly arbitrary
in nature, reflecting neither the character's actual quickness (except as
minorly modified by Dex - see above) nor any other significant measure of
dodging ability (fighters ought, according to the general D&D picture, be
better at dodging than wizards, but such is not the case, at least at low
levels). It also means that, especially for fighters, going out and
slaying lots and lots of whatever creatures your DM dishes up (orcs,
dragons, giant spiders, what have you), as well as picking up lots of
gold, increases your ability to resist ALL categories of attack -
including those you may never have encountered.
Finally, the categories on which saving throws are based --
paralyzation/poison/death ; rod/staff/wand ; petrification/polymorph ;
breath weapon ; spell - bear little if any connection either to a
realistic conception of a fantasy realm or to any theoretical
explanations I can come up with. Why "death magic", "polymorph" and
"spell" are three separate categories - and why different character
classes respond to these magical attacks differently - is beyond me.
Somebody had clearly been up too late a lmost two decades ago when these
rules were being written, and TSR hasn't had the guts (or the
creativity)to change them since.
I could continue my rantings, but a) I promised I would limit myself
to two pet peeves, and b) I suspect the editor is going to hack this
article apart as it is (who, lil' old me? -- ed.). Allow me to end by
restating what I feel to be the obvious: D&D, played well with good
players and a good DM, can be lots of fun. But for those who want more
control over character creation and a system that more realistically
reflects the world of "fantasy physics", I would recommend another game.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
RANTS AND RAVES #4: "Religion, Human Nature and Role-Playing"
By Tom Janulewicz
Working the 'Little People' into the Design and Operations Matrices of A
Fantasy RPG World . . .
I wish to address some matters arising from Mr. Ayres' article in the
last issue of this publication. His offering provided an excellent
jumping-off point for the consideration of macro-issues of which the
Fantasy RPG world-builder must be cognizant. In contrast I hope to offer
a cursory analysis of some essential micro-issues, the things characters
shaped by these overarching factors might encounter during the course of
their day to day lives. While it is true that in a heroic fantasy
campaign the Players often act on the larger political and economic stages
the bulk of their interaction occurs with the people who are merely the
product of these greater forces.
The overall environment in the run-of the-mill fantasy world is
essentially parochial. That is to say the social development parallels
its political and economic analogues. Even the most urbane and
cosmopolitan areas are still relatively backward. Such worlds are
inhabited primarily the low-status masses with little or no access to or
awareness of the political foundations of their worlds. Outside of the
occasional centers of population and political authority (which are for
some reason most often realized as a cross between a set from CAMELOT and
Los Angeles a la BLADERUNNER) these worlds are primarily agrarian,
containing peasant populations struggling for basic survival. Whether the
Game Master selects the popular feudal model or any of the other systems
Ayres suggests, the plain fact is greater distinctions matter little to
the great mass of people. Will they on some level be shaped by these
forces? Of course. Will they be terribly conscious of this fact?
Probably not. Indeed it is likely that their political sophistication
will not extend much past an awareness of the fact that there is a lord to
whom they owe allegiance and through whom they enjoy a certain nebulous
protection. Beyond that, the greater concerns are not strictly relevant.
In a world organized according to such a plan, the lives of the
masses will most likely find a center through the agency of the
macro-issue of Religion. Most RPG systems ignore this matter almost
entirely, a fact which flies in the face of historical evidence. In a
low-complexity society religion pervades almost every aspect of daily
life. The results of this force varies with the form of the belief system
but nevertheless it should manifest as one of the central organizing
tenets of daily life. As realized in a traditional role-playing
environment, it seems that Paladins alone have this sort of ideological
thread running through their lives, and their devotion is usually couched
in terms of a fanatically self-righteous devotion to The Good, not a god.
Worlds based on the African, Roman or feudal European models cited by
Ayres would likely organize along polytheistic, elemental lines. Most
natural forces would be ascribed to supernatural agents. Again, this is
rarely the case in traditional role-playing worlds. In these environments
it is most often the case that gods and demons exist in some sort of
spiritual supermarket. The Tome O' Narsty Critters and other such manuals
throw "Religious Monsters" into the mix with standard agglomeration of
orcs, kobolds, ochre jellies and the like (and Game Masters pick and
choose among these things with the same careless abandon the mundanes
reserve for choosing cat food).
Certainly the theological bogeymen are on a level of power and
invulnerability that is off any worthwhile scales but in play they are
still treated as basic monsters, albeit incredibly nasty and powerful
ones. Even in those cases when the appearance of such creatures
conditions serious negative reaction modifiers based upon sheer terror,
the terror was rooted in the creature's power.Basically, just an almighty
Presence Attack. There is little sense of, "Oh, look. It is one of the
racial enemies of my people, a creature I have feared since hearing the
campfire stories passed on since the dawn of time. Faced with this
nightmare incarnate I am totally incapable of any sort of response short
of dropping dead of fright." Indeed in the face of such terror made
rotting, suppurating flesh, the players somehow seem to find its Achilles
hoof. I contend that such power abetted by an adherence on the part of
the players to some sort of system of belief would lend a more believable
air to play.
As would a somewhat more reasonable treatment of magic. The manner
in which this force is treated in the fantasy world is patently ludicrous.
As I understand things, in traditional fantasy worlds mages are groups of
individuals who align themselves into similarly-minded, effectively
unregulated cliques, enact all sorts of strange behaviors, have quite
specific and ritualized codes of behavior and serve as conduits for
unfathomable power. It strikes me that this treatment flies in the face
of basic human nature. The beginner's D&D campaign tradition of having
mages tossing lightning bolts in taverns is clearly problematic. Given
the above postulated parochial and superstitious societies such behavior
should lead to the burning of quite a few magic users. The powers they
wield, if understood on any level, will most likely appear to the masses
as the product of demonic possession. If tolerated at all, it seems that
magic and its practitioners should be met with a certain amount of
suspicion.
Ayres alludes to a possible alternative to this condition in his
piece when he suggests that magic makes long-range, high, speed
communication viable. Given the already cliquish behavior of magic users
(and the fact that mages of different schools probably have more in common
with each other than they do with the common masses) it seems that mages
might attempt to exercise power in the political realm as well. Imagine
the authority of the Church in medieval Europe coupled with the ability to
tap into the very stuff of nature. This then is the ultimate realization
of Ayres' political vision.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On Being a Minor Five-Star General #5: "Series Replay"
by Jon Howard
Gee, not only do I swipe the title of this column from someone else,
I've swiped this issue's subtitle from a magazine (The General, the
in-house wargames magazine of Avalon Hill). But it's appropriate here -- I
want to describe a recent game of Strategic Conquest that I recently
played. StratCon is a computer game from Delta Tao Software. It's a very
good game, with a wicked computer player -- even the programmer can't beat
it at its most difficult level (Level 15).
StratCon has a 60 by 80 square board (80 running East-West, 60
North-South). Units are very abstract -- there are Armies, Fighters,
Destroyers, Transports, Submarines, Carriers, Battleships and Bombers.
Pretty self-explanatory, but I should note that Bombers are one-shot
weapons that kill everything in their blast radius. Bombers made in the
first fifty days have a blast radius of 0, and every fifty days thereafter
the radius goes up one. A bomber with blast radius three can devastate
quite a bit of territory.
While you know the board's size and your starting location, you don't
know anything else about the world until you have a unit of yours next to
it to see it. At the start, almost all of the World View map is black. The
world itself consists of 15-18 islands, and you better know where the
islands are before you send unescorted (and very fragile) transports off
into the unknown.
I played today's game on Level 8. The computer started around the
middle of column 20, and I started around the middle of column 60. With my
starting position, I figured my opponent was almost certainly west of me
and started sending Fighter flights that way while taking the rest of my
home island with Armies. As soon as I took a port, I also started to build
a Transport.
No problems for the first 40-50 days. I finished taking over my
island and used my Transport to grab the islands west of me that I had
found. I also made a second Transport to colonize east of me and built
Destroyers for sea control duty (i.e. finding his islands and making sure
the computer couldn't get to mine.)
The peace and quiet couldn't last forever, though. The computer and I
made serious contact around day 50. We had skirmished and traded a few
Destroyers already, but now we wanted the same island. This island (I'll
call it Central Island) was around column 40, a little below the center of
the board, and was long enough north-south that whoever controlled it
would be well on his way to blocking off half the board and keeping it
safe.
Northeast of Central Island was a smaller island -- call it Island
Two -- that I had already taken from him. We both had a lot of our naval
and airpower strength up there. I decided to hit Central Island from the
south instead. One Transport with six Armies and another with two Armies
landed almost simultaneously, supported by three Destroyers intended for
shore bombardment and general nastiness and a Carrier with two Fighters
for air support. I grabbed the southernmost city immediately but bogged
down trying to take two cities north of it. It took another Transport
landing, Fighter reinforcements and a week to secure them, but my Armies
finally marched north to take the last city on Central Island.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch . . .
While the sea to the south of Central Island was quiet, up north was
very loud. I had been able to build several Carriers and Battleships --
but so had my opponent. We battled back and forth for control of the
straits between Island Two and Central Island, as well as for the straits
between Island Two and the north edge of the mapboard. If I could hold
these bottlenecks, he wouldn't be able to put naval units in my waters. If
he could hold them, I would lose control of my seas and would be unable to
sail Transports without heavy escort. The battle seesawed for weeks. I'd
send a Battleship in and he'd sink it with a Submarine. He'd send in a
Carrier and a Submarine and I'd sink both of them. Destroyers were going
down at an amazing rate. It was so desperate that at some points I had to
deliberately sacrifice Destroyers to keep Battleships busy while I brought
extra Submarines up.
At this point, though, I had the advantage in production -- more
cities, and therefore more naval units. After almost 50 days, I could
finally say I had control of the straits.
Just before that point, I managed to take the final city on Central
Island. My Armies had been slowed down by three separate Transport
landings from my opponent. I was able to sneak Destroyers up the southern
sea, however, setting up a patrol around the western edge of the Island.
After cutting of the supply of new forces and with the help of large
Fighter reinforcements, I was able to eliminate the final computer Army
from the island.
I was in a pretty nice position. I had at least half the board
solidly mine, including complete control over the seas. I had at least
half the cities, so the computer couldn't out produce me. I could send
enough naval units into the western sea to harass his naval operations.
What convinced me I had the game won, though was sailing Destroyers
through the southern sea to the southwest part of the board and finding
neutral cities there. I had turned his flank by taking the Central Island!
I now knew he was concentrated in the northwest, and I knew that he was
much shorter on cities than I was. After I invaded and took another island
of his with seven cities, then called in a Bomber striked on a port with a
Battleship in it (eliminating the Battleship andd making the port a
neutral city), the computer surrendered.
I guess the reason I like playing wargames is that they really force
you to think. You have to decide what your main strategy will be. Which
direction will you push in? Will you go for a big Navy, a big Army, a big
Air Force or some combination of the three? You have to decide economic
matters: which cities will produce what? Is it safe for me to produce a
Battleship that will take 18 days to make in a city near the front that
could be taken? At the same time, tehre are the smaller decisions. How
many Armies should I invade with? Which cities should I base my Fighters
in? How should I set my Destroyers to patrol? When I'm playing, I have to
think both in immediate terms and in long-range terms, and I have to
bealbe to see how the two interact.
Most importantly, I have to do all this knowing little to nothing
about how strong my enemy is or where it is or where it will attack. For
all the factors I know about, there are even more I don't know about.
When I decided to hit the southern end of Central Island, I had no
idea if that was a good thing. I was wagering that most of his strength
was up north, but I couldn't tell. if I had guessed wrong, my attack, and
the units in it, could have been chopped into tiny little pieces. That
day, I guessed right.
It's knowing that you have to make the correct guesses with not
enough information that makes the games so much fun for me.
Anybody up for a game of Third Reich?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Review: "Magic: The Gathering"
by Douglas R. Briggs
"Okay, I'll tap one to put out the black vise, and I'm done."
"Aagh. I've got three extra cards, so I'm down to two life point
now. But I'll play a mountain, tap it and everything else I have except
for this forest, and play this eight point earthquake, and then tap the
forest to prevent the damage with my Circle of Protection: Red."
"I don't think I can do anything. I'm hosed."
Though it may seem like a poorly choreographed fight from some
obscure gaming system, this is actually the bitter end of a game of Magic:
The Gathering, a new card game from the Wizards of the Coast and Garfield
Games. The players (which can number as many as you like) are opposing
wizards, each of whom has a deck of cards representing the wizard's
repetoire of spells. The object is to use your own spells to destroy your
opponent while protecting yourself from damage. While this in itself is
nothing new, the game combines the popular draw of fantasy with the
attraction of collectible items and the highly desirable quality that the
game is never the same.
As a wizard, you cast spells, which have a cost in units of power, or
mana. You have land at your disposal, which can be tapped to yield its
mana for that turn. You can then use the mana from some or all of your
lands to power spells. Some spells require specific types of mana, while
others do not. For example, playing the black vise mentioned
aboverequires no particular kind of mana, but the fireball requires at
least one mountain be tapped, which will yield one unit of red mana. You
can cast spells to summon creatures, to destroy or change cards in play,
to prevent damage (like the Circle of Protection), or even to counter
other spells as they are being cast.
To play the game, you buy packs of cards, which come randomly
assigned in each package. There are 302 different cards in all, some of
which are "uncommon" or "rare," and it is indeed difficult to collect all
the cards by buying packs. It's usually much easier to trade your own
duplicates (of which you will amass a number) for cards you don't
have.Also, if you somehow decide that you can live without your "Lich" or
"Lord of the Pit" or "Sea Serpent," you can trade away something you can't
use for something you really need.
There are three unfortunate drawbacks to the game, two of which might
eventually be eliminated. The first is that the rulebook included in a
starter pack of 60 cards is useful for summarizing the game, but when the
game becomes complicated (as it invariably does), the rules are sometimes
too ambiguous to be really decisive. One can get around this by keeping
up with the ongoing rules discussion on the Usenet newsgroup
rec.games.board or subscribing to a listserver run by Garfield Games which
publishes a "digest" of the Usenet articles. The other drawbacks are that
the packs of cards are a little expensive ($2.45 or so for a booster pack
of 15 cards, $8-9 for a starter pack of 60 cards), and that the cards
themselves are of mediocre-quality cardstock. Hopefully, since the
Wizards of the Coast seem to be making money hand-over-fist with this
game, they will upgrade to a higher quality of card and be able to provide
the cards more cheaply as the game itself gains popularity. To be safe
though, you will need to be careful while handling and especially
shuffling your cards, since they can be damaged more easily than normal
playing cards can.
SUMMARY
Game: Magic: the Gathering
Manufacturer: Wizards of the Coast (Garfield Games)
Price: $2.45 (booster deck -- 15 cards), $8.50 -- 9.00 (starter deck --
60 cards)
Game Length: typically 15 -- 30 minutes, about an hour is the longest
I've seen.
Pros: Some very impressive fantasy artwork on the cards,
collectibility, unique games every time.
Cons: Cards are somewhat expensive and fragile. You need about 120
cards to put together a sufficiently competitive deck.
Overall Comments: "Highly addictive" game, definately worth the price
of starting up if you know friends who will be playing, as well.
Rating: **** (of five)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Top Ten Reasons why the Federation doesn't use cloaking devices:
10) Test vessels keep disappearing and are never seen again.
9) Head of Starfleet has Bugblatter Beast Syndrome and thinks
that if the enemy can't see us, we can't see them.
8) Insurance company won't cover accidents involving two cloaked
ships colliding into each other.
7)
6) Afraid it would make it too easy for Kirk to steal another
ship out of the docking bay.
5) It wouldn't help anyway, Q would still find them.
4) Don't want anyone to find out what _really_ happened to
Pulaski.
3) External shots of the ship would be extremely dull.
2) Don't want to admit that for once, Klingons had a really good
idea.
AND THE NUMBER ONE REASON IS...
1) Mike Okuda and Rick Sternbach can't find the model they made
of the cloaked Enterprise.
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LEGION OF BITTER ALUMNI #8 is out on paper, and will appear on the net as
soon as I format and upload it.
LEGION OF BITTER ALUMNI #9 needs submissions! My deadline is August 26,
1994 and I'll go to press (on paper at least... :-) August 29. Send me
stuff! Have a great summer!
-- Chris Aylott
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