Jun 20
by David Artstone

Roleplaying is a practice where you pretend to be a fictional character. When you are roleplaying in the x-men universe there are a number of important social and physical issues that you have to bear in mind. The world of the X-men is a complex landscape, with many layers of friends and foes all piling atop one another in a complex and interconnected web.

The first thing you have to understand is that the unique factor in the X-men world is the existence of mutants. These mutants are born with a different genetic code than average humans. In most cases this is not like real life where a mutation causes a huge problem for the child. Instead, in the X-men world, mutations are often benign, such as causing you to grow fur, or actually quite functional, such as the ability to shoot lasers.

One of the great things about characters in this universe is the way mutant “powers” are often seen as a double edged sword. In some cases a child may be born with super strength and hearing, but also have blue fur all over their bodies. In the case of a Rogue character, she can drain the powers of anyone she touches, but she can never touch anyone she cares about, for fear of draining their life.

Even if the mutation is completely beneficial, the fact that the character is a mutant in this world is a problem. That is because non mutated humans fear the mutants, and many of them seek to kill or imprison all of them.

That is the major conflict in the X-men universe; the battle between mutants trying to survive, and the humans that are trying to kill them. This conflict is further expanded on when you understand that within each camp, both humans and mutants, there are groups that want to handle the situation differently.

For the humans, there are some people that don’t care about the mutants, some which want equal rights for them, some that fear them and want them tracked, others that want them locked up, and still others that want them killed.

For the mutants, you have some who try to make peace with the humans, while others attempt to kill them all and take over the world.

The interconnected complexities of different groups each with their own agendas is part of the fun of an x-men roleplaying session, and should be the main focus of any game. One of the most interesting aspects of this will be the conflict between the actual x-men; the group of mutants that wants peace with the humans, and the Brotherhood, a group that feels mutants are superior and should wipe out the human race.

X-men roleplaying is an intense mental challenge that requires you to think beyond puzzles and battle strategies, and start considering the consequences of actions, the role of morality, and the way that decisions affect the entire world.

About the Author:
May 12
by David Artstone

The beast ran as quickly as his newborn legs could carry him. He moved through the forest naturally, smoothly. Everything fell into place around him as if he were running through a specially molded glove, made just for him. The air itself seemed to part as his eager feat carried him forward.

All around him he could hear the sounds of nature as he listened with newborn werewolf ears. The scuttling of rodents, the scurrying of insects, the flapping of a birds wings high above.

But beyond these sounds there was another ring of noise that he could hear, just off the corner of his consciousness. The sound of people; angry people. And they were moving quickly. They were encircling him.

He could hear their cruel machines, their cars, their tanks, their motorcycles, as they sped through the forest, destroying everything in their path, and matching his preternatural bounds leap for leap.

He had only just changed a few nights before. He still wasn’t sure on his new feat. Occasionally he would miss a step, fall, but then quickly recover, pulling himself back into that same rhythm, that beat of nature which now filled his consciousness.

As the ring of human slayers closed tighter, the werewolf moved faster, bursting with energy, the easy strides now becoming fierce leaps, moving forward with every ounce of his strength.

But the humans and their cruel machines were inexorable. They kept coming, kept moving, never tripping or falling.

It was in this moment that the young wolf knew that he was lost/ He knew that not only was he lost, but his entire kind would soon be gone.

A moment of regret flooded him. He would not have much time to enjoy his new found gifts. They were getting too close now.

So he enjoyed his last moments. Breathed in the fresh forest air, tasted the deeper flavor of life, sucked the very marrow of the earth.

Then he turned, throwing himself into the line of soldiers that was threatening to close around him.

He immediately crashed into a motorcycle, leaping over the vehicle, and bringing its rider down. Two armored cars stopped, training their cannons on him, but he met the threat straight on, hiding from the one cannons fire by sliding behind the other.

Then a small group of foot soldiers caught up. They raised their weapons to fire but he was already on them, clawing and flailing wildly. That’s when the first armored car fired, missing the wolf, but sending a scattering of shrapnel flying into their own troops.

A moment passed and the wolf ran. He ran faster and faster into the woods, he ran until the sound of the humans receded behind him, and he was out, away, finally free of that evil encircling ring of mortals.

Freedom, he moved. Freedom, he breathed, sucking in the possibilities. Freedom, exhilaration, and hope.

About the Author:
May 6
by David Artstone

Empathy is a powerful tool for understanding the world around you. It opens you up to a whole new realm of possibility in expressing artistic expressions.

In order to write any decent piece of literature you have to start with character. Compelling individuals are the most important part of any tale. They are the reason for the story and the vehicle for the action. When writing about vampires, it is important for the author to try and get inside of the psychology of these creatures. You have to understand the mind of immortality, the soul of the killer, and the lust for blood.

The vampire is a dichotomy of elegance and danger. They are born in violence, being taken into the dark covenant by another of their kind. Whatever particular details may exist, the vampire’s birth is always painful, and it always involves blood.

Yet this birth is the gateway to a whole new world; a world of power and immortality. One thing that almost all vampire tales have in common is the power of the beast.

So the birth of this creature is the death of the prone mortal, the weakness, the overpowering by a greater being. And yet in this process the person is reborn into a new, much more powerful existence.

In some vampires this could cause them to reject their old humanity, to hate it, to turn away from all things mortal. This is a rejection of weakness. When coupled with the vampires need for blood, it can lead to a violent reaction to humans in general.

On the other hand, many vampires go through a second emotional rejection, hating what they have become and longing for the simple life of mortality that they have left behind. The dichotomy of these two desires can tear apart a vampires soul, if they still possess one.

About the Author:
Apr 27
by David Artstone

In some ways the creative process can be incredibly lonely. Even though you are surrounded by a multitude of the most colorful and endearing characters you can imagine, they all exist only within the confines of your head. You are isolated inside of yourself, and the extent of your wanderings is the limit of your own mind.

When people get writers block often they have to stop writing, go outside, talk to people, or read something written by another author. This is an attempt to jar their brains out of the rut that has developed. By exposing themselves to other people ideas, to thoughts outside of their own minds, they can expand their imagination and open up new connections, which will allow them to continue down the path of creation.

Tandem creativity is when any two or more people come together to engage in a process of imagination. The most common example of this would be when two people write a book together. Each author brings their own perspective, their feelings, and their hang ups to the process. The challenge here usually isn’t summoning up creativity. The fact that there are two people working off of one another will usually take care of that. Instead the struggle will be to find a compromise between the vision that each person has for the story and its characters.

A book, however, is a rather two dimensional project. The storyline can only go in one direction at a given time, even if that direction is back and forth in time. You can only have one voice, one narrative at a time. In effect, the two authors have to take turns writing and re-writing one another’s work.

The practice of interactive fiction takes this concept to the next level. Whether via roleplaying or interactive writing, this creative process involves two or more people acting in the capacity of their own distinct character, or characters, and interacting with one another to create a story. This narrative can theoretically go in several different directions all at once, with each person creating their own sphere of influence over the telling of the story.

The benefit of this is that even if one of the writers gets stale, they can always draw on the creativity of any number of other participants to continue their story. There is also an aspect of excitement involved. When two or more people are involved as active partners, and even as competitors, it is difficult for the writing to get boring, because you are essentially constantly working off of the other person.

There is still a problem with individual visions having to resolve into a single concept, however this is less since each person actually has control over their own characters. That means that even though the story may go awry, you can always self correct it by having a character take various actions to regain control of the tale.

In summary, tandem creativity is a form of collective imagination in which two or more people share in the creative process, in order to develop a work of shared art. This can be as simple as two authors collaborating on a book, or as complex as an entire community interacting with one another as fictional characters to create a whole new world. This process is becoming more common, as increases in web 2.0 technology make it easier for people to collaborate on ideas from across the world.

About the Author:
Oct 3
by Bruce Springsteen

Buying Warcraft gold is a fairly controversial way of getting the gold needed to progress through the game. However, for many people it is really the only practical way to be able to see the endgame material and be able to gear up for it so that they will eat least have a chance of being invited into groups for the 25 man raids.

warcraft gold sales are very popular on the Internet and it is indeed a very lucrative industry. You will probably have noticed the large number of gold seller is advertising in the game itself but be aware that there are many gold seller is out there who are unscrupulous and do not have a good reputation. In spite of this, it is not too difficult to find a decent an reputable seller which has good after sales support.

As soon as we reach the maximum level, virtually all of us want to start raiding as soon as possible and as nothing more frustrating than reaching a maximum level and then having absolutely nothing left to do but run the occasional heroic over and over again or go grinding for gold. Fortunately, there is another option.

There are three ways to get the gold. If you have a colossal amount of time to play, no a job and not much of a social life either, you could spend days and days grinding the gold by repetitively killing mobs and levelling up your gathering professions. Alternatively, you can simply play the normal amount of time and take months and months to accumulate the gold needed.

So, if you want to save an enormous amount of time and be able to set aside a lot of time for other things in your life, then buying World of Warcraft gold is a great option.

About the Author:
Aug 30
by Tyler Battle

The Zygor Guide has been touted as one of the best leveling guides for the World of Warcraft player on the market. An in-game guide, the Zygor Guide provides on-screen prompts to help you on your quest and adjusts its response and suggestions to each move you make. It helps you chart the most advantageous course possible. We decided to take a look at it and see if it was as good as everyone says it is. Here is what we found out.

The Zygor Guide is one of a new breed of leveling guides that offers the in-game feature. The way it works is that it opens up and instructional window on your computer screen as you are playing the World of Warcraft. It actually offers two Windows leaving it up to the player as to which one to use. Let’s take a closer look at these two windows and what they have to offer.

Providing detailed information, a large window helps you keep track of your location by providing coordinates that change as you move through the game. It also stores information for you regarding the tasks you have completed to help you keep track of your progress. This window is very helpful to players and assists them in finding the best path to reach the next level.

The only drawback to this particular screen is that it is quite large and can obstruct a player’s view of the playing area. To avoid this problem, it is a good idea to consult it as needed and then close it when you’re not using it. It does provide very important and helpful information that can improve your performance and help you move to the next level more quickly.

The second window provided by the Zygor Guide is much smaller and also transparent, a feature we really liked as it does not block your view of the game at all. That’s a good thing because you will want to leave this window open all the time. It provides guidance on a player’s immediate task and gives you everything you need to complete it.

The Zygor Guide also provides the World of Warcraft player with an arrow that points the player’s character in the direction they should go. This makes completing a quest much faster and easier. The arrow blends well into the game and you don’t feel as if it’s bothersome or out of place. Newbies will find this very helpful.

Another great component of the Zygor Guide are the waypoints. Waypoints are visible on the main map and the mini map. It only shows on the quest that you are currently active on as a clear map. It is very useful because it shows you where you need to go by simply placing your cursor over the waypoint. It truly is an incredibly helpful component of this World of Warcraft guide.

Newbies and veteran players alike will find the Zygor Horde and Alliance leveling guide exceptionally helpful. The size of the windows can be adjusted to taste, as can the opacity. The size of icons and waypoints can also be customized to personal preference. Anyone who is interested in improving the World of Warcraft game playing skills will benefit from this user friendly in-screen guide.

About the Author:
Aug 23
by Vance Kapurro

This is a list of ten pen and paper RPGs that are good, but probably aren’t on most people’s top ten list. As we’ve stated, the games are good, maybe even great, but not great enough to be at the elite Top Ten level.

1. Vampire - The lead game for the World of Darkness setting by White Wolf. It’s been around a long time and has spawned multiple different types of follow-up games in the same genre. Still, even with all the evil creatures out there, Vampires tend to attract us the most.

2. Mage - One of the follow-up games to Vampire. It also lives in the World of Darkness setting. The game introduced a free flow set of magic that allowed players to do virtually anything they could think of.

3. Werewolf - Probably one of the toughest and baddest creatures in White Wolf’s World of Darkness setting. Playing a Werewolf was badass because you could go from normal people mode to crazy killer mode in the blink of an eye.

4. Paranoia - One of the only games where the pre-made adventures were often better than player created adventures. This game had the unique idea to give characters clones of themselves so death meant even less than it normally does in a roleplaying game (which isn’t much).

5. Spycraft - This game advanced leaps and bounds from the 1st edition to the 2nd edition. I believe they could be poised to advance up there with WotC’s D&D and White Wolf’s World of Darkness. Only time will tell, but the game has a ton of potential.

6. Gamma World - I always thought this game should have gotten more props than it did. The random character generation charts were awesome. What other game could you play a poison spewing plant-thingy?

7. Cyberpunk 2020 - A very lethal, near future game. The game is cool because it is pure cyberpunk. No trolls, orks, or magic, just pure guns and chrome. Yet another game which system completely falters in the face of the world setting, but a great game.

8. Warhammer FRPG - I don’t know which came first, the miniatures game or the roleplaying game. But the Warhammer roleplaying game is a nice alternative to D&D. It also has a lot of backing with being the biggest miniatures game out there, as well as tons of video games and computer games further enhancing the world.

9. Earthdawn - Now has a Third Edition being produced by RedBrick Limited. The game is a great alternate fantasy setting with a lot of background and support. It also has a very unique and streamlined dice system and combat system.

10. Hackmaster - Come on critical hit! This game is all about the critical hit table. There is a lot of other cool stuff about the game as well, but essentially it is just another D&D clone. Not that being a D&D clone is a bad thing

About the Author:
Aug 17
by Bob Barr

Gold is a wonderful thing in world of Warcraft, just like money is in real life. The amount of things that you can buy with it as enormous an or more gold you have, the more likely you will be able to gear up for the endgame raids, the more you will stand out amongst the crowd because you will have your professions to maximum and you will no doubt have plenty of novelty items which very few people have enough money to get. However, the only quick way to achieve this is to buy cheap warcraft gold.

For example, you will surely want your swift epic flying mount skill by now and is still costs five thousand for the training alone. You will also need cold weather flying so that you can flying in Northrend. After this, you will need to buy gear on the auction house to better prepare you for raiding and doing heroic dungeons.

The process of buying gold is simple enough, and once you have found the site, all you have to do is enter a few details before payment. An honest provider will never under any circumstances ask for your user name or password and all they need to know in order to know who to give the gods to in the game, is the character name, and the faction and the realm they play on.

Another reason that you might want to buy gold would be to get the mount achievement. Mounts are particularly expensive so you are definitely going to need to save up a lot of gold to get the latest mounts in the game. You need no less than fifty for the achievement and to get them, gold is one of the most important factors.

Buying gold for Warcraft is a simple process and it only costs a modest amount of money. There are many decent and honest suppliers out there where you can start looking but just make sure you do find a good one so you don’t take any unnecessary risks for your account.

About the Author:
Jul 24
by Sandra Martin

Anyone who plays world of Warcraft realises the significance of the in-game currency. Although warcraft gold is easier to get than it used to be, it can still require an enormous amount of time to invest to get any decent amount. And there is nothing more boring than grinding gold and doing the same not repetitive tasks over and over again. Here are some other ways to get gold that you might want to consider.

The only real way to get gold that most players would agree is not boring is to simply let it trickle in as you play the game. For example, if you enjoy and running heroic dungeons on a regular basis and doing the occasional daily quests, then you will find that the gold does gradually mount up but you can expected to take several months before you will be able to buy the travellers tundra mammoth or anything else of significance.

Alternatively, you should consider having two gathering professions. Generally speaking, the crafting professions do not make a great amount of money although there are exceptions provided you know exactly what you are doing. The problem with the crafting professions is that they all cost an enormous amount to level up in the first place.

With gathering professions you can simply do circuits around various zones mining, skinning or picking herbs and you can sell these on the auction house for a reasonable sum of money. This way you might be able to get a few hundred gold per hour but it largely depends on your server’s economy but more importantly on the amount of time the you are willing to spend.

Alternatively, you can consider buying Warcraft gold. Although controversial and against the terms and conditions of Blizzard Entertainment, it is certainly not illegal and the amount of time it can save you are sure to make it worth it. Just make sure that you find a reputable provider so to minimize the risk to your account.

About the Author:
Jul 4
by Jen Morgon

There is always plenty of WoW Gold For Sale and you can find plenty of providers that are very competitive with each other. Prices do very little, depending on a number of factors not just including the provider itself. It also depends how much gold there is available on your server for purchase and also how much gold is available on your faction.

Firstly, in most importantly, you need to make sure that you go with a reputable provider, specifically one that takes security very seriously. Under no circumstances should a provider ever ask for your login password and although should need to know is your login name so they know who to send the gold to via the in game mail, your faction and realm.

The price of gold is an average of $12. 00 although it varies a little bit based on a few factors such as your realm and faction and of course the provider itself. Buying larger amounts will make sure that you get a better deal and I were generally recommend buying about 20, 000 to start off with. However, it is entirely up to you how much you buy and depends on what you want to buy with it.

Another important thing to remember is that a genuine gold provider will never ask you for your password and will only need to know your username, the faction and the realm you play on. Under no circumstances give them your password since if they ask for this, then they’re trying to hack your account.

Another popular thing to spend gold on, and some are the most expensive items in the game as well, are some of the novelty items. For example, the infamous traveller’s tundra mammoth costs no less than 20, 000 gold if you have a neutral reputation with the faction concerned.

About the Author:

« Previous Entries