-
Notifications
You must be signed in to change notification settings - Fork 1
/
index-38.html
614 lines (581 loc) · 36.1 KB
/
index-38.html
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412
413
414
415
416
417
418
419
420
421
422
423
424
425
426
427
428
429
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439
440
441
442
443
444
445
446
447
448
449
450
451
452
453
454
455
456
457
458
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492
493
494
495
496
497
498
499
500
501
502
503
504
505
506
507
508
509
510
511
512
513
514
515
516
517
518
519
520
521
522
523
524
525
526
527
528
529
530
531
532
533
534
535
536
537
538
539
540
541
542
543
544
545
546
547
548
549
550
551
552
553
554
555
556
557
558
559
560
561
562
563
564
565
566
567
568
569
570
571
572
573
574
575
576
577
578
579
580
581
582
583
584
585
586
587
588
589
590
591
592
593
594
595
596
597
598
599
600
601
602
603
604
605
606
607
608
609
610
611
612
613
614
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<meta name="description" content="Random musings on books, code, and tabletop games.">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">
<title>Lacking Natural Simplicity (old posts, page 38) | Lacking Natural Simplicity</title>
<link href="assets/css/all-nocdn.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css">
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="rss.xml">
<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Atom" href="feed.atom">
<link rel="canonical" href="https://tkurtbond.github.io/index-38.html">
<link rel="prev" href="index-39.html" type="text/html">
<link rel="next" href="index-37.html" type="text/html">
<!--[if lt IE 9]><script src="assets/js/html5.js"></script><![endif]--><link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.googleapis.com">
<link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.gstatic.com" crossorigin>
<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Crimson+Text&family=Lato&family=IBM+Plex+Mono" rel="stylesheet">
</head>
<body>
<a href="#content" class="sr-only sr-only-focusable">Skip to main content</a>
<!-- Menubar -->
<div class="blog-masthead">
<div class="container">
<!-- This keeps the margins nice -->
<nav class="blog-nav" role="navigation"><a href="index.html" class="blog-nav-item">Home</a>
<a href="archive.html" class="blog-nav-item">Archives</a>
<a href="categories/index.html" class="blog-nav-item">Tags & Categories</a>
<a href="rss.xml" class="blog-nav-item">RSS feed</a>
<a href="feed.atom" class="blog-nav-item">Atom feed</a>
</nav>
</div>
<!-- /.container -->
</div>
<!-- End of Menubar -->
<div class="container" id="content" role="main">
<div class="body-content">
<div class="blog-header">
<h1 class="blog-title">
<a href="https://tkurtbond.github.io/">
<span id="blog-title">Lacking Natural Simplicity</span>
</a>
</h1>
<p class="lead blog-description">Random musings on books, code, and tabletop games.</p>
</div>
<!--Body content-->
<div class="row">
<div class="col-sm-8 blog-main">
<div class="postindex">
<article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/unison/" class="u-url">Computer Tools: Unison</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/unison/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-08T19:23:25-05:00" title="2008-07-08 19:23">2008-07-08 19:23</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/08/unison/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/08/unison.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>I use the <a class="reference external" href="http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/">Unison</a> File Synchronizer extensively to synchronize my
working environment between 4 or so computers running a couple of
different flavors of Unix and Windows XP and I would have a hard time
getting along without it.</p>
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/computer/" rel="tag">computer</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/tools/" rel="tag">tools</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/unison/" rel="tag">unison</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/docbook/" class="u-url">DocBook</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/docbook/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-08T19:03:54-05:00" title="2008-07-08 19:03">2008-07-08 19:03</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/08/docbook/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/08/docbook.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>I've got a love-hate relationship with <a class="reference external" href="http://docbook.org/">DocBook</a>: I love the structured
markup, and hate the various quirky toolchains and the difficulty of
customizing both the DocBook markup format and the appearance of the
output. Luckily, these things are slowly improving.</p>
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/computer/" rel="tag">computer</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/docbook/" rel="tag">docbook</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/markup/" rel="tag">markup</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/plain-text-markup/" class="u-url">Plain Text Markup</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/plain-text-markup/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-08T17:39:48-05:00" title="2008-07-08 17:39">2008-07-08 17:39</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/08/plain-text-markup/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/08/plain-text-markup.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<aside class="admonition note"><p class="admonition-title">Note</p>
<p>This is unfinished.</p>
</aside><p>I still like plain text. Almost <em>none</em> of the e-mail that I get that
uses HTML formatting actually gains anything from the additional
complexity.</p>
<p>Most of my writing doesn't require a 200 mebibyte word processor
installation that still can't do reasonable <em>intra</em>-document linking,
much less <em>inter</em>-document linking. Moreover, whenever I have to use
such a beast, the conceptual overhead always gets in the way. I
realize these may just be my own quirks, but they really make a
difference to me.</p>
<p>So, I like to do my writing in plain (or very nearly plain) text. But
I also like having nicely printed documents, plus some hope of being
able to move from the plain text documents to something more
sophisticated on those occasions where it is warranted. So, what do I
do?</p>
<p>I use <a class="reference external" href="http://www.methods.co.nz/asciidoc/">AsciiDoc</a> and <a class="reference external" href="https://docutils.sourceforge.io/rst.html">reStructuredText</a> (aka ReST) for writing.</p>
<p>Why both? Well, they both have pluses and minuses.</p>
<section id="restructuredtext"><h2>reStructuredText</h2>
<p>Pros: I found reStructuredText first. It looks pretty good as plain
text, and produces clean HTML and PDF. It can handle deeper
structures off the bat than AsciiDoc, which is occasionally important
to me. (Some document formats require absurdly deep levels of nested
sections.) It can be turned into PDF using LaTeX fairly easily.</p>
<p>Cons: some of the systems I use regularly don't have good packages for
<a class="reference external" href="http://docutils.sourceforge.net/">docutils</a>, the underlying toolset. This may be in part because
although docutils has a long history and is pretty solid, it's still
not considered version 1.0 material. I get the surface impression
that there are still some things that the developers are thinking
about. And there isn't a supported <a class="reference external" href="posts/2008/07/08/docbook/">DocBook</a> output format. That's a
real shame.</p>
</section><section id="asciidoc"><h2>AsciiDoc</h2>
<p>Pros: AsciiDoc, just like reStructuredText, can go straight to HTML.
And AsciiDoc's HTML looks nicer straight out of the box.</p>
<p>AsciiDoc is also explicitly a plain-text encoding of DocBook. This
lets you be sure you can convert it to something widely used and well
understood, which can then be converted by well-known tools into
various other formats including PDF and HTML.</p>
<p>It has better package support amongst the environments I use.</p>
<p>Cons: not as pretty looking in source form as reStructuredText.</p>
</section><section id="conclusions"><h2>Conclusions</h2>
<p>I wish it was easier to add special purpose structure to both AsciiDoc
and reStructuredText that can easily added to all the output formats,
for special purpose things like RPG stats or other complicated
technical documentation.</p>
<p>So, what do I do when I need something more sophisticated? Use
<a class="reference external" href="posts/2008/07/08/docbook/">DocBook</a>, of course.</p>
</section><nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/asciidoc/" rel="tag">asciidoc</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/markup/" rel="tag">markup</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/plain-text/" rel="tag">plain text</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/restructuredtext/" rel="tag">restructuredtext</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/the-kids/" class="u-url">The Kids</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/the-kids/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-08T16:07:10-05:00" title="2008-07-08 16:07">2008-07-08 16:07</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/08/the-kids/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/08/the-kids.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>The kids I game with get mentioned a lot. Right now they're my
daughter and niece and nephews. I'm really lucky to have such a great
bunch of kids around to play games. (Some of the parents game
occasionally, and I'm glad to include them in the games, any time.)</p>
<dl class="simple">
<dt>L.B.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is my daughter.</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<p>My brother C.P.B. and his wife C.B. live about an hour away, so their
kids get to play semi-regularly.</p>
<dl>
<dt>B.B.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is the oldest of the bunch, which means I've been experimenting on
him the longest. (<img alt="(:-)" src="images/smiley-small.png" style="height: 2ex;"> I hope it hasn't hurt too
much. <img alt="(:-)" src="images/smiley-small.png" style="height: 2ex;">) His first game was a <cite>FUDGE</cite> <cite>Bunnies and Burrows</cite>
game; I think he was 5 years old then.</p>
<p>He's married and off to college now, so we don't get to game
together as much any more, alas.</p>
</dd>
<dt>D.B.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is the middle brother.</p>
</dd>
<dt>M.B.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is the youngest child, and started playing well below reading age,
so usually plays as part of a team with his dad or an older brother.</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<p>My sister C.I.A. and her husband J.W.A.II and their kids live on the
family farm, next door to me, so I get to run games for the A. kids,
along with my daughter, the most.</p>
<dl class="simple">
<dt>T.A.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is the oldest boy.</p>
</dd>
<dt>E.A.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is his younger sister.</p>
</dd>
<dt>M.A.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is their younger brother and is the youngest of my regular gamers.
He can read now, and lots of fun playing.</p>
</dd>
<dt>C.A.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is the new baby boy, and he <a class="reference external" href="posts/2011/09/24/ff-tirpg-shaggradds-hives-of-peril-play-session-1/">recently</a> started playing in our
games. He's very young yet, but seems to be having fun.</p>
</dd>
</dl>
<p>My brother N.A.B. and his wife K.B–B. live far out of state, and so
their kids only get to play on summer and winter vacations when they
come and visit the family farm, but I enjoy running games for them
when they are available.</p>
<dl class="simple">
<dt>T.B.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is N.A.B.'s oldest son.</p>
</dd>
<dt>O.B.</dt>
<dd>
<p>is his younger brother, and started with <a class="reference external" href="pages/roleplaying-games-played-with-the-kids/#buggin">Buggin'</a>, but now
plays <cite>Savage Worlds</cite></p>
</dd>
</dl>
<p>I'm going to try online gaming with a map tool and either a chat
inteface or a voice interface when the kids are a little bit older, so
the ones that are farther away can get to play more often.</p>
<p>I've run a lot of games for the kids; <em>Fudge Bunnies and Burrows</em>,
<em>BESM Dungeon</em>, <em>Toon</em>, <em>Buggin'</em>, <em>D&D</em>, <em>Savage Worlds</em>, and perhaps
others.</p>
<!-- This one is just the local version of the one above, for testing. -->
<!-- file:///c:/home/tkb/comp/xsl-website/me/graphics/icons/smiley-small.png -->
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/family/" rel="tag">family</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/gaming/" rel="tag">gaming</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/rpg/" rel="tag">rpg</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/hack-n-slash-and-dungeon-crawling/" class="u-url">Hack-n-Slash and Dungeon Crawling</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/hack-n-slash-and-dungeon-crawling/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-08T14:10:07-05:00" title="2008-07-08 14:10">2008-07-08 14:10</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/08/hack-n-slash-and-dungeon-crawling/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/08/hack-n-slash-and-dungeon-crawling.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>I find, when I've got little time or energy, that it is very easy to
fall back to <cite>hack-n-slash</cite> and dungeon crawling as the default types
of adventures to present for my players. Admittedly, these days I'm
running mostly for kids who are happy to play in the intersection of
those styles. Actual “roleplaying” happens mostly as the result of
serendipitous inspiration from in-game events (witness the
<a class="reference external" href="posts/2008/07/04/return-to-alusia-part-4/#cuirbouilli-armor">cuirbouilli armor</a>).</p>
<!-- See rpgs_. See Toon_. -->
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/dungeon-crawling/" rel="tag">dungeon crawling</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/hack-n-slash/" rel="tag">hack-n-slash</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/rpg/" rel="tag">rpg</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/recent-reading-kim-newman/" class="u-url">Recent Reading: Kim Newman</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/08/recent-reading-kim-newman/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-08T00:00:00-05:00" title="2008-07-08 00:00">2008-07-08 00:00</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/08/recent-reading-kim-newman/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/08/recent-reading-kim-newman.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<ul>
<li>
<p><cite>Bad Dreams</cite>, by Kim Newman, copyright 1990, Carroll & Graf Publishers,
Inc; 1995.</p>
<p>An interesting take on vampires, and an interesting reflection of
London at a certain time.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/books/" rel="tag">books</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/recent-reading/" rel="tag">recent reading</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/07/minimizing-gaming-baggage/" class="u-url">Minimizing Gaming Baggage</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/07/minimizing-gaming-baggage/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-07T20:15:00-05:00" title="2008-07-07 20:15">2008-07-07 20:15</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/07/minimizing-gaming-baggage/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/07/minimizing-gaming-baggage.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>I generally carry <em>way</em> too much stuff around to games. I'm trying to
minimize it all, and here are some ways I've found or will be trying.</p>
<p>If you are running a system that doesn't focus on battlemat-oriented
tactical play, or the evening's adventure doesn't require that style
of play, you don't probably don't have much to carry to the nights
game: maybe just a single rulebook, your notes, and your dice.</p>
<p>If you are using a battlemat and miniatures, you can cut down on what
you have to carry around.</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p>Just the core rulebook.</p>
<p>Just needing to carry one small rulebook makes things much easier.
<em>Savage Worlds: Explorer's Editon</em> and <em>Big Eyes, Small Mouth</em> score
high here, as does <em>Rules Cyclopedia</em> D&D and, given the pamphlet
size and low page count of the three core books, Original D&D.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Use flat paper figures and separate bases.</p>
<p>I've never been one for painting miniatures, unfortunately, but I
have found that part of the fun of many roleplaying games is moving
miniatures around on a battlemat. (The kids like them too.)</p>
<p>Now that color printers that print on cardstock are cheap, paper
miniatures are practical <em>and</em> good looking. But how do you
transport them? It's great that they're way lighter than metal or
plastic miniatures, but if you actually cut out and glue up the
common triangle-from-the-top and triangle-from-the-side they still
take up a good bit of space, too much to take on a business trip,
for instance, and they're easily crushed. The “T”-from-the-side
paper miniatures can sometimes be folded at the crossbar of the “T”,
but they tend to get bent when carried together. If you don't glue
the paper minatures you can carry them flat, but using paper clips
to hold them in their triangular or “T” shapes it is just too fiddly
and time consuming.</p>
<p>So, what I recently started doing was cutting out and gluing
together just the front and backs. This gives me flat, stiff
standups that can be easily stored in an envelope, but that together
with separate plastic bases provide nice good looking 3d
miniatures. The plastic bases themselves are sturdy and can be
transported in a small bag; even a hundred of them can fit in my
computer bag without taking much space. And the flat standups in an
envelope travel easily without being crushed or bent.</p>
<ul class="simple">
<li><p>At some point I should try counters, like Fiery Dragon's Counter
Collections, which have the complete D&D 3.5E SRD monsters
covered.</p></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>
<p>Put all needed opponents/monsters on index cards.</p>
<p>I recently got a printer that can print directly on cardstock and
3×5" cards, and I love being able to carry around the opponents and
deal out just the ones I need for the current encounter. It greatly
reduces papershuffling in the middle of encounters, too, and cuts
down on the amount of junk on the table between you and the
players. And you can carry them on in a shirt pocket on a pinch.</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p>Don't forget stock opponents.</p>
<p>Having a collection of stock opponents to fall back on really
helps. Sometimes just shuffling the 3×5" cards gives me ideas.</p>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>
<p>Flip Mats and dry-erase markers for battlemats</p>
<p>I got two of <a class="reference external" href="http://www.steelsqwire.com/">Steel Sqwire</a>'s original Flip-Mat™ battlemats.
They've got 1 inch squares on one side and 1 inch hexes on the other
side, and they fold up flat to 8×10 inches and unfolded are 24×30
inches. Two of these fit in my computer bag without bulking it up
noticably, and work wonderfully with dry-erase pens. (No more
stains from wet-erase remains!) The only problems is that since
they fold, they have creases, and don't lay pefectly flat. However,
I've used these with paper miniatures and unless someone slaps
something down in the middle of mat or really jars the table things
are pretty stable and the miniatures don't fall down.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>
<p>Printed Cardstock Tile Terrain instead of battlemats</p>
<p>I recently bought a bunch of PDF printable terrain tiles from
Skeleton Key Games. They make nice looking terrain and they are all
standardized shapes that I can print on cardstock on an inexpensive
inkjet printer and cut out. Since they're all the same size and
shape they stack flat and since they're cardstock you can easily
carry them in a standard 6½x9½ manilla envelope, and two or three
envelopes easily carry enough for an evening's play. The
disadvantages are that tiles sometimes curve, which tends to lead to
the tiles moving around more as they're laid and played on.</p>
<p>As a side node, the various tile sets published by Wizards of the
Coast for use with D&D, Star Wars, and the associated miniatures
battle games have a great graphical appears and are very heavy,
sturdy solid cardboard (not corragated), so they make a great
battlemat. Unfortunately, they're all different sizes which makes
it difficult to pack them compactly, and the thick cardboard which
makes them so stable in play also makes them surprisingly bulky.
(And I can never figure out easily if I've actually collected up all
the pieces after the game.)</p>
<p>2008-08-20 01:29:26: I'm still undecided as to whether these are
slower and less convenient than the Flip-Mats. They do look neat,
though.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<!-- --><blockquote>
<p>Stones/bennies/chips/status chips, playing cards, etc.</p>
</blockquote>
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/minimizing/" rel="tag">minimizing</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/rpg/" rel="tag">rpg</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/07/website-construction/" class="u-url">Website Construction</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/07/website-construction/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-07T20:12:17-05:00" title="2008-07-07 20:12">2008-07-07 20:12</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/07/website-construction/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/07/website-construction.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>I've been using the DocBook Website customization to build my website
since the beginning.</p>
<p>First I used the DSSSL stylesheets to built it. They built the
website as a single SGML (and later XML) document from multiple input
files included into a main organizing file that produced multiple HTML
output files, checking all the cross references and building a site
map. Unfortunately, this method stopped working in my environment for
some reason, and I never had time to figure out why.</p>
<p>I thought I'd see how the XSL stylesheets the DocBook Website
customization worked. The architecture for the Website customization
changed between the two: now the website was multiple documents, each
built from an XML input file and producing an HTML output file, and
using the DocBook XSL stylesheet <code class="docutils literal">olink</code> cross-document linking for
links between the different pages. This necessitated changing all the
source files, but even more unfortunately the processing of cross
document links consumed so much memory that rebuilding the site took
forever, and eventually got to the point where it used more memory
than was usually available on my server. (Admittedly, my setup was
atypical for DocBook, and perhaps even pathological.)</p>
<p>In disgust, I let my site lie fallow, waiting for some better solution
to present itself. Alas, nothing was immediately forthcoming. I
really like DocBook for markup, and the “correct” solution would
probably be to take <a class="reference external" href="http://norman.walsh.name">Norm Walsh</a>'s <a class="reference external" href="http://norman.walsh.name/2003/05/14/how">route</a> and custom-build some DocBook
to website software, but frankly I haven't had the time or energy to
do that, especially since, if I follow Norm's <a class="reference external" href="http://norman.walsh.name/2003/06/16/build">example</a>, I'd have to
take the time to figure out RDF and so forth.</p>
<p>Eventually I decided that I'd try something minimal: adding a new
<a class="reference external" href="https://tkurtbond.github.io">blog</a> using <a class="reference external" href="http://pybloxsom.sourceforge.net">pyBloxsom</a>, which seemed simple enough to be
comprehendable. It supported <a class="reference external" href="https://docutils.sourceforge.io/rst.html">reStructuredText</a>, one of the nicer
<a class="reference external" href="posts/2008/07/08/plain-text-markup/">plaintext</a> markup systems, which was a definite bonus <a class="footnote-reference brackets" href="posts/2008/07/07/website-construction/#simple" id="footnote-reference-1" role="doc-noteref"><span class="fn-bracket">[</span>1<span class="fn-bracket">]</span></a>.
After fiddling around about I got enough for a reasonably comfortable
minimalist blog. So, give it a look-see.</p>
<aside class="footnote-list brackets"><aside class="footnote brackets" id="simple" role="doc-footnote"><span class="label"><span class="fn-bracket">[</span><a role="doc-backlink" href="posts/2008/07/07/website-construction/#footnote-reference-1">1</a><span class="fn-bracket">]</span></span>
<p>I hate most WYSIWYG software, and am hoping that using
reST regularly for the blog will be lightweight enough that I won't
notice the burden.</p>
</aside></aside><nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/website/" rel="tag">website</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/07/new-blog-first-post/" class="u-url">New Blog: First Post</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/07/new-blog-first-post/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-07T17:51:51-05:00" title="2008-07-07 17:51">2008-07-07 17:51</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/07/new-blog-first-post/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/07/new-blog-first-post.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<p>I've been increasing dissatisfied with the complex of software I use
to create my web pages. Until I replace the whole thing with something
better I'm going to be doing things on this new blog.</p>
<p>This, by the way, is the actual first post. Anything that is earlier
is backdated to the date it actually happened, and will be
(eventually) marked with the “timewarp” tag, and have a link to this
post.</p>
<nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/blog/" rel="tag">blog</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/first/" rel="tag">first</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/website/" rel="tag">website</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article><article class="blog-post h-entry post-text"><header><h2 class="p-name entry-title blog-post-title"><a href="posts/2008/07/05/smugglers-cove-2008-07-05/" class="u-url">The Secret of Smuggler's Cove</a></h2>
<div class="metadata blog-post-meta">
<p class="byline author vcard"><span class="byline-name fn">T. Kurt Bond</span></p>
<p class="dateline"><a href="posts/2008/07/05/smugglers-cove-2008-07-05/" rel="bookmark"><time class="published dt-published" datetime="2008-07-05T22:25:52-05:00" title="2008-07-05 22:25">2008-07-05 22:25</time></a></p>
<p class="commentline"> <a href="posts/2008/07/05/smugglers-cove-2008-07-05/#disqus_thread" data-disqus-identifier="cache/posts/2008/07/05/smugglers-cove-2008-07-05.html">Comments</a>
</p>
</div>
</header><div class="e-content entry-content">
<aside class="admonition admonition-spoilers"><p class="admonition-title">Spoilers!</p>
<p>Smuggler's Cove, <a class="reference external" href="http://www.peginc.com/">PEG</a></p>
</aside><p>Saturday after the 4th I ran another <a class="reference external" href="http://www.peginc.com/">Savage Worlds</a> game for the
<a class="reference external" href="categories/cat_gaming/actual-play/the-kids/">kids</a>. This time it was “The Secret of Smuggler's Cove”, lightly
adapted for the <em>Savage Worlds: Explorer's Edition</em>.</p>
<section id="attending"><h2>Attending</h2>
<ul class="simple">
<li><p>L.B., playing Amy and Josiah</p></li>
<li><p>T.A., playing Billy and David</p></li>
<li><p>E.A., playing Catherine</p></li>
<li><p>M.A., playing Devlin</p></li>
</ul></section><section id="actual-play"><h2>Actual Play</h2>
<p>The PCs in this adventure are all kids, and T.A. wasn't any too happy
that none of the characters had any weapons more effective than a
slingshot! Still, they all had fun with the first two sections of the
adventure. In the first they raced small sailboats, and they managed
to split the characters up so that all the characters run by the two
boys were in one boat and all the characters run by the two girls were
in the other boat, and each had fun taunting and distracting the
others. I ran it as a chase and let good taunts and distractions
affect the <em>Boating</em> rolls of the two captains, and I let every
<em>success</em> and <em>raise</em> on the <em>Boating</em> roll move the boat one range
increment forward <a class="footnote-reference brackets" href="posts/2008/07/05/smugglers-cove-2008-07-05/#chase-and-ranges" id="footnote-reference-1" role="doc-noteref"><span class="fn-bracket">[</span>1<span class="fn-bracket">]</span></a>, which may not be strictly by
the book, but did allow for dramatic changes in position. The girls
won on the last <em>Boating</em> roll, and then it was time to eat a picnic
lunch. They observed the thug hide the map and papers, dug them up,
figured out the notes were in German, reburied them, followed the man
who picked them up back to Rydel Mount & figured out that he was the
gardener, headed back home (very, very, late), saw the Gypsies cooking
fire beyond the old Roman fort & traipsed over to see what was
happening.</p>
<!-- There are notes on what bennies each character has in my “Current
Gaming” notebook. I have no idea where the character sheets and
figure flats are, though. -->
<aside class="admonition note"><p class="admonition-title">Note</p>
<p>This is a <a class="reference external" href="posts/2008/07/07/new-blog-first-post/">timewarp</a> post.</p>
</aside><aside class="footnote-list brackets"><aside class="footnote brackets" id="chase-and-ranges" role="doc-footnote"><span class="label"><span class="fn-bracket">[</span><a role="doc-backlink" href="posts/2008/07/05/smugglers-cove-2008-07-05/#footnote-reference-1">1</a><span class="fn-bracket">]</span></span>
<p>I think the actual rules move a range increment
only for a <em>success</em> and the first <em>raise</em>.</p>
</aside></aside></section><nav><ul itemprop="keywords" class="tags">
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/actual-play/" rel="tag">actual-play</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/kids/" rel="tag">kids</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/rpg/" rel="tag">rpg</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/savage-worlds/" rel="tag">savage worlds</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/spoilers/" rel="tag">spoilers</a></li>
<li><a class="tag p-category" href="categories/timewarp/" rel="tag">timewarp</a></li>
</ul></nav>
</div>
</article>
</div>
<nav class="postindexpager"><ul class="pager">
<li class="previous">
<a href="index-39.html" rel="prev">Newer posts</a>
</li>
<li class="next">
<a href="index-37.html" rel="next">Older posts</a>
</li>
</ul></nav><script>var disqus_shortname="lacking-natural-simplicity";(function(){var a=document.createElement("script");a.async=true;a.src="https://"+disqus_shortname+".disqus.com/count.js";(document.getElementsByTagName("head")[0]||document.getElementsByTagName("body")[0]).appendChild(a)}());</script>
</div>
<div class="col-sm-3 col-sm-offset-1 blog-sidebar">
<div class="sidebar-module sidebar-module-inset">
<h4>About</h4>
<p>Lacking Natural Simplicity is one, not particularly flattering,
definition of sophisticated.
This blog chronicles my journey through our at times too complicated
and sophisticated world. </p>
</div>
<div class="sidebar-module">
<p>This site uses no cookies directly, but I expect the <a href="https://disqus.com/">Disqus</a> comments use cookies at disqus.com.</p>
<h4>Links</h4>
<ol class="list-unstyled">
<li><a href="pages/about-the-blog/index.html">About the Blog</a></li>
<li><a href="pages/colophon/index.html">Colophon</a></li>
<li><a href="pages/typographical-conventions/index.html">Typographical Conventions</a></li>
<li><a href="pages/static-pages-index/index.html">Pages</a></li>
<li>
<a href="http://tkb.tx0.org/">My tx0.org web page</a>
<br> Mostly empty
</li>
<li>
<a href="http://consp.org/">consp.org</a>
<br> Rises from the dead!
<br> <a href="http://consp.org/blog/blog.html">microblog</a>
</li>
</ol>
</div>
</div>
<!--End of body content-->
</div>
</div>
</div>
<footer class="blog-footer" id="footer">
Contents © 2024 <a href="mailto:[email protected]">T. Kurt Bond</a> - Powered by <a href="https://getnikola.com" rel="nofollow">Nikola</a>
</footer><script src="assets/js/all-nocdn.js"></script><!-- fancy dates --><script>
moment.locale("en");
fancydates(0, "YYYY-MM-DD HH:mm");
</script><!-- end fancy dates --><script>
baguetteBox.run('div#content', {
ignoreClass: 'islink',
captions: function(element) {
return element.getElementsByTagName('img')[0].alt;
}});
</script>
</body>
</html>