Erin Rants About OGL 1.1

You've probably heard about the fuckery that Hasbro, via Wizards of the Coast, tried to pull on third party producers of D&D compatible content. If you haven't, well, sit back and relax, because you're going to hear about it from me.

Since January 5th, people have been asking me about my opinion on this topic, and just when I thought I had a handle on it, a new development would emerge and upend things. But this past Friday I was asked to appear on Episode 305 of Geeks, Gadgets, & Guns to discuss the whole debacle, because I'm the roleplaying subject matter expert of my podcast circle. 

In this episode I rant for about 40 minutes about Hasbro's legal fuckery and why they deserve to lose All The Money. 

Let me know if you're one of the folks who would rather read than listen and I'll see about getting a transcript made. 

Show Notes & Spicy Memes

• The Poison Pill GSL

• WotC Halts Sales, Production, Distribution of D&D PDFs

• Let’s Take A Minute To Talk About D&D’s Open Gaming License (OGL)

• Roll of Law videos about OGL:

• One D&D: Are They Getting Rid Of The Open Game Licence As A Cash Grab?

• One D&D Confirms The New OGL Will Be A Cash Grab Aimed At 3rd Party Content Creators

• I Was Wrong About The New OGL 1.1 For D&D -- It's Way Worse Than I Thought

• Copyright Of Game Mechanics -- What Can Wizards Of The Coast Claim?

• OGL 1.1: How To Fight It, And What Would Victory Look Like?

• Dungeons and Dragons Players Cancel D&D Beyond Subscriptions En Masse After Insider Leak, Crash Servers

• Wizards of the Coast Cancels OGL Announcement After Online Ire

• Paizo commits to legal battle against Wizards over the future of Pathfinder and D&D

• D&D maker backs off new licensing rules that led to fan revolt

Why I Hate Traveller 5 In One Easy Concept

It's the return of Traveller Tuesday!

Most of you know that I and several confederates savaged the Traveller5 rules last year. Perhaps some of you (I'm looking at you, Faoladh) felt I was being unfair in my assessment of it.  At this point, I believe I wasn't harsh enough, and will explain how I came to this conclusion.

T5 introduces the concept of Extensions for planetary systems. Those Extensions are listed as Importance, Economic, and Cultural.  A picture is included for the Kinorb system from The Traveller Map as an example of how they are used. (and that's why I am ranting about T5 again; I use the Traveller Map quite a lot in my game, and when I saw these odd numbers crop up I needed to know what they meant.)

I will explain these extensions, using the definitions within the game itself, and you can actually see the point where this data stops being useful and is simply an exercise in mathematical masturbation.

This is an example of a useful bit of data. It explains what the extension is and what the numbers mean. You have to read eight pages ahead to find out how to calculate it, but it's an easy case of  "+1 if this, -1 if that"; for example, a Starport of class A or B merits a +1, and Starports of D or worse earn a -1. Add up the values, and if it's 4 or more, it's an important world. That's a good thing to know both data-wise and as background information for role-playing, aka "fluff". I can use this extension, and therefore I like it.

Oh-kay then. I'm not really sure why I'd need to calculate this (and yes, there are calculations involved, this is T5 after all); between Importance and various trade codes (rich, industrial, hi-tech, etc) I can probably figure out if this planet is an economic powerhouse or not, which is really all I'd need for a typical game of Traveller. Maybe I'd need this if the PCs were playing planetary rulers and the planet was theirs to administer (in which case it's a Traveller-themed version of Birthright, but hey, I wrote a game where you can play pre-pubescent talking ponies, so who am I to judge?), but in general I don't need to know (after calculating) the numbers for Resources, Labor, Infrastructure and Efficiency, and then multiply those to get its Resource Units -- in other words, its budget.

And that's all it says on p 427, the same page as the other entries I'm quoting. That's literally all it says about culture. Full stop.

Eight pages later, you get a bit more detail:

There's quite literally nothing further said about it. Not in the main book and not in the errata. Can you see what's missing?

Let's look at the Cx entry for Kinorb again:

What in God's name does any of this MEAN? There's no explanation anywhere in the book. Is a 6 in Symbols a good thing or a bad thing?  Is this culture very homogeneous, or is it very non-homogeneous? And while I see the lowest bound is a 1, what's the high end?

This tells me NOTHING. What's worse is that this is information I could really use: Traveller, at least the way I play it, is about voyaging to exotic locations and getting into trouble with the local inhabitants. Knowing if this is a planet full of superstitious racists is critical, gameable data.

I distinctly get the feeling I am being trolled.

Well done, Marc Miller. I mean it; golf applause all round. You can micromanage the GDP of a planet, but you can't be bothered to tell me anything useful about the people who live there. You've actually managed to transcend George Lucas and have become the RPG publishing equivalent of a cocktease.

Things I Won't Countenance

Okay, ranty time.

People who follow me on Facebook (and, to a lesser extent, read the comments on posts here) probably know that I'll tolerate a lot of bad behavior. I know full well that I take thing personally -- perhaps more personally than they are intended -- and so my guidelines pretty much boil down to "You can disagree with me all you want, you can dislike me all you want, you can even refuse to accept my arguments, but the moment you start insulting me, we're finished."

I'm even going to go a step further and clarify this:  If, while disagreeing with me, you call me blind or stupid or irrational, I will let that slide because I have probably been guilty of expressing a similar sentiment.

So that said, there are some attitudes prevalent on the internet that I regard as such a slap in the face that they're pretty much conversation-killers and friendship-enders.

1)  All men are rapists/ All women are victims

I'm not even going to get into the whole "rape culture" scrum, although you can probably guess what my feelings are about it. No, my biggest problem with this line of thinking is that not only does it unjustly criminalize an entire gender -- "All men have penises, and penises are used to rape," goes the 'logic', "so therefore all men are rapists" -- but it also removes agency (in the philosophical sense) from the female gender.

Claiming that "The way to end rape is to teach boys not to rape" is akin to saying "Women are utterly unable to defend themselves against rape, and therefore must rely on the goodwill of men not to rape them."

Sorry, no. I don't buy that for a second. I'm enough of a feminist to believe that women are perfectly capable of defending themselves against rape, and while of course it is a good and worthwhile thing to teach our male children good manners (especially regarding "drunk doesn't mean consenting" as they approach college), it's also equally incumbent upon us to teach our female children how to avoid situations where they are vulnerable.

I particularly hate it when proponents of this theory trot out the hoary old "A woman should be able to dance naked at a party full of men and not be afraid of rape."  Well, yes, and I should be able to walk through the roughest parts of town with money sticking out of my pockets and not be afraid of someone robbing me, but -- NEWS FLASH! -- the world doesn't work like that.  If it did, we could simply tell our children "Killing people is bad, mmkay?" and end our nation's murder problem within a generation.

Humans are predators. We aren't going to change millions of years of evolution with a few thousand years of civilization.

2)  All [Race/Nationality/Religion] are [this horrible thing]

I'm perfectly okay with people loathing me because they find some aspect of my personality or lifestyle loathesome. I won't necessarily like it, mind you -- my attitude is likely to be "Screw those judgemental assholes" -- but I'll respect their right to that opinion and take comfort in the fact that their dislike of me is based on something I did, and therefore to some extent I deserve their distaste.

However, I go absolutely bugnuts with anger whenever someone hates me because of something over which I have no control. Saying "Of course you'd think that, you're white" is just as goddamn racist as "Of course you'd think that, you're black."

Which isn't to say that discussions about privilege, as tiresome as they can be, don't have a place within our society. But, more often than not, those discussions (usually on Tumblr, the Mos Eisley of the Internet) turn into "If you don't agree with me, I will insult and harass you until you go away."

For more on this topic I direct you to some people who have written far more and far better on the subject: co-blogger Salem MacGourley, this fellow right here, and this lady here.

3) All Gun Owners are Law Abiding (Until They're Not)

And today, this happened, which is what triggered this rant. Someone who I thought was my friend quite literally told me "And so many gun owners are law abiding, responsible and trained, until they're not." I took great and immediate exception to this. At the risk of being pedantic, I shall explain why:

• His statement essentially says "Many, if not all gun owners, are untrained and irresponsible and criminals waiting to happen."  
• I am a gun owner, and he knows it.
• Therefore, he is accusing me of being at least potentially untrained (which is provably false, as my range reports show),  irresponsible (I have been carrying for over 2 years now and not only have I not shot anyone or had a negligent discharge, I haven't even felt the need to draw my pistol) and law-breaking (I haven't gotten so much as a speeding ticket since I started carrying). 
• This loops around to my first point. "All gun owners are law abiding... until they're not" is factually the same as "All men aren't rapists... until they rape" or "All women aren't whores... until they prostitute themselves."
• I'm pretty sure this is a variation on the One True Scotsman logical fallacy, i.e., "Only people without guns can be considered law-abiding, and any law-abiding gun owner clearly is a criminal just waiting to happen, so therefore they aren't law-abiding." 

It's lazy thinking and it's infuriating and it's WRONG. The arguer is essentially asking me to simultaneously prove a negative ("Prove you aren't a criminal")  and prove something in the future ("Prove, today, that you aren't going to do something wrong in the future")  before I'm allowed to exercise my Constitutionally-enumerated right. 

It's like saying "All bloggers don't commit libel and/or plagiarism... until they do. Prove you aren't a plagiarist or libeller, and prove you aren't going to do so in the future, before you can own a blog."

I swear, the next time someone uses this line in a debate I'm going to reply with "And you aren't a pedophile... until you are."  Yes, it's a cheap shot, but if I'm in a fight and someone goes for my eyes, I'm definitely kneeing them in the crotch.

Just a thought

Yesterday a loyal reader alerted me to a post wherein a curmudgeonly sort seemed irritated that people had the gall to like a TV show about magical cartoon ponies. (No, I'm not going to give a link back, because I don't believe in giving free press to haters.)   The comments were about what you'd expect, with both ends of the spectrum covered, from "Fans of MLP are a scourge upon humanity" to "Had this been me growing up, my Dad wold have kicked my ass for it and I'd have thanked him."

No doubt some of you are thinking my objection to this are a defense of my fandom, and I will grant that you are partially correct. However, let's unpack this for discussion because there's more to this going on. 

1. "Adult fans of the show need to have their asses kicked."

So you're advocating, even in jest, the abuse of people who like something you do not like because you think is effeminate?  Why don't you just be forthright with your bigotry and say "I hates me some fags, and I sure do like stompin' on 'em. They need toughenin' up. Smear that queer!"  Because then at least you'd be honest about your motivations. 

So that attitude of yours?  YOU are why I carry a gun. Think about that. 

2. "You're all stupid and immature for liking this."

Let me just pull out a few more phrases and let me see if any of them sound familiar to you. 

• The more you talk about My Little Pony, the smaller I think your penis is. 
• I’m not interested in My Little Pony I was blessed with a big dick. But I understand the impotent pantywaists who need them to play with.
• Is there a way to substitute a different compensation item instead of My Little Pony for insecure young and middle-aged men?

Seem familiar?  These phrases were taken from the first two "Markley's Law" pages of Joe Huffman's blog. I just substituted "My Little Pony" for "guns".  And yet, I've heard arguments against MLP that are nearly clones of these. 

My point here is that the moment any of us label a hobby as immature/faggy/in need of a good asskicking, we are doing exactly what the Brady Bunch and Joyce Foundation and CGSV do to gun owners. They call us immature and prone to violence and dumb rednecks and, if you’re male, desperately trying to compensate for a tiny penis. Gunnies who hate people who like MLP... call us immature and faggots and prone to pedophilia and, if you're male, desperately trying to compensate for not having a vagina.

Can you folks not see that you are doing to other people exactly the same crap as the antis are doing to us? You’re better than that. Stop it.

In conclusion:

My "So-Called" Rights

From a comment on my previous post:

You know, I like most of what you post, and followed you even though I disagreed with you on your position on so-called "gun rights".

Oooh. Isn't that just delicious contempt ? It's so thick and creamy you could drizzle it on a pancake. I especially like the one-two punch of  so-called and the scare quotes. They aren't rights, they're "rights". That's quality passive-aggression right there.

Here's what you fuckers need to know about me:  I am not a nice person.  Yes, I am geeky, and I like girly things like magical talking cartoon ponies. I even do generous things for people. This does not make me sweet and nice and kind.

Do not, for one second, assume that I give a shit about your disdain for me.

I do not need your permission to be who I am, and I do not seek your approval. I am not a placid doe-eyed submissive.  I will spit in your face and laugh at your tiny penis, even as you try to rape me of my rights. And maybe you will succeed, but by God you will know you've been in a fight, because I'll have bitten off your ear and gouged out an eye and squeezed your testicles until they ruptured.

Because fuck you, that's why.

You fear me. You are scared of me and you want to weaken me, marginalize me, diminish me. You want me unable to defend myself and utterly at the mercy of men, so you seek to rob me of the great equalizer.

Here's the lovely thing about rights: They aren't up for a vote. That's why they're rights.

Let's put it another way:

• your so-called "suffrage"
• your so-called "emancipation"
• your so-called "integration"
• your so-called "religious freedom"
• your so-called "freedom of speech"
• your so-called "right to due process"

Are you offended yet? You should be. You should be screamingly furious that anyone would diminish these rights with the phrase "so-called". And yet my inalienable right to defend myself with the most effective means possible is threatened because one, ONE asshole out of 10 million law-abiding gun owners decided to commit a raft of crimes that another law would not have stopped. 

You say "Gun control."  I hear, "We want you to defend yourself against a man who is a foot taller and a hundred pounds heavier with your bare hands."

You say "Common sense regulations."  I hear, "We don't like these cosmetic features, like an adjustable stock or a foregrip, that make it easier for a woman to use."

You say, "If it saves just one life."  I hear "Except yours, you stupid bitch. We'd rather you get raped and murdered while waiting for the police to arrive."

You say, "Think about the children."  I hear "But not yours. We won't let you defend them, and if we find out you have a gun in the same house as a child, we'll take them both away."

You say, "Compromise."  I say, "Fuck you, you mewling cowards. I will not embrace victimhood. I will not willingly disarm. If you demand I give up my life just to make you feel better, you are selfish on a level that is beyond comprehension."

Does this frighten you? Does my passion offend you? Have I somehow crossed beyond the pale, and forever lost the sublime privilege of your eyes reading my words?

I

DO

NOT

CARE. 

I am me, and that is all the justification I will ever need. If you cannot stand that, go elsewhere. I won't censor myself for your benefit, and I won't allow your weakness to dictate what I do or say or write. 

If you will not accept me as I am, you are not welcome here.

Now, kindly fuck off.  The cool kids are going to talk about ponies, and role-playing games, and guns. 

Monday Gunday: The Folly of Gun Restriction

Why I get upset by gun restriction, simplified edition:

Let's say a law is passed -- oh, let's call it the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty, just for giggles -- preventing civilians (meaning: non-military personnel) from owning military-style weapons. I would expect most people to think that law only affects "army stuff":  assault rifles, machine guns, etc.

But here's the problem I have with that law, aside from its dubious constitutionality: poor definitions that lend themselves to slippery-slope enforcement.

You see, officers and members of the military police are regularly issued carry pistols. The regulation pistol of the US Armed Forces is the Beretta M9, a 9mm semi-auto magazine that uses a 15 round detachable magazine. It is also immensely popular in its civilian version, the Beretta 92 (probably because veterans, having returned their issued sidearm and wanting to own one for private use, decide to purchase a pistol identical to what they have trained with). 

So when legislation says that "military style weapons" are forbidden for civilian ownership, it suddenly becomes a non-trivial point of legislation if this pistol is restricted because it is, in fact, issued and used by the US Armed Forces.

Is this pistol restricted because it's military issue? If not, you need a better definition than "military-style weapon".* Perhaps something like above a certain caliber, or fully automatic as opposed to semi-automatic, or any number of other things --  at which point I refer you to the 1934 National Firearms Act. **

If it is restricted, why? Is it just because it's used by the military? If that is your argument then please say yes, that I may laugh at you as I point out the large variety of pistol types used by militaries around the world. You might as well just outlaw every pistol above 9mm and .40 caliber.

Or are you going to try to stretch your definition to mean "any magazine-fed semi-auto weapon", i.e. the evil features argument? Because if you go down that road you're basically saying that civilians should only ever own revolvers, pump shotguns, and bolt-action rifles -- in which case just come right out and say THAT. I would at least appreciate your honesty in the matter.  You'd still be wrong, of course, because my five-round, bolt-action Mosin-Nagant rifle was -- guess what? -- the primary infantry rifle of Russia/USSR from 1891 until 1936 or so, and still sees action to this day:

Even after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Mosin–Nagants are still commonly found on modern battlefields around the world. They are being used by insurgent forces in the Iraq War and the current war in Afghanistan. Separatists have also used the rifles alongside more modern Russian firearms in the Second war in Chechnya.  

How about shotguns? They're okay, right? You'd be wrong, because the pump-action 12-gauge Mossberg 590A1 is used by the US Army.


In conclusion: The term "military-style weapon" is an arbitrary definition that means absolutely nothing. The bolt-action hunting rifles of today were (in design, if not in actuality) the infantry rifles of a century ago; pistol calibers as small as .32 have been military issue; and even manual shotguns are military-issue.


So when people say that they want to "keep military-style weapons out of the hands of civilians," please note how that definition can be stretched to encompass basically everything that doesn't fall into the very narrow category between .17 HMR and .25 ACP for pistols and rifles, and possibly single-shot shotguns in the .410 to 20-gauge range. 

In other words, they want us effectively disarmed; they just don't have the courage to say so, and instead of doing it by force (which will backfire) they will attempt to do it through creeping legislation that outlaws firearms by slices as they constantly define what is "military".



* This phrase should be read in such tone of voice as to imply an unspoken "you idiot" after the main clause.
** See above.

WNW: Balthazar

Balthazar (yes, THE Balthazar) shares his opinion of the upcoming 5th edition of Dungeons & Dragons.



Nothing more need be said, really.

Important Public Service Announcement

Listen up, this is important. 

I just had to un-friend and un-follow someone because he would not bashing one of my interests, so let me be as explicit as possible:

It's perfectly okay if you don't like a thing that I like, such as ponies or shooting or goth or role-playing games. That's a matter of taste, and everyone's taste is different.

It is categorically NOT okay to insult and belittle PEOPLE for liking a thing which you don't like. That's an unwarranted personal attack.

There's a huge, huge difference between "I think this thing is stupid" and "I think you are stupid for liking this thing." Not only is the latter rude and intolerant, it's also incredibly hypocritical if you have any interests outside of the mainstream, such as, oh I don't know, IDPA/IPSC competition shooting.

I mean, if you object to the supposition that owning guns and liking to shoot them means you are a violent and deranged individual who is just itching for a chance to murder someone, then what are you doing by suggesting that an adult who enjoys a wholesome show about magical cartoon ponies is creepy and immature? Aren't you just spreading the knee-jerk hate? Aren't gunnies supposed to be inclusive and welcoming?

In conclusion:  Don't be a dick about the things you don't like.

My spirit animal is a stormcrow watching a trainwreck

My, what a fine pair of barn doors you have there, WotC. Are you looking for some horses you lost?

BARNES & NOBLE | Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook: Core Rulebook I, V. 3.5 with Errata by Wizards RPG Team, Wizards of the Coast | Hardcover

Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook: Core Rulebook I, V. 3.5 with Errata
ISBN-13: 9780786962464
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast
Publication date: 9/18/2012
Pages: 320

This item will be available on September 18, 2012.

I don't know which would be better: if these sold like hotcakes, or if they rotted on shelves because Pathfinder is better in every conceivable way.  (h/t to Joethelawyer)

In related news, Monte Cook has left WotC and is no longer developing 5th Edition. Please note that when he says "I want to take this time to stress that my differences were not with my fellow designers, Rob Schwalb and Bruce Cordell," he very specifically does NOT mention Mike Mearls. Hmm, that might be telling and relevant somehow.

Wizards of the Coast: Fucking up the role-playing game industry's flagship since 2008.

Misli, gammi gra'dil, Strygalldwir.

Things which piss me off

A list, in no particular order:

• My chronic inability to get anything written on Thursday.
• Waking up feeling hung-over when I haven't had anything to drink the night before.
• That there are blogs which only update twice a month who have at least a hundred more followers than I do.
• That I bust my ass to put out good content at least 3 times a week and no one seems to care.
• That only one person in the gun-blog-sphere wished me a Happy Blogoversary -- and thank you for that, Brigid! I have many gun-curious girlfriends and I will make sure they read your blog to expand their education.
• Self-congratulatory circle-jerks which are ultimately meaningless but, nonetheless, hurt my feelings when I am excluded from them.

And now I'm off to shoot things. Later y'all.

An open letter to OWS and MoveOn.org

Warning: politics ahead. Feel free to tab out if you come here for the lulz, ponies, and weirdness; it certainly won't hurt my feelings.


Dear Occupy Wall Streeters and MoveOn.org:

I applaud you for hauling out the Constitution and maintaining that it is your First Amendment right to gather and protest. Bravo. This proves to me that you've read the damn thing.

Now kindly please stop trying to infringe, restrict, and redefine my Second Amendment rights. No, don't try to tell me that it's a matter of interpretation or that it only applies to muskets or government agencies or whatever, because if you do that then I will say that the First Amendment only applies to, say, newspapers or protesters with permits.

You've read the Bill of Rights. You know what it says. What part of "Shall not be infringed" was unclear?

So tell you what, I'll make you an offer: You stop trying to take away my ability to defend myself from predators, and not only will I support the OWS movement, I'll go up there and STAND GUARD while you sleep. Because, y'know, I'll be armed.

Do we have a deal?


Love,
Erin Palette

Thinking about portals

You know what confuses and angers me? Doorknobs.

Specifically, the turny-latchy things in the middle of them. These things right here:

Take a look at that and answer me one thing: Is the door locked or unlocked?

The answer is "locked," and most readers are now looking at me with a "Yes, and your point is...?" expression. My point is this:

It doesn't make any goddamn sense.

What does a door -- specifically, a door that would use a knob like this -- look like? Why, it's a rectangle of course, taller than it is wide. In fact, it looks an awful lot like... the latch in the locked position.

But when that knob is unlocked, what does it look like? Why, a crossbar of course. Something which bars entry. A circle with a horizontal line through it looks to me like the universal "Do Not Enter" symbol.

So when the door is unlocked, every bit of symbol-recognition in my brain is telling me that the door is locked. And when it's locked, it looks like a door, and when we think of doors we think of going through them, ergo my brain tells me it's unlocked. Therefore, every time I'm presented with a knob like this, my brain screeches to halt as it goes, "Hmm, that looks like a 'don't enter' symbol, which would mean it's locked. But because I know doorknobs are screwed up and make no sense, I need to reverse that, so that means it's open. Right? I think so. But now that I've thought about it so much, I'm starting to doubt myself, like when I misspell a word and then I look up the correct spelling and everything seems wrong. You know what, my only option here is to grab the knob and find out for myself."

How do you people deal with this? How does this NOT make you mental? I know I'm not the most logical of persons, but this time my argument makes waaaaay more sense than any explanation you can come up with regarding why "horizontal" means "open."

Since I can't change the orientation of doorknobs in my house -- and even if I could, that would really mess me up in the outside world -- what I've done is taken some red and green paint, and put a thin bar of red on the top of the knob and a thin bar of green on the side, because as we all know, green means "go" and red means "stop." I have used color symbolism to defeat object symbolism.

Of course, red is now forever associated with "up" in my mind, but I can deal with that. At least I'm not crazy like you people.

Monday Gunday: This is a stupid, useless thing

This monstrosity has been making the rounds of the gun-sphere lately. If you buy this you are an idiot, because
this abomination is only one step above putting a tactical rail on a flintlock.

The Stoeger "Oh You're Fucking Kidding Me Right?"

Now as I've said before, shotguns are awesome for home defense, and I fully endorse the notion of having a flashlight attached to see whom you're shooting. I don't even have a problem with a red-dot sight on it, though that strikes me as expensive overkill. No, here is the problem: this is a double-barreled shotgun with only one trigger.

As I see it, there are only three reasons to own a Coach Gun (so named because they were favorite defense weapons on Stagecoaches by those riding -- you guessed it -- shotgun):

1. You are a traditionalist who prefers an old-fashioned classic.
2. You want the massive traumatic power of shooting someone with both barrels at once. 
3. You want the versatility of putting different rounds (say, buckshot and solid slug) in separate barrels.

If your reasoning is option one, then I say, "More power to you." Of course, you're also likely to know your guns and know what is worth your money, i.e. Not This.  But if your choices were two or three, then this is not the gun for you, because without dual triggers, those options are useless.

This is a PROPER Coach Gun. Ironically, also made by Stoeger.

Traditional Coach Guns have two triggers: the front fires the right barrel, the rear fires the left barrel. (Or, if you have an up-and-under, top and bottom barrels respectively.) If you're really good, you can shoot both at the same time with index and middle finger. But this piece of foolishness only comes with one trigger. So, answer me this: does it fire both barrels at once (giving you massive stopping power but reducing this gun to a glorified single-shot weapon), or does it fire each barrel in order (giving you some degree of versatility in exchange for stopping power)?

Go and read that magnificent piece of ad copy BS again. You know, the one where it states that the Double Defense is "chambered for both 2.75 and 3 inch rounds." (Of course it does, fucknut, it's a breech-loader. As long as you have the proper gauge, you can fire shells of any length from it.) Does it say anything about how the gun fires?

No. No, it does not. All it says is that is has a "fast, single-trigger design." (After scouring YouTube, I discovered that it fires the barrels in order.)



I asked two friends of mine, both of whom are not familiar with guns, what they thought of this. One of them said "I don't like it for some reason." The other said "It looks all right, but don't other shotguns come with more than two rounds?"  Both of them got it exactly right, and they aren't even experts -- they just saw through the hype.

The Stoeger Double Defense is nothing more than a marketing gimmick aimed at people who know nothing about shotguns but want one for self-defense.

Oh, it looks all intimidating and "tacticool," what with its all-black exterior and flashlight (sold separately) and red-dot scope (also sold separately). But it's a double-barrel gun with none of the actual advantages of a traditional Coach Gun. Sure, you could pay $500 for a two-shot weapon with tactical rails -- or you could buy a used pump-action shotgun, which holds 5 rounds in the magazine and one in chamber, for around $150, and add the flashlight later.

Please, don't be an idiot. If you don't know anything about guns but want to buy one, find someone knowledgeable on the subject and get their opinion.

An Open Letter to Trollsmyth

Posted here because my reply to his post was too long for his comments section.

Trollsmyth,

Yours is a position I have heard several times before, and each time it leaves me shaking my head. In this reply I am going to detail exactly what is wrong with this system, and why it is good to have to at least SOME rules about social interaction.

First I shall establish a few facts for those who are reading. Prior to writing this, I talked to Trollsmyth over IM and asked him the following questions:

Erin: I believe your thesis to be "We do not need rules for social interaction because that is what talking in character, i.e. role-playing, is for."

Trollsmyth: Yep. For certain values of "we."

Erin: How would you define "we", then?

Trollsmyth: People who want a game about social interaction.

Sir, your thesis is flawed. Allow me to point out these flaws to you. 

Your System is Open to Abuse 

Let us say that I am an unethical type of gamer – perhaps not a cheater as such, but one who is willing to exploit gray areas in order to have a more powerful character – and I am playing in a game such as this. My immediate thought will be "Since social actions will be carried out through role-play alone, and without consultation of stats or rules, Charisma will become my dump stat because I won't need to roll it ever and I can count on my natural quick wits and ability to improvise to keep me afloat. Meanwhile, all the points which would have gone into social skills can now go straight into combat abilities, which I will be rolling quite frequently."

Congratulations, you (the DM) have just made your problem worse. Would you care to do the same for mental skills and have puzzles etc. be handled with player brains instead of character abilities? Wonderful! Now I can dump all that as well and become even more of an unbalanced twink. And when you call me on it, I will argue with you that I am just playing the game the way you laid it out, where (obviously) the only mechanics which matter are those for combat, and everything else is player ability.

Good luck getting the genie back into that particular bottle. Even if you win that argument, it's a fair bet that the rest of that game session is a total loss. 

Your System is Not Fair to the Players

Conversely, sometimes I want to play someone who is far more skilled than I am. What if I, the player, have no social skills whatsoever, but I still want to play a smooth-talking seducer or a quick-witted scoundrel? Well then I am screwed, because it doesn't matter what my Charisma score is, because you won't let me roll it (no rules for interaction, remember?) and I am forced to embarrass myself in front of friends as I fumble an attempt to be suave.

The same holds true for mental abilities. Too bad for the player who wants to play a genius if he's not one himself. Again, he is unfairly penalized for wanting a character who is greater than himself, and once again the attitude that "Only combat stats are important because they are the only ones which have rules attached to them" reigns. If I were this player, having made a social or brainy character only to be effectively told that it didn't matter what my PC's Intelligence or Charisma was, I would loudly complain that I had been screwed and I would quit your game immediately.

Your System is Prejudiced

Do you require your players to actually swing swords to determine if their characters hit in combat? Do you require them to perform acts of dexterity to adjudicate success with lock-picking? No? Then why do you require actual performance of actual social abilities? Especially since, as I have mentioned earlier, not everyone is comfortable talking in character? Are they somehow less deserving of a game they can enjoy? Are they simply not welcome at your table? Or are they forever doomed to be the big stupid beatsticks and meatshields of the party?

In Conclusion

Unless you are gaming with a group of theater majors or other actors, odds are excellent you will have at least one player with sub-optimal social and communication skills. You state that "Festooning [social interaction] with mechanics undercuts [the game]. The players never really care about the in-game reality, because they're too busy dealing with mechanical bits that have been bolted on top of them," but in my experience, mechanics are sometimes the only way to make sure that some players are given a fair chance to shine. The shy girl who wants to play a social butterfly and be popular for a few hours; the slow-thinking guy who wants to pretend that he is brilliant and on top of every thing; these people are disenfranchised with your system, and worse, those players who are smart and quick-witted and smooth-tongued are probably going to run roughshod all over them.

I am not advocating a bloated rules system to be tacked onto social interaction. But I very, VERY strongly feel there should be at least some rules, because your system as stated is not fun for a significant chunk of the gaming population. Role-playing is supposed to be inclusive, and your approach is exclusionary.

Your post is titled "Support, not Replacing." In that vein I urge you thusly: support your players, or you will certainly be replacing them.

Sincerely,
Erin Palette

Bah humbuggery

This is a post I really haven't wanted to write, and I've been putting it off.

My intent was to leave the... eulogy-thing... up for a few days, because if I had posted immediately after that it would have had all the emotional impact of saying, "In today's news, my friend had a miscarriage, and we are all sad. And now, sports."

And then, I dunno. Faithful readers know how cranky I get this time of year, what with the rampant commercialization and the enforced merriment and the rigid adherence to observing holiday doctrine.

To top it all off, it looks like the Christmas Spirit threw up all over our house. It took us a week to put up all the lights. And this year, we are having three trees.

Three. Christmas. Trees.

Because one isn't enough, is it? It isn't sufficient that we have a huge (artificial) tree featuring the past five years of Hallmark's ornamental dreck, along with a "Best Of" rotation from the past two decades, oh no, we need an International Tree for all the ornaments we've collected in our travels, and then yes by golly we need a Wolf Tree, covered in expensive lupine-themed baubles, so that our dogs have a place for their presents!

That grinding sound you hear are my back teeth gnashing together. There isn't enough alcohol in this house to get me through the holidays, especially when my sister comes to visit.

Let me tell you about my sister. Oh, let me.

Don't get me wrong, I love my sister. I just love her over there. Preferably out of state. Because you see, there is a rule among Southern families which states that once every generation, there needs to be a spinster aunt, with far more cats than is healthy, who teaches school and plays the organ at church. This is my sister, Scarlett, and yes, she is named after the Gone With the Wind character.

If you people think I am Inappropriate Girl, you have yet to see my sister in action. She will -- in polite, mixed company -- refer to one of her cats as "my pussy." This is not done out of innocence about the slang term, either. This is her "reclaiming the word" or somesuch.

Yet when I suggest she just name one of her cats "Vulva", suddenly I'm the bad one.

She's also more than a little fundie and charismatic with her faith, which wouldn't be a problem in and of itself, but she also has the charming habit of wielding it like a truncheon. If you want to win any arguments with this woman, you'd best know your Bible verses to back up your positions.

She's also ten years older than me, and every time she comes visit, I am once again not only the youngest but the baby of the family. I have to establish my competence on a regular basis, and it frustrates me so much I want to scream and pull my hair and smash crockery into bits.

Which brings me to my final point. Khaotica is upon us, and for the life of me, I can't think of anything to do which doesn't violate the single, cardinal rule of "Thou shalt not harsh anyone else's merriment." Really, all I want to do is tear down all the lights and smash the tacky decorations and turn off the enforced cheerful music and just have a nice, quiet, calm, tranquil, dark, still, ZEN Christmas. You know, softly singing "Silent Night" in the dark, and then curl up on the couch with a glass of eggnog to look at the tree for a while before going to bed.

If I ever have a family of my own -- which I sincerely doubt at this point -- while I may have a Christmas tree, I'm never putting presents under it. The tree is just decoration. Instead, I'm going to have a live-size manger (baby Jesus doll optional) and the presents are going to be arrayed around THAT. It's subversive in a subtle, traditional, laid-back kind of way.

So yeah. You folks have a happy feast of St. Excessivus. I'm gonna go outside in the mid-70 degree night and look at stars until I feel at peace with the world again.

Cranky Palette is Cranky

To whom it may concern:


1) Requiem for a Dream is an awesome piece of music. Please, for the love of God, stop hitching it to every banal piece of Hollywood shit in existence (I'm looking directly at you, America's Got Talent).

2) 420 stainless steel is complete and utter shit and suitable only for dinnerware and pocketknives. If the knife catalog only says "stainless steel" then I guarantee you it's 420-440 because if it was anything better, they would say so in the ad copy. For more information about what steels you should choose, go here.

3) There is a special circle of Hell reserved for people who replace C's with K's and I's with Y's, and vice-versa. If you have named yourself Kandi Magyk, I will bludgeon you with the collected works of the Brontë sisters until you learn that there is a difference between English adapting to changing times and being lazy for the sake of sensationalism.


Kisses,

Palette

Teehee Lesbianism

Just a quick mini-rant before I go to bed.

Am I the only one who is more than slightly annoyed at the current fad of young women pretending to be lesbian or bisexual for the sole purpose of garnering male attention?

I call this "Teehee Lesbianism" because in my head I can hear these girls thinking, "Teehee, I'm being so naughty by groping my friend's boobs in this picture! I bet Johnny will get so hard just thinking about it!" It's just so patently transparent that it's about as sexualized as a naked five year old running around going, "Teehee! I'm nekkid!"

To be clear, I'm not exactly incensed into dire hatred about this -- more like I'm exasperated. Are these girls fooling anyone? Are they arousing anyone?

Or is just another case of Cranky Palette Is Cranky?

EDIT: I don't care who or what you fuck as long as it's consensual. It's the patent falseness which bugs me, not the genders involved.

Yo Schmoe

Frankly, I was shocked that it took this long to make a G.I. Joe movie. I figured that in the wake of 9/11, a movie about an elite counterterrorist unit would have gotten the greenlight within 3 months and be out in time for summer 2002. Sadly, the movie which is out now was not worth the seven year wait.

It should come as no surprise to anyone that G.I.Joe: The Rise of Cobra is, as my buddy Tom Foss pointed out, a "flaming piece of crap-gilded crap." I knew it was going to be awful the moment I saw that Snake-Eyes had Schumacher-esque foam rubber lips molded onto his mask, and my beliefs were confirmed with each additional trailer I saw. I said I would never see this movie, but I was dragged along anyway, and even with a free ticket I still feel I paid too high a price.

No, I'm not going to review the movie. Tom did an excellent job of that above, and it's currently hovering at the 40% mark at Rotten Tomatoes. The last time I checked, the profits had dropped by 18% between Friday and Saturday, so it seems pretty likely that word of mouth is spreading about its awfulness. Instead, I'm going to quote myself from earlier posts, because they are relevant:

• "This is the Hollywood machine, people; its entire purpose in life is to take a giant stinking shit on beloved memories in an attempt to wring cash from your pockets." -- 7/05/07
  
• "There is a practice in Hollywood whereby films that are expected to do poorly -- usually cheap horror films and teen comedies -- are not sent to film critics to review. This is done so that the films can at least reap the benefits of opening weekend receipts before poor critical review and word of mouth can do any damage." -- 6/10/08
• "Neener." -- 5/05/09

At first pass, you'd think that the concept of G.I. Joe is too simple to screw up: a team of uber-elite soldiers uses bleeding-edge weapons to fight a terrorist threat. It's Men in Black, only without the aliens. How hard could it be to get right?

Then you think of the 80s cartoon with the red laser vs. blue laser battles, and you realize that when studios pander to the lowest common denominator, you get utter crap.

(Yes, I realize the G.I. Joe cartoon was meant for kids and therefore mass bloodshed was inappropriate. So was Gargoyles, but it was excellent, and it was produced by Disney of all things. "Appropriate for children" does not have to equal "stupid." It's just usually easier to produce that way.)

So this movie is basically a live-action cartoon. The stupid mid-80s cartoon where enlisted personnel could fly F-14s, everyone had lasers and parachutes, and basic science was ignored in the name of cool. I mean, ice floats on top of water, right? Rise of Cobra gets this fact wrong.

So if you have a hankering to watch some G.I. Joe without having your brains ooze out your ears (or scream in poisonous outrage at the screen, as I did) then I have two recommendations for you, depending on if you were a fan of the comic book or the cartoon.

If you liked the cartoon, then you will enjoy G.I. Joe: Resolute. It's basically the cartoon you remember, only with an intelligent plot, better art, decent voice acting, and action scenes that are probably closer to how you envisioned them as a kid. There are still a few funky artifacts left over -- Duke is still a sergeant yet commands officers, tandem-seat helicopters are piloted from the front seat, etc -- but at least it doesn't make Baby Jesus cry.



You can watch the entire series here.

If you were a fan of the comic book series (which was written by Larry Hama, a Vietnam veteran who tried to make the series as military-accurate as possible) then I suggest you go watch reruns of The Unit.

No, really. They have code names (Betty Blue, Snake Doctor); they are an elite unit which technically doesn't exist (303rd Logistical Studies Group); they often use cutting-edge technology; they fight terrorists. It really is a "real life" version of the G.I Joe team. Sadly, it's been cancelled, but it lives on in syndication.

Now you know... and we all know what knowing is.

WNW: Why Everything Sucks

Thank you, Craig Ferguson, for speaking truth to power:

Erin to Sortelli: I WIN

I've said before that I am prescient (though really, it's more a case of noting patterns and deducing their conclusions), but never before have I been right about something twice.

I am sharp. Sharp as a goddamn stiletto.

For those who followed the link, you will see I posited that A) Josh Sortelli had abandoned Elf Only Inn, and that B) it would be at least 2008 before he updated it again. I was right on both counts. However, as luck would have it, I wasn't precisely correct. But pray, read on and let me explain and I'll spin you a tale of woe.

Some of you may be wondering, "But Palette! You swore you were done reading EOI! How would you know any of this if you had ceased to give a damn?" More on that later, I promise.

A chronology:

May 25, 2007: Josh Sortelli announces he is having an awesome Memorial Day and will be back Wednesday. Most readers believe this to mean May 30, 2007.


June 5: Canny reader Erin Palette realizes that Sortelli never specified which Wednesday, or indeed which year. She promptly throws a shit-fit.


June 18: Sortelli returns to EOI. There may or may not have been an apology regarding his absence. Strip appears in color for the first time since 2004. Ironically, June 18 is a Monday and not a Wednesday.


August 1 (yes, you read that correctly): First EOI update since 6/18/07. Strip is no longer in color, so that's no excuse for its lateness.


August 27 - September 25: EOI updates intermittently five times, then stops. There may or may not have been an announcement about it; I'm betting on "not".


March 16, 2008: Roughly 7 months after abandoning it, Sortelli returns to EOI. My first set of predictions is proven correct. (This isn't a Wednesday, either.)


March 24: Color returns. Whee.


March 31: Last color strip. Two in a row!


April 7 - April 14: Two more strips before...


May 5, 2008: Another abandonment without notice. I am proven correct yet again. What makes this last bit so delicious is that in his final comic, Sortelli pokes fun at my blog by having a character state that another character's blog "has the worst name of all blogs on the internet. Even worse than Bloviating Rhyhtmically [sic] ..."


July 10: A faithful reader (whose name is forgotten, sadly) informs me that my blog was referenced in the 5/5/08 EOI strip. I read it, chuckle to myself, and write the following message to Mr. Sortelli via his forum:

Well played, Sortelli. Well played indeed.

"Who is this stylish person that is addressing me thus," I hear you ask. Well, I am Erin Palette, the author of the blog Bloviating Rhythththtth Lurking Rythmically.

Let me say two things, right off the bat:
1. I'm not offended
2. I'm glad you're updating again

With that out of the way, let's get down to business. To whit: how should I interpret the second to last panel of your 5/5/08 comic?

You see, I noticed with my keen writer-ly powers that while you poked fun at the name of my blog, you didn't make fun of the contents therein, or even its author. So, in a display of rare discretion and logic, I figured I'd ask you for clarification of intent before I responded.

If you simply needed to make fun of a blog name and mine came up, fair enough. I'll be happy to exchange internet slaps with you and call it done. However, there is every possibility that you don't like me, in which case I'd appreciate it if you'd tell me straight up and we can begin a proper internet feud.

Or, hell, we can FAKE an internet feud. Might be good for readership on both sides.

Finally, there is the statistically unlikely yet still slightly plausible chance that you do actually read and enjoy my blog, and this was a kind of left-handed shoutout. If that's the case, I don't want to respond insultingly to a fan over a misunderstanding.

In conclusion, Mr Sortelli, please contact me at your earliest convenience so that I can reply accordingly. My steam-powered custard pie launchers are standing by, and only await the alert codes.

Bloviatingly yours,

Erin Palette

Naturally, I receive no reply to this.


November 10: Forum declared "On Hiatus" by moderator K-Dawg, pending Sortelli's return and/or Hell Freezing Over.


May 5, 2009: A year to the day that Sortelli and EOI poked fun at me, there are still no updates to the strip. Meanwhile, Bloviating Rhyhtmically here has updated 150 times. I daresay that no matter how many (or how few) readers I have, EOI has less. Therefore, I WIN.

Neener, neener, neener.


It's hard to avoid the temptation to end on a "neener." Still, I realize I should put some kind of end thesis or denouement here, if only to stave off certain attacks and/or flames.

1. I am not butthurt that Sortelli made fun of my blog's title. As I said in my letter, he carefully did not make fun of me, or any of my content. (Besides, it is rather a silly name.)
2. Similarly, I have made every effort not to insult Sortelli personally, nor his webcomic (though I may have failed in this; if so, I truly do apologize). As I hope I have made clear, my problem is with his erratic updates, frequent abandonment, and inability to communicate.
3. Finally, if it turns out that there was some kind of awful personal tragedy that necessitated this abandonment, I will publically apologize and drop a rabid weasel down my pants.
   
4. That said, I do feel a bit of artistic rivalry with the man, since he did mention me publically, and therefore a little bit of smack-talking is warranted.
   
5. Neener.