tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-68397642009-07-04T00:26:29.499-05:00Commentary and observations on subjects of interest to gamers...or notMythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.comBlogger289125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-28711463633225661612009-07-04T00:20:00.002-05:002009-07-04T00:25:52.074-05:00

On my netbook, that is. I have no intention of returning to Windows on my desktop :)I'd like to keep running Ubuntu on my netbook, but today was the last straw, when an update hosed my sound again. I know sound is an issue with Ubuntu on the netbook, but I was able to get it working. A couple of updates (or more; I wasn't paying close enough attention) and it was gone again. I'm tried of screwing

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-45879425592042226732009-06-28T23:24:00.000-05:002009-06-28T23:24:00.663-05:00

Treasure of the Week is a new "feature" I'm hoping to do, appropriately enough, once a week, to highlight something I've found that's intended to be useful to DMs/GMs. We'll see how that works out! My focus is naturally on 4E, but I'm guessing the better part of what I find will be useful regardless of edition or even system.The start things off, I wanted to call attention to B. Scot Hoover's Old

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-87324138542378094022009-06-26T23:20:00.000-05:002009-06-26T23:20:00.241-05:00

Off and on I've been reading a collection of PDFs concerning Minaria, the setting for the old Divine Right game. The articles were originally published in Dragon magazine, but they were also collected on the CD-ROM that came with the 25th Anniversary Edition of the game (which is where I got them from). Some interesting stuff, and after reading the "origins" document I realized that the setting

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-16266668792058006322009-06-23T23:15:00.000-05:002009-06-23T23:15:03.778-05:00

What follows is essentially my thinking out loud in the process of developing/refining my alternate treasure system for 4E. As such, it may be disjointed, messy, or both.I'm not a fan of treasure parcels, the default treasure distribution method in 4E. I like the concept in and of itself, but it doesn't work if you don't keep everyone in the party at the same level (which is also the suggested

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-85466696280161219752009-06-21T23:14:00.001-05:002009-06-21T23:14:45.460-05:00

Looking at your lists, it's obvious that a lot of what's there was generated by some program. Seriously, many of those names just are...lame, really. Not something a person would have just pulled out of their head. So what's the value of having tons of lists if so much of their content is so weak? Quantity is not quality. And God forbid you acknowledge anything that may have helped you.

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-4861741674475230022009-06-07T20:09:00.003-05:002009-06-07T20:15:19.910-05:00

Copying large and/or numerous files from a Linux disk to another: Transfer time slowly degrades until it's virtually slower than moving data across a 10 baud modem. An hour to copy a 30GB file? Really?And from reading the on-line forums, the summary seems from the developers to be: "Works for me. You newbies/Ubuntu users suck. Don't bother us." Excellent way to draw people away from Windows.Yes,

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-68870218161441225992009-06-06T21:41:00.002-05:002009-06-06T21:41:00.565-05:00

From the "Seriously? This Is A Big Deal?" DepartmentApparently, the latest travesty being thrust upon us in 4E is the fact that metallic dragons aren't good or lawful good, but "unaligned". The chromatics are still evil - but unaligned metallics? The horror!Or not. I admit I was surprised to see it, but who cares? It's easy enough to just say "Hey, gold dragons are good in my world." Has nothing

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-2783308656866519492009-06-02T23:16:00.000-05:002009-06-02T23:16:00.557-05:00

I was recently reading an RPG site I frequent and one of the articles was above YAFRPG (Yet Another Fantasy RPG). Though it wasn't so much an article as it was ad-copy - besides reading like one, it was written by the author of the game. Much of it was discussing why it was so much better than D&D (it didn't call out D&D by name, but it was obvious, just as when people in the tabletop community

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-87639673269149583082009-05-30T23:01:00.002-05:002009-05-30T23:10:02.164-05:00

So, it's been quite some time since the last revision of Mythosa. Is it time for another one? Of course! I can hear the groans already...OK, this one isn't as big as they've usually been. In fact, this is less a revision than a shuffling of a few items. There are a few parts of the latest incarnation with which I've never been entirely happy. Since I want to redraw the map in CC3 (so I can work

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-90550964301842938502009-05-20T21:42:00.000-05:002009-05-20T21:42:00.584-05:00

An old article, but I just ran across it: Removing Busywork.Short and worth reading.

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-67529580051982012502009-05-17T15:27:00.003-05:002009-05-17T15:31:05.263-05:00

Seen here, in the first reply:http://en.allexperts.com/q/Small-Engines-Lawn-1746/Lawnmower-starts-stops.htmthough I've seen it elsewhere, too. I mean, look at this:From your Description, it Sounds like you need to Remove, Disassemble and Soak the Carburetor Overnight in Carburetor Cleaner (I Use Gunk).Who thinks that's the right way to capitalize words, especially since it requires much more work

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-14578002828774583342009-05-17T00:33:00.002-05:002009-05-17T00:44:25.401-05:00

From here:If you characterize the game Dungeons and Dragons as a vehicle used to express your interests, then maybe latter day 3.5 and 4e are completely appropriate for today’s audience. They don’t get into the larger scope stuff in the core rules. It’s not about historical-based anything. It’s game mechanic based, where the game mechanic takes precedence over fantasy immersion, historical period

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-57470693209720427432009-05-15T16:40:00.000-05:002009-05-15T16:40:00.355-05:00

If you spend any amount of time in the fantasy/D&D on-line community you've no doubt heard of the "Old School Renaissance". I don't know that I can describe it properly (mainly because people are so anal about categorizing their niches these days), but it essentially consists of people who want to recreate the gaming experience of the early days of D&D and RPGs, generally when people were playing

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-67340359776605722212009-05-13T23:37:00.000-05:002009-05-13T23:37:00.762-05:00

I was going to post about something I ran across on rec.games.frp.dnd awhile back, but when I checked Google Groups the original post was gone. Ah, well. It was someone complaining that their players were bored since 4E wasn't offering enough options for their PCs - powers, feats, whatever. I was going to make the point that the campaign should offer enough of interest that a lack of mechanical

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-58291547447770093642009-05-10T23:11:00.002-05:002009-05-10T23:19:04.504-05:00

I recently replaced my old laptop with an HP Mini netbook, which I've discussed elsewhere. So far, I've been pretty satisfied. My biggest problems have been with Ubuntu 9.04 (8.10 worked perfectly), not the hardware. But I've gotten Ubuntu configured how I want now, so between the OS and the Mini, I'm quite happy. Battery life is good, the keyboard is fine, etc. The only real complaint I have is

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-53325732519196516542009-05-03T18:31:00.004-05:002009-05-03T18:36:09.726-05:00

Since the bullet-proof Ubuntu went down on me again, I figured I'd start logging the occurrences; I created a spreadsheet for this purpose. Hopefully it'll help me determine what the issues are.Now, I've never had Ubuntu crash on me (that I can remember...maybe once or twice?) on my old laptop or so far on my netbook. Now, that's 32-bit and my desktop is 64-bit, so that may be an issue. I'm also

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-6997144822241276522009-04-30T23:37:00.003-05:002009-05-02T01:08:23.491-05:00

OK, this is a really old article, but I just ran across it, so it's new to me!Anyway, if you're a DM/GM and you haven't read this article, I highly recommend it. Like the author, I'm always looking for processes and guides for adventure development, and he's come up with a nifty system. I'll probably tweak it for my own use, but it's definitely something to check out.I also agree with his (brief)

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-2181055202523277282009-04-28T18:37:00.001-05:002009-04-28T18:38:33.184-05:00

Upgraded to Ubuntu 9.04. Now my sound doesn't work half the time.Thanks, hippies.

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-78500418736797451822009-04-18T21:30:00.003-05:002009-04-18T22:04:39.563-05:00

OK, lame post title...Anyway, it's finally come time to retire my old laptop. Since February of 2007, I've been using an Everex SA2052T. I bought it mainly for two purposes - to use on my train commute to and from downtown Chicago and for use as a GM tool. I wanted something fairly small and light since I'd be carrying it around each day; the Everex was small but not so light. But the price was

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-11575874259510689502009-04-10T01:37:00.001-05:002009-04-10T01:39:05.506-05:00

While I much prefer Firefox to the alternatives (on Windows, at least), on Ubuntu (64-bit, at least), it's really buggy. Google - hurry up on Chrome for Linux please!

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-69466291857323095742009-04-05T13:52:00.003-05:002009-04-05T13:53:06.616-05:00

http://www.dwarvenforge.com/dwarvenforums/viewtopic.php?id=3066Very cool! The scary thing is, I'm looking at the scenery pieces in the pictures (other than the DF stuff) going "Yeah, I've got that...and that...and that...just painted that..."

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-64932002296144208062009-04-05T13:12:00.002-05:002009-04-05T13:15:50.623-05:00

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=308748wow a crash in ubuntu. i mean i've seen it before but the hardware was more than a tad shoddy which caused it.I see it on at least a weekly basis (daily, this weekend). Last time was just a few minutes ago when I was copying files to an external hard drive. Nothing really intensive there.Shoddy hardware? Nope. And things have been running fine for

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-60996584173752155102009-04-02T22:48:00.002-05:002009-04-02T22:50:21.965-05:00

Maybe it's just 'cuz I've gotten so comfortable with it, but it's nice getting back to GNOME. It feels...right. It feels right, Brian.

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-28597689122723208522009-03-29T18:12:00.002-05:002009-03-29T18:18:07.086-05:00

Editor's Note: This post was written prior to the issues we had today with KDE.As I may have alluded to already, I've gone back to using Ubuntu as my main OS. A couple years ago I tried to go "full time" with Ubuntu (version 6.04 or 6.10; I don't recall which). I liked it, but after three months of using it for most everything except games I ended up back in Windows. Ubuntu 6.xx was good, but not

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6839764.post-86973845479553667922009-03-29T14:25:00.002-05:002009-03-29T14:30:10.647-05:00

Not because I had to restart the computer again because the whole system locked up (I thought that wasn't supposed to happen with Linux...?), but I tried to upgrade to the nvidia 180 driver, which hosed everything like the 177 driver had (before I finally got the correct fix in xorg.conf). The driver notes on nvidia's website even state that that shouldn't be an issue any longer!So, back to GNOME

MythosaAkiranoreply@blogger.com0