#139 Reposted 19oct17

Yes, they speak Klingon in Valhalla.

A proper adventuring group should be between 2 and 8. 4 is about the best to mechanically cover all your bases: Fighter, Wizard, Healer and Rogue/Thief. If you have a fifth, make it a Bard (Heart!) 4 ninja turtles, 5 planeteers, 6 power rangers if you include Tommy. Too many makes it hard to keep track.

Like 13 dwarves, a wizard and one hobbit is too many. You won’t be able to remember anyone’s name or character traits. Can you remember all of the dwarves from The Hobbit?

1.Dwalin 2. Balin, 3. Kili, 4. Fili, 5. Thorin Oakenshield6. Oin7. Gloin8. Bifur9. Bombur10. Doc11. Sleepy12. Grumpy13. Blitzen?

Not-Trek:Discovery

vindalfhimself:

It could have been a cool TV show, but it’s not Star Trek. Let’s say Star Trek is a cheeseburger. Next Gen, DS9, Voyager, Enterprise were all variations on cheeseburgers. Add some toppings, use the fancy mustard, I feel like Enterprise added kale.

Now Discovery wanted to make major changes. They switched the ketchup to a much sweeter sauce, and added a bunch more cheese; then they got rid of the top bun, and made the bottom one wider… they made a pizza. Maybe it’s a good pizza. It’s not a cheeseburger.

Those aliens are not Klingons! You can do all kinds of creative things with the culture, or the costume of the time, but the basic biology of the species is established*. We know that Kahless the Unforgettable looked like (Remember him?). It’s not like you can’t find bands of Klingons who already have the makeup and costume at any convention.

What the hell is with the mushroom drive? I grew up with a schematic of the 1701-D on my wall. I have read every technical manual for the Galaxy and Constitution class star ships. Nowhere do they mention having fungus in the engines. I can;t care about it, because we all know it fails. Like how nobody got too attached to the Jedi in Phantom Menace through Revenge of the Sith.

Prequels are a terrible idea. You can’t really get any kind of dramatic investment when the audience knows how it ends. The warp-mushrooms fail. The Klingons don’t overrun the Federation. And it looks like the Star Fleet uniform designers all get replaced real soon. Just put it in the 25th century when we don’t know that it’s all ok in ten years.

I really want to like Discovery. I’ve been a fan of Star Trek since 1987, but it’s not star trek. It’s a good pizza, but I wanted a cheeseburger.

*You even have two basic templates to choose from.

#138 Reposted 17oct17

Movie military is always incompetent, right? An entire battalion gets wiped out by the monster, but some plucky (teenagers/scientist/hero) can save the day. In a world where monster attacks become common, they just stop trying. It’s worse in video games. Every guard in Skyrim is like “Meh, the Dragonborn will deal with that.”

#137 Reposted 12oct17

As is traditional, the main character is completely unqualified to solve the problem. Remember when Luke Skywalker was sitting around on the farm making “woosh” noises with his toy airplanes? Obviously he was the one who should fight the empire.

Fantasy stories work so much better in a pseudo-medieval setting. The anarchy of no central government allows for the characters to reasonably take matters into their own hands. In a more modern world, the dragon would be dealt with by the military, or the dark wizard prosecuted. That might make a fun D&D setting.

#131 Reposted 6oct17

I think we’ll skip the next couple of issues, nothing particularly fun happens that the narrator didn’t just cover. Maybe I’ll just post them together and we’ll get on with it. Maybe I’ll learn to make these decisions in some kind of editing process that doesn’t take 10 years? Nah…