Monday, August 14, 2017

Writing History - Wilhelm Albrecht Oeltzen - The Lost Astronomer

Wilhelm Albrecht Oeltzen was German astronomer and author of several books. He is known for the processing of a part of Friedrich Wilhelm August Argelander's Zones from 1849-1852 in Bonn Germany. Often these are labeled "A. Oe." or "AOe" in catalogs. This was a two step process, I am uncertain if the abbreviations differentiate the two projects. In 1875, he disappeared. I have been unable to find any reference to what he was doing at that time.

Since the 1870s are an interesting time period, it would be no surprise that the man simply passed away of natural causes, far from home.

Notes compiled:

  • Born on Oct 2nd, 1824.
  • Studied at University of Göttingen in 1846.
  • First Assistant at Vienna Observatory 1849-1859, before moving to The Paris Observatory.
  • The Oeltzen's catalogue of Argelander's Southern Zones. 1857-58.
  • The Oeltzen's catalogue of Argelander's Northern Zones. 1851-52.
  • Schwerd's Beobachtungen von Circumpolarsternen in mittleren Positionen published in 1856, with Friedrich Magnus Schwerd.
  • Disappeared in 1875.


Saturday, August 5, 2017

5 Minute Map - Southern Temple

This is a rough map of a temple dedicated to a creature of the deep. 


5 Minute Maps - Keep of Glass

This is a quick, 5 minute map of a strange series of buildings collectively known as The Keep of Glass. The buildings are made of white marble and glass. The interiors are completely bare. Bring an artifact known as the Black Arrow, allows the characters to teleport without error to a distant location.








Saturday, July 29, 2017

3.5 House Rules - Arrows

I don't like tracking arrows. Treasure Hunters HQ has posted on this very issue. Treasure Hunters HQ has a whole collection of posts to make your game more interesting and flow better than ever before. Everything from shields to magical unguents. Go ahead and follow them, the HQ is full of good ideas.

Ah... back to the point. Arrows. Tracking arrows on character sheets simply burns holes in the sheet. It is annoying and subject to abuse. Many years ago, I realized that player's will cheat on ammo more than any other thing. Why? Because, it is annoying. To avoid it, I tended to have the players encounter lots of arrows, either because the enemy had them, they were working from a fortification, or they had a natural pause to collect up their used arrows. Some players will want to roll a number to see if the arrow broke, but that is as exciting as my other pet peeve, save vs. drowning.

After a while, I decided to impose a rule that if a player rolled a 1 with ranged weapons, they fumbled the quiver and dropped all of their arrows on the ground. Picking one up, pulling one from a target or returning an arrow shot at the player takes time, a single action. If the character doesn't take any other action, they can refill a quiver in a single round. It seemed reasonable, since the standard has been changed from a quantity to have something or don't have something.

My primary issue with running out of arrows as a DM is, the rules don't take "out of ammo" into account. It is assumed the characters have a functional method of attack, and a certain quality of weapons. But if the requisite ammo is missing, they have neither. Suddenly striping the characters of missile weapons isn't really accounted for in the rules. While a good DM will give players and characters time to reprovision, the DM really can't account for 4 character's missile counts on the fly.

Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Minor Fix in GSIV

I have had this glaesine orb for years. For the longest time, it didn't work.

LOOK:
The orb is shaped of pure midnight blue glaes, crafted into a perfect orb.  It hangs from a delicate silver chain affixed with a tiny moon-shaped mithril pin.

Tiny shimmering crystals hover inside the orb, pulsating slightly with the light of the stars.  Currently they form the shape of the
constellation of The Unicorn.

Barely visible on the glaesine surface of the orb, some words have been etched in minute script around its circumference.

405:
You gesture at a shimmering glaesine orb.

The orb vibrates gently.  A brief vision of a glittering implosion in a darkened void fills your mind.  Brightly glowing spheres are flung outward from the center of the implosion, hurtling through the
darkness as they yet bring illumination to the void.

READ:
Minute but elegant script is barely visible as it encircles your glaesine orb...

"Frae Naira vers Deiam, Jae esais bevre Tua ae te Draekeche."
"From Dusk til Dawn, I stand between thee and the darkness."
                                      - from the journals of
                                        Linsandrych Illistim
                                        circa -49,080
EXHALE:
A faint foggy mist forms over the surface of the orb then slowly fades away.

TILT:
You tilt your glaesine orb side to side, making the light play off it.

PET: 
You thumb the glaesine orb in your hand.


Thursday, June 1, 2017

Chromebook + Linux + Simutronics Wizard

Using the Simutronics Wizard is preferable to the default web client. On a Chromebook, you must install some form of linux to install the Wizard and then install Wine and WineTricks.

Installing Linux on a Chromebook is easy. How to Geek has a great install guide for linux and crouton. This guide has a couple of options, I suggest xfce as a solid OS for your Chromebook. I mention this because I am using Ubuntu and Unity, which is less optimal. This instructions will work for many types of linux, so use whatever your heart desires.

Once you have linux install go ahead and use chrosh to open it up. Your commands are: "shell" and "sudo startunity", if you have Ubuntu Unity or "sudo startxfce4" for xfce. If you have another flavor, your sudo start command will be different.

If you are using Ubuntu, sometimes the Software Center is broken when first launched. Update it by typing into the terminal: "sudo apt-get update software-center". Once this step is complete, open it and install WineTricks. This will install a basic Internet Explorer. You can reach that directory by going to: home/chrome/.wine/dosdevices/program files (x86)/ or simply searching for iexplore.exe.

For some reason, the iexplorer.exe will not download the file, but keep it open in the background for later. Open your linux web browser and go to www.play.net/software/.


Next download the Game Entry Client. This will get a program called sg32inst.exe.

Back up in the browser and do the same for the Game Launcher. This file is called InchInst.exe.

Once you have these files, open sg32inst.exe and InchInst.exe. They should open directly from your browser and run in Wine. You will end up with the Simutronics Game Entry tool in Program Files under the C:\ drive. Open it and log in.
 Next, select a game.
 Select a character AND choose your client. Your options are Stormfront or Wizard. I picked the Wizard. It will download it for you and install it into your Program Files (x86). The same for Stormfront.
 Hit play and you are in. For whatever reason, there is no sound.
Enjoy!

(If you have any problems, let me know in the comments and I will try to work it out.)

Wednesday, May 31, 2017

Inspiration for Writing: History of Rome by Mike Duncan

Oh, how I miss classes. This summer, I have been inspired by Mike Duncan's History of Rome podcast. The original show ran from 2007 to 2012. How did I miss that?

In any event, Mr. Duncan's excellent show has been very inspirational for me. I've been listening to two shows a day, once while writing and once before bed. I can't wait to catch up and start listening to his new podcast, Revolutions.

You can also check out Mr. Duncan's great book, The Storm before the Storm at your favorite book store.

Add your inspirational podcasts down in the comments. Lord knows, I don't want to miss any more great shows.

Saturday, May 20, 2017

31 Notes for Writing History

I have written 72 History papers in the past 4 semesters. I have collected some advice from my professors and personal experience, which I thought should be shared:
  1. Learn to love double spaces papers, and hate single-spaced papers. 
  2. 12 point fonts are fine.
  3. New Times Roman is the default choice for a reason.
  4. The professor's style guide is best. Do not argue. 
  5. Oxford commas are impactful, important, and helpful.
  6. Staples are not a good idea, they should be the law. 
  7. Number multiple-page documents even when stapled. 
  8. Use the school directory to look up the professor's name. Spell it correctly. 
  9. Add your own name to spell check. 
  10. Do not merely spell check. 
  11. Do not use contractions. 
  12. "Extremely" and "huge" both mean "I need a thesaurus". 
  13. Dates do not have apostrophes. 
  14. "Very" is unnecessary.
  15. "Interesting" is not. 
  16. "Toward" is United States usage, "Towards" is British, and Buffalo, NY usage. 
  17. History does not repeat, but sometimes it rhymes. 
  18. "Etc." is not worth using. There are better ways. 
  19. Foreign words are in italics. Foreign means it is not in an English dictionary. 
  20. No first OR second person, unless the professor requires it. Thank them when they do.  
  21. The past is always in the past tense.
  22. Do not confuse British for English. The same goes for others. If in doubt, look it up.  
  23. Do not confuse name places for countries.
  24. "Would" is a crutch or a mistake. Be careful. 
  25. "Led" is more apparent than "Would lead". 
  26. Passive voice is painful, but not avoidable. 
  27. When comparing situations implicitly link subjects to periods. 
  28. Do not hide verbs.  
  29. Learn how to write citations from memory.  
  30. Do not use clichés.
  31. Learn how to type special characters and accent marks manually.  
Bonus: "Thank you" means "thank you". "You're welcome" means "you're welcome". They are not interchangeable.