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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Pratchett’s Cohen the Barbarian

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Pratchett’s Cohen the Barbarian

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Cohen_CohenI am an unabashed fan of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books. Along with a lot of Carl Hiassen’s work, they are the only reads that cause me to laugh out loud. Unseen Academicals was the first Discworld book that I wasn’t really happy with when I finished it; which isn’t too bad considering it was the thirty-third in the series for me.

Though I have a very fundamental difference with Pratchett’s basic worldview, I think he is an absolutely brilliant satirist. Discworld isn’t nearly as well known generally as The Hitchhiker’s Guides to the Galaxy books, but I tell folks that if you like Douglas Adams, you should like Terry Pratchett.

Genghiz Cohen, better known as Cohen the Barbarian, appears in a few novels. He is Discworld’s greatest warrior, though now he is an old man in his late eighties or nineties, and he leads a band of senior citizen barbarians known as the Silver Horde.

Cohen/Conan. The Silver Horde/The Golden Horde. See? Get it? Discworld is full of this stuff.

Cohen is a skinny old man with a long white beard, a patch over one eye and a dirty loincloth. He has a set of dentures made from Troll teeth, which are pretty much the only things he has left from a wild life.

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Fantasy Adventure on a Tablet: Talisman: Digital Edition

Fantasy Adventure on a Tablet: Talisman: Digital Edition

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Talisman_BoardTalisman is a fantasy board game that first came out about twenty years ago. There have been a couple editions and multiple expansions. In December of 2008, Fantasy Flight Games released a revised fourth edition, for which expansions are still being produced.

In 2012, Thumbstar Games released Talisman: Prologue, a sort of ‘Talisman Light’ ipad app. It was a one-player game and was a decent translation of the board game, though not very absorbing.

In 2014, however, Nomad Games released Talisman: Digital Edition, which is a full-blown, 1-4 player game. It’s a fine adaptation of the original.

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Modular: The Warlords of the Accordlands

Modular: The Warlords of the Accordlands

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Accordlands_CodexI’m going to try to periodically post some reviews of RPG modules and supplements. If you see “Modular” in the title line, that’s such a post. And here’s one!

Warlord: Saga of the Storm was a d20-based collectible card game from AEG. I’ve never played it and know as much about it as I’ve read on Wikipedia. But I do know that in 2006, AEG released four books that made up a fine d20 RPG setting and campaign.

The World Atlas is the best starting point. There’s a long history of the world of Larisnar, going back to The Great Dragon, which destroyed gods and nations before finally being slain. But the essence of the Dragon escaped into the air and became The Storm. While its body fell deep into the earth and produced demon-like Abyssals. Most of the remaining nations and races signed The Accord as a means to survive the changed world.

The Atlas profiles each of the major nations, including those of the dwarves and elves. As part of The Accord, the Dwarves agreed to leave the surface (the Dragon had destroyed their lands) and head underground to protect against the Abyssals. They stayed down so long that the surface dwellers forgot they existed and their selfless dedication.

Meanwhile, the Elves had become short-lived, barely lasting thirty years, so they turned to necromancy. These ain’t Tolkien’s elves!

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: An Index (So Far)

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: An Index (So Far)

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Index_Holmes
An awesome print by Tom Richmond of Holmes on screen over the years. I own print #7 of 450

Surprisingly, The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes has now made it to thirty posts. While I’m sure the dedicated reader types ‘Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ in the search field to call up all the posts in the series, I said to myself (I talk to myself a lot),  “Bob, there’s got to be an easier way for someone to bask in the entirety of your writings so far.”

And there is! Below is an index with links to all the posts, followed by some topics likely to come.

 

Sherlock Holmes/Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes – Introduction to the column (rather unoriginal title, eh?)

Lord of Misrule – Christopher Lee as the great detective

The Case of the Short Lived Sherlock – One of my favorite Holmes’, Ian Richardson

Creation to Death and Back – A good intro to Holmes, focusing on Doyle’s love-hate (minus the love) relationship with his most famous creation

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Segundo de Chomón: Forgotten Fantasist of Silent Film

Segundo de Chomón: Forgotten Fantasist of Silent Film

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Voyage to Jupiter, 1909.
Voyage to Jupiter, 1909.

Fantasy, science fiction, and horror themes have been in the movies since almost the beginning. During the first few experimental years, movies consisted of simple scenes such as a man sneezing or a train pulling into the station, but soon that novelty wore off and audiences wanted stories. Since the medium itself seemed almost magical, directors began to experiment with the fantastic in order to tell gripping tales.

Most film buffs know of Georges Méliès and his 1902 Trip to the Moon, generally considered the first science fiction film. Méliès started out as a stage magician so it’s not surprising he added an element of the fantastic in his pioneering movies. Other early filmmakers such as Auguste and Louis Lumière and Thomas Edison tended to film realistic subjects or historical/adventure stories, although Edison did make a version of Frankenstein in 1910.

Lost amid these famous names is a man who did as much for the development of fantastic film as any of them. The Spanish director Segundo de Chomón pioneered many early special effects techniques and worked on some two hundred films. Having spent much of his career in France and Italy, he’s been claimed by no country and thus has fallen through the cracks of history.

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LonCon 3 Report: Attending the 72nd World Science Fiction Convention

LonCon 3 Report: Attending the 72nd World Science Fiction Convention

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LONCON3_logo_270wLast weekend in London was LonCon 3, this year’s Worldcon. The convention, which has been held in various cities around the world since 1939, is where the Hugo Awards are given out and where fans from all over the globe meet up.

It was my first Worldcon, and while I’ve been to large conventions before such as World Fantasy and Eastercon, not to mention several local conventions such as Tuscon, I still wasn’t quite sure what to expect. What I got was five fun days of events, conversation, and camaraderie.

The Loncon staff did a fine job making everything run smoothly. A handy pocket guide steered me around the huge convention center without a hitch, and twice-daily newssheets kept me up-to-date on any changes.

There were only a couple of small minuses. First off, the dining options at the ExCel Centre were overpriced and generally substandard. Not that this is unusual for a convention center, so I don’t blame LonCon for this!

Also, the ExCel is huge and has all the ambiance of a shopping mall. But as Robert Silverberg pointed out, “Cons aren’t about venues, they’re about people.”

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Deserts and Oases: Exploring Runebound – The Sands of Al-Kalim

Deserts and Oases: Exploring Runebound – The Sands of Al-Kalim

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Sands_dwarf
Forget garden gnomes: Those pesky dwarves get everywhere. Even the desert!

The Sands of Al-Kalim is one of the ‘big box’ expansions for Runebound. As opposed to the smaller, ‘card-only’ expansions, these come with a new board. You lay this board over the original game board and it completely changes the terrain. Islands, the frozen north: you get the idea. There are also other components that add to the mechanics, encounters, etc.

Not surprisingly, The Sands of Al-Kalim adds a desert/Ali Baba type of theme to the base game. There are several game play modifications (boy, does exhaustion become a factor!) such as choosing to move at day or night.

But one fundamental change is when you move onto a hex with an Adventure Counter. Now you have two additional options. You can roll the Story die or possibly undertake a Legendary Adventure.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Those Sweet Silver Blues: Garrett, PI

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Those Sweet Silver Blues: Garrett, PI

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Garrett_BluesLast year, John O’Neill wrote a post about the Garrett PI collections by Glen Cook. The talented Cook is best known for his excellent dark fantasy series about a mercenary group, The Black Company.

The Garrett books are light years away in tone and style from those of The Black Company. However, they are identical in regards to quality of writing. Garrett is the pre-eminent fantasy PI (private investigator).

Cook has written a series of books that appeals to fans of the hardboiled PI, notably practiced by Raymond Chandler, fans of the humorous fantasy world best typified by Terry Pratchett’s Discworld and to those who have read Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe mysteries. The fact that Cook has masterfully combined all three of these elements is admirable in the extreme.

Garrett is a former Marine who spent five inglorious years serving in the seemingly endless war between his nation of Karenta, and Venagata. They battle over a region called The Cantard, home to most of the world’s silver mines. And silver is the resource that fuels sorcery. And since Karenta is ruled by the magic-using Stormwardens, no cost in human capital is too great to rule The Cantard.

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: RPGing with a board — Runebound

The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: RPGing with a board — Runebound

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RUnebound_BoardIt is very difficult to build a good RPG board game. The constraints of the medium make it hard to compare favorably with the actual pen and paper or PC/video game role playing experience.

By far, the best board/card game I’ve found that emulates the role-playing experience is the Pathfinder Rise of the Runelords Adventure Card Game. The adventures get more difficult, you level up and the gear gets better. You maintain your items, spells, and levels from scenario to scenario through an entire Adventure Path, rather than start over each game play session. I’m sure I’ll post on that excellent game in the future.

Another game that I enjoy (though not as much) is Runebound (2nd Edition) from Fantasy Flight Games. It’s not as slick as Wizards of the Coast’s Wrath of Ashardalon, and not as complex as Fantasy Flight’s Rune Wars. But it’s got an appeal for RPGers.

The large board is of thick stock and divided into hexes like old school D&D maps. You travel through different terrain to either enter towns or land on hexes with colored adventure counters. The four different colors represent difficulty levels, from easiest (green) on up through yellow, purple, and red, granting from one to four experience points per color category.

When a player lands on a counter, they select an adventure card of the appropriate color. It can be a challenge, an event, or an encounter. Usually, there’s a fight: sometimes with a skill test involved. You gain experience (and usually gold) from successfully meeting the adventure card.

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