There are movies like The Gladiator, and 300 that pull you into the world of medieval combat at its greatest. They also inspired a new form of game for us, along with the good old WWE, of course. Our group decided that instead of dungeon diving, or scrounging around for work we would fight (and possibly die) for glory! Here I’ll run you through what we did and how you can run one of these great games in spite of that.

It’s All Fun And Games…

The premise of the game was that we were career gladiators. We had a choice of playing any race we wanted to as long as we could swing the level adjustment. You could be a mercenary character just looking to make quick money, or a slave forced to fight for the pleasure of the people and the powers that be. If you were a monster race the game started with you being cultivated as exotic pieces for the games. I, of course, played a special kind of Gnoll. It was an interesting character, and my special gig was hitting with both claw attacks and then getting a free bite/ grapple attack. We also had an ant-man, an exotic lizard man who was his mortal enemy, some crazy chick (played by a guy) and a normal human, go figure.

C, the mysterious loner, and Allen, the ‘vamp’ chick, had to fight preliminary rounds to qualify for arena fighting to make the big bucks. The slaves were thrown hard and fast into life or death combat and often it was PC vs PC so there was going to be someone making up a new character. I personally thought it was bogus and there were at least two people a night making up new characters, and often it was the same two punk ****, which was kind of cruel.

The aspect that I didn’t like was that Ray, the DM, found a game mechanic that accounted for fame or our sway over the crowd which translated into a combat bonus in the arena. Unfortunately it took the one great tool for role playing and turned it into a roll of the die, and I hate leaving my fate to the dice! One good example, which was the first thing that soured me on the game, was the fight with the giant (it was something huge!). It was crushing the 2 guys in the ring and the other PCs except me jumped in to save them. Well somehow the fight came into the corridors of the interior of the coliseum where the crowd couldn’t see. Naturally, now that the rest of the prize fighters were in danger the guards came in to take care of business. Even then it was a hard fight, and I still hadn’t joined in. Finally the beast was felled and the guys rolled out from the corridors bloodied and battered to the roar of the crowd. I came out after them, pristine, saying to C, “I can’t always be cleaning up your messes. Maybe you should have your mother come fight for you…” and then I threw a piece of the monster at his feet. I had to roll to see if the crowd thought I was cool and I naturally rolled piss poor. C said, “Bite me, bitch!” and kicked the claw back at me. His roll was perfect and he became a crowd favorite with absolutely no personality, or doing anything certifiably cool. That pissed me off.

The second screw you was when everyone got something that allows them to hit me when I grapple even though I had improved grapple while one guy used ‘fencing’ to be invulnerable against everything except archery. When a fight broke out over some magical item the DM used my one role playing weakness, fire, to purposely keep me from getting the item while the others walked through it. I was killed and then rezed in a ritual that cost me my arm. Now my character was totally useless, I couldn’t even grapple, which is what I based my whole character concept on. It was much later in our gaming ‘career’ so if I didn’t like the game I ditched it instead of trying to muddle through or compensate.

The game did continue on without me, and even flourished. C turned out to be a lordling of some sort with a claim to the crown. He became a fighter to run from his heavy responsibilities (that’s why I write my own backgrounds because letting the DM make stuff up can screw you!). Once the king died and the kingdom fell into civil war C was tapped to lead the loyalist armies back under one rule and uncharacteristically it wasn’t for his rule, though he did end up with the crown. Al, in a rare act of evil, seduced C’s character to bare a challenging heir much like Mordrid from the legend of King Arthur, but with the twist that he (she) purposely got turned into a vamp just before to birth a super heir. I would have played that game had it originally been like this, but I wasn’t going to play a crippled ‘wrestler’ in an every other day fight to the death.

The Point Of The Game

The point of the game is to create a whole new feel. Unlike the other suggestions I’ve made, this one doesn’t require any real overhauling or any other rules unless you use the optional rules for the crowd favor (and that’s if you can find them). The big difference is for the DM and how the game is played and presented. Instead of journeying for days and playing Colombo to figure out which castle the princess is actually in, the fight basically comes to the players. A lot of people envision gladiators fighting in a coliseum arena, surrounded by screaming people while fighting ankle deep in sand. A good example of what is possible comes from history itself. The Romans, it seemed, were bored with the norm for gladiator fights and they flooded the arena to host a naval battle! If that was possible for them, then just think what would be do able in the age of magic.

You could have an arena magically crafted to change to suit your needs from encounter to encounter. You could create any number of environs to call in any kind of monster your heart desires without the inconvenience of trying to lure your players into the spider’s pallor, or make up some crappy back story to force a head to head fight. I mean you can get creative! Throw the biggest, baddest combination of monsters to present your players with the most awesome challenges. Like will-o-wisps and shamblers, or iron golems and any flame thrower monster you want (though red dragons are preferred). One of the best things is the fact that since these are pop in and out fights you can be as bone breaking hard with these challenges as you want to be because they don’t have to fight to or out of a dungeon.

Not every fight has to be a death quest, of course. I think that was the mistake my DM made. If you keep grinding the players bones to dust again and again, especially when it’s PC vs PC, it just gets very old and draining, trust me I’ve been there. You can make it team fights, battle royals or speed challenges such as a monster obstacle course where the first one through gets the prize. Just seriously get creative because the more thought you put into each and every encounter the greater experience your players will have. And for those that just can’t get their head out of the concrete arena, I say think of what you could do if your audience could watch your warriors anywhere? Just think of using a magic eye spell, or clairvoyance spell to send the action to the masses or even a select few high paying cliental. The best thing is that every encounter can be specifically tailored to your group, or even an individual PC throughout every level. Often, in our regular games, we would pick fights with the wrong sob’s, or we wouldn’t do the challenges the way the DM wanted and fights would easily get of control and PC’s would drop like flies. With arena style fighting in artificial settings you can take the “Saw” approach to challenges by limiting what your players take into the arena or find only what you want. Like a monster that is impossible to kill unless you can find a specific weapon hidden in the area. The only thing that will hold you back is your own self imposed limitations.

Role Retooling

With this beef cake special of a game you may hear some people complain that they can play the class or character that they really wanted. I mean can you see Gandalf the Grey taking on Triple H? It would be comical for sure, but not very practical for the wizard in the early levels or the beef cake supreme in the later ones. I would see wizards playing a better role as hired specialists to give gladiators certain advantages in upcoming encounters. I believe sorcerers would fare better as they could pull their tricks out on the fly. Not having magic users in the encounters would limit the stress on your arenas. I remember once that the DM put me in a room filling up with water and mer-people were pouring out the same chutes, too. I turned water to dust and the DM said it just kept pouring out which made mud which I shifted into stone that covered up the holes pouring water into the room. Without the supply of water the mer-people could hardly move and were suffocating. He hardly saw that one coming. Although, I must say, I heard that 4th edition took care of the disparity between wizards and fighters and closed the level gap. Oh, also that they took the teeth out of wizards play book, like the reality altering spells, which I so often favored.

Paladins and Rogues may experience limitations of their roles. Paladins won’t be needed to right the wrongs of evils and they won’t usually consent to fighting or killing for pure sport. Plus, as half classes go, Paladins are notoriously limited in both combat prowess and casting ability. Rangers, another half class, on the other hand have razor sharp combat abilities and great supportive spells. Rogues aren’t really meant for grinding in head to head combat, and, unless you have to them rolling in teams, the Rogue losses many of his class features. Their only saving grace is the fact that they have so many skill points that they can dominate outside the arena, but if you want to go that route then maybe you should use a bard. Their performances can sway the crowd, and stupefy opponents. They can dominate outside of the ring where they can use their influence to set up matches, create teams or alter their own venues (such as challenging someone to a no-holds-barred match in a hell-in-the-cell).

Clerics are good because they can swing a big stick while sporting mithiral Speedos. There may be an issue with the fact that they use their god’s power in the conquest of sport and entertainment. If so they can at least find gainful employment to heal the bashed, broken and dead though their use may be limited since your PC’s aren’t full on adventuring.

You may find other applicable issues as you play as my own experience with this gaming style was tragically limited. If you have more you would like to add then please feel free to let me know.

Know Your Role- And Play It!

In this combat intensive game you may think it’s very modular and limited in the role playing department, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. You specifically have periods between the fighting where your players have nothing to do, but talk. They can talk to potential opponents to start rivalries, heal rifts, make allies, or break apart teams. They can use contacts and influence to change aspects of fights, or to increase the venue of their fight (go from a cover fighter to the main event!). They should be able to have, or be managers and make ‘stables’ where they have a group of semi-unified fighters (like DX or the NWO). There’s just really so many things outside the ring that you just can’t cover them all, and discovering them is half the fun, but you can also make it work in the ring as well. Don’t forget to introduce yourselves, or acknowledge your opponent before the match. Playing up the drama and talking smack can be very fun and sway the crowd. Make your attacks flashy and climatic, or pull the rope a dope and make your opponent look like a fool, and ruin their standing (which you could then use your sway with the commissioner to take their shot at the title…). And there is always a host of chances for zingy one liners. I seriously believe that instead of hurting your chances of role playing it will teach your players how to do it as they will have periods where combat isn’t an option and they will have to adapt or die (of boredom because they aren’t getting any action).

The Points to Focus On

• Don’t worry about setting up connecting plots or schemes. Just let the fights come and the players will pick their rivals and choose their fights.

• Try to come up with as creative of fight scenarios as you can. I like to start with a theme and then top it off with climatic finisher. Like I had a number of water challenges culminate into a death match with a kraken in an arena that’s steadily filling up with water.

• If your players aren’t taking advantage of the chances to play up the game between bouts in the arena then take the extra step. Have NPC’s approach them and start a friendship or a rivalry depending on their first impressions. Have those that participate move up the ranks and the others who don’t get it get stuck with the crappy or more deadly fights.

• You can break up the monotony of the continuous Mortal Kombat fights with interspersed quests. They can be for personal quests to fix things at home, or to find a special item they may need to have to take on a future rivial.

• A whole game of this may get old, as especially as your characters reach epic levels. You could make these periodic scenarios. Your younger characters may need a way to get experience and money, or your more experienced characters maybe looking for a way to gain fame and glory. We always worked in a worldwide fight of the most powerful warriors for domination or ultimate props.

• Just let the game happen, even if the gamers just ham it up. Go with it because the biggest thing is to just have fun.

Kings of the Stone Age

Our DM decided that it would be interesting if we played a Stone Age game. It meant first of all, that we had to adjust our weapons and inventory. We ditched everything that had metal in it, or at least made sure that they were made of more primitive materials. Those that were adjusted like this usually received a penalty to damage or attack. We also got rid of the more advanced weapons like the repeating crossbow and the composite bow. We also didn’t use anything on the extended item list like sun rods, or tangle foot bags.

We also changed the magic system some. This was my biggest beef with the game. The DM, Ray, decided that magic would be more primitive as well. Since we couldn’t mine he cut out any spell that required silver or gold (even though the Incans and many other ‘Native’ cultures could). Then he cut the spell list in half, saying that we didn’t have access to any spell above 5^th level. Magic was supposed to be rare, and mystical so only a very few could use it so that the few spells we had were supposed to be game changing. It did add some excitement and allure, but it didn’t quite work out the way he intended.

There was also a huge change in the way we saw the world. Our society was based on being farmers who were still big on the migrant hunter/gather roots. There weren’t large cities or businesses, but there were still artisans and craftsman who worked on a sort of clan need/ barter system. It really changed the way we saw things and the way we adventured. We didn’t work for ‘want’ because there was no personal gain, I don’t think we even had money. We just did what we could for the greater good of all and that was something we had never done before.

Secrets Within The Game

Playing a game in the past Ray wanted to remake one of great moments in the game. He secretly wanted me to replay one of my old characters with a twist. He named my new character with a perfect combination of my old character’s name so that unless you said the whole title really fast you couldn’t make the connection. As it was, no one made the connection until the DM and I connected the dots for them. I was playing the death shaman, not that I was necessarily evil as we worshiped the cycle of life. It didn’t work out very well for several reasons, and it had a lot to do with the limitations the DM placed on me and the imbalance it created in the game.

The shaman was a cross between a sorcerer and a cleric with d6 hp and weakest attack rate. Not being able to have silver or gold in the game was a pretty big problem from a spell component stand point. I couldn’t create holy water, or use many of the clerical spells I was given. That led me to start creating rituals to compensate for the missing spell components. I came up with some pretty cool and gross stuff that impressed the group. After that I made up seasonal rituals and magic creation rituals. One of my favorite ones was to shrink heads. We killed the Gregarian, our word for dragon, and I used the ritual to shrink the dragon’s head on a staff and tried to turn it into a badass magic item, but no dice. Seeing as no one else was willing to play an impaired mage there was no ‘good’ shaman so I created some rituals that restored hp based on death of another creature. That really turned out to be my most useful skill, but since I couldn’t do it in mid-combat it became pretty useless really fast.

Then Things Went Terribly Wrong-

Even with a significant handicap I was pretty strong once I got some better spells. The other players, however, were persistently murmuring complaints about the game, and they were less and less willing to play unless some changes were made. The DM caved, restarted the game, and then added in so much CRAP it wasn’t even funny. Everyone but me got to roll up a new character which was stupid because they now knew everything about me and acted accordingly (ie ooci). There was nothing I could do to sway them the way I wanted. Plus the DM saw how I over came the enemy’s ridiculously high SR’s and saves so the few spells that I had used were useless. Then he added more healing, because not being able to heal efficiently in the last game slowed it down terribly, and I became a bystander and more often a victim! That wasn’t even the worst of it.

He added a class called the scout. It had ranger feats and favored enemy along with some of the badass Su abilities of the Arcane Archer class! That’s not all! It also had the casting ability of the ranger! I was supposed to be the big bad with casting power even though I was capped at lvl 5 spells, but this guy had oodles of combat power and could cast as much me! I had nothing that I could offer the group and I was often made to slink by in their shadows lest one of them decided to use me as a scratching post! I had never before, or ever since, been so humiliated. The thing that made me quit was that one of the guys wished to be a good shaman at level 20. He had made it there with super combat powers, and then got to switch over just as my class was getting good! I had to give up 7 levels because a ritual I used to save my life and I could never get any exp to catch up with the rest of the group! At that point I could no longer see the value of my character, not even as a wise man with sage advice.

But For You It Can Be Different

There is a way to have a really cool Stone Age game.  Just follow some of these suggestions and I’m pretty sure that you can have a pretty enjoyable game.

Weapons will be the first major area of concern for you. The Stone Age is marked by the fact that metal working wasn’t possible, or at least wasn’t wide spread. Just go down the list and mark off every weapon that is made mostly of metal. That means swords are gone for sure, as well as throwing stars, and other such things. It will take a DM’s judgment call. Axes are a good compromise because they have a mostly wooden shaft and the metal part can be substituted with well worked stone or high quality/ magical wood. Spears and daggers and can be modified exactly the same way, and probably even easier. You should nix any weapons with moving parts, which means no repeating crossbows, and the more complex weapons, so that means no recurve, or composite bows. You’re arrows are also going to be made of stone tips instead of metal like steel or iron. In some cases you may want to say these improvised weapons are more awkward or unwieldy so they impose a -1 to attack, or that they are less effective so they impose a -1 (or 2) to damage (remember successful attacks always deal at least 1 point of damage unless mitigated by something, like damage reduction.) Not all weapons of the Stone Age suck as they can be quite vicious like say a club with jagged spikes of metal, rock and wood.

There is one hitch with this variation. D&D is based on the medieval times and incorporating magic powers into your weapon which usually requires major weapon smithing. Think about it, you are in the ‘beginning’ when legends walked the world and everything was new. Legends often start because something is special or something unexpected happened. Once we had a character that made a one in a million shot at maximum range with no special feats and scored a double critical killing the target in one hit. The NPC’s and PC’s alike knew that this guy was no crack shot so the mojo must have been in the weapon. Many people heard it and more and more began to believe it. The bow became a thing of legends that ended up having a bunch of bonuses. In practice the weapon gives the player bonuses to attack and damage just like any other magical weapon ever made and as the weapon ages it can become more powerful.

Another example could be like the people crafting the first metal weapon. Since it’s so much more powerful than anything else around and so unique or rare that they believe it is magical. The weapon gets passed down by a family through the ages, or passed from strongest to strongest in conquest. In later ages the weapon can break and there can be a quest to reforge it. It is also possible to have your shaman or witch cast a hex upon the weapon. You can even have ancient symbols or other such things carved into the blade or haft of a weapon to give it power. Honestly, that’s why I love paper and pencil play because you are only limited by your imagination.

The next big wipe out of your equipment will be the extended items list. Just think ‘would the hunter gathers have used this?’ If it seems too refined or complex then feel free to dump it. They had a way to do things back then, and it’s something you really need than do some research on the thing. When you go fishing use a gig stick instead of a fishing pole. There are many more tricks to catching the little buggers as people have been eating them since the dawn of time. It’s even better if you don’t know a whole of what went on back then as your players are free to come up with whatever answers they can find and that can be a laugh riot.

Ray had good intentions when he wanted to remake the feel of magic, but just cutting a primary spell caster’s ability to nothing isn’t the way to go. If you want to remake the feel then change certain spells. Change the spells components to more rudimentary elements like crows claws, eye of newt or frog tongues. Make certain spells have more exotic components that require quests, or require long, drawn out rituals. Some spells can be banned completely or at least out of play for the PC’s. One such spell I always ban is True Resurrection. It’s lame for someone to just jump back into their meat suit with no draw backs, or strings attached. In my games, even the more advanced ones, only the chosen few may return from the great beyond and it’s at great cost. If you want a good example of what it should be like to bring people back then watch Conan. It’s fair to me and sound game mechanically sound if it’s banned equally from the PC’s and NPC’s alike. In Ray’s game I was boned because I couldn’t scrounge enough power together to cast 6^th level spells while the bad guys were throwing 9^th level spells with the flick of a wrist.

The really fun part is remaking the rest of your word! In a more primitive age magic abounds almost everywhere in everything. Trees can walk and talk, rivers could have spirits that can become overly interested in players and other things just like that. Just literally let your imagination run wild. I mean if your players are looking for information about who went where who would know better than the mountain spirit that eternally looks over the road ways. Seriously, have pixies and dryads run through the trees and play pranks on the PC’s or even have them ask for help when it’s appropriate. Just make it a rustic, mythic play land. The coolest part is that you can have primordial gods (as avatars) just walk up to players and interact with them just like any other NPC. I think it could totally remake your gaming experience when you can just brush shoulders with them immortals, their chosen and the most powerful of creatures your world may ever know.

The quest concept of your game may need some tweaking, too. Where the Lord of the Rings had the poor fellowship trekking across the globe hitting every major city and populace center, a Stone Age game would work a little differently. At this point and time your people are somewhere between hunter/gathers and creating large settlements. Most people never leave home because not only is there nowhere for them to go, but their ability to travel is nominal and separating yourself from the ‘herd’ is near suicide. So you quests aren’t usually going to have a whole lot of travel. With magic and spirits roving about, and the powers that be lurking around every corner your adventures are going to be centrally located. Great evils can exist in caves, spring up in caverns ripped open in the earth or at the mouth of rivers to drown mortal men. A lot of your conflict can revolve man vs possessed nature or primordial forces.

The purpose of questing will, or, at least, should change. This is the age where humanity is just beginning to pull it together. Everyone must pull together just to survive. Your players will less likely be playing for personal gain like gold and magic items, but for mere survival for themselves and for those that depend on them. They will fight for honor, quest for prestige and fight against the primordial forces of nature itself.

They will undoubtedly become the strongest force within their village. They will become heroes and champions of the people and spoken of in reverence for ages to come. In such a way they can become bigger than life. Further quests maybe against the strongest warriors of other villages for rights to hunting and land, or to settle blood feuds. It can involve reshaping the landscape with feats of strength and self sacrifice (think of Paul Bunyan!). Those of the truly epic persuasion can challenges the gods themselves to bring order and peace to the world, or to become gods themselves (hey they have to come from somewhere).

Fights With A Twist!

Since you won’t have access to every metal in creation, and magic weapon smithing maybe limited, you may have to change the way players fight, or have to kill monsters. I suggest making combat more ritualistic. If you need an example of what I speak of, then watch a few episodes of Supernatural. These are average humans who have to follow a prescribed course of action to kill all the baddies they meet. Certain things must be staked I the heart, others can’t cross salt lines and the worst can be trapped in hex symbols until they can be exorcised (by a shaman?). If the creature has some kind of super high damage reduction and the players don’t have the means to bypass it then create something else that will work, or make it a ‘survival’ fight where they have to last for so long (like until sunrise).

Oh, and please, be creative. If you’re looking for new options then you may feel like (and probably do) know everything about the game. I suggest that the DM describe things as if you’re seeing them for the first time. Use the lack of light, or confusion to your advantage and tell them what they see, or think they see. If it’s a monster with a very signature look then change its appearance until it’s unrecognizable, or create one of your own monsters with similar properties. We once went toe to toe with a troll and didn’t realize it, the DM described it and left the name for us to come up with since we were the ones who discovered it. This bitch haunted us for games since we didn’t figure out who to kill it the first time the fear of fighting the ‘unbeatable one’ was enough to keep us from tangling with it! Dragons were worshiped nearly as gods and fed sacrifices! Just see how your players react to the same old same old when it wears a new face!

Advanced Civs

There are bound to be more advanced civilizations in your game than the one your players are immersed in. Just like our world, not everyone was on the same page at the same time, and those who were ahead of the ‘game’ conquered all the known world. Just think of when the Spanish ran into the Native Americans, or the English ran roughshod all over Africa. Often times the lesser civ loses out and then the conquered people come up to par with their conquerors after sometime of stigma (either slavery, or being 2^nd class citizens). If you want to keep your Stone Age ‘pure’ then make some reasons why this won’t happen. Mountains, gorges and raging rivers make great natural barriers that can keep the masses separated, but allow for a trickle of visitors each way. The more advanced civ can operate off of a non-interference clause, or deny the lesser civ the better tech because they aren’t ‘ready’ for it yet. It’s okay to let your PC’s to have better equipment than what is averagely available as long as it doesn’t saturate the game, and change the feel of it. If it does then make changes such as above by limiting contact and intentionally holding back.

Game on people!

I hope you found this useful and enlightening J!

I’ve taken some art classes so I understand some of the most basic concepts. One is the sense of motion and drawing the eye around the page. I just wanted you to know the awesome pictures that are in my head and what I can’t share with you because I lack the skill.

To Stop and Smell the Roses

Using the rule of thirds I would start with a rose bush in the bottom right portion of the page verging toward intersection 4. The roses would be a lushus red. I would draw beads of dew rolling down the petals. I would draw a small sampling of bugs indistinctly crawling up the stem and aphid in flight from middle right to bottom center. The next piece would be Death. He would be bent over delicately holding the blossom with the bright red contrasting against a skeletal boney white hand. His face would be just peeking out from his dark hood. The robe would be a light, sun-bleached gray that gives way to what looks like bone white creases/ thread bare spots. It supposed to give him an ageless, unstoppable feel which clashes with this moment of leisure. Death would be ‘rounded’ while he’s hunched over, but his back leg would be razor straight, pointing to the bottom left. The cloak would be bunched and dappled with shadows which, when teamed with the sinuous curve of Death should create a sense of movement. Death would have his scythe on his far side and leaning away from the viewer to give the picture a sense of depth. The scythe would be 1 ¼ to ½ times taller than Death to give a sense of being immense and to allude to his true height. The haft of the scythe would be angled towards intersection 1 and the blade would extend past the furthest point of Death’s reaching hand. The blade would look like sinuous M with the lower half brightly burnished and the top will be a darker metallic grey. The top half would have Gallic symbols etched in the blade to honor my Irish roots. Balancing the blade is a counter weight pike on the opposite side. It would be burnished brightly and conical with dark concentric circles to highlight the roundness and vanishing point. The pike, with the scythe leaning to the back, will be pointing straight to left, bottom section.

 In the 3^rd intersection will be a raven. It will be perched but its wings will be flexing to add energy and movement. The bird’s head will be tossed back continuing the circular motion of Death and his scythe. The raven is throwing his head back to swallow a ripe, bloody eye with a retinal vein leading back to the corpse which also serves as the perch. The corpse’s torso will be in the bottom left corner with head (attached) resting in the bottom center panel. The body’s armor would be large rings on top and tiny metallic sequins with some patches highly burnished but most dull or downright dirty. On the body which is lying flat on its back, will have 2 arrows. The first one will be slanted away from the head and point of point of entry closer to the viewer forensically suggesting he was shot from below (riding a horse) and the shaft snapped to suggest that it wasn’t the shot that killed him. The second shot would be right of center in the chest (away from viewer) and sticking almost straight up with the feathers suggesting it was the kill shot fired by a right handed shooter after the victim fell to where it lies. The neck will be covered in dingy white lace and will wear a gold necklace with a golden metal diamond shaped pendant. The diamond shape will have solid golden lines leading to center which stop at an inner diamond shape. The inner diamond will have a ruby studded rose. The rose as a symbol of the knights templar, which, with the lace and suggestion of riding a horse, will suggest he was wealthy and powerful. Also the rose will make a connection to the rose bush and Death.

The pendant bottom will be pointing to the bottom of the page hanging in line with the neck and laying across the left arm almost at arm pit. The upper portion of the chain would be tight and the bottom half would have some slack. The left arm would, in line with the rest of the body, would be lying across the bottom center frame with the hand stopping near intersection 4. The arm would be covered in sequined metal until ¾ up the forearm which then shows a dingy white sleeve with lace at the wrist. The very dirty, boney hand will rigor mortise-ly be pointing towards be pointing towards the bush and Death completing the macabre circular motion of the picture. The pinky finger of the left hand will be wearing a signet ring of 2 men riding one horse, a symbol of poverty used by the knight’s templar. The image would only be partially visible showing only the head of the horse and 1^st knight. Artistically the ring could be turned more to center and reveal the whole image. The head will be desiccated and have a grayish-blue tint to skin. The lips will be thin and drawn in death’s grin. The gums will be black-red and receding. There will be teeth missing, but they will look good. The right ear will be missing (which will be pointing to the top of the picture) with the face looking at the viewer. The right eye will be missing with beak marks above and below. There will be a slice exposing sun bleached skull and the skin will be pulling tightly. There will be dried blood around the wound. The nose will be nothing but a cavity. The left eye will be partially obscured by the arm and will be cold and cloudy, but will reflect the setting sun. The picture will be cast in an orange/red light, and the sky will have dark blue/purple tint. The rest of the scene will have patchy grass in barren rocky dirt. Far in the back ground will be almost indistinct people who will be fighting and dying with all the different weapons there have or will be made.

Digital TV

I don’t know how your situation at home is, but life has been hell on the boats. Let me clarify, I work offshore on a push boat going to small inland oil fields or small refineries. We never really go out into the open Gulf because we would be bashed apart by the waves. Now I was hardly the average consumer they thought of when they passed the law to convert all analog TV to digital only, but it has a had a huge impact on all those that don’t sit still. Digital TV signal, on a good day, goes out every time someone uses their radio to talk to each other, which is a lot because they don’t want to have any accidents. With analog signal you didn’t have that problem. You might have had an increase in snow, but the sound was continuous and you could still see enough of the show to know what was going on. So there’s 3 to 6 seconds of complete blackout every minute or so which is proceeded and followed by several ‘skips’ which completely disrupts any continuity especially on game shows like Jeopardy. It’s really annoying when you only see half the question or you completely miss the answer. Now you think I’m a small fraction of the population, but there is a huge offshore industry which is forced to live out here on the water and it’s one of our few entertainments and or only real source of news and weather. (Hint: Weather plays a huge factor in our daily lives and work.)

Now I know of a few people who can’t afford satellite or cable, whose costs keeps rising. My mom is one of those people, and she was forced to buy a Digital converter box, though she used the government coupon to buy it. She has an antenna, never moves and there aren’t any high frequency radios that interrupt signal, but she complains constantly about how her shows go in and out like it does on the boats. It’s very disruptive, as I said before, and it’s her main source of daily news and information. Anyone who makes enough money to not qualify (or accept) government support, but not enough to keep ahead of their bills are at the mercy of over the air digital TV. They lose much of the daily entertainment which we all took for granted when we had the constant analog signal.

Who Won Out In The Deal

Nothing happens in Washington without it benefiting some lobbyist and greasing the palm of some elected official that supposed to have our best interests at heart. I think that there was someone making a lot of money on both the issuing of the government coupons and another on the digital TV and the selling of the converter boxes. There was also the rush of people that went out to buy the latest, greatest TV so they could forever leave behind the out dated analog signal. I further believe that the powers that be knew that these stop gap measures wouldn’t work so we would all be forced to buy into the expensive satellite or cable TV.

I would personally like to know why we were forced to go along with this. Why weren’t we given the option to vote? This is a democracy (or really a republic) so there we should have had at least some kind of say. We have massive rallies and commercials for presidents who are only around for 4 to 8 years and some of them have had negligible lasting effects. This affects the whole country for the rest of our lives. This affects the way we send and receive information. This gives controlling interest and selective broadcasting rights to a proportionately small group of people who weren’t elected, or chosen by the elected, but chosen by our falsely limited choices. We may still have freedom of speech, but our ability to receive and there by create our opinions based on unbiased information due to the limited reception ability severely undermines our natural rights. I hope one day that the reception ability and broad casting power adequately improves so that all people can once again contiguously receive all broadcast information and allow us to freely choose what we believe.

3D! It’s for you; it’s for me! Yippee! Insouciant

Ok, I maybe starting to sound like an old curmudgeon, but man, oh man, do I hate this ‘innovation’ of 3-D movies. I really thought that 3-D was some kind of fad that popped and fizzled in the 70’s and 80’s. I mean the last prime time flopper of 3-D was some terrible Super Bowl halftime show. I fortunately don’t remember much except for a screen full of wanna be 3-D records floating across the screen as some guy rocked out. I guess they didn’t know that a TV doesn’t show a picture in the right way for you to see it as a 3-D image with the old trusty blue and red paper glasses. Needless to say the ‘experience’ was a flop of epic proportions.

The movies I’ve seen use 3-D in the usual, most juvenile ways. Like think of the latest Beowulf with Angelina Jolie as the monster. The use of 3-D was to make you homophobicly afraid of the king’s toga falling off and getting an eye full of 3-D eye poking wiener. Then there were the really ‘cool’ moments when lances were coming at you and other bullshit like that. I mean, was it any more interesting in Avatar when the bullets were coming at you? Even if the effects really kicked ass and enhanced the movie to any appreciable degree, the entire movie sucked anyway. I thought movie makers were making much more interesting headway with stop motion, full action filming such as in The Matrix.

When I see things in real life, it’s no more ‘3-D’ to me than watching TV. Things don’t really come ‘out at me’ until they are almost at arm’s reach.  I mean I suspect most people are like me. Our lives aren’t filled with wacky visions of random crap just flying out at us. Trust me, our lives would be a stressed out hell.

Besides being mostly useless for actually adding value to the movie going experience you are extorted an extra $ 3 to 5, depending on how ‘awesome’ your local theater is and you usually can’t even circumvent the cost by bringing your own pair of glasses because it’s a ‘fee’ already calculated into the ticket’s price. The best part is you are basically forced to recycle those moronic glasses in a ‘green’ movement. I mean you pay extra money for these **** glasses and you don’t even get to keep them. You are charged full price for the same used merchandise again and again. Surely someone has to bring attention to the fact that this can hardly be ethical and shouldn’t be even legal.

For me, the nail in the coffin is the fact that my wife has astigmatism. Any movie in 3-D, any movie at all, is off limits for us. A large portion of the world has astigmatism and when you have that and try to watch a very long movie in 3-D it makes you sick and gives you major headaches. I love going to the movies even though I don’t get to go a lot. Most of the really cool movies that catch our eye because of cool previews are off limits since all the theaters playing them are only showing the 3-D versions to maximize revenue.  So for my wife and the millions of people with astigmatism, and those who love them, are forever screwed out of seeing the better movies. The only real technical benefit for anybody is that 3-D movies are harder to copy and there by harder to spread around for free. So really, it would just be rockin’ if you movie makers would just get freakin’ real and drop the whole bullshit of trying to make a ‘good’ 3-D movie.

3-D HD TV in Dolby Surround Sound (Where (if ever) Available)

With the hype of 3-D raging through the movie world, the powers that be decided that It would be a good thing if they brought this ‘wondrous’ technology to our very own living rooms. I have to say ‘stop right there.’ They are trying to sell us this **** 3D TV’s idea when almost no TV programming is in actual HD quality. Now do you expect TV programmers at large to buy these expensive cameras that record in 3D? Oh no, I foresee it being more like that craptastic remake of the Clash of the Titans where they made it with regular cameras and forced to look like 3D. So it’s going to be a half ass attempt to get you to buy an expensive ass piece of **** that will work at quarter capacity at its best.

You May Actually Be On To Something

The only promising idea I’ve heard so far is that 3D has potential application for video games. This is cool because the average gamer is looking for as full immersion experience their games as possible. In fact if the average game system was VR people would line up around the blocks to get it. Plus game makers will spend whatever they have to make the latest greatest game out there because they know they will get the return. Even if one game fails others will build up on the bones of the fallen until they get it right, and with each foray into the new it becomes more practical and accessible. Besides charging a lot up front, they also make a lot of money on the back side by charging a monthly subscription rate which people who are hooked on it will continuously play, assuming they can get enough hours in the real world to hold down a job and pay for their fix. This is seriously the best  and only real successful venture I see in the upcoming years for 3D.