Category Archives: Family

Heroscape

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When NatureBoy and I attended NorthEast Wars in April, one of the events we played was a six-person Heroscape game. I hadn’t played it before; I think NB may have played with a friend more than a year prior. Although my army died early-on, NB stayed in the game almost to the end. He had a great time, and decided that he wanted a Heroscape set for his birthday.

Heroscape battle

The game features hexagonal plastic terrain pieces that snap and stack together to build a battle scenario. Then players create armies from miniatures, some of which are single “hero” characters while others are groups of less powerful units called “squads.” The rules for movement and combat are straight-forward and consistent. The object is to be the “last person standing.”

Heroscape close-up

NB received the Rise of the Valkyrie Master Set and the Volcarren Wasteland expansion set, and we have played several games. In fact, he and BW have played several games, and she even likes it. W00T! I expect this will be a staple of our gaming for a long while.

No heroes can withstand the might of...

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Whale’s Tale water park

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I have a lot of topics to post about. Here’s a fun one from last weekend.

Beloved Wife surprised me on Sunday morning, suggesting that we head to Whale’s Tale Waterpark for the day. I was giddy. 🙂

Whale’s Tale is in Lincoln, N.H., about a two-hour drive, but it’s closer than Splashwater Kingdom, and much nicer, IMHO. BW had a cooler packed with lunches, snacks and beverages in a flash, and then bought tickets online so we wouldn’t have to wait in line.

Much to our surprise, there was no line at all. Just lots of sun, slides, and pools.

NatureBoy and me in the wave pool

NatureBoy is not a thrill-seeker. In fact, he refuses to go on most amusement park rides, and waterpark tubes and slides are no different. But he loves the wave pool, and we alternated between swimming in the wave pool, and BW and me enjoying the other attractions while NB took some pictures and even video.

In fact, here’s one of his videos, this one of BW and me riding Whale’s Tale’s most recent attraction, the Bonzai Pipeline:

BW’s blog has several more photo’s and a video of each of us riding Eye of the Storm. I really like that one! I’m hoping we get in one more trip to Whale’s Tale this summer.

Guilty (campy) pleasures

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I have to confess that, although we haven’t watched broadcast or cable TV in years, TV was a big part of my life until pretty recently. Now, we watch DVDs we own or get from Netflix. But Netflix also offers some of their content to watch online. And we’ve been enjoying Hercules: the Legendary Journeys and Xena: the Warrior Princess.

Hecules cover Xena cover

The acting is, ahem, rough, shall we say? and the action and stunts are still a lot of fun. I like the low-budget sets and costumes, and the occasional oopses. And we just noticed the disclaimers in the credits: “No males, centaurs or amazons were harmed in the filming of this motion picture” was in Hooved & Harlots, for example.

It does make me pine for a better AV setup, and some home theater PC solution. But we make do.

Thank you, Gary Gygax

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The news that the creator of Dungeons & Dragons had died spread very quickly. And Geeks around the world have been expressing their feelings about his passing.

Order of the Stick had a nice send-off cartoon. Paul Tevis, Judd Karlman and others have shared their thoughts.

And now, a tribute song from Uncle Monsterface. Rock on!

Here’s my bit:

Dungeons & Dragons had a huge impact on me as a kid. I remember being in drafting class in seventh grade, and seeing a kid pull out the basic set box (red, I think, in 1981). I was immediately drawn to it, and asked the kid if he could teach me how to play. He said yeah, but I was new at the school and it never happened.

My parents were pretty hip, though, and got me the Moldvay Basic set and made an attempt to play with me, but I don’t remember playing more than once with my dad. 🙂 I did lots of solo play, and collected the expert set, and then some AD&D stuff. But I never found anyone to actually play with.

I didn’t actually play until college, when my friends Jim, Jeremy, and Brendan and I played through Castle Amber. I still have a crayon drawing that Jeremy did of our fight with a dragon. It was very cool.

Fast-forward almost fifteen years, and I’m married with a young son who taught himself to read when he was three. He loves stories, and we’ve read Harry Potter together. I still have a few D&D books and metal minis that I painted as a kid. NatureBoy is fascinated. Then I run across the 3.5 edition Basic set in Barnes & Noble.

The first day we had it, I ran NB and a very good-sport Beloved Wife through a few scenes. Then NB decided that he wanted to be the DM. Once he understood that the DM didn’t “win” if the monsters ate all the characters, he did a pretty good job.

Now gaming is a constant thread in our lives. We’ve been to several (very local) gaming conventions, played D&D, Faery’s Tale, Cat, and lots of board and card games. We’re in the third year of D&D group I run for some area young people. I’ve even made new adult friends and have grown-up gaming time, too.

All this is to say that the thing that Gary made had a big impact on me as a child, and now it’s enriching my adult life and my relationship with my son.

Many thanks and Blessed Be, Gary.

Hard work pays off

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NatureBoy started Kempo Karate classes at the very end of January, and has been working hard. We even enrolled in in Martial Arts camp for this school vacation. Yesterday, he told us that we would be surprised when we picked him up today, and to wait for him in the car. So we arrived at the dojo, and NB came right out sporting his new yellow belt. He couldn’t have been prouder. Neither could we.

Well done, NatureBoy.

Northeast Wars

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Northeast Wars logo

I’ve volunteered to run two role playing games at the upcoming Northeast Wars gaming convention. These will be my first experiences GMing convention games, but I’m pretty excited.

The first game is Dogs in the Vineyard, by Vincent Baker. The characters are a sort of religious police watching over communities of faithful pioneers in a setting much like territorial Utah.

Whitefalls – Dogs in the Vineyard
Townsfolk were much relieved when the infant daughter of the Steward recovered from the fever sickness. Their joy soon turned to grief when the young son of the miller was found in the woods near town, beaten to death. Horror and fear have become suspicions and accusations that fester and threaten to tear the town apart. You’re there to protect the Faith and make things right — one way or another. You are one of God’s Watchdogs.

The second game is a scenrio for Faery’s Tale, a rules-light rpg where the characters play faeries in a fantasy forest; the kind of place where any “Once upon a time” story could take place.

The Magic Pool – Faery’s Tale
The Laughing Brook’s cool, clear water flows quickly from the hills deep in Brightwood Forest. And legends tell that the pool at the source of the brook has mystical powers. But recently, the voice of the water sings of sadness, its waters clouded with mud and filth. Already, the animals and plants near the fouled waters are grown sickly. What malevolence has tainted the Laughing Brook? Who will venture to its source and restore the Laughing Brook before this blight spreads throughout Brightwood? You are a faery, and you’re the only one who can. Soar.

I’m very excited to run these games. I have a lot of prep work to do over the next few weeks. But I’m looking forward to it.

Gaming goodness: BattleLore

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It’s been a busy week, and now that we’re having an ice storm, I’m holed-up at home and have a chance to write a couple of posts. Last weekend, Beloved Wife was a whirlwind of productivity as she prepared for her week of academics.

NatureBoy and I stayed out of her way by playing two games of BattleLore, by Days of Wonder.
BattleLore campaign underway

Beloved Wife got this game for me last Solstice (2006), but I haven’t played it very often because it takes a long time to set up, and then quite a while to play. We had plenty of time, though, and we played through the third and fourth scenarios from the adventure book.

NatureBoy’s record of victory is still unbroken [sigh]. We decided that it’s a fun game and we should play it more often. Maybe with a little practice, I’ll be able to win one every now and then. Also, we haven’t had a chance to play with the Lore component, yet. So there’s more to explore in this cool game.

Sky pirates

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I was working at home in the afternoon, yesterday, and NatureBoy was keeping himself busy in the living room. After a while he made his way to the dining room where I was, making buzzy machine sound effects and moving this contraption through the imaginary sky:

His Flying Pirate Ship looks really incredible. NatureBoy said it was sort of like the Tiger Moth from Castle in the Sky, but different. I have a knack for taking crappy pictures, so let me start by saying that my attempts at a backdrop and back lighting just don’t do his creation justice.

He has built a lot of things with Klutz Building Cards. This flying pirate ship was built with the Pirate Ship set, and the jolly roger flapping proudly in the wind.

The other day, he made a U.S.S. Enterprise after we watched some Star Trek TOS episodes.

Way to go, NB.