22 Apr 05
If you examine the amazing detail that Tolkien put into his imaginary world of Middle-earth, and how it has sparked the imaginations of millions for a generation—you’d be forgiven for thinking that this creation is unique in its complexity. But there is another world, less well known but just as complex, multi-hued, and co-incidently also the life’s work of a professor of linguistics. His name is Professor M. A. R. Barker, and the world is called Tékumel (tay-koo-mayl). I first became interested in this place in my early teens, when it was the subject of a now-classic roleplaying game called The Empire of the Petal Throne. It came out about the same time as Dungeons & Dragons, but far from the kind of generic Tolkienesque style of that game, it was a fully developed, decidedly non-Western melieu of original fantasy.
I forgot about it for about fifteen years, and then stumbled across one of Professor Barker’s novels (there are five so far) set on Tékumel in a second-hand bookstore. The vividness of Tékumel came flooding back, and I decided to give this world a website, a home on the internet. That was almost eight years ago, and Tekumel: The World of the Petal Throne has grown into a site of some 290 pages that is not only a repository for online versions of material dating back to 1975, but a place where you can spend many, many hours reading about this amazing world and the people, societies and creatures that live on it. I’ve just re-launched the site and it has been improved in every way. If you like imaginary worlds, you are in for a big treat—welcome to Tékumel!
Roleplaying Games Tekumel
20 Apr 05
Let me see … European? Check. Doddering old man? Check. Thinks gay people have a ‘condition’ (euphemism for they’ll burn in Hell everlasting)? Check. Would see women as priests over his dead body? Check. Wrote to priests in the US telling them not to vote for the Catholic John Kerry because of his stand on abortion? Check. Rejects the marriage of priests? Check. Rejects all other forms of religion as deficient (even other Christian ones)? Check.
Hmmm … welcome to a new era of tolerance, humility, Christian values—oh, and and millions more dying in Africa because Catholic priests teach condoms cause AIDS, rampant overpopulation in Latin America due to lack of birth control, no freedom of choice for women, the covering up of child abuse … Chosen by God? Chosen by a pack of conservative old men desperately hanging onto their power more likely. Wake up world!
Opinions
20 Apr 05
I read the book by Ian McEwan some time ago and was impressed at its multi-layered, subtle portrayal of obsession. Director Roger Michell has travelled a long way from his best known work on Notting Hill and delivers a get-under-your-skin, though slightly pedestrian, telling of McEwan’s tale.
Anyone who has read the book will tell you how shocking the open scene is, and justice is done to it here with choppy editing and a complete lack of music. The latter is a blessing since the music throughout is one of the worst features of this film, going from a bland but good enough three note signature to a terrible ‘English drama on the telly’ theme that cheapens the whole production.
Anyway, Joe (an excellent Daniel Craig) and Claire (Samantha Morton) are lovers enjoying an idyllic picnic when Joe suddenly finds himself part of a terrible incident involving a hot air balloon and the age old question of ‘when to let go’. One of the other men involved in the incident is a lonely obsessive called Jed (Rhys Ifans finally getting to show his range as an actor), who becomes convinced that he and Joe are meant to be together. His habit of referring to Joe as ‘Joe Joe’ was particularly disturbing to my girlfriend as—phonetically—that’s the nickname I have for her.
Enduring Love would have a very hard time delivering the subtleties of the novel, and one has to wonder why Joe never calls the police at any point, but on the whole the film is creepy and engaging enough, with a touch of complexity in its meditations about the nature of love. English films featuring well-off upper middle class intellectuals getting their comeuppance seem to be a bit too common, and Joe’s sketchily developed career as a university lecturer going on and on about ‘what is love?’ doesn’t work, but the film’s gritty realism is mostly effective (Bill Nighy is especially sympathetic as Joe’s friend). Ifans plays Jed with frustrating intensity and absolute conviction. But it’s the two main protagonists, and their existence on two opposite ends of the concept of love that in a strange way almost brings them together, that makes this more than just another stalker story.
Three ripcords out of five.
Movies and TV
16 Apr 05
Back in the 80s, a few friends and I, having done the requisite time in our early teens playing Dungeons & Dragons, were looking for a system a little more gritty, ‘realistic’, and ‘mature’ with which to enjoy our roleplaying sessions. And along came Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay with the tagline ‘A Grim World of Perilous Adventure’, which fitted the bill perfectly with its grotty 15th century German-ish milieu. There followed a campaign that, off and on, lasted years, and featured some of the most hilarious and enjoyable moments I’ve ever had with a group of friends.
It’s been a good ten years since I did much in the way of running a roleplaying campaign, but with the release of the new 2nd Edition Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay that group of friends is clamouring to get playing again (in between jobs, wives and lives). And with the same beloved characters—so pretty soon, the so-called ‘Merry Pranksters’ should once again start terrorizing peasants, cultists and nobility alike: Lucidius Lavarar, a flamboyant raconteur with a preference for polka-dot shirts and fleecing innocents of their money, Alitl Flagelant, a smelly, embarrassing dwarf, Fatuus Fitzue, a shabby, nondescript wizard, and Robert Lacy D’Aghuitlam duCourt, a once-noble elf with a brief drug problem.
I was worried the new edition might have seen WFRP‘s distinctive atmosphere swallowed up by the money-making behemoth that is Games Workshop and their kiddy version of the Warhammer World. To my relief however the new book is excellent—well written and well designed, some of the clunkier rules streamlined and, despite a few changes to the background material and history I won’t be using, the atmosphere still thick and—well, grim. The new combat system, while I have yet to try it out, seems smart. It divides the combat round up into half actions, full actions, and free actions, thus forcing the player to think a little more about the options than just “I take a swing at ‘im.” Combat is still very deadly, as it should be, which keeps the emphasis on roleplaying and story. The new magic system seems simple, but introduces all manner of frightening side effects that make magic use dangerous and unpredictable. Everything has been standardised to use a ten-sided dice, and both skill use and combat can easily be modified by an across-the-board ‘easy to hard’ set of standard modifiers. Simple.
But WFRP isn’t really about rules, though these are very good. It’s about superior story, atmosphere and character. A new campaign is on the way (along with a Bestiary and Gamemaster’s Pack; two other releases, a Character Pack and Plundered Vaults, a set of mini-adventures, are already on the shelves), and if it’s anything near as good as the old Enemy Within campaign, they’ll be many very enjoyable evenings gathered around a table laughing our heads off to come.
There’s nothing like a vivid imagination to keep you from growing up.
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition is available from Black Industries or Green Ronin.
Roleplaying Games Warhammer, WFRP
14 Apr 05
Fredrick Ödman Photography Stunning Heironymous Bosch-ian reality from a very appropriately named photographer
Diversions
13 Apr 05
Evening sky and ocean and Carol. Heron Island.
Travel Barrier Reef
13 Apr 05
Baby turtle, Heron Island.
Travel Barrier Reef
13 Apr 05
If you’re ever down in Australia and feel like a ‘resort holiday’, I can highly recommend Heron Island. Five nights there felt like a month’s break. I also managed to fit in six dives on the Great Barrier Reef, and the highlight was encountering two huge (at least 2.5 metres from wingtip to wingtip) manta rays, slowly circling above a coral outcrop 15 metres below the surface.
The island, at least when we were there, swarms with birds chattering away all day and all night; a bit noisy when you first arrive but you soon find the calls relaxing, and it sure beats traffic noise. Every evening we went down to the beach (a complete circuit of the tiny island takes about forty minutes) to watch baby turtles crawl out of the sand and make their desperate rush to the sea. Truly the cutest baby animals on the planet, the staff know them as ‘sea biscuits’ because of the unfortunate fact that just about every form of wildlife in the sea or flying above it loves to snack on them. Only about 1 in a 1,000 make it to adulthood. Trying to improve the odds, we would protect them from gulls and, at least for a little way into the water, small reef sharks and eels.
The city seems a mad, noisy, smelly place after a tropical island. Check out some shots on the Photos page.
PS. Sorry for the lack of updates. I’ll back in the swing of things soon.
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