Sypherkhode822

Nar Mat Kordh-Ishi - an Orcish saga

Rassmata:

I'm crouching in the cellars with a terrified human steward trying to find a casket of pitch.

"Please, sir, we ha-ha-had stored so-mmmm-some pitch just last mo-montth. It must be around here somewhere."

The frail old man is dressed in his finest regalia, presumably because he had visions of dying alongside his mistress after throwing himself nobly to his death to save her from the cruel orcs, and he wanted to look his best. And when the orcs didn't kill them, he contented himself with looking good as a prisoner. If he had known that he would be helping me find some pitch to replace my used firebombs, I think he might have dressed more suitably.

"No worries, sir. I dint wish to bother you, but I needed your help, sir."

Both me and the steward are uncomfortable with one another and the situation, so we've both reverted to speaking as formally as we can, each deferring to the other. Which, while it could be amusing to onlookers, is leaving both of us with frayed nerves.

I swing the diminutive lantern around the space, a dusty underground room filled with crates and barrels with not nearly enough space for me to stand up in, though the steward can stand upright easily, if he wasn't hunching away from me.
I'm just about to give up and content myself to the firebombs I already have when the steward lets out a victorious squawk, and begins tugging at a hefty barrel set back into the corner of the room, partially obscured by other wooden containers.
Moving awkwardly to where the old man is, I reach over him, grasping the barrel firmly in two hands, and pull it away over his head.
The steward flinches, fearfully reminded of my strength.

"Thank you, sir, for your uhh, assistance."

Ducking my head in a nervous bob, I readjust my grip on the barrel, attempt a nervous sort of smile, and practically run out of the cellar, leaving a confused steward in my wake. Hopefully he'll be smart and return to where they're keeping the other humans. I don't care, it was enough torture just asking one to help.

Stepping out of the cellar, I climb the dilapidated flight of stairs back into the main hall of the castle, with the front doors open wide to the rest of the garrison courtyard and the unimpressive walls beyond. Unimpressive walls that were swarming with orcs looking like they were ready for battle. We were being attacked!
Slinging the barrel underneath my arm, I race out into the courtyard, looking around for Kavu.
A distinctive shout catches my attention, and I turn to look up at Kavu, standing next to an older siege engine. I look down at the barrel of pitch in my arms, and then at the impatient look on Kavu's face, and I break into a grin as I climb the flight of stairs to the boss.

The Binding of Isaac: My Pain and Suffering

I drooled.

One character many Role-players

Woot!
I like the convention of incorporating the last post into the current one. Third-person subjective is the narrative scheme? Awesome.

One character many Role-players

Fratboy pl0x.

'I was coming down from that awesome kegger last night, when a homie told me to talk to the dope grower that was waiting outside my pad.'

One character many Role-players

Formal petition that Phoenix must write like this for her update.

Mahz's Dev Journal

First off, I'd like to say that the notifications bar is great. It lets people send out general announcement posts to everyone without having to go into each and every thread, and it's also awesome for us comedian hacks who like to pretend they're funny and post wisecracks for all to appreciate. But could we go further with that? A 'popular notification' box would be really cool, with the highly liked notifications (presumably because they made a rhyme along the lines of 'Advanced is for smarty pants') lingering there for a day or so before being swept away.

It would just be another cool thing for people to look at as they scroll down the page to find whatever sub-forum they're trying to get to, and I can see it adding even more of a sense of community to the guild.

And I'm not just recommending this because I got six likes on this one notification and I'm hella proud of it and want more people to like it so I can achieve Guild apotheosis.

Is Greek Mythology overused?

It's also that most people rarely tap beyond the bare-bones of Grecian and Ancient Egyptian mythology, sticking with what they can find out of a children's encyclopedia and leaving it at that.

That's actually why I appreciate the Rick Riordan books, the guy does his homework, and then plays with it in ways that makes a disgruntled pre-teen appreciate Homer.

Book Recommendation... Please.

Oooooh dear. If I was alone in a library with you.. Rarr.

Anyways, I tend to drift towards older SF&F (60s-70s) because I'm a hopeless elitist and the moment I realized that other kids liked reading YA in middle school, I scorned that shit so fast it actually caused a sonic boom in the library section I left.

I do read more contemporary stuff of course, but it tends to be a bit more obscure. I actually regret not finding and reading GoT before HBO made the show, because I'm now deprived of boasting that I found before others did.

Anyways. If you want something short and sweet and a little thought provoking from a modern perspective,: Elizabeth Bear is currently my darling because of her prose and how she does a delightful fantastical realism.

And if you want to read something that is so venerable that it shaped D&D itself, yet is still so relevant that people are writing about it now 60's years after it's original publication, (with a recent collection of fanfics written by esteemed writers such as Gaiman and Martin) I entreat you to read Tales of a dying earth. It is honestly one of my favorite book series of all times. They published an omnibus recently, so you get all of them in one place.

Watership Down is also another one of my favorites, it's prose is phenomenal and it is so powerful that you forget it's about bunnies, really.

Dumb, angsty faux-philosophical ramblings.

How about the fact that we are producing more creative (or psuedo creative, *coughTwilightcough*) content now then humanity can ever consume?
And it's awful, because it's also the fact that even if you spend every minute of your life since you could walk out and physically interacting with the world, traveling to every continent, learning 20+ languages, (including HTML) achieving a PhD in astroneuroquantamrocket surgery with a bachelors in everything from English, oriental studies, WomLit, film making and pottery, you will still never scratch the surface of what it means to be human, or even be alive.

And I'm not sure if that makes me really excited, or really depressed.

Post Your Pikcha

Before we continue, I'll share a charming image of me from a while back, just to let everyone know that I condone this practice and I'm not being negatively critical about it all

(Once I get an actual picture working) Working!

My ugly mug

http://postimg.org/image/sgok2j84f/

So I've been looking through this thread, and I find it really fascinating. I've done this before on other sites, and I feel that it's worthy of some analysis.

This photo sharing habit is an act of social interaction. Most people don't use actual photos of themselves as avatar's, because an avatar is meant to be an idea or belief that you want to put out and let others people know about. I take my avatars chiefly from my favorite webcomic, because I appreciate the visual aesthetic and I want people to know that I like that webcomic. (it's Gunnerkrigg court, BTW) Other people will have different avatars reflecting what they like.

I'll use one delightful Guild member here as another example. (which he hopefully won't ban me for) @HeySeuss has a delightfully animated gif of Lord Vader dancing around, which I have watched for five minutes straight once. And that's the sort of idea's and interests he wants to project to the world. (or at least the Guild) That:
A) He likes Star Wars.
B) Has a sense of humor that is derived from unexpected responses. Someone who likes Star Wars is likely to have an avatar picture with a character from the series, and Darth Vader is an easily recognizable one and is certainly memorable. But since Heyseuss finds humor in the alteration of norms, his avatar is the sinister Darth Vader doing a funky dance, which is something that Vader is unlikely to do. (Unless George Lucas makes another remastered version, in which case Obi-Wan will be killed through a song and dance number)
So we've learned from a single glance about some things that Heyseuss is willing to share externally: his appreciation of cinematic space opera's, and cheeky gifs subverting them.

But when people start forming genuine social bonds with people, which can definitely occur online, as everyone here can hopefully attest to, evolutionary social traits require us to have a physical connection to someone else. For IRL friends and couples, this means increased physical contact, handshakes/hugs/humping. But online, with people separated from so far away, and with people communicating primarily through text, we still want that physical connection to people. So image sharing crops up, it's a way to legitimize and further social relationships online through a restricted medium. (You can't hug a person online... YET) But you can show someone a picture of what you really look like, which provides at least some of the evolutionary social needs.

You're not picturing a pigeon in a party hat pecking this out with it's beak, you're imagining a mental image of what you think I look like. (or what I do look like, once the image link is functioning) (fixed!)Because it's impossible to form an actual relationship with a party hat pigeon, or a delightfully dancing Darth, because those aren't real people faces, or your real person face. (If someone has an old James Bond avatar, I know I'm not chatting with Sean Connery, just someone who likes Scottish actors who kick-ass)

I'm not totally sure where I was going with this, cause it's around 3.30 in the morning, but if you understand what I'm trying to say, I would love it if you would chip in. Because I think this is really interesting psychological speaking.