Imperium

There's a guy on RPG.net running a play-by-post game of Imperium, the Warhammer 40,000 RPG I wrote a few years ago. Pretty cool, really. I've known people have been playing it around the world for the past year or two (thanks to continual downloads from the Yahoo group and occasional feedback on the board and via email), but it's kind of an ego-boost to find someone playing it on a public forum.

Maybe I'm just a geek craving attention... :-p

It's being run as a Space Marine-centred game, yet he's down-statted PCs to just above human levels. Having seen how lethal the combat system can be for mere mortals, it's going to be interesting to watch how well this works. Admittedly, he's downstatting NPCs as well, but no word on whether weapons are going to be reduced in any way - a bolter shell is designed to take out a human in a single shot, and can do a hell of a lot of damage to one through even power armour.

On the other hand, if he's throwing the PCs against lasguns, shuriken catapults and the like, even down-statted Marines should do alright, provided they don't get shot in the head.

I need to run a high-powered Space Marines game at some point, just to see how well it works. Just a shame I won't have the time to do it any time soon. (Unless one-shots... but I'd been reserving those for Delta Green and other lovely Cthulhoid stuff.)


Still on a roleplaying note, I've rewritten the entire injuries and recovery chapters of Smog & Mirrors, based on the difficulties picked up in last Thursday's playtest. (Hmm, I need to transfer the notes from that across from Kate's computer to my own, then type them up properly.)

19th May

It seems this year that everything wants to happen on my birthday.

The 'Wasted' Punk Festival starts in Morecambe on the 19th (you want accomodation in Morecambe that weekend, you're six months late booking it, and there's about two beds, a cot and a closet left in Lancaster).

Dammit, there was at least two other things happening on the 19th that I noticed, but now I can't remember them. Sod, I'll just have to go to the (slightly tenuous and bugger-this-whole-birthday-tie-in-thing-because-it's-not-fucking-working) punchline:

The Graduate Teacher Training Registry want my acceptance of a place at St. Martin's College by the 19th.

Yeah, I'm in. :-)

It's going to be interesting. Apart from WFRP: The Enemy Within (starting Wednesday, out of LURPS), and maybe the occasional one-shots*, I won't be GMing at all next academic year, and WFRP's probably going to become a tad less frequent as workload piles up. It's probably going to help that Kate's on the same course as me, so we can bounce off one another if things get a little too hectic.

Hmm, this does mean I'll have to quit my Social Services job after only a few months (but it's a 6-month trial period anyway, so it shouldn't be a problem).

I'll also have to leave the Tourist Centre, which is a shame, because I enjoy that job and like the people I'm working with.

But, in just over a year's time, I'll be qualified to get into a professional career that pays reasonably well, is pretty much flexible in its working hours (outside of the core 8am-3.15pm slot, obviously). Sure, I have to kick a horde of psychotic little shits into the rough shape of responsible human beings with an understanding of literature, writing, drama and the media, but that shouldn't be too hard.

Now I find myself wondering which of the others from my interview (if any) got through? The girl from Blackburn (name began with F, I think; it was an odd Asian one) was kind of confusing in her micro-lesson, while Sarah from Preston was confident, outgoing, friendly (all good qualities in a teacher, in my opinion), but got confused between accent and dialect, even confusing Received Pronunciation with Standard English.


*Note to self - organise one-shots Sunday for LURPS. It's the start of Week 4 now. How about the end of Week 6?