Chicks With Dice

What if cooking was like gaming?

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:55:47 GMT

I found this hysterical. What if cooking fans were like gamers?

http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/commentary/alttext/2008/06/alttext_0618

What I also find intersting is that I found this over at Ravelry. Gotta watch those knitter who game, we are a crazy bunch :D

A sort of actual post.

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 02:32:27 GMT

So a friend of mine and her husband are trying to make room for adopted baby #2 so he's cleaning out some of his gaming stuff that he doesn't really use anymore. Today I scored the West End Games box set of Paranoia, and Inquisitor from Games Workshop.

They've got some other gaming stuff up for grabs. I think I'll ask if they'd be willing to ship and if they'd like me to post the stuff here. Most of it's just up for grabs. They do want to sell one or two things.

HiHo!

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 01:21:10 GMT

I've been lurking around here for a month or two and thought I might introduce myself.

I've been gaming since my senior year in college. Yeah, I'm a late bloomer. Truthfully, I finally found someone to teach me D&D. He then got me addicted to Call of Cthulu. Ah, those were the days (and nights, and days ... etc.)

Through him I met my gaming friends. One of them introduced me to White Wolf's World of Darkness and Mage the Acension. And as it always works, you met one gamer, you get sucked into a community.

I was introduced to the Portland, Maine (where I live) LARP community in the late 1990's. And thus, an addiction was born. I LARP just about every Saturday, and it's mostly White Wolf, but I am learning Boffer this summer. I have played in over 15 games and have been the Storyteller for four. Currently I am running a multi-genre White Wolf game with a friend of mine. I also play in a Vampire the Requiem and a Werewolf the Forsaken game through the Camarilla. I am also playing in a One World By Night game.

When I'm not LARPing (and have time), I am playing in two Exalted games, and occasionally HackMaster.

Gaming has brought me into a fantastic community and I've made many friends. One of those got us involved in a playtest for White Wolf's Mage the Awakening and I'm proud to have a LARPing book with my name in it.

Great group here. I'm glad I found it!

New Member from Athens, GA

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 20:47:40 GMT

Hi girls! My name is Ash and I am the resident World of Darkness ST for our gaming group in Athens, Ga. Most of the games I run are Werewolf:The Apocolypse, but I'm branching out to try Changeling:

The Dreaming and I have run Vampire: Dark Ages in my time. I love D&D, especially the Eberron setting and I adore Forgotten Realms!

I'm looking over Scion right now and Blue Rose; hopefully will be running one of those two in the next few months. I'm currently playing in a Star Wars D20(the latest one), Legend of the Five Rings, and an Eberron game.

I've been playing table-top games since I was 14 years old. Ten years later, I'm still rolling the dice with my boys. I'm the only girl in my group, but I'm totally one of the guys.

My favorite games are the Star Wars ones.

ps: I've also have been LARPing since I was 14. NEVIA, BERSERKR, and NERO. I've played NERO ATL, NERO SGA, NERO ETN, NERO VALOR, NERO METRO, NERO WTN and my beloved "home" chapter of the glorious NERO MTN!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love,
Ashlyn

DIY d12 Handbag

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 18:43:02 GMT

A friend of mine sent me this link this morning because he knows my perchant for sewing stuff and gaming geekery.

A DIY d12 handbag from evilmadscientist.com.

If the creator of said handbag is here, I have to say mucho kudos to you for the creative costume geekery! This is just too damn cute!

I attack the darkness!

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:36:48 GMT

The website I work for just released this subtitler game, so I thought I'd share my geekness with the world. This is only one of the ones I've made... this thing is like crack.

Cheers!

X-posted to hell and back.

New Geek Girls Rule! #50

Sat, 28 Jun 2008 06:31:33 GMT

http://www.geekgirlsrule.wordpress.com

My review of Ayre Force. Really, it isn't bad, but it isn't great either. It's ok. Kind of the Cream of Wheat of comics. But it also isn't screamingly sexist either, surprisingly enough.

Completely not about gaming. I hope you don't mind.

Looking for a program

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 06:06:08 GMT

Hi - I'm wondering if there is a computer program for dungeon (interior) and terrain mapping. I'm by no means computer-savvy, and if the program is simple-to-use, free and clean of spyware that would be a real plus.

Thanks for your help!

Living in the future!

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 15:02:40 GMT

I do a lot of gaming online. Probably more than I should, if I'm being honest. I should clarify - I mean roleplaying, not video games (in the traditional sense... I'll clarify further in a moment).

I have used a lot of different programs to help - Open RPG (balls!), gametable (simple but effective), Maptool (really great but a fair amount of work for gms to set up), even a home made grid that one of my programming GMs concocted. (Okay, that was exis, I don't have any other programmer gms.) We have used teamspeak and other voice programs to help things along - they can be hit and miss. Voice is a nice complement to traditional internet text media, but it doesn't work as well as a stand-alone gaming format, because there aren't any other cues to work with.

Today, however, one of my groups tried something different. We used a free program called ooVoo, which allows up to six people for video chat conferencing. It's got some issues - people who don't have really great connections can find it a little choppy, and you have the same problems as you always do getting people's set up optimized for chat. You need to minimize feedback, and so forth. But overall, I think this worked out really well. I am in Texas, three of my cohorts are in South Korea, and the other two players were in England (which is why game started early on a Sunday morning, at least for me. Stupid timezones). But I could see them all, and watch them, and talk. The program also has a text chat application as well, so you can supplement that way. It was as close as you can get to face to face tabletop, I think, and the experience pleased me.

Now, there are some disadvantages. Only six people (for now, and for free - they might allow more on the paid version), you probably should get dressed for game, where traditional internet media are more clothing optional (hey, this is a legit issue for some people!). You need to pay closer attention - it is harder to get away with side browsing when you're not directly involved - much like in face to face gaming. You aren't going to get the same kind of useful chat log that you can refer to down the road, which is something that I've personally come to rely on heavily for internet games. You can't take a little longer to work out what you are doing or exactly what you are going to say the way you might in a text based chat. You're still going to need a supplementary program to run any dice scripts you have and to facilitate board based combat. In these ways, you're losing out some of the big advantages over chat based media, and keeping some of the problems.

Some of the problems are the same ones you get in f-t-f gaming though - people not paying attention, no easily kept records, etc. I don't know if you can fairly count those against the *concept*, at least, of this kind of 'video gaming'. It's faster than chat. You can still play with people who are scattered around the globe. You get the useful visual cues of face to face gaming (though mediated some what by the fact that you can't look directly at people) as well as vocal ones (accents are fun!). it is easier to keep focused attention, I find, when I am talking to faces.

Although there are still kinds and it isn't really quite he same as f-t-f play, I really enjoyed this first little experiment. I just thought I would write it up for other people to think about, and discuss, if interested...

(cross posted between my journal and chickswithdice

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 23:11:12 GMT

I think I might be a little excited about starting a new game... I just spent 3 hours with Adobe Illustrator making my character sheet. :)

Hi!

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 15:29:18 GMT

Hi everyone!

I'm 26, been gaming in various forms for as long as I can remember. (Can thank my brothers for that. Yay!) Currently I'm mostly doing computer games, but I'm very much lacking any tabletop or LARP action. This makes me sad.

My fiance is also a gamer and we play similar things, and he has continued expanding my gaming horizons since the time I met him.

I'm currently in Philadelphia, so if anyone knows of any LARPs or gaming groups local to the area, that'd be great. (I know there's a Philly OWBN chapter, but it's actually in DE, which is too hard for us to get to.)

Geek Girls Rule! Podcast #5

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 18:30:00 GMT

http://sirriamnicast.libsyn.com/

I talk about the awesomeness that was GoPlayNW including the most awesome game of Don't Rest Your Head ever, my plans for the Alternate Lifestyles track at NorWesCon, HorrorFest, Glen Cook, and I answer a listener question from the Boobs podcast (episode 3).

New Geek Girls Rule! #48 9 Chickweed Lane, again.

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 20:47:22 GMT

I'm pretty sure I'm done with 9 Chickweed Lane. It's just... ugh.

http://www.geekgirlsrule.wordpress.com

If it's not cool to post these when I'm not talking about gaming, let me know and I'll only post gaming appropriate ones.

New Geek Girls Rule!

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 22:58:47 GMT

Why am I a Geek Grrrl?

Read the column to find out! http://www.geekgirlsrule.wordpress.com

Intro

Wed, 28 May 2008 16:56:35 GMT

Hi!

My name is Natalie, I'm 24 years old and I live in Chattanooga, TN. My husband is the one who forced me to start gaming. He's been playing D&D for years, and pretty much since I knew him I made fun of him for it. He finally convinced me to role up my first character in late summer of '06, and ever since then, I've been hooked.

I've only played three RP formats; D&D, Mutants and Masterminds, and currently play Warhammer. We do use pewter figurines that I quite enjoy painting, and my husband and brother in law (who GMs our weekly games) build scenery from styrofoam (hills, trees, Dwarven forges.. My husband built a little Hobbit village! It's quite cute.) for combat situations and to get us more into the game.

I currently play a halfling named Caitlin Applebottom. It's my first time playing a halfling, and I think I'll have a hard time ever playing anything else.

My other geeky fandom type things include Supernatural, FIREFLY (my car is named Firefly), some Marvel comics, Monty Python, Harry Potter, and.. Umm... I hate to admit this, but... Twilight :)

So anyway.. Hi!

4th Edition has been leaked...

Wed, 28 May 2008 13:18:46 GMT

If you haven't heard yet 4th Edition D&D was shipped early from buy.com and you can easily download it in PDF from any torrent site. Haven't had a chance to read it yet, but my partner was up all night and says it is great.

New Geek Girls Rule!

Wed, 28 May 2008 04:57:20 GMT

A basic state of the Geek Girl What Rules. I feel vaguely vindicated in posting it here, because I do mention a game, and an upcoming gaming convention.

http://www.geekgirlsrule.wordpress.com

Cadwallon?

Mon, 26 May 2008 19:52:39 GMT

Does anyone play Cadwallon? I've finally talked the SO into GMing a game of it. Now I just need to figure out what to do for my character and figure out the rules. I'm thinking about playing a dwarf of Mid-Nor, as I already have all the models from my Confrontation and Ragnarok armies.

Sex and Characters

Mon, 26 May 2008 19:03:43 GMT

So a while ago freakwoman made a post asking about people's attitudes towards sex in games - how it should be handled, how to set boundaries, etc (post here).

At the risk of outing myself as a big perv, I am curious about something that is similar but not exactly the same. I am wondering how much thought people put into the sexuality of their characters. in terms of sexual orientation, yes, but other things as well. It your character a dom? Really submissive? Terrified of sex? A fascinated virgin? A prude? Is sex just a tool? What are they like in bed, and why/how? And so forth.

For me, thinking about the sexual aspects of my characters is a natural part of the process of exploring who they are. It's lie thinking about what kinds of food they'd like, or their relationship with their families - it is a part of the whole that can help determine how they react in certain situations. When the GM has a member of the attractive sex hit on them, are they going to go for it? Will they be shy? Suspicious? Intimidated? Disgusted? Do they maybe find it a little sexy to watch a villain lay the smack down on some of their fellow party members?

This stuff doesn't necessarily come out overtly in game, so I see it as separate from the earlier post, but it goes along with the general character baggage when I play. I'm just curious whether the same, or similar, is true for other people?

Ladies Only Game

Wed, 14 May 2008 14:54:19 GMT

One of my new gamer buddies just started a female only game. Anyone else try this? I've barely gamed with girls at all, outside of LARPs, so I jumped in for the experience.

http://www.nwarpg.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1454

Third Geek Girls Rule Podcast!

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 04:05:34 GMT

Breasts in comics and gaming art, as discussed by the Girl Gaming group. We talk briefly about Jonathan Tweet, and about being female geeks and the trials and tribulations thereof.

http://geekgirlsrule.wordpress.com/2008/04/28/the-third-geek-girls-rule-podcast-girls-gaming-and-boobs/

RPGnet Actual Play post

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 03:34:03 GMT

I thought some of you might want to read about the Vampire game I'm playing in...

Alright girls... some magic post.

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 18:57:56 GMT

I'm participating in a massive casual game, but I feel an overcompulsion to win. The rules are... all players at once (massive multiplayer, about 20 people), all black cards only (no dual lands, no artifacts, nothing special...), and winner is the one who survives or has the most life at the end of the hour. (And wouldn't it be fun to have a girl beat a bunch of guys?)

So far I've gotten a few things pulled out of my stash, and i'm planning on running snow swamps since they actually fall into the rules. (still a basic land!)

4 rimebound dead
3 gangrenous zombies
4 drift of the dead
4 deathcurse ogre
1 nefashu
2 festering march
4 innocent blood
1 smallpox
4 maggot carrier
2 circle of affliction
4 pestilence
1 infest
2 urborg shambler
2 consume spirit
2 corrupt
4 howl from beyond
2 anurid murkdiver

that's all i've gotten pulled out to make a deck for this... I know specific targetting is a bad thing for this massive game, so i'm going for a lot of cards that affect everyone. sadly, this includes me. The only ways I can figure to survive is by using lifegain, but there aren't too many black cards im familiar with that can do that.
All I know are

Orzhov guildmage (which is a little pointless since i won't have the white mana to fuel it)
Vampiric Link

I don't have uber funds to dish out for this, but I'd still like to have some fun.
I'd appreciate any suggestions and help that anyone has to offer. Thanks so much in advance.

edit: found some life gain cards lurking in my room.
1 swallowing plague
1 sickening dreams
1 midnight charm
1 vampiric link
3 hissing miasma
3 dash hopes
2 drain life

xposted to mtg,

would anyone with more experience than me like to offer up some opinions? I've already gotten a few. (like urborg shambler is bad for my regen skellies)

New Geek Girls Rule!

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 04:40:58 GMT

Playing serious characters when you're not. Basically I address my, ahem, giggling problem in gaming.

http://geekgirlsrule.wordpress.com/

Introduction & Question

Tue, 15 Apr 2008 23:19:24 GMT

Hello, community!
My name is Patty and I found this community while I was on a search for gamer jewelery!
I play Dungeons and Dragons and used to check out EverQuest. I mainly play video games, though.

There was this site I checked out, maybe half a year ago, and it had jewelry of a die (I mainly remember d20) and it was clasped onto an earring string. You could unattach it and roll.
I was wondering if any of you know the site?

~<3
Thanks in advance!