my blog sucks

I keep finding blogs that are way cooler than mine. Sure most of them don't really blog about the creator, mostly they just link to funny pics, videos, articles etc, but still, way cooler.
Any suggestions on how I could make my blog cooler?
either way, check out these 2 awesome blogs
http://www.mypointless.com/
http://blameitonthevoices.blogspot.com/

*warning, the following rant contains Role playing gaming terms, a glossary might be available on the bottom of this post. If not, too bad, look it up on wikipedia.*

I think I've mentioned it before, but I am a geek who plays D&D with my friends. We had a session yesterday, I was running the game, and it seems that we might have some issues. One of the guys who plays with us might be bailing on our weekly sessions due to World of Warcraft (aka WoW) Commitments. Seriously?! He is going to bail on us because of a friggin video game? He already plays at least 20-30 hours a week for crying out loud!!!
One of our other players is also having his D&D gaming time with the group affected by WoW. He has been playing it into the night, not getting his sleep, and then showing up tired and grumpy. When this particular player shows up tired and grumpy, it doesn't take much to have him snapping at you in regards to the rules during combat. Too much arguing and (I've seen this actually happen) can go from playing to quiting the session and threatening to quit the campaign in 20 seconds flat!

The funny thing is that we all aren't the best roleplayers and I am certainly not the best GM. We metagame (although this is getting better), we min/max our characters, and we could probably be called munchkins without us being offended. It's not entirely our fault however.
I still mostly blame the RPG system called Rifts for our poor roleplaying skills. It introduced us to min/maxing, and exploiting game rules.
We also tend to put an emphasis on killing and damage as being the most important thing our characters can do, so then we get super competitive when making characters.
This takes away from any chance that a character with real personality flaws, quarks, or realism might be used when creating characters. Those things don't help in combat, so why bother :)
Also it can give way to the players being bored if combat isn't occurring which means that actual roleplaying between characters and NPCs doesn't occur as often.

Setting the scene or giving descriptions to flesh out the world and make it trigger the imagination might not matter as much, and the players might bypass entire campaign ideas or scenarios just to get back to fighting sooner.

You might think that "isn't being the best in combat is a good thing", or "isn't fighting what these games is all about?". Well combat is a big part of most RPGs, there is a great deal to do with story lines, plot, setting the mood, suspending disbelief etc. It is a game of the imagination, so if it just becomes a numbers game with no substance or interaction with the PCs and the game world other that killing, then why don't we all just multiplayer Halo?
RPGs offer you the freedom to create almost any type of character and have them do whatever you want. Video games tend to be limited by the game itself.

I think I should cultivate some new players, but I have played with these guys for so long, that it would be scary to open the table up to unknown players who could be uber RPG nerds with no social skills, personal hygiene, and are still virgins at age 30.
That is the worst stereotype, but it could happen.

****** glossary of terms ******
RPG - Role playing game. typically played with pencils, graph paper, and funny sided dice. Typically played with 4-5 people. One person being the DM or GM. The other people creating characters to play in the game. We have been incorporating software with our mapping and combat by using Maptools from http://rptools.net/

D&D - Dungeons and Dragons. A RPG that is set in a fantasy/adventure genre that deals with weapons, armor, magic, monsters etc. i.e. Lord of the Rings was the inspiration for the original game back in the 1970s, so read the books by Tolkien, and or watch the movies and you will get the gist of it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_&_Dragons info about
http://www.wizards.com/DnD/ game site

DM/GM - Dungeon Master/Game Master. Typically the referee and architect of the adventure. Typically D&D refers to him as a DM, most other game systems use GM. By habit, I tend to refer to it as GM regardless of the system I am playing.

PC - Player character. The in-game character that the players get to control. They usually have to follow some creation rules, but the character's actions are determined by the player.

NPCs - Non player character. Characters in the game world that is created to assist, give information, fight the player's Characters. Usually the DM/GM plays these characters.

Metagaming - When the player's character acts on information that he/she wouldn't know, but the player knows. ie. if the character has no prior knowledge of Trolls, but then purposely attacks them with acid or fire which the player knows trolls are vulnerable too.

Min/Max - minimizing some stats that aren't considered combat important in order to boost (sometimes ridiculously high) the combat relevant stats. i.e. lowering social stats to boost stat that apply more damage in combat.

Munchkin - a player who min/maxes as well as uses rules/items or anything in the game (sometimes borderline game illegal) to make their character ridiculously powerful, regardless of how impossible or absurd the combination might be. This usually frustrates the DM/GM due to the fact that the DM/GM cannot adequate challenge the players when they can easily overcome any challenge with hardly any effort what-so ever. It can also wreck game balance if one player is a munchkin, and the other one makes a character based on concept.

nothing to see here, move along

I haven't wrote anything in while. I noticed I had 8 unique visitors one day, and some might have been from the US. I don't know anybody from there, so hopefully it was just a random person, and not some US stalker.

I watched the new Indiana Jones movie, and I was kind of disappointed. It was watchable, however it doesn't come close to equaling the awesomeness of the old ones. Harrison Ford is what? 66 years old? I don't really buy him jumping and running and swinging and fighting. I think if a 66 year old fell or was punched in the face, they would break multiple bones. Also I don't like the direction the went with the plot. I wont ruin it for you, but lets just say that it fails to suspend my disbelief, and this coming from a guy who watches zombies movies and plays D&D.

Speaking of D&D, we got together and played for 10 hours on Saturday. It was a pretty intense and awesome session, except when we got to the final boss, and our party got wiped out. It was just one of those chain reaction/domino effect type things. One bad decision (not by me thank god), and then things just spiralled out of control from there.

I went to Hot Yoga (aka Bikram Yoga) last night for the first time in a couple of months. It was pretty brutal, buy it was good. I strongly suggest that everybody try it a couple of times. The first time you will feel like your going to throw up. Especially if you eat too soon. I suggest hydrating all day, and having a very light light supper 3 hours before you go. One time I had pizza 3 hours before, and I almost lost it.
As far as the benefits of Hot Yoga, and what it is all about, it is like regular Yoga, but they put you in a room that is heated and humid. Sometimes up to 35 degrees.
It's pretty relaxing and good for cleansing and self reflection. I've been told that the stretching accomplished during doesn't really transfer to outside of the heated room because when your muscles are cold, they don't tend to stretch as easily. So don't try to be a super ninja after a few hot yoga sessions or you might pull something.

I bought an awesome new shirt for work, so be on the look out :P

Fallout 3 is out, I might pick that up for the PC, it's supposed to be awesome.
Oh, and I will do a separate blog out the World of Warcraft (WoW) zombie infestation later when I have time. I don't play WoW but a lot of my friends are trapped playing the evil and addicting game, and told me all about it. It sounds wild, but not enough to make me tempted to play the evil WoW game again. I have to go home now, I was blogging at work again :)

get paid to blog (blog at work!)

Just some things that are on my mind.
Why does time seem to be going faster and faster the older I get?
Why do I care less and less about having sex or companionship the more unfit I get? Or if I am feeling ill?
Where did my sense of smell go?! It's not completely gone, but I am definitely smelling impaired (olfactory challenged).
When will I find my penguin?
Why did they cancel Firefly!? It was a awesome show!
When will the Need of all outweigh the Greed of the few?
Can I leave work now?
Oh wait, yes I guess so :)

Plus: the websites I waste the most time on when I am at home. I am not going to link them, you can google them if you really want. I am lazy and at work......

TMCM - web comic
College humor - funny pics and vids. Some content is created exclusively for the site
ebaulmsworld - random vids, pics jokes etc site.
wwtdd - celeberty gossip/stalker site
funnyordie - funny indie comic short videos... mostly run by the Will Farrell and his bunch of clown friends.
OOTS - I read with my kid, a D&D humor online comic

TGIF or TGFT thank god for turkey!

It's turkey weekend! I am still on the mend from my cold. It isn't as bad as it was, but I still feel whiney so I must still be sick.

I have been playing D&D 4th Edition with some buddies, and we had to start remaking our characters again. This is the third time since we stared playing the new edition. It's getting rather annoying to have to switch guys all the time. I have no idea what I am going to be. The last guy I had was pretty good at taking names and kicking arse.

I finished reading the World War Hulk saga, and now I am waiting for a torrent to download which has 12GB's worth of marvel comics in it. It's supposed to be every major event series starting with FF and Galactis.

It's fun to read all the comics, but its annoying because for some god awful reason they are all in a .cbr format which a comic book format file extension, and so you have to change it to a rar, and then open it up with some archiving software like bitzipper, or WinRar.
Then you have to extract each one into a folder. It doesn't seem that bad, but when you have dozens or hundreds of .cbrs to do this for, it gets annoying :(

Also, I don't know why they are zipped in the first place. Each one zipped only saves maybe 1% space! Maybe there is a .cbr reader that I could download that would make this easier, but I haven't bothered looking.

Oh ya, guess what, there might be some sweet games that I might actually be excited about playing coming out soon.

A Halo Real Time Strategy game. Looks pretty neat from what I can tell.

Dead Space, a horror game set in a future outer space setting. Fallout 3, a modern version of an old post apocalyptic game that I never knew existed, but I probably would have loved.


Supposedly StarCraft 2 and Diablo 3 will be out sometime soon, but I can't say I'm terribly looking forward to them. Looks like the same games, but better background graphics and some new powers and options n'suff. Nothing super spectacular. Hopefully the game play will be the thing that makes them great, just as the previous versions.

Left 4 Dead, a Half life 2 zombie mod that seems like it has the potential to be pretty awesome.
Oh, and F.E.A.R 2 will be out next year, I can't wait to pee my pants again. That one was pretty darned freaky!!

Oh, and for some G-damn reason I cannot add images to my Blog from work!! What the hell!