Tales of Blood and Glory: Neuromancer

So I finished reading Neuromancer about a week ago. Wow, it's really good. As I mentioned recently, it's major theme is pushing the relationship between people and technology to uncomfortably intimate. The Ghost in the Shell-like climax of this theme occurs around the climax of the novel's plot-action.

Hardboiled Sci-Fi

Neuromancer is written as a sequel to Gibson's Johnny Mnemonic and Burning Chrome stories, and like those stories it is written in the style of a Hardboiled crime story. This gritty style allows Gibson to create a more realistic Sci-Fi(one of his stated goals) in much the same way that it helped Chandler to invent a more realistic Detective Fiction, based more on wheeling and dealing than on intellectual mind exercises.

Gibson also uses the hardboiled style to further his theme of discomforting human/technological syntheses. For example, his use of Chandlerisms. While Chandler uses these to set to mood through the eyes of the narrator, a man of honor living in a rough world that is wearing away at him, Gibson additionally uses these metaphors to give a view of the world through a technological lens. For example, the book's much-quoted opening line "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel".

Also worth contrasting are their heroes. While Chandler's heroes are sympathetic for their moral code, Neuromancer's Case is sympathetic more for the Pathos elicited from his dependency on technology(though Johnny Mnemonic, on the other hand, is arguably more of a Chandlerian hero. Does Johnny dying and Molly taking-up with Case have some other message about the death a that type of hero in literature?)

Keeping Focus

Now let's compare Neuromancer with another contemporary Harboiled imitator: Michael Chabon's "The Yiddish Policeman's Union".

If you're ever read Chabon's "A Model World and Other Stories", you know that the man can write one hellova short story. Really, it's a brilliant, brilliant collection--really enjoyable and highly recommended. And Yiddish Policeman's Union is full of that same brilliance: there are so many great little bits. But, as a novel, it just felt seriously flawed to me, and the biggest reason, to my mind, is focus.

Neuromancer has a lot going on. But overall it is a very focused novel. It's got one overarching theme, leaving it free to focus on creating a fast paced roller coaster ride of a high-octane, hi-tech crime story.

Yiddish Policeman's Union, on the other hand, is all over the place. Chabon has so much to say about people, relationships, Judaism, politics, and a lot of it quite profound. And yet, I felt like it was too much, just jumping all over the place. And he's so into symbolism that I remember finding his use of Chandlerisms occasionally distracting from the actual story. As for the plot itself, it moved along quite slowly through most of the novel and when it finally got moving the emphasis became more of this political message Chabon was trying to drive home, rather than on the mystery or the characters. So, overall, lots to love in this novel, but sometimes less is actually more and I can't help feeling that it didn't live up to it's potential. Maybe if Chabon he'd found one central theme to stick to like Gibson in Neuromancer, then we would have gotten a better detective story. Or perhaps, it could have been written as a series of short-stories taking place in the same location.

Not an Optimization Problem!

It occurred to me the other day that two types of argument that I hear fairly often are actually quite similar: "Which programming language is better for X?" and "Which RPG rule(set) is better for running scenario X?" Let's start off with the former.

Programming Language Preference

Programmers LOVE to talk about which language(or which technology) is better. What's the best language to start out learning? What's the best language to do my project in? Why is the language I designed objectively better than all the rest? Some people will talk to you for HOURS about this, going into the most detailed minutia. And I always feel a little uncomfortable about these conversations, regardless of how good the arguments being made are. I think Jonathan Rasmussen's point in his book "The Agile Samurai" is relevant:

You Pick Your Architecture When You Pick Your Team...A team strong in databases will naturally want to do most of the heavy lifting in SQL, while a team strong in object-oriented design(OO) will want to put all complexity in there... 

The point is that, in practice, there are many valid and effective way to accomplish your engineering task. The problem with these "which language is better" conversations is that they treat the question as an optimization problem: let's look at the problem from every possible perspective and determine which solution is optimal. This sounds very logical, but the truth is that there are many reasonable solutions, and engineering is very much an art, rather than a math exercise to find the solution to.  Pick tech that works for you and then move-on, so you can start worrying about the actual execution of your project, because that's going to make or break it for you regardless of the language you pick.

Rules Preference

It's the same with a lot of rules discussions that I hear. It's not that people aren't making valid points.  It's that they(often times myself) have a tendency to obsess over these rule choices and treat it as an optimization problem. Just pick a system that you like overall and start worrying about your execution!

The rules aren't the alpha and the omega of what makes the game. I'll be honest: whether I run WFRP, or DnD or Cyberpunk 2020, I tend to run the game a certain way.  And the same tends to hold true for other DMs I've played with. There's a lot of artistry and technique to running an RPG beyond the rules, and it's going to make a hell of a lot more difference than what kind of saving throws you chose to use, ascending or descending AC, etc!

So yeah, that's my rant for the day. Figure out what tools work for you in this situation and then get on with it! Get out there and write some great software/run a great game!

That Cyberpunk Je Ne Sais Quoi

I was reading through the latest draft of "Kill, Cyborgs! Kill!" the Cyberpunk adventure I'm working on, and there is something missing, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Mechanically, I'm happy with the system, the overall structure, and the story are pretty good.  So what's missing?

Then my long overdue Amazon order came in, including William Gibson's "Neuromancer". A few chapter's in it hit me. KCK doesn't have that Cyberpunk bite.

The Horror genre plays with your emotions, eliciting uneasiness, foreboding, and fear. Good Cyberpunk stories do something similar. It's not quite techno-horror. It's something more subtle, pushing just beyond what we consider to be a healthy relationship with Technology, presenting portraits that leave a gurgling uneasiness in the pit of our bellies:

• A tough Street Samurai with surgically implanted mirrorshades, ostensibly so that she can see in the dark, but more importantly, they keep anyone from looking into her eyes. Because if anyone did look into her eyes, if they saw what she feels in the depths of her soul, it would all be over...
• An ex-hacker, more at home in cyberspace than in reality, but chemically neutered so that he can no longer log in, leaving him in permanent exile.
• A small-time shoplifter who finds meaning in life though competitive video games and through love. Ultimately he chooses the former over the latter and ends up with nothing.
• A dolphin, made hyper-intelligent and fixed up with hi-tech scanning gear for the war. Now that it's over, he sits in dirty tank, doing illegal scanning work to pay for his drug habit.
• Gang of street kids whose tech-worship to more and more bizarre, inhuman body modifications, pushing them more and more to the edge of society.
• A mysterious criminal, apparently ex-special forces, one of the few survivors of a well known suicide mission. Now he is anonymous, his face a mask of generic plastic surgery, his intentions inscrutable.
• A teenage girl, obsessed with becoming the next reality star, she'll sink to any depth to earn the credits for the tech she'll need to realize that dream. But the deeper she sinks, the greater the chance she'll be lost forever... 
• A man who has himself cloned as a female. He raises her as a daughter, then they become lovers. Nuff said. 
• A crime lord well over 200 years old. Preserved by technology, but neutered by age. Inhumanly cunning, inhumanly uncaring for anything except well tailored vintage replica suits.

Such Pathos, such Unease, such borderline plausibility, such Truth! I frickin' love Cyberpunk! Now, back to the writing table...

Child-Brain Vampire

So I just finished reading through Bram Stoker's Dracula. I was surprised what a fun, easy read it was, considering the 1897 publication date. There's a lot there to talk about: the book is part Horror, part Mystery, and part Adventure Novel. For now, let's focus on Dracula himself and gameability...

The Child-Brain

Anyway, at a few points, Professor Van Helsing, in his broken English, goes on about how Dracula is actually a relatively immature and therefore weak Vampire. For example:

“He has all along, since his coming, been trying his power, slowly but surely; that big child-brain of his is working. Well for us, it is, as yet, a child-brain; for had he dared, at the first, to attempt certain things he would long ago have been beyond our power...

An Amalgamated Mythos

I'd assumed that vampires are like zombies: different books mention different powers and weaknesses and so you essentially have different types with different "rules". Not so. At one point the professor exposes a whopping 22 different powers and weaknesses that apply to the Count which he gathered from various legends and folklore. On one hand, they are quite varied and lack a common aesthetic. On the other hand, it makes the Vampire that much more mysterious, that we can't make sense of his bizarre and inexplicably varied abilities. There's a delicious illogic to the whole thing.

No DnD Vampires, Thank You Very Much!

So, bottom line, Dracula has many weaknesses in addition to his many powers. And I rather prefer Bram Stoker's vampire to DnD's. Rather than being a 7-9HD monstrosity, Dracula can be killed by a single well-placed knife blow(during the day time, anyway). Much of the novel is about the party trying to catch the Vampire when he is weak, while he, in turn, wriggles around their defences and evades them except when he is strong. Ultimately, the result is an intelligent cat & mouse game, rather than a full-on combat.

So let's stat him up. And ultimately, the DM needs to play this guy smartly for him to provide the challenge that he should, for the PCs:

HD: 1 per century
Save: as Thief of same level
MV: 12 or as bat/wolf when transformed
AC: 10 or as bat/wolf when transformed
Attacks: per weapon. Has Hill Giant Strength at night
Special:

• Sustenance
• The vampire live on, and cannot die by mere passing of the time;
• he can flourish when that he can fatten on the blood of the living. 
• Even more, we have seen amongst us that he can even grow younger; that his vital faculties grow strenuous, and seem as though they refresh themselves when his special pabulum is plenty. 
• Physical Powers:
• He throws no shadow; 
• he make in the mirror no reflect, as again Jonathan observe. 
• He has the strength of many of his hand—witness again Jonathan when he shut the door against the wolfs, and when he help him from the diligence too. 
• He can see in the dark—no small power this, in a world which is one half shut from the light. 
• He can hypnotize his victims either with fear or seduction
• Command
• Command wolves
• Command rats
• Transmutation:
• He can transform himself to wolf(sorry, no werewolves vs. vampires in this universe)
• he can be as bat
• He can come in mist which he create—that noble ship’s captain proved him of this; but, from what we know, the distance he can make this mist is limited, and it can only be round himself. 
• He come on moonlight rays as elemental dust—as again Jonathan saw those sisters in the castle of Dracula. 
• He become so small—we ourselves saw Miss Lucy, ere she was at peace, slip through a hairbreadth space at the tomb door. He can, when once he find his way, come out from anything or into anything, no matter how close it be bound or even fused up with fire—solder you call it. 
• Infectious

• Victim killed by having blood drained becomes vampire too
• Victim made to drink Vampire's blood is existentially linked to Vampire. Can read victim's thoughts(and vice versa) and command them. If victim dies, they will become a vampire.
• Weaknesses:
• He may not enter anywhere at the first, unless there be some one of the household who bid him to come; though afterwards he can come as he please. 
• His power ceases, as does that of all evil things, at the coming of the day. Only at certain times can he have limited freedom. 
• If he be not at the place whither he is bound, he can only change himself at noon or at exact sunrise or sunset. These things are we told, and in this record of ours we have proof by inference. Thus, whereas he can do as he will within his limit, when he have his earth-home, his coffin-home, his hell-home, the place unhallowed, as we saw when he went to the grave of the suicide at Whitby; still at other time he can only change when the time come(his powers are only from sunset to sunrise, noon, or in his unhallowed place)
• It is said, too, that he can only pass running water at the slack or the flood of the tide. 
• Then there are things which so afflict him that he has no power, as the garlic that we know of; 
• and as for things sacred, as this symbol, my crucifix, that was amongst us even now when we resolve, to them he is nothing, but in their presence he take his place far off and silent with respect. There are others, too, which I shall tell you of, lest in our seeking we may need them.
• The branch of wild rose on his coffin keep him that he move not from it; 
• a sacred bullet fired into the coffin kill him so that he be true dead; 
• and as for the stake through him, we know already of its peace; 
• or the cut-off head that giveth rest. We have seen it with our eyes.
• Any other characteristics the Players are able to bring a source for in the form of authentic folklore(not pop-culture)

Unarmed Combat for "Kill, Cyborgs! Kill!"

Okay, let's tackle this little topic.  I need an unarmed combat system for Kill, Cyborgs Kill!, the cyber-horror adventure I'm working on. Here are some of the desired attributes of said system:

• It's a Cyberpunk game so it needs to include lots of bitchin' martial arts
• BUT 2010 martial arts, not 1980's
• AND it's a horror game so I want to keep the combat simple so as not to break the mood
• AND DnD Compatible
• AND needs to work with the skill system

Techniques

There are several unarmed combat techniques characters can use:

• Punch: 1d4 damage
• Kick: 1d6 damage
• Grapple: hold your opponent, restraining him from using large weapons, moving.
• Escape Grapple: escape a grapple
• Throw(only from grapple): 1d8 damage, opponent is prone, still grappled
• Choke Hold(only from grapple): puts opponent to sleep. Each additional round the choke is held, must save or die
• Joint Lock(only from grapple): 1d8 dmg
• Neck Lock(only from grapple): paralyzed. Fort save or die.
• Eye Gouge: blindness till end of combat. Fort save or permanent.
• Groin Shot: stunned till end of combat. Fort save or permanent damage.

Skills

The skill check is done as an Opposed Skill Check(see Skills section), with the attacker and his opponent each rolling and comparing their rolls.

Example: The ninja attempts to punch Detective Hobbs. The ninja rolls 1d20+DEX bonus+Ninjitsu skill vs. the Detective’s 1d20+DEX+Brawling skill.

Example: Detective Hobbs attempts to grapple a junkie, who has no relevant skill. The Detective rolls 1d20+DEX bonus+Brawling skill vs. the Junkie’s 1d20+DEX.

Death & Dismemberment Chart for Unarmed Combat

This is a different chart for non-lethal damage such as from punches, kicks, throws, and joint locks(if a PC punches with brass-knuckles, throws an opponent's onto a concrete floor, or curb-stomps a prone opponent’s head then that is normal armed damage and should use the normal chart.) Upon taking unarmed damage which leaves a character with 0 or fewer HP, roll 1d10 + the number of negative hitpoints the character has.

• 1-6 Lightly Stunned: character misses next turn
• 7-14 Stunned: character is not killed, but is useless for the rest of the combat
• 15+ Killed: blunt force trauma, internal bleeding, etc.

Arik Sharon's Victories

Former Israeli General and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon passed away a couple days ago. Like many, I have mixed feelings about the man's legacy. More than just a brilliant strategist, Sharon was known for his strong-will and over a long military and political career, he managed to piss-off just about everyone at one point or another.

I've never played any proper wargames, like WFB, WH40K, etc. But I did spend many an hour at classic RTS computer games like Dune 2, Command & Conquer, and Warcraft, not to mention many sessions of my friend's simplified version of Axis & Allies, and of course way too much XCOM. So I do very much like strategy. In any case, I wanted to present his part in the 1973 Yom Kippur War between Egypt, Syria, and Israel(though he also played significant roles in the wars in 1947, 1956, 1967, 1982).

Sharon's Part in the Yom Kippur War

Sharon with head injury after the operation

The war began with Egypt's surprise attempt at re-capturing the Sinai peninsula, while at the same time Syria attacked Israel from the North, hoping to re-capture the Golan Heights. Things started-off well for the Egyptians: they crossed the Suez Canal, routed the defenders, neutralized Israeli air support, and repelled a counter-attack by Israeli armour, inflicting heavy casualties all the way. The tide turned as Egyptian troops advanced into the peninsula, taking heavy casualties from fortified Israeli armour. The Egyptian forces withdrew to more fortified positions, hanging on to the captured East side of the Suez Canal and it looked like the bloody beginning to what would be a violent and protracted conflict.

Zoomable Map of Operation

Knowing that time was against them, the Israeli generals decided on a desperate surprise move. A single armoured division would punch through the weak spot in the Egyptian lines between the Second and Third Armies. They would race to the Suez Canal and have to build a bridge over night, under heavy fire. This bridge would allow two other armoured divisions to cross-over into Egypt proper, flanking the Third Army and giving Israel the leverage to force a cease-fire. Needless to say, the Israeli armoured division building the bridge would probably take heavy casualties and if the Egyptians reacted quickly, would be sandwiched between the oncoming Second and Third Armies and probably destroyed entirely.

And the Tank Commander leading that Division was, of course, Arik Sharon. The man definitely had guts.

Anyway, here's a pretty decent program describing the Egyptian front in the Yom Kippur War:

Winning isn't All That

So, why did I come home last night with a bloody mouth and a big dumb smile that I couldn't wipe-off my face?

No, let's start over...

There are some DMs who think their job is to set-up encounters just difficult enough to provide the party a bit of a challenge, but not, heaven forbid, to put them in any real danger. They may even apologise to you if a particular combat starts going against the party. And if things really go South, they will start fudging dice rolls or having the monsters make intentional tactical mistakes.

Their reason for doing this is that they don't want to ruin people's fun by having them lose, but, ironically, their combats aren't fun, since there is no incentive to think too hard, try anything new or novel. Just roll your dice everybody, round after round after round until the inevitable...

Compare this with the DM who doesn't pull any punches. When the party finds themselves in a crunch, they've played with this DM a while and they know it's do or die. Suddenly the creative juices start flowing! Tactics, strategy, dirty tricks, religion checks for divine intervention. A PC sacrifices himself so that the others can escape!

Now that's fun! That's engaging! The players push themselves to their limits. In this way, a lost battle can be more fun than a hum-drum victory.

OK, so back to last night...

Last night was Jiu Jitsu practice. Now, I started out training with several guys who have only been training for a year or two: enough to give me a hard time, but not that hard a time. I got to try out a few new techniques, as well as apply some old favourites. Good times.

And then I had a match with J. Now I never really stood a chance with J. He's been training various martial arts since he was a kid, and BJJ several years more than me. He's younger, stronger, and he also fights a bit dirty when he's frustrated. So I had to use all my resources in the match: my most solid techniques, a few fake-outs, and also ultimately pain tolerance when he did manage to pin me in a bad position. Ultimately the match ended in a draw. But that hard-won draw was infinitely more fun than all of the night's textbook victories.