Character Creation: Over War: The Night Comes Down

The title makes me think of the line from MacBeth ("let it come down," which coincidentally was the title of a really bad one-act play I wrote in college) or the song from Labyrinth ("As the World Falls Down"). Neither of these things are remotely applicable to this game.

The Game: Over War: The Night Comes Down
The Publisher: Blackoath Games
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Over War: The Night Comes Down is a fantasy RPG with about five pages of setting info and then into the game stuff! It sets up the world of Ballark. There are a bunch of sentient peoples, some various kingdoms and fiefdoms and so on, and then the folks from the Over Night swoop down and invade. You're playing a Commander and as part of that you draft a Unit of soldiers of various sorts, and then do tactical shit. It's very war-gamey, and that's fine; probably isn't something I'd run, but I didn't hate it, either. (I do hate that the pagination in the book is off, but the PDF is bookmarked, so we'll call that a wash). 

First thing I do in creating my Commander is to pick an Authority Tag, and here we get into a slight problem. The book tells us that tags are innate properties and signifiers for the game world, OK. We're also told there's more info on p. 23. There's not. Rather, there is in the PDF, but the pagination is different in the print copy, which is something I've seen not infrequently in indie RPGs with POD games. 

Anyway, our first tag is less about Authority and more about species. I'm not feeling especially adventurous today, so I'll say my guy is Human. Oh, wait, hang on, I get it. I get Authority as a tag. That is not clear at first read, at least not without a cup of coffee. One really should have been included with the book. 

Ahem. Anyway, next we choose a history. I think I'll roll 4d6 and do it off this handy table. "Provincial Soldier." Cool, I'm like William Wallace, kind of. And why do my soldiers follow me? (2d6...9) "Generous Rewards!" These...two things seem at odds. Actually, the wording of Generous Rewards just says I know how to secure resources, not that I have them myself, so that's fine. 

Oh, I've got an idea. My guy was a thief and a swindler, got caught, and chose to join the military rather than hang (not normally an option, but, like, war). He won the loyalty of his fellow soldiers quickly, because he's resourceful and good at finding stuff the boys like, like booze and...more booze. 

(Holy shit, am I making Zapp Branigan? "All I asked from my men was their complete loyalty. If I had that, for all I cared they could sit around all day drinking beer in their underpants.")

"Beer?" "Underpants?"

OK, anyway. Next up I get 7 points of Skills, which means I'm not making Zapp, since "skill" isn't really what he does. Let's put two each into Subterfuge, Tactics, and Wandering, and the last one into Folkways. 

And then I get 2 bonuses chosen from a number of lists. I don't...think it matters which list? So why break them in lists at all? Maybe it matters for advancement. Let's take Stocked and Defiant.

Cool, that's everything for my Commander. Let's name him Palan Ludwick. He's a scruffy sort of fellow, always needs a shave and a haircut (two bits), but can actually clean up when he needs to (like when he's requesting provisions). Might be played by Diego Luna.

And then the next thing I'd do is draft a Unit. Eh, what the heck. I start by picking five kinds of characters I can draw from. Is there a list? I thought at first it was stuff like "Human," but then it says it's stuff like "Adept" and "Siren," so I guess it's more specific than that. Ugh, fine. Well, I'll take Raider and Rebel. Bounty Hunter sounds good. I want a beast, and War Elk sounds dope. Oh, and Rogue, obviously. My Unit is gonna be better for assassination or waylaying than, like, glorious battle. 

But I think that'll do it! 

Movie #953: The Lost World: Jurassic Park

The Lost World: Jurassic Park is the sequel to Jurassic Park, still directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Jeff Goldblum, Julianne Moore, Vince Vaughn, Richard Schiff, Pete Postlethwaite, Arliss Howard, Richard Attenborough, and Vanessa Lee Chester. 

Four years after the events of Jurassic Park, Dr. Ian Malcolm (Goldblum) is...well, we're not sure what he's doing. He makes reference in the movie to losing his livelihood and his tenure, so presumably whatever university he was at canned him, but apart from badly needing a shave he looks OK. Anyway, he's summoned to the home of John Hammond (Attenborough) and told that the dinosaurs were only shown on Isla Nublar, but actually grown on Isla Sorna (so, presumably, the eggs we see hatching in the first one would be...shipped back? But then why does Hammond say he's been "present for the birth of every living thing on this island?" Eh, never mind). And he's managed to keep InGen from, like, marketing dinosaur steaks or something, but after an incident involving a British family he's been ousted. So Hammond sends a team to make a video record of the dinosaurs in hopes to get public opinion on their side, consisting of documentarian Nick Van Owen (Vaughn), field equipment guy Eddie (Schiff), and paleontologist Sarah Harding (Moore)...who happens to be Ian's girlfriend. Hammond wanted Ian to be another member of the crew; Ian immediately pushes to leave immediately because Sarah's already on site. 

(As a side note, it occurs to me that Ian was actually a silly choice for this trip. If you wanted to try and rope anybody from the first go into this, why not Ellie or Alan, either of whom might have been more sympathetic to the aims of the expedition and definitely more knowledgeable? Eh, never mind.)

So the expedition arrives, they take some photos of some stegosaurus..es, and almost immediately a huge team from InGen shows up, led by Hammond's remarkably slimy nephew Ludlow (Howard) and this movie's best new character, big game hunter Roland (Postlethwaite). They're there to capture some dinosaurs for transport back to San Diego for the opening of Jurassic Park! Ian just wants to get home, particularly once it's revealed that his daughter Kelly (Chester) stowed away. 

Everything goes tits up, obviously, Roland finds and injures a baby t-rex to lure the parents so he can shoot one (great plan), the t-rexes rock up like "WE'RE WHAT YOU CAME TO SEE" and eat Eddie, Nick sabotages the InGen camp, which is great, fight the power and all, but it does wreck their shit so they can't signal for help, so now the whole troupe has to go through the jungle and the velociraptor-infested grasslands to find the one working MacGuffin radio on the island!

And that, my friends, is the end of Act Two. Act Three takes place in San Diego, because Roland manages to tranquilize the male t-rex and Ludlow takes it (and the baby) back with him. The t-rex gets loose (obvs), goes romping through San Diego, eats a bunch of people and a dog you fucking monster and then gets lured back to the boat and kills Ludlow, because no way was that fucker getting out of this movie alive. 

When it came out, this movie was kinda regarded as a lackluster sequel, and if I'm honest, I was a little surprised to remember that Spielberg directed it (but then, he was also the mastermind behind Indiana Jones & The Temple of Doom so it ain't like the man can do no wrong). But I think it's aged OK. The effects hold up, the CGI isn't bad - it helps that the dinos are practical when they can be. Goldblum does a nice job of showing us what four years of being disbelieved and discredited have done to Malcolm, and the new supporting cast is tight and manage to give us some memorable people. I especially love Postlethwaite's Roland Tembo, particularly because he doesn't stay past the end of Act Two - he bags his prize (the male t-rex, though he doesn't kill it the way he'd wanted to), but realizes that the human cost of this nonsense is too great and buggers off. 

I'm ambivalent about Chester's Kelly. Well, I think the actress did fine. I just don't know that we needed the character. Sure, it gives Malcolm a little more to do, and yes, it was established in the first movie that he likes having kids (though is perhaps more interested in, erm, the first part of the process, as it were). But I dunno, I think Goldblum and Moore and capable enough actors that they could have made these people and their arcs interesting without the kids. Though of course, then we wouldn't have a raptor get killed by gymkata. 

The other big issue, though, is the boat plot hole. The ship crashes into San Diego harbor with a t-rex in the cargo hold, but the crew on the deck is all dead (and ripped to pieces), including in a small control room, and one crewman's hand is clutching the controls for the cargo hold doors. So, did the t-rex...eat the crew and spit body parts into the cabin? Dive into the cargo hold as the doors were closing? 

(This question has an answer, and the answer is: There was a scene that made clear that velociraptors got on board the ship before it left, but guess what, that scene ain't in the movie so it didn't happen so it's a plot hole. Eh, never mind.)

My Grade: B-
Rewatch Value: Medium-high

Next up: The Masque of the Red Death

Character Creation: Lucid: Sea of Dreams

Sea dreams are made of fish, whom am I to disagree.

The Game: Lucid: Sea of Dreams
The Publisher: The Games Gardener
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

Games where you romp through dreams are nothing new, going all the way back to Shattered Dreams (to my knowledge, that was the first one). Shattered Dreams suffers from being way too 90s, but there are some more modern examples: WILD, Dreampunk, that game that Kai wrote for Game Chef the one year. Lucid seems a pretty simple game. System wise, you just roll d10s, and I think difficulty is assigned via target number? Except...the book says that a difficulty of 4-5 is "challenging." Um, no it ain't. Your odds are actually pretty good of rolling a 4 or better on a d10 (they're 60%, in fact), and if you're rolling three dice your chances of getting an 8 or better are about 82%, I think, because we ran those numbers for NWoD (I may be a little off, but the point is the odds are good). So why is difficulty 8 listed as "Absurdly Difficult?" As always, of course, I'd have to run it to know for sure.

The book itself is pretty well-written, though. There's not much setting, but there's enough - there are emotion-centered dream thingies that perpetuate and feed on particular feelings, there are places in the dreamscapes that you can go (and a crocodile-headed bartender named Lyle-Lyle). Writing about dreams and getting the tone of "weird and nonsensical but not totally rando" is hard, but I think this game pulls it off OK. And, I think it would a lot easier to pick up and play than the games I linked above (especially Shattered Dreams, holy shit). 

So let's make a Dreamer! I'm asked a few questions to start with: 

How did you go Lucid? It's like going rabid, I guess. No, seriously, I think my character was an addict. Let's say he was in a bad car accident and fucked up his legs pretty badly, and got hooked on painkillers while in rehab for those injuries. He kicked his addiction and one of the tools he used was lucid dreaming. Let's name him Adrian Soap. 

What are your goals? They're specifically asking about motivations for traveling the Sea of Dreams, here. I think in Adrian's case, it's for novelty and creative fulfillment. Adrian-in-Dreams can fly (or how about just run), solve problems that require heroics or profundity. That's...maybe not intoxicating, but definitely diverting. 

Who are you in the Waking World? Adrian was an IT professional who kind of fell into his job. He got t-boned by a drunk driver and now "guy who got t-boned" has sort of become who he is, and he rather hates that. At least when people find out he's a recovering addict, that's something he can own. 

Now I get to pick an Avatar. An Avatar in the Sea of Dreams can be anything, which is a little daunting. I don't see Adrian's as being too abstract, given how he came to Lucid Dream, so let's say his Avatar is a living statue. His apartment window faced a park, and there was a bronze statue of...somebody, some general or other, he thinks. He used to stare at it while falling asleep and used it as a touchstone for centering himself while dreaming, so it's kind of what he looks like in Dreams unless he changes it. He still has his own features, though, not the statue's.

Attributes! There's 3, I get 9 points, I can't go over 5 in any one of them. I think Resistance and Influence are going to be higher than Intuition. Let's put 1 into Intuition and 4 each into the other ones? Wait, do I get a free one to start? No, doesn't look like it. OK, let's go Intuition 2, Resistance 3, Influence 4. 

I get three Items, but they don't have to be literal items, they can be memories or sensations or whatever. In Adrian's case, I think he's got "the smell of rain", "a bottle of pills", and "pain."

I start with 5 Lucidity, and that's it, kids! The sheet has slots for Fears, Hopes, and Beliefs, though, are those meant to be anything in particular? I think it's just meant to be places to flesh out the character, because those terms aren't mentioned in any game context in the text. 

OK, sure. We'll say Adrian fears hospitals and medical stuff. He's more afraid of getting addicted again, but he also knows that some pain is too intense for just gritting your teeth and powering through. He hopes to find something as fulfilling in the Waking World as the Sea of Dreams, because asking people "did you turn it off and on again" ain't doing it for him. And he believes that people don't choose to be addicts and folks who say it's a moral failing as judgmental assholes. Also that The Great Escape is the greatest movie ever made. 

That'll do it!

Marvel: Enter Mount Wundagore!

Back to superheroes for the third and final Act! Here's last time.

Our heroes swoop in towards Mount Wundagore, and the weather immediately turns against them. Snow and blinding hail kicks up, and it's all Maria and Bucky can do to keep the quinjet level. But they break through the weather and see the cave entrance that Spidey saw in his vision - and three figures waiting for them.

Two of them are the huge rock monsters that Spidey saw before, but the third is a more normal-sized human with a long cloak. They can't quite make out other features, but they see the figure move their arms and then a beam of magical energies streaks towards them! Maria takes evasive action, and then has to do it again as the rock-monsters hurl boulders at the jet. But Maria is a hell of a pilot, and the quinjet turns around and lands. The back opens, and the heroes exit the plane into battle!

The figure, horribly, turns out to be Doctor Stephen strange, whom we last saw back here. But his flesh is pale and sallow, his eyes and milky, and he looks, well, dead. "Necromancy," mutters Magnus. "Don't see that every day."

Bucky takes up a position by the plane and gets the attention of the rock-monsters, who tromp over towards him, fists raised. Maria runs and slides past Strange, and sees into the cave. She sees carvings on the walls that make her eyes itch, and a huge stone slab that's clearly meant for sacrifice. Wanda Maximoff hovers above it in the lotus position, and behind her, the bas-relief of the Scarlet Witch. She doesn't acknowledge Maria or the situation out front.

Spidey tries out his brand-new taser-webs at Strange, but the amulet around Strange's neck opens and Spidey sees into eternity. A good grounding in science and a generally strong mind keep him from going mad, but it's a near thing. Magnus, now able to teleport more freely as the Null-Dimension Cloak keeps him unobserved, appears behind Strange and attempts to magic him away, but Strange counters the spell. Maria lashes out her whips at Strange, but doesn't realize Magnus is in the way (since he's invisible) and he gets a brief jolt - but more to the point, is made visible for a moment. 

Strange turns and the amulet on his chest opens again, and Magnus is silhouetted in blue for a second...but he blows sand in the amulet's eye and forces it to close before his Cloak and be compromised. The rock monsters close on Bucky and one of them throws a punch; Bucky blocks it with his metal arm, but the other one punches him in the back! Bucky grits his teeth (and moves his stress die to the doom pool), and punches the other one, cracking its chest, and trusting the team to have his back. And they do - Spidey, realizing that Strange is more a Magnus problem, fires a bunch of webs and yanks the other rock-monster back. 

Strange casts a spell and the shadows on the ground reach up and grab the heroes, worming into the cracks in their souls - all except Magnus. His cloak just sucks up the shadow and devours it. Maria unleashes her electro-whips and lashes Strange's arms, and Magnus follows up with a splash of holy water that melts his flesh. Spidey yeets the rock-monster off the cliff, and Bucky punches the other one again, cracking it further, but it raises up its arms and pounds him into the ground - he blocks with his metal arm but this thing is far too strong. Bucky picks himself up, wipes the blood from his nose, and throws one more punch, crumbling the rock-monster into chunks. 

Meanwhile, Maria tries to up the voltage on Strange and put him down, Magnus fires an energy weapon from somewhere in his Hat, and Spidey just swings over and punches him, but physical attacks don't bother the zombie. Bucky even pulls his head off, but it floats back up and reattaches itself. His cloak detaches and tries to wrap around Maria's face, but she dodges. 

And then something changes. Purple, flaking patches appear under Strange's dead eyes, and he speaks in a voice that echoes in all four heroes' heads. They feel the owner of that voice seeing them, and then Strange's head falls off, his body collapses, and from the depths of the cave, the heroes hear the clack of Wanda's shoes on the stone. 

They have the Scarlet Witch's attention. 

Character Creation: Cursed Captains of Cthulhu

Sounds like something Hermes Conrad would say.

The Game: Cursed Captains of Cthulhu
The Publisher: Black Cats Gaming
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: Just the one

So this one was kind of a shitshow on Kickstarter. Rather, the campaign was fine, they raised about $31K on a $20K-ish goal (they're working pounds, not dollars), very communicative. And then the pledge manager went up in January 2022, about six months after the campaign closed, and like an idiot I kind of blindly clicked through because normally what happens is that companies don't charge you shipping until the book is done and ready to ship, so that they know, like, how much it actually costs (this, by the way, was not the norm when RPGs started hitting Kickstarter, meaning you had to fold shipping costs into the pledges and just make it your best guess, which really fucked me on my first couple of campaigns). 

Anyway, Black Cats charged shipping right away, and they charged more than the price of the hardcover in shipping! And yes, this was right around the time that the initial tariff fuckery was happening, but that's still far too much. There was of course a bit of an outcry, I think they actually did lower the prices somewhat but I still paid $50 for shipping on a $40 book, and the book was delivered more than 2 years past the estimated delivery date anyway. So not a great start.

But...the cover is pretty cool. I hadn't cracked the book until last night (this is not uncommon, it often takes me a couple of years to get around to reading an RPG unless I have a reason to look into it sooner, like if I'd wanted to run a pirate-themed or Mythos-themed game), and...it looks tentatively pretty cool. The writing could be clearer in paces, but they do give examples (not a fully written example of chargen, but you can't have everything). 

Could've used a proofreader, is my point

System looks workable, I think? Add stats, roll 4d6, check against a difficulty. I don't understand why you'd use four dice instead of two; maybe they just wanted bigger numbers, but it feels like the probabilities would get weird. 

Setting wise, yeah, it's what's in the box. They're very careful to say they've excised slavery from the setting (in fact, they repeat the text talking about it at least once), and, like, sure, it's not something I want to engage with when telling pulpy magic pirate stories, either. There's probably an interesting point to be made about ignoring (or removing) racism from a Lovecraft-inspired setting in the interest of making everything less uncomfortable, but I'm by no means the guy to make that point. Anyway, Cursed Captains also points readers to Harlem Unbound, which is just a smart move.

So let's make a cursed captain! Step One: Choose Your Starting Profession. There's a cool compass-wheel motif here; there are professions around the spokes and as you go south, f'rex, you're more magically capable, while north is more combat capable. Now, suppose you wish to make a combat-mage? I don't know if that's just discouraged or what. 

The book says that there are eight starting professions, though, which is weird because there are actually fifteen listed. So are seven of them advanced or something? Hang on, let's figure this out. 

OK, that's gotta be a misprint, because there is nothing in the book designating any profession as a "starting profession" as opposed to an "advanced profession" or something. Also, more than eight of them are referred to as "starting professions" elsewhere in the book. Guys. 

So basically I can pick one of fifteen Professions to start. Um. I think I'd like to do magical shit today, thanks much - the setting is obvious very high-magic, though as presented magic is meant to have "at your own peril" sort of vibe, which is fine. Looking at the compass, it's interesting to me that Rigger (the one that works in the rigging, not like my dwarf in Shadowrun) is as far south on the compass as it is, but I guess it had to be somewhere. 

You know, I actually made a character for a setting like this for a setting-agnostic game called Chimera, and it's been rattling around at the back of my head the whole time I was reading this game. I don't like to repeat myself, so I don't want to do a character like Cangrejo, so let's take a different tack and make an Exorcist, someone who's still magical but in a much more disciplined way.

Step Two: Characteristics. I get 8 points to throw around. The descriptions of how this step works are really muddled; there are a couple of ways to do it randomly but it's mostly "roll some dice, add some points, stop when you hit 8," so I don't much see the point. As an exorcist I get 2 points in Abjure (the characteristics and skills aren't capitalized, kind of the opposite problem a lot of RPGs have). I can take up to 3, but if I do that I can't take any points in Accuracy (the characteristic on the opposite side of the wheel). 

Guess I should conceptualize a little, huh? I think the other pirates call my guy the Monk. He's not a monk, but he keeps himself to a very high moral and physical standard, and the result is he's a bit of a pill. You're gonna want his ass around when the monsters burble up from the depths, though. 

I get 8 points to throw around, not counting my two free in Abjure. Let's see. I'll leave Savvy and Harness at 0...oh, wait, no, Harness helps determine Courage. Argh. OK, fine. 0s in Savvy and Studies, 2 in Harness, Seafaring, and Brawn, and 1 each in Accuracy and Melee. 

My Health is 14, my Courage is 14, my Initiative is 12, and my Evasion is 10 (it's based on Savvy for some reason). 

Step Three: Skills. Looks like these are binary (you've either got 'em or not) but I can't find how many you get. It says you can pick any you meet the requirements for, but surely that'll be too many, right? I know I get Courage of the Pure by dint of being an Exorcist. I get the Otherworldly Insight skill, too, and the write-up in the Exorcist Profession says that "doesn't count as an extra skill chosen during character creation," whatever the fuck that means. 

Well, the example characters in the Quickstart each have three Skills, except the Exorcist has four, which makes sense. So I guess you get your Profession's Skill and then two more? It literally does not say that in the book anywhere that I can find. Glad this took two years of extra development, if they'd rush it there might have been mistakes. 

All right, snark aside, let's see, what should Monk have? Well, I think Sea Hand makes sense, and then I'll take Deep Diver (gives me bonus to do sailing stuff and to dive into the deeps, respectively). 

I can also take any Traits I want, which are basically flaws. It doesn't look like they do you much good, but I might well be missing something and I can be arsed to figure it out. Let's make Monk...Cannibalistic! (I'm kidding, but that's really in the book.) No, actually, I'm gonna take Cannot Lie.

Step Four: Personal Style. Basically the "everything else" stage. Oh, hang on, do I start with any spells? Yes I do, I start with four. Does...why isn't that in the chargen section? Jesus. 

Well, anyway, let's take my four spells. Definitely taking Cleansing Hands (which lets me dispel magic on people). Desalinate is one of those spells that in real life would be hella useful (it makes salt water drinkable), so sure, let's do that. I'll take Inner Resolve (lets me give someone a buffer against losing Courage), and an offensive spell sounds like a good idea, so I'll take Slashing Light (exactly what it sounds). 

Cool, now the details. I think Monk is balding (which contributed to the nickname), but has a ring of brown hair. He wears a simple wooden cross, and follows ship's rules scrupulously. He doesn't really get why people call him Monk - the hair thing, sure, but he drinks and whores with the rest of the crew, so what's the big deal? 

That'll do it. Yet another example of a character I like in a game I find real iffy. 

Movie #952: The Lego Batman Movie

The Lego Batman Movie is an animated spinoff of The Lego Movie, starring Will Arnett, Michael Cera, Rosario Dawson, Ralph Fiennes, Zach Galifianakis, and a whole bunch of other recognizable folks in smaller roles. 

In the "Gotham City", or maybe just "DC" section of Finn's basement, Batman (Arnett) is going through the motions protecting the city from the Joker (Galifianakis) and a whole host of other Batman villains. Joker escapes, but poses to Batman that he either needs to disarm the bomb threatening to destroy Gotham or capture his "greatest foe," to which Batman responds that he doesn't have a greatest foe, and Joker means nothing in particular to him. 

Joker, crushed, manipulates Batman into sending him to the Phantom Zone wherein dwell the greatest villains of history, including Voldemort (Eddie Izzard), King Kong (Seth Green), the Wicked Witch of the West (not sure; wiki says Riki Lindhorne; she voiced Poison Ivy but the Witch isn't specifically credited), and, um, the Velociraptor from Jurassic Park. He then arranges for Harley Quinn (Jenny Slate) to open the floodgates and let all these villains out again.

Meanwhile, Batman is dealing with the retirement of Jim Gordon (Héctor Elizondo) and his replacement by his daughter Barbara (Dawson), and the fact that he accidentally adopted an orphan named Dick (Cera). Alfred (Fiennes) also constantly tries to get him to admit that he's lonely and wants a family again, but Batman is bound and determined to be alone. 

In the end, Gotham is saved, the villains are returned to the Phantom Zone, and Batman admits how much the Joker means to him (finally saying "I hate you"). Dick, having already come into the role of Batman's sidekick "Robin", Alfred (wearing the 60s Batman outfit), and Barbara (now as Batgirl, not that she's crazy about the name) become the Bat-family and...all live together at the mansion? Sure, why not! 

You know, given that this movie isn't written by the same ones that wrote The Lego Movie (though they produced), they pretty much nailed the humor. The conceit of the franchise is that it's all play from Finn, and The Lego Movie did a really nice job of nailing a child's understanding of the morality and beats that you'd see in this kind of beats. That happens here, too - we see Batman through the eyes of someone who's clearly a fan, knows his history and all his rogue's gallery (right down to Condiment King), but sees the central conflict of the character as being a loner rather than the heavier themes of later stuff about the character. Likewise, Joker is scary because he's a clown with a creepy smile, not because he's a homicidal maniac. Violence is treated very cartoonishly and, well, childishly - everyone says "pew pew!" when they fire guns, and the stakes are big and dangerous in a Saturday morning cartoon kind of way.

The result is that it doesn't have the same emotional weight as The Lego Movie, since it's not about Finn and his dad, but that's OK - it's fun, it's light, and I didn't realize how much I needed to see a superhero movie that leans fully into how ridiculous the genre is until I rewatched this. 

I remember being skeptical of a whole movie around Will Arnett's Batman, just because his schtick of DARKNESS might wear thin, but the supporting cast makes a big difference. Michael Cera is bouncy and joyful as Robin, Rosario Dawson gets to be the competent adult in the room (well, she splits it with Alfred), and Galifianakis puts his own spin on the Joker rather than trying to be Mark Hamil. 

I don't think it's as good as The Lego Movie, but it's actually better than I remember from the first time I saw it. 

My Grade: B+
Rewatch Value: Medium-high

Next up: The Lost World: Jurassic Park

Character Creation: Wytch Mountain

Myst by thy syysyn yf thy wytch.

The Game: Wytch Mountain
The Publisher: Knight Owl Publishing
Degree of Familiarity: None
Books Required: "Book," sure.

I mean, it's a zine and it never claimed to be anything else. I don't know why "witch" is misspelled, and I don't know what part of this they think is folk horror, other than the fact that there's witches in it. It's one of these "bare-bones systems, character creation, bestiary, iunno, get to it" sorts of games, and frankly I need to stop backing these because they just feel half-done to me. But it's also only 34 pages and I'm pressed for time today, so hyry wy gy! (I'll stop.)

First thing we do is roll for Ability Scores, which in this case are Strength, Dexterity, and Intelligence. Sure. (As a side note, why in a game about witches are we giving physical stuff more granularity than mental/spiritual?) Anyway, we roll and check if the dice are even/odd and in what combination. Both even is the most desirable result. So we get: 2,2; 2,6; 4,1. So close! So my Strength and Dexterity are both +2 and my Intellgience is +1. Noice. 

Oh, bother, I went and wrote those scores in, but your class can change them. Serves me right for not reading ahead. Anyway, next step is Class. I think I wanna be a Leyline Witch. That boosts my Dexterity and Int by one (+3 and +2, respectively). I get a dagger, an Amulet of Protection, some bone jewelry, and my first spell is Tell Me Your Secrets (I can force someone to tell the truth with a bit of hair or fingernail).

Cool. My HP is 1d6 + Str, so...4 (ugh). My Warding is 10 + Dex + any other bonuses. Do I have any? Yeah, I get +1 from my amulet. So that's 14. I start with 1d6 gold pieces, which is the only thing that tells me we're in a fantasy setting (and I rolled a 1). I get Spell Points equal to INT + level, so 3 for me.

Roll 2d6 for a weakness...I cannot step over salt. And then I get a Last Curse; I can only cast it once and it kills me, so it's best saved for when I'm dying anyway. I roll and get...The Withering. One target's STR drops by 1d6. Hopefully that's enough to kill a motherfucker.

That's it! Let's name my witch Bartleby. Bartleby is big on doorways and thresholds - everything's on the other side of something. That's probably why a doorway blocked with salt fucks with him so - salt is curative, preservative, and draws out the life; it makes a door not a door. Anyway, Bartleby is skinny, gaunt, and has a habit of popping out from behind doors.