Character Creation: Slipstream

I feel like making a character, and Savage Worlds characters are quick.

The Game: Slipstream
The Publisher: Pinnacle Entertainment Group
Degree of Familiarity: Pretty familiar with Savage Worlds, but I've only read this game.
Books Required: The core the Slipstream book.

Well, as usual for a Savage Worlds game, we begin with Race. There are lots of playable races, a few of which are fully detailed, but then there's a whole section on making your own race. I'm tempted to do that, but I'm also tempted by the slug people, just because, seriously, wtf.

OK, I hate to admit this, but you know why I'm going with the slug aliens? Because they can release a foul stench that uses the burst template, and that's fun. Oy. So, race is Septosian (oh, and all of these races slipped into this part of the universe through a black hole or something. The Septosians originally inhabited the twin worlds Andee and Hopp. That's in the book).

As a Septosian, I get All Thumbs (boo), Rubbery (+1 Toughness), Squelchy (-2 to Stealth and +4 to track me because I leave a trail of slime), Stench (the aforementioned horrible smell) and Tentacles (my arms are stretchy).

OK, so now I need some kind of concept. Well, Michelle mentions the slugs in Flushed Away (here) and now the idea of a Septosian bard, incorporating the squelchy noises of his own squishy body as percussion, is in my head and won't fucking leave. FINE. That's what we're doing.

Septosians have names in the burpy, slurpy style of their language, so my guy's name is Plep. Plep is fascinated by music, especially music of other races, and he's interested in learning to play various instruments and sing in different styles. Being a slug actually helps that, because his vocal apparatus is squishy and malleable, meaning he's a good mimic. Mostly he just wants to bring the gift of music to those downtrodden by Queen Anathraxa. I suspect he'd need a good, hard kick in the motivation during the first session, but he'd be receptive.

Right, Attributes. Agility is important, as is Spirit, for me. So I'll take:

Agility d8
Strength d4
Spirit d8
Smarts d4
Vigor d6

Now, Skills. I get 15 points. I want:

Gambling d4
Guts d4
Knowledge (Music) d8
Notice d6
Fighting d4
Persuasion d8
Streetwise d4
Taunt d8

Good start. I see a lot of taunt to get Shaken results in his future.

Skipping Derived traits because duh, they should go at the end, I need to do Edges. Now, if I take the Heroic Hindrance in addition to any others I take, I get a free Edge for which I can ignore Rank. Um, yes. For my free Edge, I'll take Charismatic.

Now, more Hindrances? Yes, probably. I want Curious for my Major Hindrance. For my minors, I'll take Loyal and Pacifist. Seems he's a nice slug.

So that gives me four points. I'll burn 2 and put my Smarts up to d6, and burn the other two on Skills, I think. I'll put Guts up to d8, and buy Shooting at d6.

Oh, right, and then I get an Edge. There are a few I like, but I'll take Luck. I think he'll need it.

And now Derived Traits. Pace is 6, Parry is 4, Toughness is 6 (because I'm Rubbery) and Charisma is +2.

I get 500 Slips (moneys). I'll buy "leather" armor (it's not really leather), a ray gun (turns everyone into a guy named Ray), a bubble helmet, and that'll do it. That leaves me 230 Slips left.

And that'll do it! I figure Plep always carries a few varieties of musical instrument, stuff that's small and portable. If he had quarters on a ship, they'd need to be soundproofed.

Character Creation: Fae Noir

Well, since I ran it the other day and everything, figure I may as well make a character, yeah? I made some notes about the game in my last post, so let's rock.

The Game: Fae Noir
The Publisher: Green Fairy Games
Degree of Familiarity: Played it once at GenCon, ran it last night.
Books Required: Just the one.

So, the first step is "Conceptualize all over the place." I just cleaned my table so I'll probably try to keep it contained.

There are a number of different sorts of fae to play. If I want to play a character with True Faith, I can't play a faerie. Likewise, if I want to play someone using magic, I need to play either a human or a Tuatha. So I guess I'll play a faerie, since I played a human spellcaster when I played this once before.

There are 10 species of fairy listed, so I'll just roll a d10 for my race. That'll kickstart a concept. '8' give me...Ogre! Sure, I can be a bruiser.

OK, so according to the book, ogres are big, strong and stupid. They take orders well, but they aren't very motivated just by themselves. Hmm. The fae returned in 1918, the default setting for the line is 1923 or so. Let's assume that my ogre is a mob enforcer. He popped over from Faery and went about doing ogre things - eating people in the dark, and so on. And then a member of the local mob (I'd like the GM create a colorful figure for me) stood up to me, gave me a job breaking legs, and offered to keep me out of the iron shackles that the cops would undoubtedly like to slap me in.

Over the last few months, though, Fish (my character's nickname, because his eyes bug out and he has flaps of skin on his neck that kind of look like gills) hasn't been then leg-breaker my boss has been using. Might be because he's not subtle enough, or it could be because Fish likes to get drunk and then he brags. Either way, the clock might be running out for ol' Fish.

OK, good 'nuff for concept. Next up, we do Attributes. There are 8 of them, I get bonuses in Strength and Toughness but I take penalties in Looks, Intelligence and Agility.

OK, so this is weird. So, you start at given minimums for Attributes. Mostly it's 1, but, f'rex, as an ogre I start with Strength 3. I also, according to the fairy splat write-ups in the book, get a +3 to Strength, but a -3 to Looks. My maximum Looks is 4. So do I have to pump my Looks to 7 in order to get that? Is my Strength of 3 just...a given, or is it really 6 (that is, start at 3 and apply a boost later)? This is poorly explained, and the examples of chargen are human and Tuatha, which don't have much in the way of modifiers to use as examples. Bad form, Justin.

Well, since the modifiers match up with the min/max totals, I'll just leave it at that. Oh, wait, except I get a +3 to Strength, meaning my starting value should be 4. Ah, screw it. Assuming I start with one in everything (except Strength and Toughness, where I start with 3), I spend my 16 points thusly:

Agility 3
Strength 8
Toughness 6
Speed 3
Looks 1
Intelligence 2
Willpower 2
Perception 3

There we go.

Next up, Skills! I get 18 points here. Since there's no benefit to having a low Skill rating, I'll only wind up with a few with higher ratings.

Club 5
Roughhousing 5
Criminal Underbelly 4
Athletics 4

There we go. Now, Personality Flaws! I get 4 points. Let's do 3 in Blood-Thirsty and one in Obnoxious (he talks too much). That'll do.

And now, Build Points. Characters start with 42, but I lose 19 for being an ogre (because extra Strength is totally worth that. Oy.). That'd be 23, then.

Well, I can't buy Glamour and I can't buy magic. Looks like I should look at Edges. Well, I'll spend two points on Made, so I'm an official gangster. I'll Fists of Iron, too - I can beat on people wearing armor and not hurt myself.

Let's maybe buy some Skills? I have 18 points left. Skills are 1/1 unless I go over the linked Attribute, in which case they're 2/1. Let's spend 4 and knock Club and Roughhousing to 7, which is as high as they can go during chargen. Let's buy 2 in Bootlegging for two points, and then spend 4 more to knock it up to 4. Athletics is based on Agility...you know, maybe my last 12 points would be better spent in Attributes?

Those are 2/1, and my Agility and Speed could be higher. I can buy 6 points worth of Attributes with 12 points, which is 3 in each, which puts them both to 6. Much more better.

That means that folks have a +1 to target numbers to shoot me (I'm nimble!). I do an extra wound level because I'm fucking strong. I get an extra Severe Health Level, +2 to Initiative.

Ooh...but with Looks 1, I get 5 points of Personality Flaws to spend on various things. I'll take Ugly 5, and my low Intelligence means Skills are more expensive to raise with experience (which is stupid; it should only apply to Skills that you don't learn purely practically, but anyway).

On reflection, I like that having high or low Attributes means that you get these little bennies. That offsets the fact that you don't roll them much.

Do I still use this blog?

Yes, yes I do. Just very occasionally.

So, just to keep everyone up to speed on what's going on: I still blog over at my Livejournal (which is here). That's the spot for most of my online blather, but that may change. There's just not much going on in LJ-land anymore, and honestly this site is easier for me to access. So I may move my four main blog projects (cooking, actual play reports, movie reviews and character creation) over here soon.

I'm currently in the process of putting curse the darkness together, with the help of Michelle, Sarah and lots of other awesome people. There's a Facebook page for the game (here, so go Like us) and a Twitter that I'm using to update about the game and to post funny things my gamers say (here, go follow us). And, of course, the main development of the game is ongoing over at cursethedarkness.net.

So that's where we are. You might be seeing more activity here real soon-like.

Character Creation: Mortal Coil

Tonight I'm running Changeling and cooking. I need to do some cleaning, and I need to take donations up to Goodwill just to clear out some clutter, and the dishes need done. But I also know that if I start doing stuff like that, I'll continue doing it, and then I won't get a character done. And I woke up this morning with a real need to make a character.

Not with a character concept, mind. I just kind of want to make one.

The Game: Mortal Coil, Revised
The Publisher: Galileo Games
Degree of Familiarity: None. I've read it, but even that's been a while.
Books Required: Just the one.

I picked up Mortal Coil at one con or another, one a big indie games kick. It looks like fun; it's much like Fiasco and Geasa (which I still haven't received my copy of, guys at IPR) in that you build the world and the setting as part of character creation.

I really do like that set-up, by the way, but I think I like it better the way Misspent Youth and Ganakagok do it where there's at least some thematic structure going in (which may be why I went that route with curse the darkness). Anyway, once again, it does make character creation from this perspective somewhat difficult. Fortunately, there are two example games set up in the book for me to glom onto.

The first bit of character creation is setting creation, as I mentioned, and we'd decide things like the tone of the game and how prevalent magic is and so on. There are two examples in the book. One is a kind of X-Files thing, the other is basically American Gods. Think maybe I'll go with the latter, since it's something I can't easily do with at least a dozen of my other games. First step in actual chargen is Character Concept. Now, this is the "old gods becoming irrelevant and drinking in a bar" setting, meaning my character is a god without worshipers. The examples are Loki, Sedna, Pele and Pluto. Seems like we've got a wide variety of pantheons to choose from. So, heading over here, and clicking on Celtic Mythology, I find my old buddy Ogma.

Now, if you've been paying attention, you know that Ogma was one of the characters in the Mage demo chronicle. He's the Irish god of eloquence and wisdom, it seems. I picture him as this kind of avuncular ex-hippie college professor, someone who might have been wild in his younger days but it just too old, too drunk and frankly too smart to be arsed to do stupid shit. I think he gets more fiery as he drinks, but the trick is getting him to actually do something rather than talk about it.

Good start for concept. I get five points to spend on Passions, which can be focused on Duty, Fear, Love and Hate. Even a one-point Passion is strong, and they just go up from there.

I don't think Duty is a big part of Ogma's life. I think Fear and Love are, though. I want a Fear: "People are losing the ability to communicate." Ogma invented an alphabet, according to legend, and he's terrified by text-speak and other new forms of language that seem to bastardize the eloquence he's used to. I'll put one point there.

I think his stronger Passion should be something about free speech. But is that Duty or Love? Hmm. I guess it could be either, but Duty, to me, implies too much of an impetus to get up and get moving, and that's not where I see this character. So let's say it's Love: "The greatest blessing is to speak freely." Two points.

One more. Ogma took the sword away from the King of the Formorians, so he's willing to throw down when necessary. I think I want a Hate. "I will not be silenced." I'll put my other two points there.

Next step: Abilities. All of the characters in this game (that is, the gods game) start at "ageless," so I get 15 points in Faculties and 15 in Aptitudes. The Faculties are Force, Grace, Will and Wits.

Well, obviously Will and Wits (which represent, respectively, mental fortitude and cleverness) are my high points. I'll put 5 points in each (the maximum). That leaves five for Force and Grace, and I think Grace should be stronger, so I'll put three there and two in Force.

And now, Aptitudes. These are nouns, as in "My character is a/the _______." So for Ogma, I want him to be the god of eloquence. That's easy enough. I also want him to be a connoisseur of fine wines and scotches and so on. I think it's fun if he's an instigator, too, someone who can get people fired up. And, just for the hell of it, I want him to be good at darts. So my Aptitudes look like this:

God of Eloquence 5
Connoisseur 3
Instigator 3
Darts Champion 4

And that's that, then. The rest of it is starting pools for points, but they wouldn't be filled in on the sheet anyway.

Character Creation: The Secret of Zir'an

This is one of those games that I read (on a plane, so hell, when was that? January?), meant to make a character, then set down and forgot about. But I have some time today, the kids are napping, Michelle's working (well, presently on break playing Dead Island), and we've got 3 more hours until Changeling.

Stew did a character for this game a while back, and it looked interesting to me for a lot of the reasons he mentions. It's a fantasy setting that isn't hugely boring, and it has lifepaths, which if you remember a couple of my other characters, are things I enjoy. So let's do this.

The Game: The Secret of Zir'an
The Publisher: Paragon Games, published through White Wolf's ArtHaus imprint
Degree of Familiarity: None. I've read it, once upon a time.
Books Required: Just the corebook.

Well, no sense mucking about. Step One: Choose a Race. As I've mentioned, I generally gravitate towards human unless something really intrigues me. The brief descriptions in this book don't really sway me towards anything, so I'll say my race is Ianer (which is basically "human").

Choose an Origin. OK, much of this book has this annoying artsy lettering behind the text, and it's really hard to read.

Anyway, because I'm Ianer and I'm adaptable and stuff, I get lots of choices here. Where would I like to be from? OK, I like Edyss. The country is peaceful and forward-thinking, and they tutor their kids carefully to make sure everyone is productive. It looks like it'd be a little smothering, but it doesn't have the same push (from what I read) for excellence that makes the way that China raises their kids a troubling prospect. Also, I like the benny I get - every session I can take temporary skills to represent shit that I learned a snippet of growing up. My native language is LaVas, my base Physique and Mass are 3, and my based Intelligence is 6, and my base Acuity is 5. My base Aptitudes begin at 1, but I can put an additional point in Mental or Social. I think I'll make that choice later once I know a little more about my character.

I start at age 16, but since this game has lifepaths I assume I'll get older as I make the character. I get Basic skill proficiency in Area Knowledge: Edyss, Area Knowledge: Zir'An, my choice of a Lore, my choice of a Science, my choice of an Artisan, Awareness, my choice of an Occupational Skill, Conversation, Connections (Professors, Adventurers, School or University). And then I get two points of Practice to put wherever I want. Well, hell. Guess maybe I should start thinking about this guy some.

Well, looking at the Lore skills, there's one for Aircraft. And you know, I haven't made a pilot character, I don't think. That might be fun. OK, I'll take Lore: Aircraft. (Oh, shit. Am I making Lord Flashheart?)

I'll take Science: Aeronautics. Just makes sense. For Artisan, I'll take Painting. Occupational Skill...hmm. Can't take Pilot, as that's covered by another skill. I'll take Dyer, making me adept (somewhat) at working with clothes, dyes and fabrics. For my Connections, I'll take Adventurers, why not. I'm not sure where to put my Practice points...hmm. How about into Aircraft Lore and Painting?

And now I'm into Step Three: Distribute "freebie" points into Primary Stats and Derived Stats based on campaign Power Level. Let's assume we're in a Heroic Power Level, because that sounds like fun. I get 12 Primary and 4 Derived stat points, and later I'll get 75 CCPs, whatever that means.

Well, I have four base Attributes, so if I divvy it up evenly, that gives me Physique 6, Mass 6, Intelligence 9 and Acuity 8. But while Edyssians are bred to be smart, I think my guy is quicker on the draw than that. So I'll knock Intelligence down to 7 and put Acuity up to 10.

Now, for Derived traits, without any points added they look like this:

Reaction 8
Speed 10
Perception 8
Shadow 8
Hand to Hand Damage 3

So now I get 4 points to add onto these. Um. Well, without knowing how the system works it's hard to say. But I figure Reaction and Speed would be good for a pilot. I'll put two into Reaction to bump it to 10, and actually I'll put the other two into Perception. There, 10's in the first three.

Step Four: Purchasing Skill Packages. I have 75 points, but I have to save some for other stuff, I think. These are the lifepath bit, so I'm jazzed. I can choose a skill package from somewhere not Edyss, because Ianer are travelers and all adaptable and stuff.

Well, so let's think about this guy. Assume I started off in Edyss and had an affinity for art and cloth - kites, paper-folding, stuff like that. My tutors figured I'd be good at engineering, but that all went away the day some buddies and I made a hang-glider. I learned theory, but only so I could get near an aircraft.

Following that idea, I'll take Gier l'Avonce Nacionall (Edyssian National Defense). He joined up to try and learn to fly aircraft. That eats up 27 of my points, 4 years of my life (I'm now 20), gives me two Aptitudes, 1 points in a language (common), 14 Skills. Hang on, let's see how this works.

OK, each Skill can normally only get one point per Package, and that point either buys a level of Finesse (Basic, Advanced, Expert, or Elite, though I can't go over Expert) or a point of Practice (though you need at least B in the skill to begin with). So I get 14 points here, and I want:

Empyriar (B)
Pilot (B)
Lore: Military (B)
Athletics (B)
Awareness (A)
Melee: short (B)
Ranged Weapons: Small (B)
Ranged Weapons: Medium (B)
Ranged Weapons: Heavy (B)
Security (B)
Stealth (B)
Survival (B)
Unarmed (B)
Connections: Edyssian Military (B)

Oh, and with 4 Aptitudes points I put two into Personal, one into Knowledge and one into Social. Oh, and I think I'll put that extra from before into Knowledge.

Next up: I figure my guy left military service and fell in with some disreputable sorts. I'll take Mercenary. That costs 19 points (so I'm up to 46 spent), takes up the next two years (I'm 22), and gives me an uncommon language (I'll take Dorralinath, since it's a technical language). Two Aptitudes; one Personal and one Social. Skills! I get 10 points.

Dorralinath (B)
Athletics (A)
Melee: Short (A)
Ranged Weapons: Small (A)
Ranged Weapons: Medium (A)
Ranged Weapons: Heavy (A)
Survival (A)
Unarmed (A)
Connections: Mercenaries (B)
Intimidation (B)

After running with a dangerous crowd for a while, my character got arrested. He was part of a gang, and he was smuggling some stuff he shouldn't have. So he did some time. Mostly, I just think it's cool that there's a Prisoner lifepath. This costs 8 points (54 spent), and eats 1d10 years (hang on...3). Two Aptitudes. Well, hell, Personal and Social, I think. Four Skills.

Athletics 1PoP
Awareness 1PoP
Melee: Short 1PoP
Intimidation 1PoP

Moving on. After getting out, my character decided to leave behind his life of petty crime...but reputation follows you. He went to Arivonne, where they appreciate good pilots, and followed his dream of finally getting to fly free. 13 points, 2 years. 1 Aptitude (Personal). 7 Skills. This, by the way, counts as my "outside my native country" pick for being Ianer.

Lore: Aircraft 1PoP
Pilot: (Ex) (I can increase it two steps here)
Ranged Weapons: Fixed (B)
Connections: Pilots (B)
Mechanics (B)
Awareness 1PoP

OK, I'm down to 8 points left, so I better quit with the lifepaths. That puts me at 27 years old, which might alter my stats somewhat. Nope, I'm an adult, by Ianer reckoning, so my stats are what they are. Moving on.

Step Five: Pick Positive and Negative Valdreyr. Valdreyr are Merits and Flaws, basically. I get a 4-point positive one for free for being Ianer. I can take negative ones to give myself more CCPs, if I like.

First things first: My freebie. Well, shit, Daredevil is pretty much perfect. Sign me up.

I'll take Enemy. My character stole some powerful stuff from a powerful man, and said man is still pissed. My guy only did 3 years in jail, but that was only because he got caught outside of said enemy's reach. The enemy still wants my character to suffer. I get 10 points for him.

OK, now, this is annoying. I want a plane. There's even one I like: The Ballinorian Tramp Flyer. But all aircraft is Very Rare, which means I need Connections at Expert to even think about it. I have no Connections above Basic, and frankly it's not reasonable that this character would be Wealthy...though hang on a minute. I have an idea.

I am, in fact, going to take another Lifepath. I'll take Life of Debauchery. Bear with me. That costs 7 (meaning that, with my Enemy, I have 11 points left) and eats 1 year. I Aptitude, which goes into Social. 4 Skills.

Connections: Pilots (A)
Connections: Zir'an Hedonists (B)
Seduction (B)
Socialize (A)

So here's what happened. He learned to fly (better) in Arivonne, and he met lots of pilots and became well-respected. He bought an old Tramp Flyer (I'll explain how later) and spruced it up to look pretty, and basically started a pleasure flight: Rich people pay him to fly them wherever, and they can fuck on the plane and so on.

Back at Valdreyr, then. I have 11 points. I'll take Wealthy. Here's why: When my character was a Merc, that smuggling job paid off better than he thought it would. The plan was to split the loot five ways (him and four of his partners), but then they got pinched after they hid the stuff. My character, by chance, was sent to a different prison, and the prison the other guys were in mysteriously burned to the ground, killing all the prisoners (my enemy? maybe). My guy got out, found the illicit goods, and is living high on the hog.

But here's the thing: He's bored. He pretends to be loving his high-flyin' life, but really, he's getting the itch to fly free again (Hand of Fate, which is this system's name for the GM, there's your cue).

Anyway, with Wealthy I get to raise the Finesse level of any two Connections. I'll raise Pilots (since it'll allow me to get my damn plane) and Zi'an Hedonists (duh). We'll get to what that means momentarily.

OK, I got 1 point left. I can take more Valdreyr, but I think the total can't exceed 28 (my age, and I assume it means absolute value, since the total at the moment is zero). So actually I can only take 8 more points. I'll take Dubious; I just feel like a crook (-1). I'll take Minor Disability (-4). I'm deaf in one ear (cannon went off while I was in the military, I wasn't wearing my ear protection). And, finally, Curious (+2), giving me +4 to any Awareness test where I'm searching or investigation something of interest.

I have four points left. Supposedly I can spend CCPs on Battle Arts. How? Oh, they're in Chapter 10. Well, shit, they're all multiples of 3, and I have four points. Argh. I'll take Trick Shot, anyway. That lets me shoot cigars out of mouths and other such things - sounds appropriate.

That leaves me with one more point, but buggered if I can find a way to spend it. Oh, wait, my math is wrong. I've got 27 point sin Valdreyr, and I can have 28. Fine. I'll take Luck at one point.

Now, Equipment! Oy. I wouldn't bother, but this actually kind of fun. OK, so I have five Connections: Basic, Basic, Basic, Expert and Advanced. That means I get, effectively, 18 Common items (1 Very Rare = 2 Rare = 4 Uncommon = 8 Common).

Well, I'll burn 8 to buy my plane. I want an Iberta (an Edyssian pistol), so that's 2. I'll take a dagger (1)...actually, hell with this. If I were playing him, I'd pick all the shit he has on his plane, but mostly I just wanted to make sure he got the plane. Oh, wait, should take some armor. Full leather, probably. And I've got the money, so I'll pay 2 Commons and make it custom-fit, which halves encumbrance (and, more important, sounds like the sort of thing this guy would do).

I figure out Movement and Vitality and shit, and now I just need a name. Actually, it occurs to me I'm more like Han Solo than Flashheart. Just as well. I couldn't be as awesome as Flash if I wanted to.
So my character's name is Gui Mellenae ("gwee"). And I think that about does it.

Speakin' Out With My Geekin' Out - Part 2

Cooking!

I've always loved food. I understand that there are people who'll pretty much eat whatever - they have the attitude of the daddy rat from Ratatouille (whose named is Django, by the way). Food is fuel, and as long as what you're eating keeps you going, it doesn't matter what you eat.

I, however, am not a rat, nor am I unfortunate enough to be in a position where any nourishing food is acceptable. I do recognize that millions of people live in conditions like that, however, and that's maybe a good thing for a foodie to reflect on occasionally. My favorite cooking show, Chopped, is promoting No Kid Hungry at present, so maybe slide over there and have a look?

Anyway: Cooking. I never really paid attention when my mother was cooking, I just sort of marveled at the result. In fairness, she didn't really ask for my help or offer to teach me, either, and mom can be a little...off-putting in the kitchen. That's her space, and she flies around, busy, a whirling dervish of culinary activity (she's slowed somewhat in her later years, but only the pace, not the level of intensity - seriously, you should see the stuff she makes for our parties), but it's a hard environment to learn in. Some of that is because she has trouble talking about what she's doing while she's doing it.

So I learned to cook gradually. I lived on my own and would occasionally throw stuff together rather than make Hamburger Helper, but I was largely winging it and I didn't know any technique. Even for the first several years of my marriage, I would cook dinner, but it would safe stuff, stuff I knew how to make. And I'd call mom for help, and I made a lot of easy stuff like casseroles.

And then Chopped came on. If you don't know, Chopped is a show on Food Network wherein four chefs compete for $10,000. They each get a basket of three or four ingredients, then they have to make an appetizer for three judges in 20 minutes. After that, one of the chefs leaves the show (is "chopped"). Repeat for dinner, and then dessert, last chef standing gets the prize.

I don't know how I got into the show. I think that it probably came on before or after some cupcake show that Heather was watching and I got sucked in. I used to love watching Iron Chef, and this hit some of the same buttons - improvisation and working under pressure is sexy. But what I discovered as I watched was that the basics of cooking aren't that hard. You have to know some things about your ingredients and you have to know some basics (learning to make a good roux was one of the best things I ever did), but mostly, cooking successfully is about creativity, time management, and having a good palate. Which, apparently, I do.

So with that in mind, I had Heather and Kai choose four ingredients and I made dinner (I did not, however, hew to a time limit). I don't remember offhand what that first dinner was, but I remember absolutely loving what I was doing. Solving a problem, being creative on a deadline (because although I don't restrict myself to 30 minutes for dinner, I gotta get it done in enough time to eat before bed!), and making sure that it tasted good - these were challenges that I wasn't used to.

A couple of years later, I'm still doing these "Chopped dinners" a couple of times a week (doing one tonight, in fact). Michelle chooses ingredients most often, though Sarah, Heather, Aaron and Kai all contribute. My players in my ongoing Misspent Youth game consistently bring ingredients, as do players in my other games, occasionally.

I generally blog these dinners over at my LJ, but I'll do one here, just so you can see what I mean. Last weekend, I was to Lima (Ohio, not Peru) with Sarah to visit her mama. Her mama had come to visit and had dinner with us once before, and enjoyed my cooking, and so I wanted to cook for her again, with her choosing the ingredients. After her initial protests about making me work (c'mon, this ain't work), we got some ingredients picked.



My ingredients here were: trout, strawberries, moscado, cream crackers, and brussel sprouts.

Now, I've cooked with all of these things before, except the crackers (but I tried one, and it was just a cracker - like a thick saltine with no salt). I knew from experience that brussel sprouts play nice with bacon, so I got some bacon, fried it in a pan, and used the fat to sautee some onions and scallions. When those were getting soft, I threw in the brussel sprouts, cover the pan, and let them soak in the delicious bacon.

Strawberries are sweet and the moscado is a sweet-ish white wine. I knew they'd go well together, but I also didn't want to make a sauce, necessarily (I always seem to do that with fruit). Instead, since we needed a starch, I got some jasmine rice and made that, and then I boiled the strawberries in the wine until they got soft. I fished out the berries and mixed them into the rice, which was perfect - sweet enough to counter some of the bitter from the brussel sprouts, but not too sweet that it didn't go with dinner.

The fish, well. I love trout, and I like to keep fish simple. I brushed the non-skin side with egg white, mashed up the crackers to act as a kind of crust, salted the fish, and put it in the skillet in some hot olive oil. The trick with fish is letting the skin-side go until the skin gets crispy, which winds up cooking it most of the way anyway. Then I flipped it and let the crackers get cooked (fortunately, not burned).

Wound up being a good dinner, but the brussel sprouts came out really exceptional. Bacon makes everything better.

Anyway, bottom line, here is: Cooking is easy and fun. Try it. Stuff that you cook yourself just tastes better.

Speakin' Out With My Geekin' Out - Part 1

Oh, I know, I don't really update here anymore. But blackhatmatt.com is out there as "my website" in a lot of places on the web, and I'll post this to my LJ as well as to Facebook and everywhere except Twitter ('cause I don't, not yet). But anyway.

Monica Valentinelli came up with this idea following on the heels of some pretty egregious nerd-baiting. The idea is: This week, post about how you geek. And I can get behind that. So I'm-a gonna talk about three of the ways that I geek. Ready? Go.

#1 My Kids: Best for last? Eh. I'm putting 'em first because they are.



Kai was born in October 2004, and keeps getting more awesome every year. He's internalized what I've told him about paying attention, about being kind to people, and about being curious. He loves listening to stories, telling stories, and generally interacting with the world (though, of course, he's as susceptible to the glowing lure of the Idiot Box as anyone - don't blame your kids for this, folks).

Last week, Kai was playing soccer on her munchkin team and a kid on the other team got knocked down. Kai immediately stopped, asked if he was OK and moved to help him up. This behavior, this kindness, which took me years and deliberate cultivation to achieve, is instinctive for him. I'm often surrounded by people who claim they don't like people very much, and so it's balm for my soul to be around my kiddo, who does.

And then there's this monster:



Cael (born June 2008) does not have his brother's intrinsic regard for life and kindness, it's true. He's not a mean kid, just...enthusiastic in some ways. But he is scary smart, articulate and he has this cherubic smile that I know is going to get him in trouble one day. My biggest hope for him is that his resemblance to my father bleeds over into his temperament, because Dad was seriously one of the most respectful and well put-together men I've known. And Cael's a dead ringer for him.

At the same soccer game, Cael was hanging out with me while I watched Kai play (Cael's munchkin team played before his). He started head-butting my chest and I said, "What are you, a billy goat?"

Without missing a beat: "No! I'm a silly goat!"

Cael wins.

I geek out about my kids because I'm a parent. Most parents will geek about their kids given half a chance, and folks without kids will sometimes bag on us for that. That's fine. You don't have to get it. You don't even have to listen. Just understand: Literally everything in my life is less important to me than my kids, and that's not to say that other things are unimportant. It's just to say that when my eldest was born after that long night in 2004, I fell in love, and then it happened again three-and-a-half years later.

Part 2: Cooking coming later!