Signal Load

Character Journal - Dark Throne of the Western Shore

2010-10-27T07:41:00.000-07:00

Gaming Journal - Savage Encounters

2010-10-26T20:57:00.001-07:00

Character Journal - Pathfinder RPG Edition: Freeport Companion

2010-09-06T22:20:00.001-07:00

From ENWORLD
10th February 2010, 07:26 AM

For many people Freeport is still seen as a "d2o" setting, so making its use easier for players of the game that has inherited the mantle of D&D3 makes a lot of sense. This companion also allows us to test the Pathfinder market while expanding our Freeport support.

Another thing to point out is that the book this is updating, the d20 Freeport Companion, was released late in the 3.5 lifecycle and many people missed it. The work that had been done on the Advanced Class Compendium was, in fact, folded into the book because Rob Schwalb (its developer) and I agreed this was likely our last hurrah for 3.5 sourcebooks. There's thus a lot of material in here that's useful for any d20 (and soon Pathfinder) campaign, whether you use Freeport or not.
__________________
Chris Pramas
Green Ronin Publishing
"Be Your Own Master"
www.greenronin.com

For a decade now Freeport has stood as one of fantasy gaming's most distinctive cities. Home to pirates, foul cults, terrifying monsters, vicious gangs, crime lords, and corrupt politicians, Freeport is a dynamic setting that offers a unique blend of high adventure and cosmic horror. Now the City of Adventure returns to its roots with the Freeport Companion: Pathfinder RPG Edition, a rules supplement for the Pirate's Guide to Freeport. Its 160 pages are packed with all the support you need to run a Freeport campaign with the Pathfinder RPG. In addition to giving game stats for all the city's major characters, the Freeport Companion provides new core classes like the corsair and monster hunter, new prestige classes like the musketeer and witch hunter, famous magic items, an insanity system, new spells and incantations, and an introductory adventure. Celebrate 10 years of the City of Adventure with the Freeport Companion: Pathfinder RPG Edition!

Character Journal - Sisters of Rapture

2010-08-25T15:28:00.000-07:00

From COMICBITS

Hey everyone! After several long years and countless hours, my oh-so-sexy D&D book is finally complete and now available in PDF format for sale at DriveThruRPG! Don’t know what I’m talking about? Read on!

The Sisters of Rapture is an OGL (Open Gaming License, which means d20 3.5 edition) compatible sourcebook written by T.Catt (hey, that’s me!). The 72-page PDF features information on the Sisters of Rapture, an organization of warrior-priestesses dedicated to fighting evil and darkness in the names of the various goddesses of love and beauty, most specifically Aphrodite, Freya and Isis. The book contains a base 20-level class, 4 sexy prestige classes, new spells, feats, magic items and monsters and, of course, lots of brand new erotic fantasy art by T.Catt (hey, that’s me again!), Miravi, Oni, Anthony Carpenter, Thom Chiaramonte and many others! And it can all be yours for only $12.00!

If you’d like to see an exclusive sneak peek, you can download the Chapter 1 preview on the official Sisters of Rapture web-page (generously put together and hosted by my publishing partners on this project, Fantastic Gallery OGL, featured on the new -and mostly incomplete- gaming website, Arcane-Marks.com. Check out their awesome character sheets!). Eventually I plan on having more supplemental stuff on the SoR page, including a T.Catt sketch gallery and an extra prestige class and other fun free stuff. I just need to get it all put together first. Trust me, I’m working on it.

You can also see a preview of the 1st chapter (which features the base class) on the DriveThruRPG product page. So if you’re interested GO BUY IT RIGHT NOW! (Seriously. I need the money.) If you do buy the book, (and you will, because you’re an awesome person with excellent taste), feel free to leave a review on DriveThru’s site (there’s a link on the product page). Given the adult nature of the content, I didn’t submit the book for review with DriveThru’s official reviewers, so I’m counting on y’all to spread the word about it’s awesomeness! So please help me out, there.

As a little incentive, here’s the art from the cover! Thanks, everyone, for your support and I hope you enjoy the book!

A new character class emphasizing the romantic and erotic side of women and adventure. Available only through Drivethru RPG. Free bonus PDFs available through Arcane Marks

Relics of Power
The Golden Tresses of Sif
by Jarrod Camire
From Kobold Quarterly

Aura strong enchantment, strong illusion, strong transmutation; CL 16th
Slot head; Weight 3 lbs

Description

Loki once shorn the golden locks of the beautiful Sif and her husband Donar forced the trickster to have a golden headpiece made to replace the hairs of his beloved wife. This magical wig attaches itself to the wearer’s head and the hairs then grow like real ones, although the owner can change her hairstyle, coloration, and hairs’ length on a whim.

The golden tresses of Sif grant the wearer an enhancement bonus to Charisma of +8 for as long as the headpiece is worn; note that when the character specifically opts for blond hues (ash-blond, flaxen, golden blond, strawberry blond, etc.) the tresses grant an enhancement bonus to Charisma of +10. These magical tresses also greatly improve the effectiveness of a disguise, and this regardless how much the character is changing her appearance (no check modifier to your Disguise check, regardless the age, gender, race, or character’s size you chose to impersonate). Moreover, if you ever impersonate a particular individual, those who know about that person don’t get a bonus on their Perception checks when looking at you except if they intimately know the subject.

The tresses also provide advantages with all the skills that are based on Charisma as follow:

Bluff: Your opponents are blinded by your otherworldly beauty and you always succeed when feinting (for more information on feinting in combat see Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook, Chapter 8).

Diplomacy: Creatures always become friendly in your presence, unless you have taken aggressive actions towards them first. If you ever attack the creature won’t remain friendly of course and won’t fall for the same trick twice.

Handle Animal: All Handle Animal DC checks are lower by a factor of 5 in your case.

Intimidate: Your comeliness is almost alien to some and when you successfully demoralize an opponent the target is stunned instead of shaken.

Perform: When a bard, skald, or any performer rolls a Perform check during a Bardic Performance or else, she receives a +5 circumstance bonus.

Use Magic Device: When a character tries to emulate an alignment, class feature, or race the Use Magic Device checks are lowered by a factor of 5 in that case.

Finally, a lock cut from the golden tresses of Sif looks like gold filaments; a single lock is worth 1 gp, even though the wig cannot produce more than 1d100 gp per day in this fashion. Locks cut after that will turn out to be made of copper instead of gold.

Destruction
The gold used to fashion the golden tresses of Sif can be melted down only in the forge where the artifact has been originally created, that of the Sons of Ivaldi. If someone ever discovered the scissors used by Loki to cut the genuine hairs of Sif and employed them on the golden tresses the wig would be utterly destroyed.

The Company of the Scarlet Rapture

Sybilathe Firestar

Wintermoon

Clearbrooke

Gaming Journal - The Icelandic volcano

2010-04-26T06:54:00.000-07:00

Icelandic Volcano Began Rumbling in March
By BRIAN KNOWLTON
Published: April 15, 2010
Source

The Eyjafjallajokull volcano, one of Iceland’s largest, had been dormant for nearly two centuries before returning gently to life in the late evening of March 20, noticeable at first not by any great seismic activity but by the emergence of a red cloud glowing above the vast glacier that covers it.

In the following days, fire fountains jetted from a dozen vents on the volcano, reaching as high as 100 meters, according to the Institute of Earth Sciences at the University of Iceland. That spectacular show, along with lava flows up to 20 meters thick, and “lava falls” to the volcano’s northeast, turned it into a full-fledged tourist attraction.

The volcano seemed to return to somnolence early this month. Then on Wednesday, an explosion sent clouds of ash soaring as high as 11,000 meters, disrupting air traffic in Northern Europe, with ripple effects far beyond.

The latest eruption led to the evacuation of hundreds of rural Icelanders. Although in an area where many people keep packed suitcases near the door for just such an eventuality, the movement to emergency shelters was efficient, reports said.
About 450 people had registered by Thursday morning at a shelter in the Hvolsvollur Elementary School, Iceland Review reported. Hundreds of other people were staying with friends or relatives.

But people throughout the affected area had to wear protective masks, and farmers and rescue workers scurried to herd thousands of sheep and other livestock away from the area of ash fall, amid fears of the deleterious effects of fluorine or other toxic elements in the ash.

Sigurlaug Sigurdardottir, a farmer from Herjolfsstadir, told the mbl.is news site that the ash had turned a bright day so dark that it was impossible to see a nearby house.

Another farmer, Ingunn Magnusdottir, described a desolate scene, saying: “There is gray dust covering everything. The cars are gray.” She said that her animals were all being kept in barns but that livestock at other farms had to be evacuated to safer areas.

A thick layer of gray to black ash — which residents described as fine, like flour or sugar — covered thousands of hectares of land. The authorities were monitoring drinking water in islands that draw their water from Eyjafjallajokull glacier melt, Iceland Review’s Web site reported.

The eruption showed no sign of abating, Pall Einarsson, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland, told Reuters.
“The seismographs are showing that since this morning the intensity of the eruption seems to be growing,” he said.
As much a third of the glacial ice above the crater has melted — it had been up to 250 meters thick in spots — raising the level of a nearby river by nearly a meter and covering some roads. But the worst danger of flash flooding appeared to be over, and some nearby residents had been able to return home.

Bridges over the Markarfljot river were damaged. The police restricted travel on some roads in the east, and the authorities warned that further flooding was possible.

At one point, the authorities decided to use heavy construction equipment to dig a break through the main highway to Reykjavik, Highway 1, rather than risk an overflow thought capable of destroying a key bridge.

The latest eruption is the fourth by Eyjafjallajokull (pronounced EYE-a-fyat-la-jo-kutl) in 1,100 years, vulcanologists say.
The last one, in 1821, which began with days of explosive eruptions, left deep layers of dark-gray ash through vast areas of southern Iceland — some of it nearly reached Reykjavik — and it caused the Markarfljot and the Holtsa rivers to flood.
The fluorine in its ash was blamed for the deaths or debilitation of large numbers of livestock.

As Eyjafjallajokull was settling down, the Katla volcano erupted in the spring of 1823.

Some vulcanologists and geologists said Thursday that the latest eruption might last just a few days. But the possibility remained of a longer event, like Eyjafjallajokull’s eruption of more than a year in the 1820s.

What a difference 48 hours makes: Clear skies above as volcano cools down after its violent outburst

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Source

With clear blue skies and a small cloud rising up to the heavens, Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano looks a picture of calm today compared with 48 hours earlier.

Back then, with fire and 1,250C lava spitting out from its core, it presented a far more violent image to the world.

Dust particles were shot up into the skies above and drifted down over the Atlantic, closing vast swathes of European airspace.

The volcano has now simmered to 80 per cent of its intensity, but scientists are warning that earth tremors could cause an even larger eruption at a neighbouring crater.

An eruption at the Katla volcano would be ten times stronger and shoot higher and larger plumes of ash into the air than its smaller neighbour.

The two volcanoes are side by side in southern Iceland, about 12 miles apart, and thought to be connected by a network of magma channels.

Katla is buried under one of Iceland's largest glaciers, the Myrdalsjokull, which is 500m deep. This means it has more than twice the amount of ice than the current eruption has burned through, threatening a new and possibly longer aviation standstill across Europe.

Katla showed no signs of activity Tuesday, according to scientists who monitor it with seismic sensors, but they were still wary.

Pall Einarsson, professor of geophysics at the Institute of Earth Sciences at the University of Iceland, said one volcanic eruption sometimes caused a nearby volcano to explode, and Katla and Eyjafjallajokull have been active in tandem in the past.

The last three tiimes that Eyjafjallajokull erupted, Katla followed.

Katla also typically awakens every 80 years or so, and is slightly overdue having last erupted in 1918.

That notion is frightening for nearby villagers, who would have to quickly evacuate to avoid the flash floods that would rip down Katla's slopes.

Even last week's eruption generated spectacular cascades of melted water and ice chunks the size of houses when burning gases and molten earth carved through the glacier.

Svenn Palsson, the 48-year-old mayor of the coastal village of Vik, said residents were going over evacuation plans just in case.

With a population of 300, Vik has been covered in three millimeters of ash from the Eyjafjallajokull eruption, but the real concern is Katla.

Residents would have two to three hours to reach the safety of a shelter if the volcano erupted and caused the ice to melt quickly.

'We have practiced and can do it in 30 minutes,' Palsson said.

Other areas around the mountain, however, would have no more than 20 minutes to evacuate, he said.

Katla's substantial ice cap is a major worry because it is the mixture of melting cold water and lava that causes explosions, and for ash to shoot into high altitudes.

Strong winds can then carry it on over Europe.

So far there have been minor tremors at Katla, which scientists believe to be movements in the glacier ice, but the activity from Eyjafjallajokull is making measurements more difficult to read and an eruption more tricky to predict.

'It is more difficult to see inside Katla,' said Kristin Vogfjord, geologist at the Icelandic Met Office.

Vogfjord says Katla's sensitivity to eruptions at Eyjafjallajokull may have to do with pressure shifts in the Earth's crust that are caused by an eruption's magma flow.

'Katla can start tomorrow or in 100 years, you don't know,' said Palsson. 'All we can do is be ready.'

Gaming Journal - The Oldest Boats

2010-04-23T20:18:00.000-07:00

Explorers find ancient boat in Black Sea
Vessel discovered by fishermen trailing nets along the sea bottom

From the Associated Press
Source: MSNBC
updated 9:19 a.m. PT, Sat., Nov . 29, 2008

SOFIA, Bulgaria - A well-preserved wooden dugout canoe, likely dating back to the prehistoric age, has been discovered at the bottom of the Black Sea, scientists said Saturday. The vessel was discovered by fishermen trailing nets along the sea bottom some 15 miles off the coast, said Dimitar Nedkov, head of the Archaeological Museum in the port city of Sozopol. "The dugout is 8.5 feet long and 27.5 inches wide, and it is made most probably of oak," Nedkov said. Bulgarian explorers have found 4 ancient vessels in remarkably good condition in the Black Sea, whose oxygen-depleted deep water preserves wrecks without the worm damage and deterioration that normally affects wooden vessels. "Nowhere else can you find similar dugouts, as well as any kind of wooden vessels over 300 years old, because water rots the wood away," Dimitrov said. "In the Black Sea, however, there is dissolved hydrogen sulfide below a certain depth which preserves all organic materials."

Ancient Boat
Source:AGI
Archeology: 8000 year-old Pirogue found in Lake Bracciano

(AGI) - Rome, Italy, Aug 1 - An 8,000 year-old pirogue was found in Lake Bracciano, in the area of the neolithic village La Marmotta. "It's an exceptional example of ancient ship engineering, which proves the advanced knowledge of the peoples who lived here in 6000 BC" say the archaeologists who made the discovery, of the Prehistoric Museum 'Luigi Pigorini' in Rome. More than 10m long, made out of a single oak trunk, the pirogue was still being made when it was abandoned for reasons we still don't know. It was found at a depth of 10 metres. The boat will be displayed in late September, at the town hall of Anguillara Sabazia. Research at La Marmotta is being carried out by a team led by Maria Antonietta Fugazzola, with the cooperation of Lazio's archaeology superintendence. (AGI) -

COPYRIGHTS 2002-2005 AGI S.p.A.

Shifting Gears - Biometric Palm Readers

2010-03-16T23:36:00.000-07:00

Giving biometrics a hand
Palm-reading system used to safeguard patient records

By Bryn Nelson
Source: msnbc.com

A perceptive palm reader is helping one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S. divine the true identities of its patients, ushering in a new era of biometric identity verification.

The device, resembling a small black cube and manufactured by Tokyo-based Fujitsu Corp., uses a vascular pattern recognition system to accurately identify people while they hold their palm just above the cube. The scan, requiring less than a second, captures the unique branching pattern of blood veins and instantly converts key data points into a numerical code that can be compared with other palm scans to identify matches. The miniaturized device can plug into a laptop computer via a USB port, while an alternative version released last year incorporates the palm scanner into a computer mouse to facilitate secure logins.

Carolinas HealthCare System, the nation’s third largest public healthcare provider, began using PalmSecure last year in several major hospitals as part of the nation’s first biometric patient identification system based on vascular recognition technology. Now deployed at eight locations and two urgent care facilities, the identification program has enrolled about 170,000 patients in all. Once patients have registered their unique biometric “vein template,” it can be linked directly to their medical records.

“We have had excellent patient response and the product has performed well with no failures or replacements required to date after more than one year of use,” said Carolinas spokesman Jim Burke in an e-mail interview. The main challenge, Burke said, has been educating patients on the program’s benefits.

By accurately identifying patients when they check in, he said, the palm-based system has virtually eliminated the risk that a person’s Social Security number or health insurance identification card could be used by someone else to fraudulently access their records or access healthcare services.

How it works
At its core, the palm-reading system works by recording subdermal vein patterns.

“Subdermal means the information resides inside a person’s skin, and it cannot be altered by external factors such as cuts, burns, abrasions and any other skin condition,” said Hiroko Naito, business development manager at Fujitsu Computer Products of America. The technology extracts enough information from the vein pattern to create a unique template.

To acquire each vein pattern template, the technology uses “near-infrared reflection photography,” in which a high-performance camera essentially snaps a digital picture of the vein pattern within a person’s palm. The method exploits a distinctive characteristic of deoxygenated hemoglobin carried by blood: its ability to absorb near-infrared light and create a unique distortion of the light reflected back.

A computer algorithm extracts several data points from the resulting image and converts them into a compressed, encrypted and numbered vein template. The number can be correlated with bank, medical or other personal accounts, and a matching algorithm produces a similarity score for every new palm scan, deciding whether a similarity threshold has been exceeded and the pair can be scored as a match.

More accurate than fingerprints
Many banks in Japan have similarly begun using palm-based recognition as an extra level of security in case ATM cards are lost or stolen, Naito said.

“Japanese banks use PalmSecure for verifying the ATM card owner at the point of transaction via an ATM machine,” she said. Japanese ATM cards are typically “smart cards” embedded with a micro memory chip that can hold additional identification information. The card owner’s PalmSecure vein template is stored in each smart card, she said, and the owner must provide the proper biometric information plus the PIN code to complete a card transaction.

The technology, which debuted in Japan in 2004, has begun catching on in the U.S., and Naito said similar systems could be used for self-service kiosks and terminals, to record work time and attendance, or to control physical access to secure areas. Beyond the system’s high accuracy, she said, palm-based identification boasts the advantage of being more widely applicable than biometrics based on conventional comparisons such as fingerprints.

Although fingerprint recognition is more widely used for identifying people, Naito said fingerprint sensors often don’t provide enough data points for critical verification decisions. (Typically, 12 to 18 data points are needed.)

“The sensor device typically requires direct contact of a finger and is dependent upon the surface condition of the skin,” she said, meaning that dry or abraded skin can interfere with the system’s reliability. Skin diseases such as psoriasis can also impede print recognition. And some people with genetic disorders are born without fingerprints at all, limiting the system’s applicability among the general public.

Researchers generally agree that iris scanning generates the highest level of accuracy in biometrics, but Naito contends the technology is not well accepted because of its highly intrusive nature.

“People are uncomfortable exposing their eyes to some unfamiliar lights,” she said, adding that the system can force people to change their normal behavior, such as wearing contact lenses or long bangs. The technology also can be cost prohibitive and challenging to install and operate, requiring frequent adjustments for the height and angle of different faces to obtain a good eye scan.

Security Features
Carolinas determined that the palm recognition technology’s accuracy and security features offered the best option for its patient network, Burke said.

Because a computer algorithm immediately translates the image of palm veins into a number, the image cannot be stolen and reused, and patient privacy can be better safeguarded. In addition, database retrieval is faster because a number, not an image, is accessed, he said. Improved accuracy reduces that chance that patient records could be accidentally confused. Finally, patients place their hand a few inches above the device instead of actually touching it, eliminating the need for frequent cleanings and decreasing the potential for equipment damage.

“During our analysis and research, we also determined that other types of biometric identification either required touch (fingerprint), or were deemed too invasive by the general public (retinal scanning),” Burke said.

Naito stressed that because the PalmSecure system stores numbers instead of images, the vein pattern information would be incomprehensible to anyone who tapped into the system illegally. But perhaps one the best selling points of all, she said, is the algorithm’s low “false acceptance ratio” of 0.00008 percent, meaning that it incorrectly matches a vein template less than once per million tries — an error rate that even the best human palm-reader would be hard-pressed to match.

© 2009 msnbc.com

Shifting Gears: Metallic Glass

2010-03-15T18:03:00.001-07:00

Solving the Mysteries of Metallic Glass

by David Chandler PhysOrg.com

-- Researchers at MIT and the National University of Singapore have made significant progress in understanding a class of materials that has resisted analysis for decades. Their findings could lead to the rapid discovery of a variety of useful new kinds of glass made of metallic alloys with potentially significant mechanical, chemical and magnetic applications.

The first examples of metallic alloys that could be made into glass were discovered back in the late 1950s and led to a flurry of research activity, but, despite intense study, so far nobody had solved the riddle of why some specific alloys could form glasses and others could not, or how to identify the promising candidates, said Carl. V. Thompson, the Stavros Salapatas Professor of Materials Science & Engineering and director of the Materials Processing Center at MIT. A report on the new work, which describes a way to systematically find the promising mixes from among dozens of candidates, was published last week in Science.

Glasses are solids whose structure is essentially that of a liquid, with atoms arranged randomly instead of in the ordered patterns of a crystal. Generally, they are produced by quickly cooling a material from a molten state, a process called quenching.

“It is very difficult to make glasses from metals compared to any other class of materials, such as semiconductors, ceramics and polymers,” Thompson said. Decades of effort by scientists around the world have focused on “understanding and on exploiting the remarkable properties of these materials, and on understanding why some alloy compositions can be made into glasses and others cannot,” he said.

They still haven’t solved that “why,” Thompson said. But this new work does “provide a very specific and quantitative new insight into the characteristics of liquid alloys that can most readily be quenched into the glassy state,” he said, and thus provides a much more rapid way of discovering new alloys that have the right properties.

The research was the result of a collaboration between Thompson and MIT post-doc Johannes A. Kalb with Professor Yi Li and graduate student Qiang Guo at the National University of Singapore, working together across thousands of miles of separation through the Singapore-MIT Alliance. Essentially, the work consisted of producing an array of different alloys with slightly varying proportions of two metals, each deposited on a separate microscopic finger of metal. Then, they analyzed the changes in density of each different mixture when the glass crystallized, and found that there were a few specific proportions that had significantly higher density than the others — and those particular alloys were the ones that could readily form glasses. Of three of these special proportions they found, two were already known glass-forming alloys, but the third was a new discovery.

The new work could even lead to a solution to the longstanding puzzle of why only certain alloys make glasses, he said. “I expect these new results, and the technique we developed to obtain them, will play a key, and hopefully decisive, role in solving the mystery of metallic glass formation.”

Such materials could have a variety of applications because of their unusual physical and magnetic properties, Thompson said. They are “soft” magnetically, meaning that it’s very easy to change the magnetic orientation of the material. This is a highly desirable characteristic for the cores of transformers, for example, which must switch their magnetic orientation dozens of times per second. Transformers made from metallic glasses could potentially greatly reduce the amount of electricity wasted as excess heat in conventional transformers, reducing the need for new generating plants.

In addition, these glasses are unusually hard mechanically and have a high degree of springiness (known technically as a high “elastic modulus”). This springiness could make them a useful material for some sports equipment such as golf clubs or tennis rackets, Thompson said. Although metallic glasses are relatively expensive, he said, for some people interested in the best-performing sports equipment, or in virtually unbreakable housings for cellphones, for example, “no expense is too high.”

The new research is a major accomplishment for the Singapore-MIT Alliance, Thompson said, and would not have been possible without the high-quality communications and collaboration tools it provides. Despite their physical separation, “Prof. Li and I have been working together now for almost ten years,” he said. “We routinely meet via video conferencing and have both been deeply involved in the co-supervision of the remarkable PhD student, Qiang Guo, who carried out this research.”

Thompson said he sees such collaborations as a significant example of a growing trend. “I think this and other accomplishments within the SMA program demonstrate that the future of research lies in technology-mediated collaborations among people with common interests and complementary capabilities, regardless of where the different parts of the team are located,” he said.

Provided by MIT

Gaming Journal: Bbbzzzzzzzzz, Or One the Day the Insects Will Rule the Earth!

2010-03-12T17:00:00.000-08:00

Giant Insects Might Reign If Only There Was More Oxygen in the Air

PhysOrg.Com

The delicate lady bug in your garden could be frighteningly large if only there was a greater concentration of oxygen in the air, a new study concludes. The study adds support to the theory that some insects were much larger during the late Paleozoic period because they had a much richer oxygen supply, said the study’s lead author Alexander Kaiser.

The study, “No giants today: tracheal oxygen supply to the legs limits beetle size,’’ was presented at Comparative Physiology 2006: Integrating Diversity.

The Paleozoic period, about 300 million years ago, was a time of huge and abundant plant life and rather large insects -- dragonflies had two-and-a-half-foot wing spans, for example. The air’s oxygen content was 35% during this period, compared to the 21% we breathe now, Kaiser said. Researchers have speculated that the higher oxygen concentration allowed insects to grow much bigger.

Tubes carry oxygen

First, a bit of background: Insects don’t breathe like we do and don’t use blood to transport oxygen. They take in oxygen and expel carbon dioxide through holes in their bodies called spiracles. These holes connect to branching and interconnecting tubes, called tracheae, Kaiser explained.

Whereas humans have one trachea, insects have a whole tracheal system that transports oxygen to all areas of their bodies and removes carbon dioxide. As the insect grows, tracheal tubes get longer to reach central tissue, and get wider or more numerous to meet the additional oxygen demands of a larger body.

Insects can limit oxygen flow by closing their spiracles. In fact, one reason insects are so hardy is that they can close their spiracles and live off the oxygen they already have in their tracheae. Kaiser recalled a caterpillar that fell into a bucket of water in his lab. When the creature was discovered the next day, lab workers thought it had drowned. But when they removed its apparently lifeless little body from the water, they were surprised to see it crawl away.

Tracheae grow disproportionately

This experiment was designed to find out:

• how much room the tracheal system takes up in the bodies of different-sized beetles
• whether tracheal dimensions increase proportionately as the beetles get larger
• whether there is a limit to the size a beetle could grow in the current atmosphere

The researchers used x-ray images to compare the tracheal dimensions of four species of beetles, ranging in size from 3mm (Tribolium castaneum, about one-tenth of an inch) to about 3.5 cm (Eleodes obscura, about 1.5 inches). Beetles were not in existence during the Paleozoic period, but Kaiser’s team used the insect because they are much easier to maintain in the laboratory than dragonflies, which are quite difficult.

The study found that the tracheae of the larger beetles take up a greater proportion of their bodies, about 20% more, than the increase in their body size would predict, Kaiser said. This is because the tracheal system is not only becoming longer to reach longer limbs, but the tubes increase in diameter or number to take in more air to handle the additional oxygen demands.

The disproportionate increase in tracheal size reaches a critical point at the opening where the leg and body meet, the researchers found. This opening can get only so big, and limits the size of the trachea that runs through it. When tracheal size is limited, so is oxygen supply and so is growth, Kaiser explained.

Using the disproportional increases they observed among the beetles, the researchers calculated that beetles could not grow larger than about 15 centimeters. And this is the size of the largest beetle known: the Titanic longhorn beetle, Titanus giganteus, from South America, which grows 15-17 cm, Kaiser said.

And why wouldn’t the opening between the body and the leg limit insect size in the Paleozoic era, too? After all, dragonflies and some other insects back then had the same body architecture, but they were much bigger.

It is because when the oxygen concentration in the atmosphere is high, the insect needs smaller quantities of air to meet its oxygen demands. The tracheal diameter can be narrower and still deliver enough oxygen for a much larger insect, Kaiser concluded.

The research was carried out by Alexander Kaiser and Michael C. Quinlan of Midwestern University, Glendale, Arizona; J. Jake Socha and Wah-Keat Lee, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL; and Jaco Klok and Jon F. Harrison, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ. Harrison is the principal investigator.

Source: American Physiological Society

Amalgam Creatures
Seigebeast
Ankheg/Purple Worm (Amalgam Template)

This horror as the name applies is bred to do what it does. Destroy non-insect fortifications.

Avolakia/Ankheg (Amalgam Template)

Ankheg Steeds – Plated carapace for better protection

Swam Drones – Twisted Lore

Of Ages Lost: Treasures of a Dark Age

2010-03-10T18:45:00.000-08:00

Huge Anglo-Saxon Gold Hoard Found
From The BBC

The UK's largest haul of Anglo-Saxon treasure has been discovered buried in a field in Staffordshire.

Experts say the collection of 1,500 gold and silver pieces, which may date to the 7th Century, is unparalleled in size and worth "a seven-figure sum". It has been declared treasure by South Staffordshire coroner Andrew Haigh, meaning it belongs to the Crown. Terry Herbert, who found it on farmland using a metal detector, said it "was what metal detectorists dream of". It could take more than a year for it to be valued. Leslie Webster, former keeper at the British Museum's Department of Prehistory and Europe, said: "This is going to alter our perceptions of Anglo-Saxon England as radically, if not more so, as the Sutton Hoo discoveries.

"(It is) absolutely the equivalent of finding a new Lindisfarne Gospels or Book of Kells." The Book of Kells and Lindisfarne Gospels are intricately illuminated manuscripts of the four New Testament Gospels dating from the 9th and 8th Centuries.

'Just unbelievable'

Mr Herbert, 55, of Burntwood in Staffordshire, who has been metal detecting for 18 years, came across the hoard as he searched land belonging to a farmer friend over five days in July. The exact location has not been disclosed. "I have this phrase that I say sometimes; 'spirits of yesteryear take me where the coins appear', but on that day I changed coins to gold," he said. "I don't know why I said it that day but I think somebody was listening and directed me to it.

Duncan Slarke, Portable Antiquities: ''It is a hugely important find''

"This is what metal detectorists dream of, finding stuff like this. But the vast amount there is just unbelievable."

BBC correspondent Nick Higham said the hoard would be valued by the British Museum and the money passed on to Mr Herbert and the landowner. A total of 1,345 items have been examined by experts, although the list includes 56 clods of earth which have been X-rayed and are known to contain further metal artifacts. This means the total number of items found is likely to rise to about 1,500. Following the initial find, Alex Jones, director of Birmingham Archaeology and his colleagues were invited to excavate the site, Birmingham University said.

Terry Herbert: "Is there anything better than this to be found?"
Mr Jones said it was fantastic news for the region and raised the importance of heritage research. "Being a partner in one of the most exciting archaeological discoveries of our time is something we can all be proud of," he said. Experts have so far established that there were at least 650 items of gold in the haul, weighing more than 5kgs (11lb), and 530 silver objects totalling more than 1kg (2.2lb) in weight. Copper alloy, garnets and glass objects were also discovered at the site. Duncan Slarke, finds liaison officer for Staffordshire, was the first professional to see the hoard, which contains warfare paraphernalia, including sword pommel caps and hilt plates inlaid with precious stones. He said he was "virtually speechless" when he saw the items. "I saw boxes full of gold, items exhibiting the very finest Anglo-Saxon workmanship," he added. Roger Bland, head of portable antiquities and treasure at the British Museum, said: "The most we can say is, I think we're fairly confident it is likely to be a seven-figure sum."

'Truly remarkable'

The collection is currently being kept in secure storage at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery but a selection of the items is to be displayed at the museum from Friday until 13 October. Dr Kevin Leahy, who has been cataloguing the find for the Portable Antiquities Scheme, said it was "a truly remarkable collection". He said it had been found in the heartland of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia. "All the archaeologists who've worked with it have been awestruck," he added. "It's been actually quite scary working on this material to be in the presence of greatness." He said the most striking feature of the find was that it was almost totally weapon fittings with no feminine objects such as dress fittings, brooches or pendants. "Swords and sword fittings were very important in the Anglo-Saxon period," Dr Leahy added. "It looks like a collection of trophies, but it is impossible to say if the hoard was the spoils from a single battle or a long and highly successful military career. "We also cannot say who the original, or the final, owners were, who took it from them, why they buried it or when.

"It will be debated for decades."

Hoard Shines Light on Dark Ages
By Dr Michael Lewis
Deputy head of Portable Antiquities Scheme, British Museum
From The BBC

This treasure paints a new picture of our past and the Dark Ages.

What makes it outstanding is the sheer quantity - we're talking about 1,500 objects, almost entirely precious metal. Normally you would expect a handful of objects each year of this quality for the period in question, which is the 7th Century. A metal detectorist finding just one of these objects would consider it the find of their life. To find 1,500 is bizarre and it would blow the average person's mind. Now, everybody wants to know who it belongs to and why it was put there. But those questions are tricky to answer. At the moment, we can say what it isn't, even if we can't say what it is. It's not associated with a burial, like Sutton Hoo was, for example.

Precious metal

After that, there are two main possibilities. The first is that this treasure has been purposefully deposited, like an offering to a god. But, from my 21st-Century perspective, I find it bewildering that someone could shove so much metalwork into the ground as an offering. That seems like overkill. The other possibility is it's a treasure chest that got lost, or they couldn't come back for it. That means they're not treasuring the objects as wholes, they're taking the precious metals off and keeping them. Most things we find from the Anglo-Saxon period are what we call "chance finds", in other words the things people lost, or hoards purposefully deposited, or finds from burials. But hoarding is more associated with the Viking period. Things like big coin hoards are more a 10th-Century sort of find. This is a strange phenomenon in this country for the 7th Century. People will now be working to understand when the material was deposited, then we'll look at what we know of the history - which is not a lot - to tie it down. The finds date from a wide period, which is unusual, so the first thing this may do is help us improve our dating of the Anglo-Saxon period. Much of what we know about this period is based on archaeology, not written evidence, because that written evidence is so scant. We've got the objects, but not the historical context. That's a problem because we understand the world based on what's written down, but we're not that good at understanding people from their material culture.

Rulers overlooked

Yet that's what we're trying to do here.

I don't think it's realistic to identify this with a particular individual. We'll probably never find the owners, although the best bet is a ruler from the kingdom of Mercia, where it was found. In this period some Mercian rulers, like Penda and Offa, are quite well-known to us. Penda is a bit before this period, and Offa is right at the end, so it has to be someone in the middle. But our historical sources are limited to people like the monk Bede, who wrote from a Christian perspective. The Mercian rulers at the time are likely to have been pagan, but they could have been overlooked by Bede even though they might have been important, because he wasn't interested in them - for whatever reason. So this will help us look back at those sources, and those historical figures, with more scrutiny than we did before. The Dark Ages were called the Dark Ages because it was seen as a period where, after Roman civilisation, somehow we went backwards in time. But this demonstrates there were still wonderful objects being produced, and produced in this country. It will take years, or decades, to get answers, and we still won't get all of them. We can't just ask questions about this hoard, either - we need to ask questions about how this hoard fits in with everything else we know.

Have we made assumptions elsewhere that aren't right? Those are the things we'd like to know about. It's very, very early days.

At the Bazaar of the Master of Gargoyles - Arcane Spells

2010-02-23T17:17:00.001-08:00

Gaming Journal: Lost Worlds - Research Material 05

2010-02-20T20:53:00.001-08:00

Shifting Gears: Free Will and the Parietal Cortex

2010-02-15T23:02:00.001-08:00

Possible Site of Free Will Found in Brain
by Ewen Callaway

Source: New Scientist

Free will, or at least the place where we decide to act, is sited in a part of the brain called the parietal cortex, new research suggests. When a neurosurgeon electrically jolted this region in patients undergoing surgery, they felt a desire to, say, wiggle their finger, roll their tongue or move a limb. Stronger electrical pulses convinced patients they had actually performed these movements, although their bodies remained motionless.

"What it tells us is there are specific brain regions that are involved in the consciousness of your movement," says Angela Sirigu (pdf format), a neuroscientist at the CNRS Cognitive Neuroscience Centre in Bron, France, who led the study.

Brain Stimulation

Sirigu's team, including neurosurgeon Carmine Mottolese, performed the experiments on seven patients undergoing brain surgery to remove tumours. In all but one case, the cancers were located far from the parietal cortex and other areas that Mottolese stimulated. One patient's tumour sat near the parietal cortex, but did not interfere with the experiments, Sirigu says. And because the patients were awake during the surgery, they could answer questions.

"Did you move?" a researcher asked a 76-year-old man after lightly zapping a point on his parietal cortex.

"No. I had a desire to roll my tongue in my mouth," he responded.

After a stronger pulse to the parietal cortex, a 42-year-old man exclaimed: "My hand, my hand moved." Sirigu's team saw no signs of movement.

Action Loop

Sirigu's team also discovered that stimulating another brain area – the premotor cortex – provoked involuntary, unconscious movements in the same patients. The team's work points to two brain areas involved in the decision to move a limb and then execute the action. Sirigu speculates that the parietal cortex makes predictions about future movements and sends instructions to the premotor cortex, which returns the outcome of the movement to the parietal cortex. In day-to-day life, we rely on both brain regions to move about, she says. "You need both systems, the parietal and premotor cortex to generate intention and check whether this is followed through."

Ground Breaking

Patrick Haggard, a neuroscientist at University College London, says the experiment breaks ground because it pinpoints volition to a specific part of the brain, allowing scientists to experimentally control it.

"That's extremely interesting, because up to now it has been very difficult for neuroscientists to deal with the idea of intentions or wishes or will," he says.
However, Haggard says no one should be surprised that the experience of volition can be liked to specific brain areas. "I can't think of any way you can have conscious experience other than as a result of neurons in your brain firing."

Journal reference: Science (DOI: 10.1126/science.1169896)

Shifting Gears: Memory Scans

2010-02-11T21:14:00.000-08:00

Brain Scans Can Read Memories

By Livescience Staff

Humans create memories of locations in physical or virtual space as they move around – and it all shows up on brain scans.

Researchers tracked brain activity related to "spatial memory" as volunteers moved about inside a virtual reality setup. Their new study challenges previous scientific thinking by showing that memories are recorded in regular patterns.

"Surprisingly, just by looking at the brain data we could predict exactly where they were in the virtual reality environment," said Eleanor Maguire, a neuroscientist at the University College London in the U.K. "In other words, we could 'read' their spatial memories."

Maguire and her colleagues focused on the hippocampus, or a small part of the brain that deals with navigation, memory recall and imagining future events. Neurons known as "place cells" activate in the hippocampus and inform people of where they are as they move around.

The researchers used an fMRI scanner to detect blood flow changes in the brain, and study the activity of the place cells as a volunteer controlled movement inside the virtual environment. They then ran the results through a computer algorithm developed by Demis Hassabis, another neuroscientist at University College London.

Earlier studies with rats had also focused on the hippocampus and measured activity at the level of dozens of neurons at most. But that research had suggested that the brain did not record memory in any sort of regular pattern – a trend that this latest study may overturn. Maguire and Hassabis examined thousands of neurons as opposed to just dozens, which allowed them to pick out broader patterns.

"By looking at activity over tens of thousands of neurons, we can see that there must be a functional structure – a pattern – to how these memories are encoded," Maguire said. "Otherwise, our experiment simply would not have been possible to do."

Mind-reading research has grown increasingly sophisticated over the years. Another recent study predicted people's preference for one of two drinks with 80 percent accuracy. And earlier findings showed that people's brains reflect abnormal activity up to half a minute before making errors.

The latest findings on memory could lead to many more studies that examine how actual memories end up encoded across our brain cells, Maguire said. She and Hassabis want to look beyond spatial memories to see if brain scans can pick up patterns in our memories of the past, as well as visions of the future. Such work could also have clinical implications for understanding diseases that attack memory.

"Understanding how we as humans record our memories is critical to helping us learn how information is processed in the hippocampus and how our memories are eroded by diseases such as Alzheimer's," added Demis Hassabis.

Gaming Journal: Lost World - Research Material 04

2010-02-09T08:01:00.001-08:00

True20 - Of Worlds Unknown - Research Material 04

Gaming Journal: Lost World - Research Material 03

2010-02-02T20:10:00.001-08:00

True20 - Of Worlds Unknown - Research Material 03

Gaming Journal: Lost World - Research Material 02

2010-01-22T21:18:00.000-08:00

Gaming Journal: Lost World - Research Material 01

2010-01-20T19:59:00.000-08:00

Gaming Journal: Of Worlds Unknown

2010-01-18T21:25:00.000-08:00

What Am I going to say.

Right.

Avatar Press produced some eariler softcore smut in comic book format eariler in this decade under a running title called Jungle Fantasy. Interesting theme, if shallow on plot and character development. Seriously the short series produces serious eye candy for young adult males. It reminds me or Mike Grill's Warlord series DC published way backin the late 70's and early 80's when scinece fiction, (which owes George Lucas more favors than a deity owing his congregation), sheds its b-film pulp paper-esque themes and became a significant mainstream gold mine. I've always wanted to do a theme-based campaign around a lost world type scenario, but with strong elements of both science fiction and fantasy. Think of dinosaurs and primitive shamans mingling with ancient psuedo-Atlantean technology. The hay-day equipment waiting to be re-discovered. Old technology like cloning pods and maturation chambers, light-solid holographic transmitters, genetic engineering that can build extinct species from the floor up, disruptor rifles, and blasters. Machines that cna build modern mythical creatures or produce the proverbial "fire of the gods." Think of forgotten arcane lore waiting to be unearthed again. Ah sorcerers, slavers, warlords, gladiators, big game hunters, archeaologists, socialites, thieves, merchants and explorers all in one setting striving to do the best they can.

Cloning machines, bio-organic matter replicators, incubation chambers, artificial maturation envirnoments, imprinting and behaviorial nanotechnology, surgical droids, and ancient human races manipulating their very building blocks of life. Abandoned Nazi (an over used theme in my book) or Stalinist Communist research faculties still housing great unearthed secrets.

Yes, what fun.

What game mechanics would I select?

I had d20 Future in mind, but after downloading and skimming Reign of Discordia by Reality Deviations Publications and RPG Objects. Instead, I could switch to True20 by Green Ronin Games. A levelI think this system will work best and if I need stock monsters, especially dinosaurs, I can always barrow from other source books. The Menance Manial and GURPS: Dinosaurs are two books that spring to mind. A level-based system would do for a solid fantasy RPG, but I need something out more in a super-heroic genre. Green Ronin games, through their Mutants and Masterminds line of games has released a supplement called Warriors and Warlocks. I like the point based approach to super-heroics, and with a larger selection of based-stock creatures, I could easily assemble a campaign using this material. An added plus is the character templates M&M provides across several sourcebooks.

What can I use for technology? A mixture of archaic, modern, and lost science fiction seems to work best. Both D20 weapon's locker and d20 future could work but I would need a simple system for conversion. Not that it would be difficult to move one from the other. I believe Green Ronin provide that in the back of their own books. Again, I have old GURPS books, including Bio-Tech and Futures for those necessities. Weirdly enough, my old Gamma World books could be useful as well providing insight into eugenics, pure strain human, and altered human branches. Comic book source materials could include Jungle Fanatsy (again), Dynamite Press's Jungle Girl, and Mike Grell's the Warlord, the later as a more detailed realm if there ever was such a place.

More on this later.

The Realm would also be mutli-envirnomental enabling the world to host several thousand diverse species and cultures from earth's past and from other worlds as well.

I wonder if I could have shape changin monsters as well. Infernal sorcery would be the most obvious mechanic to initiate a metamorphosis. I do not believe technology or gentic engineering would do as any changes would be permanent and have the potenital to pass itself down to it descendents.

More on this later as I have other posts to, well, post.

Gaming Journal: Extra-Solar Super Earth

2010-01-05T21:21:00.001-08:00

Extrasolar 'Super Earth' is First to have an Atmosphere

By Dan Vergano
USA TODAY

Astronomers Wednesday reported the discovery of the first known "Super Earth" with an atmosphere, a water world orbiting a nearby red-dwarf star.
The detection of the planet only a bit larger than Earth, reported in the journal Nature, raises hopes of upcoming star surveys spotting another planet like ours.

"The discovery itself is very exciting," says team leader David Charbonneau of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. "But what it says about looking for signs of life on other planets is even more exciting."

The planet, called GJ1214 b, orbits the red dwarf GJ1214 once every 1.6 days, which raises its atmospheric temperature to at least 250 degrees Fahrenheit. The star resides 42 light-years from Earth (about 247 trillion miles), close by astronomical standards.

Though GJ1214 b is 6.6 times heavier and 2.7 times wider than Earth, our iron-cored world is 21/2 times denser, which suggests the new discovery is made of water squeezed to high pressure by the planet's high gravity. "It probably has an extraordinarily deep ocean," astronomer Geoff Marcy of the University of California-Berkeley says in a commentary accompanying the report.

"This discovery helps to make the case that inner (Earth-like) planets are likely to have water and hence to be habitable by life as we know it," says planetary scientist Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution of Washington (D.C.).

The find comes as international teams this week detected two more "Super Earth" planets orbiting sun-like stars, one orbiting the star 23 Lib and the other circling 61 Virginis. Both of the planets, at least 7.5 and 5.3 times heavier than Earth, respectively, turned up in telescope searches that look for gravitational wobbles induced on stars by planets.

Charbonneau's team, however, is tracking about 2,000 red-dwarf stars, dim stars 40% to 8% the size of the sun, by looking for dips in starlight caused by planetary eclipses. The team uses eight amateur telescopes distributed worldwide. After only two months of tracking a few hundred stars last year, the team found a 52-minute starlight dip comes every 1.6 days from GJ1214, which gives away the planet's orbit.

The team is requesting a Hubble telescope analysis of the planet's atmosphere, possible because of its proximity. "To look for life elsewhere, we really have to look for the chemical signatures, like oxygen, that life would inevitably imprint on the atmosphere," Charbonneau says.

Shifting Gears: The Chloro-Vault

2010-01-03T20:55:00.000-08:00

'Doomsday' seed vault opens in Norway

Source

LONGYEARBYEN, Norway (CNN) -- A vast underground vault storing millions of seeds from around the world took delivery of its first shipment Tuesday.

Dubbed the "Doomsday Vault," the seed bank on a remote island near the Arctic Ocean is considered the ultimate safety net for the world's seed collections, protecting them from a wide range of threats including war, natural disasters, lack of funding or simply poor agricultural management.

Norwegian musicians performed Tuesday as part of an elaborate opening ceremony marking the opening of the vault, located 130 meters (427 feet) inside a frozen mountain. Wangari Maathai, a Kenyan environmental and political activist who won the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize, placed the first seeds inside the vault, followed by other dignitaries.

The inaugural shipment represent 268,000 distinct samples of seeds, with each sample containing a hundred-plus seeds and originating from a different farm or field around the world. In all, the shipment of seeds secured in the vault Tuesday weighed approximately 10 tons, filling 676 boxes.

The shipment amounts to a 100 million seeds in total, ranging from major African and Asian food staples like maize, rice, and wheat to European and South American varieties of eggplant, lettuce, barley, and potato, according to the Global Crop Diversity Trust, which is paying to collect and maintain the seeds. Watch as "Doomsday" seed vault opens »

Eventually the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, as it is officially known, will hold as many as 4.5 million distinct samples of seeds -- or some 2 billion seeds in total -- encompassing almost every variety of most important food crops in the world, the Global Crop Diversity Trust said.

The Norwegian government paid to build the vault in a mountainside near Longyearbyen, in the remote Svalbard islands between Norway and the North Pole. Building began last year.

The United Nations founded the trust in 2004 to support the long-term conservation of crop diversity, and countries and foundations provide the funding.

"The seed vault is the perfect place for keeping seeds safe for centuries," said Cary Fowler, executive director of the trust. "At these temperatures, seeds for important crops like wheat, barley and peas can last for up to 10,000 years."

The vault's location deep inside a mountain in the frozen north ensures the seeds can be stored safely no matter what happens outside.

"We believe the design of the facility will ensure that the seeds will stay well-preserved even if such forces as global warming raise temperatures outside the facility," said Magnus Bredeli Tveiten, project manager for the Norwegian government.

The vault sits at the end of a 120-meter (131-yard) tunnel blasted inside the mountain. Workers used a refrigeration system to bring the vault to -18 degrees Celsius (just below 0 degrees Fahrenheit), and a smaller refrigeration system plus the area's natural permafrost and the mountain's thick rock will keep the vault at at least -4 C (25 F).

The vault at Svalbard is similar to an existing seed bank in Sussex, England, about an hour outside London. The British vault, called the Millennium Seed Bank, is part of an scientific project that works with wild plants, as opposed to the seeds of crops.

Paul Smith, the leader of the Millennium Seed Bank project, said preserving the seeds of wild plants is just as important as preserving the seeds of vital crops.

"We must give ourselves every option in the future to use the whole array of plant diversity that is available to us," Smith told CNN.

The idea for the Arctic seed bank dates to the 1980s but only became a possibility after the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources came into force in 2004, the Norwegian government said. The treaty provided an international framework for conserving and accessing crop diversity.

Svalbard is designed to store duplicates of seeds from seed collections around the world.

The Norwegian government says it has paid 50 million Norwegian Kroner ($9.4 million) to build the seed vault.

Open Game License 1.0

2010-01-01T20:38:00.000-08:00

Pathfinder RPG Reference Document

Pathfinder RPGRD - The Skeletal Document

Pathfinder RPG

Product Identity: The following items are hereby identified as Product Identity, as defined in the Open Game License 1.0a, Seection 1(e), and are not Open Content: All trademarks, registered trademarks, proper names (characters, deities, etc.), dialogue, plots, storylines, locations, characters, artworks, and trade dress. (Elements that have previously been designated as Open Game Content are not included in this declaration.)

Open Content: Except for material designated as Product Identity (see above), the game mechanics of this Paizo Publishing game product are Open Game Content, as defined in the Open Game License version 1.0a Section 1(d). No portion of this work other than the material designated as Open Game Content may be reproduced in any form without written permission.

OPEN GAME LICENSE Version 1.0a

The following text is the property of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. and is Copyright 2000 Wizards of the Coast, Inc (“Wizards”). All Rights Reserved.

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System Reference Document. Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.; Authors Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, Skip Williams, based on material by E. Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson.

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D20 Reference Document

System Resource Document Third Edition Revised [3.5]

OPEN GAME LICENSE Version 1.0a

The following text is the property of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. and is Copyright 2000 Wizards of the Coast, Inc ("Wizards"). All Rights Reserved.

1. Definitions: (a)"Contributors" means the copyright and/or trademark owners who have contributed Open Game Content; (b)"Derivative Material" means copyrighted material including derivative works and translations (including into other computer languages), potation, modification, correction, addition, extension, upgrade, improvement, compilation, abridgment or other form in which an existing work may be recast, transformed or adapted; (c) "Distribute" means to reproduce, license, rent, lease, sell, broadcast, publicly display, transmit or otherwise distribute; (d)"Open Game Content" means the game mechanic and includes the methods, procedures, processes and routines to the extent such content does not embody the Product Identity and is an enhancement over the prior art and any additional content clearly identified as Open Game Content by the Contributor, and means any work covered by this License, including translations and derivative works under copyright law, but specifically excludes Product Identity. (e) "Product Identity" means product and product line names, logos and identifying marks including trade dress; artifacts; creatures characters; stories, storylines, plots, thematic elements, dialogue, incidents, language, artwork, symbols, designs, depictions, likenesses, formats, poses, concepts, themes and graphic, photographic and other visual or audio representations; names and descriptions of characters, spells, enchantments, personalities, teams, personas, likenesses and special abilities; places, locations, environments, creatures, equipment, magical or supernatural abilities or effects, logos, symbols, or graphic designs; and any other trademark or registered trademark clearly identified as Product identity by the owner of the Product Identity, and which specifically excludes the Open Game Content; (f) "Trademark" means the logos, names, mark, sign, motto, designs that are used by a Contributor to identify itself or its products or the associated products contributed to the Open Game License by the Contributor (g) "Use", "Used" or "Using" means to use, Distribute, copy, edit, format, modify, translate and otherwise create Derivative Material of Open Game Content. (h) "You" or "Your" means the licensee in terms of this agreement.

2. The License: This License applies to any Open Game Content that contains a notice indicating that the Open Game Content may only be Used under and in terms of this License. You must affix such a notice to any Open Game Content that you Use. No terms may be added to or subtracted from this License except as described by the License itself. No other terms or conditions may be applied to any Open Game Content distributed using this License.

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4. Grant and Consideration: In consideration for agreeing to use this License, the Contributors grant You a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, non-exclusive license with the exact terms of this License to Use, the Open Game Content.

5.Representation of Authority to Contribute: If You are contributing original material as Open Game Content, You represent that Your Contributions are Your original creation and/or You have sufficient rights to grant the rights conveyed by this License.

6.Notice of License Copyright: You must update the COPYRIGHT NOTICE portion of this License to include the exact text of the COPYRIGHT NOTICE of any Open Game Content You are copying, modifying or distributing, and You must add the title, the copyright date, and the copyright holder's name to the COPYRIGHT NOTICE of any original Open Game Content you Distribute.

7. Use of Product Identity: You agree not to Use any Product Identity, including as an indication as to compatibility, except as expressly licensed in another, independent Agreement with the owner of each element of that Product Identity. You agree not to indicate compatibility or co-adaptability with any Trademark or Registered Trademark in conjunction with a work containing Open Game Content except as expressly licensed in another, independent Agreement with the owner of such Trademark or Registered Trademark. The use of any Product Identity in Open Game Content does not constitute a challenge to the ownership of that Product Identity. The owner of any Product Identity used in Open Game Content shall retain all rights, title and interest in and to that Product Identity.

8. Identification: If you distribute Open Game Content You must clearly indicate which portions of the work that you are distributing are Open Game Content.

9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.

10 Copy of this License: You MUST include a copy of this License with every copy of the Open Game Content You Distribute.

11. Use of Contributor Credits: You may not market or advertise the Open Game Content using the name of any Contributor unless You have written permission from the Contributor to do so.

12 Inability to Comply: If it is impossible for You to comply with any of the terms of this License with respect to some or all of the Open Game Content due to statute, judicial order, or governmental regulation then You may not Use any Open Game Material so affected.

13 Termination: This License will terminate automatically if You fail to comply with all terms herein and fail to cure such breach within 30 days of becoming aware of the breach. All sublicenses shall survive the termination of this License.

14 Reformation: If any provision of this License is held to be unenforceable, such provision shall be reformed only to the extent necessary to make it enforceable.

15 COPYRIGHT NOTICE
Open Game License v 1.0 Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

Shifting Gears - The Azure Star

2008-08-04T14:41:00.001-07:00

STEREO's First View of the Sun

Loops of highly charged particles burst from the sun's surface in this image, taken on Dec. 4, 2006. Among the first images taken by STEREO, the image shows the sun's roiling surface and atmosphere at temperatures around one million Kelvin (1.8 million degrees Fahrenheit).

The charged particles, mostly extremely hot protons and electrons, create a strong magnetic field that pulls the particles into the loops seen here. Over time, magnetic stress builds in the sun's atmosphere until the energy is released in a massive explosion. The explosion sends a giant cloud of charged particles (a coronal mass ejection) and x-ray solar flares hurtling into space with a force comparable to a billion megaton nuclear bombs. When the charged particles and x-rays bombard the Earth, they can disrupt communications and power systems and are a threat to satellites and astronauts in space.

Understanding the difference between harmful and harmless coronal mass ejections is one of the biggest questions that scientists studying the face of the sun. Currently, scientists only see ejections in one dimension. To understand how solar storms travel through the solar systems, scientists need a three-dimensional view of the storms.

STEREO, launched on Oct. 25, 2006, consists of observation systems orbiting the sun in front of and behind the Earth. Just as our two eyes give us a three-dimensional view of the world, the views provided by each STEREO system can be combined to provide a three-dimensional view of the sun. Though the first STEREO images were taken in early December, the two systems won't be in position to give three dimensional images until April 2007.

Image credit: NASA
Source

Ye Olde Xoblob Shoppe - Magic Staff, or Two, or Three

2008-08-02T23:08:00.000-07:00

Staff of Command

This device has three functions. The three functions are:

- Charm Animal 01 charge per 10 minutes use.
- Command Plants 01 charge for each 10 foot square area or 10 minutes of use.
- Influence: This power has the effect of providing a +4 insight bonus to Bluff and Diplomacy checks. The user can cast charm person at 11th level strength, or make a suggestion to any humanoid conversed with. The staff also enables the character to make use of mass charm enabling them to charm up to 22 hit dice of humanoids. Charm person and suggestion are applicable but once per day. Each use of suggestion or charm person draws 1 charge from the staff.
- Suppress Beath Weapon: 02 charges per 10 minutes use. Spell Compendium, Pg. 216.

Strong Enchantment; CL: 7th
Craft Staff, charm animal, command plants, suggestion, suppress breath weapon
Market Price: 30,800 GP
Cost: 15,400 GP + 1,232 XP

Satff of Curing

This device can be used but once per day on any person, and no function can be employed more than twice per day. Each function drains 1 charge. The staff of curing enables the wielder to make use of the following:

- remove disease
- remove blindness
- cure serious wounds
- lesser restoration

Moderate Necromancy; CL: 8th
Craft Staff, remove disease, remove blindness, cure serious wounds, greater restoration
Market Price: 33,600 Gp
Cost: 16,800 + 1,344 XP

Staff of Lightning

This staff has two functions that closely resemble arcane spells:

- Shock: As per the shock special abilities for weapons, except use of this function drains 1 charge per use.
- Lesser Orb of Electricity. 5d8 damage, Fortitude save (DC 14) for half damage (3 charges)
- Lightning Bolt: 6d6 damage, Reflex save (DC 14) for half damage. (2 charges)

Moderate Evocation; CL: 10th Caster Level: 11th
Craft Staff, orb of electricity-lesser, lightning bolt
Market Price: 28,000 GP
Cost: 14,000 GP + 1,120 XP

Shifting Gears - Cloaking Technology

2008-08-01T02:38:00.001-07:00

Scientists Create Cloak of Partial InvisibilityBy Ker Than, LiveScience Staff Writer
posted: 19 October 2006 10:10 am ET
Live Science

Scientists have created a cloaking device that can reroute certain wavelengths of light, forcing them around objects like water flowing around boulders in a stream. To creatures or machines that see only in microwave light, the cloaked object would appear nearly invisible.

"The microwaves come in and are swept around the cloak and reconstructed on the other side while avoiding the interior region," said study team member David Smith at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering. "So it looks as if they just passed through free space."

The device [image] only works in the microwave range of light, so cloaked objects are still visible to humans. Also, it only works in two dimensions and only for microwaves moving in a plane. A three-dimensional invisibility cloak would hide an object completely.The microwave cloak is also slightly reflective and casts a partial shadow.

Despite these shortcomings, however, the new device is "a very good achievement," said Ulf Leonhardt, a theorist at the University of St. Andrews in England who was not involved in the study.

"It's surprising that it's as simple as it is and that it works so well," Leonhardt said in a related news article about the work in the journal Science.

The achievement, reported online today by the journal, comes five months after the same team published a study detailing the precise mathematical specifications a needed to build such a cloaking device.

Metamaterials

The apparatus was made using "metamaterials," artificial materials engineered to have precisely patterned surfaces that interact with and manipulate light in novel ways.

Although called a cloak, the device is not something that can be worn. Rather, it consists of a series of concentric circles, made of copper rings and wires patterned onto sheets of fiberglass, and resembles a loosely coiled reel of film.

The patterns enable the manipulation of light, and the size of the patterns determines which wavelengths of light can be manipulated. Smaller patterns affect shorter the wavelengths. Microwaves have relatively long wavelengths and can be affected with metamaterials having relatively large patterns. Manipulating visible light, which has much shorter wavelengths, will require metamaterials with much finer patterns.

While making those finer patterns is possible with current nanomanufacturing technologies, the metals used to make the microwave cloak would behave differently with visible light, Smith said.

"They act very differently at optical wavelengths; they become very absorptive. A cloaked object would just become very opaque, rather than transparent," he told LiveScience.

But even if metamaterials are made that can deflect visible light, don't expect the kind of invisibility offered by Harry Potter's cloak or Star Trek cloaking devices any time soon.

Human eyes are sensitive to many different wavelengths of light, as evidenced by the rainbow of colors that we see, and it's still uncertain if metamaterials can deflect so many wavelengths simultaneously.

Still Useful

But even imperfect cloaking devices might be useful, the researchers say. Cloaks that deflect radio waves could render an object invisible to radar or improve cell phone receptions by rerouting signals around obstructions. They might also be used to protect people from penetrating and harmful radiation.

"If you knew that you had radiation of a certain bandwidth frequency, you could have it skirt around some region that you wanted shielded," Smith said.

The team says the next step is to create a cloak that works in three dimensions and to perfect the cloaking effect.

Cloaking Device Concept Moves Beyond Theory
By Diane Banegas, National Science Foundation
LiveScience

This Behind the Scenes article was provided to LiveScience in partnership with the National Science Foundation.
Applied mathematician Graeme Milton dreams up new materials, develops mathematical formulas to describe them and leaves it to others to construct and demonstrate their novelties and usefulness in a laboratory.

While many of his theoretical musings are published in peer-reviewed journals, his research on a superlens with the ability to hide or “cloak” an object is too similar to cloaking devices portrayed in Star Trek and Harry Potter to stay buried in the annals of academia.

The concept of a superlens came originally from Sir John Pendry in 2000 — although Milton and his colleagues Nicolae Nicorovici and Ross McPhedran conducted closely related studies back in 1994 — and the concept has been studied extensively. Yet no one had realized the cloaking properties until they were discovered through the research by Milton’s team.

The concept of a superlens cloak is a long way from a workable device, but the integrity of the mathematical concept has sent some experimentalists into the laboratory to try and turn the theory into reality. So far, the groups working in this area are not ready to publish papers, but they’ve accomplished enough to keep trying.

“We’re along way off from the Star Trek device but some of the experimental results achieved so far are surprising and exciting,” Milton noted.

Milton pursues his research at the University of Utah where the math department has some of the best scientists in the nation for studying the mathematics of new materials.

While colleagues consider Milton among “the best in the world” with the mathematics of materials, he was not always so highly ranked. In fact, Milton, who was born in Sydney, Australia, came close to failing his sophomore year at Sydney University because he spent so much time reading about advanced subjects such as quantum mechanics and general relativity he failed to attend his regular classes, and eventually dropped out of school to spend a year hitchhiking through New Zealand.

He later returned to the university to buckle down and earn his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in physics, followed by a doctorate in physics at Cornell University. His love of the outdoors led him to accept the job in Utah – he does some of his best thinking while skiing, mountain biking, swimming and road biking.

The superlens theorized by Milton and Nicorovici cloaks a nearby object by making light behave in an unusual way. Instead of having a positive refractive index that makes light bend in the same way as it does when passing from air into a medium like glass or water, the superlens has a negative refractive index that in essence causes light to reverse and travel backwards. When an object is placed next to the superlens, the light bouncing off the object is canceled out by the light reflecting off the superlens, rendering the object invisible. Milton said the phenomenon, theorized by Milton and Nicorovici and confirmed by computer, is somewhat analogous to the noise cancellation headphones passengers wear on airplanes.

“At this point, experiments would be considered successful if they worked with a single frequency of light and cloaked a few specks of dust, and the object cloaked would need to be much smaller than the superlens,” said Milton. In spite of the challenge, a group of scientists is currently working to demonstrate the proof of principle. “They’ve made some progress, but they want to do some more work before they put their results in a paper,” he added.

Potential early uses for a cloaking device are varied. While stealth military devices are an obvious option, one approach is in medicine where the concept would allow certain electronic instruments to be used despite the presence of strong electromagnetic fields, such as those produced by hospital brain scanners. Milton and other researchers have also carried out related work that might prove capable of guiding the elastic shock waves of earthquakes around buildings.

While practical applications are fun to speculate about, mathematicians may appreciate the new math presented by the concept just as much.

“The findings will lead to a better understanding of partial differential equations, which will lead to a better understanding the propagation of sound, light, fluid and turbulence,” Milton said. The new math will also help scientists better understand the new field of metamaterials – a family of new materials with properties not seen in naturally occurring materials. “Existing laws don’t adequately describe materials with exotic microstructures that are associated with some metamaterials.”

Devising new materials is how Milton and his colleagues came across the superlens in the first place. A metamaterial’s properties are dictated by its internal structure rather than by its composition. His job requires him to discover or design new geometric structures and then develop mathematical formulas to prove their properties. He was working in his home country of Australia on a composite material composed of arrays of coated cylinders when he realized the cylinders could focus light in an unconventional way. That discovery eventually led to his mathematical model for the superlens cloak.

Cloaking Device a Reality? Only if You're Very Small
Levi Beckerson (Blog) - December 20, 2007 11:19 AM
DailyTech

The cloaked circle measures a mere 10 micrometers, but try to spot it next to an uncloaked circle. (Source: UMD)
Scientists at the University of Maryland demonstrate the first working visible light cloaking device.

Cloaking devices and technology have long been the fodder of science fiction, but researchers at the University of Maryland's James Clark School of Engineering have created a material that seems to fit the bill – at least in 2D. The device uses the properties of plasmons in its functionality.

Plasmons are electron waves which are generated when light strikes a metallic surface under controlled conditions. Plasmonics is a relatively new field though it promises to provide many beneficial scientific achievements.

The cloak itself is quite small, a mere 10 micrometers in width (PDF). The structure of the device is a simple thin layer of acrylic plastic with a pattern of concentric, two-dimensional rings atop a gold film. The ring pattern creates a negative refraction effect on visible light striking it, bending the plasmons around the object. While the light appears to have passed straight through the material, it has in fact gone around it.

Far from a usable cloaking system, the device only functions under specialized conditions and only in two dimensions. It is also not perfect invisibility as it only works on a limited range of the visual spectrum and suffers energy loss in the gold film. Three dimensional use of the material would be difficult because visible light would need to be controlled both magnetically and electronically.

Of a more practical purpose, the team has also used the unique properties of plasmons to develop a superlens microscopy technology which could augment existing conventional microscopes. The light bending techniques could allow a real view into nanoscale objects like DNA, viruses and proteins. The group believes they can still improve the superlens technology, bringing the resolution to an impressive 10 nanometers.

Plasmons could one day be employed in a variety of technology due to their unique properties. Since plasmons have very short wavelengths, they can be controlled with impressively small guide structures, much smaller than systems currently in use. As the waves are generated at optical frequencies, they could be used to carry impressive amounts of data in future computing systems.

Not surprisingly, the research has garnered attention from not only the scientific community, but government agencies and industries. One can only dream of the possible applications the military could have in mind for such a technology, less long advances that could be made on the optical computing frontier.

The Mathematics of Cloaking
General Science / Mathematics
Published: 12:26 EST, December 26, 2006
PhysOrg.com

The theorists who first created the mathematics that describe the behavior of the recently announced "invisibility cloak" have revealed a new analysis that may extend the current cloak's powers, enabling it to hide even actively radiating objects like a flashlight or cell phone.

Allan Greenleaf, professor of mathematics at the University of Rochester, working with colleagues around the globe, has announced a mathematical theory that predicts some strange goings on inside the cloak--and that what happens inside is crucial to the cloak's effectiveness.

In October, David R. Smith, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Duke University, led a team that used a circular cloaking device to successfully bend microwaves around a copper disk as if the disk were invisible. In 2003, however, Greenleaf and his colleagues had already developed the mathematics of invisibility.

"We were working on improving the mathematics behind tumor detection," says Greenleaf. "In the final section to one paper, we spelled out a worst-case scenario where a tumor could be undetectable. We then wrote a couple of additional articles describing when this could happen. At the time, we didn't think further about it because it seemed extremely unlikely that any tumor would be covered with the necessary material to be hidden that way."

This past summer, however, Greenleaf and his colleagues learned about a paper that researchers at Duke and Imperial College had published in the journal Science, which used nearly identical equations to give a theoretical proposal for a cloaking device. Once Greenleaf and his colleagues saw that their results could also be used to show how to "hide" an object, they decided to analyze and improve the proposed cloaking device, using the techniques they had developed in their earlier work. They knew that a crucial question would be: What was going on inside the cloaked region?

Smith, a physicist, gave a description of why the cloaking device should work. Greenleaf, as a mathematician, knew that to have any hope of extending and improving the cloaking, it was important to fully understand its mathematical underpinnings. Then, in October, Smith published another paper, describing how he and his team actually built a cloaking device. This made it even more crucial to carefully analyze the underlying structure.

Greenleaf and his collaborators used sophisticated mathematics to understand what must be happening inside the cloaked region. Everything seemed fine when they applied the Helmholtz equation, an equation widely used to solve problems involving the propagation of light. But when they used Maxwell's equations, which take the polarization of electromagnetic waves into account, difficulties came to light.

Maxwell's equations said that a simple copper disk like the one Smith used could be cloaked without a problem, but anything that emitted electromagnetic waves--a cell phone, a digital watch, or even a simple electric device like a flashlight--caused the behavior of the cloaking device to go seriously awry. The mathematics predicts that the size of the electromagnetic fields go to infinity at the surface of the cloaked region, possibly wrecking the invisibility.

Their analysis also revealed another surprise: a person trying to look out of the cloak would effectively be faced with a mirror in every direction. If you can imagine Harry Potter's own invisibility cloak working this way, and Harry turning on his flashlight to see, its light would shine right back at him, no matter where he pointed it.

Greenleaf's team determined that a more complicated phenomenon arises when using Maxwell's equations, leading to a "blow up" (an unexpected infinite behavior) of the electromagnetic fields. They determined that by inserting conductive linings, whose properties depend on the specific geometry of the cloak, this problem can be resolved. Alternatively, covering both the inside and outside surfaces of the cloaked region with carefully matched materials can also be used to bypass this problem.

"We should also keep in mind that, given the current technology, when we talk about invisibility, we're talking only about being invisible at just a narrow range of wavelengths," says Greenleaf. "For example, an object could be rendered invisible at just a specific wavelength of red; it would be visible in nearly every other color."

Smith's team at Duke is also working on improving their cloaking device. On Dec. 6, Smith and Greenleaf met for the first time and talked about Greenleaf's new math.

"Allan has been looking at the problem much more generally, and deriving the conditions for when true invisibility is or is not possible," says Smith. "We are very interested in what he and his colleagues come up with!"

Greenleaf and his coauthors are now working to confirm the relationship between their work and experiments. Some of the equations do not have solutions, so they are looking at what the physical consequences are, and whether a cloak's effectiveness would be compromised. Since any physical construction is only an approximation of the mathematical ideal that Greenleaf's team analyzes, Greenleaf says it would also be very interesting to understand the extent to which small errors in the construction degrade the cloaking effect.

For additional information, please see http://www.seas.rochester.edu/~gresh/math/math_113006.html

Source: University of Rochester

Lost Civilizations - The Ruins of Ji'an

2008-07-31T22:32:00.000-07:00

Ancient Drowned City Found on Chinese-Korean Border
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Assocaited Press

BEIJING — The ruins of a 2,000-year-old walled city have been found in a reservoir on China's northeastern border with North Korea, China's official news agency reported Wednesday.

The mud-covered ruins were exposed when the water level in the Yunfeng Reservoir was lowered for repairs, Xinhua News Agency said, citing government officials. The reservoir is on a tributary of the Yalu River, which forms the border of the two countries.

The report said the ruins, near the present-day city of Ji'an, are believed to date to the time of China's Han Dynasty, which existed from 202 B.C. to A.D. 220. But Korea's Koguryo kingdom ruled the area at that time, and Xinhua said the city included tombs of Koguryo design.

Another burial area found some 12 miles away on the reservoir floor has 2,360 tombs also believed to date from Koguryo, Xinhua said.

The Koguryo kings reigned from 37 B.C. to A.D 668 over the Korean Peninsula and northeastern China. The era is regarded as one of the high points of Korean cultural and political power.

China angered Koreans in 2004 when it issued a document describing Koguryo as part of Chinese history. Beijing and Seoul agreed to settle the dispute through academic discussions.

The ruined city's wall is five feet high and 13 feet thick and encloses an area 600 feet by 700 feet, Xinhua said. It is surrounded by a moat.

The dam and reservoir were built in the 1950s, Xinhua said.

Zhang Fuyou, chairman of the Mount Changbai Cultural Society of Jilin Province, said further excavation would required to confirm when the city was built, Xinhua reported.

Protection of Koguryo Kingdom Ruins Stressed
Xinhau News Agency

Ji'an, a county-level city in northeast China's Jilin Province, has revised its urban development plan so that ruins of the ancient Koguryo Kingdom inside the city can be well protected.

Xu Caishan, mayor of Ji'an, said that the present-day downtown area of his city, where Guonei City of the Koguryo Kingdom was located, would move eastward, and the modern architecture would be relocated and completely disappear in 50 years from now.

Capital cities and tombs of the ancient Koguryo Kingdom of China were on Thursday inscribed on the World Heritage List by the 28th Session of the World Heritage Committee, which is being held in Suzhou, east China's Jiangsu Province.

The ruins, which are scattered in Ji'an City of northeast China's Jilin Province and Huanren Manchu Autonomous County of the neighboring Liaoning Province, include the remains of three cities and 40 tombs, Wunu Mountain City, Guonei City and Wandu Mountain City, with 14 tombs of imperial families and 26 of nobles. All belonged to the Koguryo culture, named after the dynasty that ruled over parts of northern China and the northern half of the Korean Peninsula from 277 BC to 668 AD.

Mayor Xu said that they would also drop the plan to build an industrial park near the Taiwang mausoleum of Koguryo Kingdom, and instead build the industrial park in a new location faraway from the mausoleum.

"We hope by doing so, modern civilization won't erode our precious historical relics," said the mayor.

The distribution of the Koguryo ruins overlaps with the land used for production and daily life of one third of the city's population. As local people increased their awareness of cultural relics protection, they willingly relocated elsewhere.

In March 2003, civil servants with 43 departments of Ji'an City Government moved out of the city government building, which was built on the ruins of Guonei City of Koguryo Kingdom, to work in 20 separate places.

The original location of the city government building has now been turned into a Koguryo Kingdom Ruins Park, where archaeological workers discovered a large site of palace ruins.

In the meantime, 1,150 households and 51 governmental institutions, factories, schools and shops, involving 4,145 people, have moved out of the first-phase zone designated for environmental reconstruction, covering an area of 108,900 sq m, and resettled down elsewhere so that the ancient city wall of the Guonei City will no long be threatened by increased human activities.

Jiang Yuhua, a 53-year-old farmer from Maxian Township of Ji'an City, said he never knew that the stone heap -- Qianqiu Tomb, one of the tombs for nobles during the Koguryo Kingdom -- some 100 meters away from his home was anything of significance until one day in early 2003, local cultural officials dropped in and told him the stone heap was a relic of over 1,000 years and he should be relocated so that the tomb could get proper protection.

"Having got to know what I face everyday is something significant in human history, I agree to get relocated," said Jiang. "I think it is worthwhile sacrificing a little for the benefit of children of future generations."

The local government has subsidized local residents relocated according to a standard of 960 yuan (about US$116) per sq m, and has financed the construction of two new villages and two buildings for relocated residents.

In addition to promulgating a regulation on protection of capital cities and tombs of the ancient Koguryo Kingdom in Ji'an, the city government has added nine people to the three-member detachment for security of cultural relics and authorized it to hire another 69 guards to patrol the 700,000-sq-m zone designated for protection.

Manchu Autonomous County of Huanren in Liaoning Province, where Wunu Mountain City, or the ancient Koguryo regime's early capital was situated, has not only published a set of rules on the site, but also enlarged the protected area from 2.15 sq km to 34 sq km, making detailed provisions on cultural relics, natural landscape and biological environment inside the area.

According to Sun Xudong, head of the Huanren County Government, they have dismantled a 75-meter-high TV relay station, a 200-meter-long cableway and two factories inside the protected area, where some 66 hectares of arable land have been reverted to green and 500 modern graves relocated elsewhere.

The department of publicity with Huanren County Government has financed compilation of materials about the Koguryo ruins to be used as textbooks among primary and middle school students.

Local TV station of Huangren County has also organized a county-wide contest on knowledge of Koguryo so that more people can participate in the cause of cultural relic protection.

Sun Baocheng, aged 69, an urban resident of Ji'an City, is upbeat about the inclusion of the Koguryo ruins on the World Heritage List.

The old man, who used to play a lot around the Taiwang mausoleum when he was young, regretted what he did.

"When I was a child, I liked to compete with others in climbing onto the top of the mausoleum, unaware that we were actually damaging the precious cultural relic," said the old man, adding that his greatest wish was to become a volunteer advocate for cultural relic protection.

Xinhua News Agency July 4, 2004

Ye Olde Xoblob Shoppe - The Teeth of Dahlver-Nar: Expanded Set

2008-07-27T01:21:00.001-07:00

The Teeth of Dahlver-Nar - Expanded

For detailed information on how the Teeth of Dahlver-Nar operate as well as insights into their construction and history, consulted the Tome of Magic, Dungeons and Dragons Third Edition revised, Pgs. 77 - 79.

Apep: You can use Fire Shield (either version) once per day. This tooth is always found in the shape of a serpent's fang. Strong abjuration; CL 8th, Price: 12,800 GP.

Araax: You can cast Break Enchantment once per day. When found, this tooth is polished smooth with no decay or blemishes. Strong abjuration; CL 16th, Price: 32,000 GP.

Ara-mar: You can use Shroud of Undeath three times per day. This tooth is always yellow and stained with advanced age when found. Moderate necromancy, CL 4th, Price: 3,200 GP

Domblast: You can use Magic Vestment [+04] on your armor or shield once per day for a maximum of five rounds. Moderate transmutation; CL 16th, Price: 20800 GP

Galap-Dreidel: You can store up to three spells as a ring of minor spell storing but no more than 12 spell levels of either divine or arcane types. All spells can be fourth level or lower. You may not restore any more spells until all three slots of the tooth are empty and allow the tooth to recharge for one day. Moderate evocation; CL 5th, Price: 18,000 GP

Gilgeam: You can cast Bear’s Endurance once per day. Strong Transmutation; CL 14th, Price: 11, 200 GP

Kathron: You can cast Castigate once per day. Moderate evocation; CL 8th, Price: 12,800 GP

Mililani: You can cast Identify three times per day. This tooth is always pearly white. Faint divination; CL 4th, Price: 1,600 GP

Mirot: You can cast Wall of Sand in any location once per day. Moderate conjuration, CL: 10th; Price: 16,000 GP

Nanus-Geste: You can use Mirror Image twice per day. Moderate illusion; CL 6th, Price: 4,800 GP

Nnoq: You gain a +04 enhancement bonus once per day to either your bluff, perform, or professions skill. Moderate transmutation; CL 10th, Price: 16,000 Gp

Sayyar-Sayyid: You can cast Elemental Body on yourself for five rounds once per day. Moderate transmutation, CL 00th, Price: 44,800 GP

Signal Load 01 - Plot Threads

2008-07-26T21:16:00.001-07:00

The US May Have Delivered 200,000 AK-47s to Insurgents in Iraq – War Construction Money Used To Buy Submachine Guns + Explosives
May 11th 2006
Best Syndication.com

The insurgents in Iraq may have 200,000 new assault weapons to use against US forces. But where did these weapons come from; the Russians, the Chinese, Osama Bin Laden? No, evidently they were delivered to Iraq by the U.S. Department of Defense. The Northern Ireland newspaper, The Daily Mirror, reported that a 99-ton cache of AK-47s was supposed to be delivered to Iraqi security forces. According to Los Angeles Radio Station KNX News Radio, the U.S. Department of Defense used a complex web of private arms dealers to fly the shipment from a U.S. base in Bosnia to Iraq.

According to KNX reporter Steve Marshall, NATO and U.S. officials have already voiced fears that the arms - sold by US, British and Swiss firms - are being passed to insurgents. Two companies involved in the transaction claim the weapons were delivered to Iraq, but refused to show any paperwork as evidence.

Marshall reported that a NATO spokesman said "There's no tracking mechanism to ensure they don't fall into the wrong hands. There are concerns that some may have been siphoned off."

HAVE 200,000 AK47S FALLEN INTO THE HANDS OF IRAQ TERRORISTS?
10/05/2006
The Mirror

FEARS OVER SECRET U.S. ARMS SHIPMENT

SOME 200,000 guns the US sent to Iraqi security forces may have been smuggled to terrorists, it was feared yesterday.

The 99-tonne cache of AK47s was to have been secretly flown out from a US base in Bosnia. But the four planeloads of arms have vanished.

Orders for the deal to go ahead were given by the US Department of Defense. But the work was contracted out via a complex web of private arms traders.

And the Moldovan airline used to transport the shipment was blasted by the UN in 2003 for smuggling arms to Liberia, human rights group Amnesty has discovered.

It follows a separate probe claiming that thousands of guns meant for Iraq's police and army instead went to al-Qaeda.

Amnesty chief spokesman Mike Blakemore said: "It's unbelievable that no one can account for 200,000 assault rifles. If these weapons have gone missing it's a terrifying prospect." American defence chiefs hired a US firm to take the guns, from the 90s Bosnian war, to Iraq.

But air traffic controllers in Baghdad have no record of the flights, which supposedly took off between July 2004 and July 2005. A coalition forces spokesman confirmed they had not received "any weapons from Bosnia" and added they were "not aware of any purchases for Iraq from Bosnia". Nato and US officials have already voiced fears that Bosnian arms - sold by US, British and Swiss firms - are being passed to insurgents. A Nato spokesman said: "There's no tracking mechanism to ensure they don't fall into the wrong hands. There are concerns that some may have been siphoned off." This year a newspaper claimed two UK firms were involved in a deal in which thousands of guns for Iraqi forces were re-routed to al-Qaeda.
One arms broker's lawyer is said to have admitted that nearly all of a shipment of 1,500 AK-47s went missing. And a US official said £270million of equipment could not be traced.

Meanwhile, Aerocom, the Moldovan air firm at the centre of the 200,000 missing AK47s, was stripped of its licence by its national authorities a day before the first shipment.

Two other companies in the complicated sale claim to have papers proving the guns were delivered in Iraq but refuse to show them.

Amnesty has now called on Britain to clamp down on the arms trade.

Spokeswoman Kate Allen said: "It's out of control and costing hundreds of thousands of lives every year. The UK has a real chance to do something about it when the UN meets in June."

The Latest Missing Weapons Cache
B24636 / Sat, 18 Aug 2007 21:03:09 / International
Guerrilla News Network

If there’s one thing we need to be constantly aware of, it’s that all wars are substantially fought with lies.

Sometimes all you can do is sift through everything everyone says methodically and repeatedly until you end up with something that seems like it might be worth something. And but still. You can’t say anything for sure. And it’s best not to anyway. Fuzzy Logic is the Problem Solver’s best friend.

First, let’s list our sources. Always keep track of your sources. If it’s coming from the LA times courtesy of a ‘senior military official’ file it under propaganda. But here we have

1. Amnesty International.

2. Records obtained by the US Government Accounting Office from General Petraeus and the MNSTC-I (MultiNational Security Transition Command – Iraq) as summarized by David Isenberg whose judgement I might question but whose vigilance, numbers, contacts and indignation I very much appreciate.

3. Jeremy Scahill, who doesn’t quote his sources — in this referenced piece (and is a wee bit cavalier, I think, about the difference between 200,000, 180,000, 62,000 and “hundreds”) but the firepower is good. We’ll take whatever we can get and count it as some of our most reliable data.

4. The Pentagon (LOL)

5. Associated Press Reporters who saw emails and court documents (LOL squared)
Let’s go to the end of July. On July 31, 2007, the GAO released a report comparing what the records of General David Petraeus say were ordered — for Iraqi Security Forces —and what the records of the MNSTC-Iraq say they have.

What’s missing? 110,000 AK-47s and 80,000 pistols. That’d be 110,000 AK-47s out of the total 185,000 that General David’s records say he ordered (60%) and 80,000 pistols out of the 170,000 The General’s records mention (47%).

TIP: That’s “more ‘n half” of the AKs and “almost half” of the pistols – if you’re shouting in a noisy bar and on your sixth Guinness. The pistols were prolly Glocks (if you’re worried about spitting or just like to pay attention to detail (or just seem like you do)).

That’s it. That’s the missing cache. What happened?

The Amnesty International Report, released in May 2006, found that hundreds of thousands of AK-47s and “other weapons” were shipped from Bosnia, apparently never to arrive in Iraq. The GAO report is talking about the same time period as Amnesty International’s. Approximately. May/July 2004 to September 2005.

Do we think they might be the same cache?

[This is Isenberg’s sleuthing, btw. He’s just more modest than I am about connecting dots. (He’s a senior analyst with the British American Security Information Council and a US Navy veteran — I expect you learn to get compulsive about eggshells and toes.)]

US military air-traffic controllers in Iraq say the flights those weapons were reputedly on never requested landing slots.

Isn’t that interesting?

Broken Bulb Spreads Severe Radiation Burns
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Associated Press

COLUMBIA, Tenn. — A malfunctioning light bulb in a school gym exposed more than 100 people to short-wave radiation for an hour, sending 18 to the hospital with severe sunburns and swollen eyes.

The incident occurred during a Sept. 11 memorial event held Friday at the Baker Elementary School in Columbia. Attendees, many of whom were military veterans, said they started to feel symptoms soon after the event began.

"While I was sitting in the auditorium, my forehead started itching real bad," said Fred Young, 73. "When I got home I looked into the mirror and my face looked real red."

Most victims were older adults who were sitting together under the broken lamp. No children were admitted to Maury Regional Hospital, according to Dr. David Turner.

Dr. Michael Richardson, another emergency room doctor, said the symptoms, similar to overexposure from a tanning bed, were produced by a radiation leak from a halide bulb. The bulbs, commonly used in gyms, are designed with a special membrane that blocks the UV rays, but occasionally the membranes break.

The gym was closed during the weekend and by Monday morning the bulb was removed, according to Director of Schools Eddie Hickman.

Vegas Driver Said to See 'Demons' in Crowd
Sep 23 07:20 PM US/Eastern
By CHRISTINA ALMEIDA
Associated Press

LAS VEGAS (AP) - A man suspected of killing two tourists and injuring 12 others on the Las Vegas Strip told police he steered his car into the crowd on the sidewalk because they were staring at him like demons.

Stephen M. Ressa, 27, also told police he saw people with their hands in their pockets and thought they might be armed with guns, according to an arrest report obtained Friday by The Associated Press.

"They were staring at him like they were `demons,'" the report said. "Ressa admitted he became angry at them, and intentionally steered the vehicle toward them."

Ressa, of Rialto, Calif., was arrested Wednesday evening shortly after the car barreled through the crowd and crashed into a cement barrier in front of Bally's hotel-casino. He remained jailed without bail on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.

During two interviews with police, Ressa told detectives he had borrowed his mother's car and drove to Las Vegas, where he spent a few days gambling at various casinos and slept in the car.

Although Ressa told police he had a drug and alcohol problem, he said he had used neither Wednesday. He told police he had been prescribed medication, but had stopped taking it.

Results of alcohol and drug tests were pending.

Rialto police Detective Sgt. Reinhard Burkholder said Thursday that Ressa was wanted for questioning in an assault on his mother, 54.

"He punched her numerous times in the face and choked her into unconsciousness and stood over her with a butcher knife," Burkholder said.

Earlier, Deputy Police Chief Greg McCurdy told reporters that Ressa appeared lucid and correctly answered questions about his ability to determine right and wrong. But Ressa's statements were "bizarre in nature," McCurdy said.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Shifting Gears - Neuroactivated Biometeric Key/Lock

2008-07-25T12:47:00.001-07:00

Brain Activity Provides Novel Biometric Key
15:17 16 January 2007
NewScientist.com news service
Will Knight

An electronic security system that identifies people by monitoring the unique pattern of electrical activity within their brain is being tested by European scientists.

This novel biometric system should be difficult to forge, making it suitable for high-security applications, claim the researchers behind it. The system was developed by two companies - Starlab in Spain and Forenap in France - in cooperation with researchers at the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas, in Greece. It uses an established method for measuring activity in the brain, called electroencephalography (EEG).

EEG measurements identify the location and intensity of millisecond-long fluctuations in electrical activity in the brain via electrodes positioned around a person's scalp. This can help neuroscientists understand the function of different brain areas and may also be used to diagnose and monitor neurological conditions such as epilepsy and dementia.

Neural Pathways

Since an individual's brain activity is determined by the unique pattern of neural pathway in their brain, the same technique can be used for identification, says Dimitrios Tzovaras, who is the coordinator at the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas. "It could be a very good security control," he told New Scientist.

The authentication system requires a user to have EEG measurements taken beforehand with further measurements for each authentication test. This is done via a removable cap, which communicates wirelessly with a computer that analyses the data gathered. The cap has fewer electrodes than are normally used for EEG measurements, but can still provide enough information for authentication, according to Tzovaras.

Currently users must sit quietly with their eyes shut during each test. "We ask them to close their eyes and not speak"," Tzovaras says, which provides "a much clearer picture".

The result of each authentication test is compared with the user's pre-recorded measurements, using signal-processing algorithms. These algorithms can be tuned to different security levels.

But users could eventually be required to perform specific tasks during each test, he suggests, as this should also produce a unique EEG "signature". The researchers envisage the set-up being used as part of a building or computer security system and plan to test it as the security control system for a laboratory in Germany in 2007.

Multiple Biometrics

The biometric system is part of a wider European project called Human Monitoring and Authentication using Biodynamic Indicators and Behavioural Analysis (HUMABIO). The aim of this project is to combine several different biometrics to create a more efficient and secure overall system. The EEG system will eventually be linked to a seat designed to identify a person by the way they sit, which is being developed at the University of Pisa, Italy.

A separate group, led by Rafal Wardziński at Warsaw University of Technology in Poland, is also working on EEG biometrics. In testing, this group found that the method could identify subjects with 88% accuracy.

However, John Daugman, a biometrics researcher at the University of Cambridge, UK, questions the practicality of the approach. He says an EEG cap could prove too cumbersome and invasive. "Wearing a wired helmet with sensors on one's scalp might change the ambiance of the workplace somewhat," he says.

Similarly, neuroimaging expert Olaf Hauk, also at the UK's Medical Research Council, believes using the system in a wide variety of situations, particularly stressful ones, could complicate the results significantly. "EEG varies greatly depending on a person's alertness, or mental operations," Hauk told New Scientist. "You might not want to be taken for someone else at the airport just because you had a bad night before."

OOC: use a photographic sensor to snap a picture of the neuroactivity of the occipital lobe, something similiar in the movie Seven days, except it measures information, miliseconds after to the initial flash.

D20 Future/Gamma World

Type: Personal
Progression Level 8/9: Gravity Age
Size: Variable
Weight: Variable to 1 Kg.
Hardness: 05
Purchase DC: 20 [Urban Centers Only]
Restriction: Bureaucratic [+02], Corporate [+03], Judical [+03], Military [+04]

Mutants and Masterminds Second Edition Revised

Type: Personal
Tech Level 6: Fusion Age
Size: Tiny/Small
Weight: Variable to 01 Lbs.
Purchase DC: 25
Restriction: Bureaucratic [+02], Corporate [+03], Judical [+03], Military [+04]
Toughness: +02

If an unlawful possessor of the key attempts to use it via psionic or telepathic means, total the player's insight, stability, and will modifers. Add that total to the player's concentration skill rank vs. 1d20 plus the key's power level and ten. If the result is greater then the character has managed to fool the key's neuro-encryption signature and may use the key to unlock the device.

Dungeons and Dragons Third Edition Revised

Biometric Psi-Key

This simple devise enables a psion or a wilder to imprint his psionic energies upon it and use it as a personal security key. With this devise, he can lock and unlock [via psionic lock and knock-psionic disciplines] physical objects as a mean of personal identification. First, personas unknown attempt to use the key with succeeding against a successful concentration check [DC = 10 + ½ ECL + charisma modifier], the key refuses to activate. Secondly, a psion or wilder can store up to up an additional 21 power points and unlock them when they are needed the most. Activating the key requires but one power point and that power point may not come from any points stored in the key.

Faint psychoportation: ML 4th
Craft Universal Item; Knock - Psionic, Psionic Lock
Market Price: 8,000 Gp
Cost: 4,000 Gp + 320 XP

Shifting Gears - Deep Flight Super Falcon

2008-07-03T21:38:00.000-07:00

Personal Submarine Prepares for Launch

By Marco R. della Cava
USA TODAY

RICHMOND, Calif. — The bayfront workshop redefines unassuming. Concrete floors, exposed ducting. Four hushed workers and a snoozing golden retriever. Then again, maybe the Wright brothers worked like this.
"It's not much, but we like it here," says Graham Hawkes, the modern-day visionary behind Hawkes Ocean Technologies. "I like to keep things simple."

Well, not exactly. The 60-year-old British-born engineer has spent the past four decades tinkering with submersibles, all mere prelude to his current magnum opus: the two-person Deep Flight Super Falcon.

Erase those creaky Jules Verne images. Super Falcon weds Top Gun with James Bond.

The sleek, battery-powered cigar with wings looks like a fighter jet and is designed to literally fly — as opposed to sink — through the world's oceans.

Employing the mirror image of flight technology, Super Falcon uses wings to dive when pushed through the water with 500 pounds of thrust. The brave will be happy to know it can surface vertically, like a rocket at launch.

For $2 million-plus, it's yours. Just not this first Super Falcon. Hawkes is busy preparing it for delivery this summer to Tom Perkins, the Bay Area venture capitalist who previously turned pop-culture heads (60 Minutes, the book Mine's Bigger) with his revolutionary mega-yacht, Maltese Falcon. (Perkins' yacht and the sub carry similar names, but that's coincidence.)

"When I saw the (Super Falcon) prototype at the Monaco Yacht Show about three years ago, I immediately thought, 'Yes, brilliant, got to have one,' and soon after wrote a slightly stunned Graham a check," Perkins says. He's selling the Maltese Falcon (asking price: $180 million), and his next project will be a kite-sail-equipped motor yacht to transport and support his Hawkes-built submarine.

"I'm a longtime diver," he says. "But with something like Super Falcon, I might be able to really spend time alongside seals and dolphins. Maybe I can chase whales. That hasn't been done."

Diving for Diversity

The boyish enthusiasm in the hard-nosed businessman's voice is precisely the gem that Hawkes is mining with his deep-water flying machine. More than a mere toy for the super-rich, Super Falcon subs will play a key role in Hawkes' plan to ignite a new era of ocean appreciation and exploration.

He's now building a second Super Falcon (base price: $1.7 million) for himself, which he'll use to take out interested luminaries and instruct them at a $17,000, three-day "flight school" next spring in the Caribbean. The training is designed to serve as a stand-alone experience as well as to lure potential sub owners.

"Scientists are always the ones who head into the ocean, but I want to take writers and politicians, people who can convey the beauty that is there and perhaps do something to take care of it," says Hawkes, sounding like Jacques Cousteau with a British accent.

"One time on a dive, I wound up drifting up in darkness surrounded by billions of photoluminescent creatures. It was a religious experience, one only a poet could do justice to."

Ultimately, Hawkes' mission is to assemble a small fleet of subs to take curious (and well-heeled) adventurers to remote and remarkable ocean destinations. For those in tow, the payoffs defy a balance sheet.

"The most fun was pulling back on the joystick and heading straight up to breach," says Bob Metcalfe, who attended a previous Hawkes program in Mexico with Super Falcon's forerunner. Metcalfe, an engineer who co-invented the Ethernet, founded software giant 3Com and now finances new "green" technologies through Polaris Venture Partners, was disappointed "to not spot a Humboldt squid, which lives at 700 feet," but he was giddy "watching Graham, ever the engineer, fiddling with his gorgeous creation."

Market for Adventure

Hawkes is convinced many other Metcalfes are out there, people fueled by a unceasing desire to explore regardless of cost.

"Richard Branson has proved with Virgin Galactic (the fledgling $200,000-a-trip civilian space travel service) that there is a marketplace for these sorts of things," Hawkes says. "With the super-wealthy, I think what a lot of them want isn't things, it's experiences. Preferably ones that few people can have."

Virgin founder Branson is best known for his ballooning passion, but he isn't ignoring the deep.

"The oceans are in their own way as beautiful as space, and this is something Virgin is seriously looking at," Branson says.

Specifically, he has been in touch with Hawkes and Peggy Fossett, wife of the late American adventurer Steve Fossett, who went missing in Nevada last September while flying solo across the high desert. Hawkes was readying a craft for Fossett called Deep Flight Challenger, a cylindrical bullet of a sub that was designed to be the first single-passenger sub to touch the deepest part of the ocean floor at a crushing 36,000 feet down. (For context, the Titanic was explored by a manned sub at her resting spot of 13,000 feet.)

Branson says he's debating "taking over" Fossett's quest: "The oceans are as unexplored as space is, and they need to be mapped and explored."

Sometimes, spirited adventurers are what's needed to focus the world's attention.

"Experiencing anything firsthand really is what makes the place real, whether it's polar bears in the Arctic or Yellowstone's geysers or the oceans," says Rick Spinrad, assistant administrator for research for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The NOAA is about to deploy an unmanned sub equipped with a high-definition camera that will transmit images to the agency's website.

"You can't love what you don't know," Spinrad says. "And for most people, the oceans are just a big old wet mass."

Perhaps one that's there to impress the Joneses. Despite the shaky state of the global economy, the ranks of the world's super-rich continue to grow. Forbes magazine reports that a record 1,125 billionaires in the world have a collective net worth of $4.4 trillion, up $900 billion from last year. With yachts no longer instant status symbols (where 100 feet once was king, now 500 feet is required for true bragging rights), some are looking underwater for the new symbols of Citizen Kane-like grandeur.

Among the companies servicing this market are Claremont, Calif.-based SEAmagine Hydrospace Corp. and Seattle's U.S. Submarines, whose staggering creations take the amenities of a leather-washed multimillion-dollar corporate jet and dunk them in water.

The sub activity has caused Hawkes to join forces with yacht management veteran Richard Boggs to create some standards for these new crafts, whose sophistication rivals that of aircraft.

"I don't like calling subs 'yacht toys,' simply because they need tremendous maintenance and attention, not to mention a set of operational standards to avoid problems," says Boggs, technical superintendent at Camper & Nicholsons International in Fort Lauderdale. "There has been no Joe Consumer for subs. Now we're seeing more and more yachts equipped with them."

'Disneyland for the Rich Set'

The curious show up at luxury goods confabs like those staged by Lux5 Events, a Newport Beach, Calif., company whose spring event in Los Angeles spotlighted Hawkes' submarines.

"A lot of high-end purchasing is ego-driven, and anything on the cutting edge gets attention," says Lux5 co-founder Michael Munar, who describes his exotic car, boat and plane parties as "Disneyland for the rich set."

"Whether it's Branson with his SpaceShipOne or Graham with Super Falcon, often the mere fact that the technology exists is a huge source of excitement and inspiration," he says. "We're talking about pioneers here."

Built for Beauty

The headquarters of Hawkes Ocean Technologies doesn't give up its secrets easily. Without explanation, some of the parts scattered around the place seem almost ordinary. But when prompted, Hawkes is happy to show and tell.

He starts with the hull of the Super Falcon, which is just wide enough for its passengers and consists of a hardened shell made of a proprietary composite designed to keep its occupants safe and pressurized at nearly 3,000 feet, a guideline that far exceeds the craft's stated dive limit.

"There's a sub-building rule that's been set in stone: 'Thou shalt build a circular pressure hull,' " says Hawkes, allowing a satisfied smile. "This is all curves with two holes punched in for people. We broke that rule."

Other sources of pride are a beautiful machined aluminum propeller tip in Iron Man red and exquisite joystick hand controls surrounded by gleaming metal that would be at home in a $1 million Bugatti Veyron supercar.

"This is submarine jewelry," Hawkes says, pushing a joystick and reflecting on his decades making far cruder machines for various commercial, military and exploratory ventures. "You could get inside the Super Falcon in high heels and feel right at home."

Not that that's what floats his sub. For Hawkes, the rich reward for a life spent pushing the limits of sub technology is found in an underwater flight off the Monterey Peninsula. On that recent prototype test run, a group of elephant seals decided to tag along.

"A big male kept swimming circles around us only inches above our heads as we shot through the water," he says. "That kind of thing makes every bit of work we do worthwhile. There we were, me and this guy I was taking for a ride, two grown men, screaming like 6-year-olds.

"Hah! Beautiful."

DEEP FLIGHT SUPER FALCON AT A GLANCE

What: Two-person submersible with in-line seating; the pilot and co-pilot have 360-degree views through clear, bubble-top hatches made of acrylic.
Built by: Longtime sub designer Graham Hawkes of Hawkes Ocean Technologies in Richmond, Calif.

Why it's revolutionary: Most subs are designed to sink, then resurface by losing weight; the Super Falcon is naturally buoyant and dives beneath the surface using inverted wings.

Vital Statistics

Dimensions: 21 feet long with a 10-foot wingspan
Weight: 4,000 pounds
Maximum Depth: 1,000 feet (safety rated to 3,000 feet)
Power: Lithium-ion batteries feed a brushless electric motor powering a single prop capable of 10 knots (11.5 mph).
Range: 10 linear miles per charge
Price: $1.7 million and up, depending on finishing touches and technologies

Source: Hawkes Ocean Technologies

RPG Series 3.5 Revised - Galap-Dreidel

2008-06-18T20:55:00.001-07:00

Galap-Dreidel, The Keymaster of the Ghost Tower

Once an archmage and cerebremancer of boundless power, Galap-Dreidel crafted the fabled Soul Gem to vanquish his enemies and expand his power over temporal mechanics. He extended his knowledge of planar enchantments and boundless energies by studying the limitless potentials of living souls (some would say incarnum). Scholars of ancient legend say his desire to covet the meteorite stone for himself was instrumental to his unrecorded demise. The Keymaster of the Ghost Tower thus grants binders the power to vanquish souls from their bodies, bend time and space to an astounding degree and open the limitless boundaries of the ethereal plane via psionics and magic

Vestige Level: 08
Binding DC: 32
Special Requirement: Yes

Legend: How Galap-Dreidel became a vestige is lost to the annals of antiquity. Galap-Dreidel as the proverbial “renascence man” of his era. The Keymaster, as legends tell, survived long past the length of short human years and even longer still to tutor and train many sorcerers, wizards, and psions in his obscene longevity. One academic archive houses a journal of the infamous tiefling sorcerer Acererack and within its yellowed pages it is written the demi-lich bested his former master over a dispute of power. Surviving journals and scant documented personal accounts retrieved by two expeditions that braved the perils of the Ghost Tower of Inverness confirm his hatred of corporeal undead. Could a necromancer have been systematic in his fall? Any opportunity to question his vestige by binders has called forth no new lore.

Special Requirement: If being vestiges of undeath weren’t enough, Galap-Dreidel dispises Acererack and Tenebrous for some other undisclosed reason. If the binder has made a pact with either vestige in the past 24 hours, then Galap-Dreidel refuses to answer the summons. If the binder has been “drained” of attributes, health, or acquired a negative level or more by an undead monster prior to the summons, Galap-Dreidel refuses to answer until a restoration spell or an arcane device of similar effect has been administered.

Manifestation: When called forth, a clockwise flowing soup of swirling primordial ethereal quasi-matter spills over the boundaries of the seal. Galap-Dreidel, counter-clockwise, swirls up and out of the whirlpool from the center of the seal to answer the pact. The binder sees a flowing draped vestige that appears phantasmal and wisped like a specter. His face is phased out and blurred in a state of constant flux, much like a displacer beast in motion. His facial features are difficult to focus on and always impossible to identify.

Sign: The binder’s eyes and their sockets are jet-black and appear hollow to anyone that looks at them. If one were to closely examine the binder’s open mouth, they would discover that it is jet-black and hollow, voided of teeth and tongue. The binder can see, speak, and taste normally however. The binder’s skin turns chalk white.

Influence: Galap-Dreidel considered undeath and necromancy abominations in the art that is wizardy. In any given conflict, Galap-Dreidel will order the binder and his accompanying party to attack the strongest undead first, then seconds strongest, and down the line in ranks of power.

Granted Abilities: The Keymaster’s abilities reflect his considerable mastery over living souls, time, and the ethereal plane.

The Cerebremancer’s Chrono-archive: the binder gains access to Galap-Dreidel’s knowledge of wizardry and psionics. Thus the binder gains two of the following competence bonuses or feat, or any two combination upon completion of the pact: Knowledge: Arcane +16, Knowledge: Engineering +15, Knowledge: History +14, Knowledge: the Planes +13, Knowledge: Psionics +12, Delay Spell, Quicken Spell or Craft Wondrous Item.

The Enmity of the Ethereal Soul: while bound to Galap-Dreidel, the binder is pushed slightly out of phase with the material plane. The binder thus gains limited access to the Ghost Template (Monster Manual I, pg. 116). He can use all three abilities - Draining Touch, Frightful Moan, and Horrific Gaze, every other round. He can use this ability in conjunction with his available psionic powers. Second, while bound to Galap-Dreidel, the binder gains a +08 resistance bonus to necromantic spells as if he were granted a protection from spells.

Silver in the Mind of Time: The binder has access to a formidable pool of psionic talents once bound to Galap-Dreidel. As a standard action, the binder can use Dimension Door – Psionic, Ethereal Jaunt, Light Beam, Precognition-Greater, Sensitivity to Psychic Impressions, Telekinetic Thrust, Temporal Acceleration, Touch of Health, and Time Hop. The binder is bequeathed a pool of 32 power points. If the binder already has a point pool then it adds 32 power points as a bonus.

The Touch of Impending Tomorrows and Other Yesterdays: While bound to Galap-Dreidel, the binder can bend the flow of time via touch once every five rounds. The binder can accelerate chronological decay in both organic and inorganic material or temporally “push” someone or something into a pocket of suspended time. In effect, he can disintegrate or use temporal stasis as a 16th sorcerer. The binder can stack his charisma modifier as a competence bonus against a specific target when using either of these powers. These abilities’ mechanics increase when the binder advances in level to a maximum at 20th level. These twin abilities can be used in conjunction with the feats provided above by Galap-Dreidel.

Capstone Granted Ability
You gain the following ability when you pass your binding check by ten or more.

Time’s Anchor: Any corporeal or incorporeal undead struck by the binder via touch or any weapon in his possession must make a will save vs. DC 25 or be expelled onto a triple-lapping boarder region where the ethereal, the prime material and the temporal planes intersect. Once there, the undead monster is effectively trapped for the number or rounds equaled to the binder’s level plus his charisma bonus. Magical items that modify a charisma bonus stack in terms of the length of shunt. Second, this particualr ability circumvents spell resistance. This unique ability is ghost-touched, thus primarily used against monsters and undead who carry the incorporeal type and subtypes.

© Jeffrey Williams, 2008.

Ye Olde Xoblob Shoppe - The Luck of Magic

2008-06-16T18:55:00.000-07:00

Spell scrolls are nice but I also like other magical parchments and papers. Anyway, thanks to Tadask Nezerull for helping unintentionally flush out this magical item. Written in third edition revised mechanics and I expaned the spell's definition too. Tadask can be reached at the_dark_templar11111
@yahoo.com

Parchment of Three Blessings

This uncommon magical item appears to a simple, yet folded receipt of purchase. Somewhere within the list of purchases, there is short series of three sevens. On the back of the receipt is a stamp bearing the holy symbol of luck or good fortune [I.E. Bes, Alymaine, Desna, Hermod, Norebo, Tyche, Tymora, etc.]. When the parchment is torn in half [a free action], the magic contained in it is released. The magic of the parchment bequeaths the recipient a +3 luck bonus towards the next three die rolls. No consecutive order is needed. This bonus does not stack with other luck bonus granted from other spells or magical items.

Weak Enchantment, CL: 6th
Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, Luck of the Draw
Market Price: 600 Gp
Cost: 300 Gp + 24 Exp

Luck of the Draw
Enchantment
Level: Bard 1, Cleric 2, Sorcerer/Wizard 2
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 Standard Action
Range: Personal
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No

When this spell is cast, the caster gains a +1d8 Luck Bonus to any one Dice Roll on their next round. This bonus does not stack with other Luck bonuses granted from items such as a Luckstone, or a Staff of the Magi.

Material Component: A small, eight-colored wheel and a Needle.

Shifting Gears - Bacterial Computers

2008-06-08T11:29:00.000-07:00

Living computers solve complex math puzzle
Tweaked bacteria show promise in problem-solving applications
By Bryn Nelson

Source: MSNBC

Scientists have genetically tweaked E. coli bacteria to create simple computers capable of solving a classic math puzzle, commonly called the “Burnt Pancake Problem.” The resulting advance in synthetic biology, according to researchers, hints at the ability of tiny “living computers” to aid in data storage, evolutionary comparisons and even tissue engineering.

The mathematical problem imagines pancakes of varying sizes stacked in random order — each with a burnt side and a golden brown side. The solution requires using the minimum number of manipulations to stack the pancakes according to size, with their burnt sides all facedown. Each manipulation involves flipping one or more pancakes, reversing both their order and orientation.

Scientifically, the flipping process is known as sorting by reversals and is the sort of challenge whose complexity increases dramatically with every added pancake. By the time the stack reaches 11, the problem becomes “extremely hairy,” said Karmella Haynes, a visiting adjunct professor of biology at Davidson College in Davidson, N.C.

“It’s kind of like that computer in ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,’ ” she said, referring to a popular novel by the late Douglas Adams. “It’s been working on a problem so long that by the time it comes up with an answer, everybody forgot the question.”

At that level of complexity, “bacteria could probably outperform a conventional computer at solving the problem,” said Haynes, the lead author of a new study suggesting exactly that.

Bacteria as tiny computers
Since 2000, multiple studies have focused on the largely untapped potential for bacteria, yeast and mammalian cells to be harnessed as tiny and abundant computers. “Ours is unique in that the operation required to solve the problem takes place in a living cell,” Haynes said.

The unique in vivo system takes advantage of the remarkable storage capacity of DNA and the efficiency of molecular self-assembly, Haynes said. DNA replication and bacterial cell division can quickly create millions or even billions of parallel processors. “The more little computers you have working on the problem,” she said, “the greater the likelihood that one is going to pick the right path that will take you to the right solution.”

The project began as an undergraduate entry in the International Genetically Engineered Machines, or iGEM, Competition, a showcase for the emerging field of synthetic biology. The students, under the direction of Davidson College professor A. Malcolm Campbell and in collaboration with Missouri Western State University, chose a mathematical puzzle that might lend itself to a biological solution: the Burnt Pancake Problem.

For the study, published last month in the Journal of Biological Engineering, the collaborators tried to demonstrate the advantages of a bacterial approach by exploiting a well-known enzyme from the Salmonella bacteria that cleaves DNA every time it recognizes a specific sequence of 26 DNA letters. The enzyme, Hin invertase, has the potential to cut a piece of DNA, flip it 180 degrees and put it back together.

“It’s like you have spatulas to handle the pancakes you’re flipping, to flip them over within the stack,” Haynes said.

To construct the eight possible solutions for how to flip two DNA “pancakes,” the group introduced both the Hin invertase enzyme and the DNA sequences it recognizes into E. coli, creating 100 distinct DNA components and intermediates in the process. In nature, Hin invertase can cut and flip a single section of DNA. For the project, the group showed that the enzyme can flip one piece, an adjacent piece or both at the same time. When correctly ordered and oriented, the combined DNA pieces were designed to reconstitute a gene allowing E. coli to grow even in the presence of the antibiotic tetracycline.

Unexpectedly, the researchers found that even some scrambled DNA arrangements confer tetracycline resistance. The wrinkle, Haynes said, underscores the need for researchers working on larger “pancake stacks” to find a reliable calling card — a distinct color change or survival of the bacteria, for instance — only when the right combination has been achieved amid a host of possibilities. Several of the project’s participants are now working toward that goal.

Sorting by Reversals
Despite the engineering challenges, Haynes said the bacterial system could theoretically tackle any problem that can be converted into a “sorting by reversals” format, including the evolutionary genomics puzzler of how two species are genetically related. Such a problem would require understanding how DNA chunks can become both re-ordered and re-oriented over the millennia. In trying to gauge the evolutionary distance between mice and humans, for example, “You’re essentially asking, ‘What’s the minimum number of reversals that it takes to transform a mouse genome into a human genome?” she said.

A more sophisticated setup might lend itself to data storage, given the compactness of flipped chunks of DNA. “If you imagine that a forward orientation is a 1 and a backward orientation is a 0,” Haynes said, “then you’ve got binary code” — the basis of computer data-encoding. But because Hin invertase scrambles DNA at random, researchers interested in encoding a meaningful array of informational bits would need to exercise far more control over how the fragments are flipped and in what order.

Ron Weiss, an assistant professor of electrical engineering and molecular biology at Princeton University, said the new study provides a “nice demonstration that there’s some capability to instruct cells to carry out computational tasks. And I think this certainly brings a new aspect to what’s been demonstrated before.” Weiss, who wasn’t involved with the research, said the effort is another sign that the field is progressing, despite its relative infancy. “We really are at the beginning, at the vacuum tube stage or something like that, if you use the comparison with computer electronics,” he said.

Understanding how biologically produced parts fit together into a larger whole will be key in determining how quickly the field matures. “Instead of two to five components, you’d have 20 or 50. That’s really going to be perhaps the biggest challenge as we move forward.” Advances in computational modeling and DNA synthesis, however, have provided hope that even sizeable synthetic arrangements aren’t out of reach.

Coaxing Bacteria to Behave
Three years ago, Weiss’ group coaxed bacteria to make complex shapes and fluorescent color patterns based on instructions from other bacteria, a study that yielded striking images of a bull’s-eye, heart and flower and the tantalizing possibility of creating “smart” devices able to detect hazardous compounds. The team has since introduced a similar pattern-forming capability into mammalian cells, spurring the cells to create distinct tissues instead of colors and shapes.

“Not only can we produce a pretty picture, but they can be valuable,” he said of the biological instructions, though he stressed that science has a long way to go before a similar toolkit could be called upon for whole-scale tissue engineering.

Despite the complexity, Weiss said the underlying mechanism can be thought of as a simple toggle switch: with one signal, cells may become muscle, while another spurs them to differentiate into bone. Adding signals, like the DNA “pancakes” in Haynes’s research, augments the number of choices for what the cells ultimately become.

Separately, Weiss’s team has coaxed mammalian cells to manufacture a communication system normally found only in bacteria and known as quorum sensing. Within the scheme, a secreted molecule allows a bacterial population to sense its own size and adjust its numbers accordingly.

“We now have the mammalian cells that can send and receive these bacteria quorum-sensing signals,” Weiss said, a success that has encouraged his team to work toward a more sensitive setup that one day might be used for recruiting cell populations to transform into, say, bone or neurons.

What about safety concerns?

“For applications that have to do with environment or human health, you really have to build in safety features,” Weiss said.

One biological safety valve under development would cause the whole system to abort if the cell population passes a certain number. Theoretically, he said, scientists also should be able to detect errors in biological networks the same way in which errors can be pinpointed on computer chips, and researchers are working toward developing such quality-control assurances.

Within the broader field, he said, synthetic biologists have adopted the engineering mindset of integrating safety features into their designs, perhaps well aware that their work could be for naught if they cannot assure the public that progress won’t come at the sake of prudence.

© 2008 MSNBC Interactive

RPG Series 3.5 Revised: Xakhotah - Sentinel of the Palace of Atzenteolt

2008-05-01T22:29:00.000-07:00

Xahkhotah
Sentinel at the Palace of Atzanteotl
Emissary of the Frenzied Jungle
Demoness from Green Hell

“She is the fury of Demogorgon! She is his teeth! You have been warned!”

Notes: When disaster destroyed the merchant fleet and sent her family to their deep ocean deaths, a fair-skinned red-haired child clung to driftwood and found herself washed ashore in a mysterious tropical land of violence and bloodshed. The six-year orphan of a wealthy ocean-faring mercantile family was discovered quite by accident by the high priest of Atzanteotl on one of their ritual dinosaur hunts. Fascinated by the child’s red hair, Tamochachan, in a moment of religious conviction, accepted the orphan and believed she was delivered by his godly patron. Naming her Xahkhotah [literal translation: fire from the sea], he raised her in his inner circle of advisors and adjacent priests.

As the years passed, Xahkhotah shed her fears and nightmares until her learned to draw strength and anger from them. From a scared lost child, she blossomed into a fierce warrior, but as an anointed godchild. However, without a religious proclamation, she was under the protection of the priests of the temple of dying Atzanteotl. That day would soon come her time to train in the Pits of the Teeth drew near. As her physical attributes developed, the Raptors of Atzan trained Xahkhotah in their dinosaur ritual hunts and skills in the arts of war and jungle. Tomachachan, having lived a long life with no daughters or sons of his own, would soon pass the honor of rulership onto her. Tomachachan was to bequeath the title empress (as it was his divine right) in a ceremony that would transform her into a defiler of Ka. All she needed to do and succeed was to capture a dinosaur and slaughter it in the prescribed ritual. The merit in her courage would entitle her to the Obsidian Throne.

There is deception in the motivation behind the Obsidian Throne for Tamochachan alone knows the truth. He is an Ur-Priest. All his rituals, blessings, divine visions were stolen through theft and subterfuge. The true faith of Atzanteotl had dwindled to a few hundred devotees and any remaining rituals they practiced. The ritual he guarded exclusively was called the Tchaltilka. It is divine process of transforming humanoid warriors into saurian-bequeathed champions of war and fearless bloodshed. Tomochachan’s crowning achievement would lead to the rebirth of his civilization with fresh blood while he would influence its development behind the throne. He eventually he would cannibalize slumbering Atzanteotl on the astral plane and use the energies to ascend to godhood. However, his rival enemies, the Holy Empire of Xoxlt sickened his blasphemy and by his wholesome slaughter of dinosaurs and other saurians struck first with relentless effect.

Now branded now as a degenerative culture and desperate for their survival on the verge of extinction, Tomochachan’s plans were on the verge of collapse. The feathered serpent steeds of the Holy Xoxtl Empire began and purified the taint corrupting the lands of the Obsidian Throne with their very breath. Their holy exhalations were spreading and dissolving anything chaotic, corrupted, and evil. The first initial strikes did sufficient damage to remaining followers and the nobility of the Obsidian Throne. Desperate, Tomachachan used the last of his nation’s resources to call forth creatures from the Abyss in an effort to crush their enemies. The Ur-Priest unleashed more than he bargained for.

Sensing the waning energies of a lost deity more than answering a summons for help, an aspect of Demogorgon arrived through a planar gate and onto the lands of the Obsidian throne. The duel-headed Prince of Demons assessed the situation with the twin minds of detached logic mixed with brutal cunning. What he found impressed him. A region of the Prime Material Plane rich in savage life with a diverse array of species endless in its efforts to thrive and destroy. Secondly through Tomachachan, a means of converting humanoids into saurian-like hybrids. The Tchaltika was a perfect tool for infiltrating human and elven-based cultures he so richly despised. Using deception, he convinced gating more demons would be beneficial to Tomochachan’s long term plans. The high priest, looking for the quickest solution to his crisis was desperate for a deal and a resolution. The demons did descend and drove the army of Holy Xoxtl from the lands of the Obsidian Throne. Demogorgon’s small but effective force drove them back to their own boarders.

Tomachachan’s death was to seal the pact between the Demon Prince and himself. He did indeed perish in the onslaught between demons and rival holy warriors, but he had prepared well in advance. He arose as a lich in the service of Demogorgon. Tomochachan’s remaining priests and any of the surviving populace were enslaved and used as breeding stock to replenish the Empire of the Obsidian Throne. All save Xahkhotah. His daughter, her off-color hair, and the willful defiance towards the Prince of Demons caught the attention of Demogorgon’s four eyes. He saw something in her worth exploiting, a bloodline of chaos, a guardian, a sentinel, and a perhaps the mother prototype. Her knowledge of the Tchaltilka ritual would advantageously serve him, as would the knowledge of fauna of this region. Its dinosaurs and other savage beasts would enhance his armies in the Abyss and other worlds aboard. Within days, as confirmed by the Pact, Tomachachan submerged his only daughter and heir into the Blood Pools of Sundering Ka. This time, the ritual would include essence from the Abyss. She arose from the pool of Blood, feral, savage, and less than human, but something greater. Time and training on the Abyss would harden her into a murderous adversary. She became his thrall and ardent follower on this world.

Xahkhotah now guards the Blood Pools of Sundering Ka. She watches the lich-priest protect the red ichor with necromantic magics and abyssal energies. And he has converted much of the Lands of the Empire into a massive reservation and other breeding pens for the purpose of birthing the dinosaurs necessary for The Tchaltika’s unholy existance. The again vigorous empire of the Obsidian Throne rules from its temple compiled city-state atop a mountainous plateau. Tomachachan, now a lich and a steward to his adopted daughter initiates these profane processes in the name of Demogorgon to creates more Ka-Tainted creatures in the name of his master. With the backing of his divine patron, the Obsidian Throne is on the rise again as a powerful nation and undeservingly as an offshoot of humanity.

Xahkhotah is a trained warrior and guerilla fighter. She will use the terrain and hit-n-run tactics to their best effects against the enemies of Demogorgon. Then she will rely on her swordsmanship, her poison blood and touch attacks for close quarter combat. She’ll use her gaze weapon if she is cornered or as a last resort.

As of all Thralls of Demogorgon, Xahkhotah is two personalities conflicted in one body. One is aggressive, confrontational, and feral, like a lost child, wild yet intelligent, but grossly lacking human socialization. A relentless butcher revealing in the senseless bloodsheding of beasts, man, and women alike. She is the beast that consumes the heart in the ceremony of conflict. She drinks the proverbial blood of her enemies when the battle is finished. The second personality is calculating, strategic, protective, and seeks to dominate all those who defy the will of Demogorgon. She is a guardian of evil and will use any method, overt or covert to achieve her goals.

Ranger/Fighter/Thrall of Demogorgon
Levels: 03/04/09
Experience Points: 192,675
ECL: +4
Race/Sex: Augmented [Ka-Tainted Template] Human Female
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Type: Medium Humanoid
Init: +04
Aura: Strong Chaos
Languages: Common- Aerth, Common- Azcan, Abyssal, Goblin, Elvish
Apparent Age: 24
Look: Strikingly beautiful human female with long flowing blood red hair and bright green eyes. Her skin is reptilian green and scaled like that of a dinosaur or some saurian beast from a lost world.

Abilities: Str 20 [+05], Dex 20 [+05], Con 19 [+04], Int 18 [+04], Wis 18 [+04], Cha 18 [+04]
Feats (17): Athletic, Blind-Fighting, Cleave, Combat Expertise, Combat Reflexes, Dodge, Endurance (Class Bonus), Improved Critical, Run, Thrall to Demogorgon, Megaraptor Leap, Predator’s Step, Toughness (Template Bonus), Two Weapon Fighting (Class Bonus), Track (Class Bonus), Weapon Focus (Claws), Willing Deformity
Armor/Shield Check Penalty: -04
Skills: Climb [+15], Concentration [+15], Craft: Weaponsmith [+12], Handle Animal [+14], Heal [+14], Hide [+16], Intimidate [+12], Jump [+16], Knowledge: Architecture [+14], Knowledge: Dungeoneering [+14], Knowledge: Geography [+15], Knowledge: Nature [+14], Knowledge: The Planes [+14], Listen [+16], Move Silently [+14], Profession [+12], Ride [+14], Search [+14], Sense Motive [+14], Speak Language [01], Spot [+16], Survival [+16], Swim [+15], Use Rope [+10]
Action Points: 14 [1d6]

AC: 25/19, flat-footed 21/20, touch 20/20
(armor=04, shield=00, dex=03, size=00, natural=03[02], bonus=05)
HP: 158 [3d10 + 4d8 + 9d8 + 64 + 03]

Fort: +17, Reflex: +12, Will: +12
Speed: 30 ft. (4 squares)
Special Moves: None
Base Attack: +21; Grapple: +26
Weapon Set: Martial Weapon Proficiencies
Magic Weapons: Long Sword +4 Consumptive Keen Edge weapon, Unholy Long Sword +4 Keen Edge weapon, Unholy Dagger +3 Shattermantle, Unholy Dagger +3 Brilliant Keen Edge
Melee: +21/+16/+11/+06/+01; Ranged: +21/+16/+11/+06/+01; Str Dmg Bonus: +05
Glamered Scale Mail, Moderate Fortification +04
Medallion of Thoughts
Glove of Storing [Contains a Ring of Feather Falling]
Rod of Rulership
Hand of Glory donned with a Ring of Elemental Command [Air]
Ring of Force Shield
Ring of Chameleon Power
Ioun Stone, Lavender and Green
Ioun Stone, Pearly White Spindle
Hideaway Long Bow of Distance +3
Quiver, 36 Anarchic Arrows of Seeking +2

Special Abilities
Ka-Tainted Creature Template (Deinonychus)
Attribute Bonuses/Penalties: +04 Str, -02 Int, +02 Con
Attack: Two Claw Attacks 1d4+4/1d4+4/+16 With the fiendish creature template, her claws are treated as magical weapons for the purpose of over coming damage reduction.
Blood of Ka (Su): The blood of a Ka-tainted creature is corrupted in the Tchaltilka ritual, becoming viscous and poisonous. Xakhotah’s blood acts as a contact poison (DC 22 = 10 + ½ HD + Con Modifier) that deals initial and secondary damage of 1d6 intelligence and 1d4 constitution. Xakhotah often coats her weapons with her own blood. Additionally, those deal damage to a Ka-tainted creature with non-reach handheld weapons or natural weapons that deal with slashing or piercing damage are exposed to her poisonous blood. Her blood loses potency and become harmless 24 hours after it leaves her body. She is immune to her to the effects of her own blood, but not from the blood of other Ka-tainted creatures.
Deinonychus: +02 racial bonus to Hide, Jump, Listen, Spot, and Survival Checks.
Low-light Vision (Ex): Xakhotah possesses a range of 60 ft.
Natural Armor Class Bonus: +02
Scent (Ex): Xakhotah gains the scent ability. This extraordinary ability lets a creature detect approaching enemies, sniff out hidden foes, and track by sense of smell. A creature with the scent ability can detect opponents by sense of smell, generally within 30 feet. If the opponent is upwind, the range is 60 feet. If it is downwind, the range is 15 feet. Strong scents, such as smoke or rotting garbage, can be detected at twice the ranges noted above. Overpowering scents, such as skunk musk or troglodyte stench, can be detected at three times these ranges. The creature detects another creature’s presence but not its specific location. Noting the direction of the scent is a move action. If it moves within 5 feet of the scent’s source, the creature can pinpoint that source. A creature with the Track feat and the scent ability can follow tracks by smell, making a Wisdom check to find or follow a track. The typical DC for a fresh trail is 10. The DC increases or decreases depending on how strong the quarry’s odor is, the number of creatures, and the age of the trail. For each hour that the trail is cold, the DC increases by 2. The ability otherwise follows the rules for the Track feat. Creatures tracking by scent ignore the effects of surface conditions and poor visibility. Creatures with the scent ability can identify familiar odors just as humans do familiar sights. Water, particularly running water, ruins a trail for air-breathing creatures. Water-breathing creatures that have the scent ability, however, can use it in the water easily. False, powerful odors can easily mask other scents. The presence of such an odor completely spoils the ability to properly detect or identify creatures, and the base Survival DC to track becomes 20 rather than 10.

Half-Fiend Template
Armor Class Bonus: +01
Attribute Bonuses/Penalties: +04 Str, +04 Dex, +02 Con, +04 Int, +02 Cha
Attack: Two Claw Attacks 1d4+5/1d4+5/+16 - With the fiendish creature template, her claws are treated as magical weapons for the purpose of over coming damage reduction.
Darkvision: 60 ft.
Damage Reduction: 10/magic
Immunity: Poison [except Ka-tainted poison]
Smite Good (Su): +16
Spell-Like Abilities: Darkness, Detect Magic, Detect Chaos/Evil/Good/Law, 3/Day – CL 16. Blasphemy, Demoncall , Contagion, Shout, Truesight, Unholy Blight - 1/Day – CL16.
Resistance to Acid, Cold, Electricity and Fire: 10
Spell Resistance: 26

Thrall of Demogorgon Prestige Class Abilities
Bonus Feats: 3
Death Touch (Su): As a thrall of Demogorgon, Xahkhotah can use an effect identical to that of slay living once per day. The fortitude save DC to avoid death is 23.
Duel Actions (Su): Twice per day, Xakhotah can take two full round actions in the same round.
Hypnosis (Su): Once per day, Xakhotah can produce an effect identical to hypnotism spell, except it functions as a gaze attack with a range of 30 ft. The Will save to resist this effect is 23.
Reaching Touch (Su): Three times per day, Xakhotah can cause her arms to stretch unnaturally like tentacles, providing her an extra feet of reach for 1 round.
Rotting Touch (Su): Three times per day, Xakhotah can deal 1d6 points of constitution damage as a touch attack.
Scaly Flesh (Ex): Natural Armor Class Bonus +03
Summon Minor and Major Demons (Sp): Xakhotah can summon a demon of 7 HD or less twice per day. This ability is the equivelent of a 7th level spell. This spell function as a summon monster spell cast by a 15th level caster. Xakhotah prefers to summon elemental demons or demonically infused elementals to do her bidding or an occasional succubus of incubus on those warm summer nights.
Touch of Fear (Su): Three times per day, Xakhotah can cause a creature he strikes with a touch attack to become frightened for 1d4 rounds. A successful Will save negates the fear, but the creature is shaken for one round. The Will save to resist this effect is 23.
Two Personas (Ex): Xakhotah has developed a multiple personality disorder that has the side effect of allowing her multiclass freely with no experience point penalties. In addition, whenever the character is subject to a mind-effecting attack that allows a saving throw, she makes two saving throws. Both must fail in order for the mind-affecting effect to affect her.

Resources

Player’s Handbook, Third Edition Revised.
Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss
Dragon Magazine 315, “Hollow World: Sundering Ka,” Pg.22-26.
Dragon Magazine 357, “The Demonomicon of Iggwilv – Demogorgon: Prince of Demons,” Pg. 20-32.

RPG Series 3.5 Revised - The Graveyard of Dead Gods - Addendum

2008-04-27T12:49:00.000-07:00

The Astral Plane: The Divine, The Fallen, and The Graveyard of the Gods: Addendum - The Domains of Fallen Gods

Amot
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Portfolio: destruction, annihilation, dissolution
Domains: Chaos, Deathbound, Destruction, Evil, Fire
Holy Symbol: A starburst exploding in all directions
Weapon: Morning Star

Beararak the Deviser
Alignment: Lawful Neutral
Portfolio: history, chronology, calligraphy, geography, lost knowledge, keeper of secrets, forgotten languages
Domains: Knowledge, Mysticism, Rune, Time
Holy Symbol: A three-prong rune pointing in all directions
Weapon: Quarterstaff

Valkiira the Angelic
Alignment: Neutral Good
Portfolio: courage, skill-at-arms, souls (the collection of), the afterlife
Domains: Courage, Glory, Repose, War
Holy Symbol: A clear globe resting in the palm of a feminine hand
Weapon: Long Sword, Bastard Sword, or Great Spear

Zhakautha the Devouring Maw
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Portfolio: hunger, starvation, dark knowledge, undeath (ghouls, ghasts, vampires)
Domains: Darkness, Deathbound, Evil, Gluttony
Holy Symbol: A fanged maw gripping a gnawed bone
Weapon: Club, Footman's Mace

Elif
Alignment: Chaotic Neutral
Portfolio: expression (drama), wilders, good favors, half-breeds, blood-endowed inheritance
Domains: Chaos, Luck, Mentalism, Mind, Nobility
Holy Symbol: A crossed dagger and rapier against an unrolled document
Weapon: Long Sword, Rapier, Short Sword, and Dagger

Gilgeam
Alignment: Lawful Evil
Portfolio: athleticism, civilization (Sumeria/Babylon cultures), law, tyranny, war
Domains: Evil, Law, Tyranny, War
Holy Symbol: A lammasu bearing his facial likeness
Weapon: Heavy Mace, Heavy Scepter, Great Club

Hemidall
Alignment: Lawful Evil (Lawful Neutral)
Portfolio: chivalry, defense, guardians, perception, the five senses, vigilance
Domains: Courage, Law, Protection, Strength
Holy Symbol: A circle of swords of even number alternating
Weapon: Battle Axe, Bastard Sword

Heashera
Alignment: Lawful Good
Portfolio: music, romance, love, good health
Domains: Charm, Good, Healing, Protection
Holy Symbol: A pair of twining blossoming roses
Weapon: Punch Dagger, Dagger, Whip

Ki
Alignment: True Neutral
Portfolio: agriculture, the earth, nature, the sky, water
Domains: Air, Animal, Balance, Plant, Water
Holy Symbol: A circle affixed with three elements in balance
Weapon: Khopesh Sword, Sickle, Spear

Moander
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Portfolio: rot, corruption, enmity (towards elves)
Domains: Abyss, Chaos, Evil, Darkness, Plant, Undeath
Holy Symbol: An open hand with an open fanged maw firmly in the center
Weapon: Dagger

Ramman
Alignment: Lawful Neutral
Portfolio: War, Courage, self-sacrifice
Domains: Courage, Good, Law, War
Holy Symbol: A fist clutching three spears
Weapon: Bastard Sword, Heavy Mace, Battle Axe, Long Bow

Sebek the Many Teeth
Alignment: Lawful Evil
Portfolio: Rivers, Crocodiles, Amphibians
Domains: Animal, Evil, Hunger, Water
Holy Symbol: An open crocodile mouth
Weapon: None

Serqet
Alignment: Chaotic Evil
Portfolio: scorpions, poison, madness, spite
Domains: Animal (insects only), Evil, Hatred, Madness
Holy Symbol: A scorpion's stinger piercing a skull
Weapon: Short Sword

Tayshara
Alignment: Lawful Good
Portfolio: Divination, The Moon, the Stars, the benign night
Domains: Good, Magic, Moon, Mysticism, Oracle
Holy Symbol: A feminine face superimposed over the full moon
Weapon: Quarterstaff

Shifting Gears - Stunted Black Hole

2008-04-15T20:41:00.001-07:00

Mini-black hole is smallest ever but still strong

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - NASA scientists have identified the smallest black hole ever found -- less than four times the mass of our sun and about the size of a large city.

But the mini-black hole, dubbed J1650, could still stretch a person into a "strand of spaghetti" with its pull, the researchers told a meeting in Los Angeles.

"This black hole is really pushing the limits. For many years astronomers have wanted to know the smallest possible size of a black hole, and this little guy is a big step toward answering that question," Nikolai Shaposhnikov of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, said in a statement.

It would likely be stronger than bigger black holes found at the centers of galaxies. Shaposhnikov said if someone ventured too close to J1650, its gravity would "stretch your body into a strand of spaghetti."

Like other black holes, it was formed by a star that ran out of fuel and shut down, collapsing due to its own gravity.

Shaposhnikov and his Goddard colleague Lev Titarchuk used NASA's Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer satellite and a new method to estimate the size of the black hole, found in a system in the southern constellation Ara, in our own Milky Way Galaxy.

It measures the oscillation of hot gas piling up near the black hole as it sucks in matter, they told a meeting in Los Angeles of the American Astronomical Society High-Energy Astrophysics Division.

The new black hole has a mass of 3.8 Suns and would be about 15 miles across, they estimate. "This makes the black hole one of the smallest objects ever discovered outside our solar system," Shaposhnikov said.

The smallest black hole previously identified was GRO 1655-40, with a mass of about 6.3 Suns.

"Amazingly, equations from Albert Einstein predict that a black hole with 3.8 times the mass of our Sun would be only 15 miles across -- the size of a city," NASA said in a statement.

A collapsing star that was much smaller than J1650 would likely form a neutron star and not a black hole, the researchers said.

(Reporting by Maggie Fox; Editing by Will Dunham and Bill Trott)

SOURCE: Yahoo News

Smallest Black Hole Found
By Andrea Thompson
Space.Com - Staff Writer
posted: 01 April 2008
12:55 pm ET

Updated at 2:20 p.m. ET.

NASA scientists have identified the smallest, lightest black hole yet found.

The new lightweight record-holder weighs in at about 3.8 times the mass of our sun and is only 15 miles (24 kilometers) in diameter.

"This black hole is really pushing the limits," said study team leader Nikolai Shaposhnikov of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "For many years astronomers have wanted to know the smallest possible size of a black hole, and this little guy is a big step toward answering that question."

The low-mass black hole sits in a binary system in our galaxy known as XTE J1650-500 in the southern hemisphere constellation Ara. NASA's Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) satellite discovered the system in 2001, and astronomers soon realized that the system harbored a relatively lightweight black hole. But the black hole's mass had never been precisely measured.

Black holes can't be seen, but they're identified by the activity around them, which also helps astronomers estimate a size of the region inside the activity, and how much mass must be in that confined region to generate all the surrounding activity. More specifically, astronomers can weigh black holes by using a relationship between the apparent size of the black hole and the X-rays emitted by the torrent of gas that swirls into the black hole's disk from its companion star.

As the gas piles up near the black hole, it "becomes very dense and congested," like a traffic jam, Shaposhnikov said at a press conference announcing the find. "So matter has to literally squeeze into the black hole."

As it is squeezed, the gas heats up and radiates X-rays. The intensity of the X-rays varies in a pattern repeated over a nearly regular interval. Astronomers have long suspected that the frequency of this signal, called the quasi-periodic oscillation, or QPO, depends on the mass of the black hole.

As the black hole gets bigger, the zone of swirling gas is pushed farther out, so the QPO ticks away slowly. But for smaller black holes, the gas sits closer in and the QPO ticks rapidly.

Shaposhnikov and his colleague Lev Titarchuk of George Mason University used this method to "weigh" XTE J1650-500 and found a mass of 3.8 suns. This value is well below the previous record holder GRO 1655-40, which tips the scales at about 6.3 suns.

This new mass measurement could help shed light on what the smallest star that will produce a black hole is. Astronomers know that some unknown critical threshold, possibly between 1.7 and 2.7 solar masses, marks the boundary between a star that generates a black hole upon its death and one that produces a neutron star.

"This new result brings us much closer to the theoretically predicted limit," Shaposhnikov said.

Knowing this boundary would help scientists understand the behavior of matter when it is scrunched to extraordinarily high densities.

"The question of black hole masses has concerned us for more than a decade now," said astrophysicist Vicky Kalogera of Northwestern University, who was not involved with the study, during the press conference. Scientists had predicted that there should be more black holes at the lower end of the mass range than astronomers had identified, so this study helps clear up some confusion as to where these lightweight black holes were, she added.

Kalogera did caution that the method used by Shaposhnikov and Titarchuk is not the main way that black hole masses are measured, but noted that their measurements of the masses of other black holes agreed well with the results from the standard method.

Shaposhnikov and Titarchuk presented their findings on March 31 at the American Astronomical Society's High-Energy Astrophysics Division meeting in Los Angeles.

An artist's impression of the lowest-mass known black hole belonging to a binary system named XTE J1650-500. The black hole has about 3.8 times the mass of our sun, and is orbited by a companion star. Photo: Nasa/Rueters

Ye Olde Xoblob Shoppe - A Circle of Influence

2008-03-30T16:27:00.000-07:00

Ring of Influence

This ring has the effect of providing a +4 insight bonus to Bluff and Diplomacy checks. The wearer can cast charm person at 11th level strength, or make a suggestion to any humanoid conversed with. The ring also enables the character to make use of mass charm enabling them to charm up to 22 hit dice of humanoids. Charm person and suggestion are applicable but once per day.

Caster Level: 15th
Prerequisites: Forge Ring, charm person, suggestion
Market Price: 20,000 gp
Converted From: ring of human influence.

D20 Series 3.5 Revised - L.A. Starr

2008-03-08T00:06:00.000-08:00

L.A. Starr

Real Name: Lance Angstrum Starr
Nationality: American, Anglo-European
Alignment: Neutral Good [Public Good]
Legal Status: An American citizen with no criminal record
Group Affiliation: None
Base Power Level: [-11-] - Unlimited Power Level/Power Points

Str: [-16-][+03]
Int: [-17-][+03]
Wis: [-18-][+04]
Dex: [-16-][+03]
Con: [-13-][+02]
Cha: [-16-][+03]
Toughness: [+05]
Insight: [+05]
Will: [+05]
Reflex: [+05]
Fortitude: [+04]
Stability: [+06]
Point Total: [-48-]

Powers
Empathic Manipulation: Starr can automatically perceive and the emotional states of any living creature within his line of sight. Second, he can project beneficial emotions to a specific target within hearing range of his voice. His empathic abilities make him formidable as they are geared towards influence and manipulation, not rejection or torment. His unique power gives him an edge in psychological manipulation and in activities were good or welcomed social behavior influences a given outcome. Emotion Control 10 [Drawback: Specified towards Calm, Confidence, Hope, and Infatuation only, Extra: Alternate Save- Stability, Area-Perception, Feats: Mind Blank, Subtle, Flaws: Sense Dependent]

Inductive Telepathy: Starr knows when an individual is fabricating a falsehood, lying, or acting in a deceptive manner by merely making direct visual contact. In short, he can perceive bio-metric fluxes in a person cardiography and neurography, even through clothing. Super Sense 05 [Extra: Area-Perception, Feats: Alternate Power x2 - Aura Reading, Subtle, Flaws: Sense Dependent - Auditory, Visual]

Stunning Blast: Starr's only means of self-defense is a blast of empathic energy that he can direct at an individual and use it to stun his intended target's nervous system. Starr is a "psionic sponge" of sorts. He absorbs psychic trauma, pain, anger, socio-apathy, despair, fear, etc. and stores it until he can release it towards a specific living target. Starr can use this ability every other round. If he wishes to use it again immediately on the following round, he must successfully make a Stability and Fortitude save against DC 15. For every round after that, the DC increases by 03. He surmises this is a "recharge period." A brief period, but a necessity none the less. Stun 12 [Extra: Alternate Save-Stability, Feats: Sedation]
Power Packaging: All Powers Linked
Points: [-35-]

Skills
Bluff [+07], Climb [+06], Computers [+06], Diplomacy [+07], Disable Device [+06], Drive [+06], Gather Information [+07], Investigate [+07], Knowledge: Behavioral Sciences [+07], Knowledge: Civics [+07], Knowledge: Current Events [+07], Knowledge: Military Science [+07], Knowledge: Popular Culture [+07], Knowledge: Streetwise [+06], Navigation [+08], Notice [+08], Profession: Journalism [+08], Research [+07], Search [+06], Sense Motive [+09], Sleight of Hand [+07], Survival [+08], Swim [+10]
Points: [-25-][-100 Ranks-]

Feats
Animal Empathy, Beginner's Luck, Connected: Media Company, Contacts, Dodge Focus, Evasion [+02], Exotic Weapons Proficiency, Fascinate [+03], Improved Aim, Languages [Chinese, French, German, Russian, Spanish], Luck [+02], Move-By Action, Quick Draw, Personal Firearms Proficiency, Renown [+02], Second Chance, Simple Weapons Proficiency, Uncanny Dodge, Well-Informed
Points: [-28-]

Combat
- Damage: [+03]
- Defense: [+08]
- Grapple: [+05]
- Initiative: [+05]
- Melee Attack: [+05]
- Range Attack: [+05]
Point Total: [-40-]

Weapons and Equipment
None

Hero Points: [-13-]
Point Total: [-176-]

Notes: Lance Angstrum Starr is a mutant (Homo Sapien Superior), but he is blissfully ignorant of the fact. Socially, Lance was the lowest rung in his peer group and often the butt of tasteless jokes and bullying by his school peers. Often, the stress of going through the daily regiment at school was unbearable. His teachers were ambivelent to the situations and the eventual isolation drove him away from his studies, writing, and any hope of a descent future. He was often absent do to infrequent headaches.

His empathic powers manifested shortly after his fifteenth birthday as a series of disabilitating migraines. This genetic phenomenon left him bed-ridden and inundated with tranquilizers for two weeks in a city hospital. The concentrated environment of psychological illness and isolation catalyzed his empathic powers and positively impacted the psychological health of every indigent patient immediately. This impact was collateral in its manifestation, yet not under his direct control. Immediately to his surprise, he became quite popular with the elderly, the terminally ill patients, and those of the burn-victim special units. After two weeks of medical examinations and cranial scans via MRI, his migraines subsided quickly to the astonishment of his doctors. He eventually returned to school and soon became quite popular with friends and teachers. Almost eerily unmatched as he saw it.

His world suddenly turned upside right. He had no trouble, in fact, turning in assignments late with no grading penalty. He discovered he was popular with the girls and women (especially with the teachers) at school. He had no trouble getting dates nor was he the victim of jealousy or school fights. He immediately started athletics (bicycling, swimming and weight lifting) with a physical education teacher, a woman 15 years his senior, struck an instant and plutonic liking to him. Within three years, he was elected president of the speech club and was voted most popular student of his class and graduation year. And it was all done with nothing.

Lance had no problem in applying and enlisting in the military. Thanks to his physical education, he was a gifted swimmer and a paradigm of health. He has served in the United States Navy as a Navy Seal with extensive training in deep water operations and as an attaché' dealing with Navy/Civilian relations. He eventually landed a reporting job with the Naval Times newspaper. This would become his first true taste of journalism. He would continue for four years in the Navy and begin has academic studies at George Washington University before he was honorably discharged .

Back on the West Coast, he began studying and applying his course works in psychology, counciling, technical writing, and art, but shifted away from the two former areas of study. He eventually graduated with Bachelor degrees in Social Sciences and Communication studies from UCLA. Two years later, he would finish a master's degree in journalism. The Los Angeles Chronicle hired Starr as a reporter and celebrity columnist, especially with his unremarkable connections to the American and Canadian super-hero community. Since then, he's had a life of adventure and danger against all manner of menaces in the Pacific West, Japan, Korea, and China. His personal favorites include an incursion of Amazons (during the Amazon Attacks Campaign), the hidden Turtle-Ninja Clan of Japan, the unintentional discovery of a covert Atlantean cell, and an interview with the Banner-persona dominated Incredible Hulk. His favorite column piece was the in-dept exclusive interview series with Pepper Potts, field commander and the entire roster of the west-coast team called The Order. Eventually, earned their respect and trust after his journalistic skills and connections uncovered the location of their lost team member, Mulholland and her captor, Stane.

L.A. Starr, Character Concept
© Copyright Jeffrey Williams, 2007,2008.

In Memoriam - E. Gary Gygax

2008-03-04T15:18:00.000-08:00

Dungeons & Dragons co-creator dies at 69
By EMILY FREDRIX, Associated Press Writer
Yahoo News

MILWAUKEE - Gary Gygax, who co-created the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons and helped start the role-playing phenomenon, died Tuesday morning at his home in Lake Geneva. He was 69.

He had been suffering from health problems for several years, including an abdominal aneurysm, said his wife, Gail Gygax.

Gygax and Dave Arneson developed Dungeons & Dragons in 1974 using medieval characters and mythical creatures. The game known for its oddly shaped dice became a hit, particularly among teenage boys, and eventually was turned into video games, books and movies.

Gygax always enjoyed hearing from the game's legion of devoted fans, many of whom would stop by the family's home in Lake Geneva, about 55 miles southwest of Milwaukee, his wife said. Despite his declining health, he hosted weekly games of Dungeons & Dragons as recently as January, she said.

"It really meant a lot to him to hear from people from over the years about how he helped them become a doctor, a lawyer, a policeman, what he gave them," Gail Gygax said. "He really enjoyed that."

Dungeons & Dragons players create fictional characters and carry out their adventures with the help of complicated rules. The quintessential geek pastime, it spawned a wealth of copycat games and later inspired a whole genre of computer games that's still growing in popularity.

Born Ernest Gary Gygax, he grew up in Chicago and moved to Lake Geneva at the age of 8. Gygax's father, a Swiss immigrant who played violin in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, read fantasy books to his only son and hooked him on the genre, Gail Gygax said.

Gygax dropped out of high school but took anthropology classes at the University of Chicago for a while, she said. He was working as an insurance underwriter in the 1960s, when he began playing war-themed board games.

But Gygax wanted to create a game that involved more fantasy. To free up time to work on that, he left the insurance business and became a shoe repairman, she said.

Gygax also was a prolific writer and wrote dozens of fantasy books, including the Greyhawk series of adventure novels.

Gary Sandelin, 32, a Manhattan attorney, said his weekly Dungeons & Dragons game will be a bit sadder on Wednesday night because of Gygax's passing. The beauty of the game is that it's never quite the same, he said.

Funeral arrangements are pending. Besides his wife, Gygax is survived by six children.

Dungeons & Dragons Creator Gary Gygax Passes Away; Interview
Posted by Joel Johnson, March 4, 2008 9:58 AM
Boing Boing Gadgets

An excerpt:

Q. As far as you know, what was the basic evolution of polyhedral dice? If they existed prior to the creation of Dungeons & Dragons, what were they used for?

To the best of my knowledge I introduced them to gaming, en masse, with D&D in 1974. I found sets of the five platonic solids for sale in a school supply catalog back in 1972, and of course ordered them, used them in creating the D&D game.

SEANN MCANALLY – Gary Gygax - if you're a game geek, you know the name. Even if you're not a game geek, you've probably heard of Dungeons & Dragons - you know, the game with the funny-shaped dice, literally thousands of pages of rules, the reason you hear friends saying things like, "save versus death magic" and "did you hit that bone devil last round?" Gygax created the game in the early 1970s, ushering in a completely new kind of entertainment - the role-playing game (RPG).

Gygax spent the first years of his life in Chicago, where he fell in love with card games and chess at an early age. He later moved to Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where an abandoned insane asylum on the hill overlooking town provided the scene for many early "adventures" and influenced the dungeon-crawling aspect of the game that would later make him famous. A love affair with science fiction and fantasy literature blossomed as his interest in games became more varied and intense - it was a natural development that the two interests would coincide.

The original D&D evolved from Gygax's interest in miniature war-gaming - every weekend, his basement would be full of game geeks conducting medieval-era warfare with hundreds of metal miniatures on a huge sand table. When things eventually got a little boring for the participants, Gygax threw in some new twists - a dragon, a wizard, a giant. The additions proved so popular that he soon ran out of room in his basement. Gygax published the innovations as the game Chainmail, the war-gaming forerunner of D&D. Eventually his experiments with war gaming lead to a focus on individual characters, as opposed to armies, and the exploration of ruins and wilderness areas as opposed to mass combat. With Dave Arneson, Gygax developed the basis for what would become Dungeons & Dragons. (he experimented with several names - it was his daughter's enthusiasm for the "D&D" moniker that made it stick). Gygax shopped the game to various game companies, who were not interested, citing the game's complexity and open-ended quality. Undaunted, he raised $1000 with his long-time friend and fellow gamer, the late Don Kaye, and formed TSR (Tactical Studies Rules) in 1973. Together, they hand-assembled 1000 copies of the rules, which quickly sold out - the rest is very well documented history.

The game proved immensely popular - Gygax estimates that in the first year or so, photocopied game books outnumbered legitimate editions 2 to 1 - and many of his fans were rabid supporters of the new company (self-appointed gangs of "rude boys" used to scour gaming conventions, destroying pirated copies so TSR would be sure to turn a profit). TSR published numerous other RPGs - Star Frontiers, Boot Hill, Gangbusters, Metamorphasis Alpha (still one of Gygax's favorites) which later became Gamma World - and branched out into the traditional entertainment industry as well, with books, magazines, video & computer games and the famous (if somewhat silly) Saturday morning D&D cartoon. The foundation of the TSR empire, however, remained the D&D game.

Gygax parted ways with the company in the early 1980s. To make a long story short, he eventually lost a controlling share of TSR stock and consequently, control over products for the very game he created. After several internal power struggles he resigned from TSR, which, after woeful mismanagement by Gygax' successors, later sold out to Magic publisher Wizards of the Coast (which in turn sold out to Hasbro). A game that started out as a dream - 50 pages of rough notes in a game geek's basement - is now a multi-million dollar entertainment phenomenon, with so many fan and pseudo-professional sites on the internet it's impossible to see them all.

Gygax's latest game is Lejendary Adventures, published by Hekaforge Productions - and this time he has complete creative control. A devoted gaming community has grown up around LA, a game which Gygax says reflects the way he views RPGs today. But his name will always be inextricably linked to Dungeons & Dragons, a game with immense name recognition that after almost 30 years has no major competitor. There are hundreds of RPGs on the market today, covering every conceivable genre, but D&D - currently in its third edition (the game has changed significantly since Gygax was at the helm, the new system is incredibly popular, but Gygax himself feels to be too focused on "power gaming" and player aggrandizement at the expense of game balance) - continues to outsell them all, commanding well over a quarter of the RPG market.

While Gygax generally isn't recognized on the street and usually isn't stopped in grocery stores by eager D&D fans (although his wife once caught him chatting with a young female deadhead who thought he was Jerry Garcia) his name is by and large the most recognized in the RPG world. Outside of the RPG community, he is the most high-profile RPG luminary (in 2000 Gygax played himself, alongside Al Gore and Stephen Hawking, in an episode of the Fox TV show Futurama. His list of published works is impressive and today he is more prolific than ever (see Gygax's bibliography below). As the founder of the RPG hobby, the Gygax name holds a special significance for gamers - and despite, or perhaps because of this, he is reviled as some sort of pariah or dinosaur by many younger fans, while others make him the object of blind hero-worship. It's not hard to talk to the man and find out for yourself - despite his busy schedule (six or seven 10-12 hour days a week) Gygax is known for his hospitality and approachability. He is a regular poster on several forums and attempts to keep up with a huge volume of email. Gygax recently took the time to answer questions from Joel, Randy and I...

Q: You basically gambled everything to follow your dream of becoming a game designer and writer. What was your profession in the pre-Dungeons & Dragons days, and what factors contributed to your decision to follow your heart full time?

I was an insurance underwriter. I took the job rather than going on with schooling at the University of Chicago to become an anthropologist. I did fairly well in insurance, was a supervising underwriter for individual, group, and association group, health, life, long term disability, and unusual risk policies.
I was offered positions with several major agencies, and a junior partnership in one. I turned down all those offers because I was determined to get out of that field and become a writer and game designer. When the company was moving the office I worked for to San Francisco, that decided things.

Q. What are your system stats?

We have here an iMac G3, a PwerMac 7600/120, three old and still working Mac + machines, and my Dell Dimension 8100 with the biggest monitor I could get. It has a Pentium IV giving a 1.4 GHz processing speed, with 20 gigs of ROM and 256 megs of RAM (Yes, I need more. I have a new graphics card, and I'll double RAM, have both installed soon). My modem is 56k. I have an HP Scanjet 4300C scanner, and an HP Deskjet 932C printer hooked up. The sound system is by Harmon/Kardon.
Now leave me alone! I am a writer, not a computer mechanic! (^_^)

Q. What online forums do you frequent regularly?

I hit EN World as Col_Pladoh. I also post a lot on the www.lejendary.com boards, and on the MSN Lejendary Adventure Community, and www.dragonsfoot.org ones about once a week. I post as Gary or sometimes GaryGygax.

Q. Many gamers use the computer as an audio-visual and die-rolling aid for traditional RPGs. Do you feel this contributes to or detracts something from the "spirit" of the game?

Gee, I don't know why I should comment on what someone finds useful in their RPG. I don't usually use the computer, but if I could quickly call up pics of monsters and the like, I sure would. As for rolling dice, I want to do that for myself - as Game Master or as a player. But at least one of my players uses his laptop to do that sometimes.

Whatever makes the gaming better for the group involved has to be okay, no?

Q. You have said CRPGs aren't "real" roleplaying - as online multiplayer games become fuller featured, do you foresee this changing? What kinds of technological advances are necessary to make "real" roleplaying via machine possible?

First question is: To whom does one ROLEPLAY when gaming? Obviously, CRPGs are not really RPGs at all, are they? Unless there is direct communication between the Game Master and the players, that communication affecting the GM's decisions on the results of actions other than random number results, there is no roleplay of any meaningful sort involved, although some role assumption and playing within the bounds of the character set forth is possible.

I foresee online gaming changing when there are good audio-visual links connecting the participants, thus approximating play in a face-to-face group.
When AI approximates Machine Intelligence, then many online and computer-run RPGs will move towards actual RPG activity. Nonetheless, that will not replace the experience of "being there," any more than seeing a theatrical motion picture can replace the stage play.

Q. You've been quoted as saying you don't play computer games because you know once you start, you'll never have time for anything else. What games have tempted you?

Groan! I see my son Alex playing Diablo and am tempted. I see my son Luke playing Panzer General and am tempted. I see my son Ernie playing Civilization and am tempted. Heh! I am a GAME GEEK. When Alex was playing Lemonade Stand I watched and nearly got hooked. I like most any game.

The one that got me long back was Martin Campion's Rails West (SSI). I played it all the time, to the detriment of my work. One night after faking going to sleep, my wife caught me at the computer at 3 a.m., laid down the law, and pointed out that I was not producing any work in the process of that motivational speech. I have "fallen off the wagon" only a couple of times since. I can't wait until I can "retire," or get involved in the production of a computer/online game, so as to able to play more :).

Q. You called yourself a "game geek." What does the word "geek" mean to you?

The term "geek" is most often used as a pejorative. It at least infers lack of popularity, social graces, and general appeal. It can also mean someone with an obsessive interest in something, as is demonstrated by the cable TV station, Comedy Central. When I use the term, it is in the latter context, so as a "game geek" I am prone to spend an inordinate amount of my time gaming or doing things related thereto. It helps my geekishness that I make a living at it...
I just read about one D&D geek who is a Navy Seal, btw. He wrote to WotC about it, and someone there shared his comments.

Q. While many people have accused Dungeons & Dragons (and roleplaying games in general) of being "inspired by the devil," don't you feel that there is some correlation between ritual magic (adoption of roles, costumes, gathering in circles) and the standard AD&D game playing session?

LOL. No.

Frankly, I don't believe in magic.

We all play roles - do you speak to a cop, your parents, your friends, your teacher, your boss, someone who works for you, etc., the same way? Of course not. People dress in costumes to go to parties and discos - to point out just a few such instances - and most people do not don costumes to play RPGs (as they do in live action RPGs). Playing any game, or having a meeting of a small number of people means "gathering in a circle."

Q. Do you feel that roleplaying encourages or teaches its participants to "pretend" in everyday social situations?

Not at all. It does facilitate social interaction, proper behavior of accepted sort for the persons involved in a particular situation, if the game is properly directed by a GM of able sort.

Of course as children, we all, in all cultures and societies, learn behavior from observation, imitation, and encouragement of various kinds. So by the suggestion made, we all "pretend" most of the time.

Q. Do you feel that oftentimes that RPG systems are too complicated for any but the most dedicated and intelligent players to truly utilize? What is the most "intelligent" game system you've ever played, and why?

Yes! I was partially guilty of that very thing when I did the Dangerous Journeys/Mythus game system, although the Mythus Prime was simple and easy, meant to be published before the great, honking main portion of the system was.

I don't like comparisons, so I'll say that original D&D was the most intuitive system I've played, and thus is had and still has immense appeal.

Q. Many of us grew up with the Dungeons & Dragons Saturday morning cartoon. What was your involvement in that?

I was co-producer, had total creative control of the scripts, and I developed about a half-dozen springboards from which scripts were written.

Q. The recent Dungeons & Dragons film was almost universally maligned by gamers. What was your take on it?

As a grade B production it was mildly entertaining.

As a D&D film it is akin to something that fell out of the back end of a horse. From the smurf-eater to the little wooden empress, from the Boris Karloff imitator to the giant dwarf mugging for the cameras, the acting was terrible. The story was bad, the writing was awful, the costumes were pathetic, the direction was off, the sets were fair in places, the camera work passable, and the special effects okay. Was there music in the show? Hmmm. Guess is was pretty unremarkable, so. Some of the special effects were good, though.

I loved the "Harry Potter" movie, and the first LotR was great too!

Q. As far as you know, what was the basic evolution of polyhedral dice? If they existed prior to the creation of Dungeons & Dragons, what were they used for?

To the best of my knowledge I introduced them to gaming, en masse, with D&D in 1974. I found sets of the five platonic solids for sale in a school supply catalog back in 1972, and of course ordered them, used them in creating the D&D game.

Q. If you could change one thing about the modern RPG landscape, what would it be?

More people would play the Lejendary Adventure RPG!

If I had a second choice, I'd have more people made aware of what the RPG is in actuality, so then there would be a larger audience for them.

Otherwise the "modern" (I really dislike the connotations of that word, and "contemporary" is likely more apropos) RPG landscape is not much changed from what it was c. 1985, computers excepted.

Q. Of the characters you have played, which is your favorite? May we see his or her stats?

I really must admit Mordenkainen is my favorite. I enjoy playing fighters, rangers, thieves, clerics, and multi-classed sorts in OAD&D, but the magic-user is usually most fun for me.

Can you see Mordie's stats? No! I won't even show you those for my most recent PC, Louhi Sharpnose, a gnome illusionist and treasure finder who I created only about four years back.

Q. Can you briefly encapsulate the background of the campaign you're running right now? When and how often do you play?

I've been running a Lejendary Adventure system campaign for over six years now. It is currently suspended due to my workload, but I plan to resume it in a few weeks. It is set on the Lejendary Earth world. The Avatars (characters) adventuring there have experienced sea travel, action in the desert, the strange environment of a mysterious and massive plateau, city and dungeon adventures, as well as those of overland travel. We play for a few hours on Thursday nights, beginning around 6:30 p.m. If you pick up The Canting Crew (d20/LA/generic book on the criminal underclass) coming out from Troll Lord Games in March or so, you'll have a good idea of part of my campaign, as my group got to play-test the City of Ludnum, learn Thieves' Cant, etc. :)

Q. About a dozen of us in the kcgeek community run a campaign using your first edition rules, mainly because we don't want to purchase the new books and learn a new system. In retrospect, what problems do you see with first edition AD&D? Was Unearthed Arcana your attempt at an early form of a second edition?

Great to hear that the kcgeek campaign uses the original system. Are you all aware of the OAD&D website, www.dragonsfoot.org? Actually, I see very few problems with OAD&D. I ignore the weapon speed factor, the effects of weapons vs. armor, generally don't pay attention to anything but gross violations of encumbrance, and NEVER use psionics.

Yes, Unearthed Arcana was an exploration of some of the ideas I had for a new edition of OAD&D. I wanted to have the HD ranges changes, the mechanics altered so as to allow the system to play in other genres, and to work in skills that matched classes in a complimentary way.
The Lejendary Adventure system is how I view things now - skill-bundles to make archetypes as well as unique Avatars, rules-lite, and in all the Lejend Master in charge of things, to the absolute horror of rules lawyers everywhere ;-}>.

Q. Thanks for taking the time for the interview, not to mention for creating Dungeons & Dragons.

Welcome, and my pleasure to oblige.

I had the chance to meet him and snap a photograph. Gen Con will be a different place without him.
- JnW

Ye Olde Xoblob Shoppe - Weapons of Power

2008-02-29T13:01:00.000-08:00

WEAPON SPECIAL ABILITIES

Direction: A weapon of direction typically appears to be a normal (or possibly magic) weapon of its type. Its magical properties make it function much as a find the path spell, however, empowering the weapon to show the direction of the desired way. Once per day the device can be tossed into the air; it will fall and point towards the desired way, and this process can be repeated 7 times during the next 70 minutes.

Caster Level: 11th
Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, find the path
Market Price: +3
Converted From: arrow of direction

Piercing: A piercing weapon is not actually hurled, as once per day, when the command word is spoken, the weapon launches itself. It has a range increment of 30 feet. The weapon attacks with a ranged attack bonus of +6, and inflicts normal damage. Only weapons with range or that can be thrown can be enchanted with this special ability.

Caster Level: 9th
Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, telekinesis
Market Price: +2 bonus
Converted From: javelin of piercing

Submission: A weapon of this nature appears unremarkable, exactly as any normal weapon of its type. The wielder of a weapon of submission causes any opponent struck to make a Will save (DC 15). If the opponent fails to save, he is affected as though by the spell emotions: despair for 2d4 rounds. Thereafter the creature is normal again.

Caster Level: 7th
Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, emotions
Market Price: +3 bonus
Converted From: trident of submission

Striking: This weapon's enhancement bonus may be increased by +3 twice per day, and by +6 once per day. This effect lasts for one attack, and for that attack the weapon acts as a weapon of it's raised enhancement, (thus overcoming DR and increasing both the attack roll and damage done.)

Caster Level: 5th
Prerequisites: Craft Magic Arms and Armor, greater magic weapon
Market Price: +2

RPG Series 3.5 Revised - Two for the Realms of the Profane

2008-02-13T23:38:00.000-08:00

The Demon-Queen's Comestibles

Zuggtmoy, the Demon Queen of Fungi has briefly turned her attentions towards the cultivation of blight and fungi on foodstuffs. An experiment that harvests fungi grows on grains, breads, brews and other alcoholic beverages was her main research for a time. The spores of her labor fruited true and were cultivated again in the distillation of potions and elixirs. The infestation carries a sliver of her essence and when consumed they slowly but chaotically opens the untapped psionic potential in all sentient species. In essence, individuals become 1st level wilders with added charisma attribute bonus. The Demon Queen of Fungi is trying to enhance the properties of her concoctions so they imbue the applicant with the essence of the Abyss (I.E. fiendish template). Her method of distribution is clever, simplistic, and geared towards primitive tribes and isolated rural communities. She has taken step interest in humanoid (orcs, goblins, bugbears, etc.) tribes. Human and elven tribes with a naturalistic grasp of deities and evil are her second choice for indoctrination. In truth, she is cultivating barbarians, rangers, druids, and sorcerers and augmenting them with psionic abilities for a grand army on a scale large enough to push her hated foes, especially Juiblex, into the farthest corners of the Abyss. Some say the recently liberated Shami-Amourae has sided with the Fungi Queen to distribute the blight as a fashionable narcotic through cults and cells throughout the Prime Material Planes.

A Remnant of Murders

The divine remnants of Bhaal, The Faerunian God of Murder, have drifted through the Astral Planes for decades. Through unseen circumstance (although Githzerai rumors say sabotage), it has crashed onto Stygia, the Fifth Layer of the Nine Hells. This event has garnered the attention of several Dukes, Barons and Duchesses of the Nine Hells. The lost souls of murderers and the murdered lodged themselves into one of the most inhospitable regions of Stygia and now represent a significant act of serendipity in that region's history. Now the souls of old sacrifices and servants of Bhaal are up for grabs in the region's greatest salvage operation ever recorded. Levistus, Lord of the Fifth Layer, through lackeys and unwitting servants, plots a grand scheme to free himself from imprisonment and Glasya's involvement, not can say what it is, except she covets a soul of a special murderer, or even two.

RPG Series 3.5 Revised - The Graveyard of Dead Gods

2008-01-31T23:34:00.001-08:00

The Astral Plane: The Divine, The Fallen, and The Graveyard of the Gods

From Wikipedia

The Astral Plane is the plane of thought, memory, and psychic energy; it is where gods go when they die or are forgotten (or, most likely, both). It is a barren place with only rare bits of solid matter; some creatures, such as the tyrannous githyanki, use the petrified corpses of dead gods as floating fortresses. The Astral Plane is unique in that it is infinitesimal instead of infinite; there is no space or time here, though both catch up with you when you leave. The souls of the newly dead from the Prime Material Plane pass through here on their way to the afterlife or Outer Planes.

The most common feature of the Astral Plane is the silver cords of travelers using an astral projection spell. These cords are the lifelines that keep travelers of the plane from becoming lost, stretching all the way back to the traveler's point of origin.

Note: Anubis remains his vigilant on the Astral Plane and maintains a network or Ur-Priests and Binders across the Prime Material Planes. His followers maintain constant vigilance on the those who would desecrate or exploit lost divinity.

The Harvester in the Sea of Endless Night

A nefarious organization with a secret agenda is harvesting the astral remnants of fallen deities and other discarded quasi-entities for nearly a century. In particular, one fallen and nearly forgotten deity, Erivatius, a long slumbering deity of death, aging, and time, has been "retrofitted" into a war vessel to transverse the vast dark expanse of the Negative Material Plane. Its crew, rumored by Githzerai, is searching for a lost citadel or the shard of a semi-active demi-plane lost in that expanse. It is widely rumored the destination they seek is partially shielded from the life-consuming negativity abundantly encompassing that region of the planar cosmos. What lies at their destination is a matter of speculation. Communiqués intercepted between informants of Graz'zt and the Union of Eclipses say something baleful is in motion. Rumors and fragments of a dark plot sired secretly in Thanatos and the abyssal Court of Orcus has the Prince of Tyrants nervous. Could another war is loom on the abyssal horizon between Orcus and Graz'zt and if so why does all intelligence point towards the advisor-vampire; a druid-heretic and necromancer called Iah-Dabo.

What the sources do not reveal is that the vampire-druid is collecting the remnants of forgotten deities and harnessing their divine energies for his nefarious purposes. His minions are salvaging their remnants, but targeting deities whose portfolios ascertain death, the dead, necromancy or any aspect joined or crosses into the philosophy of death across the astral plane. His minions have retrieved four such deities. They include:

- Amot, a shunned deity of destruction, annihilation, and dissolution, is a raving psychotic who dreams of cataclysms and violent disasters on a planetary scale or greater. Rightfully shunned by denizens of the Astral Plane, the remnant slumbers but more often jolts and shakes itself as if trying to awaken from a horrid nightmare or other sleep-induced prophecy. Even refrained by worshipped, the violent divinity of Amot stirs and awaits release.

- Beararak the Deviser - A lost deity of chronology, lost secrets and hidden knowledge was worshipped in an enchanted realm of sand, wind and natural elementals. He chronicled the histories of all lands and kept vital knowledge hidden until the day it could be utilized safely and wisely. He also archived and secured lore, artifacts, and dark secrets from those who would exploit their potential hazards. Jealousy, then murder at the hands of a rival deity lead to his downfall. Even adrift, he is revered as an oracle by denizens from all planes. Many whom seek out his vast archive of knowledge and lost histories, albeit in direct communion. All attempts to facilitate a dialogue with the fallen Sage-God have failed or produced scant clues to greater treasures. Even comatose in its own demise Beararak seems still guards many secrets.

- Valkiira the Angelic - A once-revered goddess of weaponry, skill, and the collector of the souls now slumbers endlessly on the Astral Plane. From dead warriros, it was her anointed task to act as a collector of souls on the battlefield and it was her task to deliver both the valiant and the cowardly to their final judgements. Courage and valor pleased Valkiira greatly but prolonged periods of peace, her lack of theological imagination ultimately lead to the abandonment of her faith. Her followers simply began to question an unwavering adherence to a simple doctrine. As the decades and centuries progressed, they explored alternatives to different after-lifes. Now regarded as an afterthought, Valkiira dreams of greatness and the fulfillment of otherworldly rewards again in service on a better world.

- Zhakautha the Devouring Maw - An abandoned deity of hunger, starvation, and knowledge via consumption was no more than a lesser power when the forces of light, justice, and law hunted and slaughtered his vampire-priests and cannibalistic followers to the last man. The god of raw flesh and ghouls eventually sought a means to bolster his status and thus battle his enemies as their numbers grew greater. The divine ritual was interrupted and Zhakautha's ascending form was consumed in the fiery cataclysmic finale. His remnants were shunted onto the Astral Plane were his boundless hunger is condemned never to be sated.

Other Remnants adrift on the Astral Plane

- Elif is half-awake on the Astral Plane. This deity did not abandon her loyal adherents nor did her followers abandon her. Elif is in a self-imposed exile after her actions inadvertently resulted in the tragic death of a cherished friend and fellow deity. Her followers lamented her decision and in a yearly ritual observance and devised a psychological strategy to bring her back into her rightful place in the divine fold. Elif is a benign goddess of expression, wilders, good favors, half-breeds, blood-endowed inheritance. Many nobles both mix-blooded and pure seek her blessing in the matters of inheritance and good fortune.

- Gilgeam once a vanquished deity of war, athleticism and urban civilization, was destroyed by his arch-nemesis Tiamat, The Queen of Chromatic Dragons. His destruction brought finality to his mad oppressive rule. It also paved the way and the progressive transformation of his earthly lands and other mortal holdings into a draconic theocracy rule by his adversary. Impotent in his masculinity and adrift in the Astral Plane, he dreams one day of rightful resurrection by his few faithful vanguards and the covert destruction of Tiamat.

- Hemidall was a once-stern deity of chivalry, guardians, defense, and the five senses. He existed as the embodiment of loyal and duty for its own sake. That was until he inflicted with madness from a cabal of entities from the Far Realms. In a state of maddened jealousy, Hemidall murdered his wife Heashera, who in turn was avenged by her follow deities. Captured, they pronounced judgement over Hemidall's actions and executed him. His church and many adherents were purged of any taint they may carry as to not effect the rest of the pantheon.

- Heashera, a goddess of music, romance, love and good health was murdered by her husband in a fit of jealous rage. Unable to accept the reality of his actions, Heashera has resisted any and all attempt to reinvigorate her divine status. Heashera wishes to be forgotten and away from Hemidall, the deity she once married and loved. An aspect of Heashera, worshipped as a wicked deity of sorrow, lost love and betrayal survives, but is a pale broken reflection broken of a once noble goddess. Kalil is wicked and mad but suffers bouts of melancholy depression only to explode in betrayed anger and homicidal rage.

- Ki is an ancient goddess and one of the first know deities to transcend the ethnic barriers separating human and elven folk. One of the first goddess of nature and agriculture, she was also one of the first deities of human civilization and beneficial co-existance with elven-folk. In time, the eventual neglect of the land drove her faithful away into the hands of deities whose influence lay in less empathetic concerns governing nature. With change in politics and theocracy, her worship waned among the internal cultures of human and elven alike.

- Moander was a disgusting god-thing of rot, decay, corruption, and disease. An old antagonist of the ancient elven-folk was the embodiment of corruption, rot, and loss of what the elven-folk hold dear: the abundant grow of nature, the trees, the fauna and all that is green and natural. Its was destroyed through the actions of a heroic warrior-bard who collected some of his divinity for his own transcendence. He released and consecrated tens of thousands of souls from this foul deity who deceived and tortured through the centuries. Lolth kept his cults living but uses the name and their agenda for her own purposes. Talona, Zuggtmoy and Juiblex have all collected pieces of Moander and like-wise use his divine energies to enhance their horrific standings in the lower planes. The remaining mass was disgorged from its profane realm in the Abyss and sent adrift on the Astral Plane. It is an island adrift in a weightless realm, a toxic hazard of filth bringing rot and corruption to githyanki, illithids and unwary astral travelers if there ever was such a thing.

- Ramman was once an ancient deity of war, courage, and self-sacrifice who clashed with Gruumsh and repelled his orcish warriors successfully for centuries. Until Gilgeam, his rival and once ally, in a fit of jealousy betrayed Ramman on the battlefield. Gruumsh seizing a tactical advantage mortally wounded Ramman. The war god never recovered from his grievous injury and in turn slowly wasted away. The numbers his followers dwindled away over the decades. They simply could not compete with the orc's bottomless avarice and higher breeding rates. The lower numbers took its toll, but not before Ramman shattered his enemy's forces single-handed while Gruumsh was occupied elsewhere. The staggering loss forced Gruumsh out of the lands of centuries to come. Ramman is now remembered lore as a heroic legend than a god.

- Sebek the Many Teeth was once a horrific god of consumption, floods, rivers, and reptiles until he was slain by a greater and rival deity of beasts and bloodlust. The rival and his faithful consumed his scaly flesh and meat in less than a day. Its savaged carcass now floats adrift on the Astral Plane as an gruesome yet ironic monument to this own hunger. Its open mouth symbolic is ever hungry for flesh of followers once again, yet it can not consume them.

- Serqet is an ancient progenitor goddess akin to the Sumerian pantheon. She was also associated with knowledge, magic and protection from poison. She was revered as a mother figure and the founder of the Amatat Empires. Her people flourished centuries and warred with horrors of the Far Realms. Their confrontations were successful until their Illithid allies rose from the depths the subterranean realms and blotted out the sun. The end was not swift for they exacted a terrible price. Her people were enslaved and sold as cattle, her empires collapsed economically and divided, scattered to the winds of history. Serqet's faith waned and she degenerated into a profane entity that became associated with demon-worship, scorpions, and other venomous creatures. She is now adrift the Astral Plane, a poisonous hazard dreaming of past glories.

- Tayshara is sad remnant that can befall even the greatest. A benign and near-forgotten goddess of divination, the moon, the stars, and night is tragic case of what happens when a deity places her proverbial eggs in one basket. Her faithful were destroyed in a stellar cataclysm when Atropus the Death-Moon devoured the life-essence of her world. Unable to stop the cataclysm, she gathered as many of her followers as she could and delivered them to another world. Of all the deities of the Astral Plane, Tayshara has the best opportunity of regenerating and shedding off her current existance. It is rumored she has sequestored several favored ones of her faith. If they canbe rejuvinated, she may rise from the enternal slumber.

RPG Series 3.5 Revised - Abyssal Bound Souls

2008-01-29T20:53:00.000-08:00

Abyssal Bound Souls
Demons in particular service to a Demonic Lord, Demonic Prince, or Demonic Queen
From the Fiendish Codex I: Hordes of the Abyss, Pg. 83.

I hit upon a fit of inspiration after looking at a picture from the Fiendish Codex I. I intend to use it as a way of differentiating lower class demons that are in the service a particular demon lord or demon queen. These lower demons take the characteristics of their patron, although not uniformly so. It is the nature of the Abyss after all.

A second version is in the works for Abyssal Bound Souls. This version will be based on Mortal templates.

Alkilith: Demogorgon - Disgusted by even the most savage of Demogorgon's legions, this demon-blob, when utilizing its own mass, spontaneously generates two heads when wishing to communicate to its intended victim or functionaries, or sometimes both.
Armanite: Graz'zt - All Armanites in the employ of Graz'zt are female. All are armored and like to kill demons and mortals alike. No males are known to exist in his Triple Realm.
Armanite: Orcus - All are helmed in the service of the Prince of Undead. Their faces are skeletal and void of flesh and muscle. Their eyes glow with a dark sinister light.
Arrow Demon: Ahazu - In addition to four-arms, all arrow demons in the service of Ahazu have bat-wings and share several physical and anatomical qualities related to a fury bat
Arrow Demon: Skekolah - All are pale white in color with two sets of solid pale blue eyes with one atop the other set. Their arrows are icicle-tipped weapons capable of puncturing the strongest enchantments.
Balor: Demogorgon - Baboon-headed generals, often have twin heads. They are next to each other, fused sideways to each other, or a second head in positioned on the Balor's chest or abdomen.
Balor: Skekolah - Those bound to the Prince of Arctic Waters are ice blue in color and emitted and aura of intense hateful cold. Frost and ice hang from their appendages.
Bloodfiend: Decca - All are battle scarred in the service of the Demon Queen of Ruin. Many wear the broken holy symbol of the temples they have ransacked and destroyed.
Bulezau: Graz'zt - Goat horned and hoved females, as all demonic thralls of Graz'zt, are women.
Chasme: Orcus - All chasme in the service of Orcus have puss-filled swollen sores amidst their bodies that spray and splatter their foul ichor and various times.
Dybbuk: Orcus - These monstrosities have the additional ability to Create Undead as per spell of any body they possess, or course they can do this after they leave its possession. Of course, they leave the body and seek refuge in another inhabited corpse. These creatures carry the motif of Orcus somewhere on their natural forms.
Glabrezu: Fraz-Urb'Luu - Fraz-Urb'luu cultivates many of his services from the discarded souls of rakshasas slain in combat by mortals. All of Fraz'Urb-Luu's Glabrezu possesses feline traits and characteristics (I.E. Cat-like eyes, skin stripes, fur, feline teeth, etc.)
Klurichir: Dagon - These demons in the service of Dagon have no wings, but can leap incredible distances and swim at amazing speeds. Gill slits can be found on the neck of this fearsome outsider and their teeth in both mouth are long and slender like that or carnivorous fish.
Lilitu: Fraz-Urb'Luu - Created by Fraz-Urb'Luu himself. These serve as his special agents in destroying mankind. All Lilitu are practiced sorcerers, illusionists, and shadow casters in his employ. Sadly, these creatures have no faces, save a fanged-filled circular maw. They mimic the face of some woman they have recently slain.
Marilith: Baphomet - All have horn protruding from their foreheads or temporal lobes. Scales are fur-covered.
Marilith: Decca - Scars and lashes of pain ring and writhe across their bodies. Their weapons and armaments are cultivated from the fallen heroes, holy champions, and other paladins across the multiverse. Then they are corrupted in secret rituals known only to Decca and her chosen priests.
Maralith: Obox-Ob - Instead of a serpentine lower torso, Maraliths in the service of Obox-Ob have the lower torso of an armored centipede or a scorpion. The female Maraliths are always larger than their male counterparts and their mariliths counterparts in the service of other demon lords.
Maurezhi: Orcus - all maurezhi, regardless of gender, grow all stark white goatees from their chin and their foreheads are sport long curved goat horns to make their allegiance to the Prince of the Undead.
Molydeus: Baphomet - are bull-headed as compared to being wolf-headed. Molydeus have the uncanny ability to navigate mazes, lairs, and obstacle courses with impeccable ease. Some double with the ranger ability to track over any terrains.
Molydeus: Demogorgon - All Molydeus in the service of Demogorgon have three heads. Twin heads of a Baboon-like creature, to indicate they are servants of the Prince of Demons and the third head for which is a snake or other serpentine animal. Almost all serpentine-like heads come from serpents and snakes indigenous to jungles and tropical climates. They are elite warriors in his service and show no mercy to the enemy.
Nalfeshnee: Ahazu - Although large and bloated, the Seizer makes sure his bureaucratic servants are as bat-like as possible. The Wings of a Nalfeshnee are twenty to thirty feet larger than their non-bounded counterparts.
Nalfeshnee: Zuggtmoy - all bureaucrats are crowned with a large singular mushroom ring. Demons, laughingly and erringly called them shroomheads. Nalfeshnee take pride in their service to the Queen of Fungi and often smashed the offender until it is bloodied senseless, or dead.
Sarrowsworn Demon: Pale Night - Ghost-like apparition with portion of its body that can be clearly seen through and other that can not.
Succubus: Baphomet - Have small bovine horns protruding from there foreheads. All have hooves instead of feet and thick hair growing from the length of their shinbones. All are trained warriors
Succubus: Decca - Cracks and fresh lashes cover the entire length of her body. Her palms have fanged mouths and her breath is hot as a forge.
Succubus: Lolth - Jet-black skin, red eyes, and stalk ivory hair. Many succubi of Lolth are profane beauties and appear in elegant spider silk garments that leave little to the imagination. Male Drow who have earned have a Succubus of Lolth at their beck and call earned the gracious favor from the Queen of Spiders.
Succubus: Obox-Ob - Insect like motifs, especially wings and eyes. Mouths are insect-like. Some succubi have tails with stingers-like appendages, or have stingers in their forearms, palms, or tongues.
Succubus: Orcus - Pale skinned, extremely lean to emaciated, gaunt features that can be concealed via illusion or metamorphic magics. All possess vampire fangs and are capable of draining blood. Succubus in the service of Orcus possess a ravenous appetite, especially for the taste of blood and souls
Succubus: Skekolah - All appears as stark white version of their counterparts with solid ice blue eyes. Their hair color ranges from blonde, to platinum blonde, to ivory white. They can produce coiled tentacles from the folds of their own flesh. Their breath is cold as an arctic wind.
Succubus: Zuggtmoy - Illusions of profane beauty hide the fungal scarred rotting appearance of these demonic thralls. Many succubi bound to Zuggtmoy are capable of sporing hallucinogenic spores from their lungs and wings as a defense mechanism. Some are capable of yellow or brown mold spores as a parting kiss.

RPG Series 3.5 Revised - Samurai Orcs

2007-12-24T19:33:00.000-08:00

Samurai Orc - Base Template

Samurai 4th Level
Size/Type: Medium Humanoid (Orc)
Hit Dice: 4d10 (24 hp average)
Initiative: +2
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
Armor Class: 18 (+3 half- plate armor, +1 bonus), touch 15, flat-footed 18
Base Attack/Grapple: +3/+6
Attack: Katanna +7 melee (1d10+3/19-20x2), Wakizashi +7 melee (1d6+3/19-20x2), Fachion +7 melee (2d4+3/18-20) or javelin +7 ranged (1d6+3)
Full Attack: Katanna +7 melee (1d10+3/19-20x2), Wakizashi +7 melee (1d6+3/19-20x2) Fachion +7 melee (2d4+3/18-20) or javelin +7 ranged (1d6+3)
Space/Reach: 5 ft./5 ft.
Special Attacks: -
Special Qualities: Darkvision 60 ft., Light Sensitivity, Daisho Proficiency, Two Swords as One, Kiai Smite
Saves: Fort +7, Ref +3, Will +2 [Base Scores and Level Adjustments]
Abilities: Str 17, Dex 15, Con 15, Int 12, Wis 12, Cha 15 [Base: Some abilities may vary]
Skills: Concentration +3, Craft +2, Diplomacy +3, Intimidate +3, Knowledge: History +2, Knowledge: Nobility +2, Listen +2, Ride +3, Sense Motive +3, Spot +3
Feats: Alertness, Cleave, Power Attack
Environment: Temperate hills
Organization: Squad (11-20 plus 2 3rd-level sergeants and 1 leader of 4th-6th level), or band (30-100 plus 150%noncombatants plus 1 3rd-level sergeant per 10 adults, 5 5th-level lieutenants, and 3 7th-level captains)
Challenge Rating: 4
Treasure: Standard
Alignment: Lawful Evil
Advancement: By character class
Level Adjustment: +0

Weapons and Equipment: Keen-Edge Katanna +1, Defensive Surge Wakizashi +1, Half Plate Mail +1, 2 Potions of Cure Moderate Wounds, 1 Potion of Eagle's Splendor, 1 Potion of Owl's Wisdom

(C) Jeffrey Williams, 2008.

Art: Sedone Thongvilay
Website
Epilogue Gallery

RPG Series - The Secrets of Pact magic

2007-12-21T10:14:00.000-08:00

In yesterday's mail, I received my proof copy of the Secrets of Pact Magic from Radiant Press. I carefully slit the box open and ventured a first look.

:::thumbs through pages without the hazards of papercuts:::

I have yet to read it from page to page, but what an excellent book filled with source material and it greatly expands the potential of the binder character class. Even if I do not use the given material in this book it is flexible enough to adapt to other campaign settings. Radiant Press also has a website which is an excellent treasure trove of little gems and usable software. A binder character generator, die server, and score generator can be found all on one page. They have a sneak preview page that contains many .pdf files, including several previews in their forthcoming book. It also has a portrait gallery and interesting supplementary material for your future use.

There is a binder quiz to determine what generic astrological sign you represent if you wish to design a binder based on your own personality.

Uh, let's see...

"You are the fiend!"

"Sages of pact magic often associate ancient spirits with 13 constellations. Based on your responses to the quiz at www.pactmagic.com, your best-fit constellation is the fiend. You are deceitful, easily earning the ire of others even when you try your best to win them over; yet, when your intelligence is needed, others come to benefit from your devious strategies. You enjoy gossip, trickery, and manipulating others; yet beware, it may be you who is maligned and tricked."

That's a surprise! Oh my, what sharp claws I have.

I also designed two characters using the binder character generator. They are siblings and each others sisters.

Mikayla
Female spirit-touched (greater) half-elf ravaged soul 1 (ECL 3)
NE medium humanoid
Init +02; Senses Listen +0, Spot +02, low-light vision, darkvision 60 ft, book scent (as scent, but detect books and scrolls), use detect pact spirits spell at will, detect spirit status
Aura faint evil
Languages Common, Elvish, Goblin, Infernal
Comeliness 14 (attractive) ; Apparent Age 24
Look A tough, confident half-elf with circular pact-magic tattoos, traces of faces, hands, and eyes beneath the skin, and eyes that show windows within the irises.

AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 15
(armor=3, shield=0, dex=2, size=0, natural=0, class=0, items=2) ; Armor studded leather armor
hp 19 (1d12+4)
Fort +06, Reflex +04, Will +01
Defenses immune to sleep effects, +02 save vs. enchantments, evasion, evasive cover, Toughness
Key Ability constitution

Speed 30 ft. (6 squares)
Special Moves fast movement (+10 ft) at will, slow fall 0 ft, ring of climbing (Climb +10)
Base Attack +01; Grapple +03
Weapon Set two bladed sword (1d8/1d8), spiked gauntlet (1d4), light crossbow (1d8, 19-20, 80 ft)
Magic Weapons None
Melee +03 ; Ranged +03 ; Str Dmg Bonus +02
Combat Options sudden strength +01 3/day, disintegrating eye ray (1d6 force damage)

Highest Level Spirit 1st; Binding Check +4
Effv Binder Lvl 1st ; Granted Ability DC 14 + spirit level
Bonus Abilities None
Highest Lvl Spirits Aza’zati, The Green Wyrmling (pg 66); Cave Mother, Sorceress of Secrets (pg 68); Forash, Precipice of Spirits (pg 70); General Hessant, Patron of Lost Soldiers (pg 72); Gwenolyn’s Ghost, The Haunting Lover (pg 74); Marat, Guardian of Shields (pg 76)
Ravager Spirit
—Disintegrating Eye Ray: 60-ft ranged touch attack, 1d6 force damage, max 1/round.
—Alert Ravagers: 30-ft sonic emenation, passes supernaturally through all mundane barriers.
—Detect Spirit Status: 10-ft cone, detect presence, type and location of possessed or bound creatures. Otherwise as detect pact spirit.
—Evasive Cover: Evasion as rogue. If cover is present within move range after you make a Reflex save, make a Hide check to take cover unnoticed.
—Stealth Bonus: +02 Spot checks, +02 Hide checks.
—Sudden Strength: 3/day, for 1 round as a free action, apply +02 Str.
Magic Options Minor Binding feat (seal pact to gain one ability of a 1st level spirit, d20+0), consume eyes (1/day, feed on a corpse for 3 rounds to gain 1 supernatural eye, +01 Spot bonus, plus 1d4 uses of 1 granted ability of consumed binder, max 1 eyes), Favored Spirit (ravager), Rapid Binding (ravager), bonus pact magic feats (0)

Abilities
Str 15, Dex 14, Con 18, Int 10, Wis 09, Cha 16
Feats Toughness
SP 08 ; Key Skills Climb +12, Jump +06
Armor/Shield Check Penalty -01
Misc skill bonuses, any favored class, elf blooded, one supernatural ability (see Secrets of Pact Magic, page 307), bonus languages
Action Points 05 (1d6)

Magic Items ring of climbing (Climb +10), suit armor +02, long sword +02
Encumbrance Medium 67+ lbs, Max 200 lbs, Current NaN lbs
Other Gear empty journal, clothing, bedroll, rations, chalk, apocrypha, rope, journal, quill, ink, books
gp NaNgp

Affiliation None; About Not affiliated with any group and its unique spirit.
Ranking 0 (scale 0-30); Activities None
History Was drawn to a particular spirit's legendary exploits. In response, desires to transcend mundane life, maybe to be a spirit.

Ushara
Female spirit-touched (greater) half-elf occult priest 1 (ECL 3)
NG medium humanoid
Init +00; Senses Listen +03, Spot +03, low-light vision, darkvision 60 ft, book scent (as scent, but detect books and scrolls), use detect pact spirits spell at will
Aura faint good as cleric (diviners under 0 HD stunned 1 round)
Languages Common, Elvish, Goblin
Comeliness 16 (beautiful) ; Apparent Age 20
Look A tough, confident half-elf with circular pact-magic tattoos, traces of faces, hands, and eyes beneath the skin, and eyes that show windows within the irises.

AC 13, touch 10, flat-footed 13
(armor=3, shield=0, dex=0, size=0, natural=0, class=0, items=0) ; Armor studded leather armor
hp 09 (1d6+3)
Fort +05, Reflex +00, Will +04
Defenses immune to sleep effects, +02 save vs. enchantments
Key Ability charisma

Speed 30 ft. (6 squares)
Special Moves None
Base Attack +00; Grapple +00
Weapon Set quarterstaff (1d6/1d6), light crossbow (1d8, 19-20, 80 ft), dagger (1d4, 19-20, 10 ft)
Magic Weapons None
Melee +00 ; Ranged +00 ; Str Dmg Bonus +00
Combat Options None

Highest Level Spirit 1st; Binding Check +04
Effv Binder Lvl 1st ; Granted Ability DC 13 + spirit level
Bonus Abilities None
Highest Lvl Spirits Aza’zati, The Green Wyrmling (pg 66); Cave Mother, Sorceress of Secrets (pg 68); Forash, Precipice of Spirits (pg 70); General Hessant, Patron of Lost Soldiers (pg 72); Gwenolyn’s Ghost, The Haunting Lover (pg 74); Marat, Guardian of Shields (pg 76)
Spellcasting Fixed set of divine spells drawn from domain lists, each spell castable once per day.
Domains Knowledge
Occult Path Benefit Pact Circle: permanent +04 bonus on all binding checks
Spell Slots -/1/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/- ; Spell DC 13 + spell level ; Caster Level: 01
Spells Known
1st— detect secret doors
0th— None
Magic Options Minor Binding feat (seal pact to gain one ability of a 1st level spirit, d20+0), consume eyes (1/day, feed on a corpse for 3 rounds to gain 1 supernatural eye, +01 Spot bonus, plus 1d4 uses of 1 granted ability of consumed binder, max 1 eyes), occult knowledge (as bardic knowledge), aura (as cleric), cast divine spells, divine domain (knowledge), cast divination spells at +01 caster level

Abilities
Str 10, Dex 10, Con 17, Int 13, Wis 14, Cha 17
Feats Ignore Binding Requirements
SP 28 ; Key Skills Swim +10, Concentration +07, Bluff +07
Armor/Shield Check Penalty -01
Misc skill bonuses, any favored class, elf blooded, one supernatural ability (see Secrets of Pact Magic, page 307)
Action Points 05 (1d6)

Magic Items ring of swimming (Swim +10), magical key (Open Locks +10)
Encumbrance Medium 33+ lbs, Max 100 lbs, Current NaN lbs
Other Gear treasure map, clothing, bedroll, rations, chalk, apocrypha, rope, journal, quill, ink, religious symbol
gp NaNgp

Affiliation None; About Not affiliated with any group and its unique spirit.
Ranking 0 (scale 0-30); Activities None
History Introduced to pact magic by an otherworldly being. In response, is searching for ways to thwart or rebel against the gods' plans.

D20 Series 3.5 Revised - "With this Axe, I Persuade You ."

2007-11-22T01:28:00.000-08:00

The Persuader

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

Real Name: John Daab
Nationality: American, Anglo-European
Alignment: Neutral Evil [Mercenary]
Legal Status: An American citizen with a criminal record once pardoned under the provisions of the contract as detailed by the executive powers of the United States government. Currently incarcerated under a second set of alternate charges. Awaiting transportation to Belle Reve prison, Louisiana.
Group Affiliation: Semi-active member of the Injustice Gang and an occasional member of the Suicide Squad. The Persuader works with a variety of criminal partners, if the heist is to his liking and the potential loot is worth the effort. He prefers to work exclusively with men. His past dalliance with Sliding Ghost has left him heartbroken.
Base Power Level: [-12-] – Unlimited Power Level/Power Points

Str: [-21-][+05]
Int: [-17-][+03]
Wis: [-14-][+02]
Dex: [-17-][+03]
Con: [-18-][+04]
Cha: [-15-][+02]
Point Total: [-42-]

Saving Throws
Toughness: [+08]
Insight: [+06]
Will: [+06]
Reflex: [+08]
Fortitude: [+08]
Stability: [+04]
Point Total: [-22-]

Combat
- Damage: [+05]
- Defense: [+10]
- Grapple: [+07]
- Initiative: [+05]
- Melee Attack: [+09]
- Range Attack: [+06]
Point Total: [-40-]

Skills
Acrobatics [+05], Bluff [+05], Climb [+10], Computers [+08], Demolition [+03], Disable Device [+08], Drive [+08], Intimidate [+08] Knowledge - Current Events [+10], Knowledge - Civics: Department of Energy [+10], Knowledge – Physical Science: Nuclear Physics [+10], Navigate [+03], Notice [+06], Profession: Black Markets [+08], Profession: Nuclear Storage/Safety Procedures [+06], Repair [+06], Search [+05], Sense Motive [+05], Stealth [+06], Survival [+05], Swim [+10] Technology: Computers {+10] Technology: Nuclear [+10]
Points: [-25-][-100 Ranks-]

Feats
Archaic Weapons Proficiency, All-Out Attack, Ambidexterity, Armor Proficiency, Assessment, Attack Focus [+02], Blind-Fight, Critical Strike, Defensive Strike, Evasion [+04], Fearsome Presence [+02], First Strike [+01], Hide in Plain Sight, Improved Disarm, Improved Flank, Improved Sunder, Instant Up, Interpose, Languages [+04 - Chinese, French, German, Russian], Mobility, Move-By Attack, Power Attack, Sweeping Strike, Uncanny Dodge, Weapon Break
Points: [-33-]

Powers
Radioactive Cannibalism – John Daab has the singular ability to absorb nuclear radiation and its various particles. Once absorb via physical contact, the contaminating material passes through his physical body and is rendered inert without harm to his physiology or anatomy. Unknown to the Persuader, his unique power has an unusual post-mortem effect. Absorption 12 [Drawbacks: Sterile – The Persuader is incapable of siring children and thus must rely on magical or advanced genetic engineering to produce offspring, Extra: Both Types – Physical and Energy, Feats: Alternate powers x2 – Super-Senses 02 – Detect Radioactivity Only, Feat: Improved Range, Immunity 01 – To Radioactive Environments - Extra: Duration - Permanent, Slow Fade, Universal Donor - John’s blood can be used to purge the harmful effects of radiation poisoning and chemotherapy - Flaws: Limited – Nuclear Radiation Only, Limited: Dispersal – does not gain power points with the absorption of nuclear radiation, Flaw: Passive – 0/R] Power Packaging: All Linked
Points: [-33-]

Weapons and Equipment

The Atomic Axe
These psionic-empowered devises were constructed by an unknown (yet a highly psi-technological) civilization and used by an elite Specforce presumed to originate from an alternate futuristic timeline. This timeline in one appropriate historical paradox cease to exist do to a convergence (a temporal unfolding) in a fourth-degree sequence of chronological events. However initial energy scans point to a second probable origin and thus another method of speculation. It points to the theoretical journey from a shattered alternate universe with specific vibrational energy frequencies imbued onto the surface of the axe. Any scientific analysis gathered from the study of the Atomic Axe is, to date, stunted. Field journals and highly classified documents from the United States government and various Black Op science bunkers reveal these weapons were used to eradicate enemy bio-weapons capable of assimilating and reconstituting any classification of organic matter. Empathic and psychometry emanations via government psi agents left some teams traumatized upon examination. Physical examination via nano-technology has cultivated curious bio-matter in the form of protein-sheath insulated viral organisms. All bio-organism were cultivated to prevent contamination in our reality, however further examination ceased when twin xeno-entities deposited the Atomic Axe into the hands of dubious sociopaths, criminals, mercenaries, and bounty hunters capable of harnessing its toxic energies to fuel their own personal agendas. The axe is current possessor is currently at large.

However, without protective armor, the Atomic Axe is likely to poison its next possessor.

Field reports show two different individuals wielding the Atomic Axe clashing with both Superman, Bat-Man and the current incarnation of the Blue Beetle.

It’s presumed where there is one axe, there is bound to be another. Forensic evidence, although some say speculation, has pointed towards two other super-powered axes that were deposited in our universe via xeno-technological means. An Ionic Axe capable of manipulating weather and lightning and a Solar Axe capable of hurling localized solar flares and manipulating gravity in a given area.

Powers: Device 15 – [Drawback: Noticeable Energy Field, Feats: Alternate Powers x7, Deflect 10 – Feats: Ricochet, Enhance Attribute: Fortitude Save 10 – Drawback: limited to radiation only, Bequeathed when grasped, Enhance Attribute: Strength 10 – Drawback: Bequeathed When grasped, Radiation Control 15 – Drawbacks: Toxic, Feats: Alternate Powers x4, - Environmental Control, Nauseate, Affects Insubstantial, Subtle, Extra: Disease - Radiation Sickness, Strike 12 – Extra: Cleave, Summon 12 – Drawback: Limited to the Atomic Axe] Power Packaging: All Linked

Base Cost: 4/R + 6
Prerequisites: None
Total Cost: [-95-] = [-190/2-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Atomic Armor
Protection 09 [Drawbacks: Noticeable, Extra: Impervious, Feat: Alternate Power x2 – Enhanced Trait: Strength 02, Super-Movement: Air-Walking 02]

Villain Points: [-13-]
Point Total: [-195-]

Notes: High school was a challenging success for John Daab. He was a student with above average intelligence (John was a B+ student). To make up for his stunted intelligence, John was naturally athletic and was able to participate extensively in baseball, track-and-field, weight lifting, and bicycling. He possessed an aggressive yet smooth demeanor, one that enabled him to remain competitive yet interested in the potentials of academia. His physical competence earned him several team and individual trophies and two scholarships to attend a major university when he graduated. Better yet, he could have been trained for the major leagues or Olympic competition. Life was fair but uneventful for John Daab.

When his unspectacular abilities manifested late in adolescence, it was done without his awareness.

Oblivious to his powers, John strove the road towards academia, yet remain physically active in some sports, namely track and softball. Four years of college and military service trained John as a nuclear technician. With his application and acceptance in the Department of Energy, John saw his first taste or career success in government and politics. The physical science of nuclear safety and other nuclear technologies opened his perception to potential and hazards of radiation, both national and international, the possibly of being a presidential candidate could happen with the right people, policies and money. Then he met Amanda and fell for the wrong woman.

Amanda was a radical environmental activist and a radical environmentalist who despised mining, whaling, and nuclear proliferation. She hated the later, especially nuclear technologies and their potential hazards. She also had personal reasons. Amanda was a third of forth generation Japanese-American whose then young grandmother had survived the devastation of Hiroshima. Yoshi Honda would pass her accursed legacy onto her grandchildren. Amanda discovered she was a mutant as well and would use the name Sliding Ghost in her criminal enterprises. She was also a participant and one of four masterminds in staging a raid on a nuclear reactor. Their purpose was to sabotage the reactor, but keep the remaining nuclear energies within it contained. A quarantined reactor is a useless reactor. Keep a watch of the contaminated site until it can be repaired and cleansed then contaminant it again. Overall, They wanted to force the closure of the reactor and its adjacent storage facility out of their state.

Amanda befriended John as a method of infiltrating the facitity. They’re relationship blossom and took a different course then she had planned. Her love for John through the year of espionage was genuine, she was loyal to the plan and would betray him. Passion overtook common scene as John tried to sire a child to keep some sort of attachment with Amanda. It was one night in the throes of passion, John realized he could be sterile and may not be able to father children. Several blood tests confirmed his presence of a meta-human gene and a tweak in his blood chemistry. John Daab learned he could absorb radiation through physical contact, pass it through his body, and render it inert. He kept his abilities secret from Amanda and would tell her with heartbroken truth when the time was right.

Three days later, Amanda and her group of radicals infiltrated the reactor and left John Daab unconscious in a contaminated wing thinking the radiation would cover all evidence. His powers saved him and the communications technology. An official of the DoE, was able to contact John while Haz-Mat crews trained in fire-fighting and radioactive sites sought to decontaminate the sight. This unnamed official directed John via cell phone to two lead-lined secondary storage lockers. The DoE official told John to don the armor found within the first locker. What John did not except to find with the Atomic Axe in the second locker. John grabbed the Atomic Axe and was struck with a surge of energy from the weapon. He had a new mission in life.

Within a week, two of Amanda’s associates were dead. A Third was hospitalized with extensive lacerations and radioactive contamination. Several more had been assaulted and battered. Amanda had moved on, but later learned of the Persuaders real identity. To this day, she looks over her knowing John has a broken heart and a vendetta to settle. John, in ignorance and happenstance, has yet to know of her identity as the Sliding Ghost.

The Persuader, The Atomic Axe, The Fatal Five
© DC Comics 2007.

John Daab, Character Concept
© Jeffrey Williams 2007.

D20 Series 3.5 Revised - Man Made Monstrosity

2007-11-12T15:12:00.000-08:00

The Shaggy Man

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

Real Name: None
Nationality: None
Alignment: True Neutral [Evil]
Legal Status: Designated artificial lifeform. The Shaggy Man or one of its regenerative aspects is often declared as property by the government in which country he was gestated. Otherwise, The Shaggy Man has no national allegiance. The Shaggy Man is often registered as a black ops bio-weapon.
Group Affiliation: Various affiliations including the Secret Society of Super-Villains, the Injustice Gang, and the Suicide Squad, but the Shaggy Man is primarily used as a siege engine or a shock trooper.
Base Power Level: [-10-] – Unlimited Power Level/Power Points

Str: [-30-][+10]
Int: [-10-][+00]
Wis: [-15-][+02]
Dex: [-21-][+05]
Con: [-21-][+05]
Cha: [-10-][+00]
Point Total: [-47-]

Saving Throws
Toughness: [+08]
Insight: [+00]
Will: [+02]
Reflex: [+10]
Fortitude: [+10]
Stability: [+05]
Point Total: [-16-]

Combat
- Damage: [+10]
- Defense: [+10]
- Grapple: [+10]
- Initiative: [+05]
- Melee Attack: [+14]
- Range Attack: [+10]
Point Total: [-28-]

Skills
Acrobatics [+10], Climb [+15], Intimidate [+06], Notice [+06], Search [+05], Sense Motive [+05], Stealth [+06], Survival [+10], Swim [+15]
Points: [-11-][-44 Ranks-]

Feats
All-out Attack, Ambidexterity, Attack Focus, Critical Strike, Defensive Attack, Environmental Adaptation: Cold, Evasion [+05], Fearless, Fearsome Presence [+02], Grappling Finesse, Improved Grab, Improved Sunder, Improved Throw, Instant Up, Move-by Action, Power Attack, Rage [+02], Seize Initiative
Points: [-24-]

Powers
Duplication 10 [Extra: Regenerative Duplication, Feat: Alternate Powers x2 -Enhance Traits: Strength 01, Enhanced Traits: Constitution 05, Drawbacks: Duplicates only], Leaping 08, Protection 02, Regeneration 12 [Extra: Action, Feat: Die Hard, Regrowth], Super Strength 05 [Feat: Bracing, Counterpunching] Power Packaging: All Linked
Points: [-30-]

Weapons and Equipment

None

Villain Points: [-10-]
Point Total: [-156-]

Notes: The Shaggy Man is a synthetic lifeform grown from a hybrid of DNA and other protein sequences from a salamander, a gorilla, and baseline human DNA. First gestated in the lab of Dr. Andrew Zagarian, the doctor was developing a method to replace damaged organs from healthy tissue samples, but required a lower animal and meta-gene DNA to synthesize the right effect. Dr. Zagarian overshot his intended mark. The beast he fathered proved uncontrollable and went on a rampage. Seeking help, Dr. Zagarian contacted the Justice League to deal with his accidental menace.

The Shaggy Man has clashed twice with the Justice League. It was buried alive with a second grown counter-part thinking that would end the menace of both monsters. They survived however. The original clashed with heroes again before it was micronized. Its sibling was tricked onto an antiquated Soviet nuclear missile and shot into outer space. In a third separate encounter, it was seemingly destroyed with the use of an explosive tipped arrow. Sometime after this incident, The United States military had salvaged its active bio-remains and created a fourth Shaggy Man. Hidden from the general public, this newest incarnation, on the secret orders of General Wade Eiling, was stored in safe storage at the bottom of the deep ocean trench. This fourth incarnation was used as a host for the consciousness of the cancer-ridden general before it was stranded in space via the league’s teleporters.

Criminal enterprises use the near-mindless beast’s fury and super-strength as cheap but very effective “muscle”. Other criminal masterminds like the physically immobile Hector Hammond, the domineering Gorilla Gordd, of the anemic Headlok use the Shaggy Man to off-set their own physical limitations. The blind clairvoyant, Madame Web, employed him in her confrontations against the then criminal Juggernaut.

What makes the Shaggy Man effective in foiling super-heroes is that any mass displaced from the beast will regrow and regenerate. Thus the Shaggy Man is unstoppable by conventional weaponry. Freezing the Shaggy Man and chipping mass from it only causes the creature to regenerate into two or more separate organisms.

Frighteningly, it seems any significant mass removed or displaced from it will group into another Shaggy Man. The beast has proven an effective, although marginally controllable by bio-warfare standards. If given enough time and accurate conditioning via behaviorist conditioning, the Shaggy Man can obey simple commands with animal loyalty.

The Shaggy Man, The Justice League of America
© DC Comics 2007.

Ye Olde Xoblob Shoppe - Ring of Fluent Speech

2007-11-10T13:09:00.000-08:00

Ring of Fluent Speech

Description: A useful, if somewhat limited, trinket worn by diplomats across the known world. This ring grants a simple +2 circumstance bonus to the character's Diplomacy and Gather Information skills while worn. In addition, three times per day the ring can enable the character to speak any verbal language if using a tongues spell. Once per day the character may speak a spell of suggestion against one specific target within its line of sight. The character must have a mouth or the ability to physically speak. Animal noises or broken speech will not suffice. This ring does aid the character in the translation or comprehension of written languages.

Moderate Divination, Enchantment, Transmutation, CL: 12th
Forge Ring, Eagle's Splendor, Suggestion, Tongues
Market Price: 15,000 Gp
Cost: 7,500 Gp + 300 Exp

RPG Series - A Phenomenon of Lightning

2007-11-03T10:09:00.000-07:00

Wandjinna’s Blossom

Medium Ooze (Air Subtype)
Templates: Living Spell

Hit Dice: 10d10+20 [70 hp]
Initiative: +05
Speed:
- 60 ft., Fly, Perfect Maneuverability
Armor Class
Base: 16
-Flat-Footed: 15
Touch: 16
Base Attack/Grapple: +07/+07
Attack: Slam 1d4+3, Ball Lightning [10d6] or Lightning Bolt [10d6]
Full Attack: Slam 1d4+3, Ball Lightning [10d6] or Lightning Bolt [10d6]
Space/Reach: 5 ft. / 5ft.
Special Attacks:
Engulf, Ball Lightning, Lightning Bolt
Special Qualities:
Blindsight, Ooze Traits, Damage Reduction/10, Spell Resistance 20
Saves: Fort +07, Ref +06, Will +06
Abilities:
Str 15 [+02], Int 00 [+0], Wis 12 [+01], Dex 12 [+01], Con 15 [+02], Cha 15 [+02]
Skills:
None
Feats: Improved Initiative
Environment: Any land
Organization: Solitary
Challenge Rating: 06
Treasure: None
Alignment: Neutral
Advancement: ---
Level Adjustment: ---

COMBAT
Engulf + Ball Lightning or Lightning Bolt

Defense
Ooze Traits, Air Subtype

Engulf (Su): A Living Spell can flow around creatures that fit within its space as a standard action. It cannot make a slam attack during a round in which it engulfs. The Living Spell merely has to move over the opponents, effecting as many as it can cover. Opponents can make attacks of opportunity against the Living Spell, but if they do so they are not entitled a saving throw. Those who do not attempt attacks of opportunity must succeed on a Reflex save [DC 22] or be engulfed on a success, they are pushed back or aside as the spell moves forward. Engulfed creatures are subject to the full normal effects of the spell(s) each round on the Living Spells turn and are considered to be grappled.

Immunities (Su): Immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, phantasms, patterns, and morale effects). Blind (but have the blindsight special quality). Immunity to gaze attacks, visual effects, illusions, and other attack forms that rely on sight. Immunity to poison, sleep effects, paralysis, polymorph, and stunning. Not subject to critical hits or flanking. Oozes eat and breathe, but do not sleep.

Spell Effects – Ball Lightning (Su): a blossom can expel a 5-foot diameter ball of lightning from its mass and roll it towards any direction up to 150 ft at a rate of 30 ft. per round. Striking an object it ruptures dealing 6d6 points of damage. Wandjinna’s blossom may expel a new lightning ball once every other round.

Spell Effects – Lightning (Su): The Blossom can release a powerful stroke of electrical energy that deals 6d6 points of electricity damage to each creature within its area. The bolt is expelled from the center of its mass. The lightning bolt sets fire to combustibles and damages objects in its path. It can melt metals with a low melting point, such as lead, gold, copper, silver, or bronze. If the damage caused to an interposing barrier shatters or breaks through it, the bolt may continue beyond the barrier if range permits; otherwise, it stops at the barrier just as any other spell effect does.

Description:
This Living Spell is named after the Storm Paladin, Karyn Wandjinna after one of her forays into the Elemental Plane of Air. Discovered by her, she aptly named after the manner it unfolds, like a spring flower blooming, shortly before it discharges its electrical energies. Slain in the initial encounter, Karyn honored its defeat by embellishing the Blossom as an icon on her shield and her coat-of-arms. Many wizards and sorcerers have traveled leagues and other planes in hoping to ensnare one of these fantastic creatures, or its young.

Wandjinna’s Blossoms are the only know Living Spell capable of asexual reproduction. Sages say Djinni Princes, the Wind Dukes and other power creatures of Elemental Air keep the Blossoms as pets and guardian creatures.

© Jeffrey Williams 2007.

D20 Series - Shake Them Up!

2007-11-01T13:00:00.000-07:00

The Shocker

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

Real Name: Herman Schultz
Nationality: American, Anglo-European
Alignment: Neutral Evil [Reputation/Mercenary]
Legal Status: An American citizen with a criminal record. Herman Schultz alias the Shocker is wanted on several counts of Armed Burglar, Armed Robbery, Arson, Assualt with Intent to Do Bodily Harm, Battery on Federal Officers, Battery with the Use of a Deadly Weapon, Use of Restricted Technology, Breaking and Entering, Kidnapping, Racketeering, Theft, Willful Destruction of Government Property, and Willful Destruction of Private Property
Groups Affiliation: The Sinister Syndicate, The Sinister Six, The Masters of Evil, Partners with Boomerang, The Beetle, Rhino, The Ringer (Leila Davis), Trapster, Hydro-Man, and Speed Demon.
Base Power Level: [-12-] – Unlimited Power Level/Power Points

Str: [-17-][+03]
Int: [-19-][+04]
Wis: [-15-][+02]
Dex: [-13-][+01]
Con: [-14-][+02]
Cha: [-14-][+02]
Toughness: [+04]
Fortitude: [+05]
Reflex: [+04]
Will: [+04]
Insight: [+05]
Stability: [+02]
Points: [-49-]

Powers
None, Shocker employs twin gauntlets as his primary weapons. He wears a special designed suit to protect him from the weapon’s discharges.
Points: [-00-]

Skills
Climb [+07], Computers [+08], Concentration [+02], Craft: Electrical [+08], Craft: Mechanical [+08], Disable Device [+08], Drive [+05], Gather Information [+06], Intimidate [+06], Knowledge: Engineering [+08], Knowledge: Streetwise [+08], Knowledge: Technology [+08], Notice [+06], Repair [+08], Research [+08], Search [+08], Sense Motive [+06], Stealth [+05]
Points: [-18-][-72 Ranks-]

Feats
Accurate Attack, Attack Focus: Melee +1, Attack Focus: Melee +3, Ambidexterity, Dodge Focus +3, Evasion +3, Improved Sunder, Inventor, Power Attack, Prone Fighting
Points: [-16-]

Combat
Attack +06 (Melee), +08 (Ranged)
Grapple +08
Unarmed +04 (Unarmed)
Defense +08
Initiative +05
Points: [-38-]

Weapons and Equipment

Shocker’s Vibro Gauntlets - Device 10 – Drawbacks: Easy to Loose, Side Effect – Damaging, Tiring [Strike 10, Vibration Control 12, Feats: Alternate Powers x6 - Burrowing, Deflect, Drain Toughness, Nullify Machines, Stun, Extras: Affects Objects, Knockback, Flaws: Check Required] Power Packaging: All Linked

Base Cost: [4/R – 3] + [3/R+5]
Prerequisites: Craft [Electrical] 09, Craft [Mechanical] 09, Knowledge [Engineering] 09
Base Score: 10
Total Cost: [-45-] = [-89/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Shocker’s Dampening Armor - Device 10 [Protection 08, Immunity 12 - Drawbacks: Easy to Loose, Vibration Control Only] Herman Schultz designed his triple mesh armor to absorb and easily disperse the kinetic energy generated by his vibro gauntlets. Prolonged exposure or any exposure to the energy generated over time damages the body at 6 per discharge [Toughness vs. 1d20+6]. The suit is the best, or than an inertia dampener, and the only feasible way of countering damage. Significant damage to his suit increases the likelihood of damage

Base Cost: 1/R + 2/R
Prerequisites: Craft [Electrical] 09, Craft [Mechanical] 09, Knowledge [Engineering] 09
Base Score: 10
Total Cost: [-15-] = [-30/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Points: [-180-]

Notes: Schultz is a professional safecracker and burglar and often uses a direct approach when breaking and dismantling security devices. Schultz likes to score hits on personal residences, cash tellers, and financial institutions. The later only if he has partners or if apart of criminal gang or syndicate. If he can pull off a large museum or art gallery heist, or blackmail a city on a large scale, then he will enact his plan carefully accounting for police, freelance heroics, and a escape route or three. The he will see it through. He has clashed with several well-known super-heroes, including both Spider-Man and Iron-Man and emerged victorious on numerous occasions. He does not believe in wholesale slaughter and like to maintain a fearsome reputation. Technically, he lets his actions and name speak for him. He’s the not villain that will drop the proverbial hat and forego a contract either. His equipment and inventing skills has made him confident that he can handle most obstacles placed before him.

In combat, he learned to direct his blasts at physical objects behind or above his enemies. In this manner, he uses the environment to some extent against super-heroes. He has on several occasions used buildings to create falling debris, shrapnel from automobiles or motorcycles, gas tanks and gas lines as combustibles, loose sand to obscure his direction and location. He has fought super-heroes, S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, and regional law enforcement officers in lumber-yards and building supply stores by using raw materials such as woods, nails and screws as grapeshot.

The Shocker,
© Marvel Comics 2007.

RPG Series - All Hollow's Eve

2007-10-31T21:03:00.000-07:00

Hungyrcloud

Large Ooze/Aberration (Incorporeal)
Templates: Living Spell

Hit Dice: 15d10+48 [123 hp]
Initiative: +05
Speed:
- 20 ft.
Armor Class
Base: 18
-Flat-Footed: 17
Touch: 18
Base Attack/Grapple: +15/+23
Attack: Slam 1d8+ 10
Full Attack: +15 Slam
Space/Reach: 15 ft. / 10ft.
Special Attacks
Create Undead, Contagion, Enervation, Unholy Aura
Special Qualities
Ooze Traits, Blindsight, Damage Resistance 10/Magic, Incorporeal Subtype, Not Subject to Critical Hits or Flanking, Immunities, Spell Resistance 18, Can be struck only by magical weapons, planar weapons, or weapons carrying Ghost touch enchantments.
Saves: Fort +19, Ref +17, Will +17
Abilities:
Str 18 [+04], Int 00 [+0], Wis 14 [+02], Dex 14 [+02], Con 18 [+04], Cha 18 [+04]
Skills:
None
Feats: Combat Expertise, Fell Animate, Improved Initiative, Improved Toughness, Quicken Manifestation
Environment: Any land
Organization: Solitary
Challenge Rating: 15
Treasure: None
Alignment: Always Evil
Advancement: ---
Level Adjustment: ---

COMBAT

Defense
Ooze Traits, Incorporeal Subtype

Engulf (Su): A Living Spell can flow around creatures that fit within its space as a standard action. It cannot make a slam attack during a round in which it engulfs. The Living Spell merely has to move over the opponents, effecting as many as it can cover. Opponents can make attacks of opportunity against the Living Spell, but if they do so they are not entitled a saving throw. Those who do not attempt attacks of opportunity must succeed on a Reflex save [DC 22] or be engulfed on a success, they are pushed back or aside as the spell moves forward. Engulfed creatures are subject to the full normal effects of the spell(s) each round on the Living Spells turn and are considered to be grappled.

Immunities (Su): Immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, phantasms, patterns, and morale effects). Blind (but have the blindsight special quality). Immunity to gaze attacks, visual effects, illusions, and other attack forms that rely on sight. Immunity to poison, sleep effects, paralysis, polymorph, and stunning. Not subject to critical hits or flanking. Oozes eat and breathe, but do not sleep.

Incorporeal Subtype: Monster Manual I, Pg. 310-311.

Spell Effects - Contagion (Su): By engulfing its opponents, a hungyrcloud can inflict horrible disease, one type every round to all creatures trapped within it embraces. All opponents contract a disease selected from the table below, which strikes immediately (no incubation period). The DC noted is for the subsequent saves (use contagion’s normal save DC for the initial saving throw).

- Blinding Sickness [DC 16 1d4 Str] - Each time a victim takes 2 or more points of Strength damage from blinding sickness, he or she must make another Fortitude save (using the disease’s save DC) or be permanently blinded.
- Crackle Fever [DC 16, 1d4 Wis]
- Filth Fever [DC 12, 1d3 Dex + 1d3 Con]
- Mindfire [DC 12, 1d4 Int]
- Red Ache [DC 15, 1d6 Str]
- Shakes [DC 13, 1d8 Dex]
- Slimy Doom [DC 14, 1d4 Con]

Spell Effects - Create Undead (Su): This evil spell allows it to create more powerful sorts of undead: ghouls and ghasts within a range of 60 ft. A Hugyrcloud may create less powerful undead than its level would allow it to do; however they will be without direction. If a second party is capable of commanding undead, it may attempt to command the undead creature as it forms. Hungyrclouds obey their master.

Spell Effects – Enervation (Su): A Hungyrcloud can fire a black ray of crackling negative energy that suppresses the life force of any living creature it strikes. If the attack succeeds, the target gains 1d4 negative levels. If the subject has at least as many negative levels as HD, it dies. Each negative level gives a creature a -1 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, ability checks and effective level (for determining the power, duration, DC, and other details of spells or special abilities). Additionally, a spellcaster loses one spell or spell slot from his or her highest available level. Negative levels stack.

Assuming the subject survives, it regains lost levels after a number of hours equal to your caster level (maximum 15 hours). Usually, negative levels have a chance of permanently draining the victim’s levels, but the negative levels from enervation don’t last long enough to do so.

An undead creature struck by the ray gains 1d4×5 temporary hit points for 1 hour.

Spell Effects – Unholy Aura (Su): Centered upon itself, a hunger cloud generates a cloud of malignant evil within a 20ft. radius. Evil creatures suffer no ill effects.

Evil creatures gain a +4 deflection bonus to AC and a +4 resistance bonus on saves. Unlike the effect of protection form good, this benefit applies against all attacks, not just against attacks by good creatures. Second, a warded creature gains spell resistance 25 against good spells and spells cast by good creatures. Third, the aura blocks possession and mental influence, just as protection from good does. Finally, if a good creature succeeds on a melee attack against a warded creature, the offending attacker takes 1d6 points of temporary Strength damage (Fortitude negates).

Description:
Hungyrclouds were an accidental creation, but later refined in the series of experimentations first enacted by Iah-Dabo. Upon his orders, Orcus, the Prince of Undead ordered the construction of a sophisticated siege engine that was capable of slaying his enemy’s ground forces while converting them in troops for his own armies. Iah-Dabo hit upon the notion in accident while he was engaged in mortal combat with superior enemy whom also was a high cleric of Orcus. Iah-Dabo triumphed were guile and some word say good fortune, but would face the terrifying fury of his master. Orcus saw the demise of a valuable cleric and a potent lich as unforgivable. However, he soon saw the Hungyrcloud enter holy ground unaffected decimate a fortified castle of Pelor. The phased creature consumed the occupants in unholy gluttony, but the Demon-Prince quickly saw the wisdom in chaos and violent misfortune.

Hungyrclouds come into existence when a cleric or priest of a god of undeath willingly sacrifices his consciousness in an elaborate ritual of necromantic transformation. Dark in its evolution, Hungyrclouds come into existence through the creation of a juncture within three planar gates. The priest or mage-priest enters the juncture and damages the fabric of the weave of magic in a violent release of energy. The resulting destruction overwhelms and consumes him in a ferocious explosion. A fourth gate, cast prior to the first three gates, larger and enchanted to contain their energies, is opened and the hungyrcloud drifts through into the prime world. On the orders of its master, it sets forth to consume and create minions in the name of undeath.

A Hungyrcloud generates a vibrational signature that resonances from the ethereal into the prime material plane. A Detect Magic spell will reveal its general location and a Magic Circle of Protection from Evil will keep the abomination at bay for the duration of the spell. Most sages and arcane scholars speculate that is an inherent flaw in the genesis of its unholy birth and its existence as an “in-between” aberration of the prime material, the negative energy and ethereal planes. A Dimensional Anchor will pull this monstrosity from the ethereal plane and bar it from returning for 1 round per caster’s spell level. Oddly enough, a Dimension Door will open a portal closest to a Hungyrcloud, enabling warriors, clerics, and arcane spell-casters an opportunity to strike.

© Jeffrey Williams 2007.

RPG Series - Etchavar’s Eviscerater

2007-10-30T21:05:00.000-07:00

Etchavar's Eviscerater

Medium Aberration/Ooze
Template: Living Spell

Hit Dice: 13d10+52 [117 hp]
Initiative: +04
Speed
- Base: 25’
- Modified: 50 ft. [original speed – 15 ft.]
Armor Class
Base: 22
-Flat-Footed: 18
Touch: 22
Base Attack/Grapple: +13/+13
Attack: Slam (1d6+10), Rig of Blades – Ranged (1d6+10) , Sword +3 Melee (4d6+7, Threat Range: 19-20, Critical Multiple x2
Full Attack:+13 Slam or Sword +17
Space/Reach: 10 ft. / 10 ft.
Special Attacks:
Hasted, Spell Effects
Special Qualities:
Some Ooze Traits, Blindsight, Damage Resistance 10/Magic, Not Subject to Critical Hits or Flanking, Immunities, Weaponry is an extension of itself thus it cannot Sundered, Stolen, or Deprived. Spell Resistance 17, Can not Engulf (Ex) as per the Living Spell Template, Monster Manual III, Pg. 91.
Saves: Fort +15, Ref +17, Will +15
Abilities:
Str 19 [+04], Int 10 [+00], Wis 14 [+02], Dex 18 [+04], Con 17 [+03], Cha 17 [+03]
Skills:
Climb +12, Hide +12, Move Silently +12, Swim +10
Feats: Track, Improved Toughness
Environment: Solitary
Organization: Any Land
Challenge Rating: 13
Treasure: None, but often acts as a guardian creature
Alignment: Neutral
Advancement: ---
Level Adjustment: ---

COMBAT

Direct Assault
Sword - Slam- Ring of Blades

Defense
Immune to gaze attacks, visual effects, illusions and other attack forms that rely on sight, Immune to charm based magics, Immune to poison, sleep effects, paralysis, polymorph and stunning, psionic intrusion.

Immunities (Su): Immune to gaze attacks, visual effects, illusions and other attack forms that rely on sight, color, or darkness. Immune to charm based magics, Immune to poison, sleep effects, paralysis, polymorph and stunning, psionic intrusion.

Spell Effects (Su): A creature hit by a living spell's slam attack is subjected to the normal effect of the spell or spells making up the creature, as if ti were within the area or the effect of the spell itself. Saves apply as normal for the spell, the DC is 10+spell level+charisma modifier.

- Blade of Evisceration - Mordenkainen’s Sword – As per the Player’s Handbook, however this weapon as a personal range and the Eviscerater must wield the sword and strike to inflict any damage. The blade retracts into the Eviscerater’s mass at the conclusion of combat.
- Moves with Unyielding Grace – Haste - +1 extra attack every round.
- Touch of the Grave – Wraithstrike – Melee attacks are resolved as melee touch attacks once per round every other round.
- Ring of Blades – Slashing Damage in a 5ft area of effect with no Reflex save. It can use this ability as a free action and function as per the Spell Compendium.

Description

With an Ioun Stone set in his Headband of Intellect, (a +6 device) Ghaliith desperately activated the magic trinket in a pitched encounter within a portion of a magical weave that was ruptured. The stored magic, however stored in the stone and headband simultaneously activated in a cascade effect. The energies tore through Ghaliith, destroying his brain but leaving enough of his life essence lingering in the area. Both life shards and corrupted energy intertwined into something rarely recorded in the archives of lore and wizardry. The rupture eventually subsided and coalesced into a Living Spell with limited intelligence. Decades later, wizards and sorcerers would be able to recreate this event and create a loyal guardian creature.

Etchavar’s Eviscerater appears as nothing more than a heap of old torn clothing, cloaks, gloves and simple face-mask. Some appear stained or soaked in dry blood. However when certain conditions are meet (i.e. guard this passage, room, myself, etc), the clothing rises and consolidates into a humanoid-shaped combatant ready to do its mater’s fearsome bidding with a fair, but degree of comprehension. To learn something new or formulate, the Eviscerater a needs to Roll a DC 20 + its Charisma and Wisdom modifiers and it able to formulate an attack pattern or counterattack pattern.

Its magic mouth enables it to communicate and answer simple yes or no questions. It can speak in ten to twelve words sentences and is capable of learning from its mistakes, but is no creative genius. It will often rely on simple strategies to defeat it opponents. Its intelligence is limited and sometimes modified or altered via magic.

Spell Composition: Unseen Servant, Cat’s Grace - +4 to Dexterity, Fox’s Cunning - +4 to Intelligence, Magic Mouth, Wraithstrike - once every other round, Ring of Blades - Damage: 1d6+10, Haste, Mordenkainen’s Sword - Damage: 4d6+ 7

© Jeffrey Williams 2007.

D20 Series - A Throwing Arsenal

2007-10-28T14:49:00.000-07:00

Captain Boomerang’s Trick Arsenal

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

George “Digger” Harkness employed a variety of trick boomerangs in his criminal career against Barry Allen, the second incarnation of the Flash. After Allen's death during the first crisis, Harkness went solo until caught and incarcerated by Walley West, the third incarnation of the Flash. He continued to use his skills and abrasive personality with his long stint in the Suicide Squad. Under the authority of Amanda Waller, he served both as an unwilling governemnt hit-man, then again as a mercenary until Waller disbanded the team. In his later days, as a third-strung villain, he took any job he could handle but usually as an enforcer, hit-man or armed robber from anyone, including the Calculator. In his final hit, he discovered the son he never knew he sired and murdered the father of Time Drake, the fourth incarnation of Robin. The hit of Tim Drake's father proved to be a set-up and a red harring. His son Owen Mercer is utilizing the current set of weaponry in tnadum with brief brusts of super-speed. Owen, once a member of the Outsiders, now without intention, has taken his father’s place in the current incarnation of the Suicide Squad.

Bafflerang - Device 12 [Drawback: Easy to Loose, Feats: Alternate power x1, Obscure 10 - Smokescreen, Improved Range - Arc, Extended Reach – Arc, Triggered, Flaws: Action - Activated when thrown, Duration - Instantaneous]

Base Cost: 1/R + 1/R+3
Prerequisites: Knowledge [Engineering] 05
Base Score: 06
Total Cost: [-12-] = [-25/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Explosive Boomerang - Device 10 [Drawback: Easy to Loose, Feats: Alternate power x1, Blast 10 – Explosion – Reduced Range 10 ft., Improved Range - Arc, Extended Reach – Arc, Triggered, Flaws: Action - Activated when thrown, Duration - Instantaneous]

Base Cost: 1/R + 1/R+3
Prerequisites: Knowledge [Engineering] 05
Base Score: 06
Total Cost: [-16-] = [-33/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Gravity-Rang - Device 10 [Drawback: Easy to Loose, Range – 05 ft. radius, Feats: Alternate power x2, Gravity Control 10 – Feat: Environment Control, Improved Range - Arc, Extended Reach – Arc, Triggered, Flaws: Action - Activated when thrown, Duration - Instantaneous]

This weapon requires itself to be planted or embedded in some object in order for the powers to activate. “Digger” made use of Tricker’s (James Jesse) anti-gravity technology, but hired a S.K.U.L.L. scientist to make the necessary modifications.

Base Cost: 1/R + 1/R+4
Prerequisites: Knowledge [Engineering] 05
Base Score: 06
Total Cost: [-12-] = [-24/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Razorang - Device 10 [Drawback: Easy to Loose, Prerequisite – Require protective gear, Feats: Alternate power x1, Strike 12 – Feat: Improved Range - Arc, Extended Reach – Arc, Flaws: Action - Activated when thrown]

Base Cost: 1/R + 1/R+
Prerequisites: Knowledge [Engineering] 05
Base Score: 06
Total Cost: [-12-] = [-24/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Screamerang - Device 10 [Drawback: Easy to Loose, Prerequisite – Require protective gear, Feats: Alternate power x3, Sound Control 10 – Feat: Burst, Focused Dazzle, Stun, Improved Range - Arc, Extended Reach – Arc, Triggered, Flaws: Action - Activated when thrown, Duration - Instantaneous]

“Digger” made use of Sonar’s sound-based technology, but hired a S.K.U.L.L. scientist to make the necessary modifications. It has one-charge use, so "Digger" use these items as getaway weapons or weapons of last resort.

Base Cost: 1/R + 1/R
Prerequisites: Knowledge [Engineering] 05
Base Score: 06
Total Cost: [-12-] = [-24/02-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Captain Boomerang
© DC Comics, 2007.

The Gaming Journal 03

2007-10-25T11:10:00.000-07:00

Cyric – The Dark Sun, Cyric the Vestige

At the end of the novels, the Prince of Lies and Crucible: Teh Trial of Cyric the Mad, I hit upon the idea of a divergence in published canon. I’ve never liked how second edition publications handled the Forgotten Realms. I believed they catered too much to the story telling or the “role” aspect in RPGs and left little to the imagination of the DM, much like what’s occurring with the transition from third edition revised to fourth edition. Cyric was barred from any direct influence on the world of Toril. Effectively, by a divine majority vote, he was banished from the Faerunite pantheon. His departure however was a planned deception on his part. Cyric must obey the vote and sentence imposed upon him by Ao and the majority of the Faerunite pantheon. Cyricists can no longer cast spells above 3rd level. In effect, they can not advance higher than 6th level as a standard cleric nor do they receive no spell bonuses for wisdom scores higher than 19. However, they may add levels as a divine disciple prestige class if they meet the requirements. Divine Disciples have a stronger connection to their deity. However, after 6th level, Clerics of Cyric may add the Ur-Priest prestige class and continue to advance until all ten levels and requirements are satisfied in that particular class.

Cyricists may not be Favored Souls as per the Complete Divine, Pg. 06-10. All Cyricists are Human, Drow, Half-Elf, Half-Drow, Half-Orc, or Tiefling stock.

Cyric fills a role in the Faerunite pantheon much in a way that Loki fulfills this role in the Norse mythology. Cyric is a troublemaker, a fermenter of strife and discord, and finally a psychopath amongst the higher divinity.

Cyric is a psychopath amongst the gods.

A write-up on Cyric as a vestige will appear shortly.

Favored Classes of Cyric
Cleric/Ur-Priest/Divine Disciple, Cleric/Binder

The Nightsong Guild of Mulmaster

Current Activities: Assassination (Minor to Mid-Level), Burglary, Commerce Raiding, Fencing, Influence Peddling, Information Brokering [Political and Economic Espionage], Mercenary/Private Armies, Racketeering (Protection and Theft), and Strong Arm Tactics

The Nightsong Guild (Standard Criminal) Alignments: CN CE LW NE; 100,000 gp resource limit, Membership 150, 2000 paid employees; Integrated, Dues 25 gp/month

Authority Figures: See Below

Associated Classes: Bard or Bard/Beguiler, Beguiler [Arcane Devotee], Binder [Fighter/Knight of the Sacred Seal or Sorcerer/Anima Mage], Cleric/Ur-Priest/Divine Disciple, Fighter [Divine Champion/Nightsong Enforcer/Tempest], Rogue [Divine Seeker/Temple Raider [Complete Divine], Scout, Fighter/Scout [Tempest], Shadow Caster, Sorcerer [Arcane Devotee/Blood Magus/Elemental Savant/Mindbender]

Associated Skills: Bluff, Craft, Diplomacy, Gather Information, Intimidate, Knowledge (Arcana), Knowledge (The Planes), Knowledge (Religion)

Requirements: Recant your old faith in favor of personal power and prestige. Commit one traitorous murder in the name of the Dark Sun and recant your faith in the name of personal power and prestige. Serve the guild willing and obediently, and through assassination and treachery, you’ll advance in station. Do not share guild secrets of affiliations. Any “hit” or score must be approved by the Guildmaster or senior guild member. The Guild takes 15% of the cut. Do not engage in unauthorized scores or activities. TH Nightsong Guild frowns upon this disobedience.

Favored in Guild Benefits: Best black market access east of the Sea of Fallen Stars. You can sell any magical item at 100% of it value and any art object or precious gemstones at 120% of its standard value.

The Nightsong Guild has a tight information network. All knowledge and lore checks gain a +2 circumstance bonus in favor of the character. +3 bonus is granted if the check requires checks in geography, local or religion.

The Nightsong also has access to rare magical items set outside the Weave. They include psionic devices, Binder Seals, Shadow Caster Magics, and Incarnum. Members can also receive training in their preferred class, at half the normal costs, but must apply and swear an oath of loyalty to the guild.

Source Material: The Complete Adventurer, Pg. 60-65, 177-179., Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting Third Edition, Waterdeep – City of Splendors, Pg. 22-23.

Althamadden of the Deceiving Star
- aka Althamadden the Apostate, Althamadden the Nightsong
- Guildmaster the Nightsong Guild of Mulmaster
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Race/Sex: Human Male
Class: Cleric of Cyric/Divine Disciple/Ur-Priest
Levels: 06/02/10 [-18-]
Spell Level/Number: 0th/13, 1st/9, 2nd/9, 3rd/7, 4th/5, 5th/4, 6th/4, 7th/3, 8th/2, 9th/1
Guild Membership: None, actively building his own cult in a hidden location
Str: [-17-][+03], Int: [-19-][+04], Wis: [-19-][+04], Dex: [-14-][+02], Con: [-20-][+05], Cha: [-19-][+04]
Feats: Blooded, Delay Spell, Dreadful Wrath, Iron Will, Reach Spell, Spell Focus [Evil], Weapon Focus [Heavy Flail]

Acolytes:
Ankar Jhaalamist [Human male, NE, Cleric 2nd/Ur-Priest 2nd Level/Fighter 2nd Level/Binder 4th Level] the twice scorned, an exiled cleric of who first saw the destruction of Torm in Tantras during the Time of Troubles. With the demise of that deity, and his conversion to the Helmite code, he has seen atrocities (slavery, purging, theft of cultural treasures) performed in his name of law and righteousness while serving in the Tethyrian restorations. The enslavement of the peoples of Maztica was the last straw. His opinions soon ejected him from the Helmite religion. Finding the Church to be hypocrites and heretics, Ankar is solely converting to chaotic evil causes and often uses violence and blackmail to win what he perceives is his divine right. Sadly, he is the dupe of a mad god. Ankar has also caught the eye of a renegade half-drow.

Sessamithra Olthalhax, a survivor of Ched Nesad, has rejected the teachings of Lolth in favor of personal power. She has provided much revenue tot eh Nightsong Guild any much knowledge of the Underdark and its various cities. Sessamithra is beginning to explore the secrets of the Ur-Priests and is learning to tap into other sources as well. The later being Incarnum. [Half-Drow Female, CE, Cleric of Lolth 5th Level/Ur-Priest 3rd Level/Incarnate 3rd Level]

Henchmen and Allies:
Kro Blackhand [Half-Orc, LE, 5th Level Fighter, 2nd Level Nightsong Enforcer, 5th Tempest – CA] is Althamadden’s leg-breaker and an expert in violence and extortion. Kro loves his job and overdoes the physical aspects from time to time. He’s careful not to murder clients or agents, but accidents happen. Not an overly intelligent individual, he does not “freelance’ behind Althamadden’s back. He has already seen what happens to those who double-cross the guildmaster.

Hathalin Malastar [Helmed Horror - LEoF, LE, with the Fiendish Creature Template– 5th Level Fighter/5th Level Ravager - CW] serves as Althamadden’s hatchetman and enforcer of violence. Abandoned to her death by her Zulkir, The Ur-Priest collected her body and is slowly cloning it. Serving to enforce his mandates, Althamadden in turn he promise to restore this once beautiful Thayvian Knight’s body to the fullest vigors of health. A vow he has promised to keep to some degree. Her battle skills and brutality are horrifically effect and he would hate to see such an effective tool go to waste. Secretly, he has bounded a splinter of her soul to the Helmed Horror in case she in slain in battle again. Hathalin’s preferred symbol in the Marilith before a large blooming blood-red rose.

Mililani Deccubus [Half-Elf (moon) Female, NE, Fighter 2nd Level/Ninja 6th Level/Soul Knife 6th Level – PH/CA/EPH] is the brainwashed clone of a slain Mystran Priestess. Either no longer caring for her past identity, or that it has been wiped clean, Mililani, known as Blood Pearl, eliminates rivals and enemies of Althamadden upon his command. Mililani has a preference for murdering other assassins, smugglers, wizards, sorcerers and other arcane spellcasters above all else. She prefers to drug them and drowned them in portable bodies of water. This psychosis is a shard from her host’s original memory. Two individuals wronged her in the past and it was something she wanted to atone for immensely. She is fiercely loyal to Althamadden. An unusual characteristic, but he can easily replace her.

Weapons and Equipment
Banded Armor of Retaliation +4, Ring of Force Shield, Mace of Sundering +3, Meta-Magic Rod of Quicken Spell, Rod of Force, Wand of Animate Dead, Wand of Contagion, Wand of Dimension Doors, Gauntlets of the Blazing Arc, Amulet of Emergency Healing, Amulet of Proof against Detection and Location, Boots of Speed, 2d4+1 Divine Scrolls containing spells of 1st through 5th levels, and 1d4+2 potions.

Notes: Althamadden learned the secrets of the Ur-Priests as a disciple of the Banished God Cyric, Lord of Murder, Madness, and Lies. Although, an Ur-Priests despises gods and various divine servants, Cyric has covertly “passed” the secrets of Ur onto his followers since his banishment from Toril. They may pilfer his divinity to maintain the faith of the Dark Sun. Although not effectively powerful as Mystra, Silvanus, or Tempus, Cyric is able to maintain his hold on any active divinity through them. They in turn continue to commit murder and collect the souls of the unjustly murdered. Through the expansion of Binders via pact magics, his memory and legacy will never truly fade from Faerun.

Althamadden is preparing for lichdom. The thought of vampirism appeals to his warped mind, but he does not like the idea of being a thrall to Vampire Lord. Such a creature is weaker in his eyes and compared to the power granted him from Cyric. Forcing a covert means of eliminating his future master is a second factor Althamadden must prepare for in a future date.

D20 Series - "The Wall"

2007-10-22T20:40:00.000-07:00

Amanda "The Wall" Waller

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

Real Name: Amanda Blake Waller
Nationality: American, African-Descent
Alignment: Lawful Neutral [Bureaucrat]
Legal Status: An American citizen with two criminal records, but pardoned on both incidents. Waller also has international citizenship in the caribbean and granted diplomatic immunity from the United States. In effect, she is an ambassador-at-large.
Base Power Level: [-09-] – Unlimited Power Level/Power Points
Group Affiliation: Currently employed by the Department of Extra-Normal Operations of United States of America and is the operational head of Task Force X (aka the Suicide Squad) serving under the current president of the United States, Former Secretary of Meta-Human Affairs uner Luthor's Presidential Administration, and Former Queen and Operational Director of Checkmate.

Str: [-14-][+02]
Int: [-17-][+04]
Wis: [-16-][+04]
Dex: [-14-][+02]
Con: [-15-][+02]
Cha: [-18-][+05]
Toughness: [+02]
Fortitude: [+02]
Reflex: [+02]
Will: [+04]
Insight: [+02]
Stability: [+05]
Points: [-58-]

Powers
None, it’s not beyond Waller’s approach to use technology and devises impounded by Federal and State agents of law enforcement. She has one occasion used the Thinker’s “Thinking Helmet” and the “Psycho Pirate’s Medusa Mask. She also carried personal firearms when the Suicide Squad operated as a mercenary outfit. It is quite possible that she will have some sort of escape devise (i.e. Mirror Master’s Dimensional Guns) or other contingency (or three) ready if her life is in jeopardy.

Nano-Tech Control Interface
Device 15 [Drawbacks: Fade – Must Replenish Nano-Supply, Extras: Effortless, Instant Command, Microscopic, Feats: Alternate Powers x2 – Mind Control 15, Stun 12, Mental Link, Subtle, Flaw: Easy to Loose: -2R, Limited Command Protocols] Power Packaging: All Linked
Points: [-46-]

If all resource methods fail, then use Device 10 [Drawbacks: Power loss- Cost 1/R, Flaw: Easy to Loose] and substitute the necessary powers with 50-100 attribute points. Waller prefers mental or emotional manipulation based devises over ranged-weapon devices.
Points: [-00-]

Skills
Bluff [+06], Computers [+05], Concentration [+05], Diplomacy [+10], Disable Devise [+05], Drive [+05], Gather Information [+10], Intimidate [+09], Investigate [+10], Knowledge: Bureaucracy [+08], Knowledge: Civics [+08], Knowledge: Current Events [+08], Knowledge: Federal Government [+08], Knowledge: International Law [+08], Knowledge: Military Science [+08], Knowledge: Political Science [+08], Knowledge: Streetwise [+08], Notice [+05], Pilot [+05], Profession [+10], Reasearch [+10], Search [+05], Sense Motive [+10], Sleight of Hand [+05]
Points: [-22-][-88 Ranks-]

Feats
Benefit: Diplomatic Immunity, Benefit: Security Clearance, Connected, Contacts, Leadership, Ranged-Melee Weapons (Hand Guns/Fire Arms), Second Chance, Simple Melee Weapons, Well-Informed
Points: [-09-]

Combat
Attack +03 (Melee), +07 (Ranged)
Grapple +04
Unarmed +04 (Unarmed)
Defense +08
Initiative +04
Points: [-21-]

Weapons and Equipment
What she can obtain through legal channels within the United States government and its Federally appointed bureaucracies. This includes weaponry, armaments, costumes, non-combative technologies, labor, paroled manpower, and information, both public and classified. With the proper wrok crew, she can make modifications to existing technology.

To insure Squad loyalty and mission compliance, an explosive implant is shackled to each member of the Squad. It is attached their left wrist and activated during squad missions. The bracelet generates an electric charge, a warning, if the agent “wanders” off for the assigned parameters of the mission. The second time it explodes taking his arm with it.

Explosive Bracelet
Devise 15 [Drawbacks: Hard to Loose, Feat: Alternate Powers x2, Blast 15, Stun 01, Flaws: Compliance Devise, Explosive charge]

Point Total: [-146-]

Notes: Her abridged history can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_Waller
The Suicide Squad - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_Squad
Cosmic Teams: http://www.mykey3000.com/cosmicteams/cosmic/index.html

Suicide Squad, Amanda Waller
© DC Comics 2007.

D20 Series - The Unkindest Cut

2007-10-21T16:03:00.000-07:00

The Atomic Axe

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

These psionic-empowered devises were constructed by an unknown (yet a highly psi-technological) civilization and used by an elite Specforce presumed to originate from an alternate futuristic timeline. This timeline in one appropriate historical paradox cease to exist do to a convergence (a temporal unfolding) in a fourth-degree sequence of chronological events. However initial energy scans point to a second probable origin and thus another method of speculation. It points to the theoretical journey from a shattered alternate universe with specific vibrational energy frequencies imbued onto the surface of the axe. Any scientific analysis gathered from the study of the Atomic Axe is, to date, stunted. Field journals and highly classified documents from the United States government and various Black Op science bunkers reveal these weapons were used to eradicate enemy bio-weapons capable of assimilating and reconstituting any classification of organic matter. Empathic and psychometry emanations via government psi agents left some teams traumatized upon examination. Physical examination via nano-technology has cultivated curious bio-matter in the form of protein-sheath insulated viral organisms. All bio-organism were cultivated to prevent contamination in our reality, however further examination ceased when twin xeno-entities deposited the Atomic Axe into the hands of dubious sociopaths, criminals, mercenaries, and bounty hunters capable of harnessing its toxic energies to fuel their own personal agendas. The axe is current possessor is currently at large.

A footnote however, without protective armor, the Atomic Axe is likely to poison its next possessor.

Field reports show two different individuals wielding the Atomic Axe clashing with both Superman, Bat-Man and the current incarnation of the Blue Beetle.

It’s presumed where there is one axe, there is bound to be another. Forensic evidence, although some say speculation, has pointed towards two other super-powered axes that were deposited in our universe via xeno-technological means. An Ionic Axe capable of manipulating weather and lightning and a Solar Axe capable of hurling localized solar flares and manipulating gravity in a given area.

Powers: Device 15 – [Drawback: Noticeable Energy Field, Feats: Alternate Powers x7, Deflect 10 – Feats: Ricochet, Enhance Attribute: Fortitude Save 10 – Drawback: limited to radiation only, Bequeathed when grasped, Enhance Attribute: Strength 10 – Drawback: Bequeathed When grasped, Radiation Control 15 – Drawbacks: Toxic, Feats: Alternate Powers x4, - Environmental Control, Nauseate, Affects Insubstantial, Subtle, Extra: Disease - Radiation Sickness, Strike 12 – Extra: Cleave, Summon 12 – Drawback: Limited to the Atomic Axe] Power Packaging: All Linked

Base Cost: 4/R + 6
Prerequisites: None
Total Cost: [-95-] = [-190/2-]
- Based on the Unlimited Power Point Rule Variation

Atomic Axe
© DC Comics, 2007.

D20 Series - Grip of Death

2007-09-26T23:03:00.000-07:00

Electrocutioner

For the Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Edition Role-Playing Game

Real Name: Lester “Les” Buchinsky
Nationality: American
Alignment: Neutral Evil [Mercenary/Hit-Man]
Legal Status: Lester Buchinsky is an American citizen with criminal records in armed robbery, attempted murder, manslaughter, murder in the first and second degrees, extortion, racketeering, the use of unsanctioned meta-human abilities, resisting arrest, and unlawful flight to avoid prosecution
Group Affiliation: Suicide Squad, Sometime partner with the Cluemaster, Partner with Plastique
Base Power Level: [-09-] – Unlimited Power Level/Power Points

Attributes
Str: [-18-][+04]/[-22-][+06]
Int: [-12-][+01]
Wis: [-12-][+01]
Dex: [-16-][+03]
Con: [-20-][+05]
Cha: [-15-][+02]
Point Total: [-33-]

Saving Throws
Toughness: [+10]
Insight: [+04]
Will: [+04]
Reflex: [+06]
Fortitude: [+05]/[+08] vs. Electricity
Stability: [+03]
Point Total: [-14-]

Combat
Damage: [+04]/[+06]
Defense: [+08]
Grapple: [+08]
Initiative: [+08]
Melee Attack: [+08]
Range Attack: [+05]
Point Total: [-41-]

Skills
Acrobatic [+07], Climb [+08], Concentration [+08], Disable Device [+08], Escape Artist [+08], Gamble [+05], Intimidate [+08], Knowledge: Electrical Engineering [+06], Notice [+06], Profession: Electrical Engineer [+06], Repair [+07], Search [+06], Sense Motive [+06], Stealth [+07]
Points: [-17-][-Rank: 68-]

Feats
Acrobatic Bluff, All-Out Attack, Ambidexterity, Attack Specialization - Strike [+02], Defensive Attack, Defensive Roll [+01], Die Hard, Dodge Focus [+02], Evasion, Grappling Finesse, Improved Critical, Improved Disarm, Improved Grapple, Improved Initiative, Stunning Attack, Takedown Attack [+02]
Points: [-19-]

Powers
Electrical Control 04 [Drawback: Reduced Range -5ft, Feats: Alternate Powers x4, Drain Electricity, Electrical Aura, Redirect Energy, Stun, Flaw: Standard Action, Limited – Needs an open or available source of electricity]

Bio-Augmentation Package [Feats: Alternate Powers x4, Enhanced Strength 04, Enhanced Fortitude 03, Protection 06 – Drawback: tweaked bio-chemistry - saves vs. electrical attacks only, Super Strength 04 – Drawback: Lifting Strength only] Power Packaging: All Linked
Points: [-17-]

Weapons and Equipment
Other than his gauntlets and protective uniform, the Electrocutioner replies on no other weaponry and equipment. This, however, does no say he would another device or weapon in combat. The Electrocutioner is capable of improving when the need arises.

Device: Electro-Gauntlets 10 [Drawback: Noticeable, Reduced Range –1, Feats: Alternate powers x2, Blast 10, Strike 10, Flaws: Weak Point x1: Conductivity] Power Packaging: All Linked
Points: [-30-]

Villain Points: [-11-]
Total: [-171-]

Notes: Lester overly relies on his electrical abilities to defeat his enemies and assigned targets. The Electrocutioner prefers close-quarter combat to overpower his opponents then delivers a variable charge of electricity to either disable or eliminate his opponent.

Lester is a creative thinker, but more of a henchmen or partner. His skills and other cognitive attributes are geared towards improving his formidable martial arts or improving his electro-gauntlets. He is often seen partnered with other villains or criminals and lets the team-leader or criminal mastermind to planning and strategy. Lester prefers contract murder or mob-sanctioned hits to supplement his income, but in some circumstances, he has performed armored heists or larceny. Lester is a trained electrical engineer and through falsified identities obtains legal work in this field. Often, to get close to an intended hit. Lester is a mid-level inventor. He can easily replicate the design of his gauntlets, provided the correct materials and replacement parts.

Costumed heroes or other villains do not easily intimidate Lester. He is smart enough to know when he is out-classed.

Electrocutioner
© DC Comics, 2007.