What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement?

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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I've only had time to play a couple more turns of Colonization, but my plans are moving along smoothly. I'll have a Master Distiller coming back from Europe soon, and I plan to have him settle on top of a sugar-rich area so that I can make large quantities of rum to sell.

I finished The Avengers and have now started watching Vega$, a show from the late 1970s and early 1980s. Before Robert Urich was Spenser: For Hire, he was Las Vegas PI Dan Tanna. This show featured numerous celebrity guest stars, including Tony Curtis in a recurring role as Dan's landlord. Greg Morris (Barney from Mission: Impossible) plays his contact on the police force.

I'm finally making progress in House of Hell, and I've figured out what I need to do to win the game...mostly. I still need to find the password for a secret door I need to open later (and actually get there), but at least I know who has it.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by DrPeterson »

I downloaded Elder Sign:Omens on my tablet and have been playing that a lot.
It's cool and the animations make it more immersive than soloing it as a board game.

My wife got me Firefly the board game and it looks damn shiny! I've already played it on solo and it's really good. Varying degrees of difficulty, challenging assignments. Great gift!
"He said we were all cooked but we were all right as long as we did not know it. We were all cooked. The thing was not to recognize it."
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I love the Firefly board game! It's a lot of fun solo, and it's even better playing with other people.

There's a new Elder Sign expansion coming next year called Omens of Ice that appears to be based on that electronic expansion.

I found out the password I need in House of Hell. Now I just have to get into the secret room where the weapon I need to win is stored and make it to the endgame with it.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by Dave Syrinx »

I've been reading the End Time supplement for Call of Cthulhu and just now started a game here called 12 Hours.
I'm still busy tinkering with settlements in Fallout 4 and trying out a game called Hard West. It's similar to X-com.

I'll be taking a look at Cloverfield Lane 10, quite soon. Cool with a sequel to Cloverfield.
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I finally finished Ultima V, and now I'm learning how to play Civilization: Beyond Earth, which I plan to play before starting Ultima VI. I won the game of Civilization IV: Colonization some time ago, crushing the English in 1697 when they tried to thwart my independence. I've started a multiplayer PBEM game of the Civilization IV scenario The Road To War (Europe 1936). I'm playing the USA, and my friend is playing the USSR. Right now it's late 1937, and I'm zipping along in my tech research and improving my industry. The Republic of Spain is doing even worse than in the real history, as the Nationalists recently took Madrid.

I finished watching Game of Thrones Season 5 recently. I also saw the first episode of Season 6 last night as part of my cable provider's free Watchathon event (in addition to the first three episodes of Outlander Season 2). After I finish the GoT bonus materials, I plan to resume watching Breaking Bad Season 5.

I completed a bunch of Fighting Fantasy books, including House of Hell. Then I started making my way through The Way of The Tiger, a series of gamebooks where you play a ninja in the world of Orb. Tonight I've just started reading the final book in the series, Redeemer! (Book 7). This one is new, and it finally resolves a cliffhanger at the end of Book 6 from nearly thirty years ago.

I recently tried the Beyond the Veil expansion to The Cards of Cthulhu, which makes it much harder (and longer). I've failed three times in a row, when I've never lost at the base game. I've put it aside for a while and am now trying Warhammer Quest: Adventure Card Game. I easily beat the tutorial, but it'll be a little while before I have time to finish learning the rules and try the first real quest.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by kabukiman »

I have seen the movie "The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec". The beginning is screaming "Indiana Jones". The movie is a bit more comic than Indiana's movies, but I liked anyway (except the tennis game). It's pulp, with a lot of pseudo-science and adventures, before the WWI, perfect for a gas light adventure.
In baldur's gate: Throne of bhaal, I'm now int the chapter 9, and I had to kill a lot of drows (nasty evil elfs),
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I've heard of that movie, and it sounds good. I'd like to see it some time.

I'm still not done looking through the Civilopedia in Civilization Beyond Earth, but I hope to finally finish that and start a game this weekend. It's February 1938 in Civilization IV The Road to War. I've gotten pretty far in tech, but the Italians keep catching my spies before I can try to steal tech from them. I did have decent luck earlier stealing a tech from the Germans, though.

I finished Breaking Bad Season 5 and am now on Season 6, early in the third episode.

I completed Redeemer! with a new character, and now that I know a (relatively) safe way through it, I'm trying it with my character who has successfully completed Books 0-6 without dying. After that, I plan to read A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, a collection of three novellas George R. R. Martin wrote that take place about a hundred years before the events of A Song of Ice and Fire.

I haven't had time to play board games in the last week.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by Dave Syrinx »

Cool about the pre-Fire and Ice books.
I started reading Conquerer by Conn Iggulden.

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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I still haven't finished reading the Cviliopedia for Civlization Beyond Earth, but I'm getting very close. Next I have to read about tile improvements. While there are a lot of them, and a few have walls of text, most of them are pretty short. After that there's just affinities and stations, both of which are very short sections, and then I'll be ready to start (probably this weekend). The Road to War is up to June 1938, and I just finished researching the tech that will let me train code breakers. Then I need to make a beeline for heavy tanks. Unfortunately, my spies keep getting caught (one I sent to Germany was stumbled upon right after she stepped off of the submarine), so I'll have to research tank destroyers the hard way. Unfortunately, CIv IV started crashing on me today every time I tried to launch it, ever since my computer got automatic updates. Also, Civilization VI was just announced, with a release date of October 21, 2016, which I believe is the 25th anniversary of the original Civilization's release. Hooray! 8-)

I'm about two-thirds of the way done the final season of Breaking Bad. The last two episodes are extended, with scenes I never saw when they originally aired.

I completed Redeemer! with my character who has been through the entire series without dying. I got A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms from the library today, but I'm only a couple of pages in so far. Also, I heard that George R. R. Martin released a new sample chapter from The Winds of Winter (probably delayed to avoid spoiling something on the TV show), but I haven't had a chance to read it yet. I was lucky enough to see the first two episodes of the new season, and my theory about Jon Snow was confirmed.

I haven't had a chance to play any new board games in my collection, but last weekend I did play a few games I'd played before at my board game group and won them all, in spite of not having much sleep. First up was Flip City, a microdeckbuilder. I didn't even flip most of my cards, as I'd accumulated enough Central Parks to get the victory points I needed to win. Then we played the Game of Thrones board game. I was House Baratheon, and I allied with the Lannisters against the Greyjoys and Starks. My ally and I did very well, and our enemies did poorly. I was within a hair's breadth of winning when the Lannisters (of course) betrayed me, capturing a territory adjacent to King's Landing with a huge force poised to take it from me. Still, I was prepared for it, and I was able to counterattack and win the game because I attacked them first. Then we played Tiny Epic Kingdoms. I (barely) won as the Lizardfolk, using their special movement abilities to good effect.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by Dave Syrinx »

Checking back in. I started to watch Cinemax' 'Quarry' and I'm positively pleased. You follow the life as returning Vietnam soldier of two tours in -72. Well worth the watch. Dark and moody with great music.

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This fall also features BBC 'The Fall' with Gillian Anderson. Check it out!

'Z-Nation' on SyFy had a season 3 premiere abot a week ago. Haven't watched it yet but will tonight. In the same vein, 'Fear The Walking Dead' on AMC is running too. A series more ZA than its forerunner. Good times.

Next year, I'm expecting a great season of 'The Leftovers' (HBO).

If you like TV-series, check out my sig and drop me a line!
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I saw the season premiere of Z-Nation, but I won't spoil it. The show is probably intended to ride on The Walking Dead's coattails, but it is played more for laughs. I've also been watching Fear the Walking Dead (plus the original The Walking Dead, which starts its new season in about a month). I haven't seen any of the other ones you mentioned, but I'm looking forward to The Fall.

I won my game of Civilization Beyond Earth quite easily some time ago. I started on Dreamfall Chapters, but once I got to Propast in the middle of Chapter Two it stopped working right. There's just so much in that area that it takes forever to get anywhere on my desktop. It runs okay on my laptop - for a few minutes, and then it crashes every time. It's a shame, as it's a great game with interesting choices that have consequences. I won't be able to continue it until I get a new computer. I started playing Ultima VI for the first time in a very long time, and it's wonderful. I've explored almost half of the surface world so far and made some progress in liberating and restoring the shrines. My multiplayer game of Civ IV The Road to War fizzled out a few months ago in February 1939 when the other player disappeared.

I recently finished watching the British version of The Office, which I picked up in a sale for $3, and now I've started watching The Sandbaggers, a British series about Cold War espionage in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It's very gritty and realistic, showing the behind the scenes bureaucracy and politics as well as the actual spy action. I got that one on sale too.

I've been playing the Blood Sword gamebooks lately, and I'm almost done bringing my veteran character through Book 3: The Demon's Claw. I don't have the fourth one (Doomwalk) yet, and the fifth one hasn't yet been released. After this I'll probably resume the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks, starting with the second one in the Sorcery! series: Khare, Cityport of Traps.

I recently started playing Star Trek Frontiers, having done very well in the introductory scenario playing solo as General Martok, but I still have to read the full rulebook. I also played a four-player game of it as Cisco and won it. This game is very similar to Mage Knight, which is my favorite board game, but there are enough differences to make it something new.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by Dave Syrinx »

Z-Nation, let's forgive the quirky bits: baby z:s and whatnot. It's purely poetic in some of the shots and music composition. It delivers some stunning one-liners.

"The worst thing, is not to turn zombie or even die. The worst is to... survive."

"An explanation? It's the Z-apocalypse - roll with it!"


Yup, I liked the opening credits where we get reacquainted with the characters. I also like the feeling it had of almost being an RP reenactment, with shaky plots and carbon NPCs. Everything does not have to be perfect. The fact that I started to count who'd be added to the cast the last five minutes was fun for me. Z-nation is like life to me. Don't take it to serious.

Your take on it?
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I don't like Z-Nation as much as The Walking Dead, but I still find it entertaining. I'm still watching it, after all.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by Dave Syrinx »

Jonathan, do you have a Steam-account? I'd like to add you to my network of gamers.
And there are some great games to try out. Unturned is a Minecraftlike game set in the apocalypse. Just putting it out there.

Ta!
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The soul trembles before emptiness and desires contact at any price. Doctor Glass

"It is invigorating, being asked personal questions." "Makes one feel desired." Luv (BR2049)
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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Yes, I have a Steam account. The account name is the first letter of my first name followed by my last name, with no spaces. I have over 450 games on Steam, the vast majority of which I haven't played yet due to lack of time. I've never played Unturned (or Minecraft, for that matter).

My Ultima VI saved game got corrupted somehow. I was able to restore the game, but not to save it again. Every time I tried, the game would hang. A search turned up no sign of this error, but there is a similar one that is apparently common with Worlds of Ultima 2: Martian Dreams, which uses the same engine. Unfortunately, Ultima VI only has a single save slot which is overwritten every time, so there is no way to recover from this. I had to reinstall the game and start over, but I'm still less than halfway back to where i was before. This time I'm backing up the saved game folder frequently so that I don't lose too much progress if it happens again. This never happened when I played it before back in the 90s, so it must be rare. I think what might have caused it was that shortly before I had used a crystal ball to look at a random set of coordinates, which happened to be in the sea. The bug in Martian Dreams can happen by visiting a certain area in that game, but that area is more frequently visited and also very close to the beginning of the game.

I'm almost halfway through The Sandbaggers, which is really excellent. It ran from 1978-80 and was cancelled after series creator Ian Mackintosh mysteriously disappeared. Maybe he knew too much. He certainly seemed to know a lot about the inner workings of the intelligence apparatus, going by what was shown in the series.

I finished Blood Sword 3 and have started on Sorcery! 2. I'm trying it out with a new character to find a safe route through it before I risk one that has been through the first book. The character I rolled up has cruddy Skill, so I'm mainly using him to test the waters. I've still managed to explore a lot even though I'm not making a whole lot of progress in finding out how to actually get out of Khare. Right now I'm wandering around the sewers, which I got dumped into, and I'm now nearly dead after a run-in with a Slime Eater. Hopefully I can explore a bit more before I kick it.

I still haven't had time to play any more solo board games, but I might over the next week, as I've come down with something and won't be able to work this week. However, I may be too incapacitated for it. So far it's not too bad, but it's bound to get worse.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by Dave Syrinx »

Expect an invite from DaveSyrinx 8-)
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I've gotten caught up to the point where my save game got corrupted and gone a little beyond it, having now explored the mainland without encountering the game-breaking bug again. There are still some more places I need to visit on islands, plus a bunch of dungeons I'll probably need to explore sooner or later. Half of the shrines have been liberated.

I'm about 3/4 of the way through watching The Sandbaggers, which is still great.

I've mapped out most of the optimal route through Sorcery! 2, and I have two of the four lines of the spell I need to get out of the city and successfully complete the adventure, plus I know where to find one of the others.

I've finally had time to start reading the full rulebook of Star Trek Frontiers, and when that's done I plan to play the full version of the game.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by kabukiman »

I am still playing Baldur's gate 2. I'm now in the chapter 9; I killed two dragons (with the spell "stop time" the game is a bit easier) and 3 favored ones of the god cymric. I need now to enter in the monastery to end chapter 9 (there will be one more chapter after that).
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

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I still never got around to finishing Baldur's Gate 1. Time Stop spells are very useful in any game. I needed those to get through the endgame in Ultima V, where there are two nasty rooms in a row, one with a bunch of dragons in it. I've made great progress in Ultima VI. There was a scare that I'd lose my new save when my computer's power supply died, but I was able to get it replaced and working again quickly. I have about half of a treasure map I need to find the other piece of the silver tablet that will let me translate the gargoyle language, and I know where to find most of the other pieces. My next stop is Dungeon Shame, where one of the pirates with a piece of the map lost it. The game's on hold right now while I'm in London. I copied the save and installed the game on my laptop, but I haven't had time to play here.

I finished The Sandbaggers and started watching Upstairs, Downstairs, which is excellent. I've completed the first season and just barely started watching the first episode of Season 2 before I left.

I completed Sorcery! 2 with both a new warrior and new wizard, and then did it with my veteran warrior and wizard who had made it through the first book. Somehow my experienced wizard barely made it through the second book, even though I only had a Skill of 6. I then started Trial of Champions and got almost to the end when a wrong choice of direction with no real information telling me it was wrong got me killed, but I'm pretty sure I can beat it. I left it at home, though. In London, I found two books in the big Waterstone's on Piccadilly that I bought. One is a new Doctor Who interactive book, Night of the Kraken, which I successfully completed on my first attempt. Now I've started reading Life's Lottery by Kim Newman, which is an interactive book written for grownups. I'd been searching for it for ages but never found it until now. It had been misshelved in the Horror section with Kim Newman's Anno Dracula books, and I just happened to see it. I've barely started reading it, and I've just been born. Thankfully I was not stillborn, but there was less than 1 in 2500 chance of that. Even if I had died at the outset, starting again would have been easy.

I read the full rulebook for Star Trek Frontiers, but I didn't have time to play it before I left.
Doctor Who/CoC Campaign:
(viewforum.php?f=176)The Terror Out of Time
(viewforum.php?f=191)]The Ninth Planet
The Shadow Over Dunwich
The Brotherhood of Death
The Horror in the Blackout
The Masque of Nyarlathotep
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Re: What´s my/your current reading/viewing/playing amusement

Post by carnage_lee »

As some of you know, I've been working on 'The Dhole's House' for just over a year, it's finally going to be released on the 31st!

The Dhole's House is an on-line tool-kit for both players and keepers of Call of Cthulhu. The core of the site are character/investigator generators for 6th and 7th edition investigators, ending up with downloadable PDF character sheets. Characters that are created can be updated via a 'character control panel' allowing SAN, HP, LUCK (etc.) stats to be adjusted in relation to game events (keeping the character sheet updated).

There's also a library of NPC/Investigators that are freely downloadable as PDF's - site members can add to the library.

There's a small section of 'tools' (dice roller and name generator) and another section of handouts/props (telegrams (3 designs), calling cards, newspaper clippings, calendars).

Mike Mason gave the green light to this earlier in the year and we had a good chat about things at the YSDC games day back in September. Going live on 31st, there will be an official announcement next week in 'Ab Chaos' the Chaoisum newsletter.

You're all more than welcome to peruse the beta site (I know some of you already have).
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