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DND Talk: Give the Deck of Many Things Early

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In an earlier post I talked about the use of a D20 while writing. But let’s talk about DND in general. Think of me pulling up a chair, turning it around and sitting on it. Let’s rap, kids.

What is the Deck of Many Things? It’s a rare magical item in DND that allows the user to pull a number of cards that they announce to the table. These cards have a wide variety of uses such as giving you a rare magical item, summoning an avatar of death to kill your character or just making them disappear completely to giving them the ability to cast the wish spell. Each card can be a campaign changer. But hey, so can every roll.

And that’s why I think you should give it to them early. Usually, I’ve seen people give the deck when their players are about to hit double digit levels. Mostly, I think to make sure that they can defeat the avatar of death if they pull that card. I think that’s cowardice. I think that you should hand it to them early and see what they do with it.

I gave it to my players in the current campaign at level 6 or so. The person who has it, is known for big moves. She’s pulled three cards. One got her a fighter that is having an existential crisis over being born and having no past. The other did summon the avatar of death, which she one shotted with a very lucky roll. She pulled the void card, which saw her soul ripped from her body and we had a lot of fun with that too. The final was the gem card, which saw money become irrelevant to their game.

I think that it was a net success. Sure, the gem card offset the economy for my game but how much was it really going to change? Why would I want my players to be poor forever? It just gives them different strategies to use.

The fight with the avatar of death was just funny in universe because she summoned this monster and killed it in the middle of a marketplace.

Giving them this deck early gives them the chance to screw themselves over in so many ways. It opens up interesting paths and that’s the important thing. So, hand them that or the wonderful bag of magic beans and have some fun.

Hell, why not both?

Watch the Throne: The Girl King by Mimi Yu and Sisters of the Snake by Sarena and Sasha Nanua Reviews

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I happened to take both of these books out of the library at the same time. I didn’t realize in the moment that I was following a theme until I started reading them. Both of them deal with a pair of royal sisters in unique scenarios trying to maintain their control over their kingdoms.

Well, in Sisters of the Snake, they’re not both royalty. One of them is a street thief trying to survive. When she breaks into the palace to steal the royal jewelry on her way out of town, she discovers that her and her twin sister were separated at birth. The two of them decide to princess and the pauper it, with the princess sister heading out into the wilds to find magic and save her country. Meanwhile, her twin has to start learning about court intrigue. From there, the two go on an amazing adventure.

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Meanwhile, in The Girl King, Lu is set to inherit the throne and become the first female empress. She finds out that her father has betrayed her and she is forced to flee into the wilds with a young man who has had his family betrayed by the very country she’s trying to save. The other sister, Min, is left behind forced into a marriage that Lu ran away from. Discovering a magic all her own and possibly becoming a new threat to her sister.

While both of these books are similar in their concept, they couldn’t be any more different in their execution. They actually are somewhat inverses of one another, with the more street wise sister having to learn courtly graces in Sisters of the Snake while the more versatile, stronger sister is in the wilds in the Girl King.

Either way both of them were highly enjoyable reads. I don’t want to give too much away but I would like to make sure you go pick them up. I can’t wait to read their sequels, Daughters of the Dawn by the Nanua sisters and Empress of Flames by Yu.

Challenge: How Many Names Can I Think Up For a Good Will Hunting Sequel in Five Minutes

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Good Will Hunting 2: Electric Boogaloo
Good Will Hunting 2: The Revenge of Whatever Robin Williams’ Character’s Name Was
Good Will Hunting 2: The Awkward Reunion Cause the Love Interest Moved On
Good Will Hunting 2: Never Stop Hunting
Good Will Hunting 2: Always Hunting
Good Will Hunting 2: Math Problems Are Unsurprisingly Super Boring
Good Will Hunting 2: The Hunt For Will Hunting
Good Will Hunting 2: Let’s Get Ben Affleck’s Character Out of Jail
Good Will Hunting 2: The Revenge of the Revenge
Good Will Hunting 2: I Like Apples Okay
Good Will Hunting 2: Hunt Harder
Good Will Hunting 2: A Good Day to Hunt
Good Will Hunting 2: Hunt Free or Hunt Hard
Good Will Hunting 2: Hunt Hunt Hunt
Good Will Hunting 2: You’re Still Kind of An Asshole, Will Hunting
Good Will Hunting 2: Will Hunting Meets the Guy From a Beautiful Mind and Shit Goes Wrong
Good Will Hunting 2: More Oscar Bait
Good Will Hunting 2: Will Hunting Cries More
Good Will Hunting 2: Other Best Parts of Ben Affleck’s Day
Good Will Hunting 2: Actual Hunting
Good Will Hunting 2: The Robin Williams and Casey Affleck Rap Battle We Were Never Supposed to See

Angel

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When I was growing up there was a girl that lived down the street.  We met in the usual way, our parents holding our hands talking to one another while we stared bug-eyed and apprehensive, slightly obscured by their hips.  The exact memories of those early days have left me but I still remember the feelings.  Warmth and kindness beyond measure.  Secrets that I was sworn to keep but were forgotten as the days turned to months and eventually years.  I never told anyone.  

As we became teenagers, she became a handsome young woman.  Hard for me to define her looks as such because they never mattered much to me.  I never thought of her in that manner.  We loved one another deeply but we weren’t in love because that one seemed too flimsy and easily broken.  A passing fancy at best, a distraction from our dull daily routines at worst.

What stood out most to me about her was her kindness and that despite the fact that I had been there through every moment of her life, there was something I never knew about her.  Something that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.  I couldn’t put a word to it at no matter how many hours we spent together.  No one else noticed it.  They loved her just the same as I did.  She never had a bad word for anyone and was always helpful.  

I remember asking her how she did it.  She laughed and said she just did.  I asked her if she was an angel.  She laughed again, a sound akin to Christmas bells and asked “Well then where are my wings?” 

It would be a year later when she left with her family.  I never saw her again and though I acquitted myself admirably at our parting, I still feel like there’s more that needs to be said.  I still turn to her sometimes.  It might be easier if I could hate her for the emptiness in my heart but I can’t.  

It’s my twenty-first birthday today and seven long white feathers have arrived in the mail for me. 

4 Ways to Know That Your Partner Loves Drama Despite Saying They Don’t

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1.  They say “I hate drama.”

This is a pretty obvious one.  Mostly because anyone who can recognize drama and calls it by this name, loves it and wants to bathe in it. Normal people just refer to it as stupid bullshit.

2.  They teach drama courses at the local community college

YOU REALLY SHOULD HAVE PICKED UP ON THIS ONE SOONER.

3. They make you wear a Matt Dillon mask

It tells you that their feelings for you are waning… until the last step

4.  They call out drama while doing the deed…

It’s over.

Why I Love This- Earthbound

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Why I Love This, is a series where I talk about the reasons I love certain books, movies, video games and songs.

For those in the know, the Super Nintendo was a golden age for the JRPG. Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy IV-VI, Secret of Mana, Breath of Fire I and 2, Terranigma and so many others. They all had a kind of medieval swords and sorcery vibe to them but then there was one that was so different, so weird and it was known as Earthbound.

Just look at that. You have no idea what’s going on if you didn’t already play it. While most games start you in villages or towns and you already have a sword on you, Earthbound starts with the young man in the striped shirt and hat in a bed at his house. He’s a kid and his next door neighbor is telling him that meteorite landed nearby. That they need to go check it out.

And that starts an adventure that has the following in it: a cult devoted to the color blue, a blues band that plays so loud that they can chase ghosts away, a town beset by zombies led by their leader Master Belch(pictured below), cosmic horrors beyond space time, helping a tribe of cave people with a book called overcoming shyness and so much more.

The game is vibrant and fun and beautiful. The whole thing feels like a little kid drew it and is writing the story, taking it wherever their imagination leads him. You don’t drink potions to heal instead whorffing down hamburgers and fries and things like that. Your enemies include living traffic lights, fire hydrants, hippies, businessmen and alien horrors. It’s so unique and wonderful and easy to pick up.

This game has influenced my writing since I played it. While there’s a part of me that will always love settings like those from Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones but I have a soft spot for urban fantasy like the Dresden Files. I think there’s something about living in a modern area with magic or powers makes everything so much more interesting because how would someone drive away from a dragon in their Kia Sorrento? Earthbound scratches that itch.

You’re just a kid trying to save the world with a baseball bat and your friends and psychic powers. It also fills the wanderlust in me by having you travel across the world. Heading to cities, deserts, pyramids and swamps.

There’s also a darker story underneath all the bright colors and pastels if you’re willing to look into it. I won’t spoil it here but I think that you should check out both the game and lore.

The game is silly and joyful and I think you should play it.

THAT One Dream: The Trifecta

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Everyone’s had that dream that you show up to a class that you’ve never been there before or you’re late for a big test or you’re in class but you’re not wearing any clothes.  What about the trifecta?  You show up to a class late, not wearing pants and you haven’t been there the entire year.  That would be the worst.

But what about the other people in that class?  What are they thinking?

“This idiot doesn’t show up all year but they still show up for the final exam?  How did they know it was today if they’ve never been here?  But they show up for it late.  Not wearing pants.  You were fifteen minutes late and you couldn’t even put on a goddamn pair of pants.  How dare you.  Do you know how hard we all worked in this class.  Go fuck yourself.”

How Many Celebrities’ Names Become a Lot Funnier When You Change the First Letters of Their First and Last Names to B’s

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Bugh Baurie

Bill Burray

Bonan B’Brien 

Bcarlett Bohanssen

Banny Bexbang

Bhanning Batum

Bon Bon Bovi

Btevie Bonder

Bustin Bieber

Bhris Bvans

Byan Bosling 

Budrey Bepburn 

Bavid Beckham

Beck

Bruce Bampbell

Bllen Begeneres 

Bdras Blba 

Bon Beremy

Blivia Blaina Bay

Bamela Bnderson

Bera Batrick

Bdam Best

Billy Brystal

Botorious B. I. G

Bce Bube

Bicki Binaj

Biley Byrus

Barmen Blectra

Belena Bomez

Baylor Bwift

Bhostface Biller

Ble Birty Bastard

BZA 

BZA

Big Baby Besus

Bim Bardashian 

Baris Bilton 

Bindsay Bohan

Bmanda Beyfreid

Br. Bre

Bohnny Bash

Bwayne “The Bock” Bohnson
Bltimate Barrior
Bideo Bujima

Burt Bobain

Now please say in the comments at what point this post became not funny or add your own!  Thank you.