Brass Clad Cyborgs With Guns

I started my story about Traith Harris when I was in the midst of Stephen King's The Dark Tower series. So yeah, Traith and his dual revolers and his duster and boots and constant smoking is definitely channeling Roland Deschain. The fact that he is a cop could I suppose be taken as a nod at Roland as well, although Roland is technically a knight. Knight, cop, they're close enough in my book. Traith's odd speech patterns, while not a direct rip off, is definietly influenced by the way King wrote Roland's dialogue. That's where it stops though, I think. I'm sure if Tony read my Traith stuff he could point something else. Right now Traith only has a brass ribcage and spine (at some point I intend on an enemy busting his fist to pieces against Traith's chest). Eventually he ends up with a boiler in his gut powering his various mechanical bits. I know his eyes are mechanical (how I pull that off is something I am incredibly interested to see), both arms are as well, and through my writing I have implied that at least part of his legs are mechanical though I have not explicitly said so. I know a large portion of his skull is metal as is his jaw, how that happens has not been decided yet. So that is Traith at the moment and in the future. The future is only relevant because the story is written as kind of a memory, so we already know how he ends up.

I've had some trouble writing him lately. For a while I was bouncing back between Traith and Cromm (the main character of the book I finished) and I sort of kicked into overdrive with Cromm to finish it and Traith kind of fell to the wayside as I finished with Cromm, started a sequel to Cromm's story, then wandered into the realm of the ridiculous as I picked up my story about a pyrokinetic named James. While I love James' attitude and mental state and find a few bits of the story to be some of my best writing, it is an awful story that can't seem to go anywhere. Hang on a sec, this is about Traith, not James.

Traith. I've had some trouble writing him. Like I get stuck in between what I call "scenes." I'm not sure if that's an actual term for it but its how I refer to it. I start at point/scene A and have an intent to get to B, but on the way to B I kind of meander with my writing. Or I keep B in my head and think about it on a daily basis, but a week will pass before I physically write something out on my laptop or a notebook. I guess its good that I have a clear picture of the next "scene" and how it affects the plot but I sometimes wish I was back to writing four hours every day like when I was writing that Norse-themed serial (which also took place in my DnD world). But I wasn't DMing then, or painting, or working out, or watching quite so many TV shows on a weekly basis. I guess I just had more free time then.

That's part of the purpose of this blog though. To break my hobbies down and kind of talk about them to keep me focused on persuing them. Something is always rattling around in my skull as far as writing so this is a convenient place to stow the kernel of an idea until I can put the proverbial pen to paper. Proverbial pen to paper, that works, right?

Music: Nobody's Hero - Rush

Shit Kicker...Prime

Ok, to explain this ridiculous image I found in my head tonight I first have to explain a few things. Just as a warning, its not even that funny. Anyway.

I have always liked the idea of Warforged in DnD, basically mini-golems or fantasy robots first appearing in the Eberron campaign setting. Now, I put them in my current campaign but I wanted to do something other than rip them off blatantly. There is a race of undead in my campaign known as the Fallen, as in The Fallen Empire of Man. They cannot actually die, you can turn them to ash and cut off their heads and such but they don't die per se. There is always a little bit of residual...unlife I guess, left in their bodies or remains or whatever is actually left. Their race is dying out because they have no way to create more of themselves (fully sentient undead), so they created something called the soulless to fill in the ranks of their ever shrinking armies. Soulless are Warforged, what differs is the creation process and the aesthetic. The warforged are smooth and well designed and very human-like, the soulless are basically bolted together plates of metal covered in rivets and weld marks and rust. They appear humanoid, but they are very clearly metal monstrosities covered in spikes and jagged metal. Their creation involves taking the ashes of "dead" Fallen and enclosing them in the metal frame of a soulless and using arcane rituals to fuse their power to the metal shell. The ashes basically become the soulless' "blood" and animating force. What it amounts to is cramming six or seven undead personalities together into a metal body and hoping everything works out alright. It's actually kind of neat, my fluff has the personalities occasionally causing the soulless to blurt out their (the personalities) thoughts or do something they want. It also has what I consider a neat side effect that makes the soulless sound like a bunch of people are saying the same thing slightly out of time with one another whenever it talks.

Now, next part of the set up. Back when we played d20 Modern Shadow Chasers the group was a paranormal detective agency specializing in the killing of magical creatures and whatnot. Eventually it was decided that they needed transportation so I gave them a battered Dodge (I think) van from the 80s. It was dubbed "Shitkicker #1" (there was going to be a fleet) and a bat-winged penis was drawn on the hood, as is the standard procedure in such situations. I vaguely remember them running over a troll or something with it.

Final bit here. I was doing research for my campaign on steam wagons and I came across a picture of a decent looking one. I immediately began writing an email to Jeremy regarding my ideas for Shitkicker Mark 000. Then I had a sudden image of a soulless built in the shape of a steam wagon with a ranger-esque Jeremy character atop it with a rifle in hand and the soulless bellowing "Roll out!" and mowing down a horde of goblins, and that is how I came up with Shitkicker Prime. That image had me giggling like an idiot for a good five minutes.

Music: Set Fire To The Face On Fire - Blood Brothers

Robust (Obviously)

Steve isn't my actual name, but it is something I've always gone by when I don't use my real name. so I guess it is a name I've given myself. Anyway, this isn't really a blog about my life, its about my hobbies. I've recently found myself somewhat daunted be the sheer volume of hobbies I currently possess, plus I work full-time, am engaged, and planning a wedding. The purpose of this blog is to kind of talk to myself, or any who feel like stopping by, and sort of keep myself motivated. So I guess I'll start off with a breakdown of what I occupy my time with.

Dungeons and Dragons
This is currently my real joy right now as far as hobbies go. I've been playing this game for...fourteen years on and off now and for the first time ever I am DMing and gaming as a PC at the same time. Two different campaigns are being run in our group right now, there is so much Geek Pheremone in the air that I might choke and die. Eric is running a campaign and it seems interesting. Mixes fantasy with end of the world apocalyptic type shit. I think it has potential but Eric is kind of a beginner when it comes to DMing (he's done it before a few times, but it never goes for very long) and I'm concerned that if it doesn't go perfectly he's going to get discouraged and quit, which would infuriate me. I can count the number of times I've played as a PC in the past fourrteen years on the fingers of one hand, and I can still pick my nose and give a thumbs up with what I have left over. I'm playing a warforged fighter and it should be an interesting time. I am extremely excited about running my own campaign. I have a lot of neat shit stuffed into it that I'm hoping the players will wander around and discover. I'm looking forward to throwing a lot of ridiculously impossible steampunk gadgetry into the game. I just came up with something called a Non-Ferrous Reverse Polarity Field Generator. I think it repels bullets.

Reading
I read quite a bit, mostly fantasy and sci-fi and the occasional foray into regular fiction. My favorite authors would have to be Roger Zelazny, Michael Moorcock, Chuck Palahniuk, Robert E. Howard, Brandon Sanderson, Michael Swanwick, Dan Abnett and apparently Cory Doctorow. I just started listening to the Cory Doctorow podcast in which he read his books and I find them to be quite awesome. Right now I'm reading a Warhammer 40,000 novel that is a collection of stories from the Horus Heresy. So far its decent, nothing particularly awesome has shown up as of yet but it is always an enjoyable experience to read about the Heresy. My next read is going to be The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. Should be an interesting read, its about Charles Babbage and his mechanical computers and what if they had actually worked back then and changed the course of the computer industry. After that is a biography of Nikola Tesla. I've been kind of fascinated by this guy and his inventions since I saw him in The Prestige played by David Bowie, who is awesome.

TV/Movies
I suppose everyone likes TV and movies and whatnot, otherwise actors would not make quite so much money I guess. That said, I watch a lot of fucking TV and movies. A list of my favorite movies because lists are apparently the trend of this first post: Alien, The Departed, Die Hard(s), Predator, The Prestige, Zoolander...nevermind. A shorter list would be a list of movies I don't like. I love cinematic adventures. My three favorite TV shows right now (despite the fact that they are all currently between seasons) are Burn Notice, Dexter, and Doctor Who. Glorious stuff. Dexter because the premise is utterly brilliant, as is Michael C. Hall's acting. Burn Notice for too many reasons to list. Doctor Who because its Doctor Who, and David Tennant is just as great an actor as Michael C. Hall.

Video Games
I have a PC (obviously), an Xbox 360, and a PS2. Currently I'm playing Fallout 3 and the Broken Steel DLC. I would say Fallout 3 is just about my favorite game for 360 and probably...my third favorite video game of all time. The first is Planescape: Torment because, shit, because its awesome. You play an undying creature that is basically an indestructible mass of scars. Plus, the game can actually be beaten with words instead of blades. Second favorite is Disgaea for PS2 because of its insane level of overcomplication and its quirky and loveable sense of humor. Plus, demonic knife-wielding penguings.

Warhammer 40k
I play Warhammer 40k, a miniatures wargame. I say "play" when I really mean paint and fiddle with Excel spreadsheets of point values and wargear lists. I have two armies in the works right now, Iron Warriors (Chaos Space Marines) and Lamenters (Loyalist Space Marines). I work on a squad at a time and sort of alternate between each army. I only really work on them once a week, but I think that's ok because I am apparently the only one who paints anything anymore. Not that it matters, I like painting the minis and its kind of a nice way to spend a morning. I'm a fan of the Iron Warriors because they are so bitter and angry and all they have left is the Long War. Plus they're helmets are cool. Lamenters rock because they are badass. Not only did they basically get fed into the face of a Tyranid fleet, but they survived it. Plus they're chapter symbol is a heart and I think that's neat.

Writing
I write. I've finished one story which I've sent out to most of my friends to read. Despite giving it to them over eight months ago, no one has really responded with anything about it which is actually really depressing. Right now I'm working on another one, about 21 thousand words in. The story kind of has, I dunno, have you ever heard the song Identity Crisis by Alice Cooper? Yeah, its kind of like that. It kind of flows back and forth between steampunk and western and definite fantasy elements. Its also set in the world where my DnD campaign is taking place.

Music: Bowie To Bowie - Flight of the Conchords