Mission

To the people typing/imaginary gaming. D&D is all played in your head, with dice and on pieces of paper. Chat rooms and forums are similar, only it's all played in ether-space. It sort of reminds me of the Mad Magazine parody of Hart to Hart (for those of you who remember that - er, remember the show, not Mad Magazine): "Did you ever wonder what the wealthy, suave, beautiful people do besides hustle designer jeans on TV? Well they spend most of their time partying, travelling, talking about sex, quipping unfunny one-liners and getting involved in murder!" Hmm. Come to think of it, that description applies to most of my AD&D adventures (Well, except for the "talking about sex" part. We didn't have the advantage of the new manual.)

I suppose they have to compete with things like on-line forums and chat rooms for the absurd imaginary sex market... So what do you use twenty sided dice for? (I'm not even going to ask about the 12-sided die...)

Eh, that's the great thing about the old RPGs; you can follow any set of rules you like. I bet you only had 6-sided dice charts, too.

Shouldn't you have posted this in Rabble Rousing?

Oh, yes. Anything for science!

There are still folks out there playing? All my fellow AD&D campaigners married, moved away or became socialists. *Sigh* Now the big thing in this realm seems to be minitures gaming or card games. I don't much care for them.

Now hold on a second...I don't think I ever said kids were bad (well, they're not always bad, only sometimes). [Er, this is from an email conversation, folks.] I believe said they're not what I want in my life. Kids add elements C&D to your life... chaos and drama. Don't need 'em, don't want 'em. _______________ "I'm a quiet living man, who prefers to spend the evening in the silence of his room, who likes an atmosphere as restful as an undiscovered tomb, A pensive man am I, of philosophical joys, who likes to meditate, contemplate, far for humanities mad inhuman noise, A quiet living man..." -the wise Professor Higgins

Uno is a fine game for campouts. (Of course, when I camped, we used to play AD&D...) I always liked Mille Bornes a little better than Uno, though. It has more strategy to it. And it has vehicles on the cards. Risk is a great board game. I loved to play Risk when I was a kid.

You broke her. From my examination of the device, it was just a plastic plate and a little off-center round thing. (My sister had one of these.)

What?! Like CaptainCiaran, I think it's fascinating. I think you can tell a lot about some people by the name they choose and the reason they chose it. In fact, I have probably asked this question on just about every board I've hung around. Very interesting, like a story unto itself. This board has some of the most fascinating histories behind user names I have ever seen. Probably due, in part, to the fact that many people here are re-enactors with vivid backstories. I find Duchess' explanation quite fascinating, cleverly invented at the young age of 10. (I love plays on words that have multiple layers.)

Sexy Bratz, Malls, Mini-Coopers and Karaoke... Don't you see...? It's Gwen Stefani we have to blame for this!

But I have! Nothing but jams and flip flops...(have to protect my diabetic feet, see...) It really wasn't that much better than with shirt and socks as I recall. Just a little cooler. I once stood at the stern of a boat going from Fort Jefferson to Stock Island as it plowed through mighty waves and wind while kicking up a tremendous sea spray. It was too cool for no shoes, no shirt, no problems... but what a trip! (I was coated in salt by the end of it.)

From the Philosophy Shoppe post... You know, I almost became both a Monk and a Padre at different times in my life...however, Mission has nothing whatsoever to do with that. It's all about a misspelling... When I joined another pirate site, I was trying to think of a good handle. I usually use MarkCK, but I wanted something more appropriate. So I chose one of my favorite pirates from the General History... Captain Misson. At one time in my life, his story fascinated me because he and ex-Padre Caraccioli were philosophers who practiced an ideology with zeal. (An ideology I have since come to personally recognize as being flawed at the core... No, that's not right...humans are flawed at the core or the ideology would be wonderful. However, since it was not useful here, I abandoned the ideology.) Anyhow, when I joined the other site, I wasn't sure how to spell Caraccioli, so I chose Misson. (I dropped the 'Captain'. Nothing so regal for me, thanks. I'm naught but a humble pirate.) Except I later discovered I didn't know how to spell that either. But it stuck and I carried it over so those who knew me at the other site would know me here as well. That's the second time a misspelled name has become a facet of my life. I try so hard, too...

Oho! Someone in the crew has surplanted Barbossa in Bess' affections! This is the second such reference I've seen... At least he has a really good sense of humor from the voiceovers. (He may be worthy of you. ) Mattel has done some fancy footwork with Barbie to try and keep her current with the Bratz line. Bratz were definitely eating Barbie's lunch from what I read in the WSJ a year ago. However, I agree that they look slutty. (That was sort of my point above. If I had a point...)

While I agree with you, this trend is rampant and long-standing. Witness: This from the post on pirate figures... Patently ridiculous things like this: The mermaid grasping a pirate flag from www.faeryshop.com (which is closed or I'd link to it). Jenna Jameson, Alex Dane, Asia Carrera and Gwen Stefani and crew as pirates (from various posts on this board) This female pirate in fishnet and corset nonsense goes back even further than that. You can trace it all the way back to bare-chested piratess images from the 17th or 18th century! I could go on and on, but that threatens to overstate my point. Prurient images of anatomically impossible female pirates definitely pre-dates the Bratz dolls. ______ "May I request something to wear, or will it be bare breasts and ankles all the way?"

I was watching my favorite cable channel (Cartoon Network, natch. ) and I saw an advert for a new line of Bratz dolls called Bratz Treasures. Apparently piracy has finally graduated from the realm of die hard re-enactors and 8 year old boys to the realm of Tweener girls. Or maybe it's just that Orlando Bloom and Gwen Stefani have done turns as pirates and the impressionable idol-worshipping crowd's interest has been caught.

While I don't miss Role Playing games, I sure liked to plan them out. I was the default Dungeon Master because I so enjoyed setting adventures up. I created a whole story arc for a group... I wrote up one of the adventures in publishable form - it was set in a castle overrun with gremlins and the undead (I even created the gremlin monster complete with line art, stats and behavior patterns).

Many people's user names are pretty straight-forward, but some of them appear to have some history or other meaning behind them. So what does your user name mean? (Fancy, I expect full disclosure from you. )

I wonder if they'll use that logo for the upcoming movie or if it's just a teaser logo hastily assembled for this promotion? It's a neat logo. Isn't it interesting that they chose Depp's character to be the skeletal logo for the original teaser campaign and now for this promotion when he spends so little time as a skeleton in the first movie? It says something about the importance and centrality of his character to the series methinks.

Until what?

Um...out of politeness for those who don't want to know...you should really leave info about the upcoming movie out of the title. You should also put *Spoiler* or *potential spoiler* somewhere in your title. For an example, see POTC 2&3 Rumors, none verified - where this very bit of info has actually already been discussed at least twice.

I used to like a game that was basically asteroids, except you had two ships tied together by a link. It was called Space Duel. When one of the ships got hit, it would blow up and then the link would turn into a fuse. You could fire off a few shots with the other ship before it blew up. That was fun. The other cool game I remember was Mappy. I liked it because I learned the patterns while in junior college. What catchy music...

Yeah, I wondered about that too. At least they had the one gift shop. (Expensive place, though. One T was worth adding to my collection, but there were two others I liked that I just couldn't see spending the money on.) The show is typical Vegas glitz, fluff and skin. The, er, "storyline" was just plain silly, but it was neat to see a pirate show complete with ships, faux cannon fire and pirate costumes. (It's fun and it's free. How can you argue with that? Well, maybe if you're one of those folks who hang in Captain Twill and worry that your breeches are not made of true-to-period cotton. It wasn't anything close to being true to the period... )

I was in Las Vegas in November and made it a point to check out the Treasure Island casino. They had this free show in front of the casino that was pretty cool. It involved a moving ship, pyrotechnics and a bunch of lusty guys hungering for a crew of piratess "sirens" on another ship. Even more amazing...it was about 35º and the guys on the moving pirate ship had the unenviable task of jumping into the water and swimming about 30 yards or so to the Siren Ship. And then they got out of the water and had to do their act soaking wet! (I hope they're paid well...) Of course, the casino was the same old, same old (I don't gamble so casinos all seem to look the same to me), but I bought a really cool T-shirt. I know this will really shock everyone - it was a skeleton in raggedy pirate togs complete with shoulder parrot holding a sword in one hand and a royal flush in the other. If you're ever in Vegas, it's definitely worth a looksee.