Dork&Beans

Good day to you all. I finally got the opportunity to go to the theatre, and to drag my wife to another summer blockbuster. AntMan and the Wasp was really worthwhile, I'd highly recommend checking it out. It's so nice to be able to laugh (and not sweat and grip my seat) in a Marvel movie, since watching Infinity War was emotionally exhaustive (the first time anyway). Okay, every time.

It's also come to light that Ben Affleck is increasingly displeased with his involvement as Batman, and now we all have to go back to worrying about if they're going to replace him, and if it'll be a lateral move. I'm a huge fan of Batfleck, so this was troubling to hear for sure. But I've been looking into it and discussing the matter with some folks, and there's some worthwhile theories and speculations cropping up. Hopefully he doesn't go too far from the project, it was nice having an actual fan of the characters filling in the role. Fingers crossed for the future guys.

More good stuff coming soon, though summer bike riding has been a hinderance to this process (which is probably a good thing). Take it easy out there people, only a few weeks of this 2018 summer left.

Oh, and hi mom.

Ahoy hoy! So I do need to catch up on my spook content levels, so I'm going to lay down two of my all time favourite "horror" films. I think my choices here deviate a little outside of the Friday the 13th contenders that make everyone's shortlist. What We Do In The Shadows is an absolute delight, a dark and twisted interview with vampires. But the gentle touch from Taika Waititi makes it funny as hell if that's your cup of tea. Cabin in the Woods is fantastic as well, the most horror tropes and cliches in one film, but man does it work. This love letter to the genre is tight, and hits all the marks with humour, gore, jump-scares, b grade horror nudity, horror monsters and more. 

I recently got through to my wife to sit down and watch Avatar the Last Air Bender, and obviously she loves it. But this is my umpteenth watch through, so I'm looking at it a little more closely. Fuck do I love this show, and it ages like George Clooney, animation still looking sharp now. The story goes from lighthearted adventuring to looming battles, genocides and subtle subtexts throughout. It's always great, check it out, and absolutely as always R.I.P. Mako 

See ya next time   

Hello again. So today I wanted to make a video in response to another tragic event in Toronto. One of the fist videos I made (and some of the motivation to make) was from the terrorist van attack in Toronto many months ago. Now, again, there's an attack that so far ISIS has claimed responsibility for, and it's resulted in the deaths of two young innocent people and many more injured. It obviously sucks and is awful for the families. Below is a link to the news explaining the event, and then another to the charity page aimed at helping victims.

1)  https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/toronto/article-mass-shooting-on-torontos-danforth-avenue-what-we-know-so-far/
2)  https://ca.gofundme.com/danforth-shooting-victims-fund

And yes, there was an annoying amount of breathing that showed up in the video, I'm sorry, I'm working on that.

So I've been hearing a lot about ASMR lately. I've been a longtime fan, and occasional evening user as a sleep aid. But lately its become really mainstream, which (Hipsters aside) is great news. Means tons more content, and if you haven't checked it out, you should. Think of it like getting relaxed from watching people getting relaxed, if that makes sense. I've also heard from some people that ASMR might be a good fit for my tone and sound, so let me know what your thoughts on that are.

Justice not vengeance guys.

Come on, this one speaks for itself. Both one of the "best movies" and one of the best "comic book movies" ever. A beautiful snapshot of the Cold War and a grim picture of realistic superheroes in our world. I loved this movie so much it was foundational to a book I had published in University; Superheroes & the Cold War. So that is to say, extremely dorky, but also this movie offers up a lot. And honestly, the score alone is a stand out, some of the best jams from across a few decades. There's not a lot else out there as good as this.

Enjoy amigos 

Hey guys. Usually I record at my place, in front of a screen of some kind, so today I decided to unplug it a bit. I headed to the outdoors of a local Provincial park, and just threw around some ideas on route. Kinda a mixed bag, I'm sure I'll do something similar soon, but yeah that is the wind you can hear some time, so I apologize for that. 

It also gets pretty American at the end there, I'm a big fan of American history and things, so it's nice to get into those stars and stripes sometime. 

Hey my dudes. In this episode I wanted to talk about how much I love Fallout 4, like the amount of love was enough to Platinum the game (my first and only) so that's a thing. For some reason I had recorded this episode, but then ran into an assload of problems. First the original recording cut out halfway through, so it was missing its other half. Then, I rerecorded the episode, only for it to save in two parts...which the first was apparently deleted. Whatever man. Here it is, a feast of Fallout, and I'll definitely give it another fully detailed spotlight eventually. 

And do check out the Dunwich Borers if you haven't, collecting that weapon reward is one of the best items you can hoard and use. I'm sure everyone's mad proud of their own Sanctuary Hills, but mine has a quite elegance. Shit's fancy yo, definitely more on that later. 

What can I do for ya?! Getting into it this episode on some RPG creative elements. I was talking shop with another DM (guess GM is more inclusive) and we were trading notes on our stable of old reliable characters. The kind of archetypal, almost intuitive NPC's that you can whip up a moments notice, or even put to paper way in advance of a mission. The group I run with now has a penchant for over-asking about NPCs, and over engaging with them. That takes an encounter like "a passing merchant  offers you a ride on his cart" to one wherein they've interrogated this newly named, fleshed out wool merchant about his political leanings and extensive family history. You always gotta be ready to throw shit back in the groups face, and no GM wants to blank and not have a character ready to go. 

I always record my episodes here in one sitting, and use zero editing software (since I don't have any...) so these were characters that just snap to mind (which is part of this whole exercise). Always make sure you can whip up a world for your players, even if it's completely the opposite direction or expectation from what you had planned. Also, for real, no offence to anyone with accents, linguistics are straight up fascinating.

Take a look at some very thrown together NPC frame examples. Feel free to change names to suit your 'verse (Arabia is the Mid-East in the Warhammer world, etc.):

-Angus: Great Scot! This is my catchall character voice for many a fantasy NPCs. The accent suits dwarves so perfectly, I almost always pair the two up. But it's still versatile and you can be a guttural barbarian lord, drunken town innkeeper, staunchly trained blacksmith or anything in between.

-Farouk: The quick to anger, "generically Arabian" Shuk merchant, or an experienced dessert mercenary who's quick to draw his blade.

-Pei Ling: The hasty Chinese servant/chef/business owner who's unmatched in the arts of the bargain. Or perhaps he's a town guard captain with no patience for new strangers in town and their nonsense.

-Lord Cuthbert: The villain. I'll go into this one at length in the podcast, but British accents (especially the high accents) have an unparalleled gift for sounding villainous. That's not to say evil, as I argue the German accent comes off as way more suspiciously evil automatically (stay tuned for my Klaus characters in a coming Ep.) But the British drawl has a way of sounding calculated, intelligent and dangerous most of the time. You can play this up or down from a devious and scheming Baron/Lord, to a shrewd and clever member of the aristocracy.

-Duke Renoir, Conquistador Compella and Baron Vigioni: European romantic accents give such a wide range of applications, for most walks of life characters. Definitely expect to see more on these later, for Euro-type fantasy settings, these are your knights, holy men, royalty, court, merchants and etc.

-Shlomo the Wise: I always love throwing in a good old Jewish character in the mix, the blend of humour, wiseness and a dash of stereotype always makes for a good time. Passing Bards, merchants or (of course) goldsmiths make for great bases to ground these guys in.

-The funny ones: Some accents are hard to bring to life without the characters coming across as silly, but I still say that gritty, urban Yuan-ti with the fast talking fierceness of a Mexican accent can play. 

-Pirates: I can't believe I neglected to throw this one down. I love pirates, accent included, and it makes up for probably 30% of the NPC voices my party runs into. Who doesn't like the old "yarr" now and again? I'll swashbuckle up a Pirate Captain or adventuring smuggler character here very soon. 

Well that's about it, I encourage you to listen in and tell me what you think of the roster. I'll be going into more RP stuff in the future, so stay tuned.

Oh, didn't see you there. This episode is pretty straightforward, just felt like going on about Jurassic Fallen Kingdom as soon as it ended. I liked it, make no mistake. But at the same time, Jurassic franchise contenders all get bogged down in some areas that I'll talk on. I've also got some "outlandish" hopes and visions for where the franchise should go from here. So take all that with a grain of something.

Also, did the laser/sonic raptor targeting/aiming system really work? I mean, as a plot device. Not really, not just for the feasibility, but also because they introduce it and never use it in a way organic to the plot. Also, why wasn't there more Chris Pratt snuggling Blue as a baby/adolescent/kawaii raptor? It was great.

I finally finished enough of God of Four that I can safely put the controller down. That is to say, the main storyline course is done and now theres just delicious sliders of side quests. I think I forgot to mention it in the video, but fuck Valkyries. Not the beautiful maidens of Aesir mythology that take the fallen souls of warriors to Valhalla after a glorious death... no, not them. The fuck ugly, bird looking assholes that I have to now defeat across the world. They are, no joke, harder than any in game boss encountered thus far. Which is, admittedly a really cool game feature for replay-ability. But also Hela (see what I did there) frustrating. I'm grinding mad side quests for the Dwarves to up my gear to flatten these fucks, so wish me luck. I beat the game without extending my health-bar at all though, so that's probably a thing too.   

Keep an eye out for those flashing red attacks guys, cheers. 

Hey guys. This is one of those ideas that you formulate because you want to see your favourite character in something, and not necessarily because it seems like a good plan. I really want to see Jason Todd (not original but best Red Hood) in the DC cinematic universe. I think the world is gritty enough to support the origins of the character, his robust and angsty nature, and the possibility of killing him off. We've already been blessed by a pretty great adaptation of the Under The Red Hood comic, so this movie will have to be original, and depart from the classic telling. Similarly, if you modernize it too much, you risk treading on the Arkham Knight portrayal which is fantastic, but not what I see being integrated in the film 'verse. 

Jason Todd will still be the reckless, orphan boy who is discovered whilst trying to pry the tires off the Batmobile, but we will see a depth to his origin, a desire to help others, and also the skewed sense of justice and violence that we come to expect from him in his later years. It's after his death, at the hands of the Joker and Harley Quinn, that we discover a fraction in the League of Assassins. Talia Al Ghul and her loyalist members (like Bronze Tiger, Lady Shiva, etc.) fracture away from Ra's Al Ghul after witnessing his reliance on the Joker for his latest scheme. They feel his direction is off, and the time for his daughter to lead the empire is now. Talia convinces her followers that the revival and utilization of the dead Robin is a top priority, and he will be a crucial general in their eventual plans and battles. But in truth, she wants to bring him back for love of her "Detective" and hopes that reviving his lost son will curry her favour with Bruce.

As Jason is smuggled into a hidden (and some said tainted) Lazarus Pit, his body and the cave are prepared for a ritual. I won't go too much more into it, but the waters revive Jason and bestow upon him unique powers and armour unseen before. Somewhere between shimmering glassine alien materials, and a daemonic energy and presence, The Red Hood is born again formidable and thankfully new enough that we haven't seen this dog and pony show before. Yes his reflective helmet will stay, but will look unique enough to suggest that perhaps he is a creature from the beyond, and not just a man under the mask.

I've got a feeling none of this will end up in the DC world, no matter the medium, but hey. Enjoy the ramblings none the less.

Also God of Four continues to be awesome. I have a soft spot for games that reflect cosmetically the upgrades you give your armour and stuff. So every additional dwarven detail or gold border to the Leviathan Axe makes me drool that little bit more.

Stay alive out there guys, let me know what you like/hate this week.

Cheers