Dicing with Distraction

Yes, I confess, I failed to do a blog post last week. AND, I've been failing to do the promised "Daily Sketch" posts... in fact, I've been failing to do the sketches themselves. But there's a good reason for most of this.

The lack of Blog Post last week was mostly the day-job getting in the way. Boss visits, that sort of thing. The usual that goes on with the mundanity of the day-job.

On top of that, I've been reading through the final layout proof of the 4th Corebook for Conspiracy X 2.0 - the Conspiracies Sourcebook. It's a huge tome, filled with a LOT of information, and a lot of it is in print for the very first time, so it's taking a while to read through. I'm determined to have it finished this week though, one way or another.

The Conspiracies Sourcebook presents for the first time, a lot of new background and detail about Area 51, reveals the origins of Aegis and the NDD, and has a lot of cool stuff that takes the game in new directions, as well as building the setting up for the inevitable alien invasion that'll feature in Conspiracy X's sister game, Extinction.

In addition to this, I've been working my way through the original files for Extinction, trying to work out what's needed to bash it into shape.

When I haven't been working on that, I've been looking into game systems and planning for other possible games, as well as still working on WILD, so I haven't been completely resting on my laurels.

Saying that though, it is January. The weather has been miserable. I don't mean the snow, I like snow. I mean the ice and sludge and cold that comes afterwards. The ice has made the daily trek to the day-job hell on earth, and I've left the iPad at home for fear of slipping on the untreated pavements and landing on it. Hence the lack of "Daily Sketches". None of those lunchbreak iPad doodles that I promised...

And January is naturally depressing. Everyone's broke after the festival of excess. If you had any time off over the festive season, you've been returned to the horrors of mundanity (luckily, being in crappy ol' retail means I don't have any time off over Christmas, so it's not so much of a shock being at work in January). And the bills on the credit cards are starting to come in... I find myself staring at the nonsense of Facebook, waiting for something interesting to happen rather than actually motivate myself.

Which is stupid really. WILD is such a personal project, and I should be really enthused. The other stuff I'm working on is really cool. I dunno. Maybe it's just real life whispering in my ears while I sleep, telling me how it's all going to go wrong, how I should remember how horrible last year was, and how I really shouldn't bother trying.

Well, negativity. To paraphrase George RR Martin's "A Game of Thrones" - There is only one thing we say to negativity - "not today".

The new use for an old Gem Dispenser - DICE!

While I've been trying to motivate myself, the lovely wife had an incredibly geeky idea. A "gem dispenser" was being thrown out by a shop, and she jumped a the chance to bring it home. Initially, she wondered what to do with it, and then we both came to the same conclusion. DICE.

Over the years we've accumulated a lot of dice, and we have our favourites that we keep handy... but what of all the other ones? The slightly older ones? The D20's that we don't use as we usually play Unisystem, WoD or ATS? Well, they seem to look rather cool in the dispenser, and if anyone needs any dice when they come around to play, it'll be just £1 for a random selection! Just need more dice now to fill it!

While looking through my old dice to fill the dispenser, I found a real relic. My first ever D20. An old fleshy-brown, plain effort with the numbers highlighted with a wax crayon. The corners were heavily worn and a bit peely, but there was something about it that brought back hundreds of memories. Of sitting around a table at Pete's, playing AD&D, as that 9th level Paladin who never seemed to advance, armed with my +5 Holy Avenger, staggering around in full plate armour. Ah, those were the days.

My first D20, preserved in its own
little display case.
(Yes, those are signed Gillian Anderson photos)

Wifey decided that such a relic from my past should have pride of place. It shouldn't be shoved into the dispenser along with the other dice, it should be displayed. So, with one of the empty dice boxes and a straw, the old D20 now has pride of place on the new bookshelves, strangely in front of my leather-bound D&D 3.5 Rulebooks that I've never played (and no, I still haven't tried 4th Ed yet... I may just wait until 5th).

So, enough distractions. I've taken a couple of days away from the day-job this week to catch up. I'll finish the ConX proofing, see what I can do to Extinction, do a little WILD, and other gaming stuff, draw something hopefully, and get the year going, finally.

And, I'll try not to miss another blog post!

Until next time, stay multi-classy!