Just added my entry to Game Chef 2010, A City, to the 500 Penny Design Downloads page.

It is also available directly here in pdf format.

Primordial Lands

A Role Playing Game of Elder Times

By

Mouse-Produced Games

Complimentary Copy Review

List Price $5.00

Primordial Lands is a Rules Lite RPG in the vein of the Older Editions of Dungeon and Dragons, with some more modern twists.

It is currently available in PDF format from DriveThruRPG. Size wise it comes in at 32 total pages and is a complete RPG by its self. No other text or books are necessary to use this game system. The Contents include a Table of Contents and then right into the character creation and rules. There is no cover page, etc, nothing like that. It is stripped down the the bare minimum to accomplish the mission, which is admirable in fact.

There are two main elements to characters in Primordial Lands, Attributes and Focuses. Attributes are generated from random die roll of 1d4 minus 1d4 yielding a starting result of +3 to -3 with the chart in the game running from -1 to +7 for Attribute Ranges. Basic Resolution is 1d20 + Rating of Attribute vs a Set Target Number (TN).

The attributes in the game are pretty stock and standard

Strength

Speed

Grace

Constitution

Intelligence

Wisdom

Charisma

Focuses take the place of Skills in other systems, allowing for a bonus to an Attribute Roll in particular circumstances. So if a player wanted an archer type character they could define a focus as +1 with Bows.

Additionally once a Focus is taken it cannot be improved further (on its own), however when a character takes a difference focus, all existing Focuses increase by a +1 (Note: I asked the author and that is how the text is written and how it is intended). So back to the Archer Example, if the second focus taken is in Woodland Combat, the Focuses would then be

Bow Combat +2

Woodland Combat +1

Each Focus can apply only once, they do not stack, but if there are different ones that can apply, they can be used in a synergistic fashion. There are examples of this in the rules to clarify some points.

Combat follows the character generation section, covering attacks, damage, healing, etc.

Next the weapons system, which is very streamlined based essentially on size of weapon rather than endless lists of different swords, knives, pole-arms, etc.

Following that is Experience and a discussion of Levels and how to create other character types. There is a scant discussions of using the idea of Classes and Focuses to create specific sorts of characters.

There are descriptions of Classes, showing sample Focuses and Advancements covering Other Races (Innate) Fighters, Rogues, Sages, Mages, and how to create your own classes.

Next sections deal with races and with Abilities. Abilities are where you can define magic abilities and spells with. Abilities ties into the Mages as a predefined class. Then there is a list of different Abilities to mix and match to create the spells or magic powers that are desired for each character. This is the most customizable portion to Primordial Lands.

Overall this is a decent effort, and if you are looking for a decent rules lite system that has a old school feel without tons of charts, then Primordial Lands is a great fit. Some kitbashing may be required and customization to a specific world setting will be necessary. There is not setting defined, however the descriptions of Elves and Dwarfs and Tobbits (Think Hobbits/Kenders) makes for a stock Fantasy RPG Feeling. Overall a strong 3.5 almost a 4 out of 5 Stars.

Reviewer Note: I received this copy for review purposes. I did not directly purchase it.

Cover Art courtesy of The great artist Clyhp Ahrt

(aka Postmortem Studios)

Relevant Links:

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_-

id=89868

Just a short update to state that the hiatus of 500 Penny Design products is at an end and new content is being created even as this is being typed.

Call of Duty: Black Ops
Just some random comments on the game

So I picked up the XBOX360 version of COD:Black Ops for $59.99 at Target. I was going to wait a few days past the launching. Wait and get some feedback, but I could not wait long enough it seems.

So here are some observations and impressions from my first 12 some hours of playing the game.

Of the gameplay modes available, I have played a single match in Zombies, a few Teamdeath Matches, and the majority of the rest of the matches in Hardore Team Deathmatch (my gameplay of choice and the only reason I spent my money).

Overall Comments:
Graphics: They are an improvement over World at War. The look and feel is quite different from Modern Warfare 2, so the fair comparison is to the other Treyarch product.

These graphics are a nice step up, perhaps a 25% increase in depth and quality to my layman eye. There are some cool death looks, from claymores and such that caught my eye.

Maps: The maps are up to Treyarch standards, mostly tight corridors and walk areas, not many sniping spots and plenty of corners to sit in.
Of the ones that shipped, I seemed to rotate through the same 4 or 5 maps, I do not have a listing of all maps as of yet.

There seems to be 14 maps in the Hardcore Team Deathmatch Rotation that I have played on.

• Nuketown
• Summit
• Havana
• Radiation
• Firing Range
• Hanoi
• WMD
• Jungle
• Crisis
• Cracked
• Villa
• Grid
• Launch
• Array

So a little bit about some of the maps.

Nuketown: 50s Kitsch Atomic Bomb test site, uber small map, 2 spawn sites, all SMG and AR work, very easy to get trapped and spawnkilled, annoying map to me. My least favorite map.

WMD: Lots of offices, cool Soviet icons, warheads sitting around, some sniping spots (I like the bottom silos to sit in-between and take out the 3rd story sniping spot)

Hanoi:: A single street (I sat on a railing and got a couple of kills) large prison section, ugly guillotine and 3 noose gallows in the semi open section in the back, where most of the map resides and there are some good sniping / ambush spots.

Havana: The best streets, best for sniping of the maps I played on. I like it about the best so far.
Remember to stick to the edges of the map and snipers can work from the ends of the street with decent effect.

Array: Large antennas, you can get up on the large one on the 'top' of the map, pretty exposed spot, the round control area is hotly contested as well as the right side leading down from the large antenna, easy to get trapped up there.

Jungle: Tight corners, lots of walk areas, some good corner camping spots making it hard to see, lots of places to shoot down on the other side.

Launch: This map to me has a feel similar to Fuel from MW2 (only 2 to 2.5 times larger), with many corners and small rooms. Do not stand under the rocket when it lifts off. One cool element is how the entire map shakes on liftoff.

Gameplay: The way the maps are set up, it is hard to get long distance shots or kills. They really are set up for SMG and AR work I feel. In Harcore a pistol can make a 1 or 2 round kill, which I like. In Core it takes 4 or 5 good hits with most any weapon. It took 2 good hits with the Dragunev Sniper Rifle at near point blank range in example.
Hardcore is locked until level 19. If you have someone on your list above that and you get invited into that lobby, as a level 3 I was able to play Hardcore Team Deathmatch, which is what I prefer.

So that is one way to surmount that limitation in a legitimate fashion. In 12 hours of playtime I have made it to level 24 with an ending KDR of .66(or so).

Good vice is to move in groups, corner camp, and use the RC car as much as you can to start with.

Currency:
I like the buying system so far. You start with 3 classes, by level 6 you have 6 stock classes and level 10 is customize starting for killstreaks, etc.

Some General Comments:
One person dislikes the Skorpion SMG, too slow and no knockdown, he said a LMG is more mobile than that.
The M16 has a nice stopping power, buy the Red Dot or Reflex scope.
Seems to be easier to get headshots than in MW2.
The guns are unlocked by level, and then you can purchase them or not. I bought the Enfield AR (wrong name I think) and with the Reflex Scope it is a nice weapon. Feels like a mainstay like the M4 is in MW2, a weapon you can use almost exclusively.
Party Chat cuts across matches, so in matches we had people on the other side and we could talk back and forth. It was satisfying to hear my Party Member complain about my 4 some kills on them in that one match in the streets of Havana as I kept sniping him.

I saved all the money till about level 7 or 8 before buying a single gun or attachment. At that time I did splurge on Perks.

Scavenger is almost Nerfed (you get ammo and grenades is all, not claymore reloads so it is not as useful) as in MW2 at all. Only reloads gun mags and lethal (Frag and Semtex grenades) are obtainned.

There seems to be no perk to hide from air assets that shoot you, lots of easy kills from that for who ever gets one.

Attack Dogs are a 11 Killstreak selection (I wont buy it due to that)
The Training mode puts names from my friends list on the players in the mode, and it is core, so nice for some easy XP, weird otherwise.

Really cool things: World Map showing concentrations of people playing the game
2.4 Million Players online first night. Second night got up to 3.5 million players. Night 3 down to 1.3 million players, so it seems it has leveled out to those that are really enjoying it over everyone playing all at once.

Customizing my Emblem, each layer is only 100 In Game Currency, so for 200 Currency I have a bullet Riddled with a dark purple Biohazard sign on my Emblem/Title. This has been expanded to a new background, and multiple layers, spent a good 3 K in Currency so far and pretty much set with it.

Bitchin Big Maps that I really like the looks of.

Some more overall things:
Played 21 Hardcore Team Deathmatches. Sometimes it was difficult getting a game started up with widely different levels of players. As time progresses I suspect that will even out as we all exceed level 19.

One concern is, if we Prestige, does the Level 19 Cap come back into play. If so several of us will only Prestige once, unless someone finds out for us sooner.

Players that were already Prestige 18 hours past Launch. We presumed they were employees or beta testers and it felt unfair to some of us I was playing with. (I have about 30 folks, over 40 mostly, from 3 large groups that I game with consistently and we had a good 1/3rd present last night that I could tell).

Core is Core, hurts you KDR and young kid reflexes win the day, especially with the tight maps, so always run with the hardest knockdown SMG or AR you can afford. The Enfield is a great choice until you get either the AK74U or the Galil (Best all round gun for the money add in Red Dot and Suppressor).

The money is a little slow, but it seems about the right value for what you purchase.
Clan Tags and Red Dots. One person put their Clan Tag on their AR. Then they got the Red Dot. For them either one or the other, the Red Dot covers up the clan tag.
So on to the single Zombies game I played. It was a single map, single match, 4 players total vs. the Zombies Horde. I did pick up the rifle, then the shotgun which worked a whole lot better. The map was a multilevel lab like setting, I know it was in the original WAW game, but I didnt play it on that game so it was unfamiliar to me. It was pretty fun, but not my personal cup of tea.
Overall I like a whole lot more than World At War. In that game I just die and die and cannot seem to get any kills going. The maps in this one are awesome, I would like it if they just DLC the older WAW maps into it. I can easily ignore historical aspects to use good guns on those more open maps in general. The gameplay should appeal to the WAW group, and after a few weeks of play I anticipate my XBOX gaming time to be split between working towards more Challenges in MW2, and enjoying the other aspects in BlackOps.

For the Tabletop Gamers out there
Lots of inspiration for maps, combat pacing. It has a more 4E combat feel to it than MW2 does. Definitely even on Hardcore it is not as deadly as MW2 can be. If you like modern games or espionage then you get some great graphic inspiration. The use of grids and sectors in the map you can find during gameplay is awesome, allows for great coordination, so something a game group could embrace. I suspect the Game Guide (Not seen one yet) will have some nice maps and better details on all the guns, giving players more choices from a fluff standpoint to say I have a Galil AR vice a standard Rifle sort of statement. Go watch or play on someone else's machine if you dont have an XBOX yourself. At $59.99 if is no worse than a WOTC Hardcover Corebook, or a Fantasy Games WH40k Inspired book, and the replay value is there for the FPS layman such as myself.

Call of Duty Black Ops website
www.callofduty.com

Below are a bunch of notes written while watching the show during all three nights
The notes from Night 1 are handwritten still, typing them later.

The Prisoner
Night Two
Anvil; Darling

Several new characters arrive, first one is 909, another version of the #6

A massive difference, the idea that there is not a #1 is a huge change from the original

909: Everything is suspicious if you look at it properly

This episode is spiking the paranoia level big time, with the wife of #2 waking up, with her then falling back asleep as she drinks wine given to her by #2. The idea of everyone watching everyone else is creepy, as well as #6 teaching children surveillance techniques.

The music keeps switching between droning ambient, to piano, to circus style to 60’s retro feel.

2: Fear is always guilt in disguise.

So where 11-12 stabs 909, thinking it is to death, the shots showing the small knife before the act compared to the shots of the knife after the dead is done, it does not see to be the same blade. The first shot was more a pocketknife while the post shots are clearly a decent lockblade.

Finally 50 minutes into the second night, the penny farthing bikes arrive, hanging from the ceiling in a bar.

The feeling in this remake is much more horrific, more a skin crawling creepy feeling lurking along madness than not. Less a lack of individuality and more a mind game to drive people paranoid feel.

New love interest, her # is 415, not a multiple of 6 at all. Not sure how it will fit in. So far the other multiples of 6 have mostly perished.

The #2 is well past sadistic and cruel.

There is some power to this second night of the remake of The Prisoner

Sybicorp
Floors
Control
Solutions
Perhaps Analysis
They all have a control, someone that watches them

As the second night episode plays for the second time on AMCTV.com, it is more jarring than the first time watched.

Night 3

Summakor is the correct name of the company, saw it in the opening of this episode.
Odd episode, evil clones, and the mother of 11-12 states that only people brought into The Village can see and go back to the other place. Those born there cannot do so. This makes it more like a genetic prison, or a conceptual construct, so if #6 is unconscious in the real world, then if he wakes he would leave The Village, while those born there, only existing there, cannot ever leave. That might be one explanation for that.

Sounds like #2 and his wife might be the original creators of The Village, not certain. This would explain how she sleeps for extreme periods of time and she still lives.

The soundtrack is one of the best since Twin Peaks. It truly is evocative and appropriate to what is happening on the show.

In a very faint way it sort of reminds me of the movie, The Cube. Not the same situation, but the transportation and manipulation reminds me of that movie. Now he is finding out about what his actions have caused, somehow in this version #6 created the entire Village.

As the show progresses, it has plenty of merits of its own, but I might prefer the older version better.

I do believe that this is an excellent show to watch for those into conspiracy theory and into the import of constant surveillance and paranoia.

Ohh mind control stuff, that is pretty damn sweet. This just ratcheted up a couple notches, way into the cool zone. Way into the stratosphere of sweet. Tie that into the statement of #2 about the Village expanding, and into the idea of it as a virtual mind control, and eventually Summakor should have total control of both forms of reality.

Ahh a major deviation, they called #6 by his first name in the Waking World, his first name is Michael. Now the Village is a psychological construct of shared consciousness. Now the back and forth that made this difficult to follow is explained. It keeps switching back and forth because it is a dual stream, like two parallel worlds, two parallel story lines.

So now the son is murdering his mother, she who was the genesis of the entire Village, if #2 in the Waking World is to be believed, so if she holds the entire idea in her, does that mean the passage between the two is cut off, or what.

313’s name in the waking world is Sarah.

A passage of power has just happened in the last five minutes of the show.

#6 has become #1 unlike in the first.

#2’s name is Curtis.
And 313 must sleep with her eyes open forever to keep The Village safe, she has paid the largest price for love unrequited.