Cower not, fierce reader! We have this glorious day the joy to bear witness to the further crimes of Vox Day in his Selenoth world. Suffice to say, the forces of Social Justice have only two choices with regards to this tome: ignore it(which I find more likely), or decry it. Let us view the charges!
Firstly, of course, is the genetic charge that it is from the "misogynistic white supremacist" Vox Day. This charge is, as usual, of the first order, and a part of why the Tor boycott is ongoing. (Yes, we know it isn't bleeding them, but another few cuts each year don't help a dying publisher.) Should any actually deign to read the text, they should find that the fiction writing of Vox has improved, making the already difficult hurdle of him being the worst writer Castalia House publishes even higher.
Secondly, the book, like its predecessor, advocates for the good effects of soldiering. The discipline and focus required to be properly prepared for war is presented wholly positively, and the lack of such is even presented as a properly negative thing. Logistics is shown as the greater part of preparation, and defensible positions, even temporary ones, are part of that. The author even references some of his own strategy authors from his role as editor/publisher.
Third, there's a few segments of discussion of traditional sex roles. The benefits of this are discussed, as growth necessary for a people to be able to defend itself. Also shown is the lie of the young career, followed by a transition into family life, as it becomes more difficult for one to change from dalliances to commitment. Of course, this is the highest offense to SJWs, being a crime against the narrative of equality.
Fourth, there's a greater and clearer moral difference between the good and evil forces. This is no ripoff of RapeRape's work, the evil is easily discernible, and makes one more than simply uncomfortable. Evil is real, and properly depicted here. This of course, flies in the face of apologists for all discyvic movements, from the invasion apologists to those that advocate a world without religion.
In conclusion, I must commend this book to any who despise snowflake culture and enjoy proper fantasy literature. While he's no John C. Wright, Vox has accomplished an impressive work, filled with unique characters, and diverse views and cultures. It is with great anticipation I await the final sections of this fine work. 9 of 10 fell deeds
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
Sunday, December 18, 2016
Tuesday, December 13, 2016
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
The Apology of the Converged Institution
So, some of my traffic from the last day has been from Geek and Sundry, the You Tube/social media leftist geek media institution that hosts Wil Wheaton and his Tabletop show. Why? Because they wrote an article by way of an apology to our dear friend Monica Valentinelli. Monica complained:
So we have motive for the pointing to me as EVIL. They wanted to be better than somebody horrible. Of course, they ignored my stated methodology for judging people's worthiness(BGG and RPGG credits), and just think that having a game based on a "major hollywood property" makes you a notable designer. It doesn't, nor does it make you a good one. Or does nobody remember all the lousy tie in games from movies and TV? Columbo, Escape from New York, not to mention all the terrible games that came from Lord of the Rings and Star Wars? And with one season and one movie, Firefly is not a major property. It is a property with a large following, sure. But CW's DC shows have far better claim to major property status based on screen time.
Maybe if Monica quit celebrating "womyn in gaming" and started caring about the quality of games she and her fellow designers were producing, she wouldn't be a data point. As to her accomplishments, a poem erasing a 40k word contribution? HAHAHAHA. You're invisible because your sex politics make you irrelevant, Monica, not Sir Terry's poem. Your credits don't disappear from the book or RPGGeek because a good writer got quoted.
And being a busy small timer is no insult. There are numerous small time authors that make good money by writing LOTS of books. Are they even mid-tier authors? No, they don't have to be. They have more work out there. That's respectable in it's own right. But, to say that she isn't the GRRM of gaming is apparently the highest insult. Well, he doesn't get my money, either.
Crafty games should thank you for limiting their sales, Monica. I was tempted by the new Mistborn book until I found out you were involved. Now? No thanks.
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
I am a Gen Con Industry Insider. Only, my credits are scrutinized. I’m lumped in as a data point, and am told women do not matter and we’re ruining gaming.And G&S went on:
This led to charges that the women selected were, essentially, affirmative action hires, and “just data points,” as Monica wrote. One blogger dismissed Monica as “a busy small timer” despite having been lead developer and writer for a game based on a major Hollywood property.Of course, the reason for the article comes up next:
Geek & Sundry is in line for some shame here. In an article on her Shadowrun release, Court of Shadows, Monica points out the following:
My new Shadowrun book is covered by Geek and Sundry. Terry Pratchett’s poem erases my 40,000+ word contribution. I am invisible once again. Terry Pratchett was never mentioned in that supplement. I am grateful for the coverage.And she’s right. In an article about a book on which she was the lead writer, we never once mentioned her name, and devoted precious column inches to a Terry Pratchett poem which has no link to the book, other than both are about elves. It’s not our finest moment.
So we have motive for the pointing to me as EVIL. They wanted to be better than somebody horrible. Of course, they ignored my stated methodology for judging people's worthiness(BGG and RPGG credits), and just think that having a game based on a "major hollywood property" makes you a notable designer. It doesn't, nor does it make you a good one. Or does nobody remember all the lousy tie in games from movies and TV? Columbo, Escape from New York, not to mention all the terrible games that came from Lord of the Rings and Star Wars? And with one season and one movie, Firefly is not a major property. It is a property with a large following, sure. But CW's DC shows have far better claim to major property status based on screen time.
Maybe if Monica quit celebrating "womyn in gaming" and started caring about the quality of games she and her fellow designers were producing, she wouldn't be a data point. As to her accomplishments, a poem erasing a 40k word contribution? HAHAHAHA. You're invisible because your sex politics make you irrelevant, Monica, not Sir Terry's poem. Your credits don't disappear from the book or RPGGeek because a good writer got quoted.
And being a busy small timer is no insult. There are numerous small time authors that make good money by writing LOTS of books. Are they even mid-tier authors? No, they don't have to be. They have more work out there. That's respectable in it's own right. But, to say that she isn't the GRRM of gaming is apparently the highest insult. Well, he doesn't get my money, either.
Crafty games should thank you for limiting their sales, Monica. I was tempted by the new Mistborn book until I found out you were involved. Now? No thanks.
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
Tuesday, December 6, 2016
Injustice Quick Reviews 8
Cower not, fierce reader! Before us this day we have a feast to make the light of SocJus flee. Let us partake greatly in the bounty of darkness!
Swan Knight's Sword by John C. Wright- This world may no longer be new and startling, but it is still very different and charming. A fine and satisfying end to the first part of the tale. Of course, the SJW crowd will avoid it for Mr. Wright alone. Major crime: A knight that is honest, honorable, and pure. 9 of 10 fell deeds.
Reaper's Run by David Van Dyke and Ryan King- An excellent continuation of the story begun in The Eden Plague. Media narratives and prejudices are shown for their shallowness and falsehood. Desperation bears the fruit of dangerous choices. Major crime: How easy it is to create totalitarianism. 8 of 10 fell deeds.
Tunnel Rats Episode 1: the Diggers by Nick Cole and Michael Bunker- We have an apocalypse! We have day to day subsistence living! We have gangs and forces moved by dark supernatural forces! There is much to be admired here. Oh, and it links to Mr. Cole's Wyrd novels. Major crime: Assumption of responsibility to and for each other. 8 of 10 fell deeds.
An Equation of Almost Infinite Complexity by J. Mulrooney- Castalia makes another venture into the literary satire category, and I found it well worth reading. The bargaining, backstabbing, false conspiracies and more keep the story moving along, despite our protagonist's naivete and lack of imagination. Major crime: Hell is real. 8 of 10 fell deeds.
Take the Star Road by Peter Grant- Yes, I know book 5 just came out. I figured I should read book 1 finally. There are some commonalities with Rod Walker's Mutiny in Space, which isn't a bad thing, and the story is good workman entertainment. Major crime: Speaking against socialism, high taxes, and other restrictive government. 7 of 10 fell deeds.
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
Swan Knight's Sword by John C. Wright- This world may no longer be new and startling, but it is still very different and charming. A fine and satisfying end to the first part of the tale. Of course, the SJW crowd will avoid it for Mr. Wright alone. Major crime: A knight that is honest, honorable, and pure. 9 of 10 fell deeds.
Reaper's Run by David Van Dyke and Ryan King- An excellent continuation of the story begun in The Eden Plague. Media narratives and prejudices are shown for their shallowness and falsehood. Desperation bears the fruit of dangerous choices. Major crime: How easy it is to create totalitarianism. 8 of 10 fell deeds.
Tunnel Rats Episode 1: the Diggers by Nick Cole and Michael Bunker- We have an apocalypse! We have day to day subsistence living! We have gangs and forces moved by dark supernatural forces! There is much to be admired here. Oh, and it links to Mr. Cole's Wyrd novels. Major crime: Assumption of responsibility to and for each other. 8 of 10 fell deeds.
An Equation of Almost Infinite Complexity by J. Mulrooney- Castalia makes another venture into the literary satire category, and I found it well worth reading. The bargaining, backstabbing, false conspiracies and more keep the story moving along, despite our protagonist's naivete and lack of imagination. Major crime: Hell is real. 8 of 10 fell deeds.
Take the Star Road by Peter Grant- Yes, I know book 5 just came out. I figured I should read book 1 finally. There are some commonalities with Rod Walker's Mutiny in Space, which isn't a bad thing, and the story is good workman entertainment. Major crime: Speaking against socialism, high taxes, and other restrictive government. 7 of 10 fell deeds.
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
Sunday, December 4, 2016
Kickstarter Spotlight
All right, it's time for a little bit of Kickstarter chat.
Mostly because Russell Newquist has launched his Lyonesse project. If you like short fiction, and want more fiction in the vein of their previous anthologies(I certainly do), I highly recommend this project. $7 gets you the stories in your email, $25 gets you ebook quarterly anthologies, and $59 gets you to quarterly print as well. Seriously, I highly doubt you'll regret backing this project.
Retro SF Dice Tower- The pulp crowd might like this. If you've a 3d printer, you can get yourself plans, or you spend a bit more, and they'll ship you the rocketship dice tower.
Abaddon: While this is the least regarded of the Command and Colors games, it is also the coolest looking. There's now an expansion, and you can get the whole for pretty reasonable cost.
For the wargamers, there's a naval battle project. I have no experience with modern period naval wargames, but it might be worthwhile.
Humor selections:
Ok, my tag line? Apparently Poe's law applies. Me, I had figured maybe someday doing a parody set of rules/cards for Pandemic. But, somebody believes in the UN.
Philanthropy is the game for people that believe you can legislate all the problems of the world away. If you're reading this blog, I'm going to guess you're more likely to visit the project for a laugh. From the end of the project page:
Metaphorosis- This initially looked like MAYBE they were about stories. But then, there's this:
These reminders so that you know:
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
Mostly because Russell Newquist has launched his Lyonesse project. If you like short fiction, and want more fiction in the vein of their previous anthologies(I certainly do), I highly recommend this project. $7 gets you the stories in your email, $25 gets you ebook quarterly anthologies, and $59 gets you to quarterly print as well. Seriously, I highly doubt you'll regret backing this project.
Retro SF Dice Tower- The pulp crowd might like this. If you've a 3d printer, you can get yourself plans, or you spend a bit more, and they'll ship you the rocketship dice tower.
Abaddon: While this is the least regarded of the Command and Colors games, it is also the coolest looking. There's now an expansion, and you can get the whole for pretty reasonable cost.
For the wargamers, there's a naval battle project. I have no experience with modern period naval wargames, but it might be worthwhile.
Humor selections:
Ok, my tag line? Apparently Poe's law applies. Me, I had figured maybe someday doing a parody set of rules/cards for Pandemic. But, somebody believes in the UN.
Philanthropy is the game for people that believe you can legislate all the problems of the world away. If you're reading this blog, I'm going to guess you're more likely to visit the project for a laugh. From the end of the project page:
In accordance with Kickstarter guidelines, we cannot promise to donate any money to charities. Therefore, no exact amount is promised. However, by us spreading the word about these charities and you playing these games with friends (with the charities' information present), we know that they will be able to receive your future support. Also, Josh (one of the two creators of the game) works full-time feeding refugees in Turkey and half of the profits from our project go to him being able to continue to do this work. So in an indirect way, you are still helping refugees from Syria in the Middle East. Thank you!YEAH. Not helping with people that want to kill me for existing. And, how much of this is going to import more, and how much goes to Infanticide, Inc.?
Metaphorosis- This initially looked like MAYBE they were about stories. But then, there's this:
Are you vegan-friendly?The future is mushrooms and sprouts, apparently. Their stories are "hand-crafted by talented artisans working in dark, lonely caves". I prefer authors that work with either pen or keyboard that don't live in third world virtue signalling factories.
We are! Our editor is a long-time vegan, and we give a vague and unspecified number of bonus points to vegan submissions. We're not sticklers about it, and we publish mostly non-vegan stories, but you won't find many stories about hunting on our pages. We also plan to publish a Best Vegan SFF of the year, full of great stories that just happen to be vegan.
These reminders so that you know:
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
Saturday, December 3, 2016
DC TV Invasion! Event
Ok, I know I'm a couple of days after the last episode aired, but that hopefully won't make this less informative. I waited until I had both watched the entire thing and read the original Invasion! event to begin this. I'm unfortunately going to have a few gripes to air.
First, this was advertised as a four night event. Give me a moment.
Right. If you count the breaches showing up in Supergirl, and the less than one minute appearance by Barry and Cisco, sure, they're right. I don't. A crossover needs to start CROSSING OVER at least before halfway through the first part.
Second, this bears so little resemblance to the original event it's laughable. Of course there are things that logistically wouldn't work in the TV series, like the alliance of aliens, and the sheer number of heroes involved. But there was no real motivation from what I saw on behalf of the Dominators. And while that is how they look, roughly, they don't fight themselves, they're an intellectual race that rules through planning and implementation. The Daxamites even had a role in the crossover, as "neutral observers" who got powers when they reached Earth, and were betrayed by the Dominators.
Third, there was so little use of the apprentice heroes from each show. Mon-El, being a Daxamite, would have been useful, not to mention J'onn. Kid Flash could have learned some hard lessons. Ragman, Wild Dog, Mr. Terrific, and even the revealed traitor Artemis would have made some impact. What were the others doing while the non-powered heroes were captured, aside from Vibe and team Arrow? Why didn't anyone else STEP UP? Crossovers are the perfect time to lay a seed or two. They don't have to become a show, but you could lay groundwork for one next year where the crossover begins a new series, if that's what you want.
Fourth, what happened in all the other cities? Sure, Flash and Supergirl planted the pain devices, but what did they do before they got there? Who was kidnapped, or killed? Who will blame the heroes, and who will become one?
Fifth, the shared dream felt more like either the Alan Moore story "For the Man Who Has Everything", or one of the numerous times the JLA gets trapped in a hallucinatory trap. I was quite unhappy that Oliver didn't go nuts on them after that, and that we didn't see what Thea did after getting back to Earth.
What did they do well? The characters actually felt like all the writers knew them, so that may be partly why the new guys didn't cross over. On the other hand, writing teams could have mixed a bit for this, and been managed like a comic book crossover. The fights were overall decently choreographed, and the camera kept the focus moving to raise the implied threat level.
The meta-bomb is actually very close to the comic, as the Dominators had a rogue scientist who detonated such after their loss, but even that got changed, and we had no internal politics or struggles within the Dominators.
Professor Stein and Jackson have faced a moral struggle once going into this, and faced on in the aftermath. The fact that they can't avoid creating some changes to the timeline, and need to tread carefully, is a nice touch. Also, the desire to avoid undoing what good has come from their changes was enjoyable.
Thankfully mostly absent were the Social Justice wailings that have become more common this year in the Berlantiverse. The DEO is going to be a new and potentially frightening aspect on Earth 1, and perhaps we end up with a show around that, but I don't think so.
The Hall of Justice might see future play, though honestly I'd have thought this a good time to bring that missing Ferris Air test pilot back, as Green Lantern against some aliens would make for good TV, even as a latecomer. And the new villain we saw in Arrow might be fun later on.
Anyway, without the SocJus aspects going full force, I did find the story more fun. So, the Berlantiverse gets viewed for a while longer. Until they decide to start playing again.
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
First, this was advertised as a four night event. Give me a moment.
Right. If you count the breaches showing up in Supergirl, and the less than one minute appearance by Barry and Cisco, sure, they're right. I don't. A crossover needs to start CROSSING OVER at least before halfway through the first part.
Second, this bears so little resemblance to the original event it's laughable. Of course there are things that logistically wouldn't work in the TV series, like the alliance of aliens, and the sheer number of heroes involved. But there was no real motivation from what I saw on behalf of the Dominators. And while that is how they look, roughly, they don't fight themselves, they're an intellectual race that rules through planning and implementation. The Daxamites even had a role in the crossover, as "neutral observers" who got powers when they reached Earth, and were betrayed by the Dominators.
Third, there was so little use of the apprentice heroes from each show. Mon-El, being a Daxamite, would have been useful, not to mention J'onn. Kid Flash could have learned some hard lessons. Ragman, Wild Dog, Mr. Terrific, and even the revealed traitor Artemis would have made some impact. What were the others doing while the non-powered heroes were captured, aside from Vibe and team Arrow? Why didn't anyone else STEP UP? Crossovers are the perfect time to lay a seed or two. They don't have to become a show, but you could lay groundwork for one next year where the crossover begins a new series, if that's what you want.
Fourth, what happened in all the other cities? Sure, Flash and Supergirl planted the pain devices, but what did they do before they got there? Who was kidnapped, or killed? Who will blame the heroes, and who will become one?
Fifth, the shared dream felt more like either the Alan Moore story "For the Man Who Has Everything", or one of the numerous times the JLA gets trapped in a hallucinatory trap. I was quite unhappy that Oliver didn't go nuts on them after that, and that we didn't see what Thea did after getting back to Earth.
What did they do well? The characters actually felt like all the writers knew them, so that may be partly why the new guys didn't cross over. On the other hand, writing teams could have mixed a bit for this, and been managed like a comic book crossover. The fights were overall decently choreographed, and the camera kept the focus moving to raise the implied threat level.
The meta-bomb is actually very close to the comic, as the Dominators had a rogue scientist who detonated such after their loss, but even that got changed, and we had no internal politics or struggles within the Dominators.
Professor Stein and Jackson have faced a moral struggle once going into this, and faced on in the aftermath. The fact that they can't avoid creating some changes to the timeline, and need to tread carefully, is a nice touch. Also, the desire to avoid undoing what good has come from their changes was enjoyable.
Thankfully mostly absent were the Social Justice wailings that have become more common this year in the Berlantiverse. The DEO is going to be a new and potentially frightening aspect on Earth 1, and perhaps we end up with a show around that, but I don't think so.
The Hall of Justice might see future play, though honestly I'd have thought this a good time to bring that missing Ferris Air test pilot back, as Green Lantern against some aliens would make for good TV, even as a latecomer. And the new villain we saw in Arrow might be fun later on.
Anyway, without the SocJus aspects going full force, I did find the story more fun. So, the Berlantiverse gets viewed for a while longer. Until they decide to start playing again.
When you play Social Justice, the world loses.
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