Thread: Questioning chirine ba kal - part II

Originally Posted by Zirunel

Sometimes it seems to me, people are so obsessed with stressing the "alien" "non-western" character of Tekumel (oh look, Mayans in space!) that they downplay the huge classical Hellenistic/Imperial-Roman Mediterranean elements in the Professor's grand pastiche. It's a mashup sure, with a lot of ingredients, but much of it really isn't as "non-western" as some people pretend.

Exactly! This is why I have never understood the "Tekumel is too hard," or "too exotic" mindset. There are many layers to Phil's creation and if you take the time to look at it, it's easy to find a comfort zone for your style of play and run an appropriate game there.

In fact, thanks to you I fell into an internet hole and only just crawled out. Guess what, turns out there is a Sanskrit word "Jna" "to know or perceive" and at least one person on the internet explicitly argues it is a cognate of znajne. Since I know nothing about Sanskrit, or Serbian, I can't evaluate any of this, but maybe it's a thing.

I think you called it.

Originally Posted by chirine ba kal

Agreed! I've got everything set up for transport by cart - I have a fleet of them - and can get in and out of a facility with a full van load (64 cubic feet of game stuff) in pretty short order. But, that's all I can do; I can't do the logistics and run the games, not without help, and I simply don't get that. So, while I've spent a good chunk of change on plastic tubs, they stay here at the house and make my gaming life a whole lot easier by allowing me to move in and out of the game room in about fifteen minutes for each game set-up.

It's all about organization; I get the most out of my limited resources by really using it.

And I do get razzed and poked at for being so organized, too. This lasts right up until I ask people for help, whereupon they simply evaporate.

You've always been impressively organized, I have to admit.

I've never been that organized, folks, I always had to make up for it by being fairly bright and quick on my feet.

I do remember times at Coffman getting four or five volunteers to help trog stuff around. Sadly, that seems a lot harder these days; a lot more people seem to want to be passively entertained.

Originally Posted by Greentongue

It would be really wonderful if she could do that with one(or more) epic scenes from your book.
Since it sounds like you have everything needed to recreate one(them).

The right 360 from the middle of a big battle would be amazing.

All for the book of course, nothing to promote the Tekumel IP specifically...
=

Wonderful idea!!! She could, actually; we have the figures for this, as well as the technology, so it'd be a weekend's worth of work for each clip. For that matter, I could do videos explaining the battles we fought in, as I've got both the table space and the miniature resources to put something like this on.

I understand your point. My position is that just about anything that encourages games played is a good thing, and if I can interest people in the fun we had then so much the better. It's like today, when I was at the local FLGS - it's Free Comics Day, and 5th Daughter went shopping - and got asked to run some game sessions for them in June, at the RPG Day they are putting on. I'll put on my usual show, and run some Lord Meren and some Barsoom for people; John Till will be there with his FATE for Tekumel game, so that's already covered. We'll see what happens; I'm kind of looking forward to this, one of my very rare public outings...

Originally Posted by Neshm hiKumala

If they're not getting what they (very naively) expected, I wouldn't be surprised if they sold the Tekumel name eventually.

That would be a rational approach, and they are anything but. This is all about their prestige and standing, not about commercial success or profitability.

Originally Posted by Neshm hiKumala

Chirine, I'm reading the Pé Chói article found in one of the Seal of the Imperium journals. It mentions a detail which I never thought about before: there's probably Pé Chói technology going back to Humanspace on Tékumel. The Pé Chói themselves don't seem to be interested in it, at all. But this suggests, of course, that there is alien tech from other non-human species scattered around too; tech from the Shén, or the Hlutrgú, etc.

In your adventures, did you ever come across technology that was specifically alien or non-human?

Oh, yes, many times! We had no idea what it was, or even how to hold it, so every 'find' was an adventure in and of itself. This is where dear old Origo would come in, as he'd be all eager and hot to try the thing, and we'd get to stand back and (usually, when we weren't diving for cover) laugh our fool heads off at the results.

Originally Posted by Shemek hiTankolel

Yes you're right, I do remember that conversation between Alex and the professor. I concur it probably is merely coincidence, but who can say? As Phil states in another Blue Room thread (I believe, or perhaps in a response on the yahoo group?) that he had forgotten where the inspiration for many of his ideas originally came from.
One thing though, there are a surprisingly large number of Slavic words which are derived from Sanskrit and I have to think that Phil would have known some Sanskrit. Perhaps that is where the derivation unintentionally comes from?
I wholeheartedly agree with you looking at the bare bones of his world building process is/would be great. I love this type of analysis and speculation.

Yes, Phil knew Sanskrit. I think you're onto something, here.

Originally Posted by Shemek hiTankolel

Got to love people with this mentality. I had to deal with these types for years until I finally had enough and switched jobs/careers. They are incorrigible and are best avoided for the sake of one's blood pressure and continued liberty.

Exactly; it's why I didn't renew my dollar-a-year contract with them. I consider myself lucky in that I got them to pay up on their tab that they owed me for stuff they wanted.

Originally Posted by Gronan of Simmerya

You've always been impressively organized, I have to admit.

I've never been that organized, folks, I always had to make up for it by being fairly bright and quick on my feet.

I do remember times at Coffman getting four or five volunteers to help trog stuff around. Sadly, that seems a lot harder these days; a lot more people seem to want to be passively entertained.

He's being modest, folks. For "Tractics" games, he'd have each unit all ready to go in an individual tray or box so all we had to do was deploy and go at it.

Agreed about the vanishing help. The tradition, back in the day, was that if you played in the game, you helped carry the game back out to the car for the GM / referee.