Thread: Questioning chirine ba kal

Originally Posted by chirine ba kal

Attachment 531

Decks and upperworks in teak oil, lower hull in wood stain. Oars still drying; teak oil. Sails artists' canvas, still to be tied properly. Masts can come off.

Now you need a second one, for the battles and boarding actions.

Originally Posted by AsenRG

...why?

Free Kriegsspiel. The written text is a guideline, not a straight jacket. Like the original OD&D rules didn't have a "coup de grace" rule because Dave and Gary both figured if you tied somebody up and hit them in the head with a battleaxe you didn't need a rule to tell you they were dead, hit points be damned.

Boy, were THEY wrong.

Originally Posted by chirine ba kal

Attachment 531

Decks and upperworks in teak oil, lower hull in wood stain. Oars still drying; teak oil. Sails artists' canvas, still to be tied properly. Masts can come off.

Splendid!!! When do we sail...??? Ancient Modeler indeed!!!

H:0)

Originally Posted by Hermes Serpent

Where's the +1 or the thumbs up option?

This is great, love the ship.

Oh fuck I think I wet myself.

Thank you! (Towel? Wet vac? Salvage pumps? I am equipped for maritime emergencies...)

Originally Posted by CRKrueger

Now you need a second one, for the battles and boarding actions.

Well, he coughed and blushed modestly, Akho joins Warrior, Fearless, Dreadnought, and the mighty Nemesis in the galley fleet. The first is a nice little galley from Flagship Games (possibly now from Scale Creep or Old Guard after Flagship closed) the second and third are open pentaconters in expanded urethane foam that I got at Origins back in 1987 from a company long gone, and the massive battlewagon of the fleet was scratch-built. There are another eight ships in the sailing fleet, plus about a dozen smaller craft. (Photos can be taken of them, if you like.) All in 28mm, for the reasons you mention...

Have I mentioned I like ships and boats?

Originally Posted by Hrugga

Splendid!!! When do we sail...??? Ancient Modeler indeed!!!

H:0)

Soon as you get down to the quay and we get your baggage stowed away. Don't have to worry about the tides, either; we haven't got any on Tekumel, and we're too far up river in Tanis...

I am 'ancient', I think; I'm about to celebrate over fifty years of model-building of one kind or another. (You'd think that, after all this time, I'd know what I was doing...)

Originally Posted by GameDaddy

Wow that's a beautiful Galley. Interesting this shows up here at this time, I just had a character one Kotaru HiKalodel sail in a Galley very similar to this from Jakalla last Saturday, and will shortly have my convention writeup for UCON posted here.

Thank you!

Wonderful! Tell us all about it, when you would!

That's a wonderful galley, Uncle! As I've said, sometimes I envy your figures collection just the tiniest little bit. (I've also said it's only until I remember the lack of storage space).

Also, I've got a very important question and can't find the answer. Ss�mani/M�nikh hiSs�yal (Food of the Ss�, for everyone) is mentioned to grow in "wet lowlands, swamps, fens, bogs, palmetto forest, and deep jungle" in Bethorm. A PC in my campaign is planning an attack on a Ssu "fortress" that's surrounded by a patch of it.

The question the player asked immediately* was: "are swamps the same as on Earth, including swamp gas? They do contain sulphur, right?"
Yes, we can all guess where this is going.
I answered, as the NPC, that he's going to consult a scholar (she's talking with her husband from Tekumel, who is a Lyviani soldier and politician, but not a scholar).
She tasked him with asking also "do Ssu breath oxygen".

And I took a pause to open this thread immediately. It's asking a scholar time!

*Remember that in my campaign the PC is an Earthling who adapted on Tekumel, so she knows about swamps and the chemical constitution of air. Talk about "Barbarians off the boat"!
The character generation itself was kinda unusual, I admit. Though I think that both the fans of Frei Kriegspiegel and Traveller fans would have approved.

Originally Posted by Gronan of Simmerya

Free Kriegsspiel. The written text is a guideline, not a straight jacket. Like the original OD&D rules didn't have a "coup de grace" rule because Dave and Gary both figured if you tied somebody up and hit them in the head with a battleaxe you didn't need a rule to tell you they were dead, hit points be damned.

Boy, were THEY wrong.

Well, "coup de grace" was clear to everyone I knew...ok, almost everyone. What was less clear was whether a group of people pinning you would allow a "coup de grace" attack.
But I must now ask, weren't they using OD&D as the base for their "Frei Kriegspiel"? If they did, Chirine has played quite the real D&D already (see the text I quoted). Maybe it was "OD&D with lots of houserules", but it still counts in my book.
(And of course, we can argue whether EPT is D&D adapted to Tekumel or not, but let's not go there in this thread).

And if their Frei Kriegspiel style wasn't OD&D-based, well, I'll be waiting for his first impressions of playing some version of D&D, and can predict it's going to be fun to read!

Originally Posted by AsenRG

That's a wonderful galley, Uncle! As I've said, sometimes I envy your figures collection just the tiniest little bit. (I've also said it's only until I remember the lack of storage space).

Also, I've got a very important question and can't find the answer. Ss�mani/M�nikh hiSs�yal (Food of the Ss�, for everyone) is mentioned to grow in "wet lowlands, swamps, fens, bogs, palmetto forest, and deep jungle" in Bethorm. A PC in my campaign is planning an attack on a Ssu "fortress" that's surrounded by a patch of it.

The question the player asked immediately* was: "are swamps the same as on Earth, including swamp gas? They do contain sulphur, right?"
Yes, we can all guess where this is going.
I answered, as the NPC, that he's going to consult a scholar (she's talking with her husband from Tekumel, who is a Lyviani soldier and politician, but not a scholar).
She tasked him with asking also "do Ssu breath oxygen".

And I took a pause to open this thread immediately. It's asking a scholar time!

*Remember that in my campaign the PC is an Earthling who adapted on Tekumel, so she knows about swamps and the chemical constitution of air. Talk about "Barbarians off the boat"!
The character generation itself was kinda unusual, I admit. Though I think that both the fans of Frei Kriegspiegel and Traveller fans would have approved.


Well, "coup de grace" was clear to everyone I knew...ok, almost everyone. What was less clear was whether a group of people pinning you would allow a "coup de grace" attack.
But I must now ask, weren't they using OD&D as the base for their "Frei Kriegspiel"? If they did, Chirine has played quite the real D&D already (see the text I quoted). Maybe it was "OD&D with lots of houserules", but it still counts in my book.
(And of course, we can argue whether EPT is D&D adapted to Tekumel or not, but let's not go there in this thread).

And if their Frei Kriegspiel style wasn't OD&D-based, well, I'll be waiting for his first impressions of playing some version of D&D, and can predict it's going to be fun to read!

Thank you! And I do agree - the sheer volume of storage space is a pain, sometimes.

Yes; as far as we know, both the Ssu and Hlyss are oxygen-breathers. And yes, swamps on Tekumel are pretty much the same as Terran ones. I don't know about the sulphur content - I would have thought that methane would have been the primary component of swamp gas, but I'm no expert on this.

I shall report back, of course!