Journal Entries
September 11, 2001
Posted Sep 15, 2001
I recently left the United States Marine Corps Reserve. I spent 6 years preparing for what I hoped would never happen: War. Recently, President Bush announced that the Miliary will be calling up some reserves. My unit will likely be one of those called up. I am ready and willing to go. I will give my life, if it will prevent just one more death, from terrorism, in this world. If there is an extended period of time where I do not reply to posts, talk to Marv, he will likely be your best source of info. For those of you that understand, I may not be able to make it to Denver. I have enjoyed my experience with the Guide over the last 1 1/2+ years and I thank everyone, in advance, for these experiences.
BEN aka: Dr. D, The Good Doctor
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Latest reply: Sep 15, 2001
Aenar: The Role Playing Game
Posted Jul 23, 2001
Writing a Role Playing Game(RPG) is one of the most interesting experiences that I have ever had. It is also one of the more difficult.
When you are writing an RPG, you have to make sure that it is completely original in all respects. If you borrow from another game system, you have to make sure that you completely rewrite it so that there is absolutely no chance of being sued for plagiarism.
I began working on AENAR shortly after I graduated high school in 1993. I began with a system, Solnis, that was written and given to me by a friend.
I had been working on Solnis/AENAR for about two weeks and actually had the system playable when I experienced my first setback, my hard drive crashed and I did not have a back-up. I spent another 3 weeks rewriting the system with additional changes and with several back-up copies at my disposal.
Game Basics
The world is one of fantasy and the general society is that of Post Nuclear Holocaust Medieval. Monarchies have been revived as have the concepts of a monarchy: knights, pages, etc. Magic is prominent throughout the world and technology has been discontinued in most areas.
The game is based off of an opposed test system. An opposed test is a skill check that is based on the strength of the opposition.
I.E.: A brick wall has a certain strength level which is represented by a number, we'll say 6. To break this wall you would roll a predetermined number of dice, the more 6s you roll the more damage you do to the wall.
The game uses many of the dice that are not commonly used mainly 4 and 8 sided. I do not use 6 sided dice, I think that they are overused.
Character Classes
AENAR has many different character classes available, unfortunately, I could not be original in this, there are only so many careers that are interesting in a fantasy RPG. Some of the classes available are: Assassin, Legionaire, and Mage. You can multi-class and you can also set up "twins". A twin is when two players set up mutually exclusive characters, i.e Mage/Legionaire. The character have to be of opposing classes but can share similar skills like cooking, hunting, etc. When the characters are together they have exceptional abilities. On the flip side, when they are apart, they can only achieve 70% of their potential.
Skills
There are many skills available to a character, anything from cooking to highland dancing to hunting. If a person is capable of doing it, it is available as a skill, the list is all but endless.
Races
Your character can be any of several races: Louki (human), Chwen (a Chow dog), Mujina (kind of like a dark elf), Saot (a mutated gerbil), Naga, (lizard/amphibian), and Avian (bird). There are also sub-races available for some of these.
Magic
The system has two types of magic: Inner magic is kind of like Psionics in other game systems. Outer magic uses outside elements like earth, air, fire, and water in the casting of spells. Inner magic is vastly more powerful but is also much harder to recover from.
Religion
An RPG would not be complete with out religion and all of the religions I have included have some basis in reality, there are several types to choose from. You can have monotheistism, polytheistism, druidism and almost anything you can think of as your religion.
Technology
There is some technology available in the game. What is available comes from the present time. There are airplanes and cars in extremely limited supply. Most of what is available from today are pistols and rifles. Most technology is shunned.
I am continually working on AENAR, I have many supplements that I have planned to write. It is a very time consuming process. When I first started, I was writing 10 to 12 hours a day. But I have enjoyed almost every minute of it.
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Latest reply: Jul 23, 2001
FruitCake
Posted Jan 19, 2000
Around the end of the earth year there is a holiday called Christmas. This season is a time of giving and most people actually like what they recieve, even the ones with digital watches. There are many people who absolutely do not like what they recieve and the reason for this is that they recieved what is called a FRUITCAKE.
Now, there is nothing inherently wrong with the fruitcake itself, a minority of the population likes fruitcake so much that they give these fruitcakes to people that do not like fruitcake. These people in turn give it to someone else who more than likely does not like fruitcake and so on, and so on. This constant recycling of fruitcake has made them extremely hard and very unpopular.
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Latest reply: Jan 19, 2000
Digital Watches
Posted Oct 24, 1999
It has been mentioned that people on Earth think that digital watches are a pretty neat idea. I have a digital watch and, they're not that neat!
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Latest reply: Oct 24, 1999
Good Doctor Zomnker (This must be Tuesday," said GDZ to himself, sinking low over his Dr. Pepper, "I never could get the hang of Tuesdays.")
Researcher U98469
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