EmeraldSilver Blogs

“You are the mast of everything situation.”
“My horse wrote that.  He has a 17 Wisdom, but only an 8 Intelligence.”

“[The bear trap] would reach almost to our waists…”

“I have succeeded!  I have connected my kingdom to the internet by way of pneumatic tubes!”

“Show me on the map where the bad man touched you…”

The kitchen door opens and the redheaded woman walks out. There’s a young boy, perhaps 8, behind her with the offal. The fire-lizards are all aware of the food, but are waiting impatiently for permission to eat.

“Most people who come to see me don’t ask for uncooked meat,” says Scarlett. “But I ain’t met many castle folks.”

If this is an ambush, it’s a slow ambush.

“It ain’t an ambush – you’re a girl. I’d guard your purse, though. Not that I think she’s likely to steal it, but she’s damned sure going to charge you an arm and a leg for that meat…”

“What’s the mule named?”
“One.”

“Because that’s what you want: a grappling wizard.”

I’m slowly feeling my way towards what I want to do with item and creature creation, and as such, I spent a little time today reviewing the ADRPG and Shadow Knight.

(As an aside – I always forget, when I haven’t looked at it in a while, just how completely insane certain sections of that book are.  Can we say “power creep”?)

There are some fascinating examples of non-standard powers and abilities in the NPC descriptions.  Items and creatures aren’t the only offenders when it comes to that, of course, but I’m sticking with items and creatures for this post.  I may look later at the powers.

Can you breed the opposite way as a shapeshifter?

I’ve considered this before – even talked with other people about this before, and the expressions I get when I mention it are fascinating.  The consensus, it seems, is that one should not be able to do – nay, should not be able to even conceive of doing – such a thing.

I have some theories as to why this is.  The uncharitable chunk of it comes down to latent homophobia.  The more charitable one is that it’s just too much work.

I mean, who has which bits?  Does it matter?  Could you get the deed done with an eyeball and a pseudopod?  Who carries the child to term?  Do both parties do so?

And then there’s the matter of the child.  What shape does it come out – the natural form of one or both parents, or the forms they were in when they did the deed?  An amorphous puddle of goo?  Does the child have shapeshifting too?  How fast does it mature?

More to the point, since we’re talking about swapping sexes before… well… swapping sex – what happens to the sexual characteristics and gender identity of the child?

“Because yeah, that sound is annoying, but my dick is choking.”