Iron Chef: Battle Mountain Oysters

…to compete in this one, you’ve gotta have balls

We misses Our Precious, we does! This nasty old desktop hurts us, it does! It slows us down and makes us stay in the same room all the time! And we must SHARE it with Grace! Bwaaaa!

365 Days, 365 Characters

About this character:  This pirate, tho technologically much more advanced than the last one, is also more bloodthirsty…and uglier.

#23: Captain Korgar 

Main Trait: Klingon
Second Trait: Starfaring Pirate
Third Trait: Two Weapon Fighting (axes)

Flaws: No Klingon sense of honor/duty, Greedy

Several generations ago, a colony of Klingons lost contact with/were abandoned by the homeworld. Since this colony was stocked mostly with malcontents and the (according to the Klingon viewpoint) mentally ill, it didn’t take long for the old ways to be forgotten and a new, more survival oriented society to emerge.

Captain Korgar was able to get hold of a starship when a group of Ferengi traders made the mistake of stopping by. After “persuading” the Ferengi to teach him and his friends how to operate the ship, he slaughtered half of them. This caused the remaining Ferengi to see the light and swear allegiance to Korgar. Soon, the “Razor Claw” and her crew were the terror of the spacelanes.

Captain Korgar stands 6’9″ tall, dresses in black leather with red accents, has many scars all over his body and carries two very sharp axes as weapons.

In his spare time, Korgar enjoys drinking, carousing, amassing wealth and feeding bits of his enemies to his pet geeloth (a big two headed furry snake).

 

Bucky & Squint Learn To Fly

…it would be so much easier with an airplane

Well, the laptop is in the shop and will be out next week. Curse you, stupid 3 day weekend!

And now, we be ready to sail into adventure…Yarr!

365 Days, 365 Characters

About this character:  He’s as salty an old seadog as ever was, matey, and a darned fine pirate, too.

#22: Captain Patrick “Bloody Pat” Kelly 

Main Trait: Pirate Captain
Second Trait: Swordsman
Third Trait: Ladies Man

Flaws: Hot Temper, Hard Drinker, Pitiless To Enemies

Captain Kelly is about 35 years old, pretty good looking and a ruthless foe of all authority. He has death sentences on him by many countries and is quite proud of that fact. He hates the French and Spanish, but as a good Irishman, he reserves most of his hate for England. He has a rather soft spot for the American colonies tho. In fact, he often says he might retire there one day.

His ship, the Nightmare, is crewed by as tough a bunch of sailors as was ever made. They are loyal to the Captain, but also take great pains not to piss him off. Once a year, the Captain has a huge party for “his lads” during which the food, rum and women are plentiful.

In his spare time, Bloody Pat likes to nurse hangovers, curse in up to 7 languages and try to remember how many children he has fathered.

Horrible Cheese Creatures

…here brie monsters

Ouch! That one even made me wince:)

Some quick updates…

I’m still using the desktop and it looks like my trusty laptop will be going into the shop tonight. The hardware part of the problem (broken screen hinge) may or may not be easy to fix. The software problem (which was explained to me, but flew clear over my non-techie head) may well result in the loss of a whole bunch of data. This will suck hugely if the data lost includes pictures and other unreplaceable stuff.

To my World Building Game players: Due to the above computer woes, as well as other extenuating circumstances, I’m closing down the game. Sorry guys, but at least we weren’t too far into it. There may still be a use for your colonies…in another project…so keep watching this space.

No big Labor Day weekend plans for Grace and I. I might clean out the garage, which could well use up the whole 3 day weekend:) 

Tonight, I’ll start Week 4 of my 365 Days, 365 Characters. The theme? Pirates and Other Scoundrels!

Gotta go…work must be done.

The Thieving Fog Nymph

…and other stories of combined naughtiness

365 Days, 365 Characters

About this character:  We’ll close out Pulp Women Week with a 21st Century woman who really got too far into her work.

#21: Professor Jeanmarie Boudin

Stats (using a d10)
Physical: 9
Mental: 8
Psychic: 0
Magical: 0

Skills:   Brawling (2d8), Climb (3d12), Security Systems (3d10), Netrunning (3d12), Self Healing (2d20)

Jeanmarie was already a Nobel Prize winning cyberneticist when, in 2031, Tempest Industries hired her to head up their Human/Robot Direct Inteface project. Besides being bored with her previous job, she was recently divorced and an empty nester, so she had plenty of time and energy to devote to a project that would link a human mind with a robotic body. She soon set to work on the problem.

After 2 years of hard work, Jeanmarie and her team had built a suit that would allow a human to seamlessly “inhabit” the body of a robot. She decided to do the demonstration herself and things went smoothly…for 20 minutes. You see, none of the previous tests had ever lasted longer than that. As she noted later, it was a hell of a thing to learn that at the 21 minute mark, your human body would just stop working, keel over dead and your consciousness would be trapped in a robot.

In her case, the robot was a 4 armed humanoid shaped EX90…a bot created for exploration in areas too dangerous or remote for humans. After some initial shock (and a few weeks of therapy), Jeanmarie accepted her fate and decided to make the best of it. Before long, she was accompanying Doc Tempest and his crew (including the recently revived Sally Smithfield) on adventures throughout the solar system and cyberspace.

Oh, she did eventually solve the “20 minute problem”, for which she won her second Nobel Prize.

Professor Boudin stands 6’6″ tall, weighs 422 pounds, has no hair, has 5 assorted eyes, copper and silver “skin”, two legs with grasping feet like a parrot and 4 tentacular arms with 6 fingers on each arm.

In her spare time, Jeanmarie enjoys reading cybernetics journals, playing four games of chess at once, trying to improve her sensor pack and exploring the Net for lost cyberworlds.

Dogpunk Stories

…hip and edgy new wave canine sci-fi

STUFF

The laptop is still fucked up…Grace will try to bitchslap the software into submission after dinner.

To my World Building Game players: this no laptop deal might put things on hold for awhile.

2008: Go to GenCon or go to Burning Man? It may well take two years to decide.

Making more tomato sauce tonight. Might spice this batch up a bit more than usual.

5 weeks until Hawaii!

365 Days, 365 Characters

About this character:  Not all pulp adventures feature citizens of the United States or Great Britain. Here’s a masked crimefighter that knows what evil lurks in the hearts of south of the border.

#20: La Bruja Blanca (The White Witch)

Stats (using a d10)
Physical: 8
Mental: 8
Psychic: 6
Magical: 9

Skills:   Martial Arts (2d10), Pistol (2d10), Acrobatics (3d6), Intimidation (2d12)

Veronica Robles has two big secrets in her life: she is the masked crimefighter known as the White Witch and she really is a witch. Or a mutant…she’s not sure yet. What she is sure of is that her powers and training make her the scourge of criminals from Tijuana to Buenos Aires. And that makes her very happy.

Like another masked crimefighter from up norte, Veronica has many agentsworking for her. They are located all over Central and South America. All of them funnel bits of information to a central clearinghouse, where the info is pieced together to give La Bruja Blanca a darned good idea what is going on in the criminal world.

Between the fact that she stops/solves crimes and the fact that having a woman kick their asses screws with the criminals machismo AND the fact that her magic scares the poor superstitious suckers halfway out of their minds, the White Witch has had a dramatic effect on crime wherever she appears. In some areas, crime is down by as much as 50%. Of course, she does have some grande contracts out on her, but good luck trying to kill her.

Veronica is 5’9″ tall, weighs 150 pounds, has black hair and brown eyes and a very nice build. As La Bruja Blanca, she wears a white suit, white cape, white shoes, a white wig, a white hat and a white mask that reveals only her blood red lips. Her voice (as LBB) has an eerie echo to it.

In her spare time, Veronica enjoys travelling, painting landscapes, riding horses and listening to radio dramas.

Searching For A Midnight Princess

…with a heart of gold

Well, it appears that the laptop has had a nervous breakdown…or maybe a heart attack…but whatever, it ain’t booting up. Dr. Grace will give it a full examination and then decide if she can fix it or if it needs to go to a specialist. If it goes to the specialist (and it needs to, due to a busted hinge on the screen/lid, I might just have the vid card upgraded, too. We shall see.

365 Days, 365 Characters

About this character:  Every pulp milieu needs a lost world (or two) and today we have a young woman from one such place on CyberPulp Earth.

#19: Ualla of the Tiger Tribe

Stats (using a d10)
Physical: 7
Mental: 7
Psychic: 5
Magical: 2

Skills:   Survival (3d8), Knife (2d10), Spear (2d8), Tracking (2d6), Climb (2d6), Swim (2d6)

Ualla is a warrior of the Tiger Tribe, which in turn is part of the Two Mountains Clan. Ualla is a firce warrior, a skilled hunter and a very good tracker. Altho she is of an age where she should be choosing a mate, she does not seem interested in any of her tribes young men. This is because Ualla has met the Outsiders, people from a far off place beyond the great barrier walls, and she is intrigued by one of their young men.

So far, Ualla has only watched the outsiders from hidden places, but she wants to do more. She has been thinking of approaching them with a peace offering. Besides, they are travelling in the direction of the Crocodile People’s village and need to be warned that that is not good.

Ualla is tall (for her people), standing 5’5″. She weighs 106 ponds and has long black hair and black eyes. Her skin is medium brown and she has many tribal scars and piercings. She typically wears a two piece outfit made of rabbit skin.

In her spare time, Ualla enjoys hunting the giant thagdar, climbing trees to gather dindi eggs and teaching young girls how to knife fight.

The Silence Of The Basset Hounds

…you may give me a tummy rub, Clarice

365 Days, 365 Characters

About this character:  This young lady is the premiere gadgeteer in my CyberPulp Dociverse, but I didn’t create her. That honor belongs to my good friend, Avis.

#18: Sally Smithfield

Stats (using a d10)
Physical: 6
Mental: 9
Psychic: 1
Magical: 6

Skills:   Weird Science (3d12), Electronics (2d10), Chemistry (3d6), Mechanics (3d6), Hand To Hand Combat (2d8), Pistol (2d8), Rifle (3d6), Driving (2d8), Pilot (2d8)

In the year 1932, Sally is 28 years old. She is tall (5’10”), has shoulder length sandy blonde hair, blue eyes and a slim athletic build, which comes from both her years of ballet training and her practicing of martial arts. Sally can be a bit absent minded at times, mostly because she tends to always be mentally working on her next adventure. For the most part, Sally is a terrible cook, but an excellent baker, with cookies being her specialty.

Sally was born to parents who were scientists, so her love of science is a natural thing. She has an older brother who is also a scientist. However, two things distinguish Sally from the rest of her family. First, she has that perfect 50/50 blend of magical and technological aptitude that results in a person being either a Weird Scientist (which she is) or a Technomancer (such as her archenemy, Wizard X). Secondly, Sally is a Type 2 Human, the next evolutionary step up from homo sapiens. This makes her just a bit stronger, faster. tougher and smarter than normal humans. Well, ok, she’s a lot smarter than the average human.

Besides working in her families lab (The Smithfield Scientific Company), Sally is also a member of Doc Tempest’s band of adventuring crimefighters. She is not only the groups gadgeteer, but their second best pilot after Doc himself.

Sally has a big secret: she is a lesbian. Presently, she has not quite accepted this fact, mostly because there are at least a couple of men she finds sexually attractive. Soon, however, Sally will meet the woman who sweeps her off her feet. Sadly, in 1940, there will be a tragic event that will cause Sally (with Doc’s help) to decide to go into cryogenic suspension for what should have been 20 years, but turns out to be 90 years. When she is revived, Sally joins up with Doc’s great grandson and continues her gadgeteering/adventuring career in the 21st Century.

In her spare time, Sally enjoys driving in her amazing car (named Betsy), ballet dancing, building kinetic sculptures and (in the 21st Century) playing online RPGs.