Random Tavern Generator

I'm expecting to have some D&D characters hit a city and want to find taverns. Therefore I need some taverns, right? So I turned to the internet, and found a random tavern generator. I just really like it when I think of something I need, and the internet has already provided it, for free.

In this case, I rather liked what the folks who made this decided were the important things to give you about a tavern.... Here's a sample.

from random tavern generator ... http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/20010223d 

Tavern Name: Lonesome Bed

Bartender: Female human, 6th-level sorcerer

Interesting Clientele: Cloaked figure in corner, a bard performing for drinks.

Rumors Overheard: An absentminded wizard has let her rod of wonder fall into the wrong hands. A mirror of opposition has created an evil duplicate of a hero.

Accommodations: Good (a small private room with one bed, some amenities and a covered chamber pot) for 5 sp/day

Today's Menu: 

Breakfast: Smoked sausage, Goose eggs, Quail eggs, Stewed prunes, Oatmeal (cost 1gp).

Lunch: Veal sweetbreads, Sharp cheese, Black beans, Peach (cost 8sp).

Supper: Lamb chop, Collard greens, Cabbage, Nut bread, Custard (cost 1gp).

Snack: Deep dwarven blue cheese, Peach, Millet (cost 4sp).

Article about Dan Harmon's Post-Community Stuff Makes Me Want to Watch Community

I've never actually watched _Community_, but the stuff about them firing Dan Harmon as showrunner was interesting, and this article about Dan Harmon's 'Harmontown' show is super interesting.

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8936669/view/full/dan-harmon-life-community

Cover for my D&D notebook

I felt like making an old school map for the cover of my notebook.

Pillowdrome, an ad-hoc game

Scott Simpson shares a game he calls Pillowdrome where you chase someone around an obstacle while balancing a pillow on your head:

http://yourmonkeycalled.com/post/56089253/pillowdrome-extended-family-vacations-with-their

This reminds me of how much fun I've had with my daughter playing our invented game 'Duck Dash', which is tag where you have to hit the other person with a stuffed duck. It's basically tag for adults who don't want to run so very much. 

Lego Hogwarts model is amazing

Wow. The size and detail is outstanding.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/88574960@N02/sets/72157632858317817/with/8508640967/

Scott ready to take flight at Jugglefest 2013

Ethan learning to juggle at Jugglefest 2013

Balloon sculpt at entrance to Jugglefest 2013

A software tool for designing games: Ludi

This was a neat find from metafilter.com: an article on BoardGameGeek about a game called 'Yavalath' that was designed by a computer program.

First the hook: the game Yavalath sounds interesting. It's played on a hex map (a hex of hexes); two players take take turns placing pieces in two colors; you win if you get four in a row of your color ... but you LOSE if you place three in a row.

The Ludi program uses a sort of evolutionary programming process ... it scrambles a bunch of game rules to make rule sets, then simulates playing the games and uses some kind of heuristic to decide which games would be interesting to human players.

Further, the humans working on the project then had people play the top-ranked games (Ludi generated 1048 games and ranked 19 as interesting to humans). The people's choice, Yavalath, was actually #4 on Ludi's list. 

Other details show that clearly the algorithm for predicting human interest isn't perfect. One of the highly-rated games had rules too complex for people to like. But so what? Think of this thing as a game design tool, a way to test and iterate options. Because isn't that the problem with game design -- one can imagine many rule choices, but it's expensive to try them all. 

The story I read about the famous German game Setters of Catan is that the author, Klaus Teuber, spent months playing the game with his family every night, testing out various rules. That's fantastic, and supports the widespread popularity of the game, but few people can make that sort of testing happen. I know I've played many a game that didn't seem like it had been playtested nearly enough.