Blockage of creative juices

Everyone gets a creative block sometimes, so to help get past a recent one of my own I went back to a much older style of mine and started on some character illustrations.

The kid, as he is simply called, is more along the line of a comic book super hero character, crossed with a little Japanese manga and thrown into the Marvel and DC universes.
A teen age boy in appearance, Kid is the result of research into lost precursor technology. An archaeological dig in the Himalayas uncovers a series of remarkable finds from a long lost civilisation, among which is a device seeming to contain a wealth of technological information.
The device passes through several hands before being claimed by those of your typical evil corporation or super villain firm of choice, who decide to gain complete one to one access of the information stored within.

To this aim they artificially grow a human body around the artefact, essentially creating a child as the interface for the device. But it did not take long before it became clear that this device was less of a store of knowledge, and in fact a direct link to knowledge, the some total of it.
In essence, they had a person who contained a direct wireless link to the Akashic records, something they were tapped into from their creation.
The end result, a person who could recall any piece of information that could conceivably exist, and the knowledge to form the shape of that information in the physical world.
You may think, a person with the building blocks of creation in their hands is a little too powerful to let loose, so did his makers, whom decided to program his brain while he was still being formed inside the lab.

This is where you insert the dramatic entrance of the Super hero team, blowing huge chunks out of the lab and smashing all sorts of delicate equipment. Right at the worst but last possible moment.
The implanted commands that were going to be loaded into the kids brain are instead replaced with heavily corrupted personal files, in this case the music library of the computer system.

While still limiting their creations power, now his access to the records, his ability to form and create and to fight are all limited to whatever music is stuck in his head at the time.
So to drive him into a battle frenzy in which guns and swords drop out of air around him, all you would need is to psych him up with some heavy metal, while some ambient electronica would mellow him out.
Just don't try country and western.

(in progress photoshop)

Filler material, masochistic Marx and Game mastering advice

Blog post, 26th of January 2011.
So very tired.

Working update
Obligatory Simpson's references to one side, I had hoped to release a demo tape of a certain project here today.
Unfortunately that tape hasn't made it to my in-box and so I can only supply vague details on the project, insert disappointed crowd noises here.

Recently a side project was offered around the course, a real world brief, offered by a real world organisation, with the promise of a real world commission.
Naturally almost all those present jumped at the thought, and so one of the tightest deadlines possible was set to select which ever team could propose the best method of meeting this brief head on.
This deadline has now past, and I am happy to say that the group I belong to (all two of us) is still in the running, the bad news is so is everyone else.
As this is such a rarity for a university course, they cant afford to hand it off to a team who can't do it justice. This means an additional 2 days and the possibility of various teams being merged to form the best results.
The deadline is closing and so I look forward to announcing the full results, discussing the winning teams victory no matter whom they may be.

Marxism
So Slightly inflammatory opening title aside, Karl (or Charles) Marx.
A recent task called for an examination of one philosopher from a huge pile of potential subjects.
Seeing as his works made such sense to me in the past, I picked up a book on comrade Marx and began re-acquainting myself.
However, I ran into a bit of a problem. You see all my prior teaching focused only on Marx's theories in regards to sociology, while the current book takes a look at more of the history. In specific Marx's own history.

And despite all he inspired, all the events for which he was a catalyst, it doesn't change the fact that the poor man lived and died in absolute poverty because he wasn't very popular.
His views were so unpopular with the Bourgeoisie he was 'revealing' that they cast him out of France and Germany, forcing him to live in England with not a penny to his name.
At many points he could have salvaged something of his life, recanting his views in return for a university posting, or focussed himself on the life of the working class and strived for better.
But no he did not, and suffered for it, loosing loved ones and station for his views.

I can't really decide if this was noble self sacrifice, stubborn headiness or anything in between.

Game Mastering
As noted elsewhere, I play and run games.
In fact I play with people from across the world, am a player in a long running pod-cast soon to be published as a game book of its own, and run stories for audiences ranging from 15 to 28.

So its little surprise I have a thought or two to spare on the matter.
The piece of advice I wish to suggest today goes for both players and game masters.

There is a party limit.
This may differ for each game but be aware there is an optimum number for the story.
Many people know the song about how lonely the number one is, well games often run down the same line. 1 player will get lonely with just themselves and the "game master".
The challenge soon dissolves, and a huge section of the game is missing due to the lack of anyone to interact with. You may as well be a pair of children with their toy box for all the character development and story that gets done.

Two will always feel like their missing something, needing to spread themselves too thin to cover all bases. Being unable to specialise and forever finding themselves incapable of acting when their other half is missing.
Not that its impossible, in fact a great Pod-cast I recommend you visit has a series of two man party games.
(http://www.anim5.com/IDDFOS/TGS/index.html Captive souls adventures).


But most games require either a trinity of power, or a classic fantastic four. Three and four member parties manage to find how best to balance against one another, how to cover all that is needed without loosing a focused identity on each character. Perhaps its the standard templates enforcing themselves upon us, or just how people best function but you can't deny the most common themes are a trinity or Warrior, Rogue and Mage, or a 4 person team of specialists.

This doesn't rule out a larger group, but bare in mind, the lager the party the harder a job it is to keep everyone happy.
In a group of six your often going to find yourself stretching to find reasons to keep the team all together at once, to involve them and keep them involved as a functioning unit without just lumping them all into a horrific conglomerate creature.
But even if you do manage it, your players will notice. A good party consists of the right people, your friends who will recognise the strain being put on you and so in turn feel regret, and probably leave the campaign for the greater good.
While its no bodies fault or anything everyone will feel let down by their own inability to include that unlucky ex-player.
So please take this on board, there is always a party limit, and you should never feel sorry for having to remind people of it.

Not the tyre company...

Thank you for visiting this particular blog.
Here will be a record of my own ramblings, as well as the progress and designs of my work.

The nature of my work will range from a small commission to sketch a new born child, to a treatise on the concept of time and how it can be toyed with.
On this blog, you can follow the progress made, as well as see the changes to a project over time as it evolves from a simple line sketch to a full size colour poster.

Each page contains various major topics and off beat comments about my leisure activities.
Fair warning, nearly all of it will contain long winded sentences and all are my own personal opinion on the topic.

Thank you for reading and hope you enjoy,
J Goodyer