The House of Irony / The House

I remember the first time I met Doug…

Wait. No I don’t. How the fuck did we meet?

My water was shut off yesterday due to maintenance. This morning I went to turn on the bathroom faucet and it made a strange gurgling noise while making up its mind as to whether to give me any water. Almost instantly Tsuki, the Chubby Avenger, lept from her bed by the balcony window and flew between me and the bathroom sink, shielding me from the evils within. I have never seen her move her stumpy little legs so quickly. Then Tsuki stuck her head under the faucet and began hissing down the drain at the monster attacking me. She kept at it even after I turned the faucet off, calming down only after I gave her some cat treats.

Thank you, Tsuki. It’s nice to know you’ve got my back.

I’m starting to feel like I’ve dropped off the planet, sitting in front of my monitor endlessly yet never posting, a creepy lurker on my own websites.

My reason is obvious for anyone that knows me, I’m as singleminded as they come, and right now all of my focus is on developing Karissa’s new site. We went minimalist while the rest of the site’s being constructed, all that’s there right now is a worklog of Karissa’s latest product, a knitting purse.

Karissa’s really been putting a lot of work into her end of things, spending a lot of time documenting her progress, updating, and yet I’m having trouble doing the same. The only thing on my mind lately is OSCommerce alternatives. AGAIN. (Without a doubt, this will be the topic of my next post.)

P.S. Can you believe I haven’t written about the Mac Mini I bought THREE weeks ago?

You’re probably all sick of me talking about Snakes on a Plane, so today I will be talking about Snakes on a Plane.

There is one aspect of the Snakes on a Plane roleplaying game in particular that elevates it to the level of a classic game. During character creation, the players must write a one sentence story that explains what they hope to accomplish while on the plane. Examples include “Snuck onto the plane to pitch my script to a producer” and “Escorting a witness to testify in a federal trial”. Alone, these short descriptions mean very little. What makes the game so special is a rule found further along.

Once the time remaining elapses, the plane arrives at its destination. Everyone who accomplished the task stated in their Story is a WINNER. Everyone who did not accomplish that task is BITTEN BY A SNAKE and DIES.

It seems obvious that the primary focus of Snakes on a Plane would be snakes on a plane, but the snakes on the plane are in fact only complications in resolving the main objectives of the characters. Unlike most goals set during a roleplaying game, these objectives are clear and have a very specific time frame. You can be the greatest damn snake fighter on the planet, but if you don’t reconcile with your estranged wife and children before the plane lands no amount of snake fighting skills are going to change your fate. You will die.

This rule creates a number of enjoyable situations. If the objective of the player characters involve other people on the plane, then they not only have to look out for themselves but also have to protect others, even if that goes against their usual selfish instincts. In addition, this gives the SnakeMaster the opportunity to create multiple obstacles to place in the player characters’ paths. If the player character has to steal microfilm from an enemy spy onboard the plane, he may have to cross a snake-infested area to reach his objective. Or perhaps the enemy spy has already hidden the microfilm somewhere on the plane, and now the player character must get the information from the enemy spy while also keeping that enemy spy from perishing at the fangs of the snakes. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking. Any result other than a clear success in their objectives means certain doom for the characters when that plane lands. The possibilities for screwing your players are endless.

Another thing that draws me to this twist is how it adds another meaning to the term Snakes on a Plane. The number one definition for Snakes on a Plane at Urban Dictionary describes the phrase as follows.

1. snakes on a plane

Guy 2: (calm) Snakes on a plane man. Snakes on a plane.

Metaphorically, by the rules of the roleplaying game the characters are already experiencing a “snakes on a plane” moment before there are any actual snakes on the plane. With the release of the actual snakes on the actual plane, they must deal not only with the mundane “snakes on a plane” but also the literal snakes on a plane, both of which are equally deadly.

This is perhaps the most damning observation on the challenges of modern life we have seen this century.

Tonight we began our campaign for the Snakes on a Plane roleplaying game. While you await our full report, please visit this game already in progress.

I’ve been very busy building a new version of Karissa’s site and would like to share the line that saved me from losing my mind:

That is all.