Wired News: Out of the Dungeon, Onto the Net

I'm not one to play MMORPGs, as I'm against the idea of buying a product and then continuing to rent a service to use that product. However, this one looks pretty cool.

The lineage of nearly all fantasy computer role-playing games can be traced directly back to the dice-rolling classic, Dungeons & Dragons. True, from there it can be traced back to Tolkien, Vance, Moorcock and other fantasy authors, but it took the genius of Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson to take the infinite subtleties and mysteries of magical fantasy and distill them down into a set of rules you can argue about until two in the morning.

Where's my dice bag? Oh yeah, I left it right next to my mouse... Is it really two in the morning already?

Foggy Dew

...and from the plains of Royal Meath
Strong men came hurrying through,
While Britannia's sons with their long ranging guns
Sailed in from the foggy dew.

Which Polyhedral Are You?

Hey gamers! Take this online quiz at dicepool.com. Afterwards, you get a Klondike Bar!

You are a four-sided die, a d4. Otherwise known as a tetrahedron, a "Caltrop", or (to a lesser degree) "Ol' Pointy". This crap bores you, so I'll get to the point. Others tend to see you as petty, conniving, manipulative, argumentative, defensive, greedy, and needlessly antagonistic. You see yourself as focused, effective, efficient, influencing, shrewd, tactical, and direct. Both points of view are in fact correct. You always know the best way to get things done, a fact that never wins sympathy with others. Whenever you manage to gain control of a situation, your solutions are swift and brutal. Unfortunately everyone else is convinced that granting you such power is, "a bad thing" and often conspire to keep it out of your hands. Such short-sighted fools!

Take the quiz at dicepool.com

Man Wounds Self, Vanishes

Zethul -- Shopkeeper Saldremor Rivryn of Rivryn's Blades and Sharpenings on west-front Gaustus Street in Trades Ward was astonished late yesterday after he sold a nondescript old knife to the outlander who looked to be from Amn, or northern Tethyr, mayhap. The purchaser laid down three coppers -- properly minted, recent thumbs from Cormyr, Rivryn notes -- for the old dagger, which Rivryn bought months ago from an adventuring band under Tymora's frown, who took ten gold for a huge sack of old weapons and mongery. Salvaged from a ruined mansion in the woods nigh Secomber, they said.

The outlander kissed the blade, cried out, At last! with some emotion -- and plunged the blade into his own shoulder. Blood spurted, the man drew forth the bloody blade and kissed it again, and then, Rivryn claims, just faded away into the air.

Rivryn insists his tale is no bid for customers. He judges the wound not fatal, if the blade be untainted and all left to heal rather than flow. The origins, identity, and fate of the outlander remain unknown; Watch investigations proceed.

Story borrowed from Waterdeep News by Ed Greenwood. Alterations for names and cities have been noted in comments.