So Lamentations of the Flame Princess had a PDF Sale

 I cannot think of a single PDF item related to gaming that I have ever paid money for. I have a small collection of items I found online that cost me nothing. I think over the years most were from The Trove website (does it still exist?) which I suppose can be considered piracy, matey. But most are very old. And mostly Judges Guild items from back in the day that I actually owned at some point in my youth, but are gone for whatever reason. Wilderlands sourcebook, Modron, etc. 

I always preferred to have a physical book on hand, and mostly still do. But in this day of the iPads, I can read a PDF without sitting at a computer. That's big. 

So, I don't have much experience with LOTFP products. Or James Raggi himself. Early in the OSR I remember seeing him post on his website a flyer he was hanging around his town looking for players. It had the image of a female thief at a treasure chest. I thought I saw it recently, but can't find it. But since at the time I was looking for players around 2008 I contacted him to ask about the flyer and if he had luck with it. He gave a friendly reply, and that was the only interaction I had with him. Lately I considered reaching out to ask about the expat experience, since I was considering getting the hell out of this fucked up country. 

It was not long before he had a business, mired in a certain amount of controversy. "Weird Fantasy" products. Cover images of female adventurers losing limbs to ochre jellies and such. But hey, to me all D&D was weird, so I never really looked into his stuff. A lot of the scuttlebutt was about shit monsters and character penis's getting turned into eels, etc. Stuff that was not exactly the call to adventure for me. But I will admit I always had some curiosity. 

I promised myself to spend no more than 15 bucks. Not because I'm broke. That's like 20 minutes pay for me. But because I did not want to get saddled with a bunch of PDF's I mostly won't use. Again, this was about curiosity, though I hope there are things I can use throughout. I went over a bit, and here is what my 16.50 got me.

Veins of the Earth: I found Deep Carbon to be interesting (though I had to change a lot to make it usable for me. For a Star Wars session no less). So I wanted to check this out. I'll do anything to make the stale old underdark more interesting.
Curse of the Daughterbrides: Sound like a father marrying his daughters. Curiosity killed me on this one.
Terror in the Streets: sounds like an urban adventure, so what the heck. Hopefully mine it for bits.
Frostbitten & Mutilated : like other Zak things I got, pure curiosity.
Fish Fuckers: Sounds like humans raping Deep Ones for a change. Pure curiosity. Maybe useful for Cthulhu games?
No Rest for the Wicked: heard somewhere it sucks. So spent a buck fitty to find out why.
A Red & Pleasant Land: I doubt I will get much use out of a setting about Dracula and Alice in Wonderland, but I just gotta find out what the hype is about. Erik Tenkar calls it Zak's masterpiece.
World of the Lost: the cover sold me.
Vornheim: Again, gotta see the hype.
The God that Crawls: Heard it was good.
Tower of the Stargazer: can always use a wizards tower.
Isle of the Unknown: heard good things. Heard bad things. But maybe has a lot of things to mine.
Death Frost Doom: The Lichway from White Dwarf is a fave I have used several times over the decades, and I heard this ripped it off. So gotta have a look.  OK, so there were some I knew well of but just decided not to get. There is Carcosa, which seems more or less a complete setting. I could tell over the years that I could not probably mine much ideas from it. But now that I think of it I should have just got it for a read. I think it is still on sale.  I may go in and see if there was an item or two I missed and want to add to my new collection.  I'll say this. I don't mind supporting Raggi. He does not seem like a bad guy. Not long ago on the Tenkar Discord I made fun of his comments about "why bother cleaning the toilet?"and got a chorus of Tenkars apparently high attendance of mentally ill people piping up about picking on those with mental issues. I just thought he might be a slob, not necessarily bonkers. But really, I can respect what he is doing...in gaming, not bathroom hygiene.   Cheers

D&D and the Rise (and fall?) of the Beautiful People

OK, it may be more truthful to call them "Peacocks." 

But whatever it is, behind my back, a bunch of D&D players have become D&D celebrities. High profile, entourage-towing, "hey look at me" types. Back in my early gaming life the most beautiful D&D player I knew was my high school sweetheart. Me and my friends were lucky enough that our gals were into pop culture things, and D&D was not off the table. All the other groups we knew in those days were sausage fests. Tables full of long hairs in heavy metal band T shirt bands, or young George Costanza's. That's not to say we had it better than anybody else (or maybe we did). But it's always nice to have fun in a mixed group. You know, like a beer commercial. And whether I had a GF involved or not, into the 2000's I was always able to get a decently mixed gender gaming group. 

I guess it was D&D with Porn Stars where a bunch of women gaming came to the fore. Not that I was aware of everything going on in the OSR. I read a few blogs, did my own little blog, made some friends, got in some beefs, then got into other things. When it came to D&D I decided to just focus on running. I've been mostly out of the loop for years now. But I decided to write a little bit in current times when somebody told me a blog is a great place to write for yourself. And that is what I am doing. But my gaming life has gone through changes, and I feel like there are some personal tales to tell. And let's face it, pop culture nerds like to talk pop culture. Even if hardly anybody is listening. But jeez, looking deeper into the game culture scene makes me wish I hadn't sometimes. But trainwrecks are hard to look away from. 

That wasn't so for Zak Smith and his blog some years ago. It was gaming with a whiff of dirty sex; porn girls playing D&D How was that NOT a win? It was popular as hell. Maybe in part from Zaks writing, maybe in part from the presence of the gals. 

Zak and company during much, much, much,
much, much, much more happier times.

 I can't speak on the talent of Smith. To me a lot of what the "edgelords" were doing did not seem much more clever than what those heavy metal dudes in high school were doing. Poop and cocks and unbeatable scenarios. But whatever. When I stopped blogging I paid little attention. When I turned my back on the whole OSR scene I guess the biggest controversy was James at Grognardia walking away from his "legendary dungeon" (that had only been invented a couple of years before) Kickstarter. And with nary a word. He did that going out for smokes and never coming back thing He did recently come back, but I could not say to what reception. He still has (reduced) comments in his comment section, and seems to have been invited to a couple of podcasts (that I never heard of). But I've been out of the loop, and still am. 

Though the Zak Smith/Mandy Morbid controversy was a hell of a thing that happened. A broken relationship and some serious allegations, followed by a big time cancellation of the dude. I never knew how popular the guy had been in the gaming scene, although I can say with a fact that anybody I met and gamed with in the last three years in my new town had ever heard of Zak, and most not of the OSR There is money to be made there, but its still a small pond. And most Kickstarters in the scene seem to go to hell. 

But Satine Phoenix? Some knew about her, mostly I guess from the recent rise in streaming popularity. And spending hours watching that shit. Watching other people have fun. 

I knew of her mostly because she was a major personality at a famous comic book shop in my home town. There was a Meetup. For 10 bucks you could come play D&D with a porn "star" and have pancakes. Well, they did not lean into the porn thing, but Satine was also one of Zak Smith's players, and a part of his video projects (not porn, but D&D with porn stars. And oh, I guess there was some porn too). 

More recently Satine is parted from Zak. Right after the allegations she spoke up in support of his accuser, and went on to her own things. She started living a life in rubber elf ears. Going to conventions and trying to gain a high profile. She was a D&D community leader (that seems to give more bragging rights than anything else). She appeared in a Rick and Morty comic. She clearly was on a path of more fame in the usual small pond of D&D. Special guest stuff. 

But that pond got bigger once 5th edition settled in and got more popular, and started skewing younger. And this was the age of streaming. And even I became a fan of some streamers. Such as the Vtube Egirls using motion capture tech to appear as living anime girls on Twitch and Youtube. 

That's what I'm talkin' bout..

Not so much tabletop. Watching others play D&D is about as much fun for me as watching two flies fucking. No matter how much they dress it up. Not the community theater of Critical Role. None of it.

I like watching streamers play video games...especially when they look like this...

Valkyrae. I have fun watching her have fun.

Pokimane. She's from Monaco! Also appeared 
briefly in the movie Free Guy.

 I think I did watch a lot of Foreververse when I moved into my new town and didn't have a full TV channel lineup for a few weeks. Jason Miller and Amy Vorpahl were on that. 

Who are they? I dunno. Outside of that show I didn't know where they were from or what they did. Though in the pic Jason is wearing a shirt from a famous music store in my home town. But they did seem like very cool and casual people on that show. I sort of liked it for that. Everybody seemed like regular folk. Zero vamping. And Jason ran some Basic D&D with In Search of The Unknown and his style was very endearing.  Miller and Vorpahl seemed to have become part of the Satine entourage lately, minor gaming celebs making up a wall of protection around Satine and her colorful husband, Stone Jamison. Maybe they weren't so nice when with these "beautiful people?"

C'mon, he looks like a nice guy. Who would totally
not tell you to get a haircut and lose some weight..

This guy is somebody I only learned about in regard to the Satine controversy. Yep, of course. Another big controversy in a small pond. I guess Satine hooked up with this guy, a tattooed gym rat with heavily gelled rainbow brite hair who seemed to be making a bicep muscle pose in every other photo I see. I mean, I go to the gym and have decent guns, but I'm not always posing them. Or even wearing short sleeve shirts. 

Oh yeah, there's the flex

And apparently every character is..him. Not too douchy a move.

Satine tends to be rendered in lots of art, and she is featured on the Kickstarted art...big time..

So I don't know about their businesses. I was aware of Satine's Destination Fantastique kickstarter that seemed to be a money making dodge as best I can tell. Hey, when you are getting popular you need to milk your simps, right? But was that a sign of less than genuine intent for Satine? Because just in my reading the last couple days, she appears as a person, when the cameras are off, puts a lot of effort into seeming nice and gaining a following to monetize. Her and the Light Brite hubby running D&D in castles and on cruise ships. Nothing wrong with that. But the main point seems to be they were not really nice people, especially if they owed you money. Becoming hostile and belittling when asked for updates on pay, and a shit ton of gaslighting.  In the latest updates Satine seems to be making a play at throwing the husband under the bus to save that brand. She talks of supporting his abusive behavior, though apparently she was not as nice as her smiles or rubber ears would lead you to think. He can go sulk in the bondage room while Satine goes on to the conventions in the ears and tries to get some good will back. And she does have those industry friends. Who will go and who will stay? Jason Miller and Amy Vorpahl were guests at the velvet rope wedding they had a Gencon (though sources say they had already gotten married...but you need that attention, right? Repeat it at a con where you are already treated as a star). 

I dunno. For me it's much ado about nothing. For my life I mean. Its an interesting story, sure. Its why I'm talking about it. Like any of the controversies. But it is a tale about lives being destroyed, for better or worse. I can't say if Zak Smith got what was coming to him. There seems to be a case of an embittered ex. But I don't know these people. Satine and company as well, but multiple complaints seem to be adding up. And this is just a few days old. There is likely to be more to come. I smell cancellations, but maybe Satine and her ears can at least get her out of it. 

(I want to add that Battle of the Bards, though kind of overly flashy, seems kind of cool to me).

I'll just be gaming. Tonight is game night! I don't know how beautiful my players are. I don't use video on Roll20. Well, "T" is a former actress. I know what she looks like. But the others are fairly young. And that skews much better for me than when I did 1st ed in later years.

YMMV. Cheers.