Of Steampunk Games, Krakens & Being Kind to your Engineer

Good Morning!  How are you guys today?  

I feel fantastic and I can't wait to embark on a weekend of gaming!  I play in a really fun D&D game run by my bandmate Rion & his wife, Sarah a couple of times a month.  Right now we're trying to beat up a bunch of evil dwarves who have stolen, among other things, huge amounts of cheese from the surface villages and towns.  I assure you all that my being lactose-intolerant will not quench my heroic fire one little bit.

I also run a steampunk/fantasy game about twice a month called RookeMare.  I've been GM'ing games for a number of years now, but they have always been fantasy-based.  I'd been dying to run a steampunk game but I'm having an interesting time of it.  I have to keep reminding myself that the setting is Victorian!  Here's an example of a typical encounter:  "You see before you a really mean-looking orc! Ummm yes... it's got a big 2-handed sword... oh, I mean rifle!  Yes... a steam-powered rifle.  With gears on it... ya... and ummm, he's wearing Victorian-styled armor and a bowler hat - ya, that's it... a bowler hat!  Oooh - and he's wearing goggles..."  It's a pretty new game and we're all having fun, it'll just take me a little while to shift gears.  Oooh - didja catch that?  "I said, "Shift Gears!" ha ha ha... never mind...

My girlfriend, Emily, her sister, Sarah (different Sarah) & I all went out to Mimi's for dinner.  (Mimi's jambalaya is amazingly good!)  Sarah had just gotten back from a biology conference in Salt Lake City and she was telling us about the various lectures she attended.  Really fascinating stuff, especially the knowledge that there are life-forms we have yet to lay eyes on because they live so deep underwater.  As you can imagine, being an artist, this really began to fuel my imagination. What if things like the Leviathan and the Kraken are still swimming around today?  Because no one really knows what lives down there, no one can say with any assuredness that those kinds of "fantasy" creatures don't exist!  Remember that the next time some silly muggle says, "Dragons aren't real."

Now for some art!  Yay Art!  I did a piece called, "Steampunk Sally" a couple of years back and while I loved how the figure came out, the muse was off eating a sandwich when it came time to do the background.  This year I vowed to do up a new background for her and I finished it Thursday night.  So here she is - all dusted off and ready for the new year!  Incidentally, you can purchase this piece here!  Let me know what you  think.  :)

And remember - always be kind to your engineer and other members of the support team when you're bounding about on your adventures! Saving the cheese is rarely a one-person job. 

- Chaz -

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