After yesterday's surprise venture into Sailor Moon territory, I did a little brainstorming at lunchtime and wrote down a few ideas. One of them was this very rough concept for an opening.

Quote:

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I don't remember any of this, but the journal entries from which I constructed this particular account were in my helmet. Locked with my password. And from a period for which I have no memories. I cannot vouch for their truth. I cannot answer any questions about this span of time. I can only assume that this actually happened. What I *remember* is arriving on that Earth, and spending a year living an ordinary, average life while searching for the next gate song. I don't remember anything that this account claims happened, or the people with whom Iam supposed to have experienced it. At all.

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Doug would, no doubt, have some interesting interaction with O'Neal and Teal'c... not to mention the Gua'uld, To'kra and Jaffa Resistance... Perhaps an encouner with Horus or something...
"I've met gods. Even killed one once. You, sir, are no God!" or something

-Z
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If architects built buildings the way programmers write programms, the first woodpecker to come along would destroy civilization.
-Z, Post-reader at Medium
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If architects built buildings the way programmers write programs, the first woodpecker to come along would destroy civilization.

Of late, I've been thinking thoughts about putting Doug in worlds where his metagifts would be mostly useless in dealing with the kind of plot that might evolve therein.
Worlds like Love Hina and maybe even Sister Princess. (If you haven't seen or heard of Sister Princess, it's a very very low-key shojo series about a guy who gets shuttled off to some high school he's never heard of on an island off the coast of Japan, and discovers that he has a dozen or so half-sisters that he's never known he had waiting for him there. It's 26 hours of slow personal growth and self-discovery, and the biggest conflict is Wataru learning to deal with 12 adoring sisters and feeling guilty because he can't recompense them for all the things they do for him, as well as facing an equally low-key conspiracy that seems determined to tear him from them. This is not a show for adrenaline junkies.)
Anyway, Kodocha is technically in this category, but I was wondering what people thought of forcing Doug to take a far less martial course in some of his stops.

-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

Theme songs for DW installments have been on my mind recently, as you will know if you've been reading the other fora. Well, those of you who know Kodocha will be able to judge this candidate for DW3's theme in its proper context.
------------------
Something familiar,
Something peculiar,
Something for everyone:
A comedy tonight!
Something appealing,
Something appalling,
Something for everyone:
A comedy tonight!
Nothing with kings, nothing with crowns;
Bring on the lovers, liars and clowns!
Old situations,
New complications,
Nothing portentous or polite;
Tragedy tomorrow,
Comedy tonight!
Something convulsive,
Something repulsive,
Something for everyone:
A comedy tonight!
Something aesthetic,
Something frenetic,
Something for everyone:
A comedy tonight!
Nothing with gods, nothing with fate;
Weighty affairs will just have to wait!
Nothing that's formal,
Nothing that's normal,
No recitations to recite;
Open up the curtain:
Comedy Tonight!
Something erratic,
Something dramatic,
Something for everyone:
A comedy tonight!
Frenzy and frolic,
Strictly symbolic,
Something for everyone:
A comedy tonight!
Something familiar,
Something peculiar,
Something for everybody:
Comedy tonight!
Something that's gaudy,
Something that's bawdy--
Something for everybawdy!
Comedy tonight!
Nothing that's grim.
Nothing that's Greek.
She plays Medea later this week.
Stunning surprises!
Cunning disguises!
Hundreds of actors out of sight!
Pantaloons and tunics!
Courtesans and eunuchs!
Funerals and chases!
Baritones and basses!
Panderers!
Philanderers!
Cupidity!
Timidity!
Mistakes!
Fakes!
Rhymes!
Crimes!
Tumblers!
Grumblers!
Bumblers!
Fumblers!
No royal curse, no Trojan horse,
And a happy ending, of course!
Goodness and badness,
Panic is madness --
This time it all turns out all right!
Tragedy tomorrow,
Comedy tonight!
-- Comedy Tonight
from A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum
(written by Stephen Sondheim)


-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

I really wanted to work this one into the story, but I haven't found a place for it yet. Maybe, if I don't go with the Beatles' Revolution, I can make this the overall theme song for DW2.
--------------
The silicon chip inside her head
Gets switched to overload,
And nobody's gonna go to school today,
She's going to make them stay at home,
And daddy doesn't understand it,
He always said she was as good as gold,
And he can see no reason
Cos there are no reasons
What reason do you need to be shown
Tell me why
I Don't Like Mondays
I want to shoot
The whole day down
The Telex machine is kept so clean
As it types to a waiting world,
And Mother feels so shocked,
Father's world is rocked,
And their thoughts turn to
Their own little girl
Sweet 16 ain't that peachy keen,
No, it ain't so neat to admit defeat,
They can see no reasons
Cos there are no reasons
What reason do you need to be shown
Tell me why ...
All the playing's stopped in the playground now
She wants to play with her toys a while
And school's out early and soon we'll be learning
And the lesson today is how to die,
And then the bullhorn crackles,
And the captain crackles,
With the problems and the how's and why's
And he can see no reasons
Cos there are no reasons
What reason do you need to die
The silicon chip ...
Tell me why ...
-- I Don't Like Mondays
Boomtown Rats, 1979

-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

I came up with an idea for an advantage based on watching DBZ (OK, I admit it, I enjoy the mindless show ) : That Which Does Not Kill Me Makes Me Stronger.
For those who don't know, there's a race in DBZ that grows in power everytime they recover from damage, somewhat proportionally to the amount of damage they took, but occasionally exponentially (and possibly including a metamorposis of sorts when they reach a new level). It seems to me that this could be multi-leveled advantage, from someone who gains 1/10 point to put towards increasing ST/HT for every Fatigue/HP they recover (say, a 25-point variant) to something really obnoxious for 100+ points (haven't figured out the formula yet, but probably something exponential based on the proportion of damage).
While not particularly useful for true role-playing campaigns, it could be very interesting in a purely combat-oriented campaign...
Just a thought (I do have them on occasion )
Offsides
Drunkard's Walk Forum Moderator and Prereader At Large

Okay, I'm finally getting around to assembling a "soundtrack album" for DW2 (now that I have a cd burner...). And I've been thinking -- what would be a good "theme song" for the story as a whole? For a long time, I've been favoring "Original Sin", a Jim Steinman song originally recorded by Pandora's Box, an all-woman group he assembled circa 1990. I even began writing a script for a music video to go with it. But I'm having some second thoughts. So I'm putting the question to both board members here and my prereaders on their own list -- is there a song out there that you can think of which says "Drunkard's Walk 2!!!" to you?
Thanks.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

Just a little treat for folks. Several times Doug mentions the Warriors' headquarters in England, which is simply called "The Mansion". Here's a picture of it:

(Well, actually, it's a building at a college in England, but everyone in the campaign looks at it and says, "Yup, that's the Mansion.)
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

A thought that came to mind: What if the first time Doug heard a song, he was watching a music video of it?
Might his subconscious key to something he saw in the video?
I have this image in my head of Doug keying up Europe's Final Countdown and having an Eva unit launch behind him...
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars
This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius
Age of Aquarius
Aquarius!
Aquarius!
Harmony and understanding
Sympathy and trust abounding
No more falsehoods or derisions
Golden living dreams of visions
Mystic crystal revelation
And the mind's true liberation
Aquarius!
Aquarius!
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars
This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius
Age of Aquarius
Aquarius!
Aquarius!
Aquarius!
Aquarius!
-- Aquarius, from the musical "Hair"
Music by McDermot, lyrics by Rado and Ragni
-- Bob
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Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.