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#41
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"LaDonna Wyss" wrote in message om... "Ami Silberman" wrote in message ... "LaDonna Wyss" wrote in message . com... "Ami Silberman" wrote in message ... No, a NASA operation. Even "stuffy" wouldn't argue that it was a military operation. AS-204 was not under military command or control. It did involve several military personnel as flight crew. Heck, does this mean that the LA Raiders' games in 1986 were military operations since running back Napoleon McCullum was on active duty in the Navy (but permitted to play for the Raiders that season.) Is my D&D game a military operation since one of my players is in the Marine Corps Active Reserve? I realize I'm getting older, but surely with the news coverage of the past week you have heard of the "Cold War?" What do you think the race to the Moon was all about? Just a bunch of flyboys getting the ride of their lives courtesy of our tax dollars, with which of course we had absolutely nothing better to do with that money? As for D&D, I think that says a lot about the person to whom I am speaking. I've lived through a major part of the Cold War. I understand that the race to the moon was part of the Cold War. Not everything in the Cold War was a military operation, in fact, most of it wasn't. Voice of America was not a military operation, and neither was the Peace Corps. The fact is that the astronauts were not on active military operations. They died in the service of our country, but they did not die in its defense. By your logic, the civilian contractors who died during the Apollo program also died in the defense of our country. To my mind, considering the astronauts to have died "in defense of our country" cheapens the memories of those who died in Korea, Vietnam, and elsewhere while on active duty and in combat with the enemy. I think it is very fuzzy-minded to conflate the two (dying in service to the country, and dying in defense of the country), and we can even add "dying while in service to the country" to take into account non-combat deaths in the military. And what does D&D say about me? Does it say anything more than a Google search on my name does? |
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From: LaDonna Wyss ]
Sent: Friday, June 11, 2004 1:48 PM To: Ami Silberman Subject: news flash.......mosley bleeds from O-ring. Reposted from mail with permission. Personal identification removed. Well, first of all I believe anyone who dies in uniform dies in service to his country. I also believe those who die after serving in uniform die in service to their country. It is to be respected and honored, regardless of the capacity in which the person served. From a member of the Air Force band to a member of an assault strike team in the Marine Corps, they are all working to defend the country. By the way, are you aware those launches take place NOT on NASA property but on Air Force property? That lends a military aspect right there. Yes, I was aware of that. The AF leases the facilities to NASA. However, the way you use the term isn't the way most people use the word. Most people consider a difference between death after serving their country, while serving, and while defending it. But the fact is, they were not just climbing on rockets so they could zip around the sky and yell "Whoopee." There was a larger picture involved, a much larger picture. The fact that in all likelihood the Soviet Union was behind Apollo One (even only by bribery) makes Gus, Ed, and Roger casualties of war. As for D&D, it is a very disturbing "game" that has had real consequences for innocent bystanders. I have no use for it whatsoever. LaDonna Well, you know next to nothing about D&D. What are some of these "real consequences for innocent bystanders"? Other than occasional soft-drink spills and a penchant of gamers to fail to clean up after themselves, I can't say that I've seen any. (All the "Satanic Murder" stories etc. have been pretty well debunked.) I've seen as many people drop out of school or disrupt their love lives with bridge, model rocketry, and sports as I have with role-playing games, and I've been playing them for close to 30 years now. Ami Silberman wrote: |
#43
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On 2004-06-11, Ami Silberman wrote:
Well, you know next to nothing about D&D. What are some of these "real consequences for innocent bystanders"? Other than occasional soft-drink spills and a penchant of gamers to fail to clean up after themselves, I can't say that I've seen any. I know of several brutal injuries resulting from D&D. (Standing on a tetrahedral d4 barefoot *hurts*, y'know.) -- -Andrew Gray |
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On Fri, 11 Jun 2004 14:19:34 -0400, "Ami Silberman"
wrote: Well, you know next to nothing about D&D. ....Actually, Tunnels & Trolls was a lot more fun. Especially when you consider that only D6's were used, and it was easy to get involved in massive dice roll wars with 44-oz cups full of cheap gambling dice thrown on tables that required 2-3 minutes to determine whether or not you just beat the **** out of your opponent enough to earn a right to tumble in the furs for a night with his favorite mistress :-) ....T&T was D&D for those of us who a) despised Gary Gygax and his "no nukes or phasers" bull**** rules, and b) drank too much to give a **** about DM guides and lookup tables and anally retentive rules. In short, it was role-playing for those of us who wanted to just have fun and not try to live the damn game. That is, until FASA released their initial version of the Star Trek TOS RPG... OM -- "No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society - General George S. Patton, Jr |
#45
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Andrew Gray wrote: On 2004-06-10, Ami Silberman wrote: Raiders that season.) Is my D&D game a military operation since one of my players is in the Marine Corps Active Reserve? I know the Pentagon is big on innovative warfighting techniques, but this is ridiculous... Wouldn't you prefer our Leathernecks know what to do when one of their tanks suddenly corrodes completely away? OF COURSE YOU WOULD, MAGGOT! These guys are putting their lives on the line every day for your liberal civilian candyass! Why, just yesterday three Gyrenes came under attack by a Jinn in one of Baghdad's numberless ancient tunnels...DID THEY RUN? ......HELL NO! For they were ready due to their D&D training...and due to the fact that Nancy Reagan's astrologer had warned the Late, Great, Man himself that the powers of dark magic may threaten our troops at any time! So under the classified program "Wizard's Whup-Ass" every Marine Corps Ka-Bar knife was magically upgraded with the ability to destroy Demons, Jinn, Vampires, Werewolves and Hydras...and today that Jinn's ears and testicles are winging their way to Camp Lejeune, so that the new combat trainees may realize that there is NOTHING in the this world...or any OTHER world...that is is half as kick-ass as a MARINE! SEMPER FI on that one, mister! ;-) The Old Gunny |
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"OM" om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_researc h_facility.org wrote in message ... That is, until FASA released their initial version of the Star Trek TOS RPG... Still have mine. The Klingon supplement was once of the best RPG values around. Then they started squeezing the product for money. The Romulan supplement was a waste of money. Haven't looked at any of the newer Trek RPGs. FASA's books did a good enough job. The real problem lies at Paramount. Must be run by a bunch of Democrats who keep thinking that since it's Trek, the fans will buy it, no matter how poorly produced or expensive it is. Just stamp a little silver trim on it and call it a "limited edition" (of 10 million), and you can keep jacking up the price. This is one of the reasons why UPN ratings suck. |
#47
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"OM" om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_researc h_facility.org wrote in message ... On Fri, 11 Jun 2004 14:19:34 -0400, "Ami Silberman" wrote: Well, you know next to nothing about D&D. ...Actually, Tunnels & Trolls was a lot more fun. Especially when you consider that only D6's were used, and it was easy to get involved in massive dice roll wars with 44-oz cups full of cheap gambling dice thrown on tables that required 2-3 minutes to determine whether or not you just beat the **** out of your opponent enough to earn a right to tumble in the furs for a night with his favorite mistress :-) I'll have to look at my copy. I thought it used the same dice as D&D. You might be getting it confused with "The Fantasy Trip", which was the parent of the Hero system and also spawned GURPS. (Not biased against GURPS I am, no siree.) (Flying Buffalo recently, a word which here means "within the past fifteen years", republished both Tunnels and Trolls and "Monsters! Monsters!".) To put things back on topic (sort of), it is impossible in GURPS vehicles or GURPS space (at least as of the previous edition) to build a launch vehicle using current technology. |
#48
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"Ami Silberman" wrote:
From: LaDonna Wyss ] Sent: Friday, June 11, 2004 1:48 PM To: Ami Silberman Subject: news flash.......mosley bleeds from O-ring. Reposted from mail with permission. Personal identification removed. Well, first of all I believe anyone who dies in uniform dies in service to his country. I also believe those who die after serving in uniform die in service to their country. *After* leaving the service? That makes little sense, and certainly is not the sense the phrase 'died in service' is usually used. By the way, are you aware those launches take place NOT on NASA property but on Air Force property? That lends a military aspect right there. Most everybody is aware of that aspect, but the military doesn't control anything that goes on there (other than launch safety). To consider that significant is ludicrous. D. -- Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh. |
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On Fri, 11 Jun 2004 15:48:55 -0400, "Scott Hedrick"
wrote: Still have mine. The Klingon supplement was once of the best RPG values around. Then they started squeezing the product for money. The Romulan supplement was a waste of money. ....A little background: one of the reasons the Klingons suppliment worked as well as it did was that it was co-written by several people involved in the writing of Mike Ford's _The Final Reflection_. Mike was also involved in the suppliment, and the two were done basically in the same fashion as Kubrick and Sir Art did _2001_. With one major loudmouthed exception(*) the suppliment was well-received, and _TFR_ was a big seller that opened Paranoidmount's eyes to the possibility that a Trek novel that didn't involve Kirk, Spock and/or McCoy could sell and sell big. Ironically, they demanded that a "framer" sequence featuring the Big Three be added to firmly explain to the "hardcore trekkies" that this *was* a Star Trek novel, set in the Star Trek universe. It wasn't necessary, but the mention of McCoy in diapers is still pretty funny. ....However, something really bad happened to the production side of Star Trek. TNG came along, and Gene hired a complete and utter dip**** by the name of Richard Arnold to act as his assistant. Arnold - aka "Melakon" amonst most Trek fans due to his abusing Trek licensing matters in Gene's name - wound up demanding complete and final say-so over anything FASA produced. The suppliments started getting edited for content, and anything that looked like it would be a good concept for TNG was axed and then quietly passed on to the TNG writing staff(**). Over a period of two years, Arnold totally devastated all of the Trek licensing outlets, making changes that made no sense whatsoever and/or done simply because he had personal issues with the writer/creators. CIPs that come to mind a * Arnold had a major problem with Peter Allen David, whom Arnold felt was adding way too much satire and humor to Star Trek. To quote Arnold "Star Trek is serious science fiction, and the fans don't want humor save for maybe the jokes at the end of the show, and even then they really don't like them." He was, as one would expect, unable to explain why "The Trouble With Tribbles" was one of TOS' most beloved episodes, and was quite frequently hit up on this at convention appearances to the point where he finally refused to answer the question and would simply go "Moving right along...". ....The best examples of how much interference he caused PAD were the novels _Vendetta_ and _Q-In-Law_. Arnold tried to have the former axed because it featured a female Borg when Arnold claimed the Borgs didn't have females, while the latter he wanted tossed because it was way too "funny" for his tastes. _Vendetta_ saw print because Pocket ran a disclaimer in the front cover that most people ignored because the novel was one of the best that's been written for TNG even to this date. _Q-In-Law_ saw print with *no* editorial or Arnold-ordered changes after PAD gave a copy of the manuscript to the one person on the planet who could override Gene or anyone pretending to act in his name - Majel, who fell in love with the book for reasons obvious to anyone who's read the book and wished that the 'Noids would film the damn thing just so we can all see Q getting the **** kicked out of him by Lwaxana Troi. ....Shortly after this, however, Arnold had his revenge by forcing DC Comics to dump him off of their TOS comic, which was selling far better than the TNG one by worthless Trek hack Michale Jan Friedman. For over two years, Arnold was butchering PAD's scripts and forcing character name changes without giving explanantions, and finally demanded that PAD be removed from the book. However, to prove a point, PAD did one more script, and DC submitted it for approval. It came back from Arnold with AbZero changes to it, and given a glowing stamp of approval by Arnold, who stated this writer needs to be on the book permanently. However, it was still PAD using a pen name. The name? Robert Bruce Banner. * Another example is Margaret Wander Bonnanno's butchering of her original _Probe_ script following STIV. Margie's got it up online at her website so you can see just how badly the script was raped at Arnold's insistance. The original novel is far superior to what got printed. * FASA also got screwed. Arnold got involved in FASA's business shortly after they came up with the TNG suppliment. He got ahold of a copy and screamed bloody murder, claiming that there were "tons" of inaccuracies and that an immediate correction release needed to be done or the contract would be pulled. One did come out a few months later, but the corrections made by Arnold were themselves contradicted by the series itself - especially certain 'facts' about Data's construction and Dr. Soong's true nature. Arnold went ballistic again, but by this time FASA decided that despite the fact that the RPG was selling really well still - third only to D&D at that time - there was more money in Battletech, which despite the fact that it was a blatant knockoff of every big mechwarrior anime slugfest since "Space Cruiser Yamato", they got 100% of the profits and didn't have to pay licensing fees to Paranoidmount. * Speaking of FASA, remember that "tricorder" suppliment they made that the entire gaming industry laughed at? It was reportedly made as a joke to send to Arnold for approval after he asked for something "different" with regards to gaming utils. He approved it, FASA released it, and when harassed about it FASA reps would shrug their shoulders and go "Hey, it's what Richard Arnold wanted, and he's the boss. Go yell at him." ....And there were others, most of whom came forth after Arnold got ousted following Gene's death in '91. Of those, thankfully only one of them has refused to return. But considering Vonda McIntyre's novels were the biggest piles of printed excrement this side of a certain SRB conspiracy theorist's own piles, this was obviously no loss at all. ....As for the later versions, I thumbed through them a few years back. Wasn't as impressed as I was with the original FASA stuff. Tepool & McLimore did an excellent job in setting up an RPG that carried on the TOS Trek universe without access to a lot of established "semi-canon" material. Probably the most noticeable was the inability to use the Franz Joseph _Star Flee Technical Manual_ designs thanks to Lou Zocchi having those rights and refusing to part with them. But still, what they concocted still has a lasting place in Trek fandom. There are resin conversion kits for the Locnar-class vessels that keep the FASA RPG memories alive, and they've recently been rescaled for the Polar Lights TOS "E" kits as well. ....I still have most of those game books, but they're packed up with my T&T manuals. One of these days I'll pull them out for grins :-{ (*) There was this one jerkoff who was a former FIDOnet moderator back when usenet was barely weened off of DARPANet. Can't remember his name, but he was so psychotically anti-FASA that he a) got banned from most of the FIDOnet Trek groups for life, b) got banned from FIDOnet for life, period, and c) actually had two or three peace bonds filed against him because he made serious threats against some of the FASA guys. (**) Who promptly, to their credit, circular filed it. This was one of the taboos and other signs & verities that Arnold violated quite frequently that alienated him from pretty much everyone on the Paranoidmount lot *except* for Gene - who was too sick and insulated to notice - and Guy Vardaman, who was his buddy *and* Brent Spiner's stand-in. When Gene died, Arnold was tossed off the lot before the corpse was cold, along with Vardaman. However, Vardaman got let back on the lot a day later when someone remembered that he was needed for a scene with Data and Lore on the same set... OM -- "No ******* ever won a war by dying for | http://www.io.com/~o_m his country. He won it by making the other | Sergeant-At-Arms poor dumb ******* die for his country." | Human O-Ring Society - General George S. Patton, Jr |
#50
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"OM" om@our_blessed_lady_mary_of_the_holy_NASA_researc h_facility.org wrote in message ... Mike Ford's _The Final Reflection_. Whatever happened to him? ...However, something really bad happened to the production side of Star Trek. TNG came along, and Gene hired a complete and utter dip**** by the name of Richard Arnold to act as his assistant. Met him. Shook his hand. Washed it repeatedly afterwards. * Arnold had a major problem with Peter Allen David, whom Arnold felt was adding way too much satire and humor to Star Trek. Having met PAD many times, I had a chance to hear his explanation of how we got "The Rift". Knowing how Arnold acted, PAD submitted three outlines- the good one, the OK one, and the one with all of the worst aspects of Trek and a few others thrown in, intentionally creating something so bad even Arnold wouldn't accept it. Of course, the plan backfired, PAD wrote the sucky book because of contractual obligations, and then told Arnold to kiss his LaDonna. After hearing PAD's explanation as to the exacting requirements implemented under Arnold- chapers are exactly so many pages, pacing is exactly so, a specific character must appear x number of times, no matter who the focus is on, Kirk, Spock and McCoy must have the greatest number of pages because they are the Important Ones, and so forth, I immediately stopped buying Trek novels. I suppose I've bought maybe a half-dozen since 1996, and most of those were PADs. * Another example is Margaret Wander Bonnanno's butchering of her original _Probe_ script following STIV. Margie's got it up online at her website so you can see just how badly the script was raped at Arnold's insistance. The original novel is far superior to what got printed. It smelled of an Arnold "collaboration". ...And there were others, most of whom came forth after Arnold got ousted following Gene's death in '91. PAD took delight in saying that, the day after Gene was dropped in the hole, Arnold was given a box and told he'd be escorted off the property. But considering Vonda McIntyre's novels were the biggest piles of printed excrement this side of a certain SRB conspiracy theorist's own piles, this was obviously no loss at all. Met her. It carries over to her non-Trek stuff as well. At the *Star Trek convention*, she stated that she didn't want to talk about Star Trek and was only going to talk about her newest novel, which was supposed to be some psycho thriller (are the visions the mass murder is having his imagination, or are his victims really coming back from the dead for revenge? You decide! *No, you dumb twit, _you_ are the writer, _you decide_.*). |
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