Story Telling and the Dynamic Nature of it in Gaming

When I was a kid I got into role playing games. I think it has helped me a lot in my study of mathematics, as well as my communication skills in group based technical development. But what I think is most interesting is when I am preparing to have players go into a violent encounter, that can go in numerous different directions.

Firstly, I need to provide my definition of some words if you haven't read role playing games before:

NPC

Non Playing Character - Something that has intelligence that can interact with players.

Creature

Any object, animal, evil/neutral/good NPC, etc. that can attack players

The Dungeon

This is a good example of how things can be dynamic. Most adventures will have a creature in each room of a castle, underground cave, luxurious mansion, etc. But I always feel that once the players start fighting loudly with the first creature, all the other creatures will join the fight! So I often will have something that I think should be a bunch of small fights, into one large one. I'm not sure if this is right or wrong with may adventures I prepare for, but its how I run games. And the players normally enjoy it much more since it is more realistic of how those creatures would react to the combat situations.

The Story

This is often pre-defined by an adventure path, book, scenario, etc., but I think this should be very dynamic as well based upon the players and/or parties motivations for playing in the first place.

Windows vs Mac

Normally every few years I switch between Windows and Mac for software development. Usually this is a painless process, and now that Windows 10 has the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) I have been kind of happy. But now I have some BIG issues that I need to blog about so that I don't forget in 2050 (That is how old I plan to get to, I'll be 80 in 2050...)

1. No Trash Folder - I've been using this Windows laptop for a year now, and finally I deleted something that I wanted back! And then I see that there is no Trash folder! That by default it isn't turned on! And that I would have to change the settings to have it on... So now I use GIT for any files that I care about on this damn box...

2. Note - I'm a big fan of Note app on my old Mac, I have have a lot of notes and with Mac Note app I can sync it between my phone and laptop. And Windows doesn't have a good alternative. So now I'm paying for Evernote since I need my notes on all my devices...

3. Dark Mode - its just feels better on Mac, and all the apps I use on Mac support it. But with Windows a lot of apps I use don't plan to ever support it on Windows...

Etymologies

Etymology - the study of the origin of words and the way in which their meanings have changed throughout history. Here I have found that it is interesting that has knowledge and information is doubling every few days that people's vocabulary is also becoming more segregated. Working in computer science industry there are so many terms that have completely different meanings in other vocations. So I thought I would have this blog entry focused on a list of terms that have so many different meanings in different industries.

 4H - I grew up with that meaning Head,  Heart, Hands, Health and but most recently with technology companies it is now Honest, Humble, Happy, and Hungry.