Boardgame Night Recap: Night of the Green Knight

We tried out Warrior Knights last night, and found it to be a great game, even with only three people. We all found it incredibly intuitive after a while, and the color-coded cards and bits really help on that end. A good, multi-dimensional game that forces you to keep several plates spinning in the air at one time (so to speak) if you wish to claim victory. As Giles Pritchard says in his review of the game at boardgamegeek.com:

One of the things everyone I have played Warrior Knights with has said is, ‘there is so much going on’. A difference that is important to raise at this point is the gulf between ‘so much going on’ and ‘a lot to take in at once’. Many heavier Euro or American wargames fall into the category of being rules heavy and quite counterintuitive, having read about some of the issues people had with the Warrior Knights rules on the Boardgamegeek I was concerned that it would have those same issues. Warrior Knights is not a lot to take in at once, but there is certainly a lot going on.

Especially fiendish are the mechanisms related to the Head of the Church and Chairman of the Assembly positions. To utilize these positions at maximum effectiveness requires lessening your hold on the position itself. For instance: if you are the current Head of the Church, the position allows you to spend your faith tokens to vastly alter events to your favor (or against the interest of another), but by lowering your number of faith tokens you increase the chance that someone else will become the Head of the Church! This leads to a delicate balancing act.

Now on to a very brief recap:
This was a very pacifistic game—there were almost no player-on-player attacks until the very end of the game. (Having only three players admittedly made it easier to stay out of each other’s way!) Instead, we roamed about and used the siege attack to take most cities, trading speed for safety.
Schizo immediately grabbed the Chairman of the Assembly position and maintained a steady death-grip on the position, using it to net himself a huge number of noble offices by winning numerous tied votes. He didn’t lose the job until the penultimate turn, when Larry (in an attempt to gain two medieval pensions, no doubt) held down the job of both Head of the Church and Chairman of the Assembly! I myself held the position of Head of the Church a few times, only to end up a “double heretic” at game end! Call it my fall from grace.

Militarily Schizo got off to a slow start, while Larry and I netted a couple of cities each. A law that granted 10 gold to each taking of an overseas city helped keep Schizo and I rolling in lucre much of the time, and we all learned (through one devastating Wages phase) to keep enough money around to feed our troops! All three of us had got so caught up investing (read: betting) on overseas trade expeditions that we left dust in the treasury!

Other amusing occurrences included Larry’s seemingly perpetual state of poverty, my cursed luck in general, and a triple-whammy of three revolts (two off which struck a very poor Schizo).

The end-game came suddenly, as we all realized that there was only a turn or two to go and money soon became almost meaningless. Despite his enormous success in the Assembly, Schizo was somewhat behind on influence points, so I concentrated my attacks on Larry and made a late-game assault on his stronghold. Alas, the stronghold held (by tying an incredible 4 victory points!) and Larry went on to win the game (by one point, grrrr)—the nobles shall clash again soon and the fate of the kingdom shall be decided anew, I promise!

Veto Conundrums

Standard fair warning: This blog is my opinion, and only my opinion. I have strong feelings about some subjects and occasionally air them here in-between the lighter fare. I try to back up what I say with details and facts, as best I understand them. People have varied and strong views when it comes to the question of how life is defined—I make no attempt to answer that. I respect that everyone has their own opinion.

President Bush marked the momentous (and long overdue) moment of his first veto with a horrible bout of grandstanding and theatrics. The bill blocked would have permitted federal funding for research on new embryonic stem cells, and had the support of over two-thirds of the American public. I would like to assume that it was purely a political play, designed to motivate his sagging base, but I suspect otherwise—that it was partly personal belief and conviction on his part—leading me to further question his sense of logic and common sense. I believe that Bush is indeed a man of faith, and I respect that, but I believe this veto and the way it was presented was a mistake.

Surrounding himself with so-called “snowflake” children was an especially overblown touch. In the last 9 years there have been approximately 130 such adoptions, a paltry number compared to the estimated 400,000 embryos that will be frozen this year alone. Understand: this bill did not prevent or forbid these adoptions. This carefully-phrased bill would only allow government funds to be used for research using embryos that would have been discarded. These were not embryos slated for adoption, they were slated for the garbage can. The bill also only allowed access to these 3–5 day-old embryos when the donor gives written permission.

So where's the logic? How are lives saved? The choice was simple: simply allow the excess frozen embryos to be discarded or allow embryos that would have been discarded to be used, with the donor's permission, in research that probably holds the highest hope to solve many of our most debilitating illnesses: Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, Parkinson’s disease … the list goes on. Bush chose the former.

In his testimony before the President’s Council on Bioethics, John Opitz, a professor of human genetics, obstetrics, and gynecology at the University of Utah, stated that millions of embryos — between 60 percent and 80 percent of all naturally conceived embryos — are flushed out of women’s bodies during the normal menstrual flow process unnoticed. What about the “lives” being lost there?
On average, 30 to 40 extra embryos per woman are produced as a byproduct of the in vitro fertility procedures and are later discarded. That’s thousands and thousands of discarded embryos each year. Where is Bush's outrage about that?
No, nothing is said about closing down fertility clinics nationwide; evidently Bush is smart enough not to commit political suicide. It's also worth noting that, surprise, Bush's two daughters were both produced as a result of, you guessed it, fertility treatments.

The research will carry on, regardless, but stem cell research is so expensive in the U.S. as to be near-impossible without government funds. Already many of our talented scientists have relocated to Singapore to conduct their research there. We are nearly 8 years behind much of the world in this critical field of study.

It's bad enough the current Administration has seriously hurt our standing in the world, run our deficit through the roof, committed human rights abuses, hurt our environment, and shamefully exploited a tragic national event to begin an ill-planned (but long-desired) war; but now we can add to the list the decline of America's position as the scientific leader of the free world. Well done.

Marathon Madness

This week bring many things with the Fourth of July holiday, including a favorite of mine—the Sci Fi Channel’s annual Twilight Zone episode Marathon.

I won’t belabor why I like the Twilight Zone here, as the series has been endlessly talked about elsewhere … sometimes to the point of far overshadowing some other decent shows of a similar vein, including The Outer Limits (which I felt was faithfully adapted into the newer series by Showtime).
Instead, I’ll present two lists: the first is a list of five episodes that are recommended viewing for those who have never experienced the show (are there such unfortunates??) and the second, a list of my personal favorite “second-stringer” episodes—these are not the episodes that first leap to mind as the best (some of which I mention in my first list) but rather a number of episodes that are less well-known but in my opinion noteworthy nonetheless. I’ve purposely skipped over some famous episodes (“It’s a Good Life” and “The Invaders” spring to mind for a start) here and tried to go for other, less obvious choices, though I’m sure the more TZ-savvy will be acquainted with most or all of them regardless. On to the lists!

Five Must-Watch Twilight Zone Episodes

1. Nightmare at 20,000 Feet
For me, this is the quintessential Twilight Zone episode. It embodies that deeper fear that all human possess … to encounter something fearful and have no one believe you, no one at all. Adapted from the brilliant Richard Matheson script (and short story) and well played by William Shatner, who generates sympathy not only as a frightened man no one believes, but also as a man desperately afraid he may soon question his own sanity. Matheson once looked out a plane window while flying and thought, “what if I saw a man out there?” and this lead to what may be one of the most famous episodes of all. The episode is doubly good considering that it aired during TZ’s Fifth Season, when most TZ concepts had already become painfully cliché.
The somewhat goofy gremlin design (a William Tuttle mask coupled with a furry suit from wardrobe) fails to undermine the pure horror Matheson evokes here.

2. Where is Everybody?
The original pilot and a good intro to the series. Here the fear of being alone is well tapped. The scene in which Mike Ferris (Earl Holliman) desperately pushes against a phone booth only to realize it pulls open came from a similar experience Rod Serling had in which he panicked inside an airport phone booth.

3. A Stop at Willoughby
Who can’t feel empathy for a man who feels overworked, underappreciated, and stressed out by life? It's easy to feel the need for escape, and this episode implies that for some, death is the ultimate escape.

4. Time Enough at Last
This episode usually is named on most best episode lists. A charming performance by that TZ veteran Burgess Meredith (who starred in three other episodes of the show) as the goofy but endearing Henry Bemis, victim of a harsh wife and unforgiving boss. The cruel, ironic ending lingers long after the closing credits.

5. The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street
Serling often wrote episodes that warned about the dangers of mob mentality (“The Old Man in the Cave” and The Shelter” are two such episodes that come to mind) and here he does it best in a story that demonstrates that our own worst enemy is indeed ourselves.

Runner-Ups: It’s a Good Life, The Invaders, The Lonely

Which is your favorite episode of these?

Give your opinion"Nightmare at 20,000 Feet""Where is Everybody?""A Stop at Willoughby""Time Enough at Last""The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street"

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Ratatosk’s Oft-Overlooked Twilight Zone Episodes

1. Nick of Time
A couple in love, sitting in a sunny diner being served by a good-natured counterman—not the place to find evil unless you are deep in the Twilight Zone. The creepy machine (which you may be able to purchase here or build yourself!) was probably based on the popular Ask Swami diner machines of the 1940s. It is a real co-star here, a little tin tyrant quite willing to consume your life if you give it half a chance.

Nice episode summary here.

2. The Midnight Sun
One of many frightening episodes dealing with the breakdown of society after a natural disaster (man-made or otherwise)—something that I’ve always found scary myself. Here the Earth has broken loose from its normal orbit and tumbles ever closer to the Sun. The words of the neighbor Mrs. Bronson at the end are haunting, “Yes, my dear … it’s wonderful.”
(Astute viewers might recognize the actress here—Betty Garde—as the sarcastic Thelma the Maid in an episode of The Honeymooners.)

3. Back There
In this episode Russell Johnson (much better known as the Professor in Gilligan’s Isle) tries to undo the assassination of President Lincoln—and learns that it isn’t easy to change what has already happened.

4. Mirror Image
An eerie episode that explores man’s hidden fear of losing his own identity.
I’ve had people tell me that they’ve “seen my twin” more than once, and one time, long ago, I experienced a bout of folks waving to me and addressing me—by another name. I often wonder what that other me is really up to…

5. To Serve Man
Probably the most popular episode on this list, maybe too popular, but worth a note. No great moral here except to always look a gift horse in the mouth. (And the crabby Russsian diplomat in the UN scene is right!)
This great episode always make me think of Charton Heston’s shrieking “Soylent Green is people!” years later in 1973.

6. Living Doll
Scary. You couldn’t help but feel a bit sorry for Erich Streator (Telly Savalas), even if he is an ass. I’ve always found dolls creepy and this episode is a major nightmare come to life for many. Comparisons with other works, such as Ray Bradbury’s brilliant “A Small Assassin” aren’t unjustified. “My name is Talky Tina, and you’d better be nice to me.” Yikes! And to think June Foray, who did the voice of Rocky the Flying Squirrel, gave voice to this small creature.

7. Mr. Bevis
It’s a Wonderful Life told in a half-hour. A charming performance by Orson Bean as the child-like Bevis. A gem.

8. Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up
A classic “who done it?" story told in pure Twilight Zone style. Two policemen, a bus driver, and seven passengers huddle in a snow-bound diner—the problem: one isn't human. (Why do all these weird episodes take place in diners, anyway?) Great surprise ending.

9. The Arrival
An episode with an engaging mystery that keeps us watching. The success of the episode is somewhat lessened by the less-than-fulfilling ending, but Harold Stone’s performance easily makes up for it. Watch as Inspector Sheckly begins with a business-like, iron-clad control and slowly loses control of everything around him even as he struggles to make sense of it all.

10. The After Hours
Another creepy episode. This one runs a bit long but still delivers.

Happy marathon watching and
a happy 4th of July!