The Metal Gods Update by Jay Neale III published by EEK! Text & Graphics Welcome to our second online issue! You can still find the first issue in the links on this page, so if you are new to the Metal Gods Chronicle or the StoryTeller system in general, please feel free to browse at your leisure. The game has gained a new player. Her name is Jo Wright and she lives just down the street from Jay. They have yet to draw blood, but that first session is looming ever closer. We'll keep you posted on further developments.
Herman Campbell has been playing his character online with our friendly StoryTeller. Cornelius Whitlock Moore is quite a change from the old days when we played AD&D, but in some respects he is the same breed of man: intelligent, caring yet impulsive. When he blindly stepped into a glowing cube he suspected to be a gateway to some unknown location recently, just to see what would happen, the StoryTeller nearly came unglued, scrambling for the pages of the story that dealt with the other side of the Gate. Luckily, no one can see him when this sort of thing happens online.
Robert and Roberta Taylor are playing more, and more successfully than anyone else in the Metal Gods Chronicle to date, due in large part to the fact that they work as a team fairly well and are getting better all the time. This is their first foray into the world of role-playing in general and the World of Darkness specifically, and as much of a grouch as Robert is he seems to be enjoying himself.
On a personal note, Jay's son, Trevor learned to ride his bicycle this past month. He will also be starting first grade August 10. Time flies even without the benefit of Temporal Magick.
But enough chit chat. Time to jump right in. Contents Click on the stuff you want to read The John & Amber Saga (fiction) Hunter/Hunted (fiction) The Basement Bombers (fiction) Media Sources The StoryTeller Speaks MGU Back Issues MGU One Media Sources
There follows a list of the sorts of things that hold our StoryTeller's attention. You may want to check some of these out as well.

Movies: Alien (the original was the best, but all are worth watching and are great sources of inspiration for gaming)
A Clockwork Orange (a great setting for a quest into an alternate dimension or perhaps one of those unexplored realms floating around the Umbra)
The Usual Suspects (for a real mindphuque -- this is perfect for a game dealing heavily with the New World Order -- Verbal is a Black Hat seeking to disinform the enemy [your players])
Mimic (okay, it's basically an Alien rip off, but it is a very well done rip off with a very high paranoia quotient -- worth seeing)
Starship Troopers (a few months ago I recommended this film based simply on the fact that I liked the book, but I made a mistake:
this film SUCKS! -- but it is worth renting to see what the world would be like in a future run by the Technocratic Union)
The Crow (if you haven't seen it you have no business messing around in the World of Darkness for very long -- this is the blueprint!)
Dark City (RENT THIS TONIGHT! It was directed and written by Alex Proyas, the man who directed The Crow, and this movie is brilliant in its darkness)

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The StoryTeller Speaks by Jay Neale III
TSR. They all but died this year, and I think I have an interesting slant on the whole mess.
For those of you who do not know, TSR is the company that brought you the cultural phenomenon that is Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. They also produced such failed bits as Metamorphosis Alpha, Gamma World, that piss poor thing meant to compete with the StoryTeller System that featured Bug Hunt, and a recent attempt at taking down another cultural phenomenon, that snowballing collectable card game called Magick: The Gathering (produced by Wizards of the Coast, I can't even remember the name of the TSR offering).
Anyway, here's my take on it: TSR sucks!
Okay, perhaps I could expound a bit, yes?
You see, I quit the ranks of AD&D players a little over 6 years ago. The reason I quit was because of poor quality, over-priced products produced at a mind numbing rate. How many supplements do we need to play a fighter? How many types of wizards do we really want access to? Granted, variety helps any system survive, but this stuff has never been about variety. It is simply about making money for TSR. Just pick up a copy of the Gnomes supplement (look at it in the book store, but for God's sake don't buy the damned thing) and fax me anything of value you find within.
As far as I can tell, the only thing these books contributed to the AD&D game was to add even more rules to an already top heavy system. I defy any novice player to plow through ANY AD&D rule book without falling asleep. The system itself is perfectly playable without adding anything to it, but you still need someone who already plays to explain it. It got to the point where I not only didn't know all the new rules, I didn't care about them or the game they were meant to "improve."
So what happened to TSR? Why did they continue down a dead-end road into near oblivion? I believe they were relying upon the practices that got them to the top in the first place. They used to be the biggest kid with the biggest stick and they could produce anything and out sell the competition. The market has expanded now, however, and the talent pool has grown thin as a result. The average product from TSR 20 years ago really was better than the other stuff on the shelves. Recently other companies with new ideas and money to spend have sparked new interest in RPG's and related genre's. Artists and writers left for fresh waters and TSR began to flounder. The suits at the top, however, failed to change the way they looked at the market, and their average product, which was now inferior to most other offerings, was not selling. They produced more product and took greater and greater losses until they could produce no more without help from the company that had become their number one competitor. 
So, in a move that surprised many and delighted more, Wizards of the Coast bought TSR in the Spring of this year. Sources tell me that the TSR line is being streamlined and slightly retooled to bring it in line with WotC's other, high quality products. This should insure that the mother of all RPG's survives into the next millennium.
At least that's how I see it.

Stay Dark, Jay Neale III



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