Pictures and Words

Hey guys – I started my new job today. Got up at 5:30am, started at 7am. It’s 8:30am, and i only just got out. The State library, where I am now, closes at 9pm, and there is literally no possible way I can type up an entry before then. Will try again Saturday.

This computer uses such an old version of Internet Explorer that I can’t even see what I’m typing, so please excuse any typos in this entry.

Recently in the Homeless Peter comments, someone found and linked to a video of Peter doing stand-up comedy in 2007 (which can be found here). People are pointing towards this clip as being proof of Peter’s depravity, etc. Because of this, I think I need to share with you a little bit of comedy theory.

Firstly: Peter and I were taught that while doing stand-up comedy, it’s a good idea to adopt a character; they don’t have to be radically different from you, they can even have your name, but it can make things a little easier. That doesn’t have much to do with the rest of what I’m going to say, but you have to remember that there is a separation between what someone is on stage, and what they are in real life.

Secondly: You have to remember that different people have different senses of humour to you; not everyone is the same. I know, weird, right? So, what you find distasteful and humourless, other people may find rib-achingly funny. Also, topics that you may think should never be joked about, others might see some potential for humour in. It’s something that I have learned you (grudgingly) have to accept.

The main thing I wanted to talk about (quickly, as I have to leave for work soon) is that what people say while on stage mostly isn’t <strong>real</strong>. Remember this, it will be important later on. In the clip, for those of you who haven’t watched it, Peter makes some (yes, rather crude) jokes about his “mother” and “father”. Remember what I said just before, about things on stage not always being real? That’s right, this is one of them.

Peter is not talking about his real, actual, factual parents (you could argue that the character is talking about the character’s actual parents, but then you’re venturing into the realm of absurdism). When I was doing stand-up around the same time (which no videos exist of, thank goodness), I made jokes about meeting my first girlfriend while I was drunk, getting invited around to one of my teacher’s houses for a bit of “fun”, and getting an erection while studying the pyramids (it was “the biggest cock-up in history”!). I was not talking about my actual girlfriend, my real teachers or a factual event.

Yes, you may not appreciate his humour, and no, the jokes aren’t very good. But honestly people: get over it! The Homeless February posts really aren’t a forum for general Peter-hating or Peter-loving. If you have comments to make about the video, go over to youtube and make them there.

I’m sure Peter will be delighted to discuss all of this with you when he returns in a week, but as of now, your circular discussions are clogging up my inbox.

<strong>On another topic:</strong> Peter has asked for suggestions of what to do with his final week. Leave them in comments here, and I’ll text them to him tonight.

Hi! My name’s Peter, and in a bit over an hour, I’ll be spending a month on the streets of Melbourne.

My bags are packed, I’m ready to go, so I thought I’d list what I’m taking with me.

Essentials:

I’ve spent a lot of time lately on homeless forums, and these are the items that are most commonly recommended that people take with them if they know that they’re going to be spending time on the streets in the immediate future.

• A sleeping bag. One of the most obvious items; I picked up a cheap sleeping bag from the Salvos for $5. A number of people recommended I buy a dodgy second-hand one, so that I wouldn’t stand out/become a target.
• A jacket. Another obvious one – this is a cheap brown jacket that I used to wear when I was part of the stand-up comedy circuit. It’s about 6 or 7 years old, and I think it originally cost less than $20.
• Clothes. As well as the set of clothes that I’m wearing (a shirt that I found somewhere, a pair of my old workman boots, underpants, socks, and a pair of jeans that I bought from Target today for $20. My cousin Gavin has roughed up the jeans so that they’re not obviously brand new) I’m taking along some spare clothes, mainly because I had room in the bag. I’m taking:
  • Another two pairs of socks
  • One set of underpants
  • A pair of black pants that I was going to get rid of
  • Two spare shirts

  That seems like a lot of spare clothes, but they don’t take up much room, and they’re all I’ll have to wear for a month. If my bag gets stolen or lost, I probably won’t be able to afford to replace them. (my priority with any money I receive will be food. If I somehow manage to get a few days worth of food, I might stop by St Vinnies and pick up a cheap set of clothes.)

  The plan at the moment is whenever I/if I ever manage to have a shower, I’ll wash the underpants that I’m wearing at the time, and change into the other pair. If there’s somewhere obvious to wash them, I’ll work out a similar system for pants and shirts. By the end of the month, I expect all these clothes to be pretty smelly, and will probably never wear them again.

• Duct tape. This was recommended by a number of different people, both here and on the homeless forums. I had some left over from when I used to do a lot of filming, but I don’t think it originally cost more than $5.
• A cheap mobile phone + charger. When I originally planned this out, I wasn’t going to take a phone at all. Everyone, absolutely everyone who heard about this informed me was a terrible idea, so I’ve picked up a cheap phone ($29 at Cash Converters) and a SIM card for $30 that came with $30 worth of credit. Unless I get into serious trouble, I won’t be making any phone-calls during the month, but I will be texting my sister twice a day (for safety – if she misses two text messages in a row, she’ll know that something’s happened, and the last place that I was safe. My text messages won’t be interesting or informative in any way) and I’ll be texting my cousin Gavin every Friday to let him know where the Sunday meet-ups will be. I’m hoping that I won’t have to charge it more than once or twice a week.
• Map of Melbourne. I picked up a map of Melbourne (if you’re ever looking, I used to work in a map store; the UBD Suburban maps are the best by far) and have marked the particularly dangerous areas that people have recommended I stay away from. This is what I’ll be using to navigate, until I get the hang of where things are. $8.95
• A box of matches. I have no idea if I’ll have any use for these (especially considering Victoria’s in a total fire ban at the moment) but several people recommended that I take some, and they were only 45 cents.
• A knife and fork. For eatin’ with.
• A back-pack and belt. For storing most of the above in. (I’m using the belt to keep the jacket and sleeping bag together, everything else is going in the back pack.) I’m using my old school back-pack; it’s falling to bits, and will most likely be thrown out when the month is over.

“Luxury” items:

The above items are what I could reasonably expect to have with me if I were genuinely homeless. These items are not; they’re either for my long-term health, or for keeping this blog up to date. I’m also taking a $40 Coles voucher – if I lose any of the following items, I’m going to replace them with that. If I lose anything on the “essentials” list, I won’t be using the Coles voucher.

It took me a long time to decide what to take that I wouldn’t reasonably expect to have if I were genuinely homeless, but at the same time wouldn’t make life any easier for me. The following list is what I settled on:

• Pens, paper and envelopes. These are the items that will most “distort” the experience (I suspect that most homeless people don’t sit and write for an hour or two each day) but they also allow me to update people on what happens to me (almost) as it happens. I’ve had a few people ask why I don’t just go in and use an internet cafe every day; I settled on the “letter-writing” system for two reasons;
  1. If I go onto this website to update, I’ll inevitably end up looking at stats, reading comments, checking emails…I’m attempting to feel as much of a disconnect from my normal social circle as possible. My sister won’t be replying to my texts, and my cousin won’t be replying to any of my letters. I’m always going to be aware that my support network is there, that’s inevitable. But other than out-going messages, I won’t have any interaction with them.
  2. I don’t want to be tethered to libraries or internet cafes. If I want to spend two days walking to and from the airport, I want to be able to without having to first look up libraries or internet cafes. As long as I pass a post-box, I’ll know that my letters will get through, and I have the freedom to go anywhere else that I want to go. (depending, of course, on whether I have enough money/food to get me there and back.)
• Sunscreen, toothbrushes, and floss. These aren’t going to make my life on the streets any easier, these are purely for the sake of my long-term health.

I still had some room in the bag, so on a whim I grabbed two hand-puppets. (I collect hand-puppets.) I’m not sure what category to put those in; they’re definitely not essentials, but if they go, I definitely won’t be replacing them. If I end up doing any busking during the month, it will probably be with my puppets.

Here’s a photo taken this afternoon, when I’d just finished packing everything up and getting changed into my “street clothes”:

I’ve not shaved for the past week or so, in an attempt to look more scruffy, and my hair does the “scruffy” look naturally. (I was moving my hand when that photo was taken. My hand does not normally look like that.)

A common question I’ve been asked: What specifically would make you give up?

I can think of four things off the top of my head that would make me immediately abandon the project. I’ve arranged them from what I think is least likely to happen to what I think is most likely to happen:

• If I genuinely can’t find somewhere to sleep. I can’t honestly imagine this happening – if worst comes to worst, I’ll sleep in a park during the day, and stay out of trouble somewhere quiet at night. Technically, sleeping in public is illegal, so it’s possible that I’ll be hassled enough by the police or there will be too much competition from genuinely homeless people for available sleeping places (remember, my aim is not to make someone else miss out because of my actions.) If this happens, I’ll call it quits.
• If I couldn’t get enough money to survive on. I’ve said many times that I don’t plan on using homeless services, and while I do have a Coles gift card, that’s only for non-essential use. (if I run out of sunscreen, toothbrushes, floss, pens or paper.) If this happens, I think it will even further highlight the problem I’m trying to draw attention to.
• If I get seriously attacked or beaten up. A friend of mine asked “what if you get pushed over, will you give up then?” No. Unless I need professional medical attention, I’m going to keep going, but if I’m attacked in such a way that I can’t deal with it myself (open wounds, broken bones, serious injuries of any kind) I’m going to call an ambulance, go to hospital, and walk away from February having learned that no, I can’t look after myself on the streets.
• If my presence on the streets seriously puts someone more needy at a disadvantage. This is the most common criticism that I’ve received for my plans for February; people predicting that just by being there, I’m taking away someone else’s sleeping spot, someone else’s spare change. I don’t necessarily believe that this is the case (see my last post for details) but I’m prepared for the possibility that I’m completely wrong. If I am, I’ll immediately abandon what I’m doing. I’m not doing this to take from other people.

Those aren’t the only conditions under which I’ll abandon this, but they’re the four that immediately spring to mind. If I get fined into oblivion by the police (it’s possible to be fined for $12 000 for public begging) I’ll probably stop, just out of financial necessity, but my research has suggested that they typically just move you along, or give you an $80 fine for a first offense. Similarly, as I mentioned above, sleeping in public is illegal, so I could be looking at fines for that as well.

The other thing that could conceivably make me stop is mental anguish. I’ve had several people predict that I won’t last more than two or three weeks, simply because the mental strain of not knowing where I’ll sleep or when my next meal will be, of having to constantly look over my shoulder will be too much. I’ve also had people tell me that simply being aware that I can stop any time I like will be enough to prevent it from getting to me at all. I have absolutely no idea where on the scale I’ll fall, but it’s something I’ll be trying to monitor in my blog posts.

My personal prediction is that none of the above will occur, and in 28 days I’ll be a little worse for wear, but essentially unharmed. In a month’s time, we’ll see just how wrong I am.

Gavin and I are heading off now; Gavin will be dropping me off in the city, filming me walking off into the distance, and then preparing to go home. I’m going to try to find somewhere safe to sleep (probably not in the CBD) and then head back into the city in the morning, attempt to get money from the morning commuters* and (if successful) buy something to eat.

*I’ve been warned that commuters are the worst people to get money from, a theory which I want to test for myself.

After that, I’ll wander around for a while, find somewhere to sit, and write up my first letter. Gavin plans to be back home by Wednesday night, at which point the post should be waiting for him, so you can expect the next post to go up then.

This is the last time you’ll be directly hearing from me about this, but if you can spare any money at all, seriously consider donating to StreetSmart Australia. Link is below.

Wish me luck!

Wednesday: Day 1

The last five races of All-That-Is.

Humans, Elves, Orcs, Gnomes, Dwarves:

Humans, Elves, Orcs, Gnomes and Dwarves have remained largely unchanged. You could almost play these races straight from the D&D PHB (except for the difference in character creation numbers, which I’ll be detailing in a post of its own.)

Humans
My friend Damon, who was the person I worked closest on All-That-Is with in the first few months of its existence (before it had a name, and was simply (and a little egotistically) referred to as “The Peterverse”) hates the fact that Humans are the “base” of every other RPG system. The more I worked on All-That-Is, the more the other races intrigued me, and Humans were given a smaller and smaller role in the world.

In All-That-Is, instead of being the “dominant race”, they’re actually one of the least dominant – the only reason the other races ever notice them is because they fight all the damned time. Angels, as the large, self-proclaimed protectors of the world, are the most prominent, however Dwarves (for reasons I’ll go into later) are the most common.

Humans are notorious for their aggressive tendencies. The Human home-land (“Humania”) is in a state of constant civil war – it’s the only homeland that doesn’t have a capital city, simply because they couldn’t agree on one. In the in-universe year that the Traveller’s Guide is published, two of Humania’s states are at war, and the other two are just a number of tiny provinces (they refer to themselves as “kingdoms”) who are all constantly bickering over petty matters of land, kidnapping each other’s princesses, and setting dragons on one another.

Humans look pretty much like they do in our world – they’re slightly tougher and stronger, for the sake of adventuring, but otherwise there aren’t a lot of changes. Humanian Humans (Humans from the Human home-land) are of an Anglo-Saxon appearance, however Human skin has a unique feature – when someone spends more than a decade in another land, their skin slowly changes colour, and some of their facial features rearrange.

For example when a Human lives for more than ten years in the Angel home-land, their hair and face start to pale – within a generation, they have an entirely Albino appearance. (for the Fairy home-land, it’s a South-West Asian appearance, for the Gnome homeland it’s more of a Mediterranean look, etc etc.) Babies are born looking like their parents, however if they live for more than a decade in another land, the same thing happens. It’s not uncommon for a Human family reunion to be made up of two Albino adults, an Asian grandfather, a black grandchild, and a white cousin or two.

Elves
Elves, honestly, are the race that I’ve done the least work on. At this point, they’re essentially just stereotypical fantasy Elves, simply because I haven’t had much of a chance to mess around with the tropes yet – their civilisation live in cities in the Tree-tops, they’re a very formal society, warrior-based sort of thing – they’re by far the most racist of all the races, and the Elven homeland is the most “racially pure”, but I don’t really know enough about Fantasy to tell you whether that’s typically Elven or not.

As you can see from the picture at the top of the post, I had an idea early on about all Elves wearing glasses, but that was, fortunately, abandoned rather quickly.

I’ve written bits and pieces of fiction set in all the other countries, about all the other races, I just haven’t sat down and fiddled around with Elves yet, so they’re not at all fleshed-out. My cousin Gavin had an idea about their society being split into distinctly different social classes, but I haven’t decided whether or not to go with that. As I said, I simply haven’t worked on them at all.

Orcs
Orcs are a playable race – I never liked the Dungeons and Dragons race being “Half-Orcs”, especially since (at least in any of the campaigns I played) you never really came across many orcs, let alone felt compelled to start having sex with them. Essentially, Half-Orcs were their own race, and so when I brought them over to All-That-Is, I removed the “half” element, and just made the race Orcs. (Orcs are one “size” away from Humans – Medium to Large – and thus the two races are able to breed, but they’re not called Half-Orcs. A Half-Orc could be half-Human, half-Elf, half-Angel…)

Orcs have tough, scaly skin that comes in a variety of dark colours. (green, black, blue, red…) They stand at the same size as Angels, about a human-and-a-half, or two Dwarves stacked on top of each other. They’re dumb and strong, but not as dumb and strong as ogres. (one could describe them as Ogre-light, and the two races are often lumped together in-universe, simply referred to as “Trolls”. This can either be an insult, a term of endearment, or simply a description, depending on the tone of voice used.)

The race has an extremely strong sense of family, loyalty, and race-pride; Orcs don’t hate other races, but they’re unlikely to make close friends with anyone who’s not an Orc. They’re also strongly connected with nature and the world around them, with the vast majority of Orcs in the Orcish homeland living off the land. I haven’t decided whether or not to give them tusks yet, or just huge teeth.

Orcs are the second-most common types of slaves that can be found. Non-Troll slaves are extremely rare, except in the Land of Ogres, where pretty much anything goes.

Unlike Ogres, intelligent Orcs aren’t outcast, they’re revered, and given important positions in the tribe.

Gnomes

If Ogres are known for being big and dumb, Gnomes are known for being smart and smart. By far the most intelligent race in All-That-Is, Gnomes treasure above all else knowledge, intelligence, organisation, and smarts. Gnome, to many people, is synonymous with “Genius”.

Gnomes exist much as described in Dungeons and Dragons, except without the playfulness and creativity. Gnome society is a hairs breadth away from eliminating names altogether, and simply giving each Gnome born a number.

Any Gnomes born with even a hint of playfulness or creativity are likely to shun Gnomish society and become adventurers, though they might be regarded as stuck-up and stiff by their fellow adventurers. (especially Peedlings. Peedlings and Gnomes go together about as well as Orcs and Demons, or Angels and Dwarves. Ogres and Fairies, despite their differences, get along quite well.)

Dwarves

Of all the “kept” races, Dwarves are the ones that I’ve changed the most, though I didn’t even realise I’d changed them until someone pointed it out to me.

To begin with, all Dwarves have beards, even the female ones. Yes, I’m aware that Terry Pratchett did it first.* **

*so did Tolkien and early versions of D&D.
**I hadn’t actually read any Pratchett when I came up with this – it wasn’t until I was telling my cousin about it that he revealed the unoriginality of my idea. I’ve already written it into a couple of pieces, so I’m unlikely to get rid of it, even if it does cause unfavourable comparisons to Discworld. I’m not using it to make points about feminism, or metaphors for fitting in or coming out, I just think it’s an interesting idea that I want to play with.

Secondly, and this is the one that I had assumed automatically came with Dwarves, most Dwarves are Pirates.

I thought this was self-evident. They have beards, they speak in gruff voices, they drink alcohol by the barrelful – of course Dwarves were Pirates. It wasn’t until I was showing a friend the map, showing which Dwarven Clans controlled which parts of the sea that I was informed that no, Dwarves aren’t typically sea-faring creatures.

There are five Dwarven Clans. Three are primarily Pirate Clans, two are primarily Miner Clans, but they both have extensive navies and mining operations. The three Pirate Clans control roughly one-third of the ocean each, and range from “Good-natured” to “Evil”. Depending on which part of the ocean you’re planning on crossing, you’ll need to either hitch a ride with a heavily-armed ship, ready to fight for your life, or set sail prepared to stand to the side while the pirates rummage through your good cutlery. (in exchange for compliance, good-natured pirates won’t kill you, do any lasting damage to your ship, or take your food and water – if you don’t make it to your destination, they won’t be able to rob you again on the way back, and killing people tends to inspire missions of revenge. Who needs the hassle?)

Dwarves are fiercely loyal to their clan or to their friends, heavy drinkers, and great sailors. Dwarves are the only race with a majority not living in their homeland – most Dwarves are either sailing the eleven seas*, happily mining in another land, or simply adventuring.

*technically four seas and seven oceans.

All-That-Is is a world of islands (writers create their ideal world – I have always loved islands) and so Dwarves, controlling the oceans as they do, are ubiquitous. Angels might be the most powerful race, but Dwarves are the most wide-spread, making up about one-quarter of the world’s population. If an adventure takes places entirely within an Elven forest, or a Gnomish city, then you might not run into any, but if the story takes you anywhere near the ocean, you’re going to come into contact with Dwarves, and probably a lot of them.

I don’t even particularly like Dwarves, it just makes sense to me.

So those are the ten playable races of All-That-Is.

Character creation numbers and other stuff that needs to be known to actually play them will come in another post, this was just to introduce them, give an idea of the kind of world that All-That-Is is.

In the next few posts I’ll be covering some of the miscellaneous bits of information you need when you’re creating a world (e.g. what sort of Calendar is used, life-spans, religious beliefs), what Earth has that’s “missing” in All-That-Is, a bit about the countries and lands of All-That-Is…once all that pesky “world-building” stuff is out of the way, we’ll start getting into the meat of this project – The Numbers.

If there’s anything in this post that you think doesn’t work for whatever reason, feel free to leave a comment – at this point, I’ve done so much work with these races the way they are that I’m unlikely to change much, but this project is all about getting input, so let me know. If you think that Dwarves shouldn’t be pirates, or that Fairies are too small to be a playable race, or that Gnomes are just stupid and ugly and you hate them, please, leave a comment, and I’ll address it in a later post.

Up next: Miscellaneous World-Building Stuff!

More on the Races of All-That-Is.

Angels and Fairies:

I’ve always wanted to play a character in Dungeons and Dragons who could fly. None of the base races that come with the Rulebooks have the ability to fly – if you want a flying character, you have to get supplementary material, and adjust your levels, and it becomes such an inconvenient mess that you might as well just play a character who can jump really high.

I wanted to make flying characters accessible but not overpowered, and it wasn’t hard to decide on “Angels” and “Fairies” as two flying races to include.

Angels
Angels came from a simple idea – an all-Good race. In Dungeons and Dragons, you choose an “alignment” to describe your character.

There are two scales – Good to Evil, and Chaotic to Lawful, and you choose where your character sits on both. A Chaotic-Good character, for instance, would steal from the rich to give to the poor, while a Lawful Evil creature might be true and loyal to his evil overlord, and gleefully carry out his orders to torture you to death. (there’s also a “neutral” option on both scales)

Throughout fantasy history, there have been examples of “All evil” races. (the Orcs in Lord of the Rings, the Dark Elves in a lot of fantasy.) I wanted to play with the idea of an all-Good race, and since I’d already decided to include Angels in All-That-Is, the choice was obvious.

Originally, they were going to simply be a race of Good people, then I changed them to overly-religious zealots, then a race of fastitidious rule-keepers, and finally I combined various elements of the three – the Angelic people are ruled by a strictly organised Lawful-Good Church, which can be a bit over-zealous at times, but the average Angel citizen is just trying to get on with their life and do the right thing.

It’s a right of passage for every young Angel who wishes to join the Church to go out and see the world as an adventurer for a while. Others are sent by the church to do good around the world, and others (particularly Chaotic-Good Angels) don’t like to live by the church’s strict rules and leave the Angel homeland to seek their fortune elsewhere.

Angels are large and strong, but the entire race suffers a weakness to water. Submersion in water will kill an Angel, and even having a bucket thrown on them can be fatal. They are unaffected by ice or steam however, so most Angels carry an enchanted amulet with them that will either boil or freeze the first batch of water that comes too close to their body. (I feel that this nicely counters the advantage of being able to fly – it’s a huge but manageable weakness, and any player will have to weigh up the advantages of flight against having to be constantly on their guard from water.)

Fairies
I was raised on Enid Blyton books, so fairies were another pretty obvious choice for a flying race.

The Dungeons and Dragons races are all an extremely similar size – half-orcs are slightly larger, halflings (and gnomes and dwarves) are slightly shorter, but if you line all the races up and swing an axe, you’re still going to either behead or miss all of them.

As you can see from the diagram above, I decided to switch things up a bit with the All-That-Is races. Enter: Fairies. They’re one-quarter the size of Humans (one-sixth the size of Angels) and while they can fly, they don’t flit around like the fairies in Fern Gully, they travel at a speed which makes sense for their size. (as do Angels – flying speed, in an attempt to keep it balanced, is the same as walking (not running, walking) speed. The obvious exception is when they’re travelling downwards, and gravity is on their side.)

Their strength is correspondingly reduced as well, but what they lose in size, speed and strength, they more than make up for in intelligence and magical ability. (the magic system is something that I’m completely redoing – there’ll be a post with more detail coming up in the next couple of weeks, but basically your percentage chance of succeeding at a spell is determined by your race. Fairies, straight off the bat, have a 90% chance of succeeding at an average spell.)

Fairy skin comes in various different colours, depending on the colour of the food that they’ve eaten all their life. The colour of the food in the Fairy Homeland, in turn, depends on where it was grown, so a Fairy’s skin colour largely depends on the region that they were raised in. (except for big cities, which has food brought in from all over the country. This can create either Fairies with patchy rainbow skin, or a rather dull brown, depending on the quality of the food.)

Angel wings are big and feathery, pretty much how you’re imagining them right now, while Fairies come in a variety of different flavours – huge butterfly wings, small dragonfly wings, aeroplane wings, a couple of other non-typical designs.

I’ve tried to write a compelling reason for a typical member of each race to go adventuring, but Fairies don’t really have one. Sometimes Fairies just feel like going off and having adventures.

Demons and Ogres:

Demons
I wanted a race to counter the all-Good Angels, but all-Evil races are

a) Overdone,
b) Extremely constraining. Few players want to play an evil character, and even less people want to DM them,
c) Tricky to justify in-universe. Their society would just collapse, or every other race would try to wipe them out, and
d) Not really much fun.

I really liked the idea of a demon race though. When I think “demon”, I don’t think tall and domineering with the red muscly chest, and the glowing black eyes. I think small and mischevious – more like the Gremlin from that Looney Tunes cartoon. More Satan from Bedazzled than Satan from Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.

Demons in All-That-Is are an all-Chaotic race. They’re small and gnobbly (I’m imagining they look somewhat like Dobby from the second Harry Potter movie) and have a reddish-brown, crinkled skin. I haven’t decided whether they should have tiny horns & a tail yet, but I don’t think it will dramatically affect gameplay either way. Demons stand at about half the height of a Human, and have disproportionately large heads, and smaller, pointed teeth. They have huge eyes, long noses, pointed ears, and long, thin fingers.

Demons probably suffer from the most racial prejudice of all the races on All-That-Is. They’re not outlawed from entering other countries, but they’re pretty widely disliked. They don’t like the term “Demon”, preferring to be referred to as “Underlings”. (this came out of a system where every letter of the alphabet described something different about a Player Character, so that a phrase like “AHBN” could sum up your character’s status at any given point. This system has long sice been abandoned (early 2007) but I liked the name “Underlings” and the idea of Demons having a different name for their race.)

Possibly as a consequence of being so widely disliked, Demons are extremely personable, good at making people trust them (another reason that people are so often warned not to) and just generally quite likeable. They’re your best friend, right until they stab you in the back. (this is, of course, a racial stereotype – a number of Demons work particularly hard to be trustworthy, just to prove that they’re not all like that.)

Ogres
The last “invented” race on All-That-Is (the other five are almost directly out of the handbook.) Ogres stand twice as tall as a human (like Fairies, Ogres came from a desire for more varied sizes in All-That-Is), are almost twice as strong, and about one-tenth as intelligent. Big and stupid are the two most commonly used words to describe these creatures. Tough, but…well, stupid.

“Min-maxing” is a technique used by players to create the strongest, most focussed possible character. If you were playing a game where you knew ahead of time that the aim was to break into a tower without being caught, for example, then when creating your character you might sacrifice all combat abilities and social skills in order to focus on wall-climbing, sneaking around, picking locks, etc.

Since the vast majority of pen-and-paper role-playing games focus on combat, players will often take hits anywhere else that they can in order to get more combat advantage. Systems like Dungeons and Dragons (possibly as a result of this) have their character creation process almost entirely based around combat, so that you can’t drop anything else (except maybe your Charisma stat) to get better at combat; you’re just trading off skill in one combat area for skill in a different combat area.

Ogres weren’t deliberately built for min-maxers, but I can see how they could appeal – I’ll be going into specific numbers in a later post, but if you choose to be an Ogre, you gain significant combat benefits in exchange for non-combat losses. Of course, in any combat situation with an Ogre, the enemy is almost exclusively going to focus on them, and their sheer size constrains them from entering normal-sized buildings, so picking an Ogre is a significant trade-off.

As I said, they stand twice the size of Humans, are about one-third larger than Angels, and approximately eight times larger than Fairies. They have soft skin and tend to either grow their hair quite long, or shave it off and keep it shaved. Ogres come in four main flavours – those with two eyes, like all the other races, those with two eyes one on top of the other, those with three eyes, arranged in a pyramid formation, and those with one single eye in the middle of their forehead.

(I’ve actually written different “factions” for all of the races – different states, regions, tribes, city-states etc etc. (Angels, for instance, are split into Chaotic, Neutral and Lawful. They’re not at war with each other or anything, but these are still three distinct groups within the Angel homeland.) Ogres are the only ones who show it in such an obvious physical manner.)

These four different Ogre-clans are constantly warring with each other – outside the Land of Ogres, they don’t leap straight into battle, but they’re more uneasy around Ogres of a different clan than they are around any other race. Ogres are the only race that are legally sold as slaves in all the countries of All-That-Is, even their own home-land. An intelligent Ogre (roughly the equivalent of a slightly stupid Human) is a rare thing, and generally outcast from Ogre society. Intelligent Ogres make up the vast majority of Ogre adventurers.

Tomorrow: The last five races – the ones from the books!