State Politics, Gaming, Odds and Ends
Mar. 27th, 2007 06:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tcpipLabor wins the NSW state election; whilst the conservative Coalition didn't have a snowflake's chance in hell, I was a little surprised by how minimal the swing was. Much apparently due to the Federal governments unpopular workplace relations laws (despite being a Federal issue). On the other side of the planet, massive swing to conservative separatists in the Quebec elections, but the liberal federalists (Parti libéral du Québec) retains power, albeit with their worst ever result. The social democratic Parti Québécois came in third; leading to three-way split with each major party holding about 1/3 of the votes.
In gaming news have run two games of RuneQuest, one of Traveller: TNE, and the notorious AD&D1e module "Tomb of Horrors" since my last post. Recent reviews include Deities and Demigods (genius and idiocy in one package), Gods of Glorantha (solid content, average production), Spell Law (clear, balanced, but not beautiful) and the AD&D module In the Dungeons of the Slavelords. Oh, and remember the RPGPundit? Get a hold of these comments; Goth women are to be fucked and then mocked, and teenaged goths should be sent to therapists as punishment.
Visited![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
recumbenteer and partner for their Parkville housewarming; most enjoyable, must have them over dinner soon. caseopaya is on a loose end, employment-wise (although I'm sure this will be a very temporary situation); she found a job where the pay, hours, work and people were good but the company wouldn't shell out the $6K that the agency wanted as a finders fee. Today we had an annual house inspection; the estate agents took (literally) thirty seconds. Rogue the rat hurt his foot during the week and spent a couple of days hopping around on three paws; all better now. LUV meeting next week with an emphasis on beginner's talks (new features of OpenOffice and an Introduction to DNS). Gave an introduction to philosophy talk (doc file, will convert later) at the Melbourne Unitarian Church on Sunday; was extremely well received and will be expanded to further discussion topics.
In gaming news have run two games of RuneQuest, one of Traveller: TNE, and the notorious AD&D1e module "Tomb of Horrors" since my last post. Recent reviews include Deities and Demigods (genius and idiocy in one package), Gods of Glorantha (solid content, average production), Spell Law (clear, balanced, but not beautiful) and the AD&D module In the Dungeons of the Slavelords. Oh, and remember the RPGPundit? Get a hold of these comments; Goth women are to be fucked and then mocked, and teenaged goths should be sent to therapists as punishment.
Visited
recumbenteer and partner for their Parkville housewarming; most enjoyable, must have them over dinner soon. caseopaya is on a loose end, employment-wise (although I'm sure this will be a very temporary situation); she found a job where the pay, hours, work and people were good but the company wouldn't shell out the $6K that the agency wanted as a finders fee. Today we had an annual house inspection; the estate agents took (literally) thirty seconds. Rogue the rat hurt his foot during the week and spent a couple of days hopping around on three paws; all better now. LUV meeting next week with an emphasis on beginner's talks (new features of OpenOffice and an Introduction to DNS). Gave an introduction to philosophy talk (doc file, will convert later) at the Melbourne Unitarian Church on Sunday; was extremely well received and will be expanded to further discussion topics.![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-03-27 01:39 pm (UTC)I did notice straight away that Dagon and Hydra were absent in the Cthulhu section, but Deep Ones, whom they rule, were included.
That's canon for Call of Cthulhu, but I don't think it's specified in Lovecraft's own work. As best I can remember, the name 'Dagon' appears in two places in Lovecraft's stories: as the title of a story where a shipwrecked sailor sees a very big marine monster, and the 'Esoteric Order of Dagon' in Shadow over Innsmouth. Making Dagon a god of the Deep Ones is fairly consistent with that, but it's not something HPL really spelled out. I don't recall Hydra appearing at all in his stories, though I may have missed something.
But like I noted a while back, the Cthulhu mythos neither began nor ended with Lovecraft; there really is no definitive version on this, and Lovecraft's own stuff was vague enough that RPGs looking to detail mythos beasties and their stats often add in a lot of the later stuff.
BTW, you might be amused to know that Dagon has resurfaced in last year's Hordes of the Abyss as a demon prince (obyrith, which basically translates to 'old fogey demon that drives men insane').
no subject
Date: 2007-03-27 09:43 pm (UTC)No, I don't think it's specified. Like most things in the mythos it's ambigious at best. Dagon might be an extremely big, powerful and nasty Deep One; and he's certainly a deity and the deep one's certainly worship Dagon (c.f., The Shadow Over Innsmouth).
But like I noted a while back, the Cthulhu mythos neither began nor ended with Lovecraft
Which is one of the best aspects of it...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 12:03 am (UTC)Plausible but not confirmed; that would be an obvious interpretation of 'Esoteric Order of Dagon', but for all we know it could be the fishman version of 'Society of St. Vincent de Paul' ;-)
Or more seriously, things like the Hermetic/Rosicrucian orders, and indeed Buddhism, which are named after a bringer of wisdom who isn't himself a god. Looking at what they did with Hastur, more than one of these things could be true...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 01:36 am (UTC)LOL! I want to see their op-shops!
no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 02:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 05:43 am (UTC)It would be like a reverse of the doorknock collection from Bad Taste!