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Josh Sawyer Q&A Thread

Roguey

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Like many people in the US, Sawyer was a young idiot who chose to major in a subject that wouldn't help him get a job anywhere. You can learn about history on your own time for free (with the aid of a library, pre-internet).
 

Prime Junta

Guest
Like many people in the US, Sawyer was a young idiot who chose to major in a subject that wouldn't help him get a job anywhere. You can learn about history on your own time for free (with the aid of a library, pre-internet).

I majored in history. Most of us got pretty good jobs. Media, politics, civil service, diplomacy, that sort of thing. Back then the media were actively recruiting us, they wanted people with a deep and broad understanding of society who are able to do research, separate the relevant from the irrelevant, keep a sense of perspective, express the result as a story, and then write it up. (My job is in a completely different field but eh.)

Also, learning about history in a library is not at all like studying it academically, any more than watching movies is like making movies.
 

Latro

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Back then the media were actively recruiting us, they wanted people with a deep and broad understanding of society who are able to do research, separate the relevant from the irrelevant, keep a sense of perspective, express the result as a story, and then write it up.
ah, so you're the guys they hired to come up with manipulative narratives
 
Self-Ejected

Sacred82

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Like many people in the US, Sawyer was a young idiot who chose to major in a subject that wouldn't help him get a job anywhere. You can learn about history on your own time for free (with the aid of a library, pre-internet).

An unprivileged BA in history is definitely about as good as absorbing information of varied reliability in your spare time.

OTOH you do get to bullshit your roleplaying buddies so it wasn't for nothing. Priorities bitches
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Yeah that intro doesn't seem like something that would have been hugely difficult to get right in-game.

My guess is that it's something they could have gone back and done after they'd gained more experience with the engine, but the decision had already been made.
 

Efe

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Dec 27, 2015
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2,597
he says they couldnt do it after trying for a month.
were dropped into kool aid as an infant?
 

Drax

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Apr 6, 2013
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Silver City, Southern Lands
Yes. There are too many people. Please get your genetics out of the pool. Help the world. and its IQ. Thank you, the pool is now closed.
I don't intend to have kids, I'm a merciful man.
And my 134 IQ is for my own enjoyment, thanks.
I'm starting to think all these "high" IQ guys aren't smart at all.
Mind your manners or my 134 IQ will be forced to destroy you.
 

IHaveHugeNick

Arcane
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Apr 5, 2015
Messages
1,870,124
Classic humanity degrees (history, philosophy and linguistics) aren't so bad. They may don't directly set you on a path to a good job, but you come out with a pretty adaptable set of supplemental skills that are useful in every field and generally stay relevant for life. You'll typically come out having to pass some combination of formal logic, rhetoric, text analysis, learn how to speak, write, think critically and make arguments. Obviously you're unlikely to land a Nobel, but it's not nothing.


Now, if you graduated in feminist dance therapy, that's another story.
 

Orma

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Torment: Tides of Numenera
https://jesawyer.tumblr.com/post/183123246021/i-know-from-twitter-that-you-play-ars-magica-do

aimless-sapient asked:

I know from Twitter that you play Ars Magica. Do you have any advice for making tabletop RPG campaigns feel inclusive to all races/genders/sexualities when playing in a real(ish)-world historical setting?

I think it depends heavily on what the setting actually is and how the group wants to play with the historical context.

It’s a common assumption that older era = more conservative than now. That’s not always the case, and it depends heavily on the exact time, place, and cultural circumstances.

The scholar John Boswell, author of Same-Sex Unions in Pre-Modern Europe, makes a convincing case that homosexuality, which arguably wasn’t even considered “a thing” (at least for men) among pre-Christian Romans, was slowly reified and increasingly criminalized throughout Europe over time. If you want to play a historical setting in a way that is consonant with what we largely understand it to be, the Holy Roman Empire ca. the 17th century is generally not a safe place to be openly homosexual, especially in the midst of violent purges against people for behavior considered “deviant” by those in power.

But your group can decide that’s not an aspect of history you want to explore or play with, like 50% infant mortality or other grim realities of any given time period. I really think that the important thing is to talk about what people are comfortable with – which is true of any aspect of play in a group. Maybe the group does want to explore themes of persecution. But that’s not something that should be assumed or forced on people who are coming to the table for other reasons.

In Ars Magica, it’s honestly not that hard to justify an extremely diverse group of magi, in particular, for the following reasons:

* 1 in 10,000 humans are born with the Gift. No matter how insanely prejudiced you are, it’s difficult to justify a maga or magus turning down an apprentice because of their gender, skin color, cultural background, or potential sexuality.

* Hermetic magi organize themselves into covenants that typically live apart from “mundane” society. This is in part because the Gift makes mundanes instinctively distrust/hate you at first glance. Secondary characteristics like what you look like or whom you like sleeping with rank far below gut responses to the Gift.

* As it was for Medieval monastic communities and universities, Latin is the lingua franca of the Order of Hermes. No one gives a shit if your mother tongue is Hungarian or Russian or Italian because all of your sodales speak, write, and read Latin.

* Even young magi are incredibly powerful. Oh wow the miller doesn’t like that a gay, swarthy magus is performing a Mercurian ritual in the tower on the hill? Fascinating. Does he want to be turned to ash/a frog/stone? Magi typically don’t push their luck due to the potential involvement of the church, but as long as they aren’t making huge public scenes (which is mechanically discouraged due to how Auras work), individual peasants/merchants/etc. really can’t do a damned thing to magi.

In my time playing Ars Magica, I played the following characters:

* Leofric, an ex-crusader who openly hated the church and got into quarrels with Hospitallers. Due to his position as a companion in the covenant, it was difficult for the Hospitallers to really do anything to him.

* Venzi, a Tremere disputant from Lombardia who performed Mercurian rituals on the reg, almost never went to church despite being commanded to by a local bishop, never learned more than basic French despite living in Burgundy for literally 80 years. Also almost never left the covenant and usually did so under heavy protection of magic.

* Ciragua, a widowed Cathar heretic and trobairitz from Nîmes who spent most of her life in Burgundy following her husband’s death in the Albigensian Crusades. Never fully converted to Catholicism, traveled on her own and got in trouble for it, but never suffered real consequences due to her position as a teacher in the covenant.

* Bertranz, an old Cathar perfect who escaped the Albigensian Crusades and lived out the rest of his life in Burgundy, where, among other things, he was known to teach people Greek through heretical doctrinal passages. Also often went around naked because he kept taking off his robe to give to people suffering from the cold or rain. Avoided detection by hiding in the covenant and generally kept a low profile. Died at age 79 immediately after writing Apologia pro duabus vitis, a defense of Catharism.

* Ariam, an Ethiopian scribe who only knew Ge’ez, Latin, and one other Ethiopian language. When Italians saw him they went, “Wow! Holy shit!” and otherwise were amazed, not weighed down by the baggage of post-19th century racial theory.

* Orsu Paganacci, a lecherous learned magician from Corsica who was wanted (dead) by many angry husbands across Italy. His libertine sensibilities and actions got him beaten up and exiled from some communities, but he was able to avoid serious reprisal by hiding out in the covenant.

The covenants also had gay characters, transgender characters, and a variety of other folks who got disapproving comments but otherwise were able to ignore the prevailing social opinions because they lived in a magic wizard house.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

2house2fly

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Apr 10, 2013
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1,877
Frankly Sawyer should have leaned into the singing thing. Have him singing the Ondra song in White March, have a sidekick in Deadfire who's a chanter and if you have him on board there's a chance he'll sing a shanty solo(JES vocals ofc), that kind of thing. People like touches of personality like that in games. They already leaned into his face being representative of the ultimate challenge (with the bonus of his associated constellation in the challenge mode screen being a bike frame) so why not
 

Roguey

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Still, the robots in the series are affected by EMP grenades and similar attacks, so the state of technology isn’t represented consistently.

That excellent Tim Cain world-building. :M
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
https://jesawyer.tumblr.com/post/183254534341/ever-thought-about-recording-more-songs-just

mrlexx2k asked:

Ever thought about recording more songs "just because"?

Eh… not really. I mean, I briefly went to music school and I have a sense of what it takes to be a professional working musician (at least within the classical space) – enough of a sense to know that I don’t really have it. I accept that I have what is generally considered to be a nice voice. I’m glad that I do and I’m glad that friends and family members generally enjoy or tolerate my singing, but I’m not a professional singer. I have a limited range, limited vocal flexibility, limited understanding of theory, etc.

It is enough for me to be able to sing for my own enjoyment and the entertainment of those who are close to me. The occasional chance to contribute to the games I’m working on is a nice bonus, but I can’t really take the place of a professional. There was a time in college when I was so burned out on music that I didn’t sing at all for almost a year. A few years ago, I got a tattoo of Smith Smithson from Smith of Wootton Major. The image is from a part in the story where Smith sings in his workshop because he is inspired by the fae star.

“It reminds me of Faery,” he heard himself say; “but in Faery the people sing too.” Then he began to sing, high and clear, in strange words that he seemed to know by heart; and in that moment the star fell out of his mouth and he caught it on his open hand. It was bright silver now, glistening in the sunlight; but it quivered and rose a little, as if it was about to fly away. Without thinking he clapped his hand to his head, and there the star stayed in the middle of his forehead, and he wore it for many years…

… some things, when he had time, he made for delight; and they were beautiful, for he could work iron into wonderful forms that looked as light and delicate as a spray of leaves and blossom, but kept the stern strength of iron, or seemed even stronger. Few could pass by one of the gates or lattices that he made without stopping to admire it; no one could pass through it once it was shut. He sang when he was making things of this sort; and when Smith began to sing those nearby stopped their own work and came to the smithy to listen.​

I actually do sing at work. Not full songs, but just little things throughout the day. And I sing at home and in the car. I sing because I am inspired to sing, whether or not anyone hears it, and that is enough for me.

tumblr_inline_pnxa75znc31ri73pi_400.png
 

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