4th of July

Well, it is Independence Day here in the USA. My wife had today off so we had a bit of family time. She is on-call tomorrow (24 hour call, based on cases scheduled already it looks like it won't be a good one) but will have this coming Monday off as well as next Friday. Today we spent some time at the pool, where it rained, no lightning so we all kept playing until it REALLY started to pour, and we watched a movie together (Pirates of the Caribbean, #3). The rain was off and on, it only drizzled while I cooked steaks on the grill and cleared up completely on time for fireworks.

I have been spending too much time looking at the legalities, and questions, surrounding the 4th edition DnD GSL (Game System License). My discussions with a two lawyers about the GSL suggest that it really is a bad deal for all of those major print publishers with a strong background and backstock. A new .pdf publisher STILL needs to be very cautious but it is probably okay so long as you don't publish anything under the GSL with material you might want to do as an OGL product. Several publishers are clearly going a different route. They are using the fact that you can't copyright game rules and creating compatible products. This is clearly do-able under the law but, according to both lawyers, still risky. Basically, WotC can still sue and it won't be considered a "frivolous" lawsuit. More importantly, they think that the lawyers for WotC (okay, "should" based on doing the best for their client) will send cease and desist letters to the distributors, particularly electronic storefronts for .pdfs, as well as ISPs. Anyway, the question of whether I will do anything for 4e is still open. It is partly based on my time and ability to play and test the game as well as where/what to publish. Well, the story and questions get longer after this point so I'll leave off for now.

Got a bit more layout and editing work done this week. I hope to accomplish more tomorrow.
In addition to the above distractions, another distraction has been playing some games with DS#1 and DS#2. The boys LOVE playing Talisman (a fantastic board game) and DS#2 simply loves playing board games (and/or DnD or Castles and Crusades--which has been DnD for us lately). My FLGS (Friendly Local Game Store--yes, Friendly is a key word here) gives me a discount on virtually everything I buy. This includes board games such as Talisman, Cave Troll, Drakkon, etc. I mention those 3 because they are DS#2's favorites right now. Cave Troll and Drakkon are fun games and have a relatively short playtime. Be warned that Talisman says something like 1 1/2 hours on the box but ALL of our games have been MUCH longer. Descent is a good game too, bit it can be more "adversarial."

It is late, I have two ideas I want to outline quickly before I forget them. I'll just have to talk more about board games another time.