Mark MacDuff's Blog
May 26, 2018
The Island of Juralsy
As a break from writing about wine or food I have recently written a RPG (role playing game) for Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, known as AD&D for short.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Island-Jural...
This was a craze that I got caught up when I was at school and college. Back in the day, (very early 1980’s) 1st Edition AD&D (there have been many editions since) relied on nothing more than pen, paper, numerous odd shaped die (dice) and imagination. This was before computer games and it took the World by storm. With the advent of computer games AD&D was obviously, in its pen and paper format, rapidly seen as out of date. However just like vinyl records and other such things, after a while these half-forgotten inventions become fashionable again. Now AD&D is seeing a massive resurgence. Not my words but the BBC news, who of course are always right, aren’t they? Check out the link, kindly sent to me yesterday by a friend, whose children are now falling under the spell of AD&D, thanks to me. {Just blame this all on Gandalf and Tolkien, I think they started it all!)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-...
Anyhow, all the old kit you need to enjoy AD&D 1st edition is still lying around out there if you trawl Amazon and Ebay and elsewhere. But, it comes at a price… an “as new” copy of the essential rules “The Player’s Handbook” is on Amazon for an eye-watering £900 and a second hand copy for £150.05 . (Why the five pence?!) Well, when I put aside AD&D because other things were demanding my time, such as a job rather than college, I threw away my players handbook. (Fool of a Took! as Gandalf would say.) whilst the father of the younger folk, who I have now introduced the game to, wisely kept his player’s handbook on a book-shelf and lo and behold a player’s handbook appeared, with the ease of the casting a first level spell by a high level wizard.
Thankfully, I did find some suitable rulebooks on Amazon at a sane price but of slightly later imprints that have the same content but a less awesome cover. Multi-sided die (dice) are also easy to buy. (4,6,8,10, 12 and 20) do the job quite nicely, not that the rules are complicated, they’re just imaginative. And that is the key word for AD&D. It all comes down to imagination. It’s a great deal of fun for two or more people, probably up to eight though max, I’d say. Everyone assumes a character, except one person who is called the Dungeon Master and it is he or she who creates a dungeon or a scenario for an adventure and describes everything the characters encounter along the way.
Anyway, adventures were sold as modules that you bought and came with all the details of what lay in store for the adventurers and these can still be bought but they are pretty pricey. Out of print, supply and demand, it makes sense. So anyway, for fun, I thought I’d write one. It was very enjoyable for me to do as it enabled me to combine my love of writing with my enthusisam for AD&D. A young Wizard at map making created the cover for me and curtesy of Amazon you can now buy it and the price is just 1 silver piece and 2 copper pieces, which translated into stirling or euros or dollars, is a bargain.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Island-Jural...
This was a craze that I got caught up when I was at school and college. Back in the day, (very early 1980’s) 1st Edition AD&D (there have been many editions since) relied on nothing more than pen, paper, numerous odd shaped die (dice) and imagination. This was before computer games and it took the World by storm. With the advent of computer games AD&D was obviously, in its pen and paper format, rapidly seen as out of date. However just like vinyl records and other such things, after a while these half-forgotten inventions become fashionable again. Now AD&D is seeing a massive resurgence. Not my words but the BBC news, who of course are always right, aren’t they? Check out the link, kindly sent to me yesterday by a friend, whose children are now falling under the spell of AD&D, thanks to me. {Just blame this all on Gandalf and Tolkien, I think they started it all!)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-...
Anyhow, all the old kit you need to enjoy AD&D 1st edition is still lying around out there if you trawl Amazon and Ebay and elsewhere. But, it comes at a price… an “as new” copy of the essential rules “The Player’s Handbook” is on Amazon for an eye-watering £900 and a second hand copy for £150.05 . (Why the five pence?!) Well, when I put aside AD&D because other things were demanding my time, such as a job rather than college, I threw away my players handbook. (Fool of a Took! as Gandalf would say.) whilst the father of the younger folk, who I have now introduced the game to, wisely kept his player’s handbook on a book-shelf and lo and behold a player’s handbook appeared, with the ease of the casting a first level spell by a high level wizard.
Thankfully, I did find some suitable rulebooks on Amazon at a sane price but of slightly later imprints that have the same content but a less awesome cover. Multi-sided die (dice) are also easy to buy. (4,6,8,10, 12 and 20) do the job quite nicely, not that the rules are complicated, they’re just imaginative. And that is the key word for AD&D. It all comes down to imagination. It’s a great deal of fun for two or more people, probably up to eight though max, I’d say. Everyone assumes a character, except one person who is called the Dungeon Master and it is he or she who creates a dungeon or a scenario for an adventure and describes everything the characters encounter along the way.
Anyway, adventures were sold as modules that you bought and came with all the details of what lay in store for the adventurers and these can still be bought but they are pretty pricey. Out of print, supply and demand, it makes sense. So anyway, for fun, I thought I’d write one. It was very enjoyable for me to do as it enabled me to combine my love of writing with my enthusisam for AD&D. A young Wizard at map making created the cover for me and curtesy of Amazon you can now buy it and the price is just 1 silver piece and 2 copper pieces, which translated into stirling or euros or dollars, is a bargain.
March 4, 2018
Snow Leopard
I was pleased to see an article in the press recently (see end of post for link) that reported that the numbers of snow leopards had now gone up just sufficiently for the species to removed from the endangered list.
My novel "The Dragunov Deception" whilst first and last a thriller, is also, in a small way, a commentary about the plight of the Amur Tiger of Siberia and the snow leopard of the Himalayas. After reading "The Snow Leopard" by Peter Matthiessen a very long time ago, I knew I had to go to the Himalayas and realised this in the 1990's when I was able to spend time in Bhutan.
It was there, whilst trekking to remote Buddhist monasteries, that I got an idea that became the basis for "The Dragunov Deception".
http://www.independent.co.uk/environm...
My novel "The Dragunov Deception" whilst first and last a thriller, is also, in a small way, a commentary about the plight of the Amur Tiger of Siberia and the snow leopard of the Himalayas. After reading "The Snow Leopard" by Peter Matthiessen a very long time ago, I knew I had to go to the Himalayas and realised this in the 1990's when I was able to spend time in Bhutan.
It was there, whilst trekking to remote Buddhist monasteries, that I got an idea that became the basis for "The Dragunov Deception".
http://www.independent.co.uk/environm...
January 9, 2016
Walking on thin ice
Do you buy a book on the strength of the cover? As a child the book cover that caught and held my attention was of a canoe, with six men in it, sailing down a jungle river. Longer than the canoe, a giant snake rose up out of the water, towering over the tiny canoe, where one man was caught by the artist, in the act of taking a seemingly futile pot-shot with his rifle at the anaconda python. The book was titled “Exploration Fawcett” by Colonel P.H.Fawcett. The book, published in 1953, was passed to me by my grandfather and inside there was a cutting from the Daily Telegraph from 21st February 1966 reporting “Site of Last Col. Fawcett Camp Known.” It was the first book of its genre that I read and I read it avidly.
More recently I was given a copy of “The Worst Journey in the World” by Apsley Cherry-Gerrard. This first-hand account, originally published in 1922, of Captain Scott’s ill-fated attempt to reach the South Pole is, as Condé Nast Traveller says, “A masterpiece”. I love reading such books and no sooner had I finished Cherry-Gerrard’s work, was I embarked upon “Libyan Sands” by R.A.Bagnold, suitably subtitled “Travel in a Dead World”. This was first published in 1935 and I felt it fair to assume that the era of exploration, first attempts and daring-do, had surely come to a close by the middle of the last century. After Everest, the north and south Poles, the darkest jungles of Brazil and the vast emptiness of the Libyan desert, where was left?
I first met Mike Laird a couple of years ago and we fell into conversation. I found out that he’d been to the Himalayas – without doubt the most memorable place I’ve ever been to. That said; I’ve not done much travel, unlike Mike who has been to, roughly, eighty countries. Mike has not just travelled, but he has undertaken numerous gruelling and hazardous journeys in places that sensible people would do well to steer clear of. He was in Afghanistan in 2007 and he has walked to the North Pole. This year he is undertaking another journey; crossing The Bering Strait - a shifting mass of freezing water and shifting ice that covers roughly fifty miles at the narrowest point between Siberia and Alaska.
It was crossed in 1913 by dog-sled, by kayak once in 1989, by skis in 1998 and in 2012 on foot. That though is about it. In comparison, the North and South Pole are busy places and Everest is over-crowded. Basically, no-one goes there and as journeys go, you can’t really imagine anything worse. Mike is going to attempt a two-way crossing. There and back again; which I have just realised is the sub-title for The Hobbit. No danger of meeting a dragon but a good chance of meeting a polar bear for sure. 900 lbs in weight, 42 very large teeth and capable of charging at 25mph, definitely not something you want to meet on an ice flow with nowhere to hide.
More recently I was given a copy of “The Worst Journey in the World” by Apsley Cherry-Gerrard. This first-hand account, originally published in 1922, of Captain Scott’s ill-fated attempt to reach the South Pole is, as Condé Nast Traveller says, “A masterpiece”. I love reading such books and no sooner had I finished Cherry-Gerrard’s work, was I embarked upon “Libyan Sands” by R.A.Bagnold, suitably subtitled “Travel in a Dead World”. This was first published in 1935 and I felt it fair to assume that the era of exploration, first attempts and daring-do, had surely come to a close by the middle of the last century. After Everest, the north and south Poles, the darkest jungles of Brazil and the vast emptiness of the Libyan desert, where was left?
I first met Mike Laird a couple of years ago and we fell into conversation. I found out that he’d been to the Himalayas – without doubt the most memorable place I’ve ever been to. That said; I’ve not done much travel, unlike Mike who has been to, roughly, eighty countries. Mike has not just travelled, but he has undertaken numerous gruelling and hazardous journeys in places that sensible people would do well to steer clear of. He was in Afghanistan in 2007 and he has walked to the North Pole. This year he is undertaking another journey; crossing The Bering Strait - a shifting mass of freezing water and shifting ice that covers roughly fifty miles at the narrowest point between Siberia and Alaska.
It was crossed in 1913 by dog-sled, by kayak once in 1989, by skis in 1998 and in 2012 on foot. That though is about it. In comparison, the North and South Pole are busy places and Everest is over-crowded. Basically, no-one goes there and as journeys go, you can’t really imagine anything worse. Mike is going to attempt a two-way crossing. There and back again; which I have just realised is the sub-title for The Hobbit. No danger of meeting a dragon but a good chance of meeting a polar bear for sure. 900 lbs in weight, 42 very large teeth and capable of charging at 25mph, definitely not something you want to meet on an ice flow with nowhere to hide.
February 23, 2013
Gross National Happiness
Gross National Happiness
It has been interesting to see that Bhutan is now getting a few mentions in the national newspaper not least for its concept of Gross National Happiness rather than Gross Domestic Product. I suppose that at a time of global recession when it seems everyone has declining or struggling GDP, national leaders, our included should latch onto a concept that until now they have disregarded.
When I was in Bhutan I believe about a third of the male population were monks and I don’t suppose it is much different now. If you should describe saffron robes as their uniform then that uniform was ubiquitous. In comparison I only noticed one or two police and a few soldiers. I was pleased though to hear that Bhutan welcomed Indian army manoeuvres frequently inside the country and in particular in the regions close to the Tibetan border, or as some would say the Tibetan Autonomous Region of the Peoples Republic of China border.
Bhutan is walking a tightrope between respecting its history and unique culture and in recognising that it cannot remain isolated from the rest of the world. The current King’s father cherry picked some of the best of what the west could offer, such as modern vaccination programmes and rejected what he saw as undesirable – an avaricious attitude towards utilising the country’s natural resources and passed laws accordingly so that for example a man may cut down a tree to use it for his own needs so long as he replants one but men may not cut down trees to sell them for profit.
It has been interesting to see that Bhutan is now getting a few mentions in the national newspaper not least for its concept of Gross National Happiness rather than Gross Domestic Product. I suppose that at a time of global recession when it seems everyone has declining or struggling GDP, national leaders, our included should latch onto a concept that until now they have disregarded.
When I was in Bhutan I believe about a third of the male population were monks and I don’t suppose it is much different now. If you should describe saffron robes as their uniform then that uniform was ubiquitous. In comparison I only noticed one or two police and a few soldiers. I was pleased though to hear that Bhutan welcomed Indian army manoeuvres frequently inside the country and in particular in the regions close to the Tibetan border, or as some would say the Tibetan Autonomous Region of the Peoples Republic of China border.
Bhutan is walking a tightrope between respecting its history and unique culture and in recognising that it cannot remain isolated from the rest of the world. The current King’s father cherry picked some of the best of what the west could offer, such as modern vaccination programmes and rejected what he saw as undesirable – an avaricious attitude towards utilising the country’s natural resources and passed laws accordingly so that for example a man may cut down a tree to use it for his own needs so long as he replants one but men may not cut down trees to sell them for profit.
