WarFlail's Archives - January 2001

Go to WarFlail's Archives - February 2001

Fellow Hârn gamer Timo Hanschke (of Timo Hanschke's Hârnic Corner) and I have been collaborating on an article about converting the hides of Hârnic monsters and beasts into armour. I'm sure more than one player has dreamt about wearing dragonhide! Actually, we've done the article for both HârnMaster Gold (HMG) and HârnMaster Core Rules (HMC), since the statistics are different in each rules system. Enjoy! :-)

Monster Leather - for HMG  (16Kb)

Monster Leather - for HMC  (13Kb)

I see from the Project Hârn site that WarFlail's Amoury is currently being voted as the second most popular Hârn fan site (after Patrick Nilsson's excellent Swords & Shields site - no contest there)! That's fantastic - I didn't realise that this site is so well-liked! I'm kind of embarrassed. Thank you for your kind support! :-)

As always, if you have any suggestions on how I can improve this site, please let me know.

BTW, I have posted a couple of documents on the House Rules page. Both are essentially works-in-progress, but I suppose there is no harm in releasing them early:

HMG House Rules - Skills (10Kb)

HMG House Rules - Character (16Kb)

Both will be added to in the near future. Keep watching this space! :-)

AUSTRALIA DAY

CENTENARY OF FEDERATION 1901-2001

Today is Australia Day, the traditional Australian celebratory day since 26 January 1788, when Captain Arthur Phillip became Governor of the Colony and took 'formal possession of the colony of New South Wales'. Governor Phillip had jurisdiction over an area of Australia bounded by latitude 10°37' to 43°49' south, and inland to longitude 135° east (a bloody huge area, but not enough to cover even half of Australia).

This year also marks the Centenary of Federation, which was celebrated at the beginning of this month, on the first day of the new millennium. This was the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Australia's foundation as a united democratic nation. Most of the celebrating took place in New South Wales over on the other side of the continent, so Western Australians like myself generally forgot about it. However, if there is ever an excuse needed to make the fireworks celebrations for this year's Australia Day bigger than ever, this is the perfect one. :-)

...Just got back from viewing the Lotto Skyworks 2001 this evening. Spectacular! Definitely more impressive than in previous years.

KUNG HEI FAT CHOI

Yes, it's that time again. Characteristic of the Snake, the Chinese New Year has just crept up on us without warning this time - normally, it doesn't strike until around February. Light your firecrackers, make lots of noise and get staggeringly drunk! :-)

Ever-industrious fellow HârnList member Andy Staples, of Penultimate HârnPage fame, who had earlier brought you the first ever Hârn chat log this week, has asked me to put a direct link to the following page:

 The CC2/Hârn Mapping Project Public Page  <http://www.minarsas.demon.co.uk/harn/chmp/index.htm>

The reason for this is that while the page is nested within the Penultimate HârnPage, it is a separate, distinct project. 

On the illness front, the penicillin seems to be working very well. I hope my fellow tonsillitis sufferers are also making sure they are taking their medicine! :-)

My illness wasn't getting any better - if anything, it was worsening. So I went to see the doctor this morning. He confirmed that I had indeed suffered some sort of heat-related dehydration, but the worst thing was I had somehow contracted acute tonsillitis! So, it's time to dose up on penicillin...

Surprisingly enough, I'm not the only one to be suffering from swollen glands. At least 10 other people who attended Dean and Marina's wedding last Saturday are suffering similar symptoms (including the bride and groom)! Talk about an epidemic!

Launch Day!  Today, Auran launched the world's only official Hârn website, entitled Project Hârn. Check it out now!

  Project Hârn  <http://www.harn.com/>

Coinciding with the launch at 8:00am Australian Eastern Standard time, Auran started up a Hârn chat room on IRC. Hârn fans were able to log onto the chat room <Server: irc.auran.com Port: 6667 Channel: #harn> and chat with Auran staff, Robin Crossby and Tom Dalgliesh. Excellent! Unfortunately, I've still been under the weather since yesterday, so I didn't manage to log on early enough to chat with Robin or Tom, but fellow HârnList member Andy Staples has been kind enough to post a log of the chat session at:

The First Hârn Project Chat  <http://www.minarsas.demon.co.uk/harn/chatlog1.htm>

I'm delighted to see that Project Hârn has put a link to this site on their Links page (wow, that was fast!). I have obviously put up a link to the site on Hârn Link, plus a couple of other gems that I found on the Project Hârn website:

The Chronicles Hârnica  <http://www.philocity.com/chronicles/>

Village of Trobridge PBEM  <http://users.aol.com/Harngm/trbridge/frmst.htm>

I've also made one change to one of the links on Hârn Link, by replacing the link directly to Michael Cule's GURPS on Hârn article with a listing of all the HTML articles on the website where this article is located:

Jumi HârnPage: Index of HTML Articles  <http://jumi.lut.fi/Harn/HTML/>

This listing not only gives access to Michael's article, but also to several HTML Hârn-related articles, such as Michael Johns' and Cassandra Hocutt's article on Vampires in Hârn.

Just to give you some context, the HârnPage on the jumi.lut.fi server was the original HârnPage for many years, before Columbia Games shifted it to their own site.

Scully and I went to a birthday party for 2-year old Cameron, son of one of Scully's close friends. It was good fun and all, but I think I was out in the sun a little too long in the pool - I'm fairly sure that what I am suffering from right now is heatstroke. :-(

Today was the wedding day of my friends Dean and Marina. The wedding took place in picturesque Kings Park, with the reception being at Dean's close friend's mansion (and I do mean mansion!). Congratulations to the happy couple!

Fellow Australian HârnList member Peter Leitch has moved his website from the harnworld.com domain. Check out this highly professional-looking website here and be sure to update your bookmarks:

Lýthia.com  <http://www.lythia.com/>

I've made some more updates to my HârnMaster House Rules page, firstly with the addition of a new page showing the map of Hârn and a brief description of the place:

Hârn

Also, I have posted updated versions of the following three PDF files, with cosmetic alterations:

Bill Gant's HârnMaster House Rules v3.2 (306Kb) - Removed the annoying thick black line from the bottom of each page. Honestly, I don't know how it got there! No other changes.

Skorth-Ra (78Kb) - Added a rough drawing of the monster that I drew some years back.

GunMaster Gold (1,010Kb) - As with the HârnMaster House Rules v3.2 document, I removed the black line from the bottom of each page. That was unintentional, and slow as I am, I finally figured out how to remove it in Word. Otherwise, the only change was a small clarification on page 25 that I should have picked up ages ago.

Both the Bill Gant's HârnMaster House Rules and the HÂRN LINK pages have undergone a significant colour transformation today. Gone are the brooding, dark colours; the time has come to make the colours a little brighter! I hope you like the changes.

Comments? Please email me.

The latest version of my HârnMaster Gold House Rules for Combat is now available for viewing. Take a look on my House Rules page, or see below:

HMG House Rules - Combat (41Kb)

I received an email announcement today from Columbia Games, which I thought I should share with you:

Nasty, Brutish and Short: The Orcs of Hârn is the first release for d20 from Columbia Games. Other d20 modules are planned.

My local Blockbuster video store has this deal where it costs no more to get a couple of new release movies and an arm-load of weekly movies, than to get just the two new release movies. So, I grabbed a range of old films that I had heard a little about, just to make up the numbers... and one of them was (unfortunately) "The Norseman", starring Lee Majors and made in 1978 or thereabouts.

"The Norseman" has got to be one of the worst and most laughably pathetic films I have seen in years! The term "B-grade" is too high an honour for this complete failure. The acting was wooden, the cinematography amateurish, and the plot as weak as water (yet it was based on fact!). And what the hell was with the costumes and props!? It was obvious that nobody ever bothered to do any historical research. I totally agree with the following review. Consider yourself warned! :-)

The Hârn Link has been updated with two new additions. Check them out:

www.HârnWorld.de  <http://www.harnworld.de/>

Tavernengeschichten  <http://www.tavernengeschichten.de/>

Since these sites are in German, I thought I'd give the Gist-in-Time translator interface in Internet Explorer a go. The results weren't too bad, although I almost spat out my coffee laughing when I saw that it had translated "HARNMASTER" as "URINE MASTERS"!!! LOL :-D

I went through the whole listing of links on Hârn Link today to check on the status of each link. A few have been dead for ages, but I've kept them up (and annotated) just in case they come back online one day - after all, they were live at least at some point since WarFlail's Amoury went online in October 1998. Actually, the ratio of dead links to live ones is reasonably good, sitting at around 10%.

As always, if you spot a Hârn-related fan site that is not listed on Hârn Link, then please send me the URL. I am always trying to expand the listing and I could certainly do with your help! :-)

Well, the week-long Hyundai Hopman Cup tennis tournament has drawn to a conclusion, with the final being played today between Switzerland's Martina Hingis and Roger Federer, and USA's Monica Seles and Jan-Michael Gambill. Switzerland won with Hingis winning every set in the entire tournament!

Fellow HârnList member Dennis Dutton has updated his website by converting most of his articles to user-friendly .PDF format. Some very interesting reading here:

HârnMaster Notebook  <http://www.pagan.drak.net/duttond/Harn/notes/index.html>

Today is my mate Ned Kelly's birthday (no, not the original Ned Kelly!). Happy birthday! :-)

I've added a new Hârn fan page to the Hârn Link. This site belongs to Jason Brisbane, a fellow Perth HârnGamer. Go and check it out - WarFlail's Amoury rates 3 out of 5 axes on Darkeen's rating system (what, only 3?!)... :-)

Darkeen's Battlefield  <http://www.westnet.net.au/darkeen/harn/harn.html>

It was back to the Hyundai Hopman Cup tennis tournament this evening, to watch Belgium play against the Slovak Republic (the Slovaks won). Another fine match.

I've been doing a general clean-out of several floppy disks that have been lying around for ages, and I found a couple of documents on one of them that I think may be of interest to HârnMaster fans. I have posted them on the HârnMaster House Rules page as the following articles:

Divine Retribution (30Kb)

Purse Cutting (3Kb)

I have also posted a font pack that contains the fonts for Lakise and Runic, as well as a miscellaneous Hârnic symbol set. These can also be found on the House Rules page, zipped up as Font Pack #2 (120Kb). Note that these fonts are also available from the HârnPage.

   HAPPY NEW YEAR!

            HAPPY NEW CENTURY!

                     HAPPY NEW MILLENNIUM!

At midnight, Scully and I celebrated the coming of the New Year at Neisha and Adrian's wedding reception at Altitude 9 (see last month's news).

There was a fantastic view of the light show at the Swan Bells bell tower, but it was disappointing that there weren't any fireworks to be seen - apparently, the fireworks took place elsewhere in Gloucester Park. Also, while the view from Altitude 9 was fantastic, the light show itself wasn't particularly interesting after the initial colour changes - there were no lasers or anything fancy. I felt a bit sorry for all those people that had taken the trouble to gather before it to see it work its "magic". It didn't matter for us, since we were busy partying away at the reception to our hearts' content.

Finding a taxi home afterwards was a bitch, though... Why are there never any taxis when you want one?! *Sigh* Don't you just love public transport? :-)

Elsewhere in the world, it appears the celebrations took off big-time. I hope you had a wonderful time too. News on what happened can be seen at:

World Welcomes 2001  <http://www.abc.net.au/news/2001/01/item20010101022534_1.htm>

And, for a review of some of the main events that took place in 2000, take a look at:

2000 in Review  <http://abc.net.au/news/features/yir2000/>

Today is Scully's mate Marina's birthday. It's also Pe-Le Jaks's wife Helen's birthday. Happy birthday to both of you! :-)

Go to WarFlail's Archives - December 2000

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