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Matt James
Forgotten Realms Game Designer
USA
918 Posts |
 Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 02:20:00
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I am in the process of drafting an article that may or may not have Realmslore  and have been corresponding with Ed. As mentioned in his last e-mail correspondence, I can share with you what remains. You can view his e-mail by clicking HERE
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Children Games in the Realms.
* Drown Witch: this requires a brook, stream, or river (course of moving water, not a bog or pond). Dolls (or bundles of sticks, sheaves of reeds or cattails or sumac, tied together and “dressed” in something distinctive) are cast into the water at a given spot (often a bridge) and then hunted for at another location far downstream, the “winner” being the witch-bundle that floats down the fastest. If a bundle disappears (can’t be found) the “witch wins.” If all bundles get snagged and don’t reach the downstream spot, “the witch that got the farthest was best” but the players win and the witches (or “the magic”) loses.
* Spy Shrike: this requires outdoor areas, and a means of timing (a local bell or other signal, or sundown, or “the lighting of the lamps” or other daily regular occurrence, like livestock being driven from one field to another, or heading home for milking or feeding on their own. It’s simply a competitive game of finding a hidden distinctive object (the “shrike”) like a doll or a painted vase, which is not retrieved or moved. The players reconvene at an agreed-upon spot at or after the “time up” signal, and tell other players where they saw the shrike and what other carrion birds or raptors they saw, and where. The player who saw the most (or can tell the most dramatic stories/whoppers about those sightings) wins.
* Groundsnake or Racing Serpents: Two to four teams (of four or more players each; six is the most popular, and eight or nine usually the limit of practicality) race from one agreed-upon spot to another, in any manner they desire, except that they have to stay grasping each other, in a human chain. Whenever the chain breaks, they have to stop and loudly sing a particular local song (that usually takes at least a minute to sing) before joining up into a chain and moving again. The winning team is the “snake” that arrives at the finish spot first. This race is typically run through a town or down a valley, with one or more obstacles (river crossings, mudpits or pig-wallows, thick woods, hedges or high fences, and the like) to cross.
* Rolling Heads or Goblinhead: A vaguely-soccer-like game played by two teams of any number (so long as they’re about the same size, or an agreed-upon balance, like a few older kids against more numerous younger ones), in which a ball (the “head,” usually a large irregular sphere made of old rags knotted and looped around a lump of wood or old pot or helm, but in olden times, sometimes rags tied around an actual orc or goblin skull) is moved about an agreed-upon playing area, to score goals by passing it through a doorway, farm gate, hedge gap, space between two trees, or other agreed-upon “goal.” After each score, the head must be returned to a central “start of play” spot, hurled straight up into the air, and play begins again (continuing until an agreed-upon finishing time or goal total; if the former, most goals wins, if the latter, first to reach the total wins). The game is played more like volleyball than soccer, in that the head can’t be carried or kicked along the ground, but can only be moved “in the air” (by throwing it, or punching or slapping it when it’s aloft/falling). Players can only be touched when they’re touching the head (i.e. a player can tackle, punch, or grapple another player while they’re catching or throwing or spiking/slapping/punching the head - - or if the other player cheats by moving along the ground while carrying the head).
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Edited by - Matt James on 03 Dec 2010 02:22:17
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The Sage
Procrastinator Most High
Australia
31701 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 03:09:18
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Oooh! Neat. Thank you Matt, and to Ed as well. I'm compiling this into the "So Saith Ed" archives.
And, also, I may even be able to use 'Spy Shrike' in my weekend campaign this coming Saturday.  |
Candlekeep Forums Moderator
Candlekeep - The Library of Forgotten Realms Lore
http://www.candlekeep.com -- Candlekeep Forum Code of Conduct
Scribe for the Candlekeep Compendium -- Volume IX now available (Oct 2007)
"So Saith Ed" -- the collected Candlekeep replies of Ed Greenwood
Zhoth'ilam Folio -- The Electronic Misadventures of a Rambling Sage |
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The Hooded One
Lady Herald of Realmslore
5056 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 03:26:30
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Heh. I think I can tell which game you chose, Matt. Would "FTK" have anything to do with it, perchance? We Knights played that, in game, with a mad and murderous sorceress, with a life at stake.
(If I'm right, don't worry, I'll reveal no more. I don't want to hamper your article any more than Ed does.)
love,
THO |
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Elfinblade
Senior Scribe
Norway
377 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 08:27:08
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Ah ye sweet wonderful lore!  |
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Quale
Master of Realmslore
1757 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 11:53:53
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| is there a Barca of the Goblinhead? |
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Bakra
Senior Scribe
628 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 14:07:23
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| This is soooo sweet. And I can't wait until Matts' article gets post or not posted. |
I hope Candlekeep continues to be the friendly forum of fellow Realms-lovers that it has always been, as we all go through this together. If you don’t want to move to the “new” Realms, that doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with either you or the “old” Realms. Goodness knows Candlekeep, and the hearts of its scribes, are both big enough to accommodate both. If we want them to be.
(Strikes dramatic pose, raises sword to gleam in the sunset, and hopes breeches won’t fall down.)
Enough for now. The Realms lives! I have spoken! Ale and light wines half price, served by a smiling Storm Silverhand fetchingly clad in thigh-high boots and naught else! Ahem . .
So saith Ed. <snip>
love to all,
THO
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Matt James
Forgotten Realms Game Designer
USA
918 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 14:22:29
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| Well, my article still has to get through editing so it's not guaranteed what will make it (if anything). THO, you would be correct. That game jumped out at me and think it will fit well enough :) |
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GRYPHON
Senior Scribe
USA
527 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 14:42:24
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| Interesting... |
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Erik Scott de Bie
Forgotten Realms Author
USA
4598 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 14:57:05
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Are you interested in FR children's games not detailed by Ed? 'Cuz there's one that goes on in one of my books, albeit played by adults in this particular case. But it originated as a game for nippers.
Cheers |
Erik Scott de Bie
'Tis easier to destroy than to create.
Author of a number of Realms novels (GHOSTWALKER, DEPTHS OF MADNESS, and the SHADOWBANE series), contributor to the NEVERWINTER CAMPAIGN GUIDE and SHADOWFELL: GLOOMWROUGHT AND BEYOND, Twitch DM of the Dungeon Scrawlers, currently playing "The Westgate Irregulars" |
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The Red Walker
Great Reader
USA
3563 Posts |
Posted - 03 Dec 2010 : 16:24:16
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quote:
Originally posted by Erik Scott de Bie
Are you interested in FR children's games not detailed by Ed? 'Cuz there's one that goes on in one of my books, albeit played by adults in this particular case. But it originated as a game for nippers.
Cheers
Share friend Erik! |
A little nonsense now and then, relished by the wisest men - Willy Wonka
"We need men who can dream of things that never were." -
John F. Kennedy, speech in Dublin, Ireland, June 28, 1963
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Ayrik
Great Reader
Canada
7970 Posts |
Posted - 04 Dec 2010 : 12:05:29
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I've recently purchased a maddening "ancient" game called Zen Blocks ($2 at thrift, lol).quote:
Cryptic instructions from blocks box
A very special Three Dimensional many experiences for the Intuitive, for the Dreamer, and for the Great Thinker. Match all symbols to form a cube where you bring together Lion and Lamb, Heaven and Earth, Rain and Sun, Yin and Yang to form A Single Perfectly Transcendant And Harmonious Whole. A Genuine Game which unfolds differently each time you play. Not a one solutions puzzle. Thus, excellent for Family Play, for in classrooms as Logic Game, for in groups to Assessing Cooperative Skills or just even for to traditional give to that Special Clever Person. Everyone plays together and we realize the common objective and symmetry.
If you are Very Young then to Simple Play you Achieve Harmony by make blocks as pleasing shapes like Great Wall, or City, or River, or Mountains. If you are Very Old then to Hard Play you think about Symmetry in Many Pleasing Shapes and Sounds to make blocks for Special Harmony.
I have meditated upon this impossible wisdom in an attempt to gain Complete Understanding of the Harmonious Objective, yet to no avail.
Surely there must be a Kara-Tur equivalent for this in the Realms? |
[/Ayrik] |
Edited by - Ayrik on 04 Dec 2010 12:07:18 |
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Brimstone
Great Reader
USA
3286 Posts |
Posted - 04 Dec 2010 : 13:33:12
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Pretty cool stuff going on here... |
"These things also I have observed: that knowledge of our world is
to be nurtured like a precious flower, for it is the most precious
thing we have. Wherefore guard the word written and heed
words unwritten and set them down ere they fade . . . Learn
then, well, the arts of reading, writing, and listening true, and they
will lead you to the greatest art of all: understanding."
Alaundo of Candlekeep |
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BARDOBARBAROS
Senior Scribe
Greece
581 Posts |
Posted - 04 Dec 2010 : 16:54:30
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BARDOBARBAROS DOES NOT KILL.
HE DECAPITATES!!!
"The city changes, but the fools within it remain always the same" (Edwin Odesseiron- Baldur's gate 2) |
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BARDOBARBAROS
Senior Scribe
Greece
581 Posts |
Posted - 04 Dec 2010 : 16:56:19
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| Good... |
BARDOBARBAROS DOES NOT KILL.
HE DECAPITATES!!!
"The city changes, but the fools within it remain always the same" (Edwin Odesseiron- Baldur's gate 2) |
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Markustay
Realms Explorer extraordinaire
USA
15724 Posts |
Posted - 04 Dec 2010 : 20:22:18
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quote:
Originally posted by Erik Scott de Bie
Are you interested in FR children's games not detailed by Ed? 'Cuz there's one that goes on in one of my books, albeit played by adults in this particular case. But it originated as a game for nippers.
So you've invented 'nakey tag' as well, eh?
Or is it 'strip twister' - a popular pastime played at Sunefests.
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"I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me" --- Dudley Field Malone
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althen artren
Senior Scribe
USA
780 Posts |
Posted - 06 Dec 2010 : 02:20:27
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| I've tried to get my wift to play strip twister, with no success. |
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---> Realmslore from Ed
