I had finished binge watching all 8 episodes of the first season of True Detective a few days ago. What a tour de force. By episode 6 it was up there with my favorite series, Twin Peaks, Wild Palms, Millennium, X Files, and the mini series The Lost Room. This was simply a superb series and one I will actually get on DVD for future viewing and dissection. I would love a transcript of the monologues from Matthew M, especially the ones in the police interview scenes. Those are pure gold. This series is to me the way a great modern Call of Cthulhu, or perhaps something like Unknown Armies, could actually play out as. This is my model for what I want my gaming to be like, in general, in modern or surreal horror.
Saturday, June 13, 2015
So Other Occupations for a Character
So Other Occupations for a Character
Often times in gaming we keep reusing the same occupations over and over. I know as a Player and a GM that the same sorts of people keep showing up, time after time after time. So this list is one way for myself, and potentially you my reader, to include a few different vibes in your game.
Some games have a limited subset of occupations. Call of Cthulhu is one such game, with a very specific main set of where characters come from occupation wise. This is intended to maintain the look and feel of the core setting.
Other places I have used to pull in real world occupations are the major job boards and the Occupational Handbook. The easiest way is to log into your account at one of the major job boards (if you have your own login already made) or just put in a larger city in the location search field. So run it and pull in a search of the last 30 days worth of jobs. Copy it all and paste into a text friendly location such as Notebook or the website www.darkcopy.com (my personal favorite).
Copy again into your word processing program of choice to do some cleanup work and if you want to, as I did with a large list one time, put the cleaned up list of only job titles into a spreadsheet program to sort alphabetically and remove duplications.
Yes it takes a little work, but the efforts can yield a long list of potential different, more modern oriented of course, occupations. These are suitable for modern, near future, and with minor tweaks, far future SF games. The genre does not really matter in the timeframe. These jobs work equally well for espionage, conspiracy, surreal, horror, cyperpunk, superhero, or even urban fantasy.
The following list was pulled from a poem that was published in a magazine. They are all dealing with new ways to move, aggregate, adjust, and deal with customers and people in the online setting. Some are older, such as Copywriter and Brand Agent. Others are brand new and really are less than 10 years old such as the Sponsored Blogger or Notable User.
Some research would be necessary to find out more about the more esoteric ones. Since many of them are new, creations of companies attempting to tame the wild Internet (Used in the broadest term here), others are outgrowths of existing occupations, taken in new directions.
Have fun using them, or finding inspiration for character backgrounds or even entire types of characters in this list.
In Alphabetical Order
Aesthetic King
Bit Tracker
Bottom-Line Analyzer
Brand Agent
Brand Ambassador
Brander
Change Agent
Copywriter
Designer
Illustrator
Interface Wizard
Marketer
Meme Generator
Multi-Platform Guru
Notable User
Online Retailer
Profit-Maximizer
Re-Poster
Social-Media Consultant
Sponsored Blogger
Starred Commentator
Viral Relayer
Thursday, June 4, 2015
Some Commonly Found Creatures in US Swamps
Some Commonly Found Creatures in US Swamps
Sourced from varied websites
Mixture of Freshwater and Saltwater Denizens
Now the majority of these creatures will not be suitable for an encounter. Things like a Fox, Rabbit, Vole, Bats, etc. Others could be encounters like Bears, Bobcats, especially the Alligators or Crocodiles. Another issue with this list is that is for both Fresh and Saltwater so if you pull them all in at once,
it would be a severe mishmash. However to get an idea as to what creatures may be living in a swamp, it should be most suitable.
Alligator Snapping Turtle (Macroclemys temmincki)
American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis)
American Toad (Bufo americanus)
Banded Water Snake (Nerodia fasciata)
Barking Treefrog (Hyla gratiosa)
Barred Owl
Beaver (Castor canadensis)
Big Brown Bat (Eptesicus fuscus)
Bird-voiced Treefrog (Hyla avivoca)
Black Bear (Ursus americanus)
Black Rat (Rattus rat)
Black Rat Snake (Elaphe obsoleta)
Bobcat (Lynx rufus)
Brazilian Free-tailed Bat (Tadarida brasiliensis)
Broad-headed Skink (Eumeces laticeps)
Bronze Frog (Rana clamitans)
Brown Snake (Storeria dekayi)
Brown Water Snake (Nerodia taxispilota)
Bullfrog (Rana catesbeiana)
Common Musk Turtle (Sternotherus odoratus)
Common Muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus)
Copperhead (Agkistrodon contortrix)
Corn Snake (Elaphe guttata)
Cotton Mouse (Peromyscus gossypinus)
Cotton Rat (Sigmodon hispidus)
Cottonmouth Snakes
Coyote (Canis latrans)
Crabs
Deer Snakes
Dwarf Salamander (Eurycea quadridigitata)
Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapene carolina)
Eastern Chipmunk (Tamias striatus)
Eastern Coachwhip (Masticophis flagellum)
Eastern Cottonmouth (Agkistrodon piscivorus)
Eastern Cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus)
Eastern Fence Lizard (Sceloporus undulatus)
Eastern Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis)
Eastern Glass Lizard (Ophisaurus ventralis)
Eastern Gray Squirrel (Sciursu carolinensis)
Eastern Harvest Mouse (Reithrodontomys humulis)
Eastern Hognose Snake (Heterodon platyrhinos)
Eastern Kingsnake (Lampropeltis getulus)
Eastern Mole (Scaolpus aquaticus)
Eastern Mud Turtle (Kinosternon subrubrum)
Eastern Narrow-mouthed Toad (Gastrophryne carolinensis)
Eastern Pipistrelle (Pipistrellus subflavus)
Eastern Red Bat (Lasiurus borealis)
Eastern Ribbon Snake (Thamnophis sauritus)
Eastern Spadefoot (Scaphiopus holbrookii)
Eastern Spotted Skunk (Spilogale putorius)
Eastern Woodrat (Neotoma floridana)
Egrets
Evening Bat (Nycticeius humeralis)
Feral Pig (Sus scrofa)
Five-Lined Skink (Eumeces fasciatus)
Flamingo
Florida Cooter (Pseudemys floridana)
Florida Panther
Flying Fox
Fowler’s Toad (Bufo fowleri)
Fox Squirrel (Sciurus niger)
Frogs
Gapper’s Redback Vole
Golden Mouse (Peromyscus nuttalli)
Gray Fox (Urocyon cinereoargenteus)
Gray Squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis)
Gray Treefrog (Hyla chrysoscelis)
Green Anole (Anolis carolinensis)
Green Treefrog (Hyla cinerea)
Ground Skink (Scincella lateralis) Turtles
Hoary Bat (Lasiurus cinereus)
House Mouse (Mus musculus)
Insects (Of All Sorts)
Jabiru
Least Shrew (Cryptotis parva)
Lesser Siren (Siren intermedia)
Little Brown Myotis (Bat)
Loggerhead Musk Turtle (Sternotherus minor)
Long-tailed Weasel (Mustela frenata)
Mangrove Monitor Lizards
Marbled Salamander (Ambystoma opacum)
Marsh Rabbit (Sylvilagus palustris)
Marsh Rice Rat (Oryzomys palustris)
Masked Shrew
Meadow Jumping Mouse (Zapus hudsonius)
Meadow Vole
Midland Water Snake (Nerodia sipedon)
Mink (Mustela vison)
Mole Salamander (Ambystoma talpoideum)
Mole Skink (Eumeces egregius)
Mud Salamander (Psuedotriton montanus) Mammals
Mud Snake (Farancia abacura)
Mudskippers
Muskrat
Nine-banded Armadillo (Dasypus novemcinctus)
Northern Cricket Frog (Acris crepitans)
Norway Rat “Common Rat” (Rattus norvegicus)
Nutria (Myocastor coypus)
Oldfield Mouse (Peromyscus polionotus)
Osprey
Otter
Pine Vole
Queen Snake (Regina septemvittata)
Raccoon (Procyon lotor)
Red Bat
Red Fox (Vulpes vulpes)
Red Salamander (Psuedotriton ruber)
Red Squirrel (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus)
Red-Bellied Snake (Storeria occipitomaculata)
Red-Bellied Water Snake (Nerodia erythrogaster)
Red-Spotted Newt (Notophthalmus viridescens)
River Cooter (Pseudemys concinna)
River Otter (Lutra canadensis)
Rough Earth Snake (Virginia striatula)
Rough Green Snake (Opheodrys aestivus)
Saltwater Crocodile
Sandhill Crane
Scarlet Kingsnake (Lampropeltis triangulum)
Scarlet Snake (Cemophora coccinea)
Sea Snakes
Seminole Bat (Lasiurus seminolus)
Short-tailed Shrew (Blarina brevicauda)
Silver-haired Bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)
Six-Lined Racerunner (Cnemidophorus sexlineatus)
Slender Glass Lizard (Ophisaurus attenuatus)
Slimy Salamander (Plethodon glutinosus)
Smoky Shrew
Smooth Earth Snake (Virginia valeriae)
Snails
Snapping Turtle (Chelydra serpentina)
Southeastern Crowned Snake (Tantilla coronata)
Southeastern Five-Lined Skink (Eumeces inexpectatus)
Southeastern Myotis (Myotis austroriparius)
Southeastern Pocket Gopher (Geomys pinetis)
Southeastern Shrew (Sorex longirostris)
Southern Black Racer (Coluber constrictor priapus)
Southern Chorus Frog (Pseudacris nigrita)
Southern Cricket Frog (Acris gryllus)
Southern Flying Squirrel (Glaucomys volans)
Southern Leopard Frog (Rana utricularia)
Southern Ringneck Snake (Diadophis punctatus)
Southern Short-tailed Shrew (Blarina carolinensis)
Southern Toad (Bufo terrestris)
Southern Two-Lined Salamander (Eurycea cirrigera)
Spiny Softshell Turtle (Apalone spinifera))
Spotted Dusky Salamander (Desmognathus conanti)
Spotted Salamander (Ambystoma maculatum)
Spotted Turtle (Clemmys guttata)
Spring Peeper (Hyla crucifer)
Squirrel Treefrog (Hyla squirella)
Starnose Mole (Condylura cristata)
Striped Mud Turtle (Kinosternon baurii)
Striped Skunk
Striped Skunk (Mephitis mephitis)
Swamp Rabbit “Cane Cutter” (Sylvilagus aquaticus)
Three-Lined Salamander (Eurycea guttolineata)
Timber Rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus)
Turtles
Two-toed Amphiuma (Amphiuma means)
Upland Chorus Frog (Pseudacris feriarum)
Virginia Opossum (Didelphis virginiana)
Water Buffalo
Water Moccasin
Water Turkey
White-footed Mouse (Peromyscus leucopus)
Whitetail Deer (Odocoileus virginianus)
White-Tailed Deer (Odocoileus virginianus)
Wood Duck
Wood Stork
Woodchuck
Woodland Jumping Mouse
Woodland Vole (Microtus pinetorum)
Yellow-bellied Slider (Trachemys scripta) Alligators
Much of the above list copied from
Another site utilized is
Note: I plan to cross post this to two other of my own gaming oriented blogs as it can pertain to both of those as well.
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