iKitties

Hi,

So in the next few weeks, we'll be taking possession of two kittens. Feel free to suggest names, but right now I think we're leaning towards calling one "Dr. Teeth" and the other one "The Electric Mayhem".

Or maybe not.

In any event, what I'm really asking about are some powered accessories to help make keeping the cats a little easier for us. In particular I'm curious about:

Auto-scooping litter boxes
Pet drinking fountains

Do you have any experience with either of these tech toys? Do they actually help make things easier or are they big hassles to clean/maintain? In the case of the former, I really hate dealing with poop and in the latter, the last cat we had living with us seemed to prefer fresh-drip water from sinks/bathtubs and didn't care for the water dish. I'm hoping a gurgling fountain will be more appealing.

Any other tips for managing two cats? I'm essentially looking at katatonic here but perhaps others in LJ land have useful tips.

later
Tom

iKitties

Hi,

So in the next few weeks, we'll be taking possession of two kittens. Feel free to suggest names, but right now I think we're leaning towards calling one "Dr. Teeth" and the other one "The Electric Mayhem".

Or maybe not.

In any event, what I'm really asking about are some powered accessories to help make keeping the cats a little easier for us. In particular I'm curious about:

Auto-scooping litter boxes
Pet drinking fountains

Do you have any experience with either of these tech toys? Do they actually help make things easier or are they big hassles to clean/maintain? In the case of the former, I really hate dealing with poop and in the latter, the last cat we had living with us seemed to prefer fresh-drip water from sinks/bathtubs and didn't care for the water dish. I'm hoping a gurgling fountain will be more appealing.

Any other tips for managing two cats? I'm essentially looking at katatonic here but perhaps others in LJ land have useful tips.

later
Tom

MegaDungeons

Hey,

So thanks to bryant I've been thinking about MegaDungeons. You know. Dungeons that are huge pretty much for the purpose of being huge. The massive "Ruins of the Undermountain" maps and Castle Greyhawk and stuff.

And now I've got an idea.

So Orcus (cause hey, he's a great finishing Big Bad) steals the Amulet of Yendor and tosses it at the bottom of a massive dungeon in another dimension. Since the Amulet not only makes you Ruler of Yendor, gives you hoopy magic powers, and totally gets you laid, but also keeps demons and other critters out of your world, getting it back is a pretty high priority. Major governing bodies and not a few private individuals go to work on the problem and eventually they come up with these smaller magical amulets that allow someone to pass into the Dungeon Realm for a random period of time. The amulet coats you in an etherial aura that allows you to exist and interact in the Dungeon Realm, but eventually the aura breaks down and you're ejected back into the Yendor reality. Most people come back within a day, a couple don't come back for a week, but that seems to be the extent of it. The aura's decay seems to be influenced by conditions at the moment of transition so groups of people who jump all at once come back at the same time. The call goes out far and wide for brave and daring teams of adventurers who are willing to make the dangerous journey into the Dungeon Realm.

That's the fluff. The deal is that I build a huge, huge, HUGE megadungeon. Then I run on multiple nights with different groups of people. Each group is a separate adventuring party. They kick off their amulets and go exploring. As soon as the night's session is over, the amulets go off and they return to Yendor where they have to wait until the next session. In the middle of a fight? Tough (or maybe yay). Sit in a locked room for days and days and days. Whatever. When the real-world game session is over, everyone zaps out.

So now you're not just competing against the monsters and the dungeon, you've got other parties to worry about as well. You might not see them directly, but if they get to the dwarven throne room first, you won't get any loot. Worse, if other parties can negotiate with factions in the dungeon, you might find yourself facing a rather formidable set of opponents. Of course, parties can cooperate as well, trading magic items, spells, maps and information. Some parties might choose to run deeper into the dungeon, do a quick scout and come back to sell the info.

Every so often, parties would get access to a magical token they could leave behind in the dungeon to serve as a "spawn point" (so they don't have to tromp down 16 levels and can just start. Of course, those tokens have a small, but non-zero chance of being moved or disturbed.

There'd be massive GM burnout, but it seems like a fun idea in theory.

later
Tom

MegaDungeons

Hey,

So thanks to bryant I've been thinking about MegaDungeons. You know. Dungeons that are huge pretty much for the purpose of being huge. The massive "Ruins of the Undermountain" maps and Castle Greyhawk and stuff.

And now I've got an idea.

So Orcus (cause hey, he's a great finishing Big Bad) steals the Amulet of Yendor and tosses it at the bottom of a massive dungeon in another dimension. Since the Amulet not only makes you Ruler of Yendor, gives you hoopy magic powers, and totally gets you laid, but also keeps demons and other critters out of your world, getting it back is a pretty high priority. Major governing bodies and not a few private individuals go to work on the problem and eventually they come up with these smaller magical amulets that allow someone to pass into the Dungeon Realm for a random period of time. The amulet coats you in an etherial aura that allows you to exist and interact in the Dungeon Realm, but eventually the aura breaks down and you're ejected back into the Yendor reality. Most people come back within a day, a couple don't come back for a week, but that seems to be the extent of it. The aura's decay seems to be influenced by conditions at the moment of transition so groups of people who jump all at once come back at the same time. The call goes out far and wide for brave and daring teams of adventurers who are willing to make the dangerous journey into the Dungeon Realm.

That's the fluff. The deal is that I build a huge, huge, HUGE megadungeon. Then I run on multiple nights with different groups of people. Each group is a separate adventuring party. They kick off their amulets and go exploring. As soon as the night's session is over, the amulets go off and they return to Yendor where they have to wait until the next session. In the middle of a fight? Tough (or maybe yay). Sit in a locked room for days and days and days. Whatever. When the real-world game session is over, everyone zaps out.

So now you're not just competing against the monsters and the dungeon, you've got other parties to worry about as well. You might not see them directly, but if they get to the dwarven throne room first, you won't get any loot. Worse, if other parties can negotiate with factions in the dungeon, you might find yourself facing a rather formidable set of opponents. Of course, parties can cooperate as well, trading magic items, spells, maps and information. Some parties might choose to run deeper into the dungeon, do a quick scout and come back to sell the info.

Every so often, parties would get access to a magical token they could leave behind in the dungeon to serve as a "spawn point" (so they don't have to tromp down 16 levels and can just start. Of course, those tokens have a small, but non-zero chance of being moved or disturbed.

There'd be massive GM burnout, but it seems like a fun idea in theory.

later
Tom

Litany of the Long Review

Hi,

Blazed through Litany of the Long Sun (books 1 and 2) by Gene Wolfe. It's a series set roughly in the same universe as his "Urth of New Sun" books, but not directly related to it in any way.

As you might guess rather easily from the title, the characters are all trapped aboard a slower-than-light world-ship. It's a long cylinder with the "long sun" a glowing plasma conduit running down the center. Of course, everyone has forgotten about their origins (some 300 years ago) and now they've got this whole messed-up religion based around their half-remembered past and visitations by god-like AI's in the various large terminal screens.

The main thrust of the story follows Patera Silk, an augur who receives enlightenment from the god known as the Outsider. The priest sets off to rescue his parish and in the process becomes a thief, a detective and a rebel leader. All rather by accident, as he strives to remain true to his faith in spite of ever-increasing demonstrations that it's all a put-on.

My biggest pet peeve about the books is that they're clearly meant to be read as a whole and have no problem just up and stopping in the middle of the action. In fact, they basically end on cliffhangers. Not so big a deal since I have the books collected in two volumes and can easily go onto the next page, but had I read these when they first came out, I'd be a bit miffed. As it is, I'm not entirely sure if I want to go onto the next set of books.

On the plus side, he never really stops for a huge amount of exposition. So you soon figure out that there are "bios" who are normal humans, "chems" who are basically robots and a few bios who have almost enough prosthetics to quality as chems. But all of this slowly teases out along with various bits and pieces of the ship's true history and the social underpinnings that have grown up to hold everything together.

So...yeah. The writing was very strong and kept me going, but now I'm looking at the concluding volume and I'm trying to make up my mind. I'll probably go through with it, just for completeness sake, but it feels like a real slog.

later
Tom

Litany of the Long Review

Hi,

Blazed through Litany of the Long Sun (books 1 and 2) by Gene Wolfe. It's a series set roughly in the same universe as his "Urth of New Sun" books, but not directly related to it in any way.

As you might guess rather easily from the title, the characters are all trapped aboard a slower-than-light world-ship. It's a long cylinder with the "long sun" a glowing plasma conduit running down the center. Of course, everyone has forgotten about their origins (some 300 years ago) and now they've got this whole messed-up religion based around their half-remembered past and visitations by god-like AI's in the various large terminal screens.

The main thrust of the story follows Patera Silk, an augur who receives enlightenment from the god known as the Outsider. The priest sets off to rescue his parish and in the process becomes a thief, a detective and a rebel leader. All rather by accident, as he strives to remain true to his faith in spite of ever-increasing demonstrations that it's all a put-on.

My biggest pet peeve about the books is that they're clearly meant to be read as a whole and have no problem just up and stopping in the middle of the action. In fact, they basically end on cliffhangers. Not so big a deal since I have the books collected in two volumes and can easily go onto the next page, but had I read these when they first came out, I'd be a bit miffed. As it is, I'm not entirely sure if I want to go onto the next set of books.

On the plus side, he never really stops for a huge amount of exposition. So you soon figure out that there are "bios" who are normal humans, "chems" who are basically robots and a few bios who have almost enough prosthetics to quality as chems. But all of this slowly teases out along with various bits and pieces of the ship's true history and the social underpinnings that have grown up to hold everything together.

So...yeah. The writing was very strong and kept me going, but now I'm looking at the concluding volume and I'm trying to make up my mind. I'll probably go through with it, just for completeness sake, but it feels like a real slog.

later
Tom