Review: Actual Factual: Dracula - A Compendium of Vampires

Actual Factual: Dracula - A Compendium of Vampires is an unassuming book. The cover is stock art (I am guessing, not sure) and the preview is text with a small amount of art.  That and the $40 price tag (sale price $18) might scare some people off.

That would be a mistake.

Inside are 472 pages of detailed vampire types from all over the world.

In this book we are given a basic overview of vampires (aka the stuff everyone knows) and then we move quickly into the relationship between Vlad the Impaler and Vampires.  I will honestly say that this section, while entertaining seems tacked on.  The book would have been fine without it, but is likely better with it.

Next we get into the heart of this book.  The Compendium of Vampires.
The A to Z section detail vampires from around the world and not only represents the bulk of the book (340+ pages), but also the bulk of the research.

Each entry contains the name of the vampire, pronunciation and translation of the name. Also listed are it's country or area of origin, type of creature (creature, spirit, demon...), how it appears, prefered prey, how often it attacks or feeds, Modus Operandi, abilities, defenses against it and how to kill it.  Not every creature has everything listed, this is not a Monster Manual, but there are enough. In some cases the author has used her own imagination to fill in the blanks.  This is fine really, given that the author is Theresa Bane.
But I guess if you want something purer you can go to her pages of resources.

There is a bibliography, which is almost as interesting to read as the entries themselves.

What follows next really puts this book into a different category of usefulness, the indexes.
First is a more common index of words, names and other things you might want to find in the book.

Next is an index of Abilities.  So if you need a vampire that is Beautiful (as an ability) then you have GREEN OGRESS 124 and SUCCUBUS 274.

There is an index of Appearance.  So "barbed tongue" gives you:
ASWANG MANDURUGO 23
BICHOHINDU 44
GROBNIK 125
KRVOIJAC 164
UPIER 294
WIESZCZY 330 (one of my favorite barbed tongue vampires).

An Index on Creation.  Indexes of How Often it Attacks, How to Find, Origins, Prey, Types, and finally Weaknesses.

Now what would have been a nice touch would be to hyper link all these indexes to the main document.  But I am not complaining.

What the book lacks in art, there are only a few pieces, it makes up for in research and utility.
You can debate on whether or not Creature Y is a vampire or not, but I can't fault the authors for doing all this work.

All in all a great book.  A must have if you are at all a fan of vampires or use them in your games.

October Movie Challenge: Vampire Academy (2014)

Well this one was forced on me because my youngest wanted to watch it.  I am calling it horror...cause...well have you seen it?

Oh it is not good.

The plot is basically Vampires and their half-vampire/dhampir body guards all go to highschool together.  So vampires here age.  Ok.

And they go to High School.

Now to be fair this is based on a YA series and I don't think it translated well to the screen.  Sure. Harry Potter did (are there vampires in Harry Potter?) but not everything will.

There are plenty of horror elements and the vampires did remind me of the living and undead
vampires from the Hollows series. So I can at least get behind that.

The idea of a training ground for vampires has it's roots in the Scholomance.

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Tally so far:  2 Total Watched / 1 New

What do you find scary?
October Horror Movie Challenge hosted by Krell Laboratories.

October Movie Challenge: Lost Boys (1987)

Lets start this one off with a modern classic.
Lost Boys

I watched this one with my youngest and he loved it.  There is so much here that pretty much all modern interpretations of vampires have used.  True Blood, Buffy, Vampire$, even on to Underworld.  Though not Twilight.  Hell. There would be no Buffy without the Lost Boys.  Though I am sure there would have been no Lost Boys with out Anne Rice.  And...there is a lot of the Goonies in this, but still this is one classic movie.

I remember seeing this in the theaters back when it came out and I was expecting nothing.  Wow was I mistaken.   I pretty much turned around and saw it again.

Yeah there are some issues with how they handle vampire lore, but that scene where the David and the Lost Boys are hanging like bats in their coffin/cave.  That was pretty cool.

And lets not forget about that soundtrack.

It was pretty much a huge influence on me at the time and it came right when I had discovered Anne Rice after moving away a bit from Lovecraft.
So yeah I was a huge fan.

I wore the hell out of that black trenchcoat

Watching it again over 25 years later I noticed the movie had lost none of it's charm and even the parts I disliked I know looked on with amusement.  No one sparkled and the witty "current" language was kept to a minimum.

Normally I like to kick things of with something new, but this was a great way to start.

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Tally so far:  1 Total Watched / 0 New

What do you find scary?
October Horror Movie Challenge hosted by Krell Laboratories.

Movies Queued up so far

Here are some of the movies I am going to tackle in the next week or so.

Some I have seen, others I haven't.

Alucard (2008)
Alucarda (1978)
Billy the Kid vs Dracula (1966)
Black Sabbath (1963)
Blood + Roses (2010)
Count Yorga (1970)
Female Vampire / Erotikill (1973)
Fright Night (2011)
Fright Night 2 New Blood (2013)
Mario Salieri's Dracula (1994)
Return of Count Yorga (1971)
The Deathmaster (1972)
Zoltan Hound of Dracula (1978)

Should be fun!

Owl & Weasel Wednesday #12 January 1976

Sub-Titled *Special Late Edition* (a few days late according to the editorial).  The start of 1976 was an interesting time for me personally.  I am curious to see how the world looked through the eyes of a gaming zine across the ocean.

From now on when ever I am late for a schedule post I will simply relabel it "special late edition".

D&D-wise we start with a note on the front page that Blackmoor is now out. More on that on page 4.  I don't recall much in the way of fan fare when Greyhawk came out, but that could be due when D&D hit Britain's shores.

Page 3 goes into length about Games Day.

Page 4 details Blackmoor.  On one hand Steve Jackson claims it is Earth shattering, but on the other hand also says it is not quite as good as Greyhawk.  What he seems to like most about it are the revised to hit tables (thus giving characters a reason to wear a helmet) and more details on various monsters. He also claims that Temple of the Frog is a must for any Game Master.  Temple of the Frog was 10 years later republished as a new adventure.

Moving through the rest of the zine there is more on the game Organized Crime and a section of Pub Games (lest we forget this is still a more general game magazine and not yet an RPG one).

The "Orbituary" column is back to review games that have died or are no longer played (really, the idea of spend text space on something no reads or could read anymore...that's a special kind of obsessive!).  This month is Parker Brothers "Take the Brain". Which is described as a chess variant where pieces, Ninnies and Numbskulls, move about the board to capture a brain piece. Reviewer Kendall Johns decides that the game failed due to being marketed at the wrong audience. Aimed at children it really should have been dressed up more and aimed at adults.

Far less ads this issue and we are back down to our regular 12 pages, Page 1 is a page again, not a cover.

October is coming...

Starting at Midnight tonight October is here.

I have all my vampire movies queued up on Amazon and DVD.  Though a DVD I bought back in the summer to watch now is missing.  I am sure I will find it. Can't even remember what was on it to be honest.

http://krelllabs.blogspot.com/

My youngest wants to join in with me, so I am going to be watching some vampire movies that are good for him to watch as well.  Maybe some I have already seen. Lost Boys is on the list now.


It is also my oldest birthday coming up and he has requested a midnight D&D game.
It has to be scary (his request) and have vampires (mine).  I am thinking it will either be the original Ravenloft module or the Hanging Coffins of the Vampire Queen.

I am leaning towards the Hanging Coffins of the Vampire Queen.

The module is so gonzo. Plus this is a group of 14-15 year old boys.  So yeah.
I have run this group before and I have taken them through the Pacsetter Vampire Queen modules (here and here).

I am also planning on getting some more reviews done in October/November.

Busy month ahead!

Old Games

Contrary to some belief I am not an obsessive collector of games.  I have things I like and genres I follow and I usually stick to that.  Outside of those I am pretty much open.

This week the Games Plus Fall auction begins and I still have some time to get some of my books in.
I am planning on selling of some of my more recent Tunnels & Trolls purchases as well as the last of the True20 material I still have laying around.

I figure anything I have not played in 5 years is good to go and anything I am not likely to play in the next 3 is also good to go.  

Do ever pare down your collection?
If so, how do you decide what to sell and what to keep?