Marvel RPG

For those of you who are keeping track, Gerry is now 3 years old. As befits a nerd like me, the first thing that I started to think about was how I was going to get Gerry interested in RPGs.
:)

Unfortunately, it doesn't look like Gerry will be able to get involved in any kind of role playing until 4-5 years old. However, during my research, I came across this website - http://www.marvelrpg.net/. Basically, the Marvel Super Heroes RPG is now available as a free download.

When I was a kid playing RPGs (many many moons ago), we predominantly played D&D but we did branch out briefly into some other RPGs - of which Marvel Super Heroes was one. At the time, this seemed like a great idea. I was (and still am) a big fan of Marvel comics and the opportunity to play Spider-Man, Iron Man or any of the other big super heroes seemed like a great idea.

Unfortunately, the Marvel RPG never really took off for us (for various reasons which I won't go into here) but it did leave me with one memory in particular which stands out.

It was a long long time ago so I can't remember the scenario which we were playing or which hero I was controlling at the time. All that I can remember was that we were in our base and were "visited" by some villains. In the best Marvel tradition, a fight broke out.

Being a super hero base, our home was obviously strengthened to deal with the additional punishment of heroes practicing their super powers. As a result, the walls were made out of adamantium. In the Marvel universe, adamantium is the strongest possible substance and is considered indestructible. In terms of numbers, the strength of adamantium was rated at 1000. For comparison, many heroes had strength ratings in the 10's (although the Marvel RPG mainly used descriptors like Amazing, Incredible etc).

Anyway, during the fight, one of the heroes gets really creative and decides to throw one of the villains up against the wall. Not that I'm a violent guy but you have to admit, this action is in keeping with the time (this was during a time when TV was dominated by shows like A-Team and Knight Rider - basically, shows where people get regularly thrown through windows and walls and tables etc in slow motion).

The villain flies through the air, spinning gracefully head over heels in slow motion before going splat against the wall. Beautiful, right?

Unfortunately for us, the Power Nazi DM decided that this action ended up killing the villain and penalised us by reducing our karma.

"No way" we all screamed, "his strength was only Amazing! The villain should have had enough hit points to survive!"

The DM looked at us distastefully before replying "Ah, but the wall is made of adamantium and so you did 1000 damage to the bad guy".

Despite out pleading and cajoling that the damage should be based on the heroes strength and not the sturdiness of the wall, the DM stood firm. The villain was dead.

The stinkiness of that decision sticks with me to this day...

Christmas time

The child is a king, the carollers sing,
The old has passed, theres a new beginning.
Dreams of santa, dreams of snow,
Fingers numb, faces aglow.

Christmas time, mistletoe and wine
Children singing christian rhyme
With logs on the fire and gifts on the tree
A time to rejoice in the good that we see

A time for living, a time for believing
A time for trusting, not deceiving,
Love and laughter and joy ever after,
Ours for the taking, just follow the master.

Christmas time, mistletoe and wine
Children singing christian rhyme
With logs on the fire and gifts on the tree
A time to rejoice in the good that we see

(silent night, holy night)

A time for giving, a time for getting,
A time for forgiving and for forgetting.
Christmas is love, christmas is peace,
A time for hating and fighting to cease.

Christmas time, mistletoe and wine
Children singing christian rhyme
With logs on the fire and gifts on the tree
A time to rejoice in the good that we see

Mistletoe & Wine

by Sir Cliff Richard

Goodbye Majel

Majel Barrett Roddenberry passes away - and geeks around the world cry.


Majel has been such a huge part of Star Trek that its hard to imagine the franchise without her. In addition to the host of characters that Majel has portrayed over the years, Majel was also the voice of the Federation computer. Now, any future Star Trek's will have to have a different voice (except the upcoming Star Trek film - apparently, she was able to complete the voiceover for that before she passed away).

Although you don't always see her on screen, her voice will always be associated with Star Trek for me.

On a personal level, its a shame I never got to meet her at any of the Star Trek conventions I went to. And now, I never will.

By all accounts (and by this, I mean everyone on the forums that I've read), Majel was a great person who made a real effort to really enjoy the conventions and the interaction with fans. The sad reality is that not every actor makes this much of an effort.

True Love

Miss Asia 2008

As you may or may not know, there is a recent controversy about the Miss Asia 2008 pageant (it was even mentioned on the front page of some local newspapers). First off, some background.

Apparently, the Miss Asia 2008 pageant was different from other beauty pageants in that the winners were not decided by a panel of judges. Instead, viewers from around Asia were allowed to call in and vote for the winner. The beauticious and multi-talented lady with the most votes would be crowned Miss Asia.

This is, of course, a good change. Instead of the winner being someone who can bang the most lecherous old men judges, you now have the much harder task of trying to bang the most members of the public instead. Only j/k!!! :)

What happened next is obvious - 1.3 billion votes later, Ms Eunis Yao of HK wins.

Wait, what? Someone from HK won? Wasn't anyone from mainland China watching (or voting)?

Well, actually, it turns out they were. Apparently, the voters mere "mainland dominated" (surprise!!) and the fact that a HK girl won "raised eyebrows" (I guess they were expecting a winner from mainland China). The end result is that an independent body has been setup to review the voting tally and investigate the discrepancy.

What I can't believe is that this is actually news. I mean, come on!! Is anyone taking this pageant seriously?

This is a "beauty" pageant for which the participants are representing different countries in Asia. The winner of said "beauty" pageant is determined by votes from viewers in those different countries in Asia. Considering that China has 1.3 billion people, the obvious conflict of interest is so glaring that I can't believe this judging format was actually approved. Does anyone actually believe that the majority of mainland Chinese won't vote for someone from China or at the very least, for someone who looks Chinese? The very fact that a non mainland Chinese girl was the winner was what initially raised eyebrows should tell you all you need to know about the integrity of this "beauty" pageant.

If this is how pageants are run these days, you might as well just give the crown to a girl from mainland China and save yourself the time and money in running the bloody thing...

The Bailout

Source (via Boing Boing)

Bad customer service at badminton arena

Last Monday, I spoke about watching a badminton competition live. At the end, I mentioned that there was one incident which spoiled the event a little. In the interest of being fair, I will summarise the event as factually as possible so you can understand what happened before adding in my comments at the end.

Situation
There were two courts in the badminton arena. Our seats were right behind court number 2 and we were right next to the VIP area which was reserved for members of the HK Badminton Association (and clearly labeled as such). Our seats gave us a great view of court number 2 but court number 1 was a bit far off (but still very watchable).

Play in the evening started at 6:30pm. Lin Dan finished his match on court 1 just before 11:00pm. By that time, court 2 had already finished all games by then. After Lin Dan finished, quite a few spectators got up and left (he was obviously a big draw for lots of people). At this point, the tannoy announced that there was 1 more doubles match to go on court 1 (a lot of matches on court 1 went to 3 games which was why court 1 was still playing despite it being so late).

The timeline of events that followed was roughly thus:

• Large groups of the crowd near court 2 get up and start moving closer to the seats near court 1
• Our group gets up and moves over 4 seats into the VIP section (the people originally sitting in the VIP section had already left)
• Just before we sit down, one of the ushers (hereafter called usher 1) says that we can't sit down there as those seats are reserved for VIPs. Then he adds "Can't you read?"
• We move back to our original seats and sit down.
• Usher 1 sees that we are sitting next to the VIP section and then comes over and asks to check our tickets.
• My friend says "Everyone is moving around - are you planning to check everyone's tickets?"
• Usher 1 replies "Don't worry - I will check everyone's tickets"
• My friend says "yeah - right" (not exactly, but this is probably the closest to what he actually said in Cantonese which was "ha ma")
• Usher 1 says "Yeah. My name is [redacted] and my number is [redacted]. You can complain to my manager if you like"
• My friend says "Fine - I'll watch you do your job"
• Usher 1 says "You do that"
• Usher 1 goes to another group of people who had moved into the VIP section and says "Excuse me. I'm sorry for troubling you but that group over there (points at us) says that I have to check your tickets"
• My friend immediately calls usher 1 back and demands to see the manager.
• Usher 1 calls on his radio and, while waiting for someone in authority to show up, goes to a 3rd group of people and asks them not to sit in the VIP section as it is reserved for VIPs. That 3rd group try to justify their position by saying that everyone else is moving around and usher 1 says that this isn't an excuse to move into the VIP section.
• At this point, a lady shows up (I will call her usher 2 as she wasn't a manager but just slightly higher up the food chain relative to usher 1)
• My friend calls over usher 1 again and after usher 1 shows up, he then explains what happened above and why he is upset (basically that usher 1 made a rude statement about his ability to read and that usher 1 is stating that he is checking tickets at the request of my friend). He also acknowledges straight off that he was wrong to move into the VIP section.
• Usher 2 makes usher 1 apologise for the rude statement about his ability to read. My friend accepts the apology.
• Usher 2 points out that we shouldn't have moved into the VIP section (my friend agrees with this again).
• Usher 2 then says that usher 1 was indeed checking tickets at my friends request because my friend indicated that other people had moved seats.
• My friend explains that this doesn't make sense as checking tickets is the job of usher 1. It isn't the job of usher 1 to be directed in how to work by members of the public.
• Usher 2 doesn't agree and says that my friend was giving a heavy indication to usher 1 that he needed to check other peoples tickets which was why usher 1 was checking the 2nd groups tickets.
• My friend doesn't accept this and, as other viewers were complaining about the noise, decides to take it outside to find a manager (and consequently missed the final doubles match).
• The manager apologises.
• My friend lodges a formal verbal complaint as well as a formal written complaint the following day.

My opinion
Flexible rules
Anyone who has any experience in CS will tell you that rules are flexible. In my opinion, the best way that usher 1 could have handled the above was by simply ignoring people moving seats. Its already late (11:00pm) and people have already started to leave. Its the very last match of the day and if anyone was coming to sit in the empty seats, they would have been there already.

Quite frankly, there was no need to get so uppity and insist on everyone moving back to their original seats. If someone did show up and find his seat taken, then a quick word and the person would have moved. There was no need for a confrontation at all in this case.

Rude
As a CS rep, you absolutely cannot be rude to the clients and say stuff like "Can't you read?"

If you want them to move, then you ask them to move politely. You can be firm and stand your ground, but you cannot be rude. Only a moron would say something like that to a customer.

If I was a boss and I heard anyone in my team do something like this, at a minimum, it would be a formal reprimand. And in the current economic climate, if I had to make cuts, you would be one of the first people out the door.

Know your job
It was usher 1's job to check tickets as an usher. To even suggest that he is checking tickets because it was at the request of my friend is basically shirking your duties. If you don't know what your job and responsibilities are, then you don't deserve to have that job.

In case there is any doubt, the ushers job and responsibilities do not include following the instructions of the public.

Cocky
When usher 1 said his name and number and said that you could complain to management, he did it in a really cocky manner. What a moron.

Most people don't like confrontations and making a formal complaint is a type of confrontation. This means that most people won't actually proactively complain unless they get really upset. For example, people might get pissed off by a really arrogant CS rep who seems to think that he won't get into any trouble.

His attitude only serves to inflame the situation and raise the possibility of a formal complaint.

Even his apology for the rude comment (which he was forced to do by usher 2) was a joke - he didn't even look at my friend and just said in a really arrogant voice - "sorry". The impression I got was that he was not remorseful and didn't think that he would be reprimanded.

Usher 2
Usher 2 could have defused the situation immediately. When usher 2 made usher 1 apologise, my friend accepted the apology even though it was clear that usher 1 didn't mean it and had no remorse whatsoever (my friend is a really easy going guy). Usher 2 should have realised from this that my friend was not interested in kicking up a fuss.

If usher 2 had made usher 1 give another apology for the incident re checking the 2nd groups tickets, my friend would have accepted it even if it had been insincere (I believe - obviously we will never actually know). And usher 2 should have realised this from his reaction to the pitiful first apology.

However, instead, usher 2 tried to justify the actions of usher 1 and say it was indeed my friends request that usher 1 check the second groups tickets. This was unacceptable to my friend which meant that he had to argue his position. The end result was that they eventually had to find an actual manager to resolve the situation and my friend ended up missing the final match.

By this stage, my friend was so pissed off that there was no way in hell he wouldn't lodge a formal complaint.

Summary
From the above, I can only come to one of two conclusions:
1) Usher 1 is a moron; and/or
2) Both usher 1 and usher 2 have little to no experience in customer service

Both usher 1 and usher 2 handled the situation badly. A little more intelligence on their part and the whole situation could have been defused easily.

But then, maybe I'm being unreasonable. I mean, let's face it. In a city like HK, if they had any intelligence, they wouldn't be working such a dead end job.

Yonex Sunrise Hong Kong Super Series 2008

The Yonex Sunrise Hong Kong Super Series 2008 has just wrapped up. Nothing notable except for the fact that I managed to get some tickets to watch the game live last Friday!

One of my friends is a really eager badminton fan and he was able to get 4 really good tickets for Friday night. Seeing as I had nothing else to do, I jumped at the opportunity to go along.

The games on Friday night were generally around the quarter final stage which is a good time to start watching live. Basically, at this stage, some of the not so good players have already been knocked out and the players aren't too tired yet. This means that you see lots of good players playing at the top of their game - that's the theory anyway. I don't know if the theory worked in this particular case, but the badminton on show was definitely impressive.

I was especially lucky in that the Friday night games included both Lin Dan and Taufik Hidayat - both of whom are fantastic players (in fact, you may recall that Lin Dan won the Olympic gold medal!).

Our seats were right behind court 2 so we managed to get a fantastic view of Hidayat playing singles (unfortunately, Lin Dan was on court 1 so we didn't get as good a view). I've seen a lot of good players playing badminton over the years but nothing compares to watching top professionals play - in particular, how effortless they make it seem. Two shots in particular from Hidayat stand out in my memory.

One of them was a backhand cross court smash from the middle of the court. Even in the stands, you could hear the crisp "pok" as he connected. What I couldn't believe though was how he managed to hit a powerful smash using his backhand (which was even more powerful than my best forehand smash!!). My mind boggles in trying to figure out how his hand and arm could do it.

The other shot was a straight forehand smash. At the time, Hidayat was on the far side of the court and facing our seats. Wong (his opponent) only managed a clearance to the middle of the court and you could see Hidayat preparing to smash it back (sure enough, Hidayat smacks the ball - boy oh boy, did he smack it!). From my point of view, I heard the "wallop" as he hit the shuttle - the next thing I know, the shuttle is already on the ground and Hidayat has won the point!

According to wikipedia, Hidayat holds the record for the fastest smash in singles play of 305 km/h (189 mph) and I can't help but wonder how close he got to repeating that (or maybe even beating it) on Friday!

All in all, an awesome night out which was only spoiled by one event at the end of the night (but I'll leave that for another post).