2009 - 10/2009 Meeting

Page Created: 09/16/10. Last Updated: 11/01/10. Last Google Group Page Update: 11/16/09.

BARD BLOOM

Books:

World Tree (with Victoria Borah Bloom)

A Marriage of Insects

Bard Bloom is an author, a game designer, and an inventor.

.....He is the co-creator of the Fantasy Role Playing Game WORLD TREE

.....He has written a fantasy novel set in the game world, A MARRIAGE OF INSECTS

.....He is the owner of two Patents

.....His blog is Live Journal

.....His World Tree lizard character, Sythyry, maintains a log: (http://sythyry.com)

(I recommend scrolling back to January 8, 2009 and getting a feel of things before trying to make sense of whatever constitutes the latest update.)

MEETING SUMMARY:

Meeting Date: October 10, 2009.

Meeting Site: Yeager Domicle, Paramus, New Jersey.

Official Attendance: 19.

Meeting Program: Talk by Fantasy Game Designer / Author / Inventor.

Notes:

Newsletter Account:

The following account is reprinted with permission from THE STARSHIP EXPRESS Copyright 2009 Philip J De Parto:

Robert Yeager was kind enough to host the October 10, 2009 meeting of the Association at his house in Paramus. Author/Game Designer/Inventor Bard Bloom was our speaker.

The anime series MOON PHASE proved a popular selection for our Animation Associates. Roy Greenberg guest moderated the Ice Nine discussion, which revolved largely around STAR TREK.

A long time science fiction fan and gamer, speaker Bard Bloom had been happily teaching computer science at Cornell until he was denied tenure. The experience gave him a distaste for academic life and caused him to become a software developer for IBM. It also resulted in him becoming a game designer and a writer.

The game was World Tree, and the fantasy adventure poured out of him (and was reworked by his wife, Victoria Borah Bloom) in the months following his dismissal from Cornell. It was revised and play tested for five years before the couple sought commercial publication for the work.

The World Tree is just that, an immense structure whose trunk is hundreds of miles in diameter and whose countless branches stretch for tens of thousands of miles in each direction. The civilization of the eight Prime races created by the Seven Gods stretches across two dozen branches of the highest branches. Most of these are on the World Tree itself, but two are on branches of two adjacent trees. Hardy expeditions have braved the increasingly foreign and dangerous environment hundreds of branches beneath Prime civilization with no indication of a tree bottom.

Magic is the technology of this world. The heads of the Seven Gods are visible in the sky, viewing their creation. They do not take an active part in the affairs of the world. Theology is a matter of understanding the magical essence of the gods so that you can more effectively weld the various types of magic they embody. Bard describes the gods as "being like utility companies-eccentric and sometimes dangerous utilities."

The game has caught on among furry fandom-fans of anthropomorphic animals (think Bugs Bunny, Donald Duck, and science fiction and anime works which employ this sort of creature; there is also a lot of non-mainstream eroticism in this sub genre) as many of the Prime Races meet this criteria.

Continued in next month's newsletter.