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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Social Vox populi ~ Interviews with RPFers ~ Issue#5 ~ DarkLordoftheFins

Discussion in 'Role Playing Resource' started by SirakRomar, Jul 19, 2011.

  1. LordTroepfchen

    LordTroepfchen Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Apr 9, 2007
    Actually I wondered how second season is coming along. Yes, this is the public demanding more journalism! The fourth pillar and all that!
     
  2. DarthXan318

    DarthXan318 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Sep 12, 2002
    Bump for great justice!

    I just noticed that all the interviews are right at the top of the thread - great idea, makes for excellent re-reading. :D
     
  3. Sir_Draco

    Sir_Draco Jedi Master star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 19, 2007
    Oh, I did not know that! That really is cool. I wouldn´t go through them to look for them when this htread grows, but this way we got them all up there.

    So, do you have any teaser for us before the move?
     
  4. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Well, it will be another three to four and I already have one go and soon gonna ask my other three candidates. In between there will be a "Special" which might be interesting to read which will accompany the SotF/SotSo finales. Names? Before I have a "Yes" by all four players I´d prefer not to hand them out.

    But Vox Popoli will be back! And Season 2 will be more "player-based", meaning our partners will be more famous for being players than GMs.
     
  5. Penguinator

    Penguinator Former Mod star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 23, 2005
    Big ups!
     
  6. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Äh, the 10000-issue cut all my interviews kinda short
     
  7. Ramza

    Ramza Administrator Emeritus star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Jul 13, 2008
    Yeah, that truncation issue's a huge pain. I will not miss it.

    I take some solace in the fact that it doesn't effect posts going forward, but gaaaaaaaaah.
     
  8. Penguinator

    Penguinator Former Mod star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    May 23, 2005
    Yeah - but at least we're working on truncation issues right now - I think that's the big one.
     
  9. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Okay, I´ll wait until you fine Mods resolve that issue and then go on with my new series of interviews, I think.
     
  10. DarthXan318

    DarthXan318 Manager Emeritus star 6 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Sep 12, 2002
    I wouldn't hold my breath on that one if I were you - might very well take another year, who knows.
     
  11. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Yeah, but all my interviews are too long then . . . :_|
     
  12. Ramza

    Ramza Administrator Emeritus star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Jul 13, 2008
    Actually, new posts are unaffected (Testing confirms it, handily enough). It's only old ones.
     
    Penguinator-176 likes this.
  13. Saintheart

    Saintheart Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Dec 16, 2000
    Or, if you saved offline, editing them back in restores them to full length without an issue. :)
     
  14. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Saint, you are a . . . Saint, probably ^:)^
     
  15. Mitth_Fisto

    Mitth_Fisto Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Sep 29, 2005
    Does this mean we can expect a new installment soon? [face_batting]
     
  16. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Well, they will take time. I have DarkLordoftheFins ASotS themed interview, which is a beast of a text and probably must be divided . . . maybe I will do that one first here, also it as meant for the "Pieces" thread. Menawhile I can begin to look for new interview partners, restore my old interviews and begin to conduct Season 2 interviews. Players it will be this time . . . so I think my greatest problem once again will be to limit myself ;) Been hard last time.
     
    Ramza likes this.
  17. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    My work here will soon continue . . . got my next two victims and I´ll restore the old interviews with my copies on my hd. So, nobody protested against a SotS based interview? I take this as nobody feels I misuse the thread as my personal fanbase. I´ll cut out the middle part and just post the stuff about general stuff. So next up: GM retirement special: DarkLordoftheFins
     
    Penguinator likes this.
  18. Ramza

    Ramza Administrator Emeritus star 9 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Jul 13, 2008
    [​IMG]

    It'll be great to read these again - plus with new content on the horizon!
     
    Penguinator likes this.
  19. Saintheart

    Saintheart Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Dec 16, 2000
    [​IMG]

    More articles!
    The public has a right to know!

    :D :D :D
     
  20. DarkLordoftheFins

    DarkLordoftheFins Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Apr 2, 2007
    Do with it whatever you like, Claire. It´s all yours.
     
  21. Mitth_Fisto

    Mitth_Fisto Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Sep 29, 2005
    So long as whatever you do with it involves posting :p
     
  22. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    Well, I think 1st October will be our relaunch. Let me say so much, the Fin interview is a beast. Much longer than any beofre, maybe much longer than they all together. So I need to divide it, shorten it or do something about it . . . undecided yet. I hoped Fin would be a bit more help, but he says he leaves it to me. If I post it in one it will be the Chinese Wall of text and nobody will read it. So, dammit. Needa figure it out.
     
  23. Mitth_Fisto

    Mitth_Fisto Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Sep 29, 2005
    Divide, spread it out as you perform the interviews for the new issues with a post a week ;)
     
  24. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    The Finthing. Yeeeeeah. Okay, I reread it and it truly is a beast and shockingly honest at times. I´ll make three parts of it and see how much of SotS I take into it. Guess that is only of limited interest to a larger audience, is it? Well, expect me to resume service . . . next week.
     
  25. SirakRomar

    SirakRomar Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 30, 2007
    The Sins of the Fins

    Part I: Where good friendships come from ~ A special interview with DarkLordoftheFins

    [Well, this interview is a bit special in more than one way. First it really was not written down until it was completely done, but I met Fin face-to-face in his flat in Hamburg to seriously interview him about The Sins of the Saints, believing the game had a bit of a bigger history than ordinary and therefore it would be a good idea to get into it. It turned into one behemoth of an interview, which was only limited by me running out of cassettes for my Dictaphone. Originally I planned to do this only in the Pieces of a Jigsaw thread, but lately it was decided we can use a little “special” to keep Vox Popoli going. Remember this interview was one about five month ago and therefore not all he says is entirely up-tp-date. So here is the interview with one of my favorite GMs, one of my favorite human beings and the most charming devil I personally know: Dark Lord of the Fins]

    Hello Fin.

    Hey Claire, you´re late. Coffee.

    Sure.

    Still black?

    What means still? I got used to that from you. You never have sugar and milk.

    Don´t need any. But accidentally I got some today. So black or blonde?

    Blonde.

    [this is a shortened version of our 15 minute long argument about the finer points of drinking coffee and serves to illustrate the difficulties I had to go through to do this live)

    Well, where do we begin?

    You know that you were the very first person to ask to give me an interview? You are also the only person to ever turn me down, twice actually. Why do you give me an interview now? Has the success of Vox Popoli changed your mind?

    Partially, probably. But really? I felt you would not be happy with me never doing one and I had this retirement because of old age share your wisdom kinda feeling. I also think the Vox Popoli thingies actually sounded as if it was fun. And I grew up.

    You grew up?

    Yeah, I was a little boy deep inside of myself. I am afraid of big woman with complicated questions.

    Sure.

    I am.

    You trying to lure me into that one so I go easy on you, do you?

    I try to get that fangirly out you sometimes show on the boards.

    Well, she stays on the boards. You should know that by now.

    Okay. Go on. Do your worst, Claire. Do your WORST.

    We agreed any question is fair game, yeah. Your suggestions not mine. Any. You do this live, so you can deny any answer once I asked it and I will not write them into the transcript, okay? (Editor: Fin did not do that once)

    Yep.

    We also agreed we will concentrate on The Sins of the Saints, which I plan to do in the second half of the interview, right?

    Right.

    Then I´ll begin with my standards and you will just have to get through them to get my critical questions about your latest game.

    Go ahead, Claire.

    Good, tell us how you ended up on TFN and in the RPF.

    Oh, that was in 2007, I believe. You asked me to have a look, actually. With you I mean Claire aka SirakRomar. Actually we two were still a couple back then and it was the happy part of our relationship.

    Weren´t they all?

    Sure. How could you not be happy being my girlfriend!

    Yeah! How?!?!

    Anyway, you were hanging around in my flat and LordT came along to . . . do something. I don´t remember what. Always had an open door policy, at least back in the day when I myself was still at home from time to time. We worked in the same firm back then, T and me. The topic came to RPing. We all had not done so much about it since a year earlier our own site went offline. We had a table-top group back then meeting monthly. You said you were now on theforce.net and looking to join games. We all knew it as a news service for prequel stuff. So yeah, we started talking and then I joined you. LordT said he wouldn´t at first, but we all knew he began lurking instantly.

    We also had done online RPing in various forms since . . . forever. I joined 2001 I believe, but by then you were already pretty far progressed. So you told us you wanna begin with it again. I caught fire. Then we checked out the site and most things were a bit strange and not really comprehensible. But despite the “TAG” they did it was much the same way as we did it back in the days. From there it all developed. 128 ABY was our entry point, because we could get what it was about. And we connected our storylines and LordT soon joined. It was a good choice, as the comics had kept us amused in those lazy days. We played a few games in between I think, while waiting for the big one to begin. An AU game replaying Ep III and a KOTOR III. Both ended within 50 posts, I believe. The thought of leaving was in the room by then and then 128 ABY kicked in and Sinrebirth really rocked our world with it.

    I should mention MASTERPRENN, our GM from back then. He did a lot good to keep me interested, too. GenOochy and KraytDragon90 who shared a scene with us were great first players to interact with. From there things ran smoothly. Our little story soon caught attention, we connected to other players and the whole thing we did became bigger and Kira Romar and Eydan Skorne turned out to be much fun.

    Indeed. Until I killed you.

    From the first post we weren´t meant to make it both out of the storyline alive, really. But my death was almost 9 months later in real life.

    True. I think these days people know that we have played before coming to TFN. But actually something I often realize is, they do not know you did never GM before you came here, right?

    No. 128 ABY became my entry point for that one, too. In our old site and our old long running campaign it was SonofZeus and LordTroepfchen with occasional high-class content by TheSithGirly taking over the GMing duties. I was a player, a minor player I´d say.

    Not that minor.

    Well on the German boards, I circled the center of attention without entering it, I´d say. Anyway, 128 ABY got me into GMing when I suddenly was asked to take over GM duties. Together with LordT and TheSithGirly I was meant to be a two weeks holiday replacement GM for Sinre. It is probably the GMing testing ground of your dreams to do that! Oh, will you ask me about this rivalry with other GMs somewhere down the road? You always do that.

    It was my plan, yes.

    Yeah, Sinre and Winged and I. The big rivals in people´s minds. I tell you something about GMing, Fin and those rivals.
    I remember my first player was actually a guy called Follow-the-snowflies. In those two weeks I took over for Sinre. He played a Sith Inquisitor massacring an academy and calling it an investigation. That is of course @WingedJedi ´s sock, who I did enjoy so much GMing we actually kept that little storyline going after Sinre returned and I played a nice, nasty massacre at a Sith academy . . . somewhere . . . with him. Lovely. The idea of Winged and Sinre being my rivals is ridiculous. Those two were basically the two who made me a GM. They did my two favorite games, too.

    Okay, I cut that question then. *laughs* How did you come to full GMing then?

    Sinre asked me straight away to do a sidequel to his game. 128 ABY – Collapsing Galaxy was my breakthrough, so to say. I had ideas and a vision of how the game should work and I felt like a little kid. It totally flashed me. Probably a bit too much.

    LordTroepfchen did Co-GM. He had done a lot GMing before, but never in English. It was collaboration so good; we actually did it later on all my games. It was then that I understood the key to my GMing. Providing a canvas for others to paint the picture on. No matter how restricted a storyline is and how linear, it is always the thing how people do things that matters. A scene can be awe inspiring or boring no matter what it is about. That only depends on the writing. So I tried to get my best out of my players and I learned pretty quick it was often best to leave them alone to do that. It was lovely. I had incredible strong “leads” to draw other players in with Darth_Bojangles Aruw´n and your Kira Romar as morale opposites and LordT came back with his legendary Hoole. That finally closed the circle between my old games and the new ones and I managed to merger them. SonofZeus had joined us by then and so had his wife TheSithGirly. We became a German colony around here. The PanzerRPers.

    Oh God, I forgot about that!

    Yeah! We weren´t the Germans originally, but the PanzerRPers.

    What was that name about?

    Actually I do not know where it came from. But I heard different stories what it meant. :p. It is an obvious German word. Some said it was referring to our “resistance is futile” attitude, others said it was a testament how we build the core of 128 ABY to protect it. Imperial_Hammer once told me, for him we had blitzed the RPF within a season and therefore he liked the term. It certainly was a lot more colorful than the later TheGermans.

    When did the name-change come? I can´t recall. In my memory we were always the Germans.

    2008, after our return. I think the PanzerRPers died with us leaving to mourn over SonofZeus. When we returned we were the Germans.

    We will certainly speak about SonofZeus later, but his name is inevitable connected to your comeback game, of course. He wrote kind off the Exposé to 133 ABY – the Dark Odyssey, right?

    Exposé is a good word. Yes indeed, I got an idea-paper with a possible storyline how it could all come together a few weeks before his death. The new storylines, the new characters, the old storylines and the old characters. It had brilliant ideas concerning the use of techniques in it, like telling Hoole´s story through flashbacks, pointing to the players Xenly might be redeemed, the pregnancy, the Sith as a red herring villain. It was all there. After his death I needed a year to come to the conclusion I wanted it to be played. But first there was a year I could not touch the keyboard to write a line in character without feeling guilty about it.

    I know what you mean. You still writing - him not, that kinda feeling, right?

    Yes. Maybe it´s time we talk about SoZ?

    If you want to?

    Not the most comfortable thing to talk about, but I think we teased people long enough about him and the whole affair. So I said anything is good, so let´s talk about him.

    You were a good friend of him, were you?

    Actually initially I hated him, but that´s often where the good friendships come from, is it?

    Yeah, maybe. Tell us about you two. Tell us whatever you feel like people should know.

    Okay. Well. We were friends and we have been friends for a very long time. Back in my school days I became first aware of him when he entered the circle of friends of mine through . . . I don´t know someone brought him. We were young, hanging out together. Half a dozen and occasionally up to a dozen teenagers. TheSithGirly and you among them. We were all into Cyberpunk, Gibson and stuff. We also were the cool kids who tried out things. Too much fun, you could say. But somehow we came all out of this mess quite fine. SonofZeus was a guy far older than us who hung out with some of us when we met at the Café Einstein, the bar of our youth. Oh, I disliked him instantly, because he was well liked by you girls. For a teenage boy a terrible thing, an elder rival. He was nice to me, I think he liked me pretty much from the get go. It took a year until we finally talked and found out we had the world in common. I realized that guy was not a creepy guy who hung out with youngsters to impress. He simply had nobody his age sharing any of his interests. We came from a small town and he had not a lot of inquisitive minds to choose from as friends.

    And like all friendships ours began with a lot of beer and a lot of talking. He pointed me out to things without ever being preachy or like any of my teachers. Also I consider him my most influential teacher nowadays. He would not wanna hear a thing about it. Yet, he made me read. Read stuff that blew my mind. I could not help it, but I loved him for it. We became friends. Close friends. And we always stayed that way. He was an amazing guy.

    And then we became partners.

    Oh yeah, I almost forgot about that one.

    Yeah, in 1995 he opened up an Internet café. That was pretty revolutionary for a small sleepy town like ours back then. He had the money, he bought a bar and then pushed in a T3 line and five computers. And because he still served in the army he needed someone to take care of business and he choose me and you. Teenagers. It was actually of questionable legality, also there was an official manager of the whole thing who was a grown up. I think we came together behind that bar on New Years eve, did we?

    For the first time, yeah.

    Great times. I always remember them as the days of my youth.

    Your friendship changed over the years, though.

    We changed. Everybody does in time. Life moved on and radical changes came to all of us.
    SoZ was a soldier and he had signed that contract in a time where Helmut Kohl stood by his word German soldiers would never again fight beyond German borders. Then Gerhard Schröder came, the guy who had been our Governor for eight years anyway and he send German troops to Kosovo. First in the line where some good friends of mine. LordTroepfchen, someone I know through SoZ actually, was there. But SoZ was deep into the operations. He never talked about it, but it changed the man. Same time I did kids stuff, like ending school, chasing girls, getting into my studies. When we met afterwards we almost were strangers to each other. I wished I could have been a better friend to him back then, but I was still a stupid boy fooling around.

    I know for sure he appreciated your heavy drinking duties with him.

    Yeah, if there was ever a guy needing a drink, it was him back then. He came to Kiel, stayed three weeks on my couch and we drank and talked.

    When did you start playing roleplaying with him?

    God, no idea. Pretty early on I guess. But if someone said it was two years after we met I would not be surprised. I really gets a bit fuzzy nowadays. Must have been twenty years ago now. We began as a tabletop group. Pen&Paper. Cyberpunk. Vampire: The Masquerade. The good stuff. I think that´s how I actually met LordT. He was a guy who joined us one day, did take the GM chair and hell, he took it by storm. But time dragged us apart and the very, very early internet with it´s IIRC chats and all took over for us. At the beginning we used it for little pieces to fill in holes in our big campaigns, then more and more as our main medium. LordT and SoZ both had access to pretty groundbreaking stuff back then, I assume they were researching stuff for the military. I remember we were in one those very early chat rooms playing and talking to writers. Writers who are famous nowadays. I loved it. Man, it was so futuristic. We had no idea smartphones would one day be a hundred times faster than those huge bulky things we called computers. But the technical side was a limitation to me. I dropped out for a year or two, I believe . . .

    Longer. Three years maybe.

    Yeah, I simply had no money for a computer and internet line like that. Technical evolution left me behind to die a good Darwinian death of the one not fit enough. You guys were all having your Pentium high powered PC, while I still wrote my stuff on a Pentium 200, using free internet access at the university to check my mails. It was a few years before I saw the money to buy one of those monsters.
    When I finally rejoined you, you were already playing Star Wars for about a year.

    Longer.

    Really? Forum based, not so much unlike this forum, actually. And I found SoZ leading this effort. And the community had grown to something like 50 people. I think some of those people were active here in Ibop or WoG back then, but I did obviously have no idea what were there usernames. Our own campaign grew quite steady though, becoming a real epic.

    The Honor of the Jedi campaign.

    Die Ehre der Jedi. Yeah, enough said about that one I believe. We actually concluded it more or less many years later here with 133 ABY. But I think the story of the old campaign was outlined often enough.
    Anyway, SoZ and I stayed in contact for many years almost exclusively over the internet. He ended his service, travelled the world, working. He got together with TSG, hell I dunno how this happened, they were both living in the south back then. All of this only came to me through the computer. Fitting enough I could not be reached on my mobile the morning he died and so I received that notice through an eMail, too. From TSG, who was now his fiancé. Plane crash. You know it was news . . . somewhere far behind the important stuff the news had 15 seconds to announce a plane had crashed in central Asia. Germans aboard working for a private oil company, no survivors expected. I saw it the evening before, not even thinking he might be out there. He had locked into our server (we had a frakkin server by then!) and updated 128 ABY – The Collapsing Galaxy a few hours before. Not his best update, but it pushed the story a bit forward. Then he is gone. It is hard to describe the shock and numbness that leaves you with. You kinda expect him to call you and tell you it was all a big misunderstanding and as the weeks go by this call never comes. It was a dark time. I withdrew. Not only from RPing of any kind but from the world, to mourn his absence. That is what mourning is really about is it? You are sorry for yourself and your loss, because you just got this gaping hole inside of yourself where once someone held a special place. Now he is shifted into the “past-tense” area and in the presence something is missing.

    A lot of this darkness later found it´s way into “his last game” 133 ABY – The Dark Odyssey. It was a game coming from that dark place. And I felt it showed. Emotionally it was an incredible honest game. I believe these days fueled your legendary death scene with Kira actually.

    They certainly did.

    Yeah, TSG once said that more than anything . . . 133 ABY was a game about dying. Maybe she was right about that one. But as strange as it sounds, it was sooo much fun, too. Entertainment probably can afford to have some gravity, as long as the story entertains, too.

    I actually think it was a story about three people meant to die and all three refused to. I saw it the same way. Kira actually won, because she was the first to accept her own undoing. Death as inevitability. A common theme in your games.

    Is it? I always thought I do games about personified gods.

    Yes?

    Think about it. I think I do.

    You are a bastard Fin, now I need to think on that.

    *laughs* Well, 133?

    It was a huge success and actually became many players favorite around here. I think it changed the way people looked at you, actually.

    I did a good game. My players made it great. I took the credits. Word got around, people noted they would have a look at my next. Nothing else. I agree with Winged on the whole RPF Star-System back then. In his interview he said it is a game we play, which has no more importance than being a game of itself. I think I never became a RPF star, I was always the secret tip.

    Back then. I think stardom came for you with SotS.

    I think the star-system was gone by then, really. Game was over.

    I am happy we are all a lot more laid back and relaxed nowadays. The drama back then could be . . . distracting.

    To me you were the guy who told the most cinematic and thrilling stories.

    Wasn´t that ManCubs? No, whatever. I was just a guy making friends and playing games. Everything else is an ePersona that is not truly what I do. I did not care that much for it. Maybe I was too old for it. I could see how it was fun for some and how some took it too serious. If it had any point, it actually showed the change of generations within the board. That one interested me. Authority was questioned and believe it or not, I thought that would be a good thing. Not that anything was wrong with what came before me, but sometimes a little reformation is necessary. But I had other probs, too. I broke up with you in that time, took a new job. I simply had other matters on my mind.

    We constantly broke up since we knew each other.

    That one was for good. It affected us surprisingly little here, did it? You yelled at me at the phone and then made an angry post with Laura in SotS an hour later. Ridiculous, was it?

    It was. But we´ll come to SotS. Let me look a bit deeper into the “game that made you”. So the success of 133 ABY did mean nothing to you?

    The success of a game is for me how good I can entertain/reach my players and I think that worked very well in 133 ABY. Better than I had ever expected. Sarge probably still is afraid I do it to him again. :p
    So, yes. That was important and very satisfying. That I had shown some players my true colors and they actually liked painting with them.


    [And next time we will look into the progression from the first success of 133 ABY to SotS, it´s conception and the creation of the OP, as well as Fin´s personal take on religion, life, sex and the the woman interviewing him. Yeah, I am afraid I am serious. [face_laugh] Stay tuned, the best is yet to come! See Part 2 of 3 in 10 days! ]