It is a start. I know the whole story - I played it. I just have to take the time to sit down and write the whole thing. 

I guess this is close enough...

Like all adventures start, the party met after reading a flyer posted on a wall in the village at a local pub. The pub, as expected, was named after something typical, a Unicorn, or Pony, or Griffin or Dragon – something of that conventional sort. This was not a noble adventure funded by the village leaders to protect the citizens from an encroaching evil or looming threat. It was a sketchy proposition by desperate mercenaries with the goal of earning great monetary rewards for significant risk of bodily harm, dismemberment, and quite possibly death or dismemberment.  There were no Paladins at the table that evening, and the prayers of the Cleric were not answered by the Gods he believed he prayed to, but by far older, unspoken deities that civilized society shunned.  The gathered adventurers – really a group of rouges, cut-throats, thieves and vagabond mercenaries – thought they were discussing an effort for the common good of the land they inhabited – but really, per

Had the Drow known this group was planning on visiting their neck of the underworld, their response would have been simple,
“There goes the neighborhood.”

First were two twin elves, Zeek and Zipp – always in that order. Like most of this group of adventurers, they were a couple, inseparable, who watched each other’s back – and who had skills that complimented the weaknesses of the other member. They were in it for themselves, but depended on the other member to step forward where their weaknesses were greatest.

The next was a wizard, in the traditional sense of the term. He wore a flowing, rough hemp robe, had long white hair, long beard and pointy hat wrapped around a sunken, weathered face. He was a purebred human, capable of great potential in the realm of sorcery – but young by the measure of warlocks, and not very experienced. What he lacked for in personal skill he made up for in a pair of great artifacts he had stolen from a far greater wizard – a Staff of the Magi – a rechargeable rod of magical potency – and a cloak of displacement, virtually assuring that every first strike against him would miss – giving him ample time to bring the destructive potency of his primary weapon against his foe. He travelled with his mate, a half-elf magic-user/warrior. He had enchanted her with a love potion bought in a disreputable magic shop. If his staff and his cloak failed him, he could count on her, with her sword and spells, to throw herself between himself and peril until he could bring

William Fence reminds me of the time I told Google Translate to convert "Bill Gates must die" into Irish and it used the words "Na geataí billí" for his name.

I was actually trying to amuse a co-worker who is a native speaker.  He was amused all right.  :)

William Fence was my idea, not the bot's.  An attempt at humor 

Oh, i could have had it do better, with more refinements.  Just dont have the patience and it wasn't that important to spend all afternoon on.  You outline each section more carefully than i did, feed results back into itself for expansion/refinements until you have a complete workable story. 

Same for the image, you take what you got, feed it back in for it to refine.  tho it did resemble the cover of a lot of 1970 and 80s paperbacks.

Sun Jun 04 2023 05:45:56 PM EDT from darknetuser

It was a nice read. It was also a good reminded that I am not going to lose one of my jobs anytime soon XD

Ok i know i said i was done, but i asked it to give me prompt data to feed into the image generator to create a book cover, based on the final battle scene and it was worth sharing. But now i'm done flooding everyone with nonsense, ..  really.. :)   

2099345376@Uncensored

Well i cant find where where were talking about the proposed scifi episode about pushing gates out an airlock..  But i had my bot come up with a short story for us:

In this science fiction story set in the future, an evil wealthy man named William Fence designs a series of computers using terrible invasive software to gain more control over people's lives. He then uses his power and influence to limit access to meat and vegetables for common people, forcing them to scavenge and eat insects just to survive.

The story begins with the introduction of William Fence as a wealthy man who is determined to have complete control over society. He designs a series of computers that are equipped with invasive software, which he uses to monitor and manipulate people's lives. With this power, he limits access to meat and vegetables for common people, forcing them to scavenge and eat insects just to survive.

As the story progresses, it becomes clear that William Fence is a ruthless man who will stop at nothing to achieve his goals. He uses his wealth and influence to control the supply of meat and vegetables, making it difficult for people to access these essential food sources. The common people are left with no choice but to scavenge for insects just to survive.

The situation becomes dire as more and more people become malnourished and sick due to their limited diet. They begin to organize themselves, forming resistance groups that aim to take back control of their lives by overthrowing William Fence's regime. The story follows the struggles of these resistance fighters as they try to gain access to meat and vegetables again.

As the tension builds, it becomes clear that William Fence is not going to give up his power easily. He uses all means necessary to maintain control over society, including violence and intimidation tactics. The story culminates in a final showdown between the resistance fighters and William Fence on a luxury spaceship orbiting Pluto.

In the end, after a trial, the common people push William Fence out of an airlock as punishment for his crimes against humanity. This serves as a warning to other wealthy individuals who may seek to gain control over society through invasive technology and limit access to essential resources.

Not read them yet but just ran across some BSG books, supposedly set in the time around when the colonies fell. Guy was supposed have played a part in the story of the reboot.  ( and they are legit free )

https://www.smashwords.com/books/byseries/55216

Yeah. When I was writing for Tech Republic, there was a big house cleaning where they cut about 95% of their editors and content contributors. The two Sr. Editors at the top were flaming liberals. 

Around the same time, I noticed that Wired, a bunch of video game outlets, and other media outlets like Gizmodo started going very Identity Politics on their articles. National Geographic was actually the *first* publication where I noticed this, and quit my long term subscription, years ago. 

It is kind of like how every "colonize Mars" or "set up a permanent space station in Earth Orbit" movie now starts out with a white male Captain who becomes incapacitated within the first 30 minutes of the movie, and his female, Chinese 1st Mate takes the helm. Once you see it as a pattern, it is hard to un see it.

Oh, there is also a white women who is a science engineer or botanist who is having a secret affair with the black man who is the chief-engineer. The white woman slowly become

Wed Mar 17 2021 12:25:20 EDT from darknetuser Subject: Re: Sci-fi magazines

2021-03-15 23:12 from ParanoidDelusions
Subject: Re: Sci-fi magazines
Funny, Amazon made a bunch of recommendations for Kindle SciFi
magazines - and I was almost ready to pull the trigger - and then It

[Acame to me - it'll just be paying to get stories that push an agenda,

and I'll be disappointed.

Yup. It seems many modern publications are pozzed :)

If you do some research it turns out lots of current publications have political disclaimers in their websites, which is not good.

Archive.org has most of the back-issues of Galaxy...  That ought to take you at least a year or two to get through unless you have way too much time on your hands.

Hey guys, do you read any regular science-fiction magazine? Do you have any recommendations for good ones? Duckduckgoing around shows many rhits, but I usually get better results asking people away.

Right... how much science fiction is really just fantasy posing as a kind of pastice of science fiction?

Most of it, now that you mention it.  Pretty much all of Star Wars is fantasy-in-space, or perhaps even just a space opera.   Real science fiction requires some imaginative speculation, some radical departure.

It was absolutely a mistake for literary awards to merge fantasy and scifi. Detrimental to both genres, and to fiction as a whole.

> Isn't Supergirl (and Superman for that matter) science fiction under the umbrella of aliens from other planets?

I guess so.  Truly terrible science fiction, but science fiction.

Aren't you trying to make the case that science fiction is alive and well?  This isn't doing it.

I don't know how Fantasy became the conjoined twin of Science Fiction, but I really wish it hadn't.  Science Fiction is NOT supposed to come across as magic.  Unfortunately, I think it is fantasy that is thriving, not SF, and the fact that fantasy often masquerades as SF does not change that.

Good science fiction should be believable to a competent reader, albeit perhaps with a single impossibility. Westworld qualifies.  Supergirl does NOT.

Are you kidding?  There is more Science Fiction and Fantasy on TV and in movies than ever before.  There are more books being published than before due to the rise of self publishing, and smaller imprints.  

Quick list: 

NBC: Midnight, Texas
NBC: Manifest
FOX: The Gifted
FOX: The Orville
FOX: Gotham
CW: Supergirl
CW: Charmed
CW: Legends of Tomorrow
CW: Flash
CW: Arrow
CW: Black Lightning
CW: iZombie
CW: The Outpost
USA: The Purge
ABC: Marvel's Agents of Shield
ABC: NCIS
ABC: NCIS: LA
ABC: NCIS: New Orleans
HBO: Westworld
HBO: Game of Thrones

This is just what I can think of off the top of my head.   I know there are more shows than that.  

This SF forum needs to have some life injected into it!  Unfortunately, in this world where science fiction is very much on the wane, that may be hard to do.  I don't think there are as many fans as there once were.

For starters, take a look at ARCHIVE.org - a site that was recommended to me by Ghek the Kaldane - a try.  It has huge numbers of old magazines available for viewing or downloading.  Here, for instance, are 350+ copies of GALAXY magazine:  https://archive.org/details/galaxymagazine&tab=collection

BTW, if you like classic sci-fi, try jack Williamson.  Day of the Triffids, Humanoids, fine stuff.  Larry Niven I like, but his books are thin.  There is a writer in the old, old days called A. Merritt, wrote stuff like Dwellers in the Mirage, really powerful sci-fi, will shine your shoes and float your boat.

Back on to space farce! :) Robert Sheckley is a master of ... whatever it is! 

( If you need a quick pick me up: "Dimension of Miracles" Robert Sheckley ;) )

I recently bought "Shadowrun Returns" off Steam and played through the "The deadman's switch" campaign. After that I read through the only shadowrun book I own, made me think about when I read the first 20 of them when I was a teenager. Maybe I shall see if I can buy a bunch of them from second hand supplies. Or Battletech. I found the game boring, but I read lots of the novels, friends of mine had plenty. They are nice for a quick read, nothing too deep.

Last year I bought a bunch of used Dragonlance novels, for the same purpose

Sometimes, reading stupid stuff makes me read more meaningful stuff in parallel.

Contemplating reading another Larry Niven book, maybe set in the knownspace universe. Ringworld was a blast, Asimov bores me tbh, Mr Niven actually can write :) - good sense of humour.

I think i'll leave it at Ringworld for the minute. He only ever intended writing the one book so...   

http://www.bikerumor.com/2013/06/19/more-flying-bikes-paravelo-folding-flying-bike-on-kickstarter/  ?

flycycles - sounds interesting Mo.  Thanks for bringing it up.  I like the older stuff (Asimov etc...)  Kinda campy, but I like the story lines complex, but simple as I am simple.

ok sf it is, np :\ -- mt B)

btw anyone read ringworld before? Please be nice to me if this is the wrong place to talk about classic science fiction ?! 

btwbtw: a robot just passed the Turing Test! Oh my goodness!!

It's not "Sci Fi" anymore.  Now it's "SyFy" -- indicating that they have replaced the science fiction with crappy reality shows like everyone else.

Sci-fi is not the channel i hope, becaase i'm just about to post about a book!

"Dimension of Miracles"  by Robert Sheckley -- Nuff said !! You've read it? Then lend your copy to the person on your left hand side!!!

<bow>

<runs-off>

I finished watching it some time ago; went from really strange, to bad, to very bad, to interesting but waaaay drawn out, and finally to bad but I kinda want to see how it ends. 

Nah, you just need a strong hatred for network t.v.

So, did anybody watch that Firefly t.v. show, or get a copy on vhs :-)

The "New Messages" view in this room is very interesting...

Also, babel fish apparently babbles with fishes when it comes to Russian...ouch

Это что, новый вид научной фантастики или вы размещения в неправильный номер?

Вроде работает...

А перевод?

Локаль как?