…if you’re reading this, you probably like human beings with human problems and dumb meat brains, which is what I provide: dumb meat.
Author Archives: vmalesh
Dr. Vytautas Malesh (MFA, PhD) is a writer and professor living and working in Miami, Florida. He has moved so many times that it’s difficult to say where he’s actually from, but he always, enthusiastically, claims Detroit. Content added on a need-to-write basis.
Dirt Cheap Dungeons Cavern Set – A Review
I strongly recommend the DCD system for anyone looking to add affordable, easy-to-use walls to their role playing games, and I’ll double down on that recommendation so far as this new Cavern System is concerned.
Intimidation and Persuasion in Dungeons and Dragons
[A] persuaded NPC can be trusted because they act in their own self-interest in addition to whatever communal interest has been established. An intimidated NPC cannot be trusted because they act only in their own self-preservation and share in no communal benefit in so doing.
Race and Dungeons and Dragons: An Unsolicited Opinion – Part 2
When someone’s response to “Black Lives Matter” is “there’s no such thing as race,” you can go ahead and move on with your life because that person literally farts in the bath tub and bites the bubbles.
Race and Dungeons and Dragons: An Unsolicited Opinion – Part 1
The scholarship and culture to which I personally am responding… is still undergoing earth-shaking change. Tolkien… was being quite progressive by suggesting elves, humans, dwarves, and shire-folk could live happily together… but…that is through a contemporary lens problematic. I come here not to bury Tolkien, but to contextualize him…
Rings of Power – First Impressions
I’d make one final note about the casting, and in particular the so-called controversy regarding casting People of Color – literally anyone who has a problem with it should go pound sand and die mad about it.
One D&D and the Subscriber Model of Doom
Whenever anyone starts talking about “creating an experience,” it’s time to watch your wallet, and that’s not even the worst of your worries. I’ve been playing dungeons and dragons, and games like it, since the 1980s. I’m hardly a grognard – I’m wide open to change in the form of streamlining and simplifying rules, expandingContinue reading “One D&D and the Subscriber Model of Doom”
What a Summer
Wrapping up from a double-overloaded summer semester, and heading into a double-overloaded fall semester.
You could say I like to work.
So I Ask Again: How’s That Novel Coming..?
Clocking in at 334 pages, I have completed the first draft of the novel I’ve been working on for the last year-ish. I’ve sent a copy to one of my trusted readers for first impressions, and I for my part have begun pen-and-paper edits.
End of Term Blues?
Semesters can be intense, truly. Over a span of weeks (as few as three, as many as 16) I and a number of students all work hard and try our best. We usually develop something of a friendship, and I hope in the end that we all learn from each other.
Vytautas Malesh 