Episode 162: Of the Massachusetts Necrotaurs
October 16th, 2015 | Robin
The Gaming Hut turns over the hourglass as we discuss villain clocks.
Ken issues a Travel Advisory on the latest installment of the H. P. Lovecraft Film Festival.
In Ask Ken and Robin we field a Pete Darley question about our adherence to canon in published scenario.
And in a pulse-pounding, pumice-raining edition of Ken’s Time Machine, sabotage places our doughty chrononaut in Pompeii, eight hours ahead of the head cloud that will flash-cook its remaining residents.
Ken and Robin have oft been accused of being cards. Well, we can deny it no longer. We have become super-limited promo cards for Murder of Crows, Atlas Games’ fast-paced card game of murder and the macabre, for two to five players in the mood for something a little morbid. It’s Edward Gorey meets Caligari, by way of Edgar Allan Poe. Wait a minute, what does that graphic say? I’m not so sure about this…
Ken fans who did not partake of the Kickstarter will want to sink their fangs into the pre-order for the Dracula Dossier from Pelgrane Press, consisting of the Director’s Handbook and Dracula Unredacted. 
You say that’s still not enough Ken for you? Very well, my friend. His brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish.
It’s not easy teaching in America’s second worst school district and being a wizard on the side. But Nathan Kulwicki thought he had it covered. Until he received news of the worst kind. Inoperable cancer. He’ll be dead before the start of the next school year. Now, he will have to scour time and unheard of dimensions to find a magical cure to save himself. But what will he be willing to do to find it? Find out in Terminal Magics, a novel by Plot Points impresario Ben Riggs. 
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So what you are both wanting is not so much a villain clock as a villain flow chart? (Or maybe a villain PERT Chart: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_evaluation_and_review_technique. I once worked at a place that taught Project Management which is how I know this stuff.)
One tiny Ask-Ken-And-Robin that doesn’t really merit a segment: in reading THE DRACULA DOSSIER would you recommend reading DRACULA UNREDACTED first or THE DIRECTOR’S HANDBOOK? I went with the latter, believing it would give me a better grip on what the campaign focusses on but I can see an argument for reading the text that the players will see first. And does the same advice apply to THE ARMITAGE FILES?
Dear Ken and Robin,
May I Ask-Ken-and/or-Robin:
I want to start a Night’s Black Agents campaign set in the Balkans specifically and Eastern Europe generally. What crime/espionage novels does Ken recommend reading to get a feel for this region? What about non-fiction or movies?
Thanks,
Tom.
If Time Incorporated can fit this into the schedule and budget, I’d like to know what the last 100 years would have looked like had the Ottoman Empire not been partitioned at the end of WWI.