Greetings traveler,

Welcome to the forty-second edition of the alcarin.com newsletter.
There is an archive of the previous newsletters in the Townhall and the columns are added to the Town Square, so you can always read it again.
The past month as been one of a lot of activity on Alcarin. Especially the RPG Archives have been expanding quite a lot, as I had already said would happen in the previous edition of this mailinglist. And although its not yet on the list, a new chapter of the Landlord RPG has been added as well. One important thing is that this month's mailinglist has a new section: the Member of the Month: a short interview an elected Alcarin regular. Despite of the name, there is no garantee that there will be a Member of the Month each month. The honor of being the first one to wear this title, during the coming month, is our very own columnist, Wouter v.d. Zandschulp (Forum's Sensor), who will be interviewed by Keeley F. Hearn (Forums' Vafoth).
Enjoy reading.

This letter's content:
1. What's New
2. Coming Up Soon
3. Column: Men with a Mission
4. Member of the Month

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WHAT'S NEW:

16/04/2004 - added new monster to the School: "Blink Vink"

14/04/2004 - added legends for cities of Thass'Rhin and Khalimson (Elfstone Campaign Setting) to the School

13/04/2004 - added new spell to the School: "Jibble's Giant Jelly"

12/04/2004 - added new prestige class to the School: "Prankster"

10/04/2004 - changed Town Square / Reviews section layout, changed submit review form

09/04/2004 - added new item to the School: "Jibble's Magical Fist-in-a-Box Boxes"

08/04/2004 - added new item to the School: "Jibble's Magical Fist-in-a-Box Fists"

06/04/2004 - added new item to the School: "Jibble's Fist-in-a-Box"

05/04/2004 - added note on Open Game Content to all relevant pages

01/04/2004 - added author comment to "Yidobbi's Dwelling" rpg mission (Barracks)

Visit http://www.alcarin.com/townhall/updates.htm for the latest updates.

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COMING UP:

The Elfstone MUD project has been very quiet during the past month. However, Jan Willem v.d. Broek (Forums' Great Cthulhu) has managed to get the test version of the MUD back online again. This will probably speed up developing in the coming months. Anyway, it allows access to the legends of several Elfstone cities, which I reported as not findable last month. I expect to complete the missing parts of some of the legends in the coming days. Maybe I will start work on their Geography pages as well, providing some more background information.
The other large running project, the Landlord RPG, has a new chapter (Contacts & Diplomacy), which I've uploaded just a few days ago. The next step is a chapter on the game's units and accessories. The summarizing tables for this chapter are already online. Furthermore, I am working on a summarizing table on the cost of various buildings. I don't expect these things to be finished this month, but I will start and continue work on them.
The Archives still have several new spells and monsters planned. I hope to add these in the coming month.

For up to date news on these major projects and other major developments on alcarin.com, see the Announcements forum at http://www.alcarin.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=9

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COLUMN: MEN WITH A MISSION
A column by Wouter vd Zandschulp; wouter@alcarin.com

"Friends"

This column is NOT a homage to the finished TV-series Friends. Even more, it does not do any attempt to be this. It is not even related to this.

Classically the series Friends was not even the first TV-series with this name. Go figure. But let's not start throwing random trivia around. I do like to do that though. Makes it seem you know much and stuff. I especially like to reveal the origin of things as well as why that makes some things and habits curious or worthwhile of both. But well, that's just me.

Role-play-nights mostly have a social meaning of seeing friends. Like many groups of friends, the positive feelings we have for each others are mostly projected in insults. Friends close by give you the possibility to really know someone and insult this person with all his/her own specific characteristics.

Nice as this is, one might wonder why this is a typically friends-habit. I myself have theorized about that and cannot help but share my theories with you. To make this an Alcarin-column I hope the vague link between role-playing with best friends is enough. Maybe it will help if I claim that my role-play-friends are the most insulting people I know and are the ones that are constantly in my mind while typing this, which make the subjects link at least inside my head (over, there, behind all that mess).

Well, first of all, acting friendly often is an act. People often act real friendly when they don't know someone, to stay at that persons good side. After all, they have no idea how the other would take it if they were all that direct. It differs with all persons you meet. With some you immediately see they can take a joke. Acting nothing but friendly then only create a useless distance between the two, unnecessary. I am talking about the typical distance-creating kind of friendliness now.

When the two of you feel a lot of invisible common ground, you often just know that something won't be taken in the wrong way at all, so you can easily start joking or criticizing. When two people really are compatible, the first conversation they ever have often is wonderful to see. They start teasing pretty much immediately. And on the long term, the more people know each other, the less needed it is to say nice things, This becomes sort of expandable, since they can feel the nice feelings about each other without using words.

Well, this about in short concludes my theory. Me having quite a headache makes me take it a bit short. Lots of enters help me to get the idea faster that I've got quite enough text. And my alternative ideas backfiring make me go with this one at the first place. Isn't the way of column creating beautiful? How even most text isn't even about the subject? The way the columnist tries to get out of it easily for a month? The way he makes it so very obvious to even fill the last part with talking about that? That, dear readers, is my own very special token of appreciating for you guys. I have come so accustomed to you readers for the last 40 months or so that I thrust you will take it from me.

Phew, that was it, see you next month for a Jonathan-column, luckily. Or next month... it WOULD have been next month if I had been on time this time. (Assuming that next month's mailinglist will not be in time either, it will still be next month, red.)

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MEMBER OF THE MONTH
By Keeley F. Hearn

Well, I suppose you thought these newsletters would keep pretty much within the same format. But now the time has come to throw something completely different into the mix: Member of the Month, something we thought would make a good addition to the mailinglist. 'What makes an Alcarin Member of the Month?' you ask. I tend to look for many things, a couple in particular: someone who has done many things to help the development of the site, and someone with qualities people could look up to, whatever they may be.
This month's chosen member is Wouter van de Zandschulp. You've probably read his Men with a Mission columns, if you look at the forums you may have seen some of his comments that allways seem to lighten the mood a bit, and if you are a close friend of his you know what a versitile, helpful, kind, and all-around good person he can be, under all of the chaos.
I conducted an interview with Wouter, to help you know him a bit better:

*You have been chosen for Member of the Month, how do you feel about this?
WOW! WHAT A SUPRISE! I feel honored! I knew I am great, but THAT great? To be the ONLY Member of the Month in existence. Well, therefore I would have to say: YAY!

*How did you first come across Alcarin?
I became friends with Arjan Wardekker, the Great Webmaster himself, and some others. At school. We started role-playing together. Arjan gave us a URL to his site once. I visited it straight away, at night. It was realmsofgildor then. There I was a member and I heard about his plans for the new site.I always was enthousiastic about the site.

*What do you feel is one of you biggest contributions to the site?
I would say the columns. I contribute quite a lot to the forum.More then 17,000 posts! But still, the columns are my very own thing. They often have some heart and soul of me in them. They always have been an essential part of the mailinglist too, and something only I contribute. And I really like that.

*What is one of your favorite parts of the site other than the forums, and why?
The Temple always has been my favorite. I mostly like the storypart about fantasy and role-playing. And Arjan put some poems there that really have a lot of heart and soul of him. All his stories have some wonderfull own flavour too. And there are some stories from others too, which also is real nice.

*Which part of Alcarin do you think is best for the guests?
That's a though one. Well, I think most members would like the town, with all those characters giving funny remarks.

*What characterizes your style of roleplaying?
I usually have quite original and interesting types of characters. I mostly pay attention to the character-development and the personality of my characters. And I try as such to keep humour and heart into the game. My characters always have quite a lot of flaws. I mean, they never are just very good. I always make them then real naive, or real vain or something. So it could seem sometimes my characters are more based on flaws then strengths.

*Which race do you favor to have your characters?
I mostly play human. I find the variety of humans challeging enough to make interesting characters and they are easier for me to identify with. If I'm not a human I guess I like to play a stubborn Dwarf most. Since they are oftent treated as the sort of character I would play, like Gimli in Lord of the Rings.

*What class do you prefer?
I would have to go by Bard. I really build on the bard type of character in the Jonathan-columns. I like them as some sort of free and oppertunsistic kind of people. Not much possessions and not much worries. Just being artistic and a bit like a rascal at times. Getting in a bit of trouble at the time. Being able to talk smoothly out of things, but not all things. Still having a bit of clumsiness about him/her.

*What are some of your other hobbies?
Reading, writing, watching tv, computering.

*Name a few of your favorite things.
Coffee, food, tv, my girlfriend, my dog, my nieces, Ben, other friends. study, books, more coffee!

*Quick! Describe yourself with five words!
Clumsy, Intelligent, Confused, Obsessive, Friendly

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Well, that's it for this month's newsletter. I hope you enjoyed it.
Lord Gildor
"May the stars guide you on your journeys"
http://www.alcarin.com

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