The Mages Spellbook

I finished with my homework a little earlier than expected today (8pm). That gave me a chance to get home and play some Oblivion! I booted it up and decided to continue my quest to get into the Mages Guild. To gain status, you first have to travel to all the guilds in the various cities and garner the recommendations of the head mages in each guild. What that inevitably entails is a series of quests. For each recommendation, they all have something they want you to do for them first. I've already gotten 2 recommendations and I was going to try for my third tonight. The deal is this. I need to find a missing mage. He hasn't been seen in a while, so if I can find him I will get the recommendation I need. I start talking to some of the other mages in the guild and learn that he and Valdermort (made that name up) liked to play games with each other. So I go find Valdermort and he tells me that he'll help as long as I agree to get him the head mages spell book... as a prank. It's locked in the head mages desk, so he gives me a spell to unlock the desk. I find the book and I return to Valdermort. He asks me if I've gotten him the spellbook yet. Unfortunately, even though I have it - it's in my inventory - the "quest" in the game doesn't seem to recognize that I have it when I'm talking to Valdermort. I can't give it to him.

Have you ever seen a grown man cry?

The tears. They're welling up again just thinking about it. I had to turn the game off. How could I go on? What's the use? Why?

So I moved on to chess...

I played a game/15 tonight on the ICC against Znebster. I have no idea who Znebster is - as is so often the case when playing on the ICC. I was a little nervous when the game started because my opponent made his first move almost instantly, but then took almost 90 seconds for his second move. That's very unusual in a "quick" game. I started thinking that maybe he was going to grab a book or something. I know, I always think the worst.

It turned out to be a very exciting game. As I started an attack against his kingside, he was planning an attack on my queenside. The goal, of course, is the equal and opposite reaction. In this case it turned out to be not so equal, but it was fun finding out! I was nervous about his attack because I knew that if mine fizzled out I'd find myself immediately on the defensive.

Here's the game:

[Event "ICC 15 0"]
[Site "Internet Chess Club"]
[Date "2006.06.27"]
[Round "-"]
[White "EdBorowski"]
[Black "Znebster"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ICCResult "Black resigns"]
[WhiteElo "2012"]
[BlackElo "2034"]
[Opening "Queen's bishop game"]
[ECO "D02"]
[NIC "QP.06"]
[Time "21:23:29"]
[TimeControl "900+0"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 d5 3. Bf4 e6 4. e3 Be7 5. Bd3 O-O 6. Nbd2 c5 7.c3 Nc6 8.Qe2 c4 9. Bc2 b5 10. e4 dxe4 11. Nxe4 Nd5 12. Bd2 h6 13. a3 a5 14. O-O Qc7 15. Ng3 Ba6 16. Nh5 b4 17. Qe4 g6 18. Bxh6 Rfb8 19. Nf4 bxc3 20. Nxg6 Nf6 21. Nxe7+ Nxe7 22. Qh4 Nfd5 23. Qg5+ Ng6 24. Bxg6 fxg6 25. Qxg6+ Kh8 26. Ne5 Ra7 27. bxc3 Qe7 28. Nc6 {Black resigns} 1-0

The critical move was my 20th. It was one of those moves where you know it's right even if you can't fully calculate a win. You just know it has to be winning, so you play it anyway. Of course, you keep your fingers crossed - and hidden - as you do. This was the position before my 20th move. What would you have done?


I know... just like you would have played it! ;)

Until next time, Ed.