Special Interest Groups (SIGs)

About Special Interest Groups (SIGs)
Active SIGs
Defunct SIGs

About Special Interest Groups (SIGs)

The heart of the Harvard-Radcliffe Science Fiction Association are the Special Interest Groups, called SIGs for short. Any HRSFA member can attempt to create a SIG on just about any area of interest. SIGs with more than eight members can be approved as real SIGs by the general membership; many others continue to exist as unofficial SIGs. The rest of this page contains alphabetical lists of HRSFA SIGs, divided into those active and those that have no longer exist through lack of interest. See the main page for the weekly SIG schedule.

Active SIGs

Anime SIG

Leader: Alessandro La Porta '09
Meetings: Tuesdays, 9:30pm, location Jordan South Common Room

Don't watch entire good anime series alone in your dorm suite; instead, watch them with other HRSFAns! Right now, watching Gundam Seed. Giant Robots in Space get their Gundam Funk on.

Bizarreness SIG

Leader: Daniel Lewis '10
Meetings: Anywhere Two or More HRSFen are Gathered

Does bizarre things:

controlling the weather
going squirrel fishing
handing out blank flyers
hosting a trampoline party
making tabouli
playing tag in Widener Library
dancing in the snow (in gowns and tuxedos)
pretend you're a time traveler and confuse people

Boffing SIG

Leader: Alessandro La Porta '09
Meetings: Sunday Afternoon, Location TBA

Boffing SIG hits itself with sticks all the time. It's awesome! Currently we are using the Accelerant rules system to govern fights, but can be persuaded to use the Realms system as well if people are more interested in that. It's considering doing mini-events with persistent characters if there's interest in that as well.

Cool Movie ZIG

Leaders: John Bestoso '10 and Ashton Howard '11
Meetings: TBA, usually Mondays starting 7:45pm

Known by many names (*IG, pSIG, ZIG, Dojo), we come together, on an approximately weekly basis, to watch movies we think should be watched, movies that are cool, movies of the people, movies not forced upon us by "the Man." More information can be found on the Cool Movie ZIG page.

Gaming SIG

Leader: Betsy Isaccson '12 and Ian Storey '12 and Carl Engle-Laird '12
Meetings: Fridays 8pm-late; Usually Mather JCR

Have you played a game since setting foot in the Yard? If so, congratulations—you're a member of Gaming SIG! Board and card games are the other staple food of HRSFA. The most commonly played HRSFA boardgames range from ancient ones like chess, Chinese chess, and go to modern ones like Settlers/Seafarers/Cities & Knights of Catan, Diplomacy, Buffy: The Board Game, Betrayal at House on the Hill, and Star Wars: Epic Duels.

Card games include Apples to Apples, Munchkin, and even straight-up poker. Got a fun game you want to play? Bring it over. Chances are high someone will play.

Gaming SIG also plays videogames. Current favorites include Super Smash Brothers Melee, Guitar Hero (both of them), Tetris Attack, and Halo. As with games of the board or card variety, if you have a videogame you'd like to play with us, bring it over!

Star Trek TNG SIG

Leader: Jason LaRue '12
Meetings: Monday 9:30pm-11:00pm, Quincy A31

HRSFA gathers in the evening to relax and watch the first season of the Sci-Fi television epic Heroes. Regardless of what you've heard about later seasons we promise you the first one is worth coming to see!

Magic: The Gathering SIG

Leader: Kirby Haugland '11
Meetings: Wednesdays (alternating) 8:00pm-Late

Some HRSFAns play Magic: The Gathering, both constructed and draft, whenever they can. Not to be confused with Real Magic SIG.

The Man SIG

Leader: The Man (or the Woman)
Meetings: TBA

Watches pretentious foreign films, far above the lowbrow, unintellectual, lowest-common-denominator, so-called "cool movies."

Milk & Cookies

Leader: Nora Moseman '10
Meetings: Every few weeks on a weekend night from 9pm-1am

HRSFAns like reading stories. And drinking milk. And eating cookies. So way back when, someone had the idea to do it all at the same time. Unfortunately some of the wires got crossed, so now we eat milk and drink cookies, but we do read and listen to stories, including masterpieces of fantasy literature such as the classic "Eye of Argon" (available from us in both HTML and text format). Though M&C generally occurs from 9PM-1AM, feel free to stay for as long or short a time as suits you. It's all good.

MST3K SIG

Leader: Carl Engle-Laird '12
Meetings: Tuesdays 7:30-9:30, location Jordan South Common Room

"Mystery Science Theatre 3000" was a wonderful show that aired on the Sci-Fi Channel and then Comedy Central, in which a guy and two smart-mouthed robots watched really terrible old sci-fi movies and heckled them. Hilarity ensued. We carry on this tradition proudly, having skewered The Fantastic Four, Dungeons & Dragons, The Phantom Menace, Wing Commander, The Order, Timeline The Da Vinci Code and most recently National Treasure 2 at Vericon. Until a movie to lampoon is decided upon, we watch classic episodes of the original series for inspiration; then we begin the two parts fun, three parts unholy pain of watching one bad movie over and over and over again until we've squeezed every last drop of humor from it.

Origami SIG

Leader: Rebeca Hammann '10
Meetings: Currentl at MIT

Origami SIG folds interesting objects out of paper. All skill levels welcome.

Puzzle SIG

Leader: Kevin Orfield '11
Meetings: 9:30 - 11:00 PM, Usually in Lowell Grille

Puzzle SIG solves puzzles of the type you'll find in the Harvard Puzzle Hunt or the MIT Mystery Hunt, including a variety of word, logic, physical, and other puzzle types. We are currently solving the 2002 (Monopoly) Mystery Hunt. All experience levels are welcome.

Pencils, paper, and laptops are recommended.

RPG SIG

Leaders: Tom Dimiduk, John Bestoso '10, Alessandro La Porta '09 (LARPs)
Meetings: Scheduled Weekly -- email leaders for more information

In roleplaying games (RPGs), a small group of people collectively tell a story from the perspective of individual characters, under the guidance of a Game Master (GM) who controls everything else. Live-action roleplaying games (LARPs) are like RPGs except players actually walk around instead of sitting around a table. Several extended campaigns and a few one-shot sessions are being planned for this year; if you are an avid roleplayer and want in, or are curious what it's all about, join RPG SIG, which meets regularly to play roleplaying games of both the tabletop and live-action varieties.

Perhaps our most notable invention is Live-Action Clue. We've also recently played the Metal Gear Solid LARP, which ran several times in 2003-2004, wherein a dozen or so people tried to outwit and outspy each other in the tunnels under Lowell House, with the threat of giant robotic destruction looming around every corner.

RPG Design SIG

Leader: Tom Dimiduk,
Meetings: Co-meets with Gaming SIG

RPG SIG != RPG SIG Have you ever wished your RPG did something better? Are you unhappy with the way D&D seems to become progressively more like a video game with every release? Would you like to see a roleplaying system whose rules make you really feal like you are in a sword fight or that you are James Bond? Then join RPG SIG, and help us design our own high-verisimilitude, multi-universe RPG!

We currently have a substantially working modern/future system that will be used for a game this year, but there is still lots of work to do fleshing that out and getting the multi-universe part going. See also RPG SIG.

Come see the rules and help colaborate at our wiki

SCA SIG

Leader: Antonia Menard Pugliese '12
Meetings: Currently at MIT

SCA SIG works with the Harvard Society for Creative Anachronism. More information forthcoming.

Defunct SIGs

Last updated 2 May 2010. ©1995-2012 HRSFA.
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