Day 27: If you had to do it all over again, would you do anything different when you first started gaming?
No, I wouldn't =)
Day 28: What is the single most important lesson you've learned from playing Dungeons & Dragons?
The single most important lesson I've learned from playing D&D would be that the Game is what you make of it. You play it RAW, you change or customize it, you go for this clone or that incarnation, all those decisions are meaningless if not done deliberately.
The whole DIY-ethos and everything it entails is something I only started to see because I got involved in D&D (via the OSR).
Thus ends the D&D 40th Anniversary Blog Hop Challenge. I gave my best to answer as many questions as possible on time (guess I failed, most of the time) and had fun thinking about my answers or reading those of the others. If I were to participate again in such a thing (which won't be any time soon), I'd not do it on a day-to-day basis, but answer several of the questions at once (like I was forced to do with this one).
One positive aspect would be that I discovered several great blogs I need to add to my blog roll as soon as possible!
Day 25: Longest running campaign/gaming group you've been in.
My longest running campaign had nothing to do with D&D because Midgard had been our system of choice back then. Two out of three fridays for up to eight hours over a 5-year period. Good times, but that group is long gone and disbanded (including all the drama this could entail ... ah well). My cousin is the only player from that time that is still a regular in everything I could come up with.
Anyway, that was my longest going campaign and the most consistent group I have been in and I don't expect something like this to happen again before I retire ...
Day 26: Do you still game with the people who introduced you to the hobby?
Well, no. My brother and I bought our first set of rules when we were 13 after I had learned about those books from magazines and fantasy novels. You could say we taught ourselves how to play the game. I've been doing that ever since, but my brother has lost interest a long time ago (I did get him to play some HackMaster a few years ago, but now he's a father of twins, living 50 km away from where I live, so that's that).
But I still own the book that introduced me to the hobby.
I'm back, eager to answer the rest of the questions and happy to see that I'm still a part of this (as it is not entirely on me to decide such a thing ...). So without further ado, the next 10 (sorry!) answers.
Day 14: Did you meet your significant other while playing D&D? Does
he or she still play? (Or just post a randomly generated monster in
protest of Valentine's Day)
No, I didn't meet my significant other while playing D&D, but I believe it helped (a bit at least). At the time we met, I still had a regular group and she was living in the neighbourhood. Now, when we played, it had been a rather loud affair, with a lot of laughing involved (as it should be, I believe) and that had garnered some interest.
Me writing stuff about the hobby on a blog did collect some points, too. To be perfectly clear about it, those weren't the reasons for us to be together right now. But it showed some compassion and creativity and those are (for some, at least) valuable character traits. Lucky me :)
She's still interested to try the game, which, sadly enough, only means that we as of yet didn't get around to play the game. But it will happen and I'm looking forward to the occasion ...
Day 15: What was the first edition you didn't enjoy. Why?
3E, hands down. The "why" is spread all over my blog like breadcrumbs. In short, it's a hard game for the DM to be the authority in. Thousands of unreflected splat books, five-foot-steps (as a stand-in for all the board game elements of that edition), the hours of preparation needed on higher levels and all the small unfortunate rules that make it a power gamers wet dream took, for me at least, the fun out of the game really fast.
This is, of course, to some degree a matter of taste.
Day 16: Do you remember your first edition war? Did you win? ;)
I know I had those discussions at some time or another, but do I remember the first one? No. Anyhow, it ain't about winning, either, because seeing it like this already implies an unmovable stance on the subject (any subject, really), which renders a discussion completely useless from the start, in my experience. Worthwhile discussions usually involve people open enough to positions they don't agree with to get to a satisfying conclusion for all involved.
Any topic should be considered a free agent and opinions aren't more than a status of your own knowledge, which I believe to be not set in stone, but subject to change. In the end, defending an issue isn't more than rhetorics, but it involves to be able to see the arguments presented to you in relation to your own. So a "win" would at least mean you got something out of the discussion worth thinking about ...
Day 17: First time you heard D&D was somehow "evil."
"Funny" story right there. The first time I realised this is something "they" are serious about, was in the late nineties. I shared the way home with a classmate. He and his family had recently moved from Bavaria (south Germany, traditionally a bit more conservative then the rest of Germany, I might add) to the neighbourhood and he hadn't befriended that many people yet. Well, we got into talking and role playing games were a subject close to my heart, so some of that talk was about playing the game. He was interested enough and thought about joining our small group of nerds.
The thing is, he was a pastor's son and when he'd told at home what he was about to do, his parents wouldn't allow him to do so. I was, of course, shunned after that, too. When confronting him about it, he'd told me (and I kid you not) that his parent's had a book at home with advice about what activities would be unsafe (even dangerous) for their children to participate in. Their son starting to play role playing games was for them like he was about to join a satanic sect.
There was nothing to do about it but feeling sorry for him.
Day 18: First gaming convention you ever attended.
The first convention I attended had been the MaRT (Mannheimer Rollenspiel Tage). Not much to tell you about it, because this was a really long time ago (almost 20 years) and I barely remember the event.
Five things stayed with me, though. The convention had been held in a park (which had been quite idyllic), a friend of mine had brought his (very strange) girlfriend, it was the first time I encountered Cyberpunk (and fell in love with the system) and Deadlands (not so much, but a nice enough game) and there had been no option to stay over night. But the fifth and most important thing that had happened was that they gave out flyers for yet another con in the area. But this one was over the course of 3 days with an option to stay over night. A convention we would visit for years to come from then on.
Day 19: First gamer who just annoyed the hell out of you.
The stereotypes illustrated in Knights of the Dinner Table are no strangers to me. I've known guys like that and even played with them occasionally or had them in my group.
A classic: the first KotDT comic strip (full story here).
So over the years I have had my share of strange and adverse gamers with all the struggles, discussions and drama one might expect with such people. I tend to forget about those things and don't think they are worth remembering so it took some time to think of one. Here I go ...
One of the first, if not the first, that "annoyed the hell out of me" had been a guy in our Vampire: The Masquerade game in the late Nineties. While everyone else at the table was playing the game, he had been drawing some stupid picture. After an hour of trying to get everyone at the table immersed into the story, I had enough of him being so dismissive and told him to either go somewhere else to do his thing or give the game at least a chance.
It's something that still bothers me every now and then. Basically I believe if I took the time to prepare and DM the game, I at least want to share it with people that take it as serious as I am. If that's too much, those people could as well do something else instead of wasting my time.
Day 20: First non-D&D RPG you played.
Midgard was my first non-D&D RPG. There is no English source page I could link you to, but I wrote a bit about it here.
Day 21: First time you sold some of your D&D books--for whatever reason.
I have never done that, but, being a bookseller by trade (well, at least it's the job I have learned), I always had a hard time parting with the books I own ...
Day 22: First D&D-based novel you ever read (Dragonlance Trilogy, Realms novels, etc.)
That had happened long before I started to play D&D and I read it because I had been told it was good fantasy. And indeed, I had a great time with the book just for the story and world it presented.
So my first D&D-based book (without me realizing what I was reading about, but enjoying it nonetheless) had been The Verdant Passage by Troy Denning:
Great books (as far as I remember, anyway) and a great setting I always wanted to check out further ...
Day 23: First song that comes to mind that you associate with D&D. Why?
This seems like a strange question at first, but I believe every gamer has a song just like that. Mine is connected to a time were we still had been enthusiastic enough to play (or make characters or draw maps or daydream about campaigns ...) at every given opportunity.
So it was nothing special that we (me and a friend of mine) were sitting in a garden, enjoying the summer sun, slinging dice. But the neighbours daughter, on the other hand, sunbathing topless and barely veiled by the shrubbery dividing the properties had been a welcome change of pace the day I'm talking about (and maybe this is why I remember it so well?) ...
Anyway, I digress. So we were sitting there with some cold lemonade on the table and the radio playing in the background, giving some barbarian a run for his xp. He had just entered a tomb and was about to confront a few skeletons when the radio started playing an old classic:
So we cranked up the volume, went with the flow and started rolling initiative. But most of the time we were too busy laughing.
Day 24: First movie that comes to mind that you associate with D&D. Why?
Easy, but I guess it seems to be a strange choice at first (or not - I mean, it is kind of obvious, isn't it?). Behold:
One of the coolest movies ever made ...
Big Trouble in Little China is, in my opinion, more D&D without being D&D than most that try. A group of heroes (led by a wizard, no less) enter a big dungeon (with beautiful and mystical underground passages, full of traps and monsters) to defeat what might as well be called a Lich and rescue a few damsels in distress! It even has potions and a beholder:
All that and Kung Fu. What's not to love?
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That were a lot of questions. The rest will be easier and I have the time to write them all (and a bit more, I hope).
The first store I bought my gaming supplies from goes by the name Fantasy Forest and is in Mannheim, Germany. And yes, online research revealed that it is still around (which is amazing in it's own right). My last visit must have been in the last millennium. Here are two pictures:
This was the store where I bought the Rules Cyclopedia! I'm planning on visiting them again some time in the next weeks. For nostalgic reasons and some treasure hunting ...
This may come to you as a surprise, but I'm not a big fan of miniatures. For me they have no place in role playing games where the mind should roam free without visual aids tempering with the illusion. The emphasis the companies put on the relevance of little plastic figurines in D&D was what ruined 3E for me (well, it had been one of the main reasons ...) and made it easy for me to ignore 4E entirely.
If I want to play a board game, I'll do just that.
But I had to try before coming to this conclusion, right? So one of the first sets I looted for D&D (and I guess I'm not alone in this) where the miniatures from the legendary Hero Quest. Here is a picture of the German edition of the game:
Formed my vision of how the game should look long before anything else ...
And that's it for today, folks. The next two questions demand separate posts. And I really should write something else in between. Let's see if I'm up to that. The weekend is fast approaching, after all.
Sometimes these questions really put me back in time. So much stuff I haven't thought about for years. Turns out my answers are not so much about D&D this time, but about my earliest experiences as a gamer. Some very early impressions, if you will. And some more German gamer paraphernalia.
First bought gaming magazine?
&
First splat book I begged my DM to allow?
At first I thought I had nothing to say about this question. I asked myself what a magazine is supposed to do. Inform, support, inspire, stuff like that. I couldn't think of a gaming magazine that ever did something like this for me. Or could I?
Before I really was into role playing games, me and my brother had owned an Amiga 500. We had loved that machine, of course. We had played a lot of games back in the day. And now that I was sitting here, thinking what my first gaming magazine had been, I wandered back to that time when the fourth official Indiana Jones installment had been a computer game.
And yes, I remember those journeys to the next newsdealer, eager to get the newest issue as soon as it was published and reading like a holy text. Right there it was, the first gaming magazine I've ever purchased: the Amiga Joker (the following examples are from this archive):
March 1992! Where is all the time gone ...
Monkey Island 1 & 2, Lemmings, Worms, The Chaos Engine, Eye of the Beholder, all those beautiful games and memories. But there was more than just computer games. The Amiga Joker had been one of the few magazines that had a two page column about board games and (wait for it ...) role playing games! They'd called it Stromausfall (Eng.: power outage). Look:
A board game about neanderthals ...
... and a pen & paper role playing game about teddy bears.
It was fascinating, opening new worlds for me every time. Most of those games landed on my wish list. Most of them would stay there, too. But I that's the way it had been, knowing and dreaming about those games had been more important to me than owning and playing them.
So one of my early sources for ideas and information about role playing games was the Amiga Joker, a German computer magazine. Now I have to revisit that archive. A trip down memory lane is in order ...
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Not so much luck with the splat books, unfortunately. I'm really a DM most of the time so I never was in that position and my players are not invested enough to buy stuff and argue about using it after the fact. Not even during our 3E buying frenzies.
Why is it Sunday already? Somebody needs to be blamed for this ... Anyway, for now I'll keep the rhythm I am at. Two answers per post as long as my answers are short seems reasonable enough, I guess.
First Dice?
&
First Campaign Setting?
The dice were from the Midgard Basic Boxed Set, my first role playing game (I wrote a bit about it here). Do I still own them? ... Honestly? I don't know. There is a good chance, though. Using that word again should be an SEO nightmare by now, but I've been at many conventions and dice tend to migrate a lot with time and on different tables. I lost track of those things a decade ago.
To make up for my short comings (at least in this regard, ha), I'd go and tell you a "first dice" story my cousin once told me. It was about his first own set six sided dice. It's a bit crazy and, I believe, worth sharing.
Where I grew up, gumball machines were something you could find in every neighbourhood. For some change (Pfennige) you could either get gum or, if you were lucky, some toys that had been in the mix. Some of it you could make out by looking beyond the transparent walls of those machines.
Those things often were near playgrounds and ways to schools [source].
Some of the stuff you could get were plastic rings, rubber balls, rubber animals and ... six sided dice. So my cousin had started to play with us and didn't own dice at first. There were enough of those at the table, but, as every gamer worth his salt will do with time, he wanted to have his own set.
While I'm not quite sure where he got his first D20 (or even if he bought those other dice before the six sided dice), I know for sure those dice were the first of it's kind he owned. And yes, he had deliberately bought them from a gumball machine.
You have to realize, now, that the output of those machines was random. So he had seen the dice somewhere at the front behind those plastic windows, had felt the urge to get them and had to, literally, buy his way through hands full of chewing gum and plastic toys before he could get his loot. I really admired his determination.
As you can imagine, he loved those dice with all of his heart. And he was lucky with them. So very lucky.
Don't know if he still owns them, though. Have to ask him ...
And I have to say, what a trip down memory lane. Those gumball machines are history now. Haven't seen one (or thought about them) in ages.
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My first campaign world was not a D&D world, but an official Midgard setting called Alba. It had been a mix of medieval Scottish culture on a fictive continent with some low fantasy elements in the mix. Here is a map to give you an impression:
You see all that free space on that map? It had been perfect. A solid frame and enough room to fill the blanks with the own creativity. Had been my longest lasting campaign, too. I should revisit it some time in the future.
For now I'd just say that the mix of real world fantasy for flavour and the basic fantasy tropes (with lots of room to navigate in between) had worked very well for the campaign and it reminded me that it's worth thinking about the importance of setting specifics like this in our games.
I know I'm cutting corners here, but the real meaty questions coem later this month and I hope I'll get a good chunk done on the weekend. Now for the next two questions in the challenge!
First character death?
&
First D&D product I ever bought?
They never died on me. And that's not a good thing either, because they didn't really have a chance to live to begin with. It's all because I'm most of the time a DM and the rare occasions I get to play a character aren't of the long lasting sort. Well, those that should have been lasting, didn't even develop most of the time. So there is that.
But that question got me thinking. I had a few characters that had potential. Real heart breakers. They had been made, some had even seen some actual play time. I loved them all. Their fate, in my opinion, is worse than any death they could have experienced in the game. They got forgotten and, ultimately, lost forever.
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The first D&D product I ever bought had become my go-to reference of the game and is almost the sole reason for my blogging. Behold:
Not that I saw it's potential back in the day. That had been back in the 90's and the decision to get it was because it said "complete" on the cover and I always wanted some D&D book for my collection and that was where it landed for some time.
Funny thing is, I did try to start a campaign with it as we formed a new group. Alas I didn't get into it and after an adventure we thought it was better to switch to another system (which did work so good that the campaign we started had lasted for 5 years ...).
If asked now I'd say I still don't understand the books full depth. Maybe it's not that intimidating anymore and I'm beginning to see where the loose parts fit.
The first Dungeon I ran as a DM (the second part of today's question)is incidentally still my favourite dungeon EVER: Rappan Athuk. But I wrote a bit about it end of last year during the 30 Day Challenge. For the new and uninitiated, the post is here. And now a short one about the first part of the question ...
The first Dungeon I explored as a player-character.
On rare occasions I have the opportunity to be a player in our regular group. One such occasion was years after we started to play D&D. At the time we had already migrated to HackMaster. I felt a bit like playing and one of our players felt a bit like giving HackMaster a spin or two. He chose one of the modules available, prepared it and we had two wonderful sessions playing the HackMaster variant of the legendary Keep on the Borderlands:
At least some eye candy is this post ...
It really was the first time I experienced a classic dungeon module as a player. And I loved it! We kicked some serious ass and got as far as fighting some Hobgoblins. But we never got a chance to finish it, which is a shame. Some day, maybe.
If you ever get a chance to check out the "hacked" version of the Keep, don't hesitate to do so. The HackMaster books are a treat. Maybe I should compare the two versions some time ...
Turns out today was till yesterday somewhere else, so that's good. Won't be that close today and maybe I should start writing those in advance. Here comes Day 2!
The first person I introduced to D&D?
Which Edition? Their first character.
I remember this very well, maybe because it had been a conscious effort when it happened and took some time get there. And when I write "time" I don't mean the time it needs to convince someone, but the time it needs to get "old enough to play". I know, it sounds somewhat arbitrary and I've read about people that started playing as early as 10 years old. It's just that "old enough" is something where the perceptions of all those involved need to align to make it work.
So my seven years younger cousin had to wait until he'd turned 16 to get an offer to join us.
He had been ready the whole time, though. I remember two occasions that showed his early potential. One time my brother and I where playing Hero Quest at my grandparent's house. We had been 12 and 11, so my cousin would have been 5. He was barely able to look over the edge of the table, but he wanted to play so very bad.
Of course we didn't let him, being 7 years older and hitting puberty hard. I couldn't tell you why I remember that so clearly, but it's to this day that I see his excitement and disappointment ...
The second thing I remember is how he had loved our Amiga 500. He was 7 and we had lots of cool games plus two joysticks for two-player-fun, so yeah, what's not to love. When he was over at our house, he would play. When he played, the whole body moved with the joystick and the neighbours would hear him cheering it up. He was good at those games, too.
Naturally he was aware of the fact that we were playing role playing games. Of course he wanted to play. And I believe it was in the year 2002 when I asked the group if they wanted to add him as a player-on-trial. I had been pretty confident that he'd be able to pull it off and they agreed to give it a go.
We weren't playing D&D at the time but had a very intensive campaign Vampire: The Dark Ages going. Anyway, 3E was the hype and I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to get started with D&D.
That's how it started. He has been a player at my table ever since. 3E did take it's toll on how he perceives the game and we don't agree on most topics, system-wise. But he's an excellent player natural gamer.
His first real character had been a magic-user with the name Elmin (yeah, a bit obvious where that name came from), famous for his short fuse. If the group took their time to decide the best way to handle a situation, you could count on him going all in, charging into the situation. This went as far as other players positioning their characters close enough to tackle him, if need be. Despite his suicidal tendencies, he survived every encounter although being a magic user (which was quite the task ...).
Cutting the first one a bit close, but here I am. Where I'm sitting it's still before midnight. Again it's about a convention. But this time with some fond memories. Good times had been had. Let's get this started!
The first person who introduced me to D&D, what edition had it been and what had been my first character.
It was at my first visit of a local convention. I must have been 19. I already had some experience as a DM but didn't yet have the courage to offer my own game to strangers. We were there to play and learn about new systems, so that was what we did.
At the time I've only heard stories about D&D (and few at that). As far as I'm aware (it has been at least 14 years ago now ...) I knew D&D was the first role playing game, nothing more.
Anyway, a big table was offered with a mid-level game. Those guys had been older than me (four years, if I remember correctly) and that was quite intimidating. Older meant more experienced and they sure as hell did show the appropriate attitude.
Anyway, we wanted to play, so we had to prove ourselves. We sat there for at least 15 hours. Most of it had been making a character, eating and waiting. It had been AD&D and that game was slow! But fun was had nonetheless.
I only remember a few bits of the adventure itself, but my first character had been a level 6 (?) halfling. The adventure had been about a tournament and some dark power (a succubus) manipulating some Lord.
My first Big Bad D&D Monster ...
I know we fought that beastie in the end and I had been lucky enough to survive. I also remember a scene where my character tried to steal a sausage from a dwarf (another PC, the characters didn't know each other at the time) and failed. Other than that it was the sensation to come out of this with an invitation to join again if we were to attend the next year that what stayed with me.
Now that I think about it I realize how much has changed since then. D&D had been huge at the time, now it's either the Next Best Edition or considered a relic (at least where I live). Anyway, we sure as hell sat at that same table a year later ...
I joined that. Stelios V. Perdios over at D20 Dark Ages is hosting and taking it serious. No crap Questions like with the one last year (which was not hosted by him, but still fun!) and nicely organized. I'm very much looking forward to this!
I hope to get some of my mojo back while reminiscing about the olden days and read some entertaining answers by the other (so far) 19 blogs that did join also.
If you're not already on board with this I challenge thee to consider. All you need to do so is found here. The blog hop begins at the 1st of Februrary, enlisting is closed in 16 days (2/7/2014) from now.
Now I have to find out how to implement that permanent link-thingy and where I should put it ...
