Dungeony Goodness

In case you haven't seen the awesomeness that is the Year of the Dungeon, you should. Go there DnD peeps; you will not regret it.

Late Bloomer

I'm a late bloomer. Not in the when-I-got-hair-down-there sense, but as a geek.

Not in the greater-world sense. I was always socially awkward and had a Hermione-like need to answer every question a teacher threw at a class. When I was five I gave my 20-something aunt a lecture on the proper pronunciation of counting is Spanish because "I've seen it on Sesame Street!" (which means I know everything. Duh).

But in the nerd-world sense. Unlike my husband, I didn't grow up in a pocket of well-defined nerds with super-humanly-smart parents who watched Star Wars daily (yes, one of our friends did that as a child) who all played D&D together as they grew up. I just wasn't exposed to it. I didn't know what D&D was in high school, and I grew up in a family that still questions its relationship to my Christian upbringing and ties to Satanic worship.

I didn't know Magic or WoW and probably would've thought GURPS was an STD.

I remember very clearly my first D&D game. We played in the penthouse in one of the dorm towers at our college, and with the city sprawled below us I ventured out as the halfling rogue Elizabaum Roseleaf (she'll always be my favorite). JJMIV's friends had stopped in for a few hours during a road trip and in the chatter before the game they were talking about various girlfriends' refusals to play D&D. At all. Ever. I was already the only girl, it was the first time meeting any of JJMIV's friends from high school, and I'd never played before.

I was more nervious than a prize piggy in a bacon factory. And this wasn't helping What if I sucked!? Does it diminish my nerd-cred if I don't know how to play? What if I'm reinforcing the stereotypes of girl gamers and bla, bla, bla...

We've all seen the movie-magic stereotype of what gamers are. The Comic Book Guys of the world. Ready to sass you to prove their Epic Nerd Superiority (or compensate for something, perhaps?).

And I would argue that there's some truth to the myth. If you run in nerdy circles long enough it eventually happens ~ you invite your cute new lady-pal along to a gathering. Your inescapable, socially inept Sheldon-line pal comes too. And he rips her up for confusing Star Wars and Star Trek, even though she has a legit science/math/cool-other-shit degree. But why does his opinion matter in the first place?

Well, because being a nerd isn't just about the gaming. Or the science. Or knowing a lot of cool things that no one else understands. Nerds who found a group as kids grew up in a pocket of like-minded fellows. Sure, they went through all the other crap we all go through, but they had Saturday morning gaming sessions to help them cope.

But Late Bloomers; we had our own set of challanges. Trying to find other people who liked science as much as we did. An outlet to rally around. Doing a ton of activities, but not really feeling like we had a place where it all came together.

I think Jim from American Pie 2 says it really well: "Nadia. I am a band geek. I just never joined band."

Being a nerd is partially about inclusion. I played that first D&D game when I was 20. That winter JJMIV also taught me how to play Magic and Risk. I built my first decks and got my ass handed to me by a bunch of 13 year olds at a few Booster Draft tournaments. You know what? It was awesome. Sure, those 13 year olds looked at me like I was a jerk and I had no clue what I was doing. But I loved it. We bought Carcasson and it seemed like there was always something to do or play or someone to hang out with.

And that first D&D game was awesome too. The guys we played with are now my friends and they didn't mind pausing to show me where to look on my character sheet to tally my bonuses. They liked teaching the game. Though some are Sheldon-esque at times I've realized that SO AM I. Now I'm DMing my own adventures.

Late Bloomers are an important part of our community. They're refreshing, and it's wonderful to see the faces of people who've never gamed before realize how much they love it. Being in theatre it's bonus-exciting because there are so many natural story tellers. People who really get into the background of their characters. (I just wish one of us could DRAW! It makes me jealous of Gabe & Tyko all the time).

This year we've taught 2 more people D&D who never played before. My friend Hannah (whose SWEET Dragon-born Paladin saves my Shaman Human's butt every week) said to me last week "I can't believe I never played D&D in high school. You guys must thing I'm so behind."

Nope. You know why? Because I'm a Late Bloomer too. And being a geek takes all kinds. Welcome to the fold.

You Spin Me Right Round, Baby!

Whoo!

What a crazy couple of weeks it has been for both of us. D&D, opening the Haunted Hotel,Sam & Andrew's wedding (good friends from Yale) and my first commercial!

We've been playing Keep On The Shadowfell and John is DMing. We've had a few great sessions and one 10 HOUR MARATHON and we're finally getting to the meat of it all. I have to commend our friend Brian, he's playing an evil avenger of Bahamut (I still haven't figured it out either) and did some of the best RP I've ever seen last session. He convinced a Hobgoblin War Chief to hire us, and then we killed him. And took over the clan. And sent them somewhere else. It was brilliant.





I've included a pic of Brian so you can see the amazing shirt he was wearing during these shenanigans.

The Haunted Hotel has been equally satisfying. It's at City Tech (where J teaches) and they brought me in to work with the actors. It was an interesting challenge to bring a room full of Tech students who have never acted up to speed in an hour. There were bumps, but we opened last weekend and from all I can tell everyone is having a lot of fun with it.

This weekend I filmed my first commercial spot. It should be up on the interwebs in a few weeks, and you can bet your sweet pinky toe nail that I'll be posting it everywhere possible, so stay tuned.

Finally; on Sunday we went to the wedding of our friends Samantha and Andrew and it was wonderful. Quite possibly the funnest wedding I've ever been to, including our own. They have wonderful taste and every detail was perfect ~ it was really wonderful to be a part of it. Below are some of my favorite pics from the afternoon.

~DMcC

D&D Anyone?

Just wanted to share my favorite shot from a photo shoot I did last week with Nathan Blaney. The nerds in the audience will appreciate it in a big way!

Nathan was a lot of fun to work with and was willing to experiment with my gaming concepts a little. This is John's favorite too.

We're sharing the couch at the moment and prepping for a game on Saturday with our friends Ben & Jen (BJen, as you may know them). It'll be my second round of DMing and I'm trying to keep my conscious mind occupied while I come up with schemes of the best way to meddle in the lives of these "helpless" player characters. Muahahaha.

After Action Report - Barbarians of Nenlast

Last weekend, Darlene took up the mantle of the DM for the first time. Since a DM needs players, I obliged and played the role of Brevan, eladrin fighter and scion of the House of the Autumn Leaves. Gnell the gnome bard was played by Amanda, our dear and true friend.

What follows is an excerpt from Brevan's fieldbook:
Having met on business in Hammerfast, Gnell and I came to travel together to Nenlast, a small fishing village on the eastern shore of Lake Nen. I was questing after an ancient magical spear, rumored to have been lost on the field of battle near modern-day Nenlast. Gnell was making an annual visit to her uncle Gniven, delivering metal goods from Hammerfast for use at his inn.

The people of Nenlast were ill at ease, and with good reason. The Tigerclaw barbarians, who usually trade furs for salted meat and metalwork, had taken up the habit of raiding for their goods. The fishers and farmers of Nenlast were no match for these brutal and experienced warriors, and had been totally unable to repel them. Needless to say, we took it upon ourselves to confront the barbarians. We gathered what information we could from the villagers about the whereabouts and habits of the barbarians, then set off into the wilderness in search of our quarry.

It was our intention to reason with the Tigerclaws, who had been honest trading partners in the past, but the Tigerclaws would have none of it. We were ambushed by an archer and a beastmaster with trained dogs. The barbarians attacked immediately, without warning and without asking any questions. We bested them swiftly and took the archer as a prisoner. Through a mixture of interrogation and tracking, the entrance to the lair of the brigands was soon found.

The camp was located inside an ancient ruin. Though the wall was crumbling, and had lost much of its former glory, it was still high enough to keep out intruders and boasted a magically sealed gate. Gnell, being as skilled in the ways of magic as she is at playing the mandolin, quickly deciphered the magical lock and opened the way.

Inside the camp, we found not barbarian warriors, but city-dwellers from the south. They had in their tents furs and facepaints like the Tigerclaws wear, but they used them only as costumes for scaring the villagers. Their leader, Regdis, was an accomplished warrior and was assisted by a woman mage with mastery over lightning. They were formidable opponents, but were ultimately defeated. Regdis had a letter from an unknown third party named Korin. They were appartently quarreling, but there were no clues about why these people were so far from home, or why they were impersonating the Tigerclaws.

Nenlast appears now to be safe, but for how long? And what has become of the true Tigerclaw clanspeople? I have some further inquiries to make in town about the old battlefield. Perhaps I will also dig deeper into this mystery.

Sage Advice

After being out of commission with my first NYC cold I'm finally getting back on my feet. Unfortunately, it means I haven't had a chance to write another post... so instead I'll be sharing the wonderful input of our dear friend Ben.

In response to my "OMG I'm going to DM!!" post Ben sent an e-mail with some guidance, and I thought it would fit well into the flow as I develop as a Dungeon Master. Unfortunately for my victims... uhh, I mean "players" (hee hee) I didn't receive his e-mail before we played on Saturday (I'll explain later). For now, here you go:

I've been pondering what nuggets of juicy wisdom I can add to what John would tell you about GMing. The first detail that I thought you might not have stressed is that DnD4e has just about every conceit that the theater has. The action is broken down into scenes and acts with a very specific structure for how the action is resolved. While there is nothing wrong with this, and in fact much that is good about it, there are other ways to operate. It is possible to instead conduct the action in a more literary fashion where the primary motivation for playing is developing the characters. This is more akin to what White Wolf games (Vampire, Werewolf, Exalted) try and do. These other games take longer to play since you don't just race to the boss fight and kill as fast as you can. And they also take a different priorities amongst the players and GM.

The other detail that John may well have mentioned but I feel it good to bring up. I, for one, find the best antagonists to be intelligent beings doing what we would consider reasonable if the story were told from their point of view. Like the old Wizard trying to achieve immortality. Our only gripe with him is the collateral damage caused by the ritual. It makes the moral life of the characters more than just words on the page. Again these are harder to motivate and pull together for one-shots and are better suited to a campaign.

Lastly, don't just give experience for what the book tells you to. Do your characters only learn and grow from killing things or set piece skill challenges? The point of the game is to have fun and tell a good story. Whatever helps that gets experience.

Simple Folk (Spoiler)

After writing my blog post last night I started looking through the setting maps in the 4.0 DMG and reading through the descriptions. I'm already familiar with some of the areas from the campaigns that JJMIV has been running, so I wanted to working in an area that we haven't already been playing in his world.

As I browsed the book I came upon the humble fishing village of Nenlast. It's nestled in the northeast corner of the map, a few days from Hammerfast.

Text fromthe DMG:

This tiny human village lies at the east end of Lake Nen. The folk here make a meager living by trading smoked fish to the dwarfs of Hammerfast. They also deal with the Tigerclaw barbarians of the Winderbole Forest. When the wild fold choose to trade, they come to Nenlast to barter their pelts and amber for good dwarven metalwork.

I feel a little lame. I wanted to build a great campaign with crazy monsters that made my PCs go "WHAT!?"; but alas, I've disappointed myself. I've written a straight-up brigand campaign.

From my notes last night, here's my concept:

The simple people of Nenlast have recently fallen to despair; the Tigerclaw barbarians have been praying on their simple lives, but who can help them? The local militia are simple fishermen and can do little to stop the wild woodsmen.

While there are a few surprises on the way, our adventurers will mostly be taking on the bad boys in the woods. I'm fleshing out the details of the role playing and encounters, and then it's go time! Still have to work out the treasure.

One thing that drove me crazy was the Monster Creator from Wizards of the Coast. "Why?" You ask. Well, I put together all my baddies and though I had everything ready to print... only to realize that it wouldn't print out neat little cards like the Character Creator does for your PC! Why not!? AND - if you've put something in your "clip board" you can't pull it back up to print it. Lame. Meh, it's beta.

Time to get my peeps to roll up characters. Here we go!

-D Mc C

Dungeon Mastery

One thing about New York: because we were apart all summer we've been spending a lot of time together. It's also the first time since we've been together that neither of us is going to school. The trick is finding something to do with that time. So? We've been playing a bunch of D&D.

And it got me thinking about what goes into a game. I've watched John pull together dozens of games since we've been together, but I've never helped; I always felt like I didn't know enough. Well, a person has to start somewhere, right?

So I'm taking on the mantle. I'm slipping behind the screen. I'm going to DM my very first adventure.

Obviously, JJMIV is going to help (how could he not?). We've been listening a lot to the D&D podcasts of the gents from Penny Arcade, Scott from PVP, and (sigh) Wil Wheaton. John and I thought it would be fun for me to blog my DM journey.

(For those playing, I'll warn you when there's a spoiler coming)

I've read the Monster Manual and DMG to start with, though it seems my first major road block is not what I expected: I can't find where to start! The thing I'm having most trouble with is inspiration for a story, a plot. Just that drop that starts the creative juices a-flowin'. Nothing. I've tried having JJMIV tell me about a character he wants to play. I've looked at fan fiction and artwork on-line. I've even tried Wiki-How.

Nada.

I think I'm going to have to bite the bullet and force it. (Insert "last night" joke about your mom here)

-D Mc C