May 08
I’ve been fairly seething with jealousy recently at the news that Klayton Kendall of Springs/Colorado Culture Cast and the blogger known only as Nonprophet started a group who’re playing Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. I, like many admitted geeks, played for a time in my junior-high and high-school years. I was even a DM. But it’s been years since I picked up the ol’ dice.
Klayton’s been documenting the group’s adventures over at his new blog, and I’ve been avidly (and very secretly) following along. The campaign, which is one of Klayton’s invention, sounds awesome. I really, really, REALLY want to join the group. AD&D is just fun, and now that I’m in a position to be a cultural trendsetter—or at least informer—I don’t have to worry about being ostracized from the junior-high lunchroom because of the suede dice bag I plan to tie around my belt and carry with me everywhere. I even got married, so that whole getting laid thing is taken care of. It’s almost as if I planned this!
At last night’s PPEC function, I buttonholed Klayton and begged him to let me into the group. He agreed, but I have a feeling that my membership is probationary, my continuing welcome a function of me not being such a goddamn spaz about it all. And what character class shall I be? Duh. A mage. This is going to be the best summer ever.
Posted by: Aaron Retka in Gay for ... | Permalink
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Enthusiasm is rewarded in the Atryahs campaign world! I kid you not: today someone sent me a freaking 6-page character description, complete with pictures and footnotes, which totally made my day, because not only was the back-story for the character incredibly stylized, but it actually added details to the campaign setting that I really don’t have time to think about for myself. Good players know exactly how to lighten the DM’s workload. And they get rewarded! My original group of players (newbies mostly) have all put lots of time and thought into their characters, and they’ve come up with a boatload of neat stuff that I would have never considered in a million years.
So, Aaron, part of your “probationary period” will be to: 1) contribute to the blog in the next few weeks, and 2) work up at least three pages of hilarious bullshit on your wizard.
I’ll send you the necessary materials, and we can work behind the scenes to incorporate your character into the narrative….
Geeks ahoy!
Volunteering to take care of the unmet sexual needs of women who find themselves neglected as a by-product of this heathenish behavior.
“Honey, you wanna..?”
“Shh, I’m working on my wizard’s backstory!”
1-800-TRACHEA
I have an inside scoop on this game. It is a female dominated group AND all these women are very attractive.
So you better start writing your back-story, Deep Trachea, because the phone isn’t going to be ringing…
I know that none of you will be able to believe this, but I was an AD&D geek for many of my formative years.
I still have my pewter miniatures, dice, and ALL of the 1st edition AD&D hardcover books (plus many Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance extras).
To say that I’m jealous of this gaming group would be an understatement. My jealousy is +4.
Kevin, you are not alone. My hope is that all game-related jealousy can be relieved within a year’s time, as satellite gaming groups form and local-biz sponsored conventions and gaming parties crop up throughout our fair city. There needs to be a grass-roots alternative to Gen Con (which is held in Indianapolis of all places) that is about players playing games, not corporations like Hasbro stroking off for four straight days. Don’t ask me how all of this will work, because I really don’t know, and I really don’t care. It’s important enough just to dream big — but start small.
DT: the days of little boys with wooden swords traipsing about a Tolkien-inspired Puritan Candy Land are far from over, but what successful TV shows like Battlestar Galactica have proven is that sci-fi/fantasy can be, and must be, more than that if the genre is to survive into the 21st century. Robert E. Howard will always be my greatest inspiration, because there’s essentially nothing wrong with the male desire to smash skulls and spray blood all over the dungeon wall, but the feminine imagination, when allowed to flourish amidst the carnage, clearly brings a depth to narrative development that no male can match. Imagine if Arnold Schwarzenegger had starred in a film adaptation of Willa Cather’s My Antonia set on the planet Venus (and the townsfolk are all horned ape-men), and you get a small taste of the glorious insanity of it all.
As a minimum we should be able to raise the level of the narrative from what it was when we were in junior high school, and a fantasy RPG when played right works more as interactive fiction than it does as a contest to see who knows how many hit points an Umber Hulk has. (63, suckas!)
That, and the fact that I’m a dwarve named Rufus who has 3 hot elf/half-elf chicks as his traveling companions kind of takes some of the dork out of it.
It’s Charlie’s Angels, Medieval style.
Better start writing your back-story, DT, if you wanna get in on the hot Elf chick action!
“Charlie’s Angels, Medieval style”…… Love it!