I consider myself a pretty big geek. I’ve played Magic: The Gathering competitively at a decent level. I am not intimidated by a board game who’s rulebook has a spine. I even made a Naxxramas campaign for Descent which took 7 hours (yeah, totally didn’t playtest that one right). For my friends and myself, our version of a nightcap is a game of Ricochet Robots or Acquire. And of course the video game section of my life as well. I think I still have screenshots saved on my computer from beastly Counter-Strike matches. Then we can get into other geeky things, like programming, web development, etc.
But from all the geeky things I have done, there was always one that eluded me. I had never played Dungeons and Dragons. I didn’t have an averseness to it, I was just never in a situation to actually play the game.
Until last Wednesday to some extent. I needed an evening away from a computer screen so I headed down to my local game shop. Despite finding a lack of folks interested in the WoW TCG or a Magic draft that night, a couple friends, including one of our guildies who was the DM for this game session.
This particular gaming session was called Dungeons and Dragons Encounters. From what I know about DnD and what not, basically it seems like a quick and easy get-into-the-game campaign for people. So I grabbed a pre-made character (a Drow Warlock) sat down with my dice bag (I play Magic, who doesn’t own dice?) and embarked on my first DnD campaign.
Now I know DnD came first, but given my experience playing all manner of other games, like the aforementioned Descent, Hero’s Quest, etc, jumping into DnD wasn’t all the difficult. I know there are big rulebooks, different versions of those rules, and all manner of things I have no clue about yet, but reading the character sheet and understanding the mechanics was pretty simple.
But there was one thing I learned at this 2 hour gaming session.
Some kids have the attention span of a goldfish. One kid had a PSP with him and was constantly playing a fighting game except for the 30 seconds he could pull himself away to pay attention to what was going on. Another kid couldn’t stop shouting “ALVENOR!” over and over again (the name of his character).
It’s like tapping on the glass of the fishbowl, “Hey, *tap tap* it’s your turn to do something.”
Now I don’t consider myself much of a roleplayer. I would have fun writing up a backstory and I wouldn’t ruin anyone roleplaying experience. But I had a good time. A couple other folks I know who have a slightly larger attention span will be joining us this week so I look forward to Wednesday night.
If you happen to be in the Northern Utah area, feel free to join us at the Game Grid.
As a long time dnd rp gamer, you’ll tire of the goldfish soon I suspect. That kid represents a large part of the player base, who don’t really care for story; just loot, stats, and xp.
If you’re keen to play dnd find a solid mature group. When you get a good group its a totally different game.
One of my other friends who’s pretty big into it is joining us this Wednesday will hopefully replace one of our goldfish. But I guess after such a large amount of PUG raiding, the goldfish didn’t annoy me too quickly. But I definitely know my limits. :)
ive spent my whole weekend playing Dungeon and Dragons aswell, my friend from more south in denmark took the train up here, and we played Dungeon and Dragons with my Neighbor who was our DM, its hell of a lot fun, especially with friends you know, and a good DM.
what Version of DnD will you be going to play? 4.0? 3.5? older? newer? and do you know what campaign?(if its premade)
wtb Edit option^^
Ahem..*cough* what Version of DnD will you be going to play? 4.0? 3.5? or is it an older or newer version? so far i have only been playing 3.5 & 4.0. the 3.5 is more RP based with lot of Utility spells and you get a more feel of actually Role playing, while the 4.0 is more combat minded(think hack and slash) its easier to get into, but its also more focused on the dungeons or caves or w/e is filled with mobs to slash yourself through, instead of lot of Traps riddles and roleplaying. it still has a lot of fighting and combat, but in a totally different way. 4.0 has stuff like “Encounter powers(1 use per encounter), Daily powers, Utility powers and on-demand powers, while in the 3.5 you have to prepare the magics you intend or think you need to use in the future.
Ruleset, honestly I am not sure. but according to your statement, I would assume 4.0 since we did have encounter powers. And the campaign is premade with specific things to help ease new players into the game I think. The overview is here: http://wizards.com/dnd/Event.aspx?x=dnd/4new/event/dndencounters
Looking forward to tomorrow.
My first attempt at serious DND ended up with my buying a Suduko book in attempt to fill in the gaps while waiting for people to take their turn and make a decision. I have to make sure my Iphone is away during our current campaign because it does get distracting, and when you have 6 players taking turns to roll it gets a bit ” But I would have clearned naxx by now.. “