Another year of #RPGaDay has begun and Day One's one word prompt is appropo: "Beginning."
If you want to go back the to early beginnings of role-playing, Year one covers First RPG Played and First RPG GM'ed.
Through the army, college, and real life back in my hometown, I was a once a week gamer. It didn't necessarily mean an RPG, and there were sure gaps of play time, but getting D&D, Magic, or Battletech set up was never a problem.
Once I moved out of my area, eventually met a girl, and settled down just far enough away from my hometown, gaming turned into a monthly extravaganza to justify the hour-long drive everyone needed to make (regardless of whose house we were meeting at.) The bulk of those games were our 1920's era Call of Cthulhu games, culminating in the completion of Masks of Nylarathotep.
When that campaign wound down, we were stuck in a bit of a lull. Job promotions, family events, car issues, and other things postponed our monthly meetings.
Until one fateful five-year old's birthday party.
Making small talk with all my gamer friends at the party, one of them let it slip that they were gaming with our college roommate's best friend in his Monday night online game.
I've lamented in previous #RPGaDays of not being more forceful in trying to get into some primo RPG campaigns, so in uncharacteristic form, I walked up to the host of the party (the college roommate) and simply said, "Dude, there's an online game? Can I get in on it? Will Jeff (his friend/the DM) be okay with that?"
Two weeks later I was on Rol20 in a 5e campaign playing Falgor the Mighty, an Elf Barbarian.
For three years we logged up every Monday night from 9-11pm to play D&D. Not to toot my own horn but I'm a pretty awesome addition to a group where I'm not the foci as the primary GM.
If you want to go back the to early beginnings of role-playing, Year one covers First RPG Played and First RPG GM'ed.
Through the army, college, and real life back in my hometown, I was a once a week gamer. It didn't necessarily mean an RPG, and there were sure gaps of play time, but getting D&D, Magic, or Battletech set up was never a problem.
Once I moved out of my area, eventually met a girl, and settled down just far enough away from my hometown, gaming turned into a monthly extravaganza to justify the hour-long drive everyone needed to make (regardless of whose house we were meeting at.) The bulk of those games were our 1920's era Call of Cthulhu games, culminating in the completion of Masks of Nylarathotep.
When that campaign wound down, we were stuck in a bit of a lull. Job promotions, family events, car issues, and other things postponed our monthly meetings.
Until one fateful five-year old's birthday party.
Making small talk with all my gamer friends at the party, one of them let it slip that they were gaming with our college roommate's best friend in his Monday night online game.
I've lamented in previous #RPGaDays of not being more forceful in trying to get into some primo RPG campaigns, so in uncharacteristic form, I walked up to the host of the party (the college roommate) and simply said, "Dude, there's an online game? Can I get in on it? Will Jeff (his friend/the DM) be okay with that?"
Two weeks later I was on Rol20 in a 5e campaign playing Falgor the Mighty, an Elf Barbarian.
For three years we logged up every Monday night from 9-11pm to play D&D. Not to toot my own horn but I'm a pretty awesome addition to a group where I'm not the foci as the primary GM.
- I can distract the table and make jokes like all the other players, but as a ful-time GM normally, I can sense when everyone needs to be wrangled back to the virtual table.
- I actually bought a rulebook for the game
- My preference for wargames has made Falgor tactically diverse and keeps everyone on their toes.
- and what might have been a godsend to keep the group going, I'm the back up GM when we don't have enough (or the right) players to keep things moving.
The game I run are never over-complicated affairs.
- Illuminati University using Risus.
- A Pulp-Style Terraforming Mars game using Risus.
- Call of Cthulhu using college characters set in 1990's Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada.
- Adventures in Gulluvia, a Basic D&D/BECMI adventure that's still set in the my usual FRPG homebrew, but thanks the lethality of low-level BECMI, it's a different animals. Write-Ups should appear weekly on the blog in November.
And let's not forget to give Jeff credit for introducing to us to the Modiphius version of Star Trek for a few sessions as well.
Prior to the Corona-sanity, we were already getting more complications. Everyone had work issues but Jeff the GM had it the worst. I'll find something to run for two other players, but many times it was just myself or one other players.
As COVID descended on us, I made two calls. First an email to Jeff, who admitted he wasn't ready to return behind the virtual scene quite yet, but he could definitely be available consistently as a player. Second was an open casting call among my social media friends. Only one person seriously responded, my wargaming buddy Jim "The Gnome King."
To confirm Jim was compatible with the group, I ran some connected one-shots, Bigg Melons in the Time of COVID and The Great Hall of COVIDiots, again using Risus for mechanics and Coffee Shop by James d'Amato for set-up.
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| If you don't use video, you avoid the great cosplay |
It worked well, and with a quick survey. we were off on another campaign... but that parts fits tomorrow's prompt better.
Next: RPGaDay2020 Day 2: "Change"
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