So, I hope that the gamers among you are enjoying this trip down memory lane with me. It's certainly been fun for me so far.

I'll be completing the rest of the entries, don't you fret. Don't know how good I'll be about them this weekend, as I'll be at Mysticon this weekend in Roanoke, VA with the family. Not a bad drive, and it's a fun three days. I'll be there in my official capacity as a member of the SJG MIB, so I'll be running some events.

Meanwhile, the guy who nominally started/coordinates this Bloghop Challenge has posted what they thought were some of the stories that stood out to him...and one of my entries (Day 4) made his list. Cool!

You can find his blog entry here. There's some good stories he links to.

Day 16: Do you remember your first edition war? Did you win?

Does anyone really win in a war? ;-)

To be honest, I've never been involved in any such thing. By the time such things became "commonplace", I was already of the opinion that the system was less important than whether or not people were having fun. I may have systems I prefer over others, but anytime arguments break out over which game/edition is better, I just walk away.

I think muskrat_john said it well in this Dork Tower strip.



(x-posted to my FaceBook)

Day 14: Did you meet your significant other while playing D&D? Does he/she still play?

I sort-of met mousecat0 playing D&D. Lemme 'splain.

Technically, the first time we met was in the scene shop at WMC, when I (allegedly) nearly clocked her with a 2x4 I was getting down from the lumber racks. I don't exactly remember this, but she says it happened, and in the interest of being able to sleep in a bed, who am I to argue? However, we were first introduced to each other at one of the next Sunday night gaming sessions of the college gaming group, the Knights of the Sextagonal Table.

And yes, she still plays...



(x-posted to my FaceBook)

Day 12: First store where you bought your gaming supplies? Does it still exist?

Hm. The first store I can remember going to specifically for gaming supplies was in the Burlington Center Mall. There was a game/hobby store down the JC Penney's wing on the second floor, almost to the end. Assuming I remember correctly, the store logo had an 8-ball in it. Damned if I can remember the name.

Anyway, they didn't last too long - maybe a year. Bought more than a few gaming items there.

As I said before, South-Central NJ never seemed to be much into gaming. Damn shame.



(x-posted to my FaceBook)

Day 10: First gaming magazine you ever bought?

Easy one: Dragon Magazine. Picked up the occasional copy, then my brother and I would get a subscription every Christmas.

When Dungeon came out, I got a subscription to that.

I loved the anticipation of getting that in the mail. And when it came in, I hungrily devoured every bit of gaming goodness within those pages.

Later, I would subscribe to Shadis, Kobold Quarterly, and I am a current Gygax magazine subscriber. I'm still a gleeful kid when the magazine comes in, and I still devour every word with relish.

(But not ketchup - too sweet!)



(x-posted to my FaceBook)

Day 8: First set of polyhedral dice you owned? Do you still use them?

First set I owned came with the Blue/white box. Had to color in the numbers with a crayon so we could read them easier. First set I bought outside of a boxed set was a set of translucent blue dice with white ink. I had this idea of getting a full set of each color that the store had - never got that far, though.

And yes, I still have some of that original set. My brother has some as well, IIRC.

Those blue ones? Yep. Got them too.



(x-posted to my FaceBook)

Day 6: First character death. How did you handle it?

First character death? My first character. As I've said in previous entries, my first character was a thief (Not a "rogue" damn you! We were thieves and PROUD of it. Young whippersnappers...) by the name of Laggamundo. He perished in the caverns of Quasqueton, unhallowed and unremembered by most.

How did I handle it? I have no idea. This was more than 30 years ago, people! I'm doing good in my dotage to remember 30 days ago!

That said, I couldn't have taken it too hard. After all, I'm still playing, right?



(x-posted to my FaceBook)

Day 4: First dragon your character slew (or other powerful monster)

Um. Wow. Heh.

I'm gonna leave out the loose group of characters we had that slew a few gods and assumed their powers, then got the ship from S3 - Expedition to the Barrier Peaks functional through some carefully worded wishes...

Many of my characters never got into the higher levels, mostly due to a lack of long-term games (South-central NJ never seemed to become a hotbed of gaming...). It wasn't until college that I had a character advance into the higher levels of power. That mage, Gelentan Turana, faced two truly powerful enemies that he and his comrades prevailed against: an aboleth and a demon. I believe the demon was the first we took down. Well, I took down.

No really, it was me.

See, I had a magic item in that game that (among other things) allowed me to cast "Flesh to Gold" once per year. I still remember the look on the DM's face when he failed first the magic resistance check ("WHAT?!? OK, no problem, he'll make his saving throw") and then the saving throw. Bless his heart, our DM felt it necessary to determine *exactly* how many pounds of gold a 12' demon would be.

Damn near wrecked the local economy... ;-)

Day 2: First person who I introduced to D&D. What edition? First character?

I had to think about this one. I've been playing D&D in one form or another for, what, 33 years now? Gotta say that I've been lucky - I've always found people who already played the game.

Still, there are two people who I've introduced the game to, and both they and I are glad for it. In fact, their only complaint is that we haven't found time to play the game.

Those people are my daughter (B, her first character is the elven ranger Alexia Eveningfall) and son (F, whose first character is the dwarven warrior Franush Doomhammer). They were introduced on D&D 3.5, but we have moved over to Pathfinder.



(x-posted to my Facebook)

That's right. It's time for my annual post where I refuse to promote Brunswick Games Day

Again this year, this post will not talk about Brunswick Games Day (aka I wish I was at EveCon), happening on Saturday, January 5, 2013.

There will be no additional paragraph talking about how cool it is or how much fun we've had over the years. And I'm certainly not going to thank kmusser for spearheading this.

So there. ::sticks out tongue::