A GM’s Love Affair with D&D and His Friends

I stated playing D&D with the original blue books (can’t even say boxed set these days anymore, else some kid will think we’re talking Essentials). My friend Rodney introduced me to the wonderful world of sword and sorcery. Halflings were a class, fighters simply smashed stuff, and everyone knew mages sucked until level 3 or 5+. Those were the simple days.

Later, I spent most of my gaming years in 2^nd ed AD&D. Finally in College I gave 3.5 a try on the request of some friends. It was okay, but a considerably different system. I also cut my teeth on Little Fears by Jason Blair and World of Darkness, both of which were a far departure for me from my exclusively fantasy role playing experience.

Flash forward and years later I had moved away from role playing and back into miniature war games and board gaming. This was mostly due to moving, what my social circle was into and to a degree, time constraint. Some of my 40K friends had begun bugging me to run a D&D campaign, as were some friends who had never played but really wanted to.

I ran it by my bride, who has been a role-player since her teens too, and she said she’d have to think about playing. She kind of thought that part of our life was over. You know, you grow up, move on, and don’t associate that part of your life with where you are now. Eventually she said she’d give it a go again. So began the immense process of me trying to figure out just which system to run. I immediately thought 2^nd, but that isn’t the most newbie friendly system. I mean advance math anyone? So I considered Dragon Age, but knew little about it as it was just about to release. Next was original D&D, perhaps a bit too simple.

At the end of the day after considering all the systems I was familiar with, even WoD, D10 systems, and little fears. Everyone pretty much wanted a typical fantasy game so I ended up going with Pathfinder. There were a few specific reasons I chose PFRPG: I didn’t really want to buy more books, especially if this was going to be a “one and done” game. It was based on 3.5, which I at least had passing familiarity with (minimal learning curve for me), and one other guy in our proposed group knew the system fairly well. Finally it really came down to availability of the materials. Everyone could get their hands on Pathfinder, where getting 2^nd ed or original would be nigh impossible. I’m a proponent of my players having copies of the books.

I set up a one off game so everyone could get exposure to role-playing as well as the system. And let’s be honest, I really needed to dust off my GMing…it had been awhile. I’m glad to say it was a huge success. I started everyone at level five and we ran a one or two night game. We asked around a couple others and ended up having six players and myself. From that night spawned our current gaming group, taking the place of our weekly board game night we were having.

With everyone’s excitement and willingness to do this again, we decided to start an ongoing campaign. I collected a few of Paizo’s adventure path summaries as well as a couple of my own and through email everyone voted on their top three. At the end we decided to go with the rather unique Carrion Crown path (look for upcoming reviews of the individual modules) based on the horror, investigative elements, and the hints of Cthulu that everyone liked because of our time playing Arkham Horror.

Since then we’ve added one or two players that dropped out, we’ve lost one of our core players who had to move but ended up starting a group in her home town, and now are on the precipice of a big change as a couple of our other members may be moving this summer. But we’ve consistently held at the five of us through the past year, and as working adults, some with children, some married, some neither, can I say that that is a serious commitment from everyone for a weekly game.

21st century digital DM

So what’s the moral here? Well I for one had thought my days of GMing\role-playing were lost to nostalgia. I was hesitant to get started again and to try new things (Pathfinder\modules) but have been having a blast since. At the end of the day I can’t say how much fun it is to sit around a table with living human beings and share laughs, story telling, and build those irreplaceable memories you get from those crazy moments in gaming. Friendships have developed, strengthened, been born among us. Some of our group are now more open to new experiences and we’ve grieved over the loss of some of our group as they’ve moved on.

Just a final thought, there is no replacement for friendship. Especially in a world where we’re increasing wrapped up in our careers, keeping up with the Jones’, and technology. Gaming isn’t the solution, but it can be one of many mediums to help us get in touch with each other again. In the end it’s not about escapism, or if it is it’s not about escaping reality but about escaping the unintentional isolation we place ourselves in and entering back into community. So in light of that, let’s put the iPhone down, cut off the Xbox, maybe leave a little early from work, grab some snacks, some drinks, and lets game. Face to face.

For my gaming group: David, Tammy, Malerie, Norbert, and Andrea. Thanks for all the good times.