Gaming as Life
My, I have neglected this space.
There is not much to say. My life more or less seems to revolve now around work and gaming.
This new campaign has been quite a rollercoaster. I did indeed create Felix as my D&D character (based, as I mentioned in an earlier post, on the gay wizard Felix from the Doctrine of Labyrinthes series), and he has been an absolute blast to play (pun not intended). I do wish we would have had more opportunities to explore his background. The closest I've gotten is when one of the players was snooping around my character sheet and saw he had ranks in Profession (prostitute). I sometimes have regrets about joking around about seducing party members, because everyone now believes he's a slut, when in game he's only slept with one person, and not a party member. The point is that he's running from his past full tilt, but the party necessarily doesn't realize his demeanor is more or less an act. They may never. But in any case, he's an amusing character to play.
On the DMing front I haven't run a game since the holidays started. My work schedule got in the way and I put things on hold...and just haven't picked it up again. In an effort to keep that up in some respect, I scheduled a game for my Meetup group that I've arranged to co-DM with my husband. We were discussing what we might run, and I mentioned wanting to stay away from the stereotypes of low-level enemies. Low level games are rampant with kobolds, goblins, and zombies. Among our group, it has been discussed that in video games, movies, and other media, the two safest and most common groups to villainize are zombies and Nazis. So, zombies are blase, but Nazis? What race in D&D would be Nazis? Elves. If it would be any race it'd be elves. So that's the theme. We'll have elves rounding up other races and taking them to camps, eventually getting the party itself captured. I wonder if there is a good elven equivalent of Furor...?
I am also well into taping our new sessions and have gotten a great response so far. I'm even gaining new subscribers every day, it seems. I've wanted to reach out to my viewers more and wanted to start a site for both them and the group to keep track of things like session summaries, experience points, character rosters, campaign setting info, and the like. It'd also be a great place for people to ask questions about the rules and talk about the game in general. I wheedled everyone into coming up with a name for us, and the name Oversized Parties, Incorporated was voted as the best idea. But I've just discovered that formatting a message board is a hopeless task for me, so I'm not sure how to approach the problem. I think a message board would be best, although I've toyed with using an LJ community as well. I'm not sure that'd be any easier.
Work on the other hand is more a distraction than anything. I actually get more reading done there than I do at home, and usually reserve it just for that. I'm now beginning to follow a series called the Last Rune by Mark Anthony. It's one of the many books I searched for looking for fantasy stories with gay or bi heros. So far that aspect isn't completely clear, not does it permeate the story. In fact, I found it was much better than I expected. The author is very talented and plot, pacing, and suspense. Something always seems to be happening. I also found myself much more attached to the characters than I thought I would be going in. While I am clawing my way hoping a romance does develop between the hero Travis and the knight Beltan (feelings finally being revealed, on the knight's side, at the very end of the second book), there always seems to be more to discover about these people. I hope it continues as well now that I've begun the third book.
There is not much to say. My life more or less seems to revolve now around work and gaming.
This new campaign has been quite a rollercoaster. I did indeed create Felix as my D&D character (based, as I mentioned in an earlier post, on the gay wizard Felix from the Doctrine of Labyrinthes series), and he has been an absolute blast to play (pun not intended). I do wish we would have had more opportunities to explore his background. The closest I've gotten is when one of the players was snooping around my character sheet and saw he had ranks in Profession (prostitute). I sometimes have regrets about joking around about seducing party members, because everyone now believes he's a slut, when in game he's only slept with one person, and not a party member. The point is that he's running from his past full tilt, but the party necessarily doesn't realize his demeanor is more or less an act. They may never. But in any case, he's an amusing character to play.
On the DMing front I haven't run a game since the holidays started. My work schedule got in the way and I put things on hold...and just haven't picked it up again. In an effort to keep that up in some respect, I scheduled a game for my Meetup group that I've arranged to co-DM with my husband. We were discussing what we might run, and I mentioned wanting to stay away from the stereotypes of low-level enemies. Low level games are rampant with kobolds, goblins, and zombies. Among our group, it has been discussed that in video games, movies, and other media, the two safest and most common groups to villainize are zombies and Nazis. So, zombies are blase, but Nazis? What race in D&D would be Nazis? Elves. If it would be any race it'd be elves. So that's the theme. We'll have elves rounding up other races and taking them to camps, eventually getting the party itself captured. I wonder if there is a good elven equivalent of Furor...?
I am also well into taping our new sessions and have gotten a great response so far. I'm even gaining new subscribers every day, it seems. I've wanted to reach out to my viewers more and wanted to start a site for both them and the group to keep track of things like session summaries, experience points, character rosters, campaign setting info, and the like. It'd also be a great place for people to ask questions about the rules and talk about the game in general. I wheedled everyone into coming up with a name for us, and the name Oversized Parties, Incorporated was voted as the best idea. But I've just discovered that formatting a message board is a hopeless task for me, so I'm not sure how to approach the problem. I think a message board would be best, although I've toyed with using an LJ community as well. I'm not sure that'd be any easier.
Work on the other hand is more a distraction than anything. I actually get more reading done there than I do at home, and usually reserve it just for that. I'm now beginning to follow a series called the Last Rune by Mark Anthony. It's one of the many books I searched for looking for fantasy stories with gay or bi heros. So far that aspect isn't completely clear, not does it permeate the story. In fact, I found it was much better than I expected. The author is very talented and plot, pacing, and suspense. Something always seems to be happening. I also found myself much more attached to the characters than I thought I would be going in. While I am clawing my way hoping a romance does develop between the hero Travis and the knight Beltan (feelings finally being revealed, on the knight's side, at the very end of the second book), there always seems to be more to discover about these people. I hope it continues as well now that I've begun the third book.