RPG a Day 2020: Day 7--Couple

Day 7 of RPG a Day and today’s topic is ‘Couple’.

My wife and I have been a married couple for seventeen years now. I’ve played some RPGs and board games with RPG elements over those years, but she is the type of gamer that wants to win. There’s really no traditional “winning” in RPGs, so she doesn’t get the point of playing. She also gets mad when she’s exploring and a trap gets her. I have higher hopes for playing with my daughter. No worries, we share other interests and she knew I was a player when she married me.

This past year I played with a couple for the first time in a regular game. Their names were Josh and Becky and they were from Canada. They played a brother and sister in game—male human and female tiefling  (adopted)—and although they were obviously a couple outside of play it didn’t stop male characters and NPCs from hitting on the girl. Both were brand new to table-top play. We had a DM who was patient—and quite good—with the new players and they picked up on how to play easily. For the most part we played weekly for one semester. Then, the Chinese New Year break came around and in our last session—who would have guessed—we had a TPK. Becky had already made plans to drop to “special guest star” because she wanted to take some difficult math courses. As for the group, we were full of plans to continue with new campaigns on our return from the break. Then the Wuhan Flu came around…

We never played again but I did manage to run into the pair before they returned to Canada. They had decided to return home after having taught here in China for years previously. I hope they find another group to play with. 

RPG a Day 2020: Day 6: Forest

RPG a Day 2020 and Day 6 is ‘Forest’. 

There’s an old joke that we educators tell stating that the only good things about being a teacher are July and August. Over my decade of being employed in the “noble profession” the humor, if any, found in that joke has diminished over the years as the number of days we work in July has seemed to stretch out more and more and the time we’re expected back from “summer” break is earlier and earlier. More depressing is the fact that the joke used to tell about three good things when teachers could also include June on the list. As my vacation for 2020 rapidly comes to an end having been hamstrung by the Wuhan Flu outbreak and another big move, I’m reminded of some of my better vacations from a few years back. I’m not going to turn this entry into a big slide show, but I’m including two pics from one of our trips out to Canada.

Capilano Suspension Bridge Park has a forest that you can walk over. It was an amazing place and put me in mind of any number of fantasy villages that I’ve visited during my gaming. Planet Endor for sure. I also had a brush with fame as my cousin and I definitely saw Helena Bonham Carter out there. We didn’t bother her though—had my wife been facing that way, I’m sure we would’ve gotten photographic proof of the meeting, but I rarely approach celebs unless they are pro wrestlers in which times I can’t help myself. 

The next one should be from Whistler Mountain if it’s from the proper folder. Bears and wolves in this area although it’s a big and popular resort. 

Finally, a shot from the Underground river in the Philippines. Not exactly a forest, but it really evokes a lot of adventuring I’ve done at the table. Tons of bats in here and the guano to go with it. 

Good stuff if you can do it. I haven’t run into too many fantasy creatures, but going into the environments in real-life can help one to get a feel for the game locations. I suggest visiting forests, mountains, and anything else you can. 

RPG A Day 2020--Day 5--Tribute

For day five the topic is ‘tribute’. I would use this day as a remembrance of someone I’ve lost with an RPG connection. Fortunately, all of my gaming friends are still above ground at the time of this writing as far as I know. If I’ve lost any of the semi-anonymous Roll 20 players I’ve gamed with over the years, I sincerely hope they are playing a great campaign in the sky, but I really don’t know enough to pay tribute to them. This goes for game creators that have passed as well. There are better tributes for them on the web, and my own knowledge would lack in comparison. That means I’ll pay tribute to a favorite of mine, my Dad.  The best episodes of Good Times were when James Evans—the dad—was still around. Well, a lot of the best episodes from the Mark Markham show are in the years when the dad was still around too—season 40 when young, baby Chloe shows up and Mark becomes the dad not withstanding of course.

My Dad never got into the hobby or much of any other as I can remember. No time for it really.  He worked 40 hrs a week at one job in addition to any part-time/odd jobs he could pick up. It wasn’t as hard to raise a family of four in the 80’s in this manner, but it wasn’t a comfortable way to live even back then. I think I previously relayed the story of one time when he tried playing the old TSR Marvel Superheroes game with me and my little brother. Dad played as the Hulk and he roamed the city looking for gang members and said he wanted to “Stomp ‘em!” Now, there was a little more to it that I’ll leave out  since I don’t want my Dad getting “cancelled” by the SJWs a decade after his passing, but I’ll leave it to your imagination. It was (somewhat) acceptable humor in the 80’s and he mainly said such things to get me and my brother laugh. It certainly worked back then. 

I don’t remember if I’ve told where I got that MSHRPG set from. Well,  Dad took the pair of us to Dragon*Con in Atlanta. Primarily, it was to add to my comics collection. I can’t remember if that was the year I bought a ton of Judge Dredd comics or not as those early Dragon*Cons tend to run together—even back when I was far too young to drink. He did a lot of things like that for the two of us. I didn’t get my driver’s license until age 18, so he must have taken us to more than one. When dad took us my brother and I really didn’t know what was going on. We didn’t go to the panels or any cosplay stuff. We went directly to the dealer’s room and hung out there the entire time. It was in the dealer’s room that one of the TSR guys sold me on the set playing me through a quick scenario as The Thing. I read through the rule book and judges guide again and again over the months and years that followed—and sometimes freshen up on it today.

I remember one of those reading occasions being in the backseat of a car as my Dad drove the family on a non-Dragon*Con related summer vacation to one of the State Parks in Georgia. For those of a certain age, you know how boring a road trip could be back then. Looking at scenery as it goes by can only hold a kids attention for so long, so I was glad to have something to read. I remember seeing the waterfalls there and that there was some problem with the area that kept us from swimming, but we had some kick-ass ice-cream. We didn’t have much money to spend, but Dad—and Mom who is still with us BTW—tried to make memories with us as much as they could. So, in my entry I pay tribute to Dad a man that showed me how to have fun and create memories. I can’t think of any skills as essential as those for any GM—or teacher come think of it. Thanks Dad. 

RPG a Day 2020--Day 4--Vision

For RPG a Day 2020 episode four and the prompt is vision. Sadly, as seems to be the general theme of 2020 itself everything has a negative feel to it. However, if one can get one’s head around a lot of the mess that’s going on both in the world and in one’s personal life, one can still have a positive vision for the future.

For my part and in regard to the hobby—that is why we’re here this month after all—I can envision a time when my daughter will be old enough to play RPGs with me. At age five—all too soon to be six—she already makes up interactive stories with me such as exploring an island for pirate treasure or a fun game we have where different people call us up on the phone.  As one who reads different rule books and the like even for games I have no intention of playing, it’s funny that I have more of her interest doing a ‘theater of the mind’ style with basically no rules. She does like looking at maps and drawing already, but it’s just as off the rails as you may expect with a free wheeling five year old’s mind paired with a scatterbrained 46 year old one.

With our recent move to Beijing she will also have a more populous group of English speaking youngsters than we’ve had before. The more young friends she makes and the more fun she has with me running small adventures, the more likely that I’ll have an all new play group if she wants to share the experience with them. When and if this vision becomes a reality, Ii will be different from any other role playing I’ve done. I can also envision further into the future and wherein she eventually becomes my equal but ultimately surpasses me and leaves the RPG hobby in the dust heap. Even if she doesn’t become a lifer like me, I like to think she’ll at least look back on the games we play as the time she bonded with her dad. You never know, maybe she’ll be a lifer too. 

RPG A Day 2020--Day 3--Thread

Day 3: Thread

Only a short post today, but it still counts. I’d rather be positive, but much like yesterday’s post, negativity has to creep in sometimes because I’m a realist. I sometimes feel my ability to participate in the hobby is hanging by a thread. Let’s list some more obstacles:

1. China and bad internet connections—keeping me from running or participating in a virtual table top group…or even one shots.

2. Pandemic—this is blocking the live table action.

3. Time sink—the danger of RPGs has never been Satan and his demons, but rather the time involved if you choose to be a regular player. My daughter will soon be six. A bit too young to play yet, but well old enough to want my attention. The job is also taking their 40 hrs from me each week. Maybe even more since they want me to learn Chinese and IB teaching style.

4. Product—I want hard copy. In China I’ve found it hard to get packages sent out to me even before the pandemic. I’m going to try and put that to the test soon, but since I’m a nomad I’m always having a hard time carrying my stuff. I have a literal treasure chest full of material that I want to keep sitting out in the Philippines right now. Who knows when I’ll get the stuff back?

5. Money sink—not as big a deal as it used to be, but I sometimes feel my money would be better spent elsewhere.

So, my hobby is hanging by a thread, but no worries that thread is still strong. 

RPG A Day 2020--Day 2: Change

Today’s topic is ‘Change’. In real life most changes are not to my liking. Depending on how old you are a guy my age—46 years young—is old enough to be saying “Back in my day…”, but I always felt that would be a phrase I’d be using in my “golden years” somewhere down the line. However, that wasn’t the case. Although I continue in my blind refusal to see the decade of my childhood as a “simpler” time—that’s reserved for the 1950’s in my mind—there is no doubt that most of us who were kids in the 80’s never saw the changes in culture and attitude coming. 

Certain aspects of the inclusive culture are fine by me. I’m okay with girls being more comfortable playing—saves me from being a female character…for about two minutes. I never had any racial problems in the hobby—aside from one incident that I detailed in an earlier RPG a Day entry some years back. Although I don’t agree with the various alternative lifestylers out there, I’ve played with many over the years, and have had just as much fun as I would with them as I would anyone else at the table. Most of all, it’s nice to see more and more people not associate roleplaying with devil worship like they did in the 80’s. 

However, there are some PC changes that I don’t agree with and they range from simple over correction to outright pandering. Here are a few changes that I hate:

1. Sanitization of terminology—the big one for me is changing the term ‘race’ for ‘legacy’ or whatever other nonsense term they want to use. The human race covers all of humanity as in real-life. The fantasy races—even the humanoid ones—aren’t just culturally different as they are in real-life. These races often have alien minds completely different from a human being. They would kill and eat you—and the god they worship would be honored in their doing so. This also includes the forced “diversity” baked into the rulebooks and lore.

2. Company political statements—I don’t give a rat’s ass. Make games that are fun. Now it seems that every company has to go on their social media account and make an apology tour to possible detractors who were offended by their product while at the same time preaching to the rest of us to be better people. It’s pandering and virtue signaling at its worst. I don’t like the real world creeping into the game. The hobby is there for a distraction from these problems.

3. Company hiring practices—I must acknowledge this because of the infamous stories I’ve read. Talented creators not being hired so that a company can look good by having more diverse creative teams. The companies are worried more about meeting quotas than they are about hiring the best creators for the job.

4. Cancel Culture—the opposite side of number 3. A bunch of SJWs get into an uproar because of something some guy said one time…sometimes years ago. Very often the “offensive” thing said is only offensive to soy boys and snowflakes to begin with. Invariably it seems to me that the companies will often bow to this ultra small percentage of squeaky wheels—many of which had no intention of supporting the product in the first place. 

5. General Sanitized Product—I hate how everything now is generally safe and PC. I would also call it generic and bland. With very few exceptions it seems everything now is meant to be made for everybody and we can all sit around and sing songs of peace together with sunshine and rainbows lest we offend someone. Some things should have an edge. I see the same trends in all of my hobbies: wrestling, comic-books, video games and RPGs. All of them to varying degrees are woke and preachy. In other words, they aren’t fun or interesting anymore. 

The good thing about RPGs is in spite of all these problems, the DM/GM and the table get to decide how PC they want to be. Barmaids are still getting pinched and groped, orcs are still brutal savages and the world is one spell away from being taken over by devils because some things never change. 

RPG A Day--Day 1--Beginning

It’s that time of year again. My viewers—such as they are—tend to go up during RPG-a-Day and some even stick around although I’m not really a prolific writer apart from this time of year. For those rejoining me—I’m doing well, still trying to lose weight. I’m sticking with the DDPY program which has given me quite a bit of success albeit non-scalable. I’m ashamed to say I didn’t do so well at my first school in China. However, I will soon be starting year two in a brand new school in Beijing itself. Let’s hope for good things out of this new beginning.

Speaking of Beginning, that is the topic for the day. Last school year actually had a promising beginning and I was able to find a live table group. It turned out being one of the best groups I’ve ever been a part of. I was complimented by one of the new players a couple of weeks ago when she gave thanks for playing such a fun and memorable character. I’ve talked about Gnissa Fumblebuck—the gnome bard— here before as she is one of the troupe of characters I bring out from time to time. She was pretty gonzo in this version of the Gnissaverse. I had to be careful not to tick off my new GM by being too much of a scatterbrain, but she was borderline kinder in this game. I was definitely wrecking things with her not the least of which was letting a bear loose to roam the city because he looked sad locked up by himself in a cage.  I’m glad people liked it. Sadly, she was a part of a TPK in our last session, but only because I didn’t let her live on as a coward.  I’m fairly confident that she could have gotten away from that last encounter, but I was equally convinced that the GM wanted to wrap the campaign up. It was a mystery type scenario and unfortunately, we the players aren’t always as intelligent as the character stat would suggest and it was becoming something of a slog.

Unfortunately, our beginning campaign also became the ending campaign. We’re all international teachers and lots of the guys—including the GM and the host—decided to vacation overseas during Chinese New Year. When the pandemic struck, they were unable to get back into China. For better or worse, I didn’t leave the country, but time just marched on and we were never really able to get it back together. I’ve always said that holidays are the bane of RPG groups, but now I can say pandemics don’t do them any favors either.