In Which Vanir Relays The Origin Story Of Stupid Ranger To Provide Backdrop For His Tale

Way back in late 2003, my bachelor days were coming to a close, and I’d been dating my now-wife about 8 months. My longtime karate buddy Dante was back from college and job hunting, and we invited him and his wife (Stupid Ranger, who I’d only met a couple times before), and we invited them over for New Years at Efreak’s apartment along with a couple of her college friends. After thoroughly disturbing the other guests (I believe the phrase Dante used during Charades was “the Right Testicle of Our Lord?”), we decided it was so much fun we wanted to get together more often. I forget whose idea it was to play D&D, but I was thoroughly excited about the idea. I approached my lady-friend with the idea, and she was apprehensive about it. Eventually, I successfully pestered her enough to try it.

It was rough for her at first, especially the roleplaying, but she got the hang of it eventually. And so the four of us, along with our friend John, embarked on a year-long adventure that would come to be known as the Evensbrook campaign. Efreak played a little rogue gnome named Goudy Sans Sarah (she’s a graphic designer – if you don’t laugh, she will negatively readjust your kerning). I loved that campaign. I thought Efreak did too. I was wrong.

In Which Vanir Completely Chubs His Perception Check

Things went really well for a couple months. But slowly, the frustration she was feeling started to get the best of her. She was too scared to tell me she wanted to quit, and I, of course, was too blinded by the fact that I had a wife who played D&D with me to notice. However, I did start to take notice when she started referring to game night as “F#$*ING D&D”. It was, at the time, like a bomb went off in my face. That sucked. A lot.

In retrospect, I can’t say I’m really surprised there was a breakdown of communication. It was during our first year of marriage, and wow did we need to spend some skill points on that. And we eventually got through that and a lot of other stuff in the years to come, but gaming was one thing we never really saw eye to eye on since. We’d play a little Rock Band every now and then or the occasional game of Scrabble, but by and large we’d just hang out and watch TV. And, as previously stated, my heart’s desire is to game with my wife. So, it never really sat very well with me.

Consequently, every couple of months, I decide to try another game and see if she’ll play it with me. Usually, it’s a videogame. And unfortunately, it usually results in her getting frustrated and not wanting to play anymore. Which sucks, and is not the outcome I wanted at all.

In Which Vanir Discovers That Level 5 Married People Have More Skill Points

This very cycle was perpetuating in my living room yesterday night, this time with Carcassonne on the Xbox 360. I’d recently played the tabletop version with friends and enjoyed it, and thought perhaps it might do the trick since the console version did all the math for you. Well, she got frustrated again, and I got frustrated again, but something a little different happened this time. I’m not quite exactly sure what, but I think our communications circuitry might have finally adapted.

We started having a very enlightening conversation as to what it was we both want out of games. I’m certain we’d tried to have this conversation before, but this time it worked a lot better. The things I enjoy in a game are somewhat typical of a lot of “gamer” types. I like twitch games and shooters, but I have a special weakness for turn-based strategy (disclaimer: I suck at it, but I love it) . I like a lot of interactivity in my games, and I like to feel like I’ve accomplished something when I finish one. And, as you may have guessed, I loves me some roleplaying.

Efreak, on the other hand, loves games of chance. She likes Rock Band. She absolutely hates strategy games. When I asked her why, she said she gets so stressed out that she feels like she’s going to have a heart attack. That’s when it started to make a little more sense to me. When she comes home from work, and she’s frazzled out of her mind, one of the things I’ll frequently hear her say is “I don’t care, I just don’t want to decide anything“. She’s been making decisions and stressing out at work all day. She doesn’t want to do it at home on top of all that. Decisions aren’t relaxing for her, ergo strategy games aren’t relaxing for her. And here I was picking a lot of turn based stuff because I thought it would be slower paced (and I like it). My dear wife informs me a lot of women feel like this.

How in the hell did I miss this? So what does she find relaxing? “Traditional” games like Life,  in which you don’t have to decide very much. The excitement of winning a race just from random chance appeals to her. Card games (sadly, the only one I really know is poker, and that’s only because… well…). Games that you can use your brain on (but not strategy) like Trivial Pursuit. I don’t understand why she likes Scrabble. I’m usually thinking two moves ahead when I play that game, but whatever she does it makes her more than a match for my limited intellect.

There is also a certain amount to which, for some reason, she gets intimidated because “you’re so much better at these games than I am”. I don’t generally pwn the crap out of my wife every time we play games, but it’s a factor nonetheless. Playing a game of chance, in this case, makes her feel like she’s on equal ground.

In any case, it’s plain to see we’re different kinds of gamers. Now, the trick is going to be finding where that Venn diagram intersects so we can have some fun together.

In Which Vanir Ponders The Road Ahead

Well, the road ahead for damn sure contains Boom Blox, as that’s one game Efreak specifically said she’d love to play with me. And she’s a huge Beatles fan, so this is a no-brainer. We’re also going to head out to our FLGS and try to find some stuff we’d both enjoy playing.

In the meantime, I would wholeheartedly encourage anyone with similar experiences as ours to either tell your tale, or (better!) to share what you’ve done that helped you. We surely cannot be the only couple who have gone through this!

Ultimately, it comes down to one of our old standbys here at Stupid Ranger – the only thing that matters is that everyone at the table is having fun. Finding out how to do that in one’s marriage might take some time and effort, but I can’t really think of a better reason to get back on the horse and keep trying.

Until next time!

There were.

Learning is a two way street!

I asked that we get a buffet style look at the character generation options that existed within the new edition. Each of our three players took the three rolling methods described by the PHB: point buy, random rolling, and the standard array.

I believe that all three ended up with satisfactory stats, however there was a great deal of nostalgia for actually rolling the dice. Yeah, you were pretty much guaranteed a better average to high set of stats for the point buy system, but unsurprisingly…. people want to roll dice!

There was a considerable learning curve involved with negotiating the books themselves… some aspects of the Player’s Handbook seemed confusingly laid out and it took some considerable effort to fully understand where all the rules fell together.

Our group got into some interesting philosophical discussions about the class changes that went into place with 4e. It seems that many of the changes make logical sense, and they are intended to make the game more digestible for new gamers. The trouble is that many of us are not new gamers, and we see opportunities for extension, expansion, and growth in the system that excites us. Having such a stripped down core system has left me wanting more to work with.

Do not misunderstand… I think the gameplay of 4e will be fast, fun, and very classic D&D. I’m just afraid that we’ll be subjected to scads and scads of expansion books just to get us back to “normal” and essentially the sound of my wallet emptying is the only motivator in the end.

Time will tell and so will gameplay. Hopefully Vanir and SR will come along in the next few days and provide their insights!

Navigation and storybuilding, both tricky tasks…

In my various wanderings around the mountain countryside, I determined that navigation is made much easier by large, looming markers of direction (like, say, the Rocky Mountains). It’s also made considerably easier by the addition of a Garmin nuvi 350, which one of my coworkers brought with her.

The respective bonuses to Intuit Direction have to be at least +2 and +10 respectively.

Even with this assistence, I still found myself lost a few times. This was only a little frustrating, however a few choice encounters have inspired me for a few campaign ideas. I am in the process of fleshing out these ideas into a servicable 4e campaign, which should be fun to both break me into 4e and unleash on my unwilling player characters.

One may glean from this information that I am finally reading my 4e books in depth, and that means that before long you’ll start hearing glowing praise/moderate indifference/seething rage depending on my mood at the time I sit down to write my various reviews.

I haven’t decided how I intend to structure my opinions of 4e, but I am leaning toward an “in theory” and “in practice” set of segments that would outline how I see a new aspect of the system handling, and then how it actually handles once we get into the game itself.

Any opinions would be greatly appreciated on what you want to hear me talk about. Here’s your chance, blogosphere… choose your own adventure!

What’s Next For Us

The other couple in our group has the torch to run the next campaign, and we’re all eagerly anticipating that, however we all elected to take a several week break to deal with The Real World (booooo) before getting underway with a new campaign.

As a whole, the group is eagerly anticipating the 4th edition of Dungeons and Dragons, however Kanati and I were quick to point out that we’d both be more comfortable delaying until we can fully absorb the new system rules. Our next campaign will likely be 3.5 edition Ravenloft, which will be my first time in that campaign setting.

A lament for things left behind

Thanks to this lull in our gaming activities, we’re getting ready for a garage sale here at SR Central to cull some of our extra stuff and regain some shelf space for our new acquisitions. I was going through some old boxes when I happened across my third edition D&D books, complete with my (nearly) full-body character sketch of my ropehandling wizard, Medric the Great.

I drew it while our GM was in a heated rules “discussion” with another of our college D&D crew, and I liked it so much that I held on to it. Unfortunately, we didn’t get that far through the campaign before school got in the way so I never quite got to flesh that character the way I wanted.

I often grapple with the urge to revisit past characters or campaign settings, and I always get talked out of it by the rest of our gaming group. This pull usually gets stronger without the immediate presentation of roleplaying opportunities, in fact I keep several Google Docs with “Return to…” campaign threads that sit, waiting for their time to come.

If anyone has any suggestions for how to slake this thirst for reliving “the good times” I would appreciate hearing it!

While she was agonizing over the sale tables, I ventured into the roleplaying section to peruse the new offerings from my favorite publishers and while I was looking at all of the bindings and titles I began to think about what draws me to certain supplements.

I work in the manufacturing industry and there is a concept called “fit and finish” that is used to describe the final touches that are put on the product before it is considered complete. As I looked at those bindings, idly selecting one or two to pull of the shelf and flip through I found that some very superficial things made me actually pick up certain books and look through them.

Things like fonts, cover art, and titles are what initially drew me to some titles. I grabbed a few books and found that their layout or typeface was so appalling that I couldn’t stand to read more than a paragraph at a time, which placed those into the “right out” category. I believe that is why so many roleplaying resources are moving online: you can choose how you want to receive the content, many times controlling the superficial things that help you drive down into the content.

On the car ride home, I was thinking about what good gaming opportunities I may have missed or dismissed purely on these criteria. Essentially, in my opinion usability matters. If the “fit and finish” is off and I can’t get past reading a single paragraph, or I can’t read the chart easily from arms length I very likely won’t buy the book, and often times I have found that I marginalize anything in that same given series purely due to the manner in which the information is presented.

Am I alone here?

Beginning with the Basics

In addition to armor and weapons, there are certain things most character will need to procure before adventuring in the great wide world. I try to never leave home without the following:

• Backpack
• Bedroll
• Winter Blanket – I love to use these for more than just camping in the colder months; they’re handy for a make-shift litter or awning, and in a pinch, you could create a blanket rope.
• Scroll case, parchment, ink & pen – a great DM with whom I once had the privilege to game had a house rule that unless you character was carrying the necessary equipment for taking notes, you as the player didn’t take notes. So if you wanted to keep a copy of the prophecy, you character better be able to write it down. Ever since that momentous session, I have always equipped my character with the necessary writing materials.
• Flint & Steel
• Mirror – sometimes you use it, sometimes you don’t. But you never know when a mirror will come in handy.
• Rope – of course.
• Waterskin & Rations – even though our house rule doesn’t specifically monitor such things, I always have them on my character sheet.
• Class-specific requirements – holy symbols for clerics, instruments for bards, thieves’ tools for rogues, etc.

Adventurer’s Wish List

Beyond the basics, every character has a wish-list of items they would buy if they had enough money. For me, these tend to be:

• Amulet of Natural Armor – since most characters don’t have anything to provide natural armor, this is a quick boost to AC without the tedious mucking about trying to figure out what kind of bonus it is and do you always have something with that bonus.
• Stat-boosting items – gauntlets of ogre power, cloaks of charisma, gloves of dexterity, anything that will boost the primary stat for your character class
• Bag of Holding – true shopping can only begin when you can sell more loot! And to sell more, you must be able to carry more.
• Magic weapons – for the fightery-types, magic is always better, especially if it comes with some sort of extra enhancement, like fire damage or keen-ness
• Magic accoutrements – for the spell-castery-types, bonus spells are always a plus… magic wands, extra scrolls, anything to fill the void when you’ve used up your best spells for the day
• Magic Armor/Robes – anything to make it harder for the enemy to hurt you is always cause for celebration, whether you need shiny new plate or a fabulous new robe.

I know I always have a great time when I get to cash in my share of the loot and upgrade my character’s equipment. And it’s even better than Black Friday door-busters, since you don’t have to wake up before the sun just to get the best deals!

Finally, a Plot Hook I Can Really Enjoy

At the beginning of our Act 2 campaign, I had a hard time finding motivation for my character, but we finally encountered some crazy-scary plot hooks that have pulled me back into the game. First, we encountered a horribly evil goddess bent on tipping the balance of good and evil towards evil (big surprise, huh?). She’s an evil, scary enemy that we totally didn’t deserve. After all, we saved the world just 4 short years ago! One would surely think our contributions have earned us a little peace and quiet, but, alas, that is not to be.

Then, in a follow-up twist, we were called to a council of the gods, who told us that Evil Lady had a good point, that we made the world too good when we saved the world last time. So, the gods can’t stop Evil Lady, and we’ll just have to figure out how to defeat her ourselves.

WHAT!?!?!

We’re being abandoned by our various gods! On the verge of world-wide war, we’re being given a secret mission to defeat an evil goddess, but we can’t count on our gods for assistance. This is the kind of treatment I would have expected if we’d failed our last attempt at saving the world, but being the proven heroes we are, I would expect a little more support, especially as our characters all have strong religious connections.

And so it is that we embark on our assigned mission to save the world once again in these desperate times. There are few times more intriguing than that moment when you realize that (once again) the fate of the entire world rests on your ability to overcome the unreasonable, evil goddess.

The Player’s Perspective

This is always a tense situation, because we if we fail in our mission, the world will be overcome with darkness. I love the intrigue of this particular type of plot hook. The difficulty I find is how to accurately represent my character’s reaction to this kind of responsibility. For Ari, an accomplished fighter, it’s not so much about the impending battles as it is the overwhelming knowledge that failure means the destruction of the world she has already fought to save; unfortunately, this isn’t the easiest reaction to roleplay, so I have my work cut out for me.

Share Your Stories

What kind of crazy-scary moments have you encountered or (for the DMs out there) created? And how did you (or your players) roleplay their reactions?

Round 1: The Introduction

I started out with just my husband (then fiance) Dante, and our friend, Chuck, who was the DM. Just the three of us… so if I screwed up, I wasn’t too embarrassed. I had a lot of random knowledge from miscellaneous myth systems, folk lore and legends; I figured I could handle the story side of things, though I was a little nervous about the mechanics of it all. After consulting the PHB, I opted to play an elven bard, so the guys helped me roll up my character and place my stats and all those little things that go into creating a character.

Dante & Chuck made things so easy for me in those first couple of session that I was brave enough to accept another friend (Boyle, another long time gamer) into our little group. The very first Evensbrook campaign was my very first campaign, and I had a marvelous time saving the world from the evil Drow.

Round 2: Big Isn’t Always Better

While our little campaign was my only campaign, Dante & Boyle were playing in another campaign that Chuck was running with a bigger group. Both stories ended up about the same time, and they guys encouraged me to join in with the rest of the group for the new campaign. And that’s when the nerves really set in for me.

This group was composed of long-time players from the early days of D&D; I felt like a D&D-infant having just started in the early days of 3.0. And I distinctly remember the fears PM described: I was sure I didn’t know enough of the rules, but I was more sure I didn’t know enough of the everyday-kind of D&D things that we would encounter. I was terribly afraid of embarrassing myself in front of the seven or so guys I didn’t know very well.

The Verdict

In the end, I didn’t make a huge fool of myself, but probably because I’m such a shy person. I played a support character; I stuck to the bard class into which I had already been introduced and offered support in the form of healings and Inspire Courage bonuses. I didn’t put myself in the spotlight, mostly because I was nervous about saying or doing something wrong, but in the end, it didn’t matter.

I came to realize throughout that campaign that all of these guys – most of whom I did not know prior to the campaign – were willing to put up with my inexperience because, in the end, we were all there to enjoy ourselves.

The Moral of the Story

I highly encourage new players to get their feet wet because it was one of the best things that ever happened to me. Stick with it, play more than one session at least, and try to suspend your nervousness. Don’t let the rules scare you; in the end, it’ll be just fine. Have fun, and welcome to the family.

After analyzing your answers with state-of-the-art medieval fantastic psychology profiling tools, Dungeon Mastering is confident that your inner D&D character is a Neutral Good Half-Elf Fighter!

Though I must say I’m not completely surprised. Most of my close friends already think I’m an elf… so that part is “half” right. And after a rather startling revelation a few weeks ago, it’s no surprise I’m not a spellcaster. And neutral good… well, that’s subjective I suppose, but I like to think I’m a generally nice person, though I do have a few chaotic tendencies.

The only change I would really make in this is that I’m more of a ranger than a fighter. I like the slashy-slashy but I also like tracking and slaying my sworn enemies. But then, I’m sure that’s not really a surprise!

I won’t say it was an entire disaster, but it was definitely a lot more difficult that I was lead to believe. I got bogged down in tables and charts, and I just got so overwhelmed. For me, being the DM was not as much fun as being the player.

After talking to my group and explaining my situation, they allowed me to dissolve the campaign. And since, I have never tried to DM. I learned a very valuable lesson that day: those who can, DM; those who can’t, play.