A disclaimer: I'm really not all that terrible at living alone. But, during my two weeks of being by myself in the apartment, I have said some of the following wonderful lines to myself:
"Well, this is technically bread, and what I'm putting on it is technically cheese... so I have myself a cheese sandwich. Technically."
"Hm... I suppose milk isn't really food as such, but it still counts as lunch. I think."
"I could eat the paprika... but I'll need that for the chili. I could eat the beans, but I need those for the chili. I could eat some carrots... but I need those too for the chili. So what if I just boil crushed tomatoes? Wait... I need that for the chili too."
"Right, I can't use the mixer to mash the potatoes in a teflon pan. I'd better put them on a plate and mix them there."
"Wait, is this breakfast? Is it... lunch? When the hell did I wake up? If it is breakfast, how come it's chili?"
måndag 21 juni 2010
onsdag 9 juni 2010
2000: The Crossdressing Crusades
In the year 2000, the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons was released. I got it pretty much fresh off the printers, though I had no idea how new it was; all I knew was that I was switching from something old, to something new. Pretty much simultaneously, AD&D celebrated its nineteenth birthday (The early D&D, which I never played, turned 26 that year).
The same year, a few months before I got the new books, I had managed to recruit two new players who came to form the basis of the first group I ever seriously ran adventures for. It consisted of my friend from school, Andy, and his little brother Benny. While Benny would only be in the group for two years, Andy formed the core of my long-running chronicles to follow. He spent a lot more time on his character than me or Lex had done before, detailing such things as family, education, habits, personality and wardrobe. While he was a bit overzealous at times, and he absolutely detested any form of harm befalling his precious, well-crafted character, Andy taught the rest of us that the sky's the limit when it comes to character creation. While my father still ran adventures for this group as well (the Tower of Power adventure in the previous post actually included them), I took my first staggering steps as a GM designing simple "kill the monster" scenarios for these two players.
Andy was also the one who gave this blog post its title. He introduced a novel new concept that neither me nor Lex had previously considered: his character was a girl, a stunningly gorgeous elven paladin named Gondriel. With that, he sparked somewhat of a trend, and when we eventually got the third edition books, three out of four people made female characters. At this point I still had my own characters in all the adventures, and was more or less the inofficial GM only because I owned the books – and my first 3rd edition character was Wendy, a half-elf druid. Lex followed suit with the ranger Wanda, which left Benny as our only male – Bruno the Bard.
For practical reasons we later split the group, and along with Lex I created the first real “campaign” or “chronicle” I ever made, unimaginatively named “Wendy & Wanda” which really sounds a lot more like a daytime TV sitcom than an exciting fantasy adventure now that I look back at it. Nevertheless, it was the first thing I played with a coherent, sensible storyline – and more importantly, it was the first time I got to work crafting NPCs. I made a lot of them for this game: Recurring villains, sidekicks, the quirky store owner Thorin, even a romantic interest.
I know what you're thinking, and let me stop you right there – yes, we were two teenage boys playing female characters in a story with a romantic side plot. This couldn't possibly end well, could it?
Surprisingly, our minds weren't in the gutter nearly half as much as you'd expect. While there were a few “Tee hee, I have boobs” moments, and our characters probably took a few more baths than what was strictly necessary if you're out adventuring, the romantic storyline actually developed relatively sensibly, and ended in Wanda being married to a handsome samurai with graying temples. You might wonder what a female Aragorn was doing marrying a samurai who probably belongs in a different quarter of the world altogether, which brings me to another interesting viewpoint: While we had a story, we still didn't have a setting. I made up the scenery for the adventures more or less on the fly, and aside from one town called Freeport which served as our base of operations, nothing was really coherent between our adventures; the town was simultaneously by the sea, in the middle of the forest, or next to an evil empire, as appropriate for the adventure.
We would eventually come to deal with this issue, but for now we were happy just to go on adventures. The stories were simple, but the adventures usually were at least vaguely linked together, and because of the recurring NPCs it did have the feeling of being a single, distinct campaign to a much greater degree than anything we had done before. We looked back at our adventures, and I loved what I saw; the simple mud of dull die-rolling had been fertilized, and out of it was spiring something beautiful, something none of us had expected to be there. Out of random encounters, survival rolls, and spot checks, a story was growing, a story that somehow was more than just the sum of its parts. It was a simple story, a crude, primitive tale of man (or woman, rather) facing monsters in harsh wilderness, but it was alive, and more importantly, it was mine.
This is when I became truly passionate. I started writing down what had happened in the adventures, sometimes from the point of view of one of the characters. I started reading the books thoroughly, scanning for new interesting monsters, traps, or other obstacles. I plowed through novels solely to get inspiration. I counted the days until the next game session. I was hooked, and hooked bad.
In just one year, I had gone from stringing together random encounters for Bruno and Gondriel, to fashioning characters, plots, and all sorts of challenges falling outside the scope of the rules. Now, only one thing remained: A setting.
Notable Characters: Gondriel, who was the first character to really be a character in her own right. Paradoxally, she wasn't in the first chronicle, as it was a while before I made real “stories” for the group in my hometown, but it was Andy's design of Gondriel that really showed me and Lex how to make your character more than just numbers on a sheet of paper.
Crowning Moments of Awesome: Yeah, we had a few. One of the best one was sneaking off from a school dance to run a session in the coat room, using our first-edition sheets made on the backs of old homework (Gondriel and Bruno remained 1st ed characters for most of their existence, for some reason I remember mostly playing 3rd ed with Lex). We also finally beat the first dungeon that my father ran for us, which I ran straight out of the book with some added quirks of my own. While I was the GM and probably biased, Bill and Sain (with the addition of Gondriel) finally did manage to make it to the treasury of the ruins and got their reward (not that they needed it after killing the kobold banker, but still).
The true Crowning Moment of Awesome, however, was in that magical moment when the game became a Story. I've spent my entire life since then reliving that moment in many, many, many different games, and it keeps getting better.
Next Up: Gnomeworld, in which I create a full-scale world, learn how to plan ahead, and things begin to take a darker turn. Also, a character actually climbs from level 1 to level 20 – to date, a feat I've only seen done once.
The same year, a few months before I got the new books, I had managed to recruit two new players who came to form the basis of the first group I ever seriously ran adventures for. It consisted of my friend from school, Andy, and his little brother Benny. While Benny would only be in the group for two years, Andy formed the core of my long-running chronicles to follow. He spent a lot more time on his character than me or Lex had done before, detailing such things as family, education, habits, personality and wardrobe. While he was a bit overzealous at times, and he absolutely detested any form of harm befalling his precious, well-crafted character, Andy taught the rest of us that the sky's the limit when it comes to character creation. While my father still ran adventures for this group as well (the Tower of Power adventure in the previous post actually included them), I took my first staggering steps as a GM designing simple "kill the monster" scenarios for these two players.
Andy was also the one who gave this blog post its title. He introduced a novel new concept that neither me nor Lex had previously considered: his character was a girl, a stunningly gorgeous elven paladin named Gondriel. With that, he sparked somewhat of a trend, and when we eventually got the third edition books, three out of four people made female characters. At this point I still had my own characters in all the adventures, and was more or less the inofficial GM only because I owned the books – and my first 3rd edition character was Wendy, a half-elf druid. Lex followed suit with the ranger Wanda, which left Benny as our only male – Bruno the Bard.
For practical reasons we later split the group, and along with Lex I created the first real “campaign” or “chronicle” I ever made, unimaginatively named “Wendy & Wanda” which really sounds a lot more like a daytime TV sitcom than an exciting fantasy adventure now that I look back at it. Nevertheless, it was the first thing I played with a coherent, sensible storyline – and more importantly, it was the first time I got to work crafting NPCs. I made a lot of them for this game: Recurring villains, sidekicks, the quirky store owner Thorin, even a romantic interest.
I know what you're thinking, and let me stop you right there – yes, we were two teenage boys playing female characters in a story with a romantic side plot. This couldn't possibly end well, could it?
Surprisingly, our minds weren't in the gutter nearly half as much as you'd expect. While there were a few “Tee hee, I have boobs” moments, and our characters probably took a few more baths than what was strictly necessary if you're out adventuring, the romantic storyline actually developed relatively sensibly, and ended in Wanda being married to a handsome samurai with graying temples. You might wonder what a female Aragorn was doing marrying a samurai who probably belongs in a different quarter of the world altogether, which brings me to another interesting viewpoint: While we had a story, we still didn't have a setting. I made up the scenery for the adventures more or less on the fly, and aside from one town called Freeport which served as our base of operations, nothing was really coherent between our adventures; the town was simultaneously by the sea, in the middle of the forest, or next to an evil empire, as appropriate for the adventure.
We would eventually come to deal with this issue, but for now we were happy just to go on adventures. The stories were simple, but the adventures usually were at least vaguely linked together, and because of the recurring NPCs it did have the feeling of being a single, distinct campaign to a much greater degree than anything we had done before. We looked back at our adventures, and I loved what I saw; the simple mud of dull die-rolling had been fertilized, and out of it was spiring something beautiful, something none of us had expected to be there. Out of random encounters, survival rolls, and spot checks, a story was growing, a story that somehow was more than just the sum of its parts. It was a simple story, a crude, primitive tale of man (or woman, rather) facing monsters in harsh wilderness, but it was alive, and more importantly, it was mine.
This is when I became truly passionate. I started writing down what had happened in the adventures, sometimes from the point of view of one of the characters. I started reading the books thoroughly, scanning for new interesting monsters, traps, or other obstacles. I plowed through novels solely to get inspiration. I counted the days until the next game session. I was hooked, and hooked bad.
In just one year, I had gone from stringing together random encounters for Bruno and Gondriel, to fashioning characters, plots, and all sorts of challenges falling outside the scope of the rules. Now, only one thing remained: A setting.
Notable Characters: Gondriel, who was the first character to really be a character in her own right. Paradoxally, she wasn't in the first chronicle, as it was a while before I made real “stories” for the group in my hometown, but it was Andy's design of Gondriel that really showed me and Lex how to make your character more than just numbers on a sheet of paper.
Crowning Moments of Awesome: Yeah, we had a few. One of the best one was sneaking off from a school dance to run a session in the coat room, using our first-edition sheets made on the backs of old homework (Gondriel and Bruno remained 1st ed characters for most of their existence, for some reason I remember mostly playing 3rd ed with Lex). We also finally beat the first dungeon that my father ran for us, which I ran straight out of the book with some added quirks of my own. While I was the GM and probably biased, Bill and Sain (with the addition of Gondriel) finally did manage to make it to the treasury of the ruins and got their reward (not that they needed it after killing the kobold banker, but still).
The true Crowning Moment of Awesome, however, was in that magical moment when the game became a Story. I've spent my entire life since then reliving that moment in many, many, many different games, and it keeps getting better.
Next Up: Gnomeworld, in which I create a full-scale world, learn how to plan ahead, and things begin to take a darker turn. Also, a character actually climbs from level 1 to level 20 – to date, a feat I've only seen done once.
söndag 6 juni 2010
1999: Kobold Soup
“You're sitting at a dark, dank tavern in a small town, when an old dwarf approaches, saying he knows of a ruined monastery where, supposedly, a great treasure lies hidden...”
In -99 I was introduced to roleplaying games, and spent most of that year on the player side of the table. Me and Lex (notice the cunning nickname) started out in an adventure as classically D&D as they come. Whereas we started out with a bang and a critical hit, the adventure didn't actually go so well and gave both of us nightmares because of the creepy thing sneaking around in the dungeon – we didn't actually find out what it was in-game, ever – but even in the first adventure we had some of those classical things that make roleplaying games so great, like the GM-Player miscommunication (“The door doesn't open when I push it? I bash it open!” - “It- it opens outwards, but okay?”), insane streaks of hateful, evil dice (“I missed the goblin six times and I needed to roll an 8?”) and even the tiniest bit of character backstory (“My parents were killed by dragons! Then I got adopted by my grandparents, but they were killed by dragons too!” - Hey, I was 11!).
After that initial adventure, we played occasionally under the guidance of my father, notably in the Tower of Power adventure, written and designed by one of my fathers' friends way back before I was born, but we also spent a lot of time just randomly fighting stuff from the monster manual, sans GM; it gave us the opportunity to try out how the game worked, and ignited those first few sparks of true creativity in us both – when we would actually stop and discuss for a moment where and why we were fighting the three gnolls. Somewhat surprisingly, Lex stood for the gamemastering before I did, in the adventure that gives this blog post its name: Kobold Soup. The plot: A man really, really likes kobold soup, but he has no kobolds to put in it. The mission: Kill lots of kobolds and feed the man. The twist: One of the kobolds owns a bank, and has at least one item from every treasure table in the game. The happy ending: We run out of shit to spend the money on, and build a giant church for the rest of it.
The Tower of Power was the most interesting adventure story-wise, one which I'd be glad to run again even though I've both played and ran it many, many times. Unfortunately we never finished it back then, because we either died or my father was too busy to run it for so long that we forgot what we were doing. The adventure revolves around a mysteriously scented tea, which players from my AE games probably recognize.
Notable Characters:
None really, but I'd like to give myself a pat on the back for at least giving my cleric a backstory of some kind.
Crowning Moments of Awesome:
It didn't get a whole lot better than instantly killing the first monster – a giant spider – I think. We did kind of accidentally kill a dragon because we misinterpreted the rules, but it wasn't very exciting because it died instantly (again because we misinterpreted the rules) and it was just one of those “let's fight random stuff!” bouts.
Next Up: The Crossdressing Crusades, in which we introduce two new players and four new characters, and I make my debut as a gamemaster.
In -99 I was introduced to roleplaying games, and spent most of that year on the player side of the table. Me and Lex (notice the cunning nickname) started out in an adventure as classically D&D as they come. Whereas we started out with a bang and a critical hit, the adventure didn't actually go so well and gave both of us nightmares because of the creepy thing sneaking around in the dungeon – we didn't actually find out what it was in-game, ever – but even in the first adventure we had some of those classical things that make roleplaying games so great, like the GM-Player miscommunication (“The door doesn't open when I push it? I bash it open!” - “It- it opens outwards, but okay?”), insane streaks of hateful, evil dice (“I missed the goblin six times and I needed to roll an 8?”) and even the tiniest bit of character backstory (“My parents were killed by dragons! Then I got adopted by my grandparents, but they were killed by dragons too!” - Hey, I was 11!).
After that initial adventure, we played occasionally under the guidance of my father, notably in the Tower of Power adventure, written and designed by one of my fathers' friends way back before I was born, but we also spent a lot of time just randomly fighting stuff from the monster manual, sans GM; it gave us the opportunity to try out how the game worked, and ignited those first few sparks of true creativity in us both – when we would actually stop and discuss for a moment where and why we were fighting the three gnolls. Somewhat surprisingly, Lex stood for the gamemastering before I did, in the adventure that gives this blog post its name: Kobold Soup. The plot: A man really, really likes kobold soup, but he has no kobolds to put in it. The mission: Kill lots of kobolds and feed the man. The twist: One of the kobolds owns a bank, and has at least one item from every treasure table in the game. The happy ending: We run out of shit to spend the money on, and build a giant church for the rest of it.
The Tower of Power was the most interesting adventure story-wise, one which I'd be glad to run again even though I've both played and ran it many, many times. Unfortunately we never finished it back then, because we either died or my father was too busy to run it for so long that we forgot what we were doing. The adventure revolves around a mysteriously scented tea, which players from my AE games probably recognize.
Notable Characters:
None really, but I'd like to give myself a pat on the back for at least giving my cleric a backstory of some kind.
Crowning Moments of Awesome:
It didn't get a whole lot better than instantly killing the first monster – a giant spider – I think. We did kind of accidentally kill a dragon because we misinterpreted the rules, but it wasn't very exciting because it died instantly (again because we misinterpreted the rules) and it was just one of those “let's fight random stuff!” bouts.
Next Up: The Crossdressing Crusades, in which we introduce two new players and four new characters, and I make my debut as a gamemaster.
lördag 5 juni 2010
Eleven Years of Adventure
I've had another Random Idea (tm). This idea spired out of my Half-Life Idea, because I realized that I pretty recently passed the limit where I've been doing roleplaying games for half my life, and I got all nostalgic and stuff. So, in another bout of sleeplessness, I went through my gaming year-by-year in my head, and I realized that it might be fun to write some of it down.
Since I inevitably lose anything I write down on a note, I figured I might as well use my blog. It's a neat place to keep shit, and it also means that if people are bored, they can read it and maybe become even more bored, so that's good. Furthermore, it gives me something to do with my blog during the summer.
What I'm going to do is, I'm going to primarily write about the “long-term game of the year”, since I've done one big project every year, and then maybe mention some smaller chronicles that deserve attention. I'm also going to gossip a bit about various players, so woo gossip I guess? Chances are you will be mentioned if you have played with me, but don't worry, I'll do my best to protect everyones' privacy by giving them cunning nicknames. Posts will be extremely long, very self-centered, and in all likelihood, not very entertaining. You have been warned.
The first entry is called “1999: Kobold Soup” and will be up shortly.
Since I inevitably lose anything I write down on a note, I figured I might as well use my blog. It's a neat place to keep shit, and it also means that if people are bored, they can read it and maybe become even more bored, so that's good. Furthermore, it gives me something to do with my blog during the summer.
What I'm going to do is, I'm going to primarily write about the “long-term game of the year”, since I've done one big project every year, and then maybe mention some smaller chronicles that deserve attention. I'm also going to gossip a bit about various players, so woo gossip I guess? Chances are you will be mentioned if you have played with me, but don't worry, I'll do my best to protect everyones' privacy by giving them cunning nicknames. Posts will be extremely long, very self-centered, and in all likelihood, not very entertaining. You have been warned.
The first entry is called “1999: Kobold Soup” and will be up shortly.
tisdag 1 juni 2010
Blog Challenge: Half-Life
So I couldn't sleep, and came to count various mathematical conclusions in my head. This is one of them.
I am now approximately 22 years and 46 days old (roughly). This means that, half my life ago, I was 11 years and 23 days. That was the 9th of May, 1999.
Half my life ago, I was in fifth grade and had just fallen in love with Linn J, a girl in my class. I had not yet awakened sexually, but I had discovered roleplaying games and programming in the form of the Klik n' Play game maker. I had also discovered the Beatles and hung out in Andreas' house listening over and over to Rubber Soul. I had done some acting in school plays - playing an old grandfather-guy and something involving a black top hat, as well as put up my very own mime show with some dude I barely knew.
Half my life ago, I had visited the United States but not (if memory serves) Norway, and the most important things in my life were second-hand stores for comic books and video games. I was fiercely loyal to Sega despite the losing battle against the N64 and my MegaDrive was my most prized possession. Half my life ago, I was just about to read the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for the first time, and I had just about beaten Sonic 3. Half my life ago, I outsmarted a teacher for the first time in my life, and realized that older people are not infallible.
Of the people I knew half my life ago, I now only keep contact with those I am related to. I barely know what has become of the others.
Now for the challenge: Who were you half your life ago? What was important to you? Who did you know? Use your blogs, people. I'm curious.
I am now approximately 22 years and 46 days old (roughly). This means that, half my life ago, I was 11 years and 23 days. That was the 9th of May, 1999.
Half my life ago, I was in fifth grade and had just fallen in love with Linn J, a girl in my class. I had not yet awakened sexually, but I had discovered roleplaying games and programming in the form of the Klik n' Play game maker. I had also discovered the Beatles and hung out in Andreas' house listening over and over to Rubber Soul. I had done some acting in school plays - playing an old grandfather-guy and something involving a black top hat, as well as put up my very own mime show with some dude I barely knew.
Half my life ago, I had visited the United States but not (if memory serves) Norway, and the most important things in my life were second-hand stores for comic books and video games. I was fiercely loyal to Sega despite the losing battle against the N64 and my MegaDrive was my most prized possession. Half my life ago, I was just about to read the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for the first time, and I had just about beaten Sonic 3. Half my life ago, I outsmarted a teacher for the first time in my life, and realized that older people are not infallible.
Of the people I knew half my life ago, I now only keep contact with those I am related to. I barely know what has become of the others.
Now for the challenge: Who were you half your life ago? What was important to you? Who did you know? Use your blogs, people. I'm curious.
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