Self Revelations: D&D, the OSR, and Me

I started this blog to chronicle my return to roleplaying. I really had no idea what my attempt to return to the fold would entail, or how successful I would be. As far as success is concerned, I've got a steady group of fellow gamers that I play with on a fairly regular basis. So I consider that a success.

Note, of course, that I had no idea there was an OSR when I came back to gaming within the last few years. When I first made my concerted effort to return to the table-top, my first exposure was with Pathfinder (which I found to be interesting but too crunchy for my tastes...I had never played 3E either, for the same crunchy reason). It was this lack of fulfillment with an in-print game that caused me to wonder about the out-of-print games from my past. I decided to dig around online for those older editions, and the rest is history...

Since I've come back to roleplaying, I think I've learned some things about my current gaming self. The following is very subject to change, however, as I'm nothing if not mutable:

The Old Rules
At the moment, I don't really want to go back and use the old D&D rules as written, be they Basic or Advanced D&D. Sure, I have strong feelings of nostalgia for those old rule sets. Like so many of us, it was my first RPG. There's a certain lure to the thought of playing actual D&D instead of a retroclone, but again, that's probably just a bit of "bad" nostalgia. In re-reading the Rules Cyclopedia, Moldvay/Cook/ Marsh B/X, and AD&D, I find myself balking at the "clunkyness" (or what I personally perceive/define as clunkyness) of the rules. I've also run into that balking feeling while running some Labyrinth Lord recently. So I've reached a point where my issues with the rules have overcome the gravitas, the prestige, the tradition, the whatever-you-want-to-call-it of playing actual D&D or those retroclones that cleave close to it (i.e. the "first wave" of clones = OSRIC, Swords & Wizardry, Labyrinth Lord).

I say all the above with not a little sadness, because I blame my current state of life as being the culprit behind my inability to grok the old rules. I can't seem to retain the little idiosyncrasies of the old rules. I know this seems lame, but it's a sad truth for me. I've got some personal things in my life that are taking up a fair bit of brain power of late. Maybe this ineptitude on my part will abate someday, but for now...

I have to admit, though, that I've felt a recent urge to get the original AD&D books, in order to add them back to my collection. The books my teenage group shared years ago were destroyed by a friend who became a hardcore born-again Christian. After so many years of not having the hallowed words of Gary Gygax in my library, I feel the need to own them once more.

I'm not sure why, even though I know how old school games are about rulings and not rules, that I just can't feel totally at peace with playing D&D rules as written OR with house rules that make them more to my tastes. Maybe it's some disillusionment with the rules, or being tired of the same old D&D rules appearing over and over in the vast number of OSR publications, or a combination of the two. Don't get me wrong, I love the wondrous variety of the OSR and believe it is a positive aspect of the movement. 

I think familiarity does breed contempt, and I've been around the D&D rules for so long that I'm probably getting a bit tired of them. I probably need a break from them. I can't seem to help the urge to tinker. I know, the prevailing thought process is that older D&D rules were pretty much made to be just guidelines, and made to be tinkered with. But I just don't have the stomach for too many house rules of late. Maybe it's my current time crunch that makes me get upset if I have to craft too many house rules. Granted, I don't think I've played with too many house rules, but still...I feel the need to find a game that doesn't give me the overwhelming urge to tweak. This feeling alone probably strips away a good portion of my OSR cred (if I ever had any).

The Rules with D&D DNA
Again, I've no urge to use the original D&D/AD&D rules in a current game. For my AD&D needs, I have Castles & Crusades. It is the game that had Gary's blessings as the successor to D&D, after all (at least, according to the Troll Lords, who were close to Gary before he passed).

Yes, the only version of AD&D I really dig is Castles & Crusades. It's a wonderful amalgam of 1E (classes, races, overall aesthetic) and 3.5 (more modern unified mechanic), with some new ideas/twists thrown in (example: rangers don't cast spells...that's awesome...never could stand spellcasting rangers) and an old-school mentality surrounding it.

The other game that's made a big impression on me is DCC RPG. I really like this "second generation" clone! I am definitely liking it more than the original/first wave of clones, and I know that statement may raise some hackles. I know, DCC is not supposed to be a clone, but come on folks...call a clone a clone. I'm not ready to actually run DCC RPG at the moment, but I have the itch (and some of those Zocchi dice as well).

Both of the games mentioned above use a much more unified mechanic than the old versions of D&D/AD&D. And these days, I'm loving me some unified mechanic. This is due to being busy with adult life, which leaves me with minimal brain space to use for storage of various mechanics. I know, lame, right? Oh well, it's my truth. And to thine own self be true.

The less I feel the need to house rule, the more I like the RPG. I do like to play with some minimal house rules for C&C (one sheet of paper front and back is my limit!), and DCC seems like a game I wouldn't want to house rule much at all.

But C&C and DCC have that D&D DNA, and of late that's bothered me. So I have to conclude that I'm having an issue with D&D, deep down.

Other Rules and New Rules
Lord knows that, over the years, I've played a bunch of other games that weren't D&D-based. I played a lot of Palladium (TMNT, Rifts, Heroes Unlimited, Ninjas & Superspies) and also Amber Diceless RPG. Most recently I've been playing Savage Worlds. So my experience with the other RPG possibilities out there is probably part of my current urge to look elsewhere. Look, I learned a lot about rulings not rules and other concepts favored by the OSR through my experience with a non-D&D game like Amber Diceless Roleplaying. With no dice and just four attributes, the ADRPG GM has to make a lot of rulings.

Bottom line: I'm really curious about newer, non-D&D based systems like Savage Worlds and Dragon Age. I feel the urge to break away from the D&D "hegemony"...at least for a while. These games also have unified mechanics (with Dragon Age going so far as only using the d6, rather than Savage World's use of the other polyhedrals we all know and love...I have to admit I'm going to miss all those other dice while we play Dragon Age).

I know there are a lot of OSR folks who clamor about player vs. character skill, and a system like Dragon Age can lend itself quite easily to players depending on the character stats and associated skill rolls. But I'm here to tell you that my thoughts towards character stats and skill rolls are also tied to my current gaming status. I'm a busy adult playing with busy adults. We don't have all the time we used to have in order to lean mostly on player skill and searching every cranny of a dungeon.

I guess you could say we don't have time to be incredibly clever. We have time to be somewhat clever. My players are very creative and come up with really inventive solutions to things, be they battles or negotiations with NPCs or solving puzzles. But if they sometimes want to lean on the dice mechanic, I'm not going to stop them. Because in our limited time we want the adventure to press forward, and not worry about exploring all the minutia that "pure" old school D&D play demands.

I do encourage a combination of player and character skill, a compromise if you will. These two roleplaying concepts don't need to be mutually exclusive. Player ideas improve dice roll success or eliminate the need for dice. I guess I am not purely of the OSR when it comes to mechanics, but I am when it comes to the style, the spirit. Not that labels matter, though. The gaming is what really matters.

Conclusion...For Now...
I'm not sure if I'm getting across all my feelings as clearly as I wanted, but I made an effort here. Mostly for my benefit, but I'm also wondering what others think. You may think I'm a cop out when it comes to the OSR, but again, I'm thinking that I'm more of an omnivorous gamer rather than just a consumer of the old ways. Maybe I'm not really an OSR gamer at heart. I don't know. Not that there's a strict membership guideline for the movement, right? ;-)

I'm not knocking those who want the pure OSR feeling/gameplay. I'm just realizing that I'm different...at least for the moment. Someday, I'm sure, I'll want to play C&C or DCC or maybe even Labyrinth Lord again. I think I just need some time away from the same rules I've been using for so many years. Hell, I might want to try my hand at original AD&D again. Who the heck knows, right? I'm nothing if not a sufferer of chronic Gamer ADD!

But for the time being, I talked to my group and they seem interested in me running some Dragon Age RPG. And I'm having a blast with my friend Bill's Savage World of Solomon Kane game. Both games may owe their existence to D&D (like all other RPGs), but they don't owe much in the way of mechanics. And I'm really, really liking that fact.

Wish me luck on this latest phase of my gaming life. Until we meet again, happy gaming!

It's All D&D to Me

I'm just gonna go off here a bit. Just a short tidbit of brain spew, sort of an offspring of the post I wrote yesterday regarding what I consider the "flavors" of D&D (including Castles & Crusades, my preferred flavor, and the upcoming 5th edition of D&D). Please let me know if you agree or disagree.

Here goes, according to my brain:

OSRIC is D&D.

Labyrinth Lord is D&D.

Swords & Wizardry is D&D.

Lamentations of the Flame Princess is D&D.

Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG is D&D.

[Insert title of D&D-inspired rule set] is D&D.

Are you seeing a theme here? A common thread?

Bottom line: for me, I don't care what you call it, it's all D&D. Like Shakespeare wrote, "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

I don't care that there are small, medium, or large differences between the clones and the rules they emulate. I don't care how crazy the "house rules" found in rule sets like Lamentations of the Flame Princess, Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, and their ilk may be.

It's no accident that images of the original D&D Red Box grace the front of the three-ring binders I use for my GM's screen during my Castles & Crusades games. C&C is in many ways the successor of D&D. It's is a successor from a mechanics standpoint, as well as the spiritual successor. So when I'm using those rules, if someone asks me what I'm playing, I usually say "A version of D&D" or just "Dungeons and Dragons." If they ask for more detail, I'll get down to the nitty gritty, but otherwise, I see no difference between C&C and the system that gave birth to it/inspired it.

The same goes for all the clones and clones of clones out there. That's the main reason the Edition Wars make no sense to me.

Back to Castles & Crusades: It may have a different name, have some different terms scattered throughout (i.e. Castle Keeper instead of Dungeon Master), and differ in mechanics in some ways. But in the end, it captures the feel of both 1E and 3.X D&D, paying homage to both iterations. Yet, at the same time, it has aspects that make it its own creature, especially the mechanics of the SIEGE Engine.

I know this is all my opinion, and I'm not some sort of missionary that seeks to show others the "true way." This is just MY path to D&D nirvana. Yours no doubt differs.

I am curious to see what 5E will be. Heck, I may even get into the playtesting if I am able. But I already have my version of D&D that I enjoy above all others. And it's called Castles & Crusades.

Does anyone else out there feel the same? I'm sure I am not breaking any new ground here. Does anyone disagree? I know I've probably written the same sentiments on this blog before, but sometimes we need to be reminded of things. Lemme know your thoughts. Or am I just shouting into the void here?

*EDIT: I should mention that I also consider Pathfinder to be D&D by another name (wait, is that a stupid statement?). I would even venture to say the unthinkable: 4E is even D&D to me, though a vastly altered version. I can hear the outrage at that statement! I don't say 4E is D&D because it has the brand name and is currently in print (for a little while longer, at least). I say it because it bears at least some resemblance to the editions of the past. Though I would never play 4E, it still gets grudging acknowledgement from me. Heresy, I know...

Thoughts after reading Moldvay’s Basic Set

So, as part of my desire to read up on Classic or "Basic" D&D, I’ve read through Moldvay’s Basic Set. Here’s how I sum up my thoughts after reading it:

The nostalgia that I felt was heavy duty (again, I never played it when I was young, but it still reminded me in some ways of reading through the AD&D 1E books).

The only real difference that I could see between Moldvay Basic and Labyrinth Lord was the rules for attribute adjustment. It might be clearer to state that the only rules difference that matters to me is attribute adjustment, which I think is absent from Labyrinth Lord (then again, I haven’t read Labyrinth Lord from cover to cover, so I could be wrong). But really, I don't think that there are any other differences of any considerable size.

If I wanted to play by these rules or something like them, I’d rather play Labyrinth Lord.

This last statement is how I felt after finishing my read-through. I feel like Labyrinth Lord has a much better organization, appearance, and some small changes in the rules that make it much more accessible, at least to me at my current stage of life.

The big factors that appeal to me when thinking of running a Classic D&D game are:

Limited class options make it easier for the GM to remember class abilities and faster for players to create characters (even faster than Castles & Crusades/C&C, which is pretty quick when it comes to character creation).

Saving throw progression and other similar mechanics don’t require the thought process that goes into systems that require the GM to create target numbers for attribute checks (an issue I had with D&D 3E, but C&C mitigates much of the thought process with the SIEGE Engine system). If I ever thought there was a need for attribute checks in a Classic D&D game, I like the thought of making players roll under the appropriate attribute score. I’ve always felt that D&D attribute numbers were sort of useless, and their modifiers or lack thereof had more effect on the game (perhaps that was just my style of play back in the day…)

The four human races and the demihuman race-as-class options lend a certain archetypal/mythic aspect to the game that appeals to me. I have ideas for developing my own setting for use with Classic D&D rules, and using that in a future campaign.

How Classic D&D lends itself to a certain style of play that is appealing to me (i.e. simpler, faster, rules-light, archetypal/”mythic”). I truly believe that system influences style of play.

Actually, there’s one other big thought on my mind, as you can probably tell from all my references to C&C above: I still prefer C&C for my number-one go-to game. I love that system and its combination of AD&D and d20 D&D concepts. It’s the rules set that makes me want to do the least amount of house ruling. To me, at this point in my life, I find that “limited need for house ruling” is a big factor for me when it comes to a game system. This is mostly due, I think, to my limited free time for gaming. I would prefer to spend my time prepping for game time and actual play rather than rules tinkering. And less house rules means that players can depend mostly on published rules and not have to worry about tons of house rules that I might foist upon them.

While I was reading Labyrinth Lord, I found myself doing a lot of house ruling in my head. There were a lot of tweaks I found myself wanting to make. And in considering the changes, they were mostly efforts on my part to put C&C functionality into Classic D&D. Such as thinking about how to do attribute checks in Classic D&D in a manner that was satisfying to me.

I KNOW that this is a big heresy when it comes to Classic D&D play. I know there’s a rabid contingent of people, many many people out there, who would balk at my attribute check fixation. Trust me, I do so myself. In our C&C games, I try to minimize attribute checks when possible, resorting to asking my players to roleplay out the actions they want to accomplish as much as possible. Even if they are asked to make an attribute check, I still ask them to roleplay things out (and depending on how convincing they are, I will often give them bonuses to the associated rolls).

And come to think of it, instead of resorting to Classic D&D rules to get the Classic D&D “style” of gameplay (archetypal), I could very well just run C&C but restrict races and classes to what would be close to what is available in Classic D&D.

I am thinking of potentially asking my group if we could sometimes run Classic D&D one-shot sessions. Just so I can get a fix. One other aspect of Classic D&D that I like, funnily enough, is how deadly it can be. I would like to run a game that is more deadly and less about epic adventure. Again, this is just my own perception of game systems, but I find that AD&D/C&C (at least for me) lend themselves to more epic adventure style of play, where characters are more hardy at lower levels and therefore have a much greater chance of living to reach high levels and forging great destinies.

Anyway, there you have it, folks. For good or ill. Please give me your thoughts. I guess I’m on to read Moldvay Expert, and then on to Labyrinth Lord (for a more through read than I’ve ever given it).

Facing Down the Beast

So, instead of bitching about gamer ADD like I've been prone to do in the past, I decided to man-up and do what I should have done before: take all the RPGs that have been plaguing my mind and literally spreading them all out in front of me. Like a lineup of the usual suspects. And I gave them a good hard look, and some thought, and I was determined to come to some conclusions. And I think I've finally regained mastery of my gaming domain.

First there's Castles & Crusades, my number one game. The Sancho Panza to my Don Quixote. The Little John to my Robin Hood. The Riker to my Picard. I started out my gaming career with AD&D 1E/2E, and C&C to me is a near-perfect reimagining of those editions of the game. I like what Troll Lord Games has done with the system by incorporating the SIEGE Engine mechanic, bringing some 3E into the mix. I don't have to do much in the way of house ruling to get it to where I need it to be at my table. I will never need to go back to AD&D, because C&C has become the ideal version of those editions, to me.

Now, as I've said before, until recently I never actually played any version of basic/original/non-Advanced D&D. I bought the Rules Cyclopedia when it came out in the early 90's, and also bought the "Black Box" version of D&D, but never actually played them. I missed out on the whole boxed set thing entirely when I was a kid. The LBBs and all that Holmes, Moldvay, Mentzer, etc. jive was something I would have appreciated back then, I think...but I missed it all. I was just never exposed to it.

But looking back now, and having dabbled in OD&D (especially via Swords & Wizardry and Lamentations of the Flame Princess), I have become more and more enamored of OD&D and its clones. But looking through Moldvay, Mentzer, the Rules Cyclopedia, clones like Labyrinth Lord and S&W and LotFP and all the rest, I think that I feel strongly about actually using the original Mentzer books rather than a clone. I just like the look of the game, the layout of the books, the style, the art (as a confessed Elmore nut). There's just something about it that calls to me.

So, when I get the chance to run some OD&D, I'm going to use Mentzer, with some house rules I'm mulling over to add a bit of spice to things. I'm taking inspiration for my house rules from many sources on the web and blogosphere, as well as from other games. This includes the beta version of Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG.

Now, there are some other various games that have also been tempting me with their shininess. Games such as Barbarians of Lemuria, Dragon Age, and even that game based in Middle Earth called The One Ring that I just learned about YESTERDAY! Yes, gamer ADD has no mercy. Heck, I just really discovered a lot to like about Dragon Age less than a week ago, on Free RPG Day. All of these various other games I have lumped together as potential candidates, but I have used a bit of reality to temper my expectations. These miscellaneous games are nice and all, but I either don't own them, they haven't been published yet, or they would take time to learn that I just don't seem to have these days.

Above all, I'm totally dedicated to the Dragonlance game I am currently running, and have no intention of sacrificing it in order to jump into OD&D right now. And especially not for some new shiny game that would require a whole new cycle of reading rules, learning rules, teaching rules to others, etc. I've been waiting a looooong time to do a Dragonlance campaign,  and I have met a great group of gamers who make running the game a pleasure.

Wow, it feels good to get that all out! All it took was standing up to the beast!

Are YOU with D&D?

Hi all. I haven't been able to post over the last few days due to work and family. I am becoming much busier by the day at my new job, so that unfortunately means that my blogging during the day will be slowing down/sporadic. I have to sacrifice something in favor of spending time to actually game/prepare to game. As always, I do what I can when I can. Anyway, enough of all that. On to the real topic of this post:

Has anyone read the "I'm with D&D" post over at The Other Side blog? Take a look if you haven't, and let me know your thoughts. What is your stance on the many editions of D&D? Are you an egalitarian, or a staunch partisan? I for one have a "play and let play" stance on things for the most part. Any kind of D&D is D&D, alright! What's most important to me is that people are actually playing! Now, does that mean I love the 4E incarnation? No. I am not a huge fan of editions 2 through 4 of D&D, actually. And I have just truly started to delve into OD&D, and find some issues with that venerable beast as well. Give me 1E any day! But if people are as passionate about other versions, so be it. Who am I to tell them what should be their game of choice? I could write posts that go on about what I find offensive about a particular edition, but always with the caveat of "this is my opinion." If you love it, play it.

I've been called "mealy" for my opinions. So be it. Mealy I may be, but at least I'm not a "flaming" uber-nerd who's sole purpose is to extend one's ire for a D&D edition to actually attacking those who play said edition. That's a level of meta-dorkness to which I will not descend.

Currently, I am playing using Castles & Crusades, which has been dubbed a 1E/3.5E hybrid. But I am also increasingly interested in Labyrinth Lord, a clone of Moldvay/Cook/Marsh B/X. I see C&C as a means to do more "story-driven" roleplaying, whereas LL to me would be used at my table for a more "traditional" version of D&D that focuses on the sandbox-y, dungeon crawl "slay and loot" approach. I know some of you are groaning right now at my mention of story in conjunction with D&D. I might need to do a separate post on my thoughts regarding the use of certain editions depending on what style of game you want to run. This post may also include my thoughts on playing strong archetypes versus more "individualized" characters, etc. I may have to rethink my stance on other editions, and accept that each has their merit based on what style of play you seek to foster.

I, Gamer: A Testimonial in Three Parts (3)

PART THE THIRD: How Drance Got His Game Back
(Ages 25 to the Present)

 

So, we arrive at my last post in my gaming testimonial. By the end of the second post in the series, I was a young adult in the post-9/11 years, and the terror attacks were a major catalyst in the cessation of most of my gaming activities. By the time I turned 25 I was also heading into a period of personal upheaval with regard to friendships, family relations, and especially my dealings with significant others that would come and go. This era in my life would last for years to come. I won’t go into the details of my baggage, of course. I’m sure you get the idea.

I say MOST of my gaming activities ceased, but I was actually still gaming in various ways. It was just face-to-face, table-top gaming that had totally ceased to exist in my life. And that was a significant source of sadness for me, a malaise that would wax and wane (but never truly leave me) as the years went by.

The primary way in which I got my game on after college was through RPG video games. These, of course, are a good way to get the RPG experience without the need to get together with anyone else. You can have adventures all by yourself. And there were some great games, especially the D&D games like the Baldur’s Gate and Icewind Dale series, and later Neverwinter Nights. But these games are a double-edged sword. It’s a great way to get that dose of adventuring you need, but it’s not really roleplaying in the pure sense. There’s no human interaction, and eventually it becomes a hollow experience. I know that some may argue that MMORPGs like Everquest and World of Warcraft combine video gaming with a “virtual” human touch, but I never saw the appeal of MMORPGs (I’ve heard a lot of horror stories, most focused around veteran players swindling “noobs”). Call me old-fashioned, or maybe just old.

And as I touched on briefly in my second post, I also got into board games and card games that—in greater or lesser ways—emulated some of the experience of roleplaying. Or I would try to inject some type of roleplaying into a game, with varying degrees of success. These games included the Game of Thrones board game from Fantasy Flight Games, Shadows Over Camelot by Days of Wonder, and a game I discovered called “Thieves Guild.” These did a bit to sate that roleplaying desire, but were never really that fulfilling.

Fantasy Flight Games in particular has a good number of board games and card games that seek to emulate the roleplaying experience (like Runebound and Descent) but the cost for these games is, more often than not, very high. Trust me, these games can be very tempting, because for the most part they are very well done with regard to mechanics, presentation, artwork, etc. But I wasn’t about to try to buy all these different games in order to emulate what I used to be able to do with just a couple of books, a few friends, and our imaginations.

It wasn’t until the late Fall/early Winter of 2006 that the urge to roleplay became overwhelming again. But what was I to do? I decided to search the Web for an outlet.

That’s when I came across play-by-email gaming (PBEM). It was a eureka moment, and I set to work almost immediately to get in on the action. It was this decision that truly set me on the path back to the table-top.

I had of course, over the years, seen advertisements in places like Dragon magazine for play-by-mail games from companies like Flying Buffalo. But these never appealed to me in the slightest. The potential time delay between actions/rounds seemed hideous, to say the least. Call me a fiend for instant gratification if you must, but I really would need more immediacy for my gaming experience.

But play-by-email seemed to me the perfect way to ease myself back into roleplaying. It might not be instantaneous, but it would be a heck of a lot faster than play-by-snail mail. I could conduct PBEM games at a leisurely pace, which appealed to me because I knew I would be extremely rusty as a GM and would not yet be able to handle the much faster/instantaneous pace of a table-top game. And technically the “game session” would never end, because the emails from players could arrive at any time of day, seven days a week. There would be no need to get players together in one place at the same time. I didn’t need to stick to my circle of old friends anymore. And the Internet was a good buffer between me and the strangers I would be soliciting to play in my games.

All of this appealed to me…for the time being.

So in January of 2007 I became a DM again for the first time in ages. The campaign was called Wanderers of Faerûn (WoF), and obviously it was set in the Forgotten Realms, my favorite official campaign world. I decided to set the game up as a Yahoo group.

What might be surprising is that for the campaign’s rule set I used a modified version of the Amber Diceless RPG rules. I may have been ready to run a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, but I wasn’t quite ready to actually use a Dungeons & Dragons rule set!

I advertised the game on the Yahoo group called RPG Player Sanctuary and found a great group of players from across the country. I also managed to get a couple old friends to join the game, both of whom were a part of my earliest D&D experiences. This included my old friend Pat, who originally introduced me to the game. This fact in particular made it seem as if things had come full circle in my gaming life.

The WoF campaign went on for over a year, and I can’t describe to you how great it felt to be back in the DM saddle. The game had some great moments, and my six players all did a fantastic job of making our shared adventures thrilling. And my personal roleplaying itch was well and truly scratched.

But by the beginning of 2008 I could already tell things were slipping into oblivion. Certain players were posting less and less. Those who did post were sometimes resorting to one to two sentence posts. Finally, I decided to call it quits in March 2008, and WoF breathed its last.

I tried to start another game in May of that year, using some of the players from WoF, but that second attempt was far less successful, sputtering along for nine months (and we averaged less than 10 posts per month). I realized I was done with PBEM, and this was disheartening. I had put all my hopes into that particular basket, and I was back where I started again: no immediate roleplaying prospects.

Life events swept me up again for the rest of the year. My daughter had been born in 2006, and she hit the feared second year of human life right about the time my son was born in 2008. For the next year and a half, during my free time, I would sometimes flip through my game books and dream of roleplaying. From mid-2008 right up to the present also saw a severe diminishment in my board and card gaming endeavors as well, due to increasing schedule conflicts among my circle of friends. And I hadn’t played a computer RPG in years. I was in danger of slipping into a new period of gaming deprivation…

Which leads me to the dawn of 2010.

The reason my PBEM game used an Amber Diceless rules set was because I wanted a “rules light” game. But towards the end of the PBEM campaign I felt the diceless system was TOO light. I wanted just a bit more crunch to my rules.

Wizards of the Coast had recently released 4th Edition, but I had no interest in the game for many reasons. Taking a look at the rule books, I just didn’t like the feel of the new rules. I also didn’t like the art for the most part, as shallow as that might be. In addition, it wasn’t economically feasible for me to buy the new edition’s books. I had a ton of other gaming stuff at my disposal already. And irrational as it may seem, I was sort of angry at Wizards of the Coast, who seemed more and more interested in the bottom line (especially since they were bought out by Hasbro) than in the legacy of D&D. They had changed their website, requiring users to pay to access information that had been free during the 3.0-3.5 years. I also had bad feelings towards WotC and Paizo for killing my beloved Dragon magazine.

So, I looked at my game book collection for inspiration. I had the three core books of D&D 3.5, which I had bought years before on a lark, during a time when I had gotten curious about what D&D was like in the 21st century. And it was too much crunch.

Sometime in 2008 I had scored a major find on the Web: a PDF of pretty much all the 2nd Edition books (for the life of me I can’t remember where I found it). So I looked into that, but again, it all seemed overwhelming.

Within the last year or so I had also remembered that my buddy Pat had some of our group’s old D&D stuff. Most of that old material had disappeared over the years, but I remembered that he had our copy of the Rules Cyclopedia (which we had bought but never played). I paid him a visit and picked up the Cyclopedia and whatever other random old D&D materials he had. But for some reason I even found myself overwhelmed by the Cyclopedia. Perhaps it was the small type and the sheer volume of stuff it covered, but even this “simpler” version of D&D seemed beyond me.

I started to get frustrated with myself. What the heck was I looking for?

In despair I turned back to the Web, and that’s when I found the old-school renaissance. I started reading blogs about the subject. And I learned that people were resurrecting the old rules and republishing them in new packages. And most of these "new-old" games, these so-called "retro-clones," were available for FREE. I was instantly intrigued.

So started a personal quest to find the right rules for my return to the GM’s chair! I began to refresh my memory about Original/Basic D&D (which I never really played, having gotten my start with AD&D 1st Edition and moving on to 2nd Edition) and delved into the retro-clones. I really seemed to focus on Swords & Wizardry, but after a time it seemed TOO simple. It took me a while to really get back into the mindset of old-school D&D, where there weren’t rules for everything and there were no feats, skills, and the other stuff that had been added into the game since 2nd Edition (reading Matt Finch’s Old School Primer helped out a lot).

So I began attempting to house-rule Swords & Wizardry into my own “perfect” rule set. And I spent a lot of time on this. I made several attempts, and got fairly far each time. But I discovered that I didn't have the time to really do such an effort justice, with all the adult responsibilities of my life. I just didn't have the time I would need, like I did when I was in my teens (and even most of my 20s for that matter). It was a tough fact to confront, but then I realized that I could just search through all the great games people were resurrecting/ producing and settle on one that most closely fit what I wanted in a game. And believe me, I studied them all: Labyrinth Lord, OSRIC, Basic Fantasy, even Microlite74 and its ilk.

It turns out that I would settled on a little game called Castles & Crusades for the game I want to run. I know that it's not really a retro-clone (I think). But I feel like, for what I want to do as a dungeon master/game master/referee/castle keeper/whatever, it's the “D&D-esque” game that will allow me to do the least amount of house ruling as possible. So I can focus on game prep and actual gaming. I feel like C&C is "rules light" enough (or I can make it so) and yet has some aspects of more recent versions of D&D (3.0-3.5) that makes it unique. The rumor that it had the involvement/blessing of Mr. Gygax himself is a bonus.

At any rate, I am just happy to have finally settled on a game!

At the same time, I put out a call on the Web (through good old RPG Player Sanctuary) about my desire to meet up with new gamers, since all my old gaming pals had scattered to the four winds. That’s right, I finally overcame my trepidation about playing table-top D&D with strangers. I was at last ready to break away from my association of D&D with just gaming with old friends. Anyway, I was contacted by a guy who I had spoken to briefly in the last year or so with regard to PBEM. He asked if I was interested in joining one of his Pathfinder games, and I've pretty much agreed to do so. And I am very excited about the opportunity. Now, would I ever want to run a Pathfinder game? Probably not. As a GM I know that I want to run something like the older editions of D&D. But damn it, I am itching to get back into the gaming scene, and therefore I have leapt at the chance to join a gaming group. Even if it means I will be playing a more recent edition. Which is more than fine by me.

So there you have it! Writing this testimonial has really been a good experience for me. I’ve been able to finally reflect on my own personal gaming history, and it’s been more of a revelation that I first imagined it would be. Sorry for being so damned verbose, and I hope this doesn't seem too incoherent.

And of course, to those of you who read this, please feel free to share tales of your own gaming histories.

Thanks for reading! And don't forget to read the Epilogue!

P.S. My newfound determination to find new people to game with may even extend to board and card games. Stay tuned…