Yesterday, a group I’m gaming with reconvened after a holiday season hiatus. My friend Chris is GM of a Pathfinder game set in Eberron. Last time, our intrepid band, trying to find a way through a ruined castle built inside a gigantic cave, freed a fighter (a new player, our friend Chad) who had been held captive by performance-enhanced goblins working for some mysterious big bad. Agnar (as he named himself) quickly showed us what kind of fighter he was going to be, by rushing heedlessly unto an alchemical laboratory (from which several goblins had been attacking us from cover), killing a goblin alchemist, destroying a shelf full of potions, and setting the room ablaze.“My first adventure and I get a dungeon AND a dragon?”
- Chad, 2011
That was Chad’s first ever rpg session. Yesterday was his second...and he killed a red dragon.
True, she was a weakened thing, and hobbled by some magical chains of some sort (how weakened, and hobbled in what way, remains mysterious), but she was still a dragon, and with her special goblin entourage, could have easily done us all in. With a little bit of tactical planning, a bit of luck--and no small measure of daring--we triumphed.
It’s been enjoyable to sit back and play instead of game-mastering, but what’s been most fun is seeing a new guy get into gaming. I should say Chad just isn’t a guy who’s never gamed before--he’s a guy who’s been actively disdainful of gamers, thanks to the customers he had to deal with back when he worked at a comic book store. To see the unbridled fun of getting scaling walls, taking goblin scalps, and charging a fifteen foot tall dragon with a frost axe turn a hater into a player...now that’s entertainment!
I love his play style: charge in and wreck shit. That's pretty much me, too.
ReplyDeleteSometimes the simple approach is best, no doubt about it.
ReplyDeleteThe credo we used back when we played Technocracy was, "when all else fails, violence prevails."
ReplyDeleteIt is really interesting to read about your experiences as a player, Trey. I hope you get to do a lot of that in the new year, and that you share your stories with us.
I think a lot of my patient's share that philosophy--though I don't know that they pursue other options as diligently as they should. ;)
ReplyDeleteHopefull we will get to play more often in the new year. I'll keep you posted.
In normal circumstances I would never ask but... "would you tell me about your character?" Since you don't get to play much, I hope you are making the most of it with a nice juicy character full of interesting quirks.
ReplyDelete(And I'm rather fond of Eberron as a setting, though I never experienced it as a player or GM)
I think we've got an interesting group in general. My character is an artificer named Horvendile L. He tends to be the planner and (fast-)talker of the group. Decent with a throwing knife, but otherwise not terribly combat-oriented.
ReplyDelete"performance-enhanced goblins" love that. Roid rage goblins.
ReplyDeleteHater into a gamer, is an excellent trick. Back when D&D was only for the outsiders in junior high and high school I was the only football player that played. Most of the others would ridicule D&D until a couple at a time other players would ask me in study hall to teach them. I think I converted nearly a dozen in those days.
Keep the gospel going.
In Gary's name! ;)
ReplyDeleteYou know, that philosophy is quite common among the patients I work with as well. Not too strange perhaps, as I'm working in an "asylum for the criminally insane."
ReplyDelete