Whew

That was an ordeal.  Locked out of the account, then life hit.  Next thing I knew it was a new year, jobs and kids and ups and downs.  Every time I try to get this blog off the ground, they keep pulling me in!  Anyway, back.  Not much now but gathering my thoughts.  We've been off and on with playing AD&D style D&D.  Other games have come and gone, and with the kids having jobs, our oldest getting ready for college, and just the general demands of life, spending inordinate amounts of time planning for make believe knights battling make believe dragons must take a back seat.

Nonetheless, we still have our times.  Here is a bit of inspiration.  This is the dungeon.  I remember Rodney, one of the fellow in high school who introduced me to the game in the early 80s, copying this on a sheet of graph paper.  In our neck of the woods, graph paper was for shop class, and possibly certain higher math classes.  That was it.  So seeing him put pencil to rare and wonderful graph paper and copy this beauty?  Magic.  And that it was the location for my first time out playing just added to it.  Needless to say, this occupies a major place in my Greyhawk campaign, being in the southern regions of moors in Furyondy, the base kingdom for my party.

Here it is, for all its eye candy glory:

You have to love it.  One of the best D&D maps ever.  It looks like a floor plan that could, compared to most, realistically be found beneath some sprawling religious edifice.  The crypts have widened corridors.  You can almost feel the low, arched ceilings.  The single, large ceremonial chamber that brings the fallen to the crypts.  The smaller, tighter rooms for the cellars section.  It is real.  Or at least as real as you'll get in a world of 10' by 10' underground chambers and hallways.

It is the location for the main goal of our first adventure.  And we have yet to get back to it. After losing the wizard (who came back since he's a wererat and wasn't actually killed by silver), the party broke and we rerolled a newer, lower level party.  Soon they will join again, and hopefully hie to the legendary cellars and crypts beneath the ruins of Elthrage Monastery.


"In the 308th year of the Common Reckoning, the last High Abbot of Elthrage, Eustides, returned to the monastery of Veluna City. According to accounts, he was 'bare of foot and in rags, dirt covered and trembling.'"

From the Notes on the History of Elthrage Monastery
Frandan of Thornberg
523 CY

Discovering D&D

I never said I didn't play D&D or know anything about it.  I'm just not a major fantasy/sci-fi fan.  With that said, I've read more and studied more in recent years than ever before.  Plus, I always enjoyed mythology and folklore.  Where fantasy and history mixed, I often found myself enjoying the stories or tales.  And of course like any red blooded American boy, I liked monster movies and space movies as a general rule. 

But playing RPGs was just never my thing.  Nevertheless, it wasn't for a lack of trying, and here is a brief list of the times I tried.  Over time I'll unpack them.  But like most of this blog, it's for my own records that I post it.

First, in the early weeks of 1982 school year.  I was a sophomore in high school, and was invited earlier that school year to a gaming group.  My interest was wargaming.  While there, I noticed some kids playing D&D.  I knew of it by then, but had never seen it played.  After a few visits, I actually jumped on board and tried.  I was given a thief.  That lasted for a few months, then I lost interest.

In the Summer of 1987, I was playing cards with a couple friends.  One of their friends invited them to meet with a group that played, among other things, D&D.  They said no thanks, but I raised my hand even if I didn't know the fellow or those he knew at college.  Once there, I stayed with the group until late 1989.  We played other games, but stayed with D&D for the most part.  I actually DMed my first adventure.  But as all things, marriage, graduation and life happened, and we broke apart and that was that.

In 1992, I moved to Florida.  I stumbled into a gaming group at a local hobby store.  They were mostly adults, young adults that is.  All of us had jobs and were just starting out in life.  I only lasted there for a month or so, the tempers and temper tantrums getting the better of me.

In the late 90s I was in graduate school and met a few folks who played RPGs as well as other games.  I suggested D&D, and went so far as buying some more books and materials (including the updated 2nd edition rules).  But we never got around to playing D&D.  At least one had issues with the genre on belief grounds, and time was, again, the culprit.  Still it allowed me a chance to enter the new world of the Internet and find several sites worth of materials to add to the books I owned.

That's it.  The next round was with my sons several years ago, at the height of the Harry Potter/ Lord of the Rings hype.  We've been playing off and on since.  Though my oldest is now 18 and getting ready to move on in life, we still manage time to play this (and other games).

I know, not very poetic or moving, just getting thoughts down.  The first posts will be this.  Eventually when I've put a few basics down, I'll begin moving on toward the meat and potatoes of why I started this in the first place.