Some Random Friday Thoughts

Several things have been occurring in my little world which have had my thoughts jumping from topic to topic in a most unhelpful way.  So, in an effort to gain some control I thought I'd try to nail a few of them down here .

My gaming:  Two big events coming up.  One is the start of my OD&D/1e campaign.  I'm going back to my roots (or comfort zone as some would say) and digging out all my old adventures that I wrote back in my college and graduate school days.  I'm updating it all to add in new acquisitions made since then as well as changing some of the dated references of the early to mid 80's.  I'm adding in some Wilderlands stuff as well as some of the old TSR modules I have picked up these past 20 years.  I'm also making a list of the rules changes, ie which OD&D rules take precedence to 1e and vice versa, that will be the foundation of the system.  Hopefully, I end up with something that looks interesting and that folks will want to play.

The other big event is pulling the trigger on the PF game, I think.  The current DM and most (if not all) of the players like a high powered super character combat driven game.  I don't.  I also generate my character's personality from his stats and how the world works.  They generate their characters' personalities from feats and skills, regardless of the world.  They have backstories and names and such before they have stats.  I never give my characters a serious name until they reach 3rd level.  To me, character death is no big deal because chargen takes 10 minutes.  To them, character death is awful and should be avoided at all costs because chargen takes hours.  So, different outlooks and different attitudes will eventually cause strife either in the game or at the table.  I like these folks personally so I'd rather walk away from the table with friendships intact rather than be unhappy or cause others to be unhappy.

My home life:  The next child is heading out to college this coming week.  That's two of the four kids gone.  The big house is going to feel more empty.  The wife has added lots of clutter to hide that fact, I think.  And clutter makes me irritable.  So, we have some undercurrents of strife. Adding to that strife is the cost of the college, which is not insignificant and we've still yet to hear back from the Financial Aid department.  I'm taking on tutoring jobs to add in some cash but I don't think it will be quite enough.  We'll see.

School/Job:  Odd schedule and more duties.  Busy, busy, busy but not feeling like I'm accomplishing anything.  Trying to implement new tech strategies.  Preliminary results are positive.

Well, I think that's all of it.  Just sort of venting so no need to comment unless you just want to.  Thanks for listening.

The Old Games

For the past few weeks, I've been working on cataloging and organizing my bookcase full of gaming books and such.  Since I obviously enjoy the older game systems and their associated modules and settings books, I've got quite a lot of stuff.  The difficulty has been trying to find a good way to place them in the book shelves.  Especially since the shelves are antique lawyer style cabinets with glass fronts.  I'll post a picture of them once I get everything in place.


Of course, as when you dig through a collection you've not looked at in a while, you find treasures you forgot about....like my old gaming stuff when I first learned to play and several of my original dungeons I put together.  Ugh...they were awful Monty Haul, fill every space of the graph paper, no sense of ecology things....But I did find  pocket folder filled with 1e characters I spent a couple of weeks on.  I remember thinking I should have a stable of NPCs to pull out if I ever needed a party of adventurers to be encountered.  Those were fun to look at.  I was scrupulous about following the rules of character creation and equipping.  I could probably still use them today for a 1e game....

But something else I found as well.  Back when the OSR was starting up and I was beginning to give up on 3.5, 4e just looked awful and Pathfinder's bulk looked intimidating, I found the website of Jason Vey.  His write-up of an OD&D Hyperboria fascinated me.  I would love to run such a game at some time.  Now Jason has another website and I've bought his stuff.  Very nice and very useful.  Then I did some more internet digging and found some other stuff that intrigued me.  Like this.  And this.

And then I came across a box of games from a dear friend of mine and I want to play those too.  The 2nd edition of Paranioa boxed set was in there along with at least a dozen different modules.  Under that was a batch of the original Traveller books (the LBBs) and a batch of 2nd & 3rd edition Call of Cthulhu modules and rulebooks.  Some of these I hadn't thought about since we played way back in graduate school.  Of course, we also played Star Fleet Battles but as a beer & pretzels game of "kill the ship". 

Ah...the fun we used to have when life moved at a slower pace.  Taking all of a Saturday to play a game was acceptable.  There were no demands from work after you left at 5ish.  No cell phones to interrupt anything.  And the term "gamer" meant a person who played at a table with other "gamers", using funny shaped dice, pencils, and paper; not a person on a computer or console.

Guess I'm just getting old.

(swiped from here)