I Am He Who Walks in Eternity…ish…

So, happy Easter, or Ostare, or whatever rite of Spring-renewal-ness you all are celebrating at the moment. I know, I know: It’s been way too long since my last posting and “where the hell have you gone?” and “where’s the latest on the D&D adventure you’re running, are you still even doing that?”

Answers:

1. I Haven’t gone anywhere, not really. I just have been really lazy and not motivated to post at all. I realize that this means that no one gets to read the stuff I think up and want to talk about and I’m sorry about that, I truly am. Sometimes life just gets in the way…or I get in the way…or Skyrim…yeah, we’ll blame Skyrim.

Sorry buddy. We still have great times together and someone’s gotta take the fall for this. We’ll always have Solstheim!!

 

2. I know, I know!! Yes I am still running that campaign, and yes it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything of note. See above reasoning for that. Don’t worry, though, I haven’t been completely slacking off. I have prepared a comprehensive synopsis of what’s happened since the last time you heard from your heroes. In fact, after tonight’s session, I plan to add to it and post it, finally. There. Happy now?

Seriously though, I do miss you all and I want to get myself back to a pace where I am writing regularly again and with life as it has been the last month or two and then going forward, I should have plenty to write about, be it in my own life or just commenting on something ridiculous I happened to see or read or hear somewhere.

Which brings me to this post in particular.

My Birthday is in a week and a day.

Just look at this suave looking motherfraker right here! Give this man some cake!!

[waits for the screaming applause…still waiting…]

I’ve been fortunate enough to have been able to cling to this beautiful insanity of a planet for the last 32 solar revolutions.

Here’s the part where I get all Ray Lamontagne on you, and get into how I “never learned to count my blessings. I choose instead to dwell on my disasters.” True to my usual form of birthday-time introspection self deprecation blah blah blah, yakety smackety.

Except, I’m not going to do that.

Not this time.

No! None of that! you hear me? you cut that out right now, Mister!!

I admit that there has been some rather crap moments throughout the year, I have to say that there have been some crazy moments that I happen to be pretty frelling proud of. So I think I’d like to talk about those.

1. I’m still frelling ALIVE!!

– Yes, that is totally a thing and if you don’t believe me, just ask anyone who is dead. Go on…I’ll wait.

Seriously though, getting to remain on this planet, with my wife and little girl (she’s 3 now. Can you frelling believe that? I know! I’m still having a crazy time wrapping my head around it.) is a huge blessing. If you are a believer in a spiritual path or not, being alive and having a family that loves you and that you love just as much is something to take a second and just feel amazingly grateful for. So there!

2. I’ve made considerable progress in the writing of my Novel.

– This is a project that I started a little over a decade ago. It has been through so many changes and iterations that I honestly thought I would never ever sit down and finally write out any lengthy amount of it.  Thanks to participating in NaNoWriMo, I’ve finally put some permanence to the world I’ve created and have written enough that I can’t turn back now and change things. I have to see it through and I WILL.

Just keep writing, just keep writing, just keep writing, writing, writing…

Even if I still haven’t thought of a title yet…details! Minor details.

3. I’ve become a DM. (Dungeon Master)

– This is a title I never thought I would take on, having been such a fan of the player aspect of Table Top RolePlay, but after playing with a couple of groups and getting my own ideas about what would make for fun experiences for players, it felt like a natural progression. The campaign I’m running is full of intrigue and insanity, and the players in the group are incredibly intelligent and strategic. We are constantly keeping each other on our A game and I’m having an absolute blast with it! And I haven’t killed any of my players…yet! [queue ominous soap opera music]

It’s not fancy. it’s not crazy. But it’s mine, and it has Legos!! D20s and Legos FTW!!!

4. I am expanding my circle of friends.

– This might not seem like a huge deal to some, but I can be a bit of an introvert and if I get myself in with a group and feel comfortable with them, I tend to stick with them for a while and not really let go. With the job change and just the general meeting of new people, this has changed a bit. I’m in a Pathfinder game group with some guys that I work with and I’m having a great time. I still hang with my other friends, they’re not going anywhere as far as I am concerned, but I am having fun and making new friends.

5. I’m in a really fun place, Musically.

– This is a more recent development, as I’ve been in a bit of a dry spell as far as my music goes. Through my best friend Christopher, however I have connected with a great group of musicians, Christopher included, and are calling ourselves the Gentlemen of Leisure. We’re not a musical group as such: think of the Fueled By Ramen or Soulquarian groups. We’re a musical collective of like-minded individuals spanning across varying genres of music that have come together with a purpose: To create the kind of (good) music we want to listen to and to provide help for each other in our separate musical projects.

These are a bunch of Sexy BEASTS!! Especially the one with the hat and cane! I hear he’s one hot and awesome nerd-type-person! Actually, word on the street is that they ALL are!

We Just recently had a meet up here in Tacoma about two weekends ago, and, in three days, we’ve recorded tracks (unfinished, but great starts) for 5 songs that we’ve written. Two of them written by myself. On top of that, I’m writing a song for a track produced by one of the group members that will (once finished) be the new theme for this blog. (as they share the same title, I figured “why the hell not”).  It will be a nerdcore hip hop song. (tee-hee-hee)

Disclaimer: I am not a rapper. I just rhyme a lot. (see what I did there, huh? Huh? Riiiiiiiight?)

The point of all of this is:

– Yes, I am getting older (I-AM-NOT-OLD, I-AM-NOT-OLD, IAMNOTOLD!!!)

– No I am not where I thought I would be when I was 20. (Globetrotting, living in the lap of luxury, screaming adoring fans and groupies, huge frak-off house, cameras flashing wherever I go, yadda yadda) Here’s the thing though: I’m okay with that. Hell, I’m happier that my life worked out the way it did and not the way impetuous, starry-eyed, 20-year-old me dreamed that it would. I’d be a very different (and way less awesome) person for it. Current, about-to-be-32 (gulp) me would likely want to punch what could have been 32-year-old-rock-star-me dead in my theoretical face…with a chair…

Can you imagine being smacked by this thing…seriously, OW!

 

Or, he could have turned out just as awesome as I have. We’ll never know. What I do know is that I don’t want any other life beyond the one I currently live…well, okay, one or two things can change. I live comfortable in the knowledge that my life, no matter how strange, no matter how geeky, no matter how everyday it might seem; is a pretty good one, and I’m happy to have survived another year, clinging to this ball of rock and atmosphere spinning around a bright yellow star.

 

Happy Birthday, Kid.

 

Now, if you’ll excuse me: I’m going to prepare for my game night, and sing the Doom Song!!

Come on! Don’t sit there and act as if you didn’t know this was coming! It totally was…just sing along already!!

 

Oh yeah, I can imagine that you notice a change in the background and Icon and whatnot. It’s in celebration of the continuation of this season of Doctor Who on tomorrow! Are you guys ready? I’ve been ready since Christmas!!

Geronimo!

All Great Stories Have a Beginning. Entry#2

Okay, so the campaign I’m running begins in little over an hour and a half!

I’ve got everything set. Monsters and Enemies created and accounted for.

Campaign adequately Modified (there may still be some making things up as I go along and I’ve prepared for that as well).

I’m in the process of drawing the opening map as we speak.

I’ll be tweeting and Tumblr-ing the night as it goes by.  ( http://sphinxakashaa.tumblr.com/  my twitter is, as always: @sphinxakashaa

Wish me luck.

Hell, wish the PC’s (player characters, for those not in the loop) luck.

 

Allons-Y!!

All great stories have a beginning…

yeah, it’s true. I roll funny shaped dice and I LOVE IT!!

So…hi!!

So I mentioned in an earlier post that I had recently decided to take up the mantle of Dungeon Master. If I had to give you a reason as to why, I could give you several.

* My desire to create a story that other people can interact with…

* My absolute love for D&D that compels me to want to share it with people…

* my need to create that has filtered into my gaming and geeky sensibilities (seriously, that’s another post altogether)

or

* we can go with the Michael Jordan explanation and say that it all stems from my pure love for the game and my affection towards the bonds it forges with the people who share the experience together. It’s something I didn’t get from W.O.W. or any other video game. For me, it stems from my very first real table top experience.

I blame my father.

Not someone who was really into D&D (that I knew of, anyway), but he bought and played my first real tabletop game with me. It was a game called Battlemasters. It was more Warhammer Fantasy Adventure than D&D but we brought our own element of role-play into it. We would spread that insanely huge battle grid in the middle of the living room or my bedroom and attempt to out think each other while rolling multiple d6’s at each other into the wee hours. This is the man that taught me checkers and chess and would stress playing to strict Hoyle regulation rules with me. This game, for me, was chess with dice and a game piece that was a frelling CANNON!

A few years later, my dad bought Hero Quest home and said “Hey, this looks like a lot of fun.”

My friends, my fate was sealed. My dad was the DM, my cousin and I were the PC’s and there were dungeons crawled, dragons slain, and treasure looted. My Childhood. When it was awesome, it was seriously awesome!

Recently, I went back home to New Orleans and shared my love for D&D with my parents. I knew that my dad would be into it, given our history with RPGs, but that my mom seemed just as, if not more, interested was pretty much faint worthy.

Anyway, my love for role-playing stems from my experiences playing games with my dad (and often my mom) as a kid. It’s something I always dreamed of doing with my kids when I was old enough to have them, and it’s played a huge role in why I became a DM. If there is anyone who is going to turn my little girl over to the Geek side of the force…Gorramit, it’s gonna be me. (I Hope).

In any case, for those reasons and several others, I decided to DM for some friends of mine that were as into the aspect of roleplay as I am. Three of them, I met at a weekly Dungeons and Dragons Encounters session that I attend here in Tacoma. To my knowledge (and I could be very wrong here) they haven’t really gotten into the meat of what role-play can really be, and I really hope to show them that. It’s also pretty cool that the three of them all seem to be best friends already, so this will create an interesting dynamic to the story I hope to help them weave. They’re a bit younger than I am, somewhere in the area of 21 to 23 years old, so that will bring a level of fresh imagination and energy to the game.

The other two players have been lifelong friends, one of whom is married to one of my wife’s best friends and is a dear friend of mine. The other is a damned good guy and awesome friend as well. The pair of them have a ton of experience with roleplaying and are, coincidentally, both actors. I’m looking forward to seeing what they bring to the party and the experience as a whole.

_______________________________________________________________________________

So one of the things I’m excited about in this process is that, instead of the standard miniatures used for D&D, I’m using lego mini-figures. The reason I decided on this is…well, there are several reasons:

1. (and this is most important) It’s funny!! There is absolutely no way that people will be able to take the game to the extent of seriousness that it is no longer fun. C’mon!! It’s Legos!!

2. They are easy to pose and equip. You don’t have to stick to the standard D&D minis that you can order from a ton of websites or buy from gaming shops or conventions. There are so many fantasy themed lego figures that it is pretty easy to create an encounter or campaign with them.

3. It would be all too easy to get kids into tabletop RPG’ing. You’re playing a game with your friends and your little one comes around and goes “hey, legos! what are you grown-ups doing with legos?” You see where that can go, right? Right?? Nuff’ said!!

4. Depending on where you get your mini’s, lego figures can be dirt-frelling-cheap! Ebay is my new friend! Seriously! I have been finding some quality lego figures there for a crazy low amount of money. Now…you do have to hunt a bit, but once you find a good group of sellers, stick with them!! They have good, quality mini-figs.

Another thing I’m excited about is the campaign setting itself. It takes place in the world of Eberron;

Eberron Campaign Setting book cover (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

for me this is a magical version of steampunk, or what I like to call magepunk. So, high magic is at the center of everything; trade and commerce, industry, and technology – under the backdrop of this very film-noir post hundred-year-war atmosphere. With the D&D version of fantasy involved it makes for a plethora of incredible story opportunities and character development hooks that could be (at some point) very interesting and great to use in a story setting. There are still some very medieval elements to the setting,  and it’s fairly easy to convert standard D&D campaigns to meet the Eberron world.

Personally, at least for now, I’m planning to stick to the pre-designed campaigns.

Which brings me to the one hurdle I found:

So I’m running this game in 4th Edition (I know, I know, 3.5 is incredible, amazing, and all of the other arguments that have been thrown out there – as much as I loved 3.5, I also love the more streamlined 4th Edition. But, again, that’s another post entirely) , the problem there is that it’s been an insane crazytrain experience to hunt for any of the campaigns for Eberron in 4th edition.

Probably because they don’t actually exist there.

I looked.

I scoured forums and gaming sites until I thought my eyes would bleed. Nada.

So I undertook the task of locating all of the 3.5 campaign modules for the world and converting them to 4th edition.

cacophonous cries of “blasphemy” here while I stick my tongue out at you>

On top of this I’m starting all of my players off at lvl5, this means that I am converting all of the lvl1-5 quests to lvl5-10 accounting for creature/monster/baddies as well as skill challenges and experience points. (XP for those of you in the know) On top of that, one of my players wanted to roll a character class infamously known as the Gunmage. So (because I like to think that I’m the kind of DM that says “Why the hell not? That could be fun!” I also built (with help from various sources) a Gunmage class that has already impressed many of my other gamer friends and should be really fun to play with.

So my time has been consumed with math and story elements and the like and I’m honestly having a great time at it. This Friday will be the first time my group will meet to discuss their collective group origin story and personal back stories as well as address any character creation issues and questions. it will be the first time that the player rolling the Gunmage will see the two builds I’ve prepared for him and I’m looking forward to seeing how that goes.

There will also be copious amounts of Munchkin played, which is always a wonderful thing, as far as I’m concerned.

So there it is. I’m hoping to get started running the campaign in about three weeks. By then, I’ll have the last of my mini-figures in hand and so will my players. I hope you all join me as I begin running them through The Forgotten Forge and hopefully they, and you, of course, enjoy it.

 

May the Dice roll ever in your favor…

(yeah, I just did that)

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