Excited!

So today I was off work and one thing I did was roll up a Dungeons & Dragons character for a game a friend is going to run.  Now mind you, I've played roleplaying games [and by that I mean the tabletop/dice and paper kind] for 27 years, but, while I have done Call of Cthulhu (for that entire time) as well as Ars Magica, Shadowrun, Brave New World, Vampire/World of Darkness, and Hârn, I never actually ever got a chance to play D&D.  Now I have a half-elven fighter-thief named Aderyn who is going to help escort a caravan with 8 hit points, all the gear I could muster for 110 gold pieces, and an abiding dislike of orcs and goblins. :)  Here's hoping I can keep myself (and the others) alive.  I know my other friend, the one I live with, plans on standing behind me, as he's a magic user with half the hit points I have, so he can be killed by the common housecat. :)

Hahahahahahahahahaha!

So far tonight I have come home, put my knee up for awhile, flooded the bathroom, gotten something to munch on, and frittered an hour that should have gone to game notes on Facebook. But I found this and laughed hysterically!



Of course, these dice would have been made from people, if you know your Star Trek, so they're really more appropriate to Call of Cthulhu than Dungeons & Dragons, I think. But if you've gamed for long enough, yes, there were dice with crayons. I've seen them, although by the time I got into things in the early 90s, they were printed.

Still blah

Came home, slept, and now I'm up. Don't worry, I'm on all of my meds. This, too, shall pass. But it has reached an annoying level. I spent most of my day just trying to hold it together so I didn't cry or snap at anyone. The social niceties are a little harder to navigate, but I managed.  I have a social event Thursday and I hope I'm feeling better then. The drive across town in rush-hour traffic and back almost got me. Spending a little time with friends helped, especially the Big Bang Theory clip with Sheldon and Amy having Dungeons & Dragons sex (I am, or used to be much like Amy, although she is smarter). I'm finding I'm feeling both needy and standoffish at the same time, so I didn't stay too late. This should resolve soon; it's partly hormonal. I know that. And it's not the kind of lingering, heavy depression I've seen in others. Mine is cyclical; it will tip the other way eventually, or if I'm lucky, just back to balanced. Usually that's the case. Welcome to bipolar disorder II.

I can't stop laughing

Muppet Alignment Chart

Click here for many more alignment charts over at MightyGodKing.com.

:)

As my feed for it said, 'because it's never too early to teach them how to kill orcs':

Wizards of the Coast Publishes D&D for Kids

Monster Slayers: the Heroes of Hesiod is a free PDF aimed at children 6 and up.

Daniel Donahoo says:

The publishers of Dungeons and Dragons have just launched Monster Slayers: The Heroes of Hesiod which looks like it could be a whole new line of D&D products for children age six and up. They are quick to link their product to the broad range of educational benefits including math skills, literacy, problem solving and creative thinking.

They leave out the other important skills that can be learned like how to pierce a dragons hide, why you should always let the thief open the locked box and why you should never, ever become separated from the party in a narrow dungeon.

Maybe Chaosium will get on the bandwagon and publish something similar as a Cthulhu Mythos line. :)

I've gotten sucked into an application on Facebook

It's Dungeons & Dragons Tiny Adventures. I am an elf ranger named Esidriel Greenleaf. I've gone on one adventure. The computer basically does the work, but you have control over equipment and stuff like that. Unfortunately my rolls didn't go so well on my first adventure and although I did fine up to the end, I wound up having to run away from the Stronghold of the Drow. Still, I'm about a fifth of the way to the next level and I have a better armour, some potions of glibness, and a little more gold, so it was worth it. :) It's not a bad little diversion. Nothing like real roleplaying, of course (and by that I mean dice and table), or even like the more complex computer games. But still, for a Facebook app, it's pretty sophisticated, and I'm enjoying it.

Five things that Dungeons & Dragons begat

According to an article from the BBC:

1. ONLINE ROLE-PLAY GAMING
2. THE GEEK RAMPANT
3. REVIVING FANTASY MANIA (Call of Cthulhu and HP Lovecraft get a mention :))
4. TEENAGE GAMING MORAL PANICS
5. MANY-SIDED DICE

I never got to play D&D

(the guys I knew who played were into mega-level characters and not about to teach a newcomer how to play), but role-playing games have been an important pastime of mine for nearly 17 years, and without Gary Gygax, a lot of gaming wouldn't exist (not just in regular RPGs, but computer ones as well, since many of them are based off of D&D). So it was sad to learn that he died today at the age of 69, after years of declining health.

It's a shame we don't really have potions and spells that will restore health or the dead.

Hey, I'm home early for a change

So I thought I'd watch some funny videos.

How not to read in a library:

How Peter got his library card suspended...


Which brought me to this (hey, I was in a 'Family Guy' mood):

How a toilet works...


and then there's Stephen Lynch, who a friend discovered on YouTube. He's terribly unpolitically correct, so you may not want to watch the videos if you're easily offended. 'Priest' is hilarious--if you're not Catholic. But this one's tame--and so fun for those who have encountered gaming geeks, especially of the hack and slash variety.



Hope you have enjoyed this comic interlude...(which was also the name of a comic store I once worked in--comic geeks are very similar to gaming geeks, incidentally).