Dungeon Master Growth Patterns

            Those who have been following my blog for a while will have noticed how much Dungeons & Dragons has become a part of my life in the past few years. In that time, I’ve been part of about fourteen different games, and I’m currently involved in five active games. During this time, I’ve been both a player and a Dungeon Master, but what has captured my attention today is the rise of new DMs and how they follow roughly the same growth pattern that I went through.

            Most people starting out as a Dungeon Master (though not all) have played the game before, so they have a pretty good idea of how it works on the players’ side of the table. They know that it’s a challenge to switch to being behind the DM’s screen, where they essentially have to create and control an entire world – much like a writer does, only a writer doesn’t need to account for the craziness that players come up with.

            The first game the new DM runs isn’t bad (with a good group of players, it’s very hard to have bad D&D), but it isn’t quite where they want it to be. Often the plotline railroads the players – that is to say, there’s pretty much only one way for the players to go, and one way for them to solve problems. This isn’t ideal in a game that revolves around the decisions made by players, but it’s also extremely understandable – because allowing players complete freedom takes a lot of thinking on your feet, and that takes practice.

            That first game usually falls apart within the first few sessions, but the new DM doesn’t give up. They learned a lot in those games, few though they were. The next game they run is significantly better. They’ve learned to prepare for players doing crazy things, and so they adapt their new game for that. This game goes much better, but it still isn’t perfect. The rails are still there, and still noticeable, and the DM runs into two similar problems: the players don’t catch on to what they were certain was obvious, so they need to improvise huge hints; and the players respond to things in ways previously unanticipated. Once again, the game usually falls apart at this point – but the DM has learned even more.

            Now comes the time for over-preparedness. The new DM has realized that players are wild and uncontrollable, and so the solution is to have a plan for everything. A massive world begins getting built, populated with interesting people and things. Histories and mythologies are created, as well as multiple dungeons and ways to attract the players to them. It becomes overwhelming, and at some point the DM realizes that if they keep this up, they’ll never get to play again – and so they take a leap of faith and start the game with what they’ve prepared.

            This time, the game goes very differently. Instead of the players going in crazy directions and forcing the DM to improvise, they seem to stick to the plot and avoid 90% of the content the DM has painstakingly created. This isn’t out of malice – this is simply because the DM has improved enough that the players feel that they are on the most natural course. The game lasts longer, and now the DM learns and perfects the rest of their skills. Their world is more in-depth, so they find improvising easier when it’s necessary. They get more of a feel for how to run and balance the game. They learn how to anticipate what their players are going to do, and to plan accordingly – but also how to have backup plans for when the players surprise them.

            Finally, DMing begins to come naturally, and less preparation is needed for each game. A lot of work still goes into running the game, but it becomes easier and more natural – as does coming up with things on the fly when the player throws a curveball at them.

            This isn’t a precise formula, as different people improve at different speeds. Some people manage to hold together that first game, improving as they go, while others have a few more false starts. However, by and large, this is the basic pattern of learning and growth I’ve observed in multiple new Dungeon Masters, and I find it to be fascinating – because running Dungeons & Dragons isn’t a skill you can learn everything about by being taught, or reading a book. It’s a form of art that you can only learn by doing.

Check out my YouTube channel where I tell the stories of my D&D campaigns.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Building D&D Backgrounds

            I recently went through the process of helping someone completely new to Dungeons & Dragons create a character, and it got me thinking about writing up some guidelines for the part that’s not explicitly described in the books: giving the character a background and personality. There are loose guidelines and suggestions for this, but there’s only so much guiding that can be given to what is very much a personal creative process. Naturally, with no hard and fast method for doing this, certain stereotypes frequently find their ways into characters. So, here are a few guidelines (not rules) I’ve come up with – both from my own experiences and from observing others – about what types of characters to avoid making.

1.      Don’t make your character a dark and mysterious brooding hero.

This is a very popular character archetype that a lot of people want to play – I know I’ve made characters like this before, but there’s a big problem with them. D&D is an interactive, teamwork-based game. This type of character tends to remain silent and untrusting of others and, as a result, ends up lurking around, following the group of adventurers, and only engaging in the combat aspect of the game. When it comes to roleplaying, all they can do is sit in a corner and sulk, waiting for one of the other players to convince them to open up – which almost never happens, because the character is usually abrasive enough that others don’t want to interact with them. Now, if you want to just observe the game with minimal interaction, this type of character may be perfect for you – otherwise, I suggest making your character more interested in interacting with others.

2.      Don’t try to recreate your favourite hero from some other story.

It’s perfectly okay to steal various characteristics, but taking an entire character never works out. There are two main reasons for this: the first is that creating your character is limited by a set of rules, and, as a result, you will invariably end up disappointed when your character isn’t able to do everything the hero can. The second is that, however well you know this character, it is unlikely that you’ll be able to accurately represent them – leading to further disappointment. Borrow and steal, yes, but make the character your own.

3.      Make a character with energy levels you can play.

Playing a super high-energy character that is always chatting and bouncing off the wall is loads of fun – but how long can you keep it up for? You need to make a character that you can actually play the role of, otherwise they will morph into something else that you may not be happy with. Similarly, if you make a character who is incredibly witty, but no one laughs at your own jokes, well... perhaps that’s not a good character trait to have.

4.      Don’t make a character that’s too much like yourself.

Elements of yourself will always show up in your character – that’s how you relate to them. It may seem like a good idea to make a character that is basically you in a fantasy world, but this can cause all sorts of problems – the main one being that it becomes hard to not take things personally. D&D is a roleplaying game, and sometimes it can get pretty intense. If someone (either another character or an NPC) has a problem with your character, and the character is basically you, it’s pretty hard to not take that personally. Not to mention, how will you feel if your character dies? In D&D, that’s a very distinct possibility.

5.      Avoid making a reluctant hero.

Unless the specific D&D game forces your character into the role of the hero, you’ll end up just like the brooding hero. Reluctant heroes don’t want to go adventuring – and there is an assumption in D&D that adventuring is exactly what the players want to do. A reluctant hero is a lot of work – not just for you, but for the Dungeon Master, too. Make sure your character wants to be adventuring – or, at the very least, has a very compelling reason to adventure.

6.      Don’t make a character that is already a great hero.

Most D&D games start off with lower level heroes, which mean they can’t necessarily to all the great things you want them to do in their backstory. If you make a character who is famous dragon slayer, you could very well be bringing them into a story where a baby dragon could kill them. Make sure that what your character accomplishes in their backstory fits what they are capable of doing when the game starts – otherwise there will be a lot of uncomfortable questions about why you can’t perform these great deeds anymore.

            And that’s all I can think of for now. Again, these are guidelines, not rules – one of the great things about D&D is that you can play the role of whoever you like. However, following these guidelines will help you ensure that the role is one that you’ll actually enjoy playing.

Check out my YouTube channel where I tell the stories of my D&D campaigns.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Endings

            Last Wednesday brought a close to the Dungeons & Dragons campaign Colleen and I have been playing weekly for most of the year. Other games I’ve played in have ended, but this one truly rounded out the story and gave us an ending that was incredibly satisfying.

            Because he knew this game was coming to an end – and that many of the players wouldn’t be returning for future games due to work or other reasons – our Dungeon Master, Jeremy, wanted to make this a night to remember. It’s extremely difficult to arrange a situation like that, especially when other people determine how it plays out in the end, but he certainly pulled it off.

            The game was a high stakes game with a high mortality rate. The beginning of the adventure started off with our heroes finding an item that place them all under a curse. They had two choices: go insane, or assemble an object that would bring about an end to the world. The characters were all willing to accept the insanity, but they learned that if they didn’t complete this task, someone else would. So they decided to assemble the object in the hopes that they could defeat whatever doom they summoned. Bonded together by their common goal, they called themselves the Onyx Order and made their heraldry the likeness of Manny, the mammoth they had pooled together to purchase.

            Their adventures took them far and wide, leaving a swathe of destruction in their wake – usually unintentionally. They were pursued by a cult that, for their own reasons, wanted the item assembled.

            After many months, during which a town, a city, and the village one of the characters came from were destroyed – not to mention the deaths of three of the original Order members and two of the replacements – the item was finally assembled, and the curse lifted.

            Yet, though the curse was gone, the heroes felt obligated to complete their task. They had seen the enormous egg fall from the sky and knew it would hatch into giant worms that would eat the world away into nothing. They had to prevent it from hatching.

            Luckily, the egg had fallen onto a glacier and would need heat to hatch. Unfortunately, the cult had arrived first and had brought fire magic to hatch the egg. This was where the final night began.

            It was an epic battle that lasted nearly the full three hours we played for. The magical cultists were channeling magic into a crystal that was superheating the egg while their backs were guarded by a large number of minions. In the skies, two evil denizens lurked.

The Onyx Order’s druid (played by myself) turned himself into a giant eagle and carried the barbarian into the midst of the spell casters – where he wreaked havoc – then spent the rest of the battle using his speed and size to move his allies into favorable positions while calling down lightning to smite the cultists. The bard opened up with a powerful spell that did massive damage to the cultists’ rear guard, then fought on as best he could – nearly dying. The fighter (played by Colleen) hacked her way through the minions and took down one of the denizens. The rogue stealthily picked off more of the minions, and finished off the other denizen. The wizard helped where he could, then truly proved his worth by trapping the leader of the cultists in a magical sphere she couldn’t escape from.

            With the lesser enemies destroyed, and the fire removed from the egg, it seemed the day was saved. They escorted the cultists as far as they could from the egg before the magical bubble dissipated, healing what wounds they could. The barbarian stayed behind at the egg, packing ice into the hole drilled by the cultists’ fire to prevent further damage to the egg.

            The rest of the party prepared to strike down the cultist leader and released her from her prison, but as they did so, the egg shattered, becoming a portal from which a giant worm sprang to attack the barbarian. The rogue ran to help while the others finished the battle with the cult leader – a battle that took longer than expected. The cult leader did finally fall, and not long after the heavily injured barbarian rent the worm in two.

            But there were more worms swirling in the portal. A book found on the body of the cult leader revealed that only extreme cold could seal the portal. In that instant, the barbarian knew what he had to do. This quest had claimed many of his friends, destroyed his village, and turned his beloved grandmother into a vampire he’d been forced to slay. Failure wasn’t an option.

            Taking a magical ice crystal he had, he leapt into the portal and swung his axe. When the axe struck the crystal, there was an astounding blast of icy magic, and the egg was sealed over the portal – with the barbarian inside.

            The Order was devastated, but they respected his sacrifice. Their long journey over, it was now time for them to return to the world. Each player gave an epilogue for what became of their character.

            The rogue, one of the two remaining members of the original Order, took to roaming the world – reuniting with old friends when she felt like it, sometimes reliving old memories.

            The other original member, the fighter, returned to the city she knew best. Suffering from PTSD that she’d had even before the beginning of this adventure, she took to drinking and fighting until she was banned from all the bars. One night, alone in an alley, she died of liver cancer.

            The wizard built himself a tower of ice on top of the sealed portal, defending it from intruders for the rest of his long elven life.

            The druid returned to the wilderness with Manny the mammoth and Balto the wolf (the former companion of a fallen ally). Together they roamed the boarders of the glacier where the egg resided, slowly collecting more mammoths and forming a herd.

            The bard roamed the world, singing tales of the Onyx Order, with particular emphasis on a great barbarian who had sacrificed himself.

            Jeremy made one addition to these epilogues.

            In the dark alley, where the fighter lay dying, a figure appeared – the same person who had led the adventurers to find the cursed item that set them on this quest. She knelt by the fighter and whispered:

            “Not yet.”

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Tales from D&D for CF

            When Jeremy first mentioned he was planning to run a 12 hour Dungeons and Dragons marathon, I loved the idea. I mean, who doesn’t want to play D&D for 12 hours straight? Plus, it was to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis, making it a very fun way to support a cause.

            For those of you who haven’t been following the saga, Jeremy is the DM (Dungeon Master – the person who controls the monsters and storyline of the game) of the weekly Dungeons and Dragons game Colleen and I play. He has a 3-year-old daughter, Avril, who was born with Cystic Fibrosis.

            I will admit that, as much as I loved the idea of a 12 hour D&D marathon, I wasn’t sure how successful it would be. I gladly volunteered to be one of the DMs, but with 4 tables there was room for 24 players and I wasn’t sure we would get that many.

            Every seat was filled within 3 days of registration, and my doubts faded. By the time last Saturday came, I was confident we would be raising at least $1500, maybe even $2000. When laying his plans, Jeremy had been hoping to raise $700.

            Saturday came, the donations were collected... and we had raised far more than anyone had anticipated. $4000! We were amazed.

            The event, itself, was great fun. I couldn’t possibly relate to you all that occurred, but I’ll try to touch on some of the highlights.

            Before we got to playing, the first of the door prizes were raffled off – there were a whole lot of them, donated by a bunch of gaming publishers and, of course, some chainmaille from myself. The first draw was supposed to be done by Avril, but sadly she had been rushed to the hospital that morning with problems caused by her Cystic Fibrosis. As sad as that was, it seemed oddly appropriate to me that, as Avril was in the hospital fighting her illness, we had a room full of people fighting to raise money to cure that illness.

            Before I get into the game itself, I need to point out a couple things we had that aren’t present during normal D&D games. The first was a brilliant idea from the board game cafe that hosted us – they printed off and sold (with all the money going to the donations) cards with special abilities and items to use in the game – from potions to restore health all the way up to a card that let the players take over for the DM for 10 seconds (which basically means they could do whatever they want). The other added element was that the more money players raise, the more in-game benefits they gained. This came in the form of magic items, resurrections for the first (and, for more, second) time their character died and, most notably, Cry Havoc.

Cry Havoc was the ability for a player who had raised $130 to, at any time they pleased, send some random monsters to one of the other tables. If a player raised $200, Cry Havoc was upgraded to Total Havoc, allowing the player to send the monsters to all three of the other tables.

            We raised $4000. There was a lot of Havoc in that room.

            The following is only an account of my own table – the adventure played out very differently on each of the tables – and there are some minor details (such as all the available routes they didn’t take) for the sake of brevity and to avoid confusion. The characters started off waking up in the morning after camping outside some jungle-overgrown Aztec-like ruins, wherein it was rumoured there was a secret shrine to a vampire god of the underworld. As they set out towards the giant stepped pyramid they could see, the ground gave way beneath the adventurer’s feet and they slid a very long way down underground, coming to a stop in a crumbling chamber – the way they came in completely blocked by rubble. Once their cleric cast a light spell so they could all see, they discovered there was a yellowish haze in the air – which turned out to be a poison gas that dealt them damage every hour and cause the torches they later lit to splutter and cast less light than they should.

            While most of the party set about examining the various dioramas depicting Olman (the nation who had built this place) culture and life, the Warlock (one of the people I regularly play with) decided to attack the locked stone doors at the far end of the hall. In doing so, he inadvertently damaged one of the door’s hinges. Seeing this, the barbarian came along and bashed off the hinge – causing the door to fall on top of him.

            But, the party was free of the room! So, they picked up their things and headed out. After triggering a trap that injured four more of them, they came to a muddy room where they saw a giant crayfish standing in front of a giant boulder. Naturally, the warlock attacked the crayfish, causing it to scuttle back to the rock and, in the Olman language (which none of the characters could understand), woke up the boulder – which unfolded itself to reveal it was an enormous crab.

            The crab tried to speak to them in Olman, but, not understanding it, the Party attacked and killed the two beasts. The barbarian proceeded to eat them. Then, after some exploring (during which the Warlock almost got himself caught in a cave-in), they decided on a path that took them to another room, where there was something green and slimy above the far exit. The ranger found herself a small silver pyramid that she took as a treasure while the rogue determined that the green stuff, ominous as it was, was only algae and almost certainly harmless. After poking the algae, the barbarian ate some of it – taking a bit of damage from the residue of the caustic lime on the wall beneath the algae. It burned on the way down, kinda like the hottest hot sauce he’d ever eaten.

            They continued on down a hall until they found a 12 foot tall statue holding a tray. It had gems for eyes and a sword sticking out over its shoulder. The barbarian came up to the statue, wanting the sword. The fighter came up to the statue and set up her dragon chess game on the tray, just in case the statue wanted to play. The warlock, wanting the gems from the statue’s eyes, climbed up onto the statue’s tray, causing the statue to fall down onto the three of them. While it hurt them, this also revealed a secret passageway. They took their treasures and travelled through this and came out in another hall – and this was when the first Total Havoc was called. A pair of hook horrors came lumbering down the hall. The party fought them off, and continued on their way after the barbarian had taken a few bites of them.

            As they approached the door at the end of the hall, they heard a melodic sound – it may have been singing, or just dripping. The rogue tried singing back. They heard a surprised squeal and a splash from the other side of the door. So, they entered to room – which looked more like a crystal-ceilinged cavern, filled with a pale light. The far half of the room had a deep pool of water, with only a narrow, slippery ledge leading to the door on the far side. They saw no signs of life.

            For reasons known only to him, the warlock dove into the water and started swimming. Suddenly, the head of a beautiful woman emerged from the water with a silvery giggle. Most of the party on the shore, uncertain of her intentions, readied their weapons to attack at the first sign of aggression. The warlock continued swimming toward the woman, who, giggling, swam up to him, grabbed him, and kissed him. A moment later, the warlock was gasping for breath that seemed to have been sucked from his lungs. Knowing something was wrong, the party attacked, managing to slay the woman-like creature before she could do anything else (which was lucky, because she had a giant electric eel friend she was going to call in to help). The barbarian hadn’t managed to help kill her, so she remained uneaten.

            Once the warlock got his breath back, they progressed through the next door and into a stairwell. This was the first of five checkpoints the DMs had agreed upon to mark progress through the dungeon. I announced this to the room and, naturally, since my party was the first to get this far, another table Cried Havoc on them. They were beset by two displacer beasts. They killed them, the barbarian ate some of them and made an improvised belt from their tentacle-tails, the ranger skinned one and the warlock skinned the other, each getting a good pelt.

            The party took a brief rest to recover some health, during which the barbarian identified his new sword as having magical properties. Then they headed up the stairs to a large hall with a fresco along one side – and someone called for a Total Havoc. An umber hulk appeared up the stairs. It was tough to pierce its tough hide, but the party prevailed and killed it. The barbarian took a few bites.

            Up until now, the party hadn’t done much in the way of searching around – this was why they were so far ahead of everyone else (they’d missed two rooms and quite a lot of treasure, even from the rooms they’d passed through). However, the traps they’d sprung had made them cautious, so they started searching around. The cleric found a part of the fresco that opened a secret door. Without exploring the hallway further, they crawled through into a hallway with several branches and with several stone statue heads projecting from the wall.

            At the far end of the hall, in the beak of an eagle statue, something gold glinted. Amid protests from her companions, the ranger grabbed it – and the eagle’s beak snapped down on her wrist. The party set to bashing apart the beak, causing her some damage in the process. Meanwhile... the warlock wandered off alone.

            He went down a side passage, saw an alcove with a silver coffer in it, and went straight for the treasure. The rest of the party caught up with him just in time to see the floor tilting on a steep angle, trapping the warlock in and them out. They spotted a lock holding the floor-trap in place on the outside. The rogue picked the lock, and the party used their combined weight to return the floor to its proper place. They discovered the warlock sitting at the far end, hugging the silver coffer to his chest.

            The ranger demanded that the warlock agree to splitting the profits from his treasure once it was sold, as he had been rescued by the rest of them. Before they could discuss it further, though, another Total Havoc brought two trolls lumbering around the corner. The warlock opened the battle by collapsing part of the ceiling on top of the trolls, but it still proved to be a tough fight. The first troll they killed came back to life before they realised that they needed fire to keep the trolls dead. After they achieved victory, the barbarian’s player used a purchased item that restored the whole party to full health. Then the warlock took his treasure and ran.

            The rest of the party gave chase, though they slowed down once they got into new territory. The warlock found an open pit beside a strange triangular wall that made the hall look like a dead-end, but which he surmised was a type of revolving door. He climbed into the pit with a bunch of skeletons, cast an illusion to make it look like the pit was filled with water, and pretended to be dead.

            The rest of the party arrived, saw through his pretence, but were fed up with him, so they decided to leave him be and jumped over the pit, continuing past the revolving door. Along the hall on the far side, they discovered a bar of copper in the ceiling that looked like it could drop down. Unable to discern a triggering mechanism, the barbarian charged forward alone – causing two heavy doors to drop down on both in front of and behind him, leaving him very trapped just in time for the dinner break, during which more prizes were raffled.

            When we returned to the game, the barbarian and the fighter managed to pry the door partway open. The warlock surprised everyone by showing up, drinking a strength potion, and lifting the door high enough for the barbarian to get out. However, instead of coming out, the barbarian insisted that he wanted to know what was beyond the door on the far end. The rest of the party were against it, except for the warlock, who dived under the door and letting it drop, sealing the two inside just as sand started pouring in from holes in the walls.

            The rest of the party, amazed that anyone would go into a trap they had just escaped, gave up on the two. They turned around and started backtracking to an area they hadn’t been to before.

            Meanwhile, between the two doors, the sand continued to trickle out, piling on the floor as the barbarian and warlock struggled to get the other door open. Them a will-o’-the-wisp attacked them materialised through the door and started attacking them. A lucky hit brought the monster down and they managed to lift the door and escape just as the sand started to really gush into the trap. The two were safe for now.

            But what of their companions? They found themselves walking down a hall lined with corpses. They proceeded cautiously, suspicious of the dead bodies, and rightly so. As they got halfway down the hall, the fifteen zombies came to life and attacked.

            The warlock and the barbarian, continuing their exploration, came across a room with a pair of perfectly preserved bodies. The barbarian, hearing the sounds of battle beyond a door, went to investigate and discovered his friends fighting zombies. He rushed in to help, while the warlock stayed behind to loot the room.

            The zombies were vanquished. Of those who had been injured by the zombies, only the ranger contracted sewer plague. However, after eating some of the zombies, the barbarian also caught the disease. They wouldn’t know until an hour later when they started feeling fatigued and having painful cramps.

            No sooner had the zombies gone down than a Total Havoc brought a zombie beholder upon them! Luckily they managed to bring down this dangerous foe before it had a chance to attack them – even the warlock rushed in to help.

            Safe again – at least temporarily – they returned to the room with the perfectly preserved bodies. The barbarian went to the slab between the two bodies where there were two crystal goblets, and a flask containing some kind of powder. He carefully poured the powder evenly into the two goblets and waited patiently for something to happen. Nothing happened.

            The cleric went to take a look through the open door – the one the warlock and barbarian had first entered the room through – while the fighter, ranger and rogue went to examine the one unopened door and, finding it to be safe, opened it.

            And the warlock? He backtracked down the hall with the zombies, leaving his companions behind. At this time, another Total Havoc called in another zombie beholder. This one came around a corner in front of the warlock – my intent being to drive him back to the rest of the party. Did he run or call for help? No, of course not. He decided to cast an illusion that would make it look like there had been a cave-in between him and his companions and go toe-to-toe with a monster that had the potential to kill and disintegrate him in one move (this happened to two characters on the table Colleen was playing at). I was now perfectly happy to kill him off (he had a resurrection scroll and would come right back to life, anyway).

            His companions regrouped by the barbarian and the goblets, unaware of the new threat. The fighter, noting is absence, went to look for him, but turned back at the sight of the rubble blocking the way. The cleric determined that the powder in the goblets was some kind of dried potion and poured water into one of the goblets, mixing the contents. The ranger tasted the potion to determine what it did and discovered it to be a very powerful sleeping potion – she barely shook off the effects that would have put her to sleep for 5000 years. She pocketed the powder from the other goblet.

            The barbarian then disturbed the preserved bodies, which awoke and were very angry about their rest being disturbed. They demanded payment from the adventurers and threatened to kill them if they didn’t cough up. The rogue offered them a healing potion, which they declined as not being good enough. The cleric then demanded of them how they would dare threaten a holy man, filled with the power and glory of his god. The formerly-sleeping monks were sufficiently cowed to accept the potion in payment. However, when asked about this temple, they could give no information on it.

            At this point, someone mentioned the absent warlock. The fighter informed them of the cave-in, but the cleric pointed out that they hadn’t heard any noise that would accompany a collapse. So they went to investigate, and discovered the illusion for what it was (I was both disappointed, because they were going to rescue the warlock, and proud that they had decided to save him in spite of all the trouble he’d caused). They passed through it, though the barbarian had trouble believing the illusion wasn’t real even after seeing his companions pass through. He charged into it, nearly knocking over the Ranger on the other side and crashing into the wall.

            The battle could have been going a lot worse for the warlock. He had started off well, but then the zombie beholder had magically paralyzed him. He shook off the effects only for it to happen again (I swear, I was trying to kill him). With the arrival of the rest of the party, the zombie beholder went down quickly. Then they continued on through the monks’ room and into the new corridor.

            Down a branch off this corridor, the warlock went and opened a set of doors. Inside, a bunch of giant fire beetles were trundling around peacefully. The warlock saw something shiny in a pile of rubbish, so (for some reason) cast a spell at it. Their nest disturbed, the fire beetles attacked in force. They weren’t strong enemies, but it took some time to whittle them down. When there were only two left, a banshee came upon the party from behind – sent by a Cry Havoc from Colleen, whose table had taken the lead (having reached checkpoint 3) and didn’t want us catching up.

            The quick-thinking cleric cast a protective spell on the barbarian who, with his magic sword, finished off the enemy with little help from the others. Once all the enemies were dead, the party decided to take a short rest.

            During the rest, the ranger identified the golden bracelet she had retrieved from the stone eagle as having magical properties and putting it on (unknowingly placing a curse on herself, but not a very bad one) and the cleric found that a rusty dagger he’d found in the fire beetle nest was magical, in spite of its poor condition. The warlock examined a bronze fish-ship figurine from inside his silver coffer, accidentally activating its magic. It took to the air and flew away. Before the party could go after it, a troll from yet another Total Havoc came through the door it had just flown out.

            They knew how to deal with trolls now, but it still did some heavy damage. The long hours of fighting in the poison were taking their toll, so at last they decided to take a long rest – something very dangerous to do with the poison in the air. The cleric used the last of his spells to heal everyone as much as he could so they could survive the night, he cured the ranger’s sewer plague, and raised a skeleton to guard them while they slept.

            Some fire beetles attacked in the night, but were quickly fought off. In the morning, the cleric healed as much of the poison damage taken over the night as he could. The barbarian had managed to recover from his sewer plague. All was looking well.

            The party wanted to go hunting after the flying figurine, but the wise cleric forestalled them and cast a spell to determine how that would go. The divine answer was woe, meaning it would not go well – for the ship-fish had already been wandering randomly through the dungeon for eight hours and could be anywhere and was impossible to catch once activated.

            So, instead, they went through the unopened door off the room and found themselves at a very long flight of stairs leading up. Well, except for the warlock, who, of course, went off on his own to seek the figurine.

            The silly party forgot to search for traps on their way up the stairs. As they neared the top, a huge millstone broke through a wall and started rolling down the stairs. The ranger was fast enough to get to the top of the stairs and rush around the corner before the millstone whooshed past. The rogue ran a little ways down the stairs and prepared herself to heroicly leap over the millstone. The barbarian ran as fast as he could for the bottom of the stairs.

            The millstone crashed through all but the barbarian, who managed to reach the room at the bottom and get out of the way. The rogue failed in her jump, but managed to squeak by with minor injuries. The fighter pressed herself up against the wall and took a chunk of damage, but survived. The cleric, though, got hit full on by the millstone. He fell to the floor, unconscious and close to death, and his mace and holy symbol (which he needed to cast most of his spells) were destroyed. His companions rushed to his side, reviving him with a healing potion. They then continued to the top of the stairs.

            During all this, the warlock had found the corridor he had chosen to take blocked by a giant sandstone block – something quite out of place. He had responded, as per usual, by attacking it. When he got no results, the player used a purchased card that essentially gave him an instant success (natural 20, for those in the know) on anything he tried... and punched the sandstone block. Now, this block was enormous, impossible to destroy with a punch. He did, however, knock a chunk out of a corner, revealing there was a corridor off to the side. Since the block was too big for him to move alone, he kept attacking it.

            Up at the top of the stairs, the rest of the party looked into a new room and were horrified to see another zombie beholder off in the shadows! They acted quickly, wanting to kill it before it noticed them. They hashed together a plan and...! The first arrow the ranger shot killed it. It exploded in a puff of spores that, had they been close enough, may have seeded the party with fungal growths – for this had been a gas spore, which merely looked like a beholder.

            After they had determined the spores were no longer a danger to them, they continued on into the corridor beyond. When the passage branched they turned off and took a twisty corridor that led them to the top of a ramp with a bunch of rollers set into the floor. The barbarian slid down to the bottom, where he found a great sandstone block with a hole in it and, through the hold, the warlock who was nursing his hand from hurting it while punching the block again. The two of them alone weren’t enough to shift the block – and the rest of the party weren’t coming to help – so the barbarian convinced the warlock to take the stairs and rejoin everyone else.

            They all came together and regrouped in the hall, coming to checkpoint two just in time for the end of the night.

            The last of the door prizes were raffled out, Jeremy said his thanks to everyone, announcing that we’d raised at least $3000, and said we were hoping to do this again next year. One of the players at my table lamented that it would be a whole year before she got to do this again.

            It was a fantastic day, and I will happily participate if we do it again next year, in spite of how exhausting it was. And, on top of all that fun, we’re $4000 closer to a cure for Cystic Fibrosis! A huge thank-you to everyone who participated, spread the word, and donated.

            If you want to know anything more about the event, feel free to ask!

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

DM for a Cure

            Coming up on May 13th, I get to be part of a wonderful event. A twelve. Hour. Dungeons and Dragons. Marathon. That’s right: twelve hours straight of Dungeons and Dragons – and not just for the sake of doing it (although that’s a good enough reason), but to raise money for the fight against cystic fibrosis. It is going to be glorious (and exhausting).

            How did I get involved? Well, the DM of my weekly D&D game at my local board game cafe has a daughter with cystic fibrosis. He mentioned he was planning this event, along with the cafe, and was working on organising the DMs to get it to happen. Knowing that I’m terrible at fundraising (what do you mean, I have to leave the house and talk to people?), I immediately volunteered to be a DM.

            As I learned more about the event, I also discovered there were going to be prizes. Well, I thought, just about anyone interested in D&D will have an appreciation of chainmaille. So I donated some dice bags, a couple dragons, and an armoured teddy-bear. Meanwhile, Colleen signed up as a player and will be raising as much money as she can (the players get more in-game benefits the more they raise). We’re committed to doing our part to fight cystic fibrosis.

            At first I was a bit concerned about how much interest there would be in the event – I mean, it’s a long day, lots of fundraising, and not everyone can make the time for such things even if they are interested. We had four Dungeon Masters, which meant we had room for 24 players – that’s a lot of seats to fill. Then registration opened on April 5th. I needn’t have worried. By the time Colleen and arrived at the cafe for our weekly D&D (6:30pm), over half the spots were already filled. By the third day of registration, every seat was filled. Three days.

            Now I’m just getting more excited as the day grows closer. Not only will this be a fun game to run, but I’m eager to see how much money our efforts raise. And now, you can look forward to it, too, because it will give me a great story to share with you.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Fish in a Jar

            Today I shall share with you a story from my LARPing days. Earlier this year, I told you about how I sometimes make joking suggestions that people take too seriously. This is a story about that, too.

            Firstly, for those who don’t know, LARPing stands for Live Action Role Playing. The one I was involved with is called Amtgard – a fantasy themed game (surprise, surprise). If that still means nothing to you, once a week my friends and I went to a park in costumes and beat each other up with pool noodle swords. Kind of like Dungeons and Dragons live. It’s significantly more awesome than it sounds.

            So, as part of this game, sometimes quests are run – usually only during events with guests from other groups because more people is better for quests and they take a lot of energy to put together. During a quest, people are split into two groups PCs and NPCs. NPCs are the people running the quest – the monsters and characters that tell the story – while the PCs are the players who try to solve the puzzles and defeat the monsters.

            Now, for years, as core members of our group, my best friend and I were usually NPCs, if not the people writing the quest in the first place. This time, however, we were PCs – which, to us, was an opening to have a lot of fun.

            For a few months, we’d been planning a couple of new characters to play – a pair of eccentric gnomes. These characters had no interest in solving the quest. No, they just tended to be around, sometimes helping, sometimes throwing a wrench in the gears. We planned all kinds of antics, such as fishing in a pile of leaves or setting up a “machine” that enchanted weapons (which really had one of us inside casting the spells). The overall intent was to mess with people enough to make them think we were NPCs rather than PCs and have them wondering what our part was in the quest.

            Well, we got word in advance that this quest was taking place during a fair scenario – where there would be games to play and prizes to be won. How perfect was that? All we had to do was come up with some items that we could trade to people, or give them as prizes, with the hope that they’d be fooled into thinking they were some significant part of the quest.

            I have no memory of how the conversation led to it, but this is where – after the laugh I have that indicates my idea is to ridiculous to do – I made the suggestion I never thought would happen.

            Fish in jars.

            However, as usual, I underestimated my best friend’s willingness to run with my crazy ideas. The idea stuck. Why? Because it was perfect for the scenario. In a quest situation, why on earth would there be live fish if it wasn’t an important part of the quest? We would hand them out to people and they’d go insane trying to figure out what they were for. What more could we wish for?

            So, the project began. We went and scouted fish prices, then went to the grocery store and bought four jars of baby food. It was while my friend was eating his way through these jars that I giggled and said the next thing I shouldn’t have.

            I said, “You know, people might ask what the fish is for, and if they do, you should do this.” I proceeded to mime drinking the contents of one of the jars.

            I should have known. He looked me in the eye and declared that he would do it. He then said that he hated me, because he didn’t want to do it, but it was too perfect an opportunity to miss.

            And so, on the day of the event, we went out and bought our fish. We bought feeder fish because of a combination of them being cheap, and that they were intended to have short lives and we had no idea what would happen to them once they were given away. My guilty conscience – still protesting at the plan to swallow a live fish – hoped that they might end up living a better life than that of a bigger fish’s meal.

            We sorted out four fish into their four jars – leaving the lids loose when we could to keep oxygen in the water – and headed for the quest. The game started, and we set to work. One by one, we went up to random people (one of them even an NPC), asking riddles or offering trades – then presented them with live fish.

            They had no idea what to make of them. The expressions on their faces were priceless. Luckily, no one asked what they were for.

            We were having so much fun messing around that I honestly have no idea what was going on with the rest of the quest. At some point, monsters attacked, and the carefree gnomes hopped inside a protective circle and watched the battle. Then the quest was over.

            The best part, though, is that during the quest, one girl had traded her way into owning all four of the fish. She told us how delighted she was with them and that she planned to take them home to the states with her and keep them as pets. It was wonderful – if not for that, I would likely still feel guilty about those fish to this day.

            At the same time, I’m a little sad that no one asked what the fish were for.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.