A gamer in peril

I can’t fully rememberwhen I was introduced into gaming, must have been around Jr High Freshman year in HS. My friends invited me to their place for gaming. We rolled dice, we wrote up characters, we even worked on our own games. I remember playing in HS during lunch, it was a fighter jet game my friend made up. We fought enemies like the Germans and Russains. Fired missles and guns to shoot down their planes. Had sheet letting us know what our sheilding was, how much damage we could take, what we needed to shoot down other planes, rolling, speed, etc. It was cool. We had a lot of fun. My friend Bryon also could really tell a story for D&D too. While in California I always had a chance to game. With him and several other friends I got to know, we had great groups that did a lot of fun things. Drank a lot of coke and ate a lot of pizza and doritos. Saw many characters rise and fall. Remembered a mage I ran. Had a facination with fire. He would fire ball his way through a dungeon. Until one time we came upon some skeletons in a closed cavern. I told everyone to get behind me and wait. I rolled for the spell. Bryon rolled for spell failure. What happened next killed half the party, and injured the rest. The spell went off, flew over the skeletons, hit the back end of the tunnel, where there was 3 barrels of gunpowder, I believe it was orcs that were hording. The fireball ignited the barrels and a fire ball 8 times the size I fired off came flying back at us. Destoryed the skeletons, and us as the flash came back. We were given a save roll. Many did not make it. I think I had 2 HP left as I staggered back out of the cave. Lets just say the others forbade me to ever run another mage again.




The reason I am writing is that yes I do miss the gaming group I grew up with. We all have grown up and gone our seperate ways. Some of them still live there in Red Bluff and others come back when they can. 3 years ago, I was able to find a group who liked to play, hadn’t played with the new rules but were willing to learn. All of htem are active duty AF men. One is a civillian working on the base. The others worked on the base, but still go out on TDY when called. So the group fell apart a few months after it was together. I was able to form another group lately and because I have a family, it is hard to do what i like doing. I like to go out with the guys and roll away the stress of family life. I would GM/DM but no time to study, and plan for the group to do things. So I am going back to playing and go from there.



One of the great things on being a gamer, there are things out there, that even when you can’t play you can read on what others have done. One of the magizines I read is Knights of the Dinner Table. Its a rag about gamers, for gamers. 20 years ago, a madman named Jolly Blackburn created a rag named Shadis. He created a group of characters that resembled his own group that played. It has grown since then. It is a monthly rag that goes all over the world to gamers. It has kept me company since I have not been able to game, nor be with my old group. Just recently, I found them on Facebook. His wife has already added me and I am looking at going to one of the gamers conventions they go too throughout the year. GaryCon 3. Named for the great Father of Gaming. E. Gary Gygax. RIP. If I can get and keep a job, I am hoping I can save up and go to GC3 in March of next year. If not, maybe I can look at other Cons near here. I think Vegas has one each year. It would be nice to get out and be with other gamers and enjoy that kinship. So we will see. So thats my few words I need to get out.