Only Children and Gaming

 

I will say that I am a proud only child. When I was seven, my mother sat me down and told me about boat children from Cambodia. They had no homes, and they needed to be adopted. She said we could adopt one so I would have a brother or sister, my choice. I started crying and said “Give them my clothes! Give them my toys! But I don’t want a sibling!!” My mom left, going to the other room. I thought that I upset her, but it turns out that she was laughing her ass off.

 

The irony is that skip forward a few decades and I have a large extended family – my gaming family. I have siblings I love, a few that have driven me nuts, but we are all there for each other at each and every crisis and life point. Recently, when Jason and I talked about starting a family, I evaluated a local birthing center. I found myself making sure that the immediate waiting area for family would support a game of Lords of Waterdeep or Cthulhu Munchkin. Sometimes my Mother-in-Law talks about ‘family only’. Not to hurt anyone’s feelings, but when your biological brother does not invite you to the Christmas party and your friend on 30 years shows up the instant he finds out you need help picking a lock at your own house at midnight, how do you define ‘family’?

Now learning how to game late in life and as an only child has not been without its own challenges. Sharing is something I still struggle with at times. I have always been unique – a fact I pride myself on. I am unique for a few reasons: being an only child, having red hair, being a female comic book nerd in my youth, and knowing Star Wars front to back while still being able to ‘pass’ in society as my mother calls it… all things that are rare. I LIKE being rare. I LIKE being unique.

 

This does not always work in the RPG world. I play with people I think of as siblings. We think alike. We act alike. This means that if I come up with something that is cool and ‘unique’… well, Solomon said a hell of a long time ago that there was nothing new under the sun, and we was right then and now. Does this sometimes cause me ‘chaos’ as we say in my group? Yes. Have I learned to live with it a hell of a lot better? Yes. At 30 something I have learned the concepts of sharing (most things) with at least an air of grace… and now those in my group can stop laughing at me making that statement.

 

At the same time, I would love to hear from all of you. Do you care if you have something who creates things very similar to you, or do you think that there should only be 1 ranger in a party of 4? What do you think?

 

-Madelyn

School Wars - Dark Sun Notes from 12 10 12

Notes for Dark Sun 12/10/12 – School Fighting

 

Barok was approached by the templars to a great display in the arena. Tosh from Nibenay arrived and he wanted to see the best of what the school had to offer. Barok was even invited to sit in the posh seats with the other dignitaries. He was asked to select five of the best gladiators from Barok’s School for Gladiator Who Want to Fight Good and Do Other Things Good Too (now called Barok’s School). Barok chose Xraneth, a thri-kreen from Xanus’s clutch, Tryranicus Thawk, the younger nearly identical brother of Adamicus Thawk, Red Teeth, a Halfling with teeth stained red from blood, Mighty Nautilus a dwarf in a mask, and El Draque, a Dray with yellow and black armor. There would be five challenges.

 

After arriving at the arena, they learned they would be facing two other teams of gladiators. One group was from Nibenay, and the other was from a famous but unnamed school within Tyr. There were nicely dressed elemental priests from all the elements, plus one. The challenges would be based on these elements. Each gladiator could only represent their team once and then would only be relegated to a helper role.

 

The first challenge was the challenge of Earth. Barok’s team fronted Nautilus the dwarf, while the other two teams but in a human and a mul. Everyone else on the teams could throw rocks at the other two school’s entries as they scrambled to get to the top of a small hill of jagged rocks. At the top was a crown of obsidian. The winner would scramble up, snatch up the crown, then they would win. The three tiers they had to climb were covered with sharp rocks, though. Once the competition started, Team Barok pelted the mul with a ton of rocks. He was almost dead before he made it to the third tier, but the human remained pretty unpelted. He made it to the top at the same time as Nautilus and snatched the crown. Nautilus used his giant hair belt as a whip to snatch the crown away and won at the last minute. In reward, he received a very nice set of armor.

 

After the game of the Earth, everyone got a small rest. The mul was dead, and the human battered. Barok’s team used some of their special items to bribe the attendants to learn the next contest was the contest of fire, and that one of the opponents was a half giant. Tryranicus bribed an attendant to slip a laxative into the half-giant’s drink, and then the game began.

 

The challenge of fire was to defeat a fire elemental in a ring of hot coals. Everyone only had a dagger, but better weapons could be obtained from burning braziers around the ring. The dray competed for Barok’s school and there was also a half elf. The dray grabbed the half-elf and face planted her into the elemental, beating her until she was unconscious. The half-giant attacked the fire elemental a few times before the Dray turned her attention on him, breathing fire in his face. Then she attacked the elemental, almost killing it, but the half-giant could have stolen the victory. Tryranicus Thawk distracted the half-giant, giving the Dray a chance to make the killing blow, which she did and got the gem.  In reward she got a nice sword.

 

The next competition was the competition of air. Barok’s team selected Red Teeth. In this chariots of various colors and prestige would attack those teams who summoned them. Each had two colored kestrekel tails and if the gladiator could grab those they would score points. The other members of the team built the stands to attract the chariots. Red Teeth proved very effective, as did the rest of Barok’s team. Because they had good teamwork and better tactics than the other teams, Red Teeth was able to attract the best chariot, the Golden chariot, twice. Both times he took the tails, and he won. In reward, he got a new cloak of kestrekel feathers.

 

There was a small break before the next two contests to be resolved next game…

Grandmother's Notes 12/8/12 - Warhammer

Grandmother’s Report 12/8/12

 

Aloysia

Just before riding out to the group, Aloysia joined the group. She was hired by Grandmother to keep an eye on the group. Then everyone took the coach out to the Holtz farmstead, the lead that Kat got from the Tilian. Riding up to the Hotz farmstead, smoke and fire were seen off to the right. After some “quick” caucusing, everyone decided to investigate the smoke and fire, even though it was to the right of their  destination.

 

Bloodbath

The farmstead was in ruins when the group arrived. The barn was still on fire despite the rain, and after a few party members investigated, they found the animal pens had been smashed and there was a torch tossed in to start the fire. There were no animals left in the barn. The house was also in ruins, with blood on the floor in splotches. There was a chaos star painted in blood. There were a few bedrooms in the house with empty bunks. Since no one was alive, everyone decided to quickly ride to the Holtz farmstead to warn them or see if they needed assistance.

 

The Farmstead

It took 20 minutes to get to the Holtz farm, and when they did they found two people arguing. One was a mutant, the other man normal. The other members of the farm were also mutants. The larger man said “I warned you not to stop Tristan” but the other man said “My whole family are dead, damn you!” and tried to stab the larger man. Aloysia managed to net Tristan and other members of the Holtz family pounced on Tristan beating him into unconsciousness. When the group said they were looking for Reiner Holtz, one man started looking uncomfortable and an older man ordered him to talk to the group. He said that he did encounter Florian but Florian sold him his cart and horse and said he was leaving town quickly. However, he broke under further interrogation and explained that he had taken Florian to sacrifice to the Beastmen at the Hag Tree. Everyone in the area did this once a month or their farms were attacked. Tristan’s family stopped making the sacrifices and they were attacked. However, the Holtz’s wanted to stop. They wanted to save Stromdorf. An older woman offered to take the group to Fredrik who was a shaman of the Beastmen and willing to help. He said the only way to stop the beastmen was kill the leader and capture the white stone in the clearing that was emitting lightning. The group agreed to help, and started walking out into the woods.

 

How to Commit Suicide, Quickly

After about 30 minutes, the group came to a large tree in a clearing that looked like a hag. Once there, Fredrick (the shaman beastman) explained that Iska of the Mad Teeth clan wanted to destroy man. But Fredrick’s mother was human and he did not want to see that happen. After scoping out the clearing where Iska was having his meeting, the team could see the stone and an altar was the symbol of Khorne painted on it in blood. There were about 25 beastmen in the clearing, and Florian who was bloodied. The team made a plan to attack and launched an attack on the leader of the beastmen while Kat crept forward trying to rescue Florian. Quickly, the beastmen attacked back. Shortly after reaching Florian Kat was attacked and fell to the ground, as Heinrik shot Iska and then got cut down. Aloysia climbed a tree and shot the beastmen that tried to come after her, as Hanz launched into a fury with his halberd. Franz used the stone’s augmentation of his Celestial magic to cast several spells, wounding beastmen. Geita rushed to Kat’s aid then got cut down herself. Finally, Iska fell with only three beastmen left. Hanz, Franz, and Aloysia threw the stone and their unconscious party members in the cart and left for the town.

Oh Sigmar! It hurts!

While most of the team were in the temple of Shallya trying to heal their horrific injuries, Franz (or Franz the Uninjured as certain members of the team started calling him behind his back) took the stone to his friend Nicholas Shulman, another Celestial Wizard for viewing. After saying he would need some time to look the item over, he stole it. Franz and Aloysia gave chase, on horse, then in boat when Nicholas stole a boat and rowed out to a vortex the stone was helping channel. In his attempt to draw the power into himself, Nicholas was destroyed, and Franz almost died. Aloysia recovered Franz and the stone, taking them back into town.