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Now we’re into the second themed weekend – “Wild”, apparently.

“Wildest Character Name?”

Oof. Don’t blame me, folks, I didn’t come up with these, I’m just answering them.

I dunno — I once had a Vampire NPC, a Brujah punk who went by the name Rexx Havok.

(I later discovered that “Rex Havoc & the Asskickers of the Fantastic” was a late 70s/early 80s comic serial appearing in Warren Publications. Maybe I’d run across it somewhere?)

 

Today’s question is: How has gaming changed you?

Oof. How hasn’t it?

I’m 49 years old. I started gaming 38 years ago, when I received a copy of TOP SECRET for my 11th birthday. Six months later, for Christmas, I received the Moldvay Basic D&D set… and from there, I was off to the races.

I gamed through high school, into college, and into my adult life. Gaming has changed me, in as much as nearly every friend I’ve made in the past 38 years has been through gaming… gaming became my career, as I began publish my own designs and do freelance work for other publishers, and that work led to other writing jobs, in comics, fiction, etc. I even met my wife via the Kansas University Gamers And Roleplayers club (KUGAR).

So yeah, you could say that gaming has changed me. It’s literally influenced every part of my life, from relationships to work, and I cannot imagine what my life would have been like without it.

 
 

Today’s question: How has a game surprised you?

I’ll admit to having been completely surprised by how much I really dig D&D 5th Edition. After 14 years of immersion (as a player, a DM and a designer & publisher) in the crunchy complexity of 3rd Edition (and it’s d20 derivatives, like Pathfinder), and after finding the dramatic redesign of 4th Edition completely not to my liking, I had pretty much no interest in 5th Edition.

Then I looked at the “Basic” PDFs that Wizards of the Coast made available, and immediately went out and bought the three core books. I was amazed at how streamlined it was, and how many influences it bore from more modern, narrative games, yet still managed to be Dungeons & Dragons. It’s a cliché, but it truly felt like a distillation of everything I loved from 2nd and 3rd editions, and awakened a nostalgic love that went back to my Basic/Expert set days. (And that might be the most surprising thing of all.)

My only regret is that I haven’t had the time (or the playing group) to actually run a game yet.