My friends have just left the house. I had four of them over for a game of D&D; it’s the eighteenth time we’ve met to play, and I enjoy it as much, if not more, than the first time we met.
The game isn’t just in the encounters that I create and the rest of them overcome; the game is in the little in-jokes and side conversations. Yes, the centaur charging at the group has potential to lay some serious hurt on them, but the fact that Shawn thought my performance of the angry centaur sounded like William Shatner was the icing on the cake.
Or when the party was approaching an unknown forest and they reached a waist-high wall made of black stone, and they took nearly a half-hour to decide how to cross it. Some people might think that’s boring or stupid. Some players might think that because the wall has no Armor Class or Hit Points that it can’t be a challenge. But in the context of the group, exploring a mysterious magical forest, it makes perfect sense to stop and examine everything very carefully, and to take their time. A low wall can be just as much fun to get across as it is to fight an ogre. And empty rooms are sometimes the scariest thing of all.
When Terry’s character, the beer-sodden Lawful priest Willy, summoned an ant-like creature called a Formian to scamper around a room they suspected was trapped, it paid off; the Formian took the damage instead of them, and found (but did not demand a share of) the treasure they found. Helpful! And something I did not expect.
I smile for days after playing with these folks. Their minds are creative and funny, they constantly surprise me with their inventiveness (and sometimes I turn that back on them by nicking their ideas for things - not always but just enough to keep them on their toes) and I hope my game is entertaining for them, as well. They keep coming back so I think we’re all doing something right.
I can outline a fantasy world, but it doesn’t really exist until players explore it - and even better when they add to it things I never imagined. That’s my favorite part. It’s almost as if I am exploring along with them.
I never would have guessed they’d toss a Formian into the spear-trapped room. That’s unpredictable!
I can’t wait for the next game.
