Friends or Strangers...

[Piratecat]

It's interesting that I make a distinction between my own campaign and game days/one shots. For my own campaign, I only want to play with people I really like (or who I think I'm really going to like.) We're all super-picky about who joins the group, choosing folks who we'd also want to socialize with away from the table as well. I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

And I don't even consider that restriction when I meet new folks at a convention. There it's the luck of the draw, and that's half the fun. Sort of a weird dichotomy.

 

[Scribble]

It's interesting that I make a distinction between my own campaign and game days/one shots. For my own campaign, I only want to play with people I really like (or who I think I'm really going to like.) We're all super-picky about who joins the group, choosing folks who we'd also want to socialize with away from the table as well. I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

And I don't even consider that restriction when I meet new folks at a convention. There it's the luck of the draw, and that's half the fun. Sort of a weird dichotomy.

I make that distinction too. At my own games, I'm more interested in Gaming with friends... A long term campaign is to me just a hobby that I enjoy doing with my friends... Like skiing or fishing, or anything...

At a convention I'm not picky, as you say luck of the drawl.. and part fo the fun is seeing who (what) shows up... Plus it's interesting seeing difefrent play styles then I'm used to.

But those are short term things, almost like the ice breaker party board games.

I can't see myself say, wanting to start a weekly charades night and looking for random people to come partake.

 

[Scribble]

Someone you know to whatever extent is having a "board gaming day" at his house. You go over and play board games with the others who show up... some of whom you know, and some of whom you do not. This is unusual?

This is how I see the occasional ice breaker party type games, but I wouldn't start a weekly board game night with people I wasn't already friends with.

As an aside, I do consider friends of friends to be a different story... While they are technicaly "strangers" they're friends with my friends, so normally I consider them just about already a friend...

 

[Victim]

My gaming group started out as strangers to me (excluding my brother), but now we're friends. However, they were all school friends of my brother, so it's not like they were just random people.

 

[mhacdebhandia]

My effective policy is that I only play with friends - I don't go to conventions or play in gamestores.

However, because I'm still a member of SUTEKH at the University of Sydney, I have many opportunities to meet other gamers and become friends with them - at which point, I'm happy to play with them.

The current age range of people in my group stretches from two guys who came to university a couple of years before me, down to another who came a couple of years after I graduated.

 

[Tian Zi]

Started playing with best friend in middle school. We still play, 18ish years later. He's still a DM who hates too much magic, and a player that loves charismatic thuggish rogues.

The rest of the extended group is all friends... younger brother of friend, his high school buddies, an old (random, and stranger) roommate (of all things!) and now his co-worker. My roommate has joined as well.

Friends or friends of friends.

Conventions can be odd. D&D is about telling jokes and having fun, humor is hard to create fresh.

Plus we drink beer for our weekend sessions.

 

[Lord Ipplepop]

My friends are actually pretty strange, so I guess I fit both categories...

Actually, my current group started with me knowing one of the guys (who no longer games) and being introduced to the others, whom I had never really known before in my life (the one used to work at the local mini-market, and I "knew" him from there). These self-same strangers are now (with one exception) my closest friends in the world.

 

[Drowbane]

friends and strangers

2e (Reedley, CA): mostly friends or friends of friends.
3e: mostly strangers, some of which became friends.

Since just before 3e came out, I've moved around quite abit. I've had 3e groups in...Tucson, Reedley, Spokane, San Diego, Portland, and Vancouver... the last four of those I met through ENWorld.

Of my two current groups (Portland OR and Vancouver WA), roughly 10 members in total, I would count perhaps half of them as "friend"... though we never hang out outside of game.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Friends first.

And then, IF I can be around you for four hours, we can game.

Too many bad experiences have soured me on random strangers, but I'm down with considering internets people, recent acquaintances, and friends-of-friends as potential friends, so it ain't like I gotta be trusted with your undapants drawer.

 

[William drake]

The people you game with...

Would you have considered them friends before you started gaming?

Or is your group comprised of strangers?

I've for the most part only gamed with good friends. I participated in a couple of gamestore games, but some friends from my regular group were there as well..

When I first started gaming, it was with a few friends...and one or two strangers. *later, some of them became good friends.* Now that I'm older, and a good group is hard to find...I game with anyone as long as they don't turn out to be creepy.