How Did You Start Playing?

[Riley]

At camp, a bunch of the older boys were playing at the picnic tables in front of the mess hall. As I recall, a paladin with a lightsaber-like sword, a cohort of blink dogs, and a wand that projected walls of acid off into the distance - disintegrating everything in their path - was up against two giant monsters known colloquially as "Slurp Slurp" and "Boom Boom."

We asked very nicely, and the DM agreed to run a game for us that night, and every night for the rest of the week. He took us through the dungeon at the back of the first blue book D&D rules, killed us all off at the end of the week, and there was no looking back.

I bought my first D&D books at the Little Professor Bookstore, my first AD&D at Waldenbooks, and only later discovered miniatures and all the other goodness at the Dungeon Hobby Shop in Lake Geneva.

Interesting that even TSR's original game store was a "Hobby Shop." Or was it a "Shoppe"?

 

[SavageRobby]

I voted "Heard about it and bought a game", since I saw some guys (acquaintances at best) playing at lunch at school (grade school), and was very taken with what I saw. When I at Toys R Us at short time later and saw the AD&D books, I bought them (or that is to say, I convinced my grandmother to buy them for me). In fact, most of my early D&D purchases were via Toys R Us (they carried all the books, back then - 79/80/81). It wasn't until much later (almost a decade ... and that is still two decades ago) that I ever went to an official "game store".

 

[Fifth Element]

There was a kid who used to play those solo modules at the back of the class in grade 4 - I sat beside him and it seemed awfully interesting. I eventually talked my mother into buying me the red box Basic Set for my birthday - would have been in 1988.

 

[Hjorimir]

The poll results are pretty much what I expected. The stigma about role-playing games (and D&D in particular) is, let's face it, pretty bad. But a friend (or relative) has a voice that can be trusted and give the incentive to at least give the game a whirl.

I really don't ever see RPGs expanding in any meaningful way (numbers may go up based purely on population growth rather than finding wider acceptance). I find it odd that people are more accepting of MMORPGs, which I think are more socially repressed than a good night at a friend's place rolling the bones.

 

[thalmin]

Really 2 answers are correct. I started playing at a game store, but a friend introduced me to the game.
We were at scout camp, where I was on staff. A scout had the the and introduced me to about a 45 minute session. When I came home, I was unable to find a game until I discovered The Compleat Gamer, a FLGS that had a game room with 2 tables. I started playing every saturday.

 

[Aegir]

Through most of my childhood, my mother owned and operated a hairstyling salon, and my school was about two blocks from it, so alot of my time was spent there. One of the women working there had a customer who played D&D, and used to run the occasional one-shot for me when he'd drop by for an appointment. I was about... hm, 8-9, I'd guess.

I didn't get into gaming until many years later, largely because of my first (and only) experience with FLGSs. I went to one in my area around that same time, and was basically told to piss off when I expressed interest in learning how to play. Needless to say I never went back, and it was a good eight years or so before I even considered picking it up again.

 

[werk]

Introduced by a friend, but it was the same friend who turned me on to fantasy novels a few years ealier. It also didn't hurt that the comic shop that we went to on our lunches (open campus) had an RPG shelf.

 

[Halivar]

A friend that I played Avalon Hill board games with came back from WinterWar Con all excited. " Dude you got to try this new game (D&D) its like playing Lord of the Rings Man! It was all over , we rarely played our old Avalon Hill stuff after that. And that was over 30 years ago

Dude. Avalon Hill rocked. Britannia, Kingmaker, Waterloo, 1776, and the King of All Board Games: Third Reich.

Fond memories. If only I had someone to play Third Reich with.

Avalon Hill also introduced me to mini's long before I played D&D (for real, not the pretend stuff in my aforementioned post) through Napoleon's Battles. I loved pushing hundreds of pewter fig's across the table. Historical miniature wargaming... man, how I miss it.

[/THREADJACK]

 

[kolikeos]

Grrrr... I hate it when people say "local game store" (there's maybe one in the country and it ain't local)

 

[Theocrat]

Parents Didn't like killing orc's gave to 8yo son!`

Hi all -
I was 8 when my parents bought the blue boxset, in '79. They played a couple times, but didn't really like it. They gave it to me and my older brother (10). I couldn't read, but didn't believe what he was telling me so I learned how to read using the rules. I went to sulivan learning center and remember asking them to use the D&D rules to teach me to read.
My brother never really got into it, other than every now and then, and mostly to placate me (as I've come to realize finally).
Be Well.
Theocrat 1ssak