Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Stormonu" data-source="post: 9364485" data-attributes="member: 52734">It's hard to summarize 45 years of playing into a few paragraphs...HOLMES.  I got Holmes edition for Christmas in '79, when I was in 4th grade (9 years old).  The game was a bit too advanced for me, so my dad helped me make my first character and ran me through the dungeon in the book (solo) - it didn't end well for me.  Unfortunately, I lost the rulebook shortly after that, and only had B2, the weird dice and two boxes of Grenadier miniatures (one of monsters, one of heroes) for the next couple of years.  I winged DMing my brother, friends, cousins and anyone I could talk into playing.  Most of the time, I played at school with my friends.B/X.  In 6th grade, one of my friends got the Moldvay red box D&D.  He let me borrow it and I devoured the rules, and started to actually use them.  Still couldn't use dice at school though, as they were considered for "gambling".  In 7th grade, one of my friends was getting rid of his D&D collection (he was getting into the Marvel RPG), and I bought a huge lot of modules from him, read through them and started taking bits out of them for our school game.AD&D & LJN.  For my 8th grade graduation, I got the 1E DMG & PHB, with the revised covers from Toys'R'us.  That was also about the time the LJN figures came out, and my brother and I picked up the whole line.  At this point, I started to switch to using the AD&D rules.  Unfortunately, my original group was scattered to the winds, so as I entered high school I had to start a new gaming group.  Luckily, there was a D&D club at school, and I picked up some players there.DRAGONLANCE.  After a year of two playing AD&D, I was starting to get bored with endless, pointless dungeons, and I was considering putting the game aside.  Then Dragonlance came along and had an epic storyline to it.  I dove back into the game with renewed interest.  Shortly thereafter, I discovered Ravenloft, and was totally in love with D&D again.AD&D 2E.  When 2E was announced, I eagerly awaited it.  The idea of a cleaned up system, cutting back down to one DMG and one PHB made me happy.  The expanded monster entries, with ecologies and tactics - that you could resort when more were released, sounded great.  I took a month or two to read through and aquaint myself with the updated rules, and it was off to the races. I played with my High School group until about '93, and then after meeting my future wife I started a new group with her, her sister and a few work friends.MAGIC.  Magic killed D&D in my area around '95.  Everybody went to the card game, and when I  went to the local Con the next year, I got booted from the open gaming tables because they needed more space for the Magic tournament.  For the next few years, nobody was playing D&D, and I moved to Atlanta, where it was difficult to find a group, and finding places that sold D&D became harder and harder as they dumped the RPG to sell Magic cards.  I've hated MtG ever since.WHITE WOLF.  Around '97 or so, I found myself drifting away from D&D and to the Storyteller games of Vampire and Werewolf.  D&D was looking pretty antiquated so I started to put it aside.The next bit of time is a bit fuzzy - TSR went bankrupt and was bought by WotC, my nemesis.  Yet, I tried my hand at getting a gig at the revived D&D, and did get an adventure published in Dungeon Magazine.  I made a couple more attempts to start building some design cred, but then...D&D 3E.  When I found out that a 3rd edition was coming, I was super-happy.  I was ready for the game to get a face-lift.  I bought the new books, started a new group and begin playing in earnest, still hoping to become an official D&D designer.  I felt like I was just getting into my 3E groove when 3.5 was released, upsetting the apple cart.  I got a new group of players, just freshly starting College and I continued to play, with the release of the SRD/d20 license I took a stab at producing my own content professionally.  The latter didn't work out, so I just stayed on the consumer side.D&D 4E. Was unwanted.  My friends were eager to switch to it, but all the marketing coming out for it really made me feel sour about it.  We did Keep on the Shadowfell twice with me DMing, and thereafter I told the group I wouldn't DM 4E.  I made another stab at the game as a player, but it just wasn't for me.  I bowed out, and my game group tried out several other games during this period, with the two most successful including Vampire and Savage Worlds.PATHFINDER.  When Pathfinder came out, our group switched to it with gusto.  We played until the group parted ways, just a few months prior to the release of 5E.D&D 5E.  I was very skeptical about 5E, but bought the starter set to give it a try.  My two children and wife were the starting group, and by the end of the adventure my brother, his wife and my own parents had all played it and had great fun with it.  So, I fully adopted the ruleset, picked up some more players at the local FLGS, and have been playing it since then.</blockquote>

Verification