D&D General Tell us about yourself

[FrogReaver]

I know very little about anyone here. This is an introduction thread for us to learn more about each other. Hopefully it's fun and entertaining while also helping us remember that we are all people behind our Avatars.

I'm from rural Virginia (U.S. for our international friends). My dad was in the Army, stationed in Germany the biggest part of his life. It's a very nice country if you ever get to visit. I grew up on my papaw's tobacco farm. Still live relatively closeby to where I grew up but am closer to the town and city. 34 years old. Went to a college for Math and Computer Science that was right in the middle of coal mining country. I currently work at a bank. I played some D&D computer games back in the 3e era. Started trying table top during 4e. It was a great fit because my games weren't regularly occurring at the time but I really enjoy analysis/optimization and 4e had a good online community for that. I play 5e now. My roleplay has improved significantly compared to my 4e days. Though I still enjoy the optimization aspect - it's just not the primary decision driver when I play anymore.

That's enough about me for now. What about you?

 

[Maxperson]

I was born in San Francisco and lived my first year on the corner of Haight and Ashbury(70's music central). My father had the biggest light show on the west coast, so he knew and partied with the Grateful Dead, Janice Joplin and others. My parents split and I ended up living with my dad who moved back to rural Michigan after converting to Christianity. We spent a few years living on a farm, then bought a house in town(population 400ish).

When I was 13(1983) I went over to a friend's house and saw this strange book that had a red dragon, a unicorn, a centaur, a green thing and a feathered thing on the cover. Intrigued I started to flip through the pages, but my friend's mother said that my dad would have to give me permission before I could learn about a game called Dungeons & Dragons. He refused. Sad panda.

About 3 months later my father who was both an alcoholic and drug user at this point had an intervention by his friends. It was agreed that I would go live with my mother in Los Angeles, California. When I got settled in my mother asked me if there were any games I was wanted her to buy for me and I told her Dungeons & Dragons. So we went to The Last Grenadier in Burbank and she bought me the core three books and maybe a module or two. I talked the kid upstairs into playing the game with me and haven't looked back.

I spent several years working in retail before going back to school to be a paralegal. After 14 years in that field I got laid off due to Covid downsizing. I initially became a paralegal with the intent to go on to law school and become an attorney, but after seeing the stress that attorneys go through behind the scenes I said "No way!" At the time of my layoff I was pretty bored with legal work and being fortunate enough not to need to go back to work right away, I decided to study to be a real estate agent. I passed the exam late last year and am at this point about a month into my new career. So if you know anyone in the Los Angeles area who wants to buy or sell, message me.

 

[pogre]

54, central Illinois, started playing D&D as a young lad almost from the beginning, former attorney and now a teacher and coach for the last couple of decades.

 

[jdrakeh]

44 years old. First played D&D (Holmes Basic) in 1985-ish at school as part of a gifted education program. The GE program was subsequently discontinued and the teacher fired as what I much later became convinced was part of the "satanic panic" phenomena of the day. Started playing AD&D regularly in 1994-95 (a kind of mashup of AD&D 1e and 2e). Started playing other RPGs in 1996-97, starting with Palladium Fantasy and Shadowrun, then branching into Call of Cthulhu, GURPS, and many other games.

 

[Stormonu]

Originally from California, moved to Mississippi in '86 (with some time working in Atlanta). Been playing some form of D&D since about '80, and had to endure the "satanic panic" in the Bible Belt.

I always wanted to work for TSR in some form of game design, so I consider my claim to fame getting an adventure published in Dungeon magazine called the "Winter Tapestry", and tried to do a small business during the 3E era (my products are still on DriveThruRPG).

 

[le Redoutable]

I am a little frenchie, born in '71 at Mulhouse , could have been assistant professor because I had the flag "model student" ; unfortunately my prof didn't approve; later on I could have been solo singer at the Chorale, but unfortunately my prof didn't approve ; by that time I was helping retarded students, to a point that I became myself an attarded;
due to orthodontist workaround I couldn't approach any girl ( just like in Orange Mécanique, as I saw years after ) ;
for two years a nurse checked my height which hadn't changed ( 1.44 mètres ) ;
this leads to my intro to Ad&d world, with floor plans and figurines

 

[Retreater]

43 years old. Grew up in the Bible Belt during the Satanic Panic with parents who didn't understand or support my nerdom. Ridiculed and bullied by those outside of the hobby - so I really enjoy the social acceptance here online. Became a librarian with a wife who eventually found religion and forbade me to game with my friends and divorced me. Over the years became a published RPG writer. Spend too much time preparing and discussing games, playing or GMing about three a week.
Currently married to a fellow gamer, with friends all around who play games. Life's pretty good now.

 

[dragoner]

Started gaming early, moved to RPG's in 78 or 79, before that it was war games, playing the Battle of Five Armies by TSR, and Imperium by GDW before D&D and Traveller. 54 now, live in Indiana between Chicago and Indy. Am dragoner or a variation of on most places of the internet. I have a publishing co called Wild Bee, with some stuff on dtrpg, and I just opened an itch store recently: dragon3r - itch.io

 

[Shiroiken]

Not today Russia! Just kidding

Grew up with classic RPGs on the NES (Zelda, Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy), played Heroquest, and watched the D&D cartoon. My older brother wouldn't let me join his D&D group, so I made my own RPG based on what I remembered from the 1E PHB and these games. His DM interrupted one of my "sessions" with my friends, and was impressed with my passion. Not only did he immediately invite me to his game (to my brothers ire), but he planned to apprentice me to become a DM (a necessity back in the day). When he left town, he bequeathed his suitcase of rulebooks and adventures, and I completely took over.

I ran 1E until we could no longer hold out against 2E, but eventually just mashed the two together. In college I reverted to just being a player, largely playing in 2E Forgotten Realms, but also some homebrew. I dabbled with running 3E when it came out, but I was primarily running Legend of the Five Rings RPG. During this time, I continued to play in 3E and alternated GMing L5R. I only ran 4E in an attempt to convince another group to switch, but they chose Pathfinder instead. I tried to like 4E because of how much I had come to hate 3E, but it was just a different hate. We switched back to 2E until the D&D Next playtest, where we went full bore 5E. I returned to DMing, and alternated with other DMs for 5-6 years. I began a hiatus about 5-6 months ago, and of course the itch to DM has returned. I've got a mini-campaign set to run after our high level game ends (giving the DM time to prep the next campaign), and an idea for a full campaign once one of the DMs is ready for a break.

 

[Scruffy nerf herder]

This certainly should be an entertaining thread to read.

My last name is Cash. Like Johnny Cash, my uncle on my grandpa Grady's side. On both sides of the family, the Cash side and the Stinnett side (my mother's family), we're bananas about music. Everyone plays something, there are always instruments hanging on the walls in most rooms here, at my maternal grandparent's home.

Since I was a kid I've always lived with and taken care of my great aunt, and later my grandparents. We're fortunate to come from a family that decided in the past to live by the Native American principle they were taught "never sell land". So we've merely paid taxes on most of our properties, even way back since 1913, when my great grandmother bought the house I grew up in. My aunt, uncle, cousins, nieces, nephews, they all live in properties that my family has owned for a long time and completely paid off.

It has immensely helped the family with living comfortably and some of us, myself included, just pick up part time jobs here and there as our bills really aren't oppressive. We're very close knit and I've had many, many D&D sessions with family members.

Edit: oh, I see we're playing the places game too, lol. Born in Oklahoma. Grew up in California. Lived in Utah for four years. Living in Salem, Oregon now. About half Norwegian, a quarter Irish, some German, some French, a mutt like anyone else.

Happily married, twice.