What are your gaming stuff mishaps?

[S'mon]

Fast forward to 2004...our apartment was broken into and all of my Dragon magazines, (from the move in '99 to the then current issue) (along with my comic book collection and a few collectible toys) were stolen.

That seems like a very unusual burglar!

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I may be tempting fate, but I've been very lucky with my gaming stuff.

I did lose my character sheet (more like half a dozen pages worth) for the first D&D character I made, only to discover a year or so later that it had fallen down between my bed and the wall! I was quite happy when I discovered that he wasn't lost after all.

The only other incidents I've had were lending my 2E D&D core rulebooks to my friend for half a session (I had to leave early and I owned the only set of rules at the table), only to get them back with the spine damaged from the books obviously opened to far.

Similarly I lent my Kingdoms of Kalamar campaign setting book to a different friend and got it back a couple of weeks later with the spine damaged.

As a result I am very, very reluctant to lend any of my RPG books to anyone.

I also have half a page torn out of my 2E PHB after my then 2 year old got to the book.

All in all I think I've been pretty damn lucky though.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Stormonu]

Less than a week after getting the Holmes set for Christmas, I misplaced the rulebook, leaving me with only the Keep On the Borderlands to puzzle out the rules for the next 3 years.

I've gone through occasional purges of gaming stuff to make room for new stuff, but I think the purge I most regret was giving my 2E collection of Werewolf & Vampire books to my sister-in-law, which ended up getting destroyed by water damage in Katrina. I especially miss the Werewolf stuff as I don't like the new version of the game much.

Also, I've somehow managed to misplace a large section of my Dragon Magazine collection which had been placed in a storage unit for a few years, including two issues that accidentally got packed into my collection back in '86 when I was moving from California.

However, the one incident that makes a friend of mine cry was that his car got stolen - with the back seat filled with over $800 worth of magic cards (this was back in '92 or so, so they'd probably be worth a whole lot more now). He got the car back (it was found abandoned on the coast), but the thieves apparently took off with the cards - they were never found, but we later suspected we know which game store they were sold to.

 

[Wik]

This thread is the gamer's equivalent of those skateboarding videos where someone gets hit in the nuts.

Okay, a few of mine:

THE PSIONICS HANDBOOK FIASCO: I bought the 2e Psionics Handbook for a Dark Sun campaign I was running. While the campaign was running, the book got lost - probably swiped at school, but who knows? So, I had to buy a new one with my meagre high school budget. This one, a friend lost, and he didn't have the cash to pay me back. So I bought the book again. And it, too, got lost a few years later, although this wasn't as bad - the same friend was moving to Ontario, and needed some books to read, so I took pity on him and gave him a few D&D books, including the psionics book as a joke. That being said, I was reluctant to ever buy it again, though I picked one up a few years back (used) to help finish off my Dark Sun collection.

THE CLOTH MAP! Way way back in around 1996 or so, I bought a bunch of stuff on boxing day, including the revised dark sun setting. I fell in love with the setting right away, partially due to the beautiful cloth map that came included - D&D collectors know exactly what I'm talking about. However, one of the other purchases I made was the Skills and Powers set, which revolutionized how D&D characters were made. And since our games at this point were all no longer than three or four sessions, a book that made character creation more interesting was a godsend. After about six months, I traded my entire Dark Sun set (which was no longer in print, because TSR cancelled the line) for a buddy's Forgotten Realms set, because this way I could use normal monsters and skills and powers.

Biggest mistake ever. I miss that map, man.

IRON HEROES: After buying the book, we played a campaign that was very well received. Really, it's one of the most fun books out there. Later, during my Savage Tide campaign, one of my players expressed interest in running a magic-light D&D campaign, and I lent him Iron Heroes. He shortly thereafter dropped out of my game, and when I asked him about the book, he'd dodge answering. He is no longer a friend of mine (though not just over the D&D book, mind you - he did some other dink moves/betrayals of the "guy code" that really ticked me off).

BYE BYE, BECMI: It was around 2002, and I was really digging 3e. It was the "last edition, because they will never need to improve on this" (ha!). Meanwhile, my little brother, who was around 14 or 15 at the time, wanted to start up a game. I gave him all of my BECMI stuff, because I felt that I had outgrown the game, that it was "too simple" (ha, again!). I also gave him most of my 2e stuff, as well. I guess he played these games, but a few months later, looking in his closet for something (I can't remember what, now), I saw all my books, under a huge pile of debris, torn and shredded. I asked him about it later, and he didn't reply... and then, a few weeks after that, all the D&D stuff mysteriously vanished. *sniff* (it's all been replaced, now, except for the Zanzer Tem dungeon set, including the best GM screen ever).

 

[Arkham]

Way back in high school I ran my first and favorite RPG, Call of Cthulhu. The particular edition, 4th, had a number of Lovecraft's poems and other stuff that weren't in the previous, or following editions. Well, I left it in the Drama room after one class, and when I returned, it had walked off. It took many, many years to find another copy of that particular edition.

 

[The Red King]

Did you disown them? I would.

Not specifically for this, but it has been 8 years since I have spoken with them.

Ok - I cannot be the only one who pictured an African rhinoceros mini in mid explosion and wondering when in the heck any campaign would need an actual exploding rhinoceros miniature. I mean how often would that come into play in any campaign?

What kind of boring RPG sessions do you have that this has never come to pass in any of them??

As a kid attending conventions in north Jersey c. 1983 or 1984, I distinctly recall wandering by the TSR tables in the dealer hall at Northeaster 1 or 2, picking up and looking at the $6 RPGA R1-4 modules, not liking the covers, and putting them back down and not buying them.

In the middle '90s, I sold my original run of Strategic Reviews, The Dragons (the oldest issue I had tracked down since starting to read Dragon with #58 was #11), my original OCE boxed set (bought directly from the Dungeon Hobby Shop) and OD&D supplements, and my original Holmes boxed set (a gift from my elementary school gifted teacher and librarian). I hadn't expected to be playing D&D again anymore at the time, and used the money to help pay off credit cards and student loan debt (so at least it was relatively well-spent). Thankfully I kept anything remotely Greyhawk-related, including my AD&D hardbacks and modules, and I've since replaced the other stuff.

Later toward the later '90s I sold my entire MtG collection, which consisted of ~13K cards from Alpha through ~The Dark (with a very heavy emphasis on Unlimited, Arabian Knights, and Antiquties) to a game store in Kansas City, who paid me half in cash and half in store credit. The store promptly went bankrupt within a month, effectively ripping me off to the score of ~$4K.

I live in tornado alley in Wichita, Kansas, so I do worry about the house's roof disappearing during a storm, which would definitely ruin many RPG books up in the attic. Hopefully that never comes to pass....

Don't you have a basement?? That where you should be storing that stuff. Preferably high up in a plastic container with a lid!

Threads like this are why I never, ever keep my gaming stuff, or comics (or books at all!) in my basement. In 25 years I've had two books (1 gaming, 1 novel) suffer water damage, and both were from my personal stupidity and leaving them outside. Both were dried out and I still have them.

I did sell 90% of my 2e stuff several years into 3e, and 90% of my 3e stuff a few years ago (and no, I didn't replace it with 4e), and I sort of regret it, but it really was a pain to move around.

I guess I don't have any horror stories.

All of my collectible stuff is in my basement. 36 year old house with no water damage, but the stuff I have bought, or printed from PDF's are in plastic containers and high off of the floor..... just in case.