Last night saw me trying out the old in-person games player side of the screen. it was an unusual feeling to start off with but we soon got back into the game and finished off the small amount of the module “Burnt Offerings” that we needed to get into the next module.
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| +Cam Mcloughlin the GM of last nights game |
I play Coltyn, a halfling summoner who looks just like Tom Baker’s Doctor Who, just much smaller! His eidolon is a bipedal, multi coloured furry thing with distendible teeth, wicked claws and evil horns (well he was last night but I levelled and today I reconfigured him but that is a story for another post). If you are interested in the characters I wrote a blog about them in October or November last year that can be accessed by clicking this link. The link will tell you about how and why I built Coltyn and Grellyk (all the players know him as Grell) as well as a little about the adventure path.
I got very tired just before the game began last night and was being a little bit of an annoying toad before we got under way but once we reached the game I had most of a thick black coffee in me and I was ready to get down with the game. We had finished the major battle of the adventure but still had to find our way through the last little bits of the dungeon so we spent the remainder of the game clearing the last few areas out. It was in essence an open doors, check the room, beat the bad guy, get the treasure kind of thing last night. That was awesome because we were all trying to “find” our characters again.
Long story short, there were some nasty combats in the tail section of the adventure and I thought a TPK (Total Party Kill) may happen on two occasions but luckily the dice were on our side. We all had our moments though as we realised that we needed to learn to play our characters again. It took me a combat to realise all the ins and outs of using my Eidolon again but by the second battle it was fine, although I had to banish him as he was facing Shadows and I had no way to heal him (I do now after levelling) which annoyed the hell out of the other players as they thought that Grell was going to soak up all the Strength damage (not likely people!).
Then in the final battle Grell did his duty and occupied a giant hermit crabs attention until he got banished back to his plane (too much damage) while we were pinging away at the beast. I realised, as I was going for the third shot with my sling that I was a summoner. I said the word again and realised that Grell was not the only one that I could summon and so I summoned an octopus to assist us (duh!) and started using my only offensive spell (acid orb) which is a cantrip to much greater effect. We all had moments like that last night.
I have to say that during the game I realised that Coltyn is not a very agreeable character. He comes off harsh and aloof, which is how I want him but I can see how he relates to me. He is the way I see myself, although I always put on a mask to cover that side. In fact Coltyn is in a lot of ways the opposite side of me. He puts out into the world what I prefer to keep as my inside voice but in reality Coltyn is quite a soft character. I intend on doing a lot of the material that is inside the Ultimate Campaign book for Pathfinder with Coltyn so I can fully flesh him out. I read some of it today and it had me questioning a lot of things about Coltyn so I think it would be wise to flesh out his background somewhat and see what surrounds my ideas of him then. I will probably use that work then to build a review of the Ultimate Campaign book for you all to consider. We will see, although I can already see that it is going to be an interesting exercise with Coltyn!
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| Many evil notes were written in here last night |
It was funny sitting that side of the screen also because the food was right in front of me! I normally don’t get a lot of the nibblies because I am behind the screen but last night I am sure I put on a load of weight from cabana and salami and cheese! I also sat down smug with my iPad character sheet and announced I would not be using dice ONLY to find out that Coltyn was not complete so I spent a night of hybrid playing (some rolling dice) while I put his equipment on to the sheet. Ooops, next time it will be different as I levelled Coltyn and Grellyk today and put all of his equipment on the sheet…
Last night must have been a good game because we were laughing and playing well while it was absolutely bloody freezing! We all had our jackets and hoodies on, hoodies up and drawstrings tight. I jogged on the spot for much of the game to keep warm! It is the heart of winter but it is the first game that has been that cold so to have enjoyed it in those settings was a great feeling. I still wanted to know all of what was going on behind the screen and had to bite my tongue from some back seat GMing (one or two got away) but it was great.
I especially loved the absence of much preparation (as evidenced by the incomplete character sheet ;). It was great to rock on up, sit down and just get my space ready. it was cool to have a side discussion with someone while I was not the focus of the game. Totally fantastic. It is something I am going to crave as I move into doing another degree as of next week and have to look for time saving methods where I can!
So, there you go. I promised today I would write about what it had been like in game and now I have! Sorry +Cam Mcloughlin who had asked me about 10 A.M. this morning if I had blogged about it yet (around 11 hours ago now) but I got busy and then I had a nap and it really only got done as the Traveller game fell through tonight. I also promised a post about using local folklore and mythology to create games and I have done some work on it but it is not yet ready. It will be soon but I can’t promise when. I want to get it right! So until next post, keep rolling!