How many times have you been sitting at the table of a role-playing game and thought, “Hey, this is actually pretty freaking cool. I haven’t had this much fun in quite a while”? It happens from time to time, and hopefully more often than not.
I remember the first time that happened with Dungeons & Dragons 4E. I built “The Shrine” quite hastily (pictured right) just before our weekly game, and the players had to fight their way up the three open levels to get to the boss at the top. It had stairs, beams, ledges, and tons of undead. It was great! The rules for 4E made it quite clear who could move from here to there, who could see who, and which player characters could be targeted by zombie-slinging-guts from the upper levels. It was awesome. No more arguing over the rules, or that pesky player vs. GM perception.
The pinnacle apex of that gaming “Yay!” moment came when a player wanted to knock an undead over the top ledge. The rules were right there in the book about knocking someone over the ledge, and the player actually tipping the undead miniature over the ledge was pure gold. That’s when I realized how much fun I was having with D&D 4e, and was finally thankful for the hard work of its developers.
I’m reminded of this gaming session after having read a post over at Blood, Sweat, and Dice. It reminded me of one of the reasons that I play role-playing games. Sure, I play because I get to be entertained by a story, I get to be the hero (or the bad guy), I get to smash crap with my hammer, I get to immerse myself in a fantasy world, I get to unleash creative energy, and I get to hang out with great friends, but really, I game for the simple joy of gaming. It’s those little “ah-ha!” moments, those “yay!” times when it all makes sense, and I don’t care what game it is or time of night (morning?).
I don’t have anything more to say here… not my usual wisened advice, correct opinions, or professional lessons – just this: thanks to all those “yay!” moments when it all came together, thanks to all those writers and developers for creating the games through which to experience those “yay!” moments, and thanks to D&D 4E in particular. I don’t know if I’ll ever play you again, but you’ll always be (at the least) a fond memory.
Side note: (1) The “Shrine” encounter was stolen from John Lewis (who, I’m sure, ran it better than I did), and (2) I was not being sarcastic in the last paragraph about having “wisened advice, correct opinions, or professional lessons.” Nope. Not at all.
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Chris Stevens
In Chris's opinion, the very best vices are dirt bikes, rock music, and gaming, while the very best medicine is fatherhood. If he could just learn to balance them all, he'd live forever. He's much more creative than intelligent, often wakes up belligerent, and ponders many things insignificant. Lastly, in an effort to transform his well-fed body, P90X, Roller Blades, and Food are all laughing at him. And the pain continues.
I had one or two of those moment. 3.5 this is what happened:
We had a necromancer who always travelled with an entourage of 11 zombies. The rest of the party consisted of a fighter, druid, cleric. We had to squeeze the wall to walk around the pit trap. I asked for a balance check from all the players. The fighter failed his and fell into the pit. The funny part was at the same time the necromancer ordered his minions to cross the pit. Out of 11 zombies, 9 fell into the pit, on top of the fighter, giving him more damage as they fell. It was hilarious. It was basically raining zombies on the fighter.
A-ha!!! We laughed for weeks about that moment
I can’t figure out what was funnier – the fighter getting rained on by the necromancer’s zombies, or having a party member walk around with a zombie entourage!
That is not the half of it. A few sessions later, he commanded a specter and shortly thereafter, the party killed a Hydra and he animated this one. We had to leave it behind at some point. It could not fit into some of the 5ft passageways. Classic.
Still one of the best adventures (and campaigns!) I’ve played. The only problem was you started to up the bar with those scenes. They became more and more elaborate and time consuming. I’m sure it was hard for you, as the DM, to keep raising the bar every week like you managed to do.
4e got some things right and some things wrong. Miniature combat though was something I thought they did very well.
@ Sam –
I agree whole-heartedly. Of the three aspects of RPGs (combat, role-playing, and exploring), combat was certainly 4e’s bread and butter. I’d like to say that that is the reason I kept upping the bar with those scenes (because that was the game’s strong point), but really, I was kind of lazy by neglecting the other two aspects of gaming – so I focused on elaborate combat encounters. It was awesome, and I learned from it, but I really still have some growing to do.
That’s something I’m going to be very aware of the next time I run.
Thanks buddy!
That’s so cool. Do you have a tutorial for the tower? (I can haz rhymez).
Thanks bud. I don’t have a tutorial for the Shrine (pictured in this post), but if you go to the top of the page, you’ll see a Special Projects category. In there is a sub-category for 3D Terrain. You’ll see more posts about 3D Terrain, and there’s also a video tutorial of a very basic loft. I hope that helps!
Excellent, thanks.