I learned a very cool thing about my new coworkers, yesterday.

I was watching over one coworker’s shoulder, while she instant messengered another coworker. I saw the guy she was talking to had a 20-sided die as his IM icon image. (I noted that the die was showing 11 instead of a natural 20.)

“Oh, he’s a gamer,” I said.

“Yeah,” she said, “one of many around here.”

That statement intrigued me. There were many other gamers at this company? Cool. Now how can I find out who without seeming like a nerd asking around? We went on with our work.

Later, when back at my own desk, I added the gamer coworker as a contact in my IM list. I then sent him a message to say, “Hi.”

During our brief introduction, I asked him, “Why is your d20 icon on 11 instead of natural 20?”

“My birthday is on the 11th,” was his answer. “No one else has ever asked that question before.”

“Well,” I wrote, “I’m a gamer, too. So I notice that kind of thing.”

“Cool. Tom, Doug, and I play D&D with some other folks on Monday nights,” he wrote.

A little while later, again, the original coworker (whose shoulder I had been looking over) was in my office. I asked her if Doug was at our lunch gathering on my first day.

“Yes,” she said, “he was sitting beside me.” She apparently figured out why I asked, because she added, “Those guys play D&D together. And my husband plays, too, but with a different group.”

Amazing. I’ve joined a company full of gamers — and the company has nothing to do with the gaming industry. How freakin’ cool is that?

Bullgrit

Dragon magazine was the monthly magazine for Dungeons & Dragons. It was published from 1976 to this month 2007 — the last paper issue was #359, September 2007. Its content is now only published online, but that’s not really a magazine to me.

I had a subscription to Dragon from the early 80s to the early 90s, and I picked up individual later issues, off the newsstand, here and there through the years. Some years I’d only pick up one or two issues, but since somewhere around 2003, I’d been buying 3-6 each year. The September 1983 issue (25 years ago this month) had the only readership survey I ever saw in Dragon. (There may have been others, but I never saw them.)

I had filled out the survey, but I never sent it in. Of the 20 questions, I didn’t answer #15 “How do you rate DRAGON Magazine overall compared with other gaming magazines?” and #20 “What other magazines do you read?” I didn’t read any other magazines at the time, gaming or other.

Click the image to see the survey near full size. (You can also see my answers from 1983.)

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

My primary set of dice, blue with white numbers, has done me well for a few years. Except for the twenty-sided die — the main, most-used die of the set. The d20 has let me down many times. In fact, it’s become a bit of a joke among my gaming group.

That blue d20 always let me down in the most important, or dramatic, or most improbable ways. It’s especially disappointing when it lets me down in dramatic ways. Like when my paladin charged the evil wizard at the start of a combat, and the die came up a natural 1. Last game session, my war-priest used enlarge person on himself to pull out the “big guns” because we badly needed heavy damage in the fight. To hit and smash the enemy, I only needed to roll a 7 or better on the d20. What did it give me? 6, 5, 5, and then the fight was over.

I wanted to destroy this cursed die, so I set up an execution for it.

The set lined up to witness the punishment.

The convicted is covered, the hammer rises.

The sentence is carried out. Eyes are cast down.

The remainder of the set will be added to my big bag o’ dice to be used when I need them. I’ve bought a new set to be my main.

Like most gamers, I have a bunch of dice — collected over nearly 30 years of gaming. But unlike many gamers, I don’t bring them all to a game session. I just bring one set. I’ve retired many dice, but this is the first time one has driven me to carry out capital punishment. But that d20 was really damned infuriating.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

I’ve mentioned how I’m looking forward to playing D&D as a Player (vice as DM) in our group’s current round-robyn-DMing campaign. But as has happened to me so many times over the many years, I’m finding frustration in this excitement.

Our group agreed to try this round-robyn style several weeks ago, and I was to be the first DM of the campaign. I had two adventures ready, each of which I figured would take us two game sessions to run through. After these four game sessions, I would get to play a character while one of the other guys DMed an adventure. So I made my character (based on a cool miniature figure I found).

The first adventure ended up taking 3 weeks to complete (we skipped D&D one of those weeks), and the current adventure will, hopefully, finish up next week, the fourth game session in it. So I’ve had this character created, and I’ve been looking forward to playing it for 7 weeks. Most D&D Players create their characters the week of, or maybe the week before the day they start playing it. And not only that, but as most Players are always Players (as most DMs tend to most always DM), they don’t feel that long delay between making a character and playing the character.

Maybe it’s my own fault for making the character immediately rather than just ignoring any ideas until the day of play comes. The other guys in my game group made their characters at the same time I made mine, but they got to immediately (within a week) play theirs. I’m waiting at least 7 weeks before I get to play mine. It kind of gets frustrating, this long delayed gratification. It’s like telling a bunch of 7-year-olds they will get some new toys, then while the others start playing with theirs, one kid has to wait several weeks.

It can break a boy’s spirit.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com