Once upon a time, Zorloc was our DM for a little play of Dungeons and Dragons. Our first adventure was in the Dragon Lance setting, and later I found out that we were basically playing out the plot to a book.
It was mostly fun, but I thought I could make it better. The main complaint I had about it was that there was too much background information that our characters would know, but that we didn’t know. Maybe we should have read some of the 100+ books that have been written for the Dragon Lance setting.
So, a bit later, I foolishly became a DM. I wanted to make my own world, and design it myself. I think the best improvement on the game with me as DM is that we were using the 3rd edition d20 system. Maybe more later about my feelings about my DM experience.
Currently Alecks B Cix is our DM…he should be going insane soon…but he is smart enough to be using a pre-made campaign setting of Ebberon.
So far this month I’ve read three Dragon Lance books.
“The Magic of Krynn” is a collection of short stories. Short stories are nice little morsels, and I believe that the best short stories have a little twist at the end. It was a fun collection of stories. One of the most moving was about the motives of an evil wizard.
“Dragons of Winter Night” is the second book of the adventure that we started. This series is one of the main stories of the world. I like the characters, there are I think 9 main characters. I like the way they interact and I like that none of them are perfect, each has a distinct strength and weakness and fears that they wrestle with. My main criticism of this series is that sometimes when all is bleak, something jumps in to save the day. I like it when the characters have to come up with their own solutions, not have to rely on luck time and time again. It seems that that they had few real choices, but, of the few choices….the kender made one that shocked me, and someone appears turned to evil. I am interested in how this turns out.
“The Covenant of the Forge” the forming of a Dwarven nation. A look at dwarven culture that I appreciated, tells of jealousy and infighting and mistrust amongst dwarves. One saying amused me “Kender happen.” And I really appreciated “to most Dwarves…the primary test of any situation - the primary test of anything – was its practicality” pg 251. That explains the Dwarves saying of “look to the left side of your tools.” Their tools for mining could be used as deadly weapons, and they could be ready at a moment to stop work, to defend themselves. Pgs 48-50.
It was some nice entertainment. I liked the study of Dwarven culture the best.
:-jon
I haven't played D&D in a decade -- oh goodness, make that a decade and a half! (ouch!) But I'm still totally addicted to fantasy as a genre -- you ever read the Robert Jordan Wheel of Time books? That man has been stringing me along since 1990! The new one came today from Barnes & Noble, still sitting at my house in a box while I sit here at church waiting for my last voice student to show up. I want to get home and read!
Chava