A Lost Jem from the Past....

I was floundering around through some of the more creative writings in my computer files and came across this one.  It's the beginning of an article i was writing for a free press paper that a fellow mad genius ran.  It never got published due to the fact that the paper went under.  Go figure.  But, I decided to post the introduction of the article I never finished since I actually think it doesn't suck as much as what I usually post here.  Enjoy....

The Layman’s Guide to Role Playing Games.

Get ready for the adventure of a lifetime in the span of a misspent Saturday night!

So, you say that you’re getting tired of going out every Saturday night and drinking, partying, schmoozing with the opposite sex and cramming too much craziness into the evening.  Well, I got an idea that will certainly put the old’ kibosh on that!  How about an evening of getting together with a bunch of friends, sitting together at a big table in someone’s basement and breaking out the pencils, paper and 20 sided dice, for a good old session of Role Playing Game (or RPG for those not “in the know”)?

Many of you fine readers may be scratching your head, asking yourselves, “Just how is playing a nerd’s game going to benefit me?”

Well, let me ask you, isn’t there the slightest fragment of your imagination that has a yearning to be stroked?  (Insert self gratification joke here ________________.)  I believe that there’s some form of child-like exuberance locked up in everyone of us that needs to break out from time to time.  Somewhere, out in the city, there’s a stock broker wondering if the Dow Jones is going to pick up, if his portfolio could improve and if his Paladin will be able to thwart the evil sorcerer, Dothlock with his +7 Sword of Eternal Holiness.  Trust me.  There’s a little of the fantastical welling up inside of you whether you know it or not.

So allow me to give you a quick synopsis of the world of Role Playing Games.

The whole idea of RPG’s are to be able to still play games like Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, Nurse Sasha and the Bad Patient and other imaginative games without running around with toy guns, plastic bows and arrows or latex and wet-naps. 

Instead, you and other players are seated at a table with your character sheet in front of you, pencil in hand and dice at the ready.  One of the players will be the Game Master (or GM), also know as a Dungeon Master (DM), a Storyteller, a Marshal, a Head Honcho or whatever the particular RPG your playing refers to them as.  Just don’t refer to them as “the jerk-knocker who killed off my Halfling mage”.  That doesn’t go over too well in most conversations.

The GM is the one who describes what is going on in whatever imaginary world you are playing in.  When the GM prompts you to obtain a certain goal, you will role a particular sided dice (in most games it’s a 20 sided dice, pending the rules and system of that game) and the dice will tell you if you succeed or failed in your attempt.  There’s much more to it than what I’ve described, but I’m writing an article, here!  Not authoring a core rule book fer crissakes!!

Well there you go.  Have a nice day!

Zangz.