GM Diary #4

What a week! Both lows and highs to talk about.

The bad news was that I spent most of the week off work sick with a cold/flu virus thingy that totally wiped my energy levels down to almost zero. I’ve had a few more of these types of illnesses in the last year or so and it worries me – perhaps it’s just age and poor lifestyle catching up with me.

The practical upshot of being off work sick was that the school club session obviously didn’t happen. I imagine there were lots of sad student faces on Tuesday but, hey – I can’t help that much, I guess. Still, I missed the game – in the sense of noticing it was missing and feeling a sense of loss – and that encourages me. Perhaps switching from someone else’s mega-dungeon to my own was a good call emotionally.

On a more positive note, despite feeling like I might have to cry off the Friday night game, I held fast and delivered a gaming session to the group. This was, actually, one of the best sessions I have run in a VERY long time and is a positive sign.

Only a week ago, I was bemoaning the likely demise of the Friday Night Gamers. What a difference a week can make. Three guys showed up and we had an excellent one-shot session playing some Castles & Crusades.

I learned a lot from the prep I’d done earlier in the week (prior to the illness) and the small number of tasks I needed to do on the Friday evening. Curious readers should keep an eye on my podcast, Roleplay Rescue, for a “GMs Journal” bonus episode that shares all the details. I’ll get it edited for release around midweek.

What did we play? I downloaded the Castles & Crusades free module, “The Wizard’s Tower & Basic Rules” which can be found on the Troll Lord Games Downloads page. I read the rules, prepped the module, used the pre-gens, and opened my doors to the players. We had a blast!

More than that, though, the players agreed that playing Castles & Crusades was a good choice. I suggested that it might be cool to play in my Fire Citadel of The Dragon Kings mega-dungeon. I also suggested that it might be even cooler if I offered some hex-crawl options for exploring the world of Mystamyr. The guys agreed and now we’ve scheduled the first open table session of “Friday Night at The Fire Citadel” – a Castles & Crusades old-style dungeon- and hex-crawl campaign.

We discussed playing with Mythras Classic Fantasy but with two players who would prefer to keep things light and were really attracted to Castles & Crusades as a game, it seemed sensible to use those rules. I fully intend that everything I write will remain compatible with Classic Fantasy because I hold out the hope that maybe, one day, I’ll get to publish the mega-dungeon for that game system alongside my other modules.

So, that leaves me prepping the mega-dungeon for two groups. I’ll need to work on the hexcrawl elements too, although I am drawing heavily on the work Rod Leary has already done and which can be found in the back of the “Moonspike Tower” adventure module.

Looks like the Friday night group is fighting on… and that makes me very happy indeed.

Game on!