Adventures in Roleplaying

Simon's adventures in Role playing.....

I don't have a home group or regular game but am just off 7 solid days of RPGs. Here's how the first four went:

I recently ran a couple of TTRPG sessions for colleagues at my school as part of "wellness sessions" on training days. A member of staff asked me to run more so I agreed to run three sessions during three lunchtimes in the last week of school

I decided to run my Steampunk rules "The Code of Steam and Steel" and my standard introductory scenario "The Evolution of Species".

The teacher who'd ASKED for the games couldn't make Monday but said she was free from Tuesday onwards. On Monday only two people turned up. They made a Lord and a Spy. We had enough time for them to be briefed on the disappearances across London and start some investigation.

Tuesday the third teacher joined us. She made an ex-hunter with a Steam Rifle - with maximum score in Steam Rifle. The group tracked clues to sewer grate near one of the disappearances and were attacked by giant mechanised rats. With the aid of the experienced Hunter they fought them off.

Then one of the players used a double to introduce a new plot element of the bad guys' secret stock of explosives going off, creating a hole the characters could use to track them. The session ended with them finding the villain in his lair.

Wednesday, the original player who'd asked for the game was busy and couldn't make it so I was down to two players again.  We fought the climactic battle but with the Hunter as an NPC with that massive Steam Rifle the battle was a bit easy.

I enjoyed the games. The people I played with were great. But there weren't enough players, there wasn't enough interest and there isn't enough time in school. So I won't try to set up an ongoing TTRPG group.

Thursday the Birmingham Central Roleplayers moved from Ladywood - which is inconvenient to me - to Selly Oak, just down the road. So I threw some games into my bag and travelled down. Though I thought I was on time, the room was full when I got there and almost everyone was already playing their on-going games. There was another Referee new to the group looking to run D&D 5th. He had one player. I joined them and we played a two player low level D&D adventure. The Referee was excellent. He's gone from self teaching himself the game to a massively clever and experienced referee in a matter of a few months. He's running regular sessions of D&D 5th for home groups and at venues like Geek Retreat - where he's run for up to 14 players at once.

I'd forgotten just how much fun a simple low level adventure can be. There was bugger all fighting but lots of tricks and traps to solve as we were caught in an ancient tomb. "The penitent man shall pass" sort of thing. A good adventure with a superior Referee.