Drums ... drums in the deep.

Madoc creating a Garden Gnome.

Dungeons and Dragons is back in my life.

D&D was a huge part of my life between 3rd grade through high school. My reading, vocabulary, math skills, creativity were all improved while playing a deep and enjoyable game.

My first campaign began when I was eight or nine, playing with my Dad and my brothers.  I named my characters after characters in Watership down.  Blackovar the fighter was killed by the first swing of the first orc in the first room of the first dungeon he ever experienced. Blackovar's son, Campion,  lived on to conquer many an adventure and is now ruling from a floating castle in the sky.

My brothers aged and moved on.  For a couple of years I had no "group" so I pretty much just rolled up characters and read Dragon magazine. If only the internet existed back then as it does now.  Finally, I was able to get my cousins playing and through high school I played with them and some school friends. When I went off to college, partially for reasons of time, partially for reasons of social stigma, and partially because I made a conscious decision to stop "playing" and start trying to really be part of the adventurer (I dive, I'm a fire fighter and EMT) I quit playing. Video games also served to usurp any time I might devote to paper and pencil games.

When did I hear the beat of the drums again? A few weeks ago my oldest child, 7 years old, brought it up. He read about it, social stigma and all, in Diary of a Whimpy Kid.  In the book they refer to a game of "Magic and Monsters".  Greg Hefley, the main character in the book, enjoys the game until his mother starts playing and ruins the game by playing his in game character's mom. I said that that sounded like Dungeons & Dragons and  relayed some of my stories of the game. His favorite was when I was trying to get my younger cousins playing. "You see an orc charging at you.", cousin replies, "I eat it." I had tried to start my cousin's too early. In any case my kids, both of them, 5 and 7 at the time, where intrigued. I dug out musty boxes of AD&D 1st Edition books. What I could not find I ordered from eBay.

We have begun playing. We've had two sit down sessions, as well as many total verbal sessions while driving. The ideas these little guys have are awesome. The older one, MacQuaid, came up with the idea of using dragon scales to make protective shields, the five year old is remembering that they saw rope  in an earlier room, and using that to try to pull NPCs from burning oil or set traps. Mind you that oil is burning because MacQuaid's trap caught both the party and the troll. He reads though the Monster Manuals and Bestiaries incessantly and remembered reading that they were susceptible to flame.

The battles are creative and engaging and their imaginations are awesome. Madoc (The now six year old) chooses to be a Garden Gnome (Ala 15 cm tall Gnomes from the popular "Gnome" book of the 70's ... hey, why not!), and MacQuaid is on an epic quest to destroy the queen Chromatic dragon Tiamat.

How lucky can I be? For the next 10 years I have live in players, and two DM's. Here, I will document some of this experience.

Let the quests begin!