This is week two of answering questions for RPGaDay. I’m a rebel and post them once a week.
7. Smartest RPG you’ve ever played?
This is an odd question. I’m not really sure what constitutes smart in this context. I suppose it has to be Dungeons & Dragons the original edition right? It smacked a load of rules and procedures together from different games, inventing a bunch of new ones, and invented a new hobby. Pretty smart.
8. Favourite Character?
I have played many, but one that sticks out in my mind was from many years ago. My friend Sam was trying out the Pathfinder rules. Me and my partner rolled up characters for a short campaign. I had been watching all the classic folk horror films at the time, so I rolled up an inquisitor called Matthew Hopkinson, Witchfinder General. My partner, totally independent from myself, created a witch character. The dynamic between us was pure comedic gold. I love playing religious zealots, probably because I am pretty agnostic in real life.
Whilst playing I became incredibly paranoid Sam was setting up an elaborate ruse to troll me somehow. I ended up manacling the witch in the bottom of a dungeon, convinced she was turning against me. Later, she convinced a giant millipede to attack me to free her. Pure chaos. PvP can work sometimes.
9. Favourite Dice?
My brother and his partner bought this stone d20 for me for my birthday last year. I don’t usually splash out on things like this. They saw me checking it out at a stall during the UK Games Expo. I didn’t buy it, so they snuck around, bought it, and surprised me with it later on. A very lovely gift, and it rolls beautifully.
10. Favourite Tie-in fiction?
The gaming related tie in fiction I’ve liked the best are some of the Warhammer Old World novels, particularly Necromancer by Jonathan Green, and the Kim Newman Genevieve novels. Kim Newman is a Hammer Horror aficionado and creator of Anno Dracula, so when writes fantasy vampire schlock, I’m all in. Vampire Counts were my Warhammer Fantasy Battles army for 6th edition, so these books were made for me. The great thing about the Black Library are they are one of the last bastions of Pulp Fiction. Sword and Sorcery, Heroic Fantasy, Grimdark military sci-fi, they publish it all, and that is a great thing.
11. Weirdest Game you’ve played?
If something is trying to be weird, it usually doesn’t achieve it. There are exceptions of course. The weirdest video game I’ve ever played was Deadly Premonition, with all the janky controls and surreal, nonexistent story, it was a very strange experience. I have had some weird times playing games; one time, during a game of Articulate, someone got so salty they threw a corkscrew at their husband.
12. Old game that you still play?
I play an old edition of D&D. I guess that counts. I also regularly play the Dune board game which was published in 1979, so quiet old. I have semi-regular games of Diplomacy with a group of friends, its from 1959. Diplomacy is one of those games that can only really be played a few times a year, it consumes a lot of focus and is so salty it runs the risk of ruining friendships. There is a lot of bare faced lying and backstabbing. It hurts to be made a patsy.
13. Most memorable Character demise?
My character Rhovar dying in the dungeons of the wind god temple was pretty memorable. Apparently he saved the rest of the party a terrible fate by rushing into a room with some kind of trap. He was already doomed though, after breathing in yellow mold. We were all being perused by a black pudding at the time, trapped and with no hope of escape. Pretty brutal.
Read about it here:
THE PIT sessions, (Rhovars death during 46):
Dreadlord Games 