Unwinnable

There’s a scene in the role-playing documentary The Dungeon Masters where one of the subjects, Scott, is sorting and arranging his hundreds of dice. As Scott’s doing this, he’s talking about how the dice need to be touched so that they’ll gain some of your personal vibrations and roll well; then he starts to talk about the die that roll poorly. Those die are separated from the rest, dipped in water and put in the freezer. Once the offending die is frozen, all of the other dice are lined up and the frozen die is placed in the middle so the other die can “see” it. Scott then smashes the frozen die with a hammer as a lesson to the rest of his dice. “This is what happens when you roll poorly!” he shouts at the rows of unshattered dice. (more…)

In a world where geek culture is becoming ever more pervasive, where videogames sell millions of copies and comic books are adapted into blockbuster movies, there still remains one hobby that rides along the edges. There is still one hobby that is shunned by the mainstream. Join me now as we explore the world of tabletop role-playing games. Join me, the TABLETOP WIZARD! (more…)

In a world where geek culture is becoming ever more pervasive, where videogames sell millions of copies and comic books are adapted into blockbuster movies, there still remains one hobby that rides along the edges. There is still one hobby that is shunned by the mainstream. Join me now as we explore the world of tabletop role-playing games. Join me, the TABLETOP WIZARD! (more…)

In a world where geek culture is becoming ever more pervasive, where videogames sell millions of copies and comic books are adapted into blockbuster movies, there still remains one hobby that rides along the edges. There is still one hobby that is shunned by the mainstream. Join me now as we explore the world of tabletop role-playing games. Join me, the TABLETOP WIZARD! (more…)

In a world where geek culture is becoming ever more pervasive, where videogames sell millions of copies and comic books are adapted into blockbuster movies, there still remains one hobby that rides along the edges. There is still one hobby that is shunned by the mainstream. Join me now as we explore the world of tabletop role-playing games. Join me, the TABLETOP WIZARD! (more…)

In a world where geek culture is becoming ever more pervasive, where videogames sell millions of copies and comic books are adapted into blockbuster movies, there still remains one hobby that rides along the edges. There is still one hobby that is shunned by the mainstream. Join me now as we explore the world of tabletop role-playing games. Join me, the TABLETOP WIZARD! (more…)

In a world where geek culture is becoming ever more pervasive, where videogames sell millions of copies and comic books are adapted into blockbuster movies, there still remains one hobby that rides along the edges. There is still one hobby that is shunned by the mainstream. Join me now as we explore the world of tabletop role-playing games. Join me, the TABLETOP WIZARD!

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Something I’ve always wanted to try: Round up a bunch of adults who have never played Dungeons & Dragons and run them through a full-on fantasy role-playing D&D campaign. At this point, I’m kind of a role-playing evangelist. To me, the idea of role-playing is not a nerdy thing. It’s a creative and artistic pursuit that blends improv, strategic thinking, creative writing, visual art, problem solving and social collaboration. It’s uniquely social, it’s non-competitive and it relies on actual human face-to-face communication. Even the Dungeon Master needs to be a team player and productive member of the group, because if his intention was to just kill his friends each week, his friends would stop showing up. (more…)