Optimistic Musings

I must say, things are actually going rather well for DnD this time around. Perhaps I've gushed about my optimism before, but it still somewhat amazes me. My concern in the past few weeks about my attitude has been that I've head months and months of buffers between each scenario and I basically had the first two done before we even set down to play in The Known World, so I thought perhaps my relaxed, non-aggressive/non-insane DM attitude was the result of extreme preparation and not having to deal with the whole deadline crunch thing I've dealt with in the past.

Evidently that's not the case. I have half the Kusseth scenario finished and it is quickly inching towards being three-fourths done. I'm definitely on the way to getting it done, but our next session is the twenty-second and that's slightly less than two weeks away and I have Borderlands and a working DS chock full of entertaining little time wasters. The strange thing is that I feel no urge to procrastinate on the scenario, I want to get it done. I want to inject my character Traith from the story I am writing into the PC's story. I want to show the guys how neat Kusseth City is. I want to reach the final conclusion of the Spineplate vignette and possibly open up the door for Nakmander and the Hell scenario. I am focused on it and not surfing the web and watching TV to kill time I should be spending finishing it up. Its a strange sensation to be this productive and committed to something as silly as DnD.

I always rail against being the DM, but to be honest I feel the title fitting pretty well on my shoulders this time around. I'm a world builder, I build shit or take it apart. I like making characters and plugging in little bits and pieces of the rules to see how things fit. I think if I were a true cheater (and not one who does so for shits and giggle) I might be a true Munchkin, the kind that manipulates the system to "win" and be better than everyone else.

DMing is just pulling apart stuff you've read or thought of in the past, swirling it around between your ears and kind of putting your own twist on it to make it into what you envision. Its character building, but on a larger scale with a less constricting ruleset. Eric's character background details Xain Mac Fumos' exploits and how his mom was a thief or bard or slave or something along those lines and how he learned his trade at the hands of an Abraxen, my "character background" constitutes ten thousand years of history detailing the rise and fall of nations, races, and wars that changed the face of a planet, plus unscheduled blogging about the place.

Thinking of it that way makes it really easy to be into the DM role and not care so much about never really playing a character.

Music: Arioch - Hawkwind