What's in the cards...

So, last night, after overhearing some discussion on the matter here at work, I went into my closet and dug out my old L5R CCG boxes. After dusting off the old decks, and rebuilding my Crab Honor-Runner, I sat at the kitchen table and taught my wife how to play. She had played Magic: The Gathering before, so the idea behind a CCG wasn’t anything new to her. It was a matter of mechanics, and me remembering how to play. I was surprised at how much I retained after the initial start up. In the end, with a little coaching from me on how certain cards worked, she won. Not surprising. She was playing one of my Dragon decks, which had been tested and found to be well-constructed years ago, whereas my Crab deck was hastily thrown back together. Not to mention some bad luck on the draws for me. But still, it was fun, and I look forward to us playing more, and eventually getting back into the game with it’s current set (my decks are about five years out of date).

The first story arc of my D&D game was completed this past weekend. The party did well. In fact, I think I under-challenged them. But I kept their interest, and the story was fun and relatively fast-paced. I have an idea where I want to go next with it, so I will probably spend most of the day Saturday writing the next part of the adventure. This is a new tact for me. I have no clear plot in mind. I am writing each session individually, based on the actions and outcomes of the last session. It’s working well, more or less. But sometimes I have hard time coming up with what I want to happen without an over-arcing plot. Still, I have managed four sessions without any real hiccups, so no worries I guess.

Of course, it all hinges on whether I can keep myself out of World of Warcraft for long enough to actually work on my D&D game. Lately I have become obsessed with that game to a certain extent. My highest character is 59 right now, and with the new expansion coming next month, I really want to get to 70 before it hits. 11 levels doesn’t seem like much, unless you factor in the fact that I am almost exclusively a solo player. I should really start trying to team up more.

NaNoWriMo is coming soon. For those who don’t know, November is National Novel Writing Month. The idea is to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. I’ve tried twice before and failed. But, I will be trying again. Last year I tried writing a Mack Bolan novel. This year, I’m probably going to stick with original fantasy. Not sure what it’s going to be yet, but I have a couple of weeks to work out a concept.

Being Green is my Orc RPG, and it’s coming along nicely. I have the basic core rules laid out, a smattering of flavor text, and am preparing to detail Combat and Experience. The Experience part is going to be unique. Well, unique for me. Apparently the idea has been used in a couple of other games. But my take will be perfect for Orcs.