Memories of the Reckless One

Today I decided to check out my old City of Heroes account since its a free weekend and as I pound the crap out of baddies with my scrapper, R. Reckless, trying to remember what does what I got to thinking about the things I used to do before I had WoW and what I miss about them. I've been a fan of role playing games since I first got into gaming and for a long time my experience was limited to turn based console RPGs from japan and they still hold the top spot in my heart but they are not alone in my nerd love. Before my friends ever talked me into playing an MMO in college I was first nudged into table top role playing. I think I probably miss that the most.

WoW is great for the friends I have made since I started playing but there is something I miss about the openess of the story and the way the players affect the ever changing story. There is cannon and rules of course but you dont have to stick to them and I liked that. My first table top experience was with Vampire and a good friend of mine really thought I would like trying it out. He was right of course and I fell in love with it all the minute I picked up the dice and rolled my first ever vampire with all her mind controlling glory and though I struggled with being put in a leadership position once i got used to having to think how my character would respond rather than how I would I really got into it all.

From there I got with more friends that liked to RP the superhero vision from Wihite Wolf called Abberant and part of me probably loved that more than Vampire. Abberant was very unforgiving as basically everybody you come in contact with is just like you, a super human freak of nature with some very flawed thoughts that usually lead to a whoever strikes first lives atmosphere to most of our outings. For example I happened to role a character that was very selfless the first time I played and as bad ass as she was we got in a fight and our leader was on the verge of being crushed. Now this guy could teleport to safety and all us playing knew this but he never told our ingame selves that little fact and as such I had to have my person react the way she would without knowing. One roll of the dice later he teleports and me and the big guy I chose to fight throwing super charged haymakers and him hitting me first. I dropped like a brick and they left me for dead. Its the split second fights like that that I loved about that game.

I tried D&D after that surprisingly and though I love my hunter without a doubt, I was all about the rogues in that game. I think i only played another class once the whole time I played. From there I started going to conventions and even tried my hand at LARPing (yes I did live action before don't judge me) and eventually got talked into playing City of Heroes for a year because of how much I loved playing Abberant.

I love and miss my table top games and the sound of the dice as we drank beer and laughed at critical failure rolls. You haven't truly geeked out till you have a medusa critically fail 2 rolls straight and end up cutting off a snake and having another bite her, or have an orge fail and drop the tree he is trying to crush you with and smash his buddy into ogre paste, or my personal favorite have a vampire freak himself out on a resist nightmare roll and piss himself kicking out the back door of an SUV before running 2 miles away shreeking like a little girl. That last one was know for staking a baby outside his club might I add.

I miss all this and though I am happy to a point it brough me to my warcraft bliss I truly long for the days of critical fails and "your alignment wouldn't do that" arguements as we wait for pizza. One day i want that back but until then I will settle for lore chatter in guild and wondering what Blizzard will give me next to lust after.