D&D Camp

[Hyena Dandy]

Since 1993, the great town of Lexington, Massachusetts has played host to a day camp for the playing of Dungeons and Dragons. Groups of campers grades 4-9 show up, and take the roles of players, with highschool students being the Duneon Masters.

I've been going to this camp since 2000, and been DMing there since '05. Ah, but one day I shall pass on my mantle to the next generation of Dungeon Masters. Truly, even I, who has been called by Mr. G who runs the camp "As much a part of D&D camp as rolling dice" shall have to pass on the role of "Awesome eccentric DM," most likely to one of my players from the last few years, who I call "Harry Potter," just as I inherited it from the great Paulor.

Sadly, this week, I am not fortunate enough to have Harry in my group. Nor do I have the players I know as "General Patton" "Hermione" "Rules Boy 1" or "Rules Boy 2"

Instead, I've got these clowns. Fortunately, my friend Sam is here to help me deal with them.

Ladies and gentlemen, our Cast of Characters.

DB: Druid Boy. Druid Boy is what is known in Dungeons and Dragons terms as a "Munchkin." The sort of player who'd rather crunch numbers than tell a story.
PG: Psion Girl. Druid Boy's sister, she does not seem to be playing Dungeons and Dragons, but rather the game of ADD&D (Attention Deficit Dungeons and Dragons.) She tends to get easily distracted by anything and everything.
FG: Fighter Girl. FG is new to this camp. She's calm, attentive, willing to follow instructions, interested in the plot, and, when its not her turn, will quietly wait for others to go. The ideal PC. If the game had five of her instead of the rest of the people, you wouldn't be seeing this. Lucky you. Unlucky me.
FB: Fighter Boy. Not his fault. He just doesn't speak much English. I believe he was raised in China. So we have to explain things a few times. He's a good guy though. No complaints other than the language barrier.
WG: Warlock Girl. What happened to you Warlock Girl? You used to be cool. Last year when I had you in my campaign, you were happy and excited. Now you're all quiet and always have this upset look. Warlock Girl, two weeks ago, was the perpetrator of the event which shall go down in D&D camp history as The Gnoll Paladin Incident, or simply... Potiongate. That incident will get its own post some other time.
HD: You can guess.
CDM: My good friend and Co-DM Sam. Sam's just an awesome guy, and he's much better at teaching D&D and maintaining authority than I am.

DAMN YOU FATE

Final Crisis is a very good comic book. So good I'm trying to tell CDM a little anecdote from it.

However... Fate has other ideas.

Fifteen times so far I have started this anecdote, and FIFTEEN FREAKING TIMES I have been interrupted. We're at snack now, two and a half hours after camp started. And I have STILL been unable to recount THREE LINES OF DIALOG AND PITHY COMMENT THEREON. It should take all of ten seconds. WHY CAN I NOT GET TEN SECONDS?

Tennis Balls

One of the campers here has, for reasons known only to himself, brought a tennis ball. Possibly he intends to play tennis with the other kid, who for some reason brought a tennis racket. Point is, he has a tennis ball. And he started pulling the fuzz off the tennis ball and dropping it on the ground.

CDM objected to this.

CDM: Stop that.
DB: *keeps going*
CDM: Seriously stop that.
DB: *keeps going*
Me: Druid Boy, stop that.
DB: *keeps going*
CDM: Somebody's going to have to pick that up.
DB: Yeah, but its not me.

No, Druid Boy. But that doesn't mean its not a PERSON. Show some consideration.

This Is Why I Can't Take My Eyes Off You Guys

I'm running an encounter, and I've made the mistake of looking down at my notes for half a second. I hear from off to the side

PG: Is it my turn yet?

I turn to say no, it is not your turn, and am surprised to discover that, while waiting for her turn, Psion Girl has decided to execute a handstand. How she intended to react if it WAS her turn I have no idea. Maybe D&D was boring, and she thought it would be improved by a new perspective?

Delayed Reaction

Dungeons and Dragons, as you know, is a game with many rules. But Rule Zero of D&D is that The DM is always right.

I explained this to my players, and we had a short discussion. Shortly after the discussion was had, and we resumed fighting some Ankhegs...

WG: Oh yeah! There IS a rule zero!

Yes, WG. We were JUST TALKING ABOUT IT FIVE MINUTES AGO

On Pipes, Relative Reality Of

I do not smoke. However, I do carry a pipe, to chew on and give me something to do absentmindedly other than sing. During camp I was chewing on mine.

PG: Is that a real pipe?
HD: Yes.
PG: How real?

The mind BOGGLES at this question. How real is the pipe? Well... Its real enough to touch. I'm chewing on it. I guess if it was just "Is that real?" then I could see the question. As in "Could you smoke it if you wanted to?" But "How Real?"

That... I can't answer that, really. Its... You know, pretty real. I guess there are things that are realer, maybe. Is real a relative quality? Should I be doing something to keep it real? Stop its reality from slipping?



The Cards Do Not Appreciate Your Insolence!

I bring my Tarot cards everywhere I go, just in case I need to make a reading. Also, they're fun to fiddle with, and make a good emergency poker set.

I made the mistake, however, of taking the cards out in the presence of my PCs. This is a mistake chiefly because... Well, for the most part they're my group. They're idiots.

So I got bombarded with questions. Some of them good (Sam wanted to know if he'd have to draw his own comic) but most of them more like

"Will I become a millionaire using the internet?"
"Will I ever grow a tail?"
"Will I ever be an anime character?"

NO! YOU WILL NOT! I DO NOT EVEN NEED TO DRAW CARDS FOR THIS.

WG, you can't become an animated character. PG, if you don't have a tail yet, you never will. And DB, you're far too stupid to become an internet millionaire.



Well, that's Day One of D&D camp. Tune in tomorrow for Day Two. Same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel.

[Nijiero]

Dude, that's an AWESOME Job... I would love to get paid to watch a bunch of kids and play DnD all day long. You have my Envy.

You also have my Pity, by the group you have described. There are few things worse in a game than the Fidgety and the Innatentive. Tell em if they don't settle down or somethin, the Tarasque will pop up out of the ground and Eat their characters alive.

Also... I SOoooo want to hear about Potiongate. You MUST fulfill the promise to tell us about it.

[Nohbody]

This is probably an old joke to many, by now, but am I the only one who read the subject line, and thought "This one time, at D&D camp..."?

[AnaKhouri]

Wow. If I tell my husband about this, he will insist that we send our son there in 10 years. Even though it's like, 10 states away from where we live.

Hell, I'd drive him up there for a week.

[dalesys]

Quoth Hyena Dandy

... Same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel.

... same Bat-Sensical Bat-Shit?

[Gravekeeper]

We did this when I was a kid. Cept we actually ran around mountain trails. It was organized every summer by one of the community centres. All your equipment was on little reference cards and you attacked by rolling your dice on the ground at at "monsters". All the volunteers would dress up their parts ( Orcs, wizards, etc ) and head up into the trails to set up their lairs and "encounters" and what not. They'd also hide gold ( plastic gold coins ) and treasure around.

A few "npcs" would set up a base camp you could come back to for healing and to buy new gear.

Was pretty cool set up, actually. Lot of fun. I got wtf pwned by a troll though. Someone else had killed him, and when that happens he's suppose to take on the roll of another troll that went berzerk over it. So he runs around the woods dressed like a troll screaming and roaring so all the kids have to run from him.

I tripped though and he caught me and rolled about 11 dice at me. ( More dice more attack and defense power you had. As you level'd up they'd give you more dice ). I only had like 4 to defend myself with so I was smotated.

[Fire_on_High]

Quoth Hyena Dandy

Warlock Girl, two weeks ago, was the perpetrator of the event which shall go down in D&D camp history as The Gnoll Paladin Incident, or simply... Potiongate. That incident will get its own post some other time.

Is it some other time yet?

[Lingering Grin]

Quoth Hyena Dandy

Delayed Reaction

Dungeons and Dragons, as you know, is a game with many rules. But Rule Zero of D&D is that The DM is always right.

I would like to Object.

The DM is MOSTLY right, but DM's also cheat and scheme. So, they can't ALWAYS be right


It's one of the fun things about the game.

[mikoyan29]

Did anyone kill a Gazebo?

I think every D&D group has a munchkin.

[Lachrymose]