Describe your current game...

[Matt James]

Tell us what games you are currently playing.

[BrianLiberge]

We're currently playing 4th edition, D&D. This campaign has been going on since shortly after 4e came out, and we're nearing level 18. We play about 2 to 3 times a month.

I'm lucky in that I've kept a number of players for the last few years, in the same home-brewed world. We did the first 3 campaigns with 3.5. In book 1 the players were typical adventurers, dungeon diving and taking on quests. Book 2 featured the second half of the continent and a party that leaned closer to evil. Each of those ended near level 20. Then in book 3 we switched back and forth between the two as each party was stuck on a different side of a war of the gods. The players had a great deal of fun in epic levels, and fighting their own characters.

Once we knew enough about 4e, that we were confident we wanted to try it, I approved pretty much every 3rd party product and broken idea so that the players were doing dynamic, should be impossible stuff and I could throw pretty much anything at them. It made for a crazy end to 3rd edition.

Book 4, and the first campaign in 4e, fast forwarded the timeline 1500 years, to explain a lot of the changes. I tried to make sure that the choices the players made in the earlier campaigns changed the world in real ways, that made sense. This campaign has been allot about free exploration and discovering what has happened during that time. Some their earlier actions were quite rash and destructive. As they've learned how much their actions shaped things they've become more cautious, knowing once this is over, they're back at level 1.

[Matt James]

That's sounds pretty fun, Brian. What do you have them doing at level 18?

[Darth Jerod]

Just started a new 4e campaign last month at this cool game store in the burbs of Chicago. Currently have 6 players ranging in age from 12 to 30+ not counting the good old DM.

I just ran them through a modified Kobold Hall adventure from the DMG and started them on Slaying Stone all in prep for some home brewed designs. It is tough with the 12 year old who I am told by the store owner he has ADD but he has been playing Encounters for a few months and so wanted to play my campaign.

The greatest kid, he is always asking questions and is so excited that I know he annoys the older guys. I just have to say "HEY, We were all young once and excited about D&D" He is a challenge for me, he is like all my difficult players throughout my long years as a DM all rolled into one. He is so into "encounters" mode that when I start roleplaying bits he is like "lets get to the next fight" LOL! Ah youth.

They all are enjoying the game, being an Encounters DM the players see I have a wider range in the weekend game.

I have started a Dragon theme going in the game, the players have heard of the big villain they will meet soon. I have some great backgrounds from most of the players, and I have started working them into the campaign. One of the players is an Elf Cleric who was raised for a time by Druids and secretly wishes he was one, that will prove fun I think.

I am running it in Nentier Vale/Nerath and the Pyromancer Mage is a keeper of the eternal flame and wants to venture to see the flame imperishable and then spread the power he feels will come from it into something good.

I am totally out of my comfort zone running games for people I have never gamed with, since I have run for the same group for roughly 18+ years.

It is a refresher!

[Diffan]

Currently I'm DM'ing a v3.5 game for 4 PCs and an NPC in the Moonsea region (circa 1372 DR). The campaign is called Heroes of the Moonsea and I'm basically taking them through 3 published adventures. The first started in the town of Glister where a fierce disease was rampaging the village and silver mines that are close by. (this adventure, called The Burning Plague, was taken from the Original Adventures on the WotC site). This disease is perpetrated by an Orc cleric of Gruumsh hellls-bent on bring the town to it's knees and weakening it's defenses for the soon to come Orc Invasion (see Sons of Gruumsh adventure). The PCs, however, thwarted his plans and ended the vile disease.

They then were protecting a small caravan from Glister to Melvaunt. Unknown to all but 1 PC, this caravan was run by Zhents who also picked up illegal drugs for the Church of Loviatar. This caravan was confronted by a small band of Knights of the North in which the PCs could either defend the caravan or attack the unknown Zhents. The PCs decided to turn on their employers and finished off the Zhent threat. Finding out they were working for the Zhentarim, the PCs wanted pay-back so they assaulted a small keep where the drugs were being concocted. The assault was a success with no PC fatalities (much to my dismay) and rendezvous with the Knights in the Crows Nest of Melvaunt.

There, the PCs will get the chance to play out the Devil's Den (or is it Tavern) mini adventure in Melvaunt to get them to 4th level and from there, take on the Sons of Gruumsh adventure.

After that, I plan on putting them through the Pools of Radiance: Ruin of Myth Drannor adventure and bring them in line to 10th/11th level. From there, it's a short hop to the Underdark to finished up the City of the Spider Queen adventure which apparently is extreamly long.

[BrianLiberge]

Well around level 14, I granted each of my main players a second PC. We're all busy adults, and sometimes we don't get more than three players to the game table (and at least one time, 2). This gave them the ability to adjust the roles present each session, as well as play new content. This has compounded many goals and stories as I essentially have 12 main characters, with some naturally becoming more support and less protagonists as sessions progress. Recent loss of their airship (and more stable schedules) has caused the party to split in two teams.

The current main goals are:
1. Help the god Guinness rise from obscure demi-god status to a place of influence.
2. Find out why Lloth is out to get them and possibly counter
3. Find out why Tiamat is out to get them and possibly counter
4. Assist The Doctor (a PC) in finding his mystical blue box before those who have it alter realty
5. Keep a stable nation in Green Haven (their starting area)

Those are the biggest goals. There's also allot of smaller goals, personal goals, and personal secret goals, and some of them conflict. I expect either an official split of the group or a big PC vs PC fight before level 21, as some are just too opposed. In the lower levels it could be ignored, but now, theres a sense of time running out for some of them. Then, we should have less, clearer goals.

Oh, and last week I ended the session by handing a player a note (a physical note that also got delivered IC). It got passed around the table and the third players read it out loud in confusing. The note said "Pazuzu Pazuzu Pazuzu". So that should be fun.

[Sanishiver]

I'm running a 3E Realms game for my lovely girlfriend: she's new to D&D and a delight to DM for. One of the first questions she posed while I described the game to her was, "Can you overthrow the DM?"

I'm playing in a 3E Realms game, set in the Moonsea region. We're bouncing between cities, trying to stay one step ahead of the authorities of each city state where we've worn out our welcome, while aiding the Harpers to pursue Orcus-worshiping slavers, makers of cursed magic items and devious mages (perhaps priests?) who've created tattoos that subsume one' will.

[Edit: both games are 3.5]

[Matt James]

All 3e or is it 3.5?

[pfloyd]

My old Saturday gaming group (which includes my wife, an old college friend, and old friend who was my Best Man all those years ago, and another gaming buddy) has reformed, and we play once, maybe twice a month. I'm currently running 4e (this is my second time playing 4e ever! The first time was over Christmas 2009 at a double-shot LFR game at Game Parlor Chantilly), using Keep on the Shadowfell and that series as the launch point. The only deviation we did was that the stats were rolled (4d6, drop lowest), so the scores are a little on the high side. Plus, an unintentional deviation was with the Combat Cards program I was using, as I was using the imported data from the DDI Compendium rather than the module as-written, so some of the attack and damage ratings were a little higher.

I'm working on another campaign, using an original adventure (inspired by two quests in Titan Quest), leading into the Saltmarsh area (from U1-U3 and 3.5e DMG2), followed by UK2-UK3 conversions. I think that could work out well.

[Amazing Triangle]

I am currently running a 4e game we started at level 5 and have just rolled into level 11. It's a group of well seasoned players so all them opted to not play something they have played before. Which meant no defenders.
As for story, they currently are trying to visit all the ancient libraries to gain all enough information about the ancient war machine. They know the machine was sent to the elemental chaos from the owner, just don't know where. They also know that the machine was able to kill deities. They have also found that the war machine is being hunted by others. The party currently controls one library and knows where two others are. One is run by a Volcanic Dragon who they helped and the other is in the mountains where they are currently headed. They have crossed the desert, now they have to figure out how to cross the ocean to get to their goal. While camped out side the monstrous city of Thran.