GAMES! Here’s my games discovery timeline:
1983: Stared at ceiling, cried. “Peekaboo”.
1984: “Ball” and “Dog”.
1985: My first board game is Uncle Wiggily.
1988: My dad showed us how to play Dungeons and Dragons. I don’t think he wanted to; we found an adventure he’d written and submitted to TSR. Six years old, terrified of animated skeletons in coffins, I was riveted then and still am.
1990: Monopoly with my parents, a real estate appraiser and a landlord. The worst thing that ever happened. Fuck Monopoly.
1993: In between Sega Genesis and D&D sessions (by now I was the DM), my brother and his friends and I fight with nerf swords in my backyard, with ‘names’ and ‘classes’. We had, as had many kids across the world, independently invented Larping.
1995: Wrote a simple RPG on my graphing calculator. It was more of a narrative puzzle game. But in ’95 we had already defined ‘RPG’ as ‘Game with text’ so there we all were, feeling sheepish.
1996: Saw some kids at the mall playing a miniatures wargame. Enrapt, accidentally got a little geekier. Oops!
1997: Lots and lots of Quake.
1999: Wrote a WWII Quake II mod. Had fun with the AI.
2000: Finished up my first really-long-running D&D camapaign. Feels good to wrap them up sometimes.
2001: First attended Darkon. Soon after, college, and Vampire and Deadlands and Werewolf and Settlers.
2002: I run Camlann, a dark age Arthurian campaign. It is a blast.
2003: More college games, especially Icehouse, and helping write and propmake weekend-long adventures at Darkon.
2004: Eberron! One of my favorite campaigns ever.
2005: Moved to Seattle, Nerd capital of the world. Played in Court of the Golden Prince, a PBEM game of political subterfuge.
2006: Tried SCA. They sent me home with many bruises, and I resolved to find Larping in Seattle.
2007: I run Siberys Rising, a PBEM game of political intrigue.
2008: Ran a bachelor party Larp for a friend. Broke a finger blocking a sword! Do not pinky-block boffer swords.
2009: Founded Dargarth, a live action roleplaying game in Seattle, which inherits rules from Darkon.
2010: The generous Noble Council of Darkon appoint me a Lord of the Realm, for writing a larper credit tracking system. I now have peerage in two imaginary realms. I start writing Brigandine.
2011: The Barony of Dargarth is doing well in its second year. Our NPCs hype up players on facebook, and I’m on the board of the Universal Larp Association. I play a project management sim called ‘League of Legends’.