Hard to believe its been over two years since I posted last. A lot has changed, so let me quickly catch you up. When last I posted, my gaming entertainment mainly focused around EVE Online (EVE) and World of Warcraft (WoW), but I stopped playing EVE a few months after my last post and haven’t logged back in. Sadly, I’ve felt no draw to play again and may never. There are many reasons, but for the brevity of this post I’ll save it for discussion another day. Even more sadly, I’m not even playing WoW. I was tremendously disappointed with the BFA expansion, and find little of interest in the SL expansion. Coupled with a general sense of disappointment in Blizzard this point marks the first time in 16 years I’m not playing an MMORPG at all, let alone the MMO I’ve been playing since 2005.
But that’s not what I want to focus on. Where one door closes, another often opens. And in my case, the door that opened is Dungeons & Dragons (D&D)! I grew up playing D&D; played it heavily through High School when family and work responsibilities crowded it out. I didn’t play again until 2015, but then only for a few months. It’s hard to believe it now, but there were much fewer online play opportunities just those few years ago and since I was finding it quite difficult to enjoy playing in often crowded and extremely noisy gaming stores, I wasn’t sure I’d actually play again.
Thankfully, through the explosion of recent online play opportunities I’ve found my way back to D&D. I actually was involved with an in-person group in December, but after the DM contracted COVID-19 the group fell apart, as one would expect. The DM recovered and is well, by the way. But that experience reinforced for me the lesson that while I’ve been careful, I can’t necessarily count on everyone else. After some sleuthing about online looking at different groups, I now find myself waiting for my new campaign to start up. Curse of Strahd, no less. What a campaign to welcome me back into the fold!
For those unfamiliar, Curse of Strahd is the D&D 5th Edition reboot of the wildly famous Ravenloft module from 1st Edition D&D, which I played and greatly enjoyed when it was originally released. Needless to say, I’m looking forward to rubbing shoulders with Count Strahd von Zarovich again.
I’ve also discovered Critical Role. I’m hooked. I’m enthralled. Love the show. I started watching at episode 116 of the second campaign, but found I was missing a lot of context and recently decided I needed to watch from the beginning of the current campaign. I’m watching episode 33 right now, as I type this as a matter of fact, so I have a lot of catching up to do and will be doing so for quite a while to come I’m sure.
But where’s the gaming, right? D&D is cool and all, but that’s not “real gaming”, right? Well, I’m playing remarkably little “real gaming”. I’ve been playing World of Warships (WoWS) the past few months, though I’m currently taking a break. And I’ve played a few others, on and off. Baldurs Gate 3, being one of those. But I’ve lost most of my faith in the gaming industry. With few exceptions, it seems that every new game is an over-priced, bug ridden mess that I’m happy I didn’t play.
And lastly, seemingly like everyone else in the world, I completed the initial phase of a months long home remodel last fall. By last November I was more than ready for a remodel break. We had planned more projects for this summer, but I don’t honestly think I have it in me. I don’t mind painting the shed, house shutters, building another set of shelves in the garage, and putting in a bit more yard drainage. But I don’t think I’m ready to build an enclosed back deck, let alone deal with contractors to extend the back of the house. I want 2021 to be a bit more chill, with a lot more gaming. Real, or otherwise.
Ciao for now! Lets see if I keep up with the blog better than I have, up to now.
Adventures of a Phearal Drood 