Tag Archives: Dungeons & Dragons

DnD Reflection

The allure of Dungeons and Dragons began all the way back at the beginning of the semester when we first designed characters. I decided to build a big red Dragonborn paladin of
Bahamut. Personally, I was most excited about this game because I play Pathfind on a regular basis and was tangentially familiar with the DnD system already. Everything revolves around your stats which come from the point buy system. I have never used it before as instead I have always rolled three d6s and totaled them together. From there we divided up into two adventuring parties based on our classes. My group had a paladin, rogue, and sorcerer who were there for two session and then a fighter and cleric who swapped out between them. We were hired by a dwarven merchant to protect his caravan from dangers in the forest.

Session one began with us pulling up to a crossroads with two dead horses in the road. On high alert now, we spread out to look for the source of danger. The rogue and the sorcerer found the trouble hiding in a few bushes off to the side of the forest while I carefully examined a cliff face for any danger. The goblins opened fire on us with their short bows, but being goblins missed nearly every attack against us. It was here the first proper bit of roleplaying immerged with a friendly rivalry developing between myself and the rogue. It was very similar to the back and forth between Legolass and Gimili. The challenge was to prove who was the best fighter between us. Little did we realize, the sorcerer would turn out to be just as deadly with her cross bow as I was with my hammer or the rogue was with her knives.

We made quick work of the goblins thanks to a critical hit and slashing blades until only one remained. As the paladin and moral compass of the group, I elected to offer the goblin its life and eternal redemption in the eyes of Bahamut in exchange for information on where the goblin base of operation. This goblin turned out to be named Maglub and became my squire, torchbearer, and student. I carried them in like Luke carried Yoda in the swamps of Dagobah. Maglub guided us through the forest and past a few traps that may have spelled out doom. The journey presented itself as great opportunity for roleplay as the other characters joked about how devote in my faith to the Great Winging One. Sesson one wrapped up with the rogue and sorcerer sneaking ahead to knockout and drown a pair of goblin senties while I taught Maglub about the tenants of Bahamut.

Session two began right where we left off, in front of the goblin lair. It was pitch black inside and only our sorcerer could see. She and the rogue lead a scouting party inside before they stumbled upon several wolves that were chained to a rock. They were by far the most dangerous threat to our group because they could actually deal damage to us. One almost killed me, but thanks to my divine healing, I pulled through. There was also a tied up captive in this chamber who shadowed us for the rest of the trip so we could keep them safe. Then came what I think was the most enjoyable part of the adventure: the trash shoot. The shoot rose 30 feet up into the cave to presumable the boss room. We thought it would be good idea for someone to do some recon so we could figure out what we were up against. Turns out that a bugbear was running this goblin gang. Once the rogue was about half way up the shaft, the bugbear decided that he would releave himself into the shoot. I was at the bottom to catch the rogue if she fell, but I think Bahamut smiled on me because I remained dry. The rogue was not so lucky.

We decided it would be better to go through the cave normally as our shortcut was now wet. This is when our sorcerer became a dead eye. She shot three goblins before they even knew she was there. The rogue took care of the other two within second and we were clear to approach the boss’s lair. We stormed in weapons drawn. I let loose my massive fire breath, the rogue threw a dagger, and the sorcerer shot some bolts into the fray. We left without a scratch on us. Victorious. The hardest part about DnD for me was getting the rules mixed up with Pathfinder. They are just similar enough for me to feel confident in a ruling and be wrong. I would recommend DnD to everyone. Where the challenge comes in is that it can be hard to find a group that you feel comfortable playing with. Once you do however, DnD can be a great experience for everyone involved.

Game of the Week Blog Reflection Week 10: D&D Week 2

This week, we played the game D&D, and this is my first game of D&D since I missed last week’s class, and I never played this game before, but I knew this is a very famous board game. So, I was very excited to play this game during the class session. During the class session, the DM helped me to insert my character, which is a monk, and I began my first adventure on D&D. We adopted three wolves to against the big Goblin, and we killed the big Goblin by one of ours ultimate.

I think the hardest point during I play this game is there are so many choices, and I do not know which I should choose. As a rookie to D&D, I think others’ experience might not be that good if they play with me, so I think this might be a part I dislike the game. However, for the game itself, I think it is very interesting, I can build my own character and I can create my own adventure story when I am playing the game.

For the leadership part of this game, I think it is most about the decision making. There are so many choices in the game and as a leader, you must think which one is best for your team. A good leader will always make the right choice for the team based on all the information the leader has. For example, in this D&D game, a leader can choose to fight with the boss directly or use some tricks to give the team advantages during the fight. If the team is under a good situation, then a leader might choose to fight with the boss directly, but if the team is not under a good situation, then the leader should think about what to do to make sure the tam can win the fight.

I think my roommate Steven will like the game, because he always like to make decisions and he did a good job on making right decisions in the past.

D&D Week 3 Blog Reflection

Last week, we didn’t have class so we wrapped up the final week of D&D. We didn’t get to finish the quest but my team and I killed a lot of goblins and wolves so I would say it was a pretty successful journey. There were lots of laughs and even a couple of plot twists like me killing a goblin who was just a father trying to provide for his family. I enjoyed role-playing and interacting with my fellow classmates, we already agreed that going through modules together maybe something we do this summer.

After class, we had a really good discussion on if leadership is a person, a process, a position, or a combination of all three and if it ever ends. JS brought up a very good point that there is no definitive definition of what leadership is and it will look different to different people but none of us are wrong. In my opinion, I believe that leadership is a combination of all of the above but mostly the person. Someone could be a leader to others even if they don’t have the “leadership position” or “title”. I also think that leadership is very subjective because it will look different depending on the situation, I could be a leader of two different groups and be authoritarian in one but democratic in the other. Furthermore, I believe that leadership never fully ends. You may have leaders that step-down or pass the position on to someone else but people will never stop looking up to that person or using them as guidance. One could even be a leader after death through their legacy.

Overall, I would still recommend this game to everyone I know because it never gets old since the players are in control of the plot and there are different stories to choose from. This game is one of my favorite role-playing games and is up there with Fiasco. I look forward to seeing what we play in class next week for Free play!

Game of the Week Blog Reflection Week 10: D&D Week 2

This week in Tabletop Leadership, we finished our D&D session. In this session, the people who have never played D&D before got better because we learned a lot from the first session. The hardest part about this game is the decisions you have to make. My health was really low this week, so I was afraid to do anything aggressive. We even had disagreements on what to do next, so we had to work together as a group to decide what is best.

The game has ties to leadership because there are a lot of decisions you have to make. Leaders have to constantly make tough decisions and use their resources. I had low health in this session so I had to be mindful of that when deciding what to do with an enemy. I think my friend Canon would enjoy this game because he is competitive and likes to think things through. In D&D, he would think ahead a lot in order to make the best decision on what to do. He would act as a leader and make sure the group benefits from every choice.

I really enjoyed my time playing D&D. It wasn’t as tough as I thought it was going to be. I like the story aspect and I would compare it to playing a role playing video game. My favorite thing about the game is that you can make every session completely different. I would want to make my character completely different next time so that I can do all new things. There is nothing I dislike about the game because our session went so well and the experienced people did a good job helping those of us who have never played.

Game of the Week Blog Reflection Week 9: D&D Week 1

Today in Tabletop Leadership, we played Dungeons & Dragons. I have never played this before but I enjoyed our first session. It is a roll playing game that requires a game master and a lot of creative players. The hardest part about the game is managing all of the character stats and being a good roll player. I don’t consider myself that creative so it is difficult to carry on the story.

This game has ties to leadership because it is a group working together. There are many different perspectives by each of the players and you have to make decisions as a group. Leadership requires making decisions and managing different perspectives within a group. The game master also acts as a leader because they have to initiate the story.

I think my friend Taylor would enjoy this game because she likes to roll play. I think her creative mind would make this game more enjoyable. She is very good at following along with a story which would let her get into it easily. I started to get into our play session after our first combat. I like how we won our first combat and then made decisions as a group on what to do next. I look forward to next week in order to see what interesting things develop in our game.

Game of the Week: D&D Week 3

This session was the last week of our DnD campaign. As always, we started the campaign by recapping what had happened previously so that everyone was caught up on what had happened. I found this a very helpful thing to do each time we played, as I found that I either forgot or misremembered some very minor things.

For this session of the story, we continued through the cave we were adventuring through to look for the man that was being held hostage by the goblins. We eventually found the man, and he was surrounded by some very angry goblins. My character tried to talk the head goblin here down but wasn’t the most successful. The goblin ended up dropping the man off the ledge we were on but one character in the group was able to jump down and catch the man in time. Sadly, we didn’t finish this section of the campaign before it was time to end.

The hardest part of the game this session was stopping. I really wanted to continue going and exploring the world around us with my group. We had a great DM who made sure that we all agreed on what to do and helped to navigate the fights and environments in a manner that really helped. The last person I’d like to introduce to this game would be my dad. He used to be into RPG games and I think he’d like it if he tried it out. I still agree on my views about leadership for this game, as it gives you the opportunity to be yourself and make the decisions you want to make.

Game of the Week: D&D Week 2

For this session, we continued our DnD campaign. We picked up from where we left off and ended up finishing the fight with the goblins. After this came the twist of having to introduce a new character to the group as we had someone new join the session. This was fun to do as we figured out a way that we all knew the character.

For the story in this one, we started to get into the plot. Our team trekked through the forest surrounding us and headed towards a cave guarded by goblins. This is where I really got to shine, as my character spoke Goblin. This moment really stuck out to me, as the whole time I’d been playing, I felt like I was in the background. But this let me try to do something that might advance the plot for everyone and just was overall a really good time for me. (Unsurprisingly, I failed and upset the goblin but it was fun to try!).

I think some of the hardship I was having the past week was a lot less this week. I understood the game a lot more and this allowed us to get through the story just a little faster than we had previously been going. The hardest part I had during this session was figuring out which weapon was best to fight goblins with! Another friend I’d like to play the game with is my friend Kaylynn. She’s very creative and I’d like to see how she reacts to things in the game. Lastly, the leadership ties to the game still remain the same as in my last review. DnD is a fantastic game for leadership I found!

Week 8, 9, and 10 (Dungeons and Dragons)

Dungeons and Dragons is the title of the game that we played for weeks 8 through 10 but it could just as well be titled as “Joe’s Favorite Game to Play with Friends”. I’ve played Dungeons and Dragons since I was around 8 years old starting with 3.5 edition. I enjoyed it then and since then have only grown more fond of the game as I’ve learned new facets to enjoy of the game that I was unaware of when I first started playing. Whether those new ideas were just role-playing or thinking of new fun character concepts. In all of this Dungeons and Dragons is related to many different aspects of leadership.

The first tie to leadership found in Dungeons and Dragons comes when creating your character. As a leader it is important to know and understand yourself. Dungeons and Dragons gives the player many opportunities to better understand their character in game as well as to develop their character throughout the game. In real life understanding who you are and what you are capable of is important as a leader to understand what tasks you can and should do as well as what you excel at. However understanding yourself isn’t the only aspect of leadership in Dungeons and Dragons.

Another tie to leadership present in Dungeons and Dragons is the amount of communication and cooperation players must have. In Dungeons and Dragons it is important to be able to talk to and understand the words of others so that you may work well as a team. That is because Dungeons and Dragons is a team game where you work with others to complete goals and objectives that you would not be able to complete by yourself. However that does not mean there is no risk and that leads to the final leadership aspect present in Dungeons and Dragons.

Risk is always present in Dungeons and Dragons. Every decision has a consequence or benefit depending on how the dice end up rolling. Therefore Dungeons and Dragons also helps teach risk management and assessment to its players as a player who does not properly assess a situation will likely end up with their character dead or worse. In Dungeons and Dragons though it is important to take risks so that you can progress through the game and to make the game interesting. Without risk the game becomes simple and boring as every task will come without consequence. But how does Dungeons and Dragons work so that their is risk present?

Dungeons and Dragons is a tabletop roleplaying game played with several players who each control a character and a dungeon master who runs the world that the players play in. The game however runs on dice. Most character statistics are determined by the dice as well as the results of actions the players take. To lie in Dungeons and Dragons is a possible dice roll, to attempt to hit an enemy is a dice roll, and so on and so forth. While a lot of stuff that happens in Dungeons and Dragons is determined by dice rolls that doesn’t mean that everything is determined in such a way.

The characters players make as well as the actions they take are all still decided by that player. In Dungeons and Dragons there is still a lot of choice that takes place. This starts in character creation where you choose your race. Basically the species of your character. You can choose to either be an Elf, Dwarf, Human, or more fantasy type races such as Tiefling or Dragonborn. From there you choose your class which ranges from sword fighting heroes, to fast handed thieves, good-hearted priests, or powerful mages. These choices are all a part of Dungeons and Dragons and determine the kind of character you can play.

In my game I played an Elven cleric. I focused most of my abilities on helping my teammates as I was fairly certain I would be playing with a lot of newer players who would be playing characters that are more damage focused than team focused. My assumption in this case was correct as I was partied with a wizard, a rogue, and a sorcerer. In the end we were able to play the game and everyone did their jobs alright. However in this game I did not have the best time.

While playing with my group there were several issues that occurred. The first issue was that besides the DM and myself none of the other players knew the rules of how to play the game. This made our first session move along slowly as many concepts had to be taught to the new players throughout the game. The issues continued as the rest of the party did little to take initiative in the game and decide the parties course of action. This made the game awkward for me as I was trying to not determine the course of every action but ended up being the main prompter of any decisions.

Overall I still think Dungeons and Dragons is fun and with more experience playing the game the other players in my game would do more and probably have a more enjoyable time. A friend I would recommend this game to and who I have been trying to get to play for a while is Zach. As a game that is great to play with friend I feel that he would enjoy the game. Also I feel like he would enjoy playing a roleplaying game.

In the end while I did not have a great time playing the game this time I still do enjoy the game itself and would recommend it to anyone who is looking for a good roleplaying game to play.

Game of the Week: DND Week 1

For this session, we played the first session in our three week Dungeons and Dragons campaign. Dungeons and Dragons is an RPG game that sets the player up in a fantasy world, and you explore while trying to battle monsters and accomplish the goals of the team. For our group, we had five players, along with one person DMing the game so that we could get through the story.

For this first week, we mainly focused on getting introduced to the game. Both I and another player were completely new to the game, so we had to spend a bit of time getting the mechanics and everything about the game explained to us. When we started the story, it was pretty fun. The most we got through in the session was exploring the toppled wagon/cart and then almost completing a battle with some goblins (who almost killed one of our players).

I really enjoyed playing DnD for the first time. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a very long time, but have never had the opportunity for. For recommendations, I’d really like to play this with my roommate Aja. She likes games like this and I’d love to play it with her. Honestly, the hardest part of this session was figuring out how the rolls worked. It confused me a lot but after listening to the more experienced players do it, I started to understand it a little more. Lastly, for leadership, I think DnD shows that leaders can have many different abilities and that other people can help you with this. Stats are a big thing in this game, and a leader might not have everything they need to complete a scenario in the best way so they need to rely on other people around them.

Game of the Week: Dungeons and Dragons

I play a lot of Dungeons and Dragons. Over the 4 years I’ve been playing (a fifth of my life, if you want to feel old), I’ve played with many different groups and been Dungeon Master more often than not. Getting to play it for college credit? A dream come true. For my character I decided to try something new to me, playing a human barbarian (who was also a little old lady who worked in an archive). Our DM, Nick, did a fantastic job of introducing the game to the new players in our group. The world he created was both immersive and interactive, allowing our characters to have agency as well as lots to discover. Over three weeks our rag-tag party of heroes killed goblins, befriended goblins, unionized goblins, mourned exactly one goblin (RIP Rushwater you will be missed), and killed a bugbear (basically a large hairy goblin).  There was a healthy mix of cave exploration, social negotiation, and good old-fashioned fighting. 

The hardest part of this game is basic math. I’m not joking. I’m so bad at adding a number to another number. I keep a calculator on hand just to make sure everything goes smoothly. Aside from that, the other major difficulty in this (and other social games) is finding the balance between leading by example and knowing when to step back and let other people have the spotlight. This is especially relevant when the other members of the group have less experience with role-playing games and may be more shy about jumping in. 

Dungeons and Dragons is not a game for everyone. It has many moving parts and numbers to keep track of, and it’s designed to tell a very specific type of story. However, it is undoubtedly the most ubiquitous of the tabletop role playing games. Everyone and their grandma has heard of it. This combination doesn’t always work out; many times people will try to hack D&D to make it do what they want, when better alternatives exist. The same thing applies to leadership! There are nearly infinite styles of leadership, and not every one will work for any given group. It’s important to fit the leadership tactic to the situation and the people who are involved. Additionally, as mentioned earlier, you have to know when to take charge of a situation and when to sit back and let other people take initiative.