In my AD&D days, I played...a brothel owner (well what else would a half elf, half siren play? Don\'t ask, the bouncer was half ogre half owlbear! The stage act was half bird, half something else. you could have called us a motley bunch).
I also played a ten year old halfing thief, a farmer npc (now THAT was fun, how to get them going in the right direction without giving away too much), a horse, a familar \"ice tiger\", an owl and a half dark elf half human. Most of my characters spent as much time in town as out. See the STORY is in town...can\'t find it in the woods, nope...you find it in town, over ale...ya sometimes. But I found as much over turnips and carrots as ale and mead. And the Juicy stuff, that was over hair cuts, or washing laundry. You want to know what the KING is doing...ask his maid...he doesn\'t even see her.
My Halfling thief grew up, found a halfing wife, found a Nice house in a calm settlement and opened up \"Ole Bill\'s sundries-everything the traveler needs for adventuring\" and turned into the DM\'s npc that opened up adventures...he let me play him.
Actually I found if you adjusted the math of PnP...then you didn\'t have to WORK so hard. Plus I tended to fudge and work with Dm\'s that did, we worked with a mana system NOT Gygax\'s magic (too weak). And yes, Sirens and owlbears were not in the player races, but sure was FUN.
OH and the Ogreowlbear...he was a mage. Knock and fly, you figure it out. (dm allowed it on strength, and yes, with fly...you took falling damage). He tried invizability(*Juhm places feathered hands over his eyes and mutters* you no see Juhm), but ended up going for sleep (*Juhm konks you on the head for five points blunt damage* Roll d4 *dm does not even look at rolled dice* you fail, you are asleep).
We also had a halfling thief with a tendancy to give back everything he took. LOL. \"Is this your dagger...you dropped it...thought you would want it back.\"
And we had a WELL played (very beat up) cavalier.
His catch phrase \"Ah HA...now I got you\" *painful sounding fight* \"Medic\" *cavlier falls unconcious* *Cleric runs forward*\"that\'s my cue\" *Mage casts a few spells as the druid, bard and theif distract the attacker. Attacker eventually dies, a few others in group are seriously injured...near death. Mage binds wounds, cleric and druid heals while the bard and thief make camp. Warrior being fast behind the cavalier lays unconcious as well while the thief browses his gear*.
The thing about PnP that many that didn\'t play it don\'t know is you got to know the PLAYER and the Character, and could love one and hate the other. Like the Cleric, sad little fella as a player, but MAN he shown in character. And the Warrior...well his character was important to the campaign, but the player was hateful and angry. He tended to sit in the room during game times, and run out and smoke during bathroom breaks, which ended up social times. I enjoyed the soda, pizza and bathroom breaks as much as the singing swords...vorpal bunnies (yes...the DM brought those in *rolls eyes* you killed it with a primative home made bomb the cleric found *groans*)
But admittedly this group was a \"Monty Hall\" group, all nearly gods, got their way alot, but DM was hard as nails, nearly killing us each battle. And we had as many puzzles as monsters. \"Ok, the hall LOOKS nice and clear,\" says the Mage. \"Let\'s send the Warrior in,\" says the thief. *mixed laughter and warrior grumbles* \"Ok ok, I know, figure it out fur foot.\" says the thief. That hall took longer than getting to the dungeon did, and thief tripped all of the magic traps, nearly died four times.
The difference between computer online and face to face is day and night. The familiarity, the warmth and true friendship is not online, sadly, as warm as it gets...it is over as soon as \"real life\" steps in...as it should be with any inanimate object (the computer). But with PnP, real life needs often were met by the play group as much as in game. I remember the thief got assigned to a ship in mid campaign (what a SAD day that was, well sad and HAPPY...he wanted that assignment, but how often do you get a thief that could almost pick pockets or locks in his sleep with cute furry feet and could COOK in real life and game, plus he was the bouncer in our afternoon game, I lost my Owlbear friend *cries*), the group helped him pack up and move to the ship. Well I cheered them on from the parking lot, NO girls in the rooms. (the group was in the Navy, except me, I am the bard\'s wife, and the Mage in the game. I learned two VERY important lessons. If it looks like a dragon and man mated...do NOT kill it, push it off the spelljammer. And a fireball on a wooden vessel is NOT a good idea. Thank goodness for call rain...and the druid), but I helped carry boxed from the door to the truck.
The PnP was CHEEP, and rather continual entertainment. Once you bought the books, the dice and a few reams of paper (ream is I think 500 sheets...maybe, I forget) and a large sheet of octagangal grid plastic and a dry erase marker and a few figures (not all the lead minis, best purple worm we EVER killed was a green ceramic worm from a gift box I got in high school and kept around, my ice tiger familar was a plastic cat I found in a gum ball machine), you were good to go. For around 200 bucks (spread over a group of six to ten, so NOT much each), you could have fun for years...literally.
Only thing I regret from those days was getting rid of all of it, if I only had my first edition monster manual and players manual *cries*.
