Veteran
D & D DM here. I have recently been DMing new people to get them into
enjoying the hobby and the love of role play games. I currently DM three
different groups of relatively new players.
I mix high fantasy, fun, drama, and modern stuff into a fantasy
campaign. Think a Knight’s Tale at
times. You can find pizza, coffee, along with ale and Orc Gut Beer. But I
digress.
The
first group of newbies I ran for, was soon after 5th ed was released. They were looking around the town bazaar
seeing if anyone was selling magical items or healing potions. They saw a tent
selling animals.
“What
kind?”
“Umm…dogs,
cats, rabbits. Oh and they have a parrot for sale.”
Parrot
must have been the rogue’s trigger word. From then on, he wanted that parrot. He was going to have that parrot. The person
playing the rogue was a young teenage kid in a group of adults, so I gave him
some rope to see where it went.
First;
he had the bright idea to try and run in, grab the parrot and tumble out. The
rest of the group who had been looking at other tents realized their young
cut-purse was not with them and started to look for him. I had him roll to see if he could stealthily
sneak in and tumble out. Massive fail. The proprietor of the tent was a very
large half-orc who had watched him literally fall on his face. The half-orc was so shocked that anyone would
attempt something so brazen and stupid with him in there, that he didn’t do anything
when the rest of the party rushed up apologizing. The group started to haggle with him on how
much the parrot was. I hadn’t expected this, so the half-orc just said 25 gp.
This
group had only been on one adventure so far, so funds were really, really low,
since they had jus re-supplied. The rogue had some silver and copper but no
gold. He begged for a loan. But the rest of the party was not real thrilled
with the idea of having a parrot along; it might give away their position at a
critical time. But the rogue was not to be deterred. Finally, after 45 minutes
of real time of arguing, the half-orc agreed to sell the rogue the parrot and
to pay him when the group got back from the current adventure they were about
to go on. The half-orc just wanted them hone. I rolled for the reaction of the
parrot to his new owner. Contempt would be the best word to describe the
parrots feeling to his new master. I rolled reaction for the parrot and the
rest of the group, with the wizard getting an extremely high reaction. For all
his trouble, the rogue got a parrot that would rather ride on the wizard’s
shoulder than his. But that still didn’t deter him; he kept trying to feed and
coax the bird.
Another
group rescued and bought off a farmer, an old cantankerous donkey called
“Granny.” They thought to use her to transport their supplies and treasure.
Sometime later, the party wasn’t sure what to do or where to go. Not an unusual
occurrence with new players. I had told them about ‘divine intervention’ (see Confession of a Dungeon Master, 1980
Psychology Today) and that any character can pray real hard to their deity and
they might get a response. Usually the PC never rolls high enough to get
anyone’s attention. Well, the Cleric of the group seemed like the obvious
person to pray for guidance. I make the PC actually ask what guidance they are
seeking in their prayer. Depending on how they do, it gives me a range for the
dice roll.
She
was nervous and gave a prayer/question about whether they should enter this
mysterious village. She rolled
percentage dice in the open, and got a 99!
Within seconds of her prayer she slowly sees everything slow down and
stops. As she turns around, her donkey starts to glow. The voice of Pelor, her
deity, speaks to her through the animal and gives her some words of
wisdom. The glow fades and everything
returns to normal. They now call the
animal the ‘Holy Donkey of Pelor.’
Another
group rescued a small dog from the underground sewers they were exploring
(because the game store we were playing at had one running around). This small
dog always seemed to be able to escape from its leash. They got an enchanted
collar so they could always locate it. I had considered making the pup some
evil, nasty thing in disguise/polymorph. But the group had joked about that and
was expecting it. So I just used the pup to have them scurry off after it; some
of the party wanted to just let it go. But the female Cleric was adamant.
I
was asked by a group of board gamers to run D & D for them. No problem.
They were in the Keep on the Borderlands
and were trying to figure out what equipment to get, worrying about torches and
such. This was boring the female Tiefling Warlock. She wandered off, and I had
a cat some up and rub up against her just to see what would happen. The Warlock
loved the cat. So did most of the party, the human Cleric being the only
non-catified person of the group. This group went overboard for over an hour
getting things for this cat. The group bought a cat carrier (two baskets tied
together) which they strapped to the Tiefling’s back, cat toys (string on a
stick, small stuffed animal) and invented a lazer pointer (a map case with a
hole in the top, a light spell on a
rock placed in it). When they go into
combat, their battle cry is “For Cuddles!”
During
the last session the Cleric was of the opinion to leave the cat. This earned
him the wraith of the rogue who loved cats. He used his hands to explain that
it would be the cat first, the rest of the party second, the goblins, kobolds
(all of which they had been fighting) and then close to the floor would the
Cleric. In real life these two are friends.
Amazing
what even unreal animals do to people.
