Role Playing Games

On Saturday I was at my very first game convention, the Orc'idee. I hadn't played RPGs for a loong time, so it was real fun to roll the dice again.

Unfortunately I did not snap any photos, since I still have no small camera, and didn't want to shlepp around my SLR. But here are a few random thoughts:

*) Gaming in French is hard. Half of the time I did not know what was going on, and after the game I was exhausted from concentrating (Yes I know. Me? Concentrating? Take it on faith.)

*) Legend of the Five Rings is an interesting game, and could be very much fun to play, but: It concentrates on diplomacy, intrigue and etiquette, not something that is easy to do in a foreign language. Also, it is set in a setting similarish to the medieval japan. I actually know a bit about that time, because I once wrote big paper in school about feudalism in japan. But... I and everybody else here in Europe knows more about the courts and customs of medieval Europe, obviously. I think playing in a setting here would be more fun, since it is easier to concentrate on the intrigue if you don't have to wrack your brain constantly for basic rules of etiquette. Just saying.

*) 10-sided dice are the underprivileged cousins of the role-playing dice family. Everybody else is a platonic solid, and they never, ever let the poor ten-siders forget that.

*) This being my first Convention: Gamer stereotypes? So true. Male-female ration 9-to-1 or worse. Obesity still en vogue. Bad social skills? Don't know - I hardly ever talk to strangers ;)