Plays D&D. My brother is that person. No, not my 13 year old brother who jumped at the chance to try it out (I’ll post THAT particular story in a post later), but my 19 year old brother who usually spends his time in our home recording studio, hanging out with his band, and playing on the Xbox 360.
About a week ago, the band (my brother and three friends of his) were over, and we were all having dinner. I was explaining the Penny Arcade/PvP podcast to my mom (if you haven’t listened to it, by the way, do so. You can find it in the Podcast section of http://www.wizards.com/dnd ), and jokingly suggested that the band do one. Well, that one innocent suggestion seems to have planted the D&D seed in their brains. We haven’t recorded anything, but they jumped all over creating characters. The bass player even found an old 3.5 name generator online.
Less than an hour later and four trips through the Character Builder, and the Brighter Brightest D&D party was formed. Davian Laughshield, gnome bard, was played by my brother, Derek. Alex, the bass player, took on the role of Adotumal Tarmikos, bugbear warden. The drummer, Ryan, became Riclamin Joysword, eladrin avenger (quite a similar character to Wil Wheaton’s character in the second series of PA/PvP podcasts). Last but not least, the tiefling invoker, Krisrath Trenspatience, is the newest band member, Kyle.
I thrust them into the Keep on the Shadowfell adventure in much the same way as the podcast. Having beaten up on goblins and kobolds for a while on behalf of the people of Winterhaven, the group comes across the keep. Upon entering, a lovely tradition of my groups is upheld. Alex, being the defender, confidently strode into the center of the seemingly empty entrance room… and promptly fell into the pit trap concealed there. I assured him he was not the first, as Thorfin Boatmurdered, dwarven fighter (from my regular Sunday group), and Ragnarok, minotaur fighter (my littlest brother who plays with two friends of his every now and again; I DM, of course) have both fallen victim of that pit.
The rats and goblins were made short work of, and the group carried on into a room being excavated by goblins. After a few falls off of planks and bites from a guard drake, the group found the handy holy symbol (appropriately given to the avenger) and moved on to the secret door they had noticed beforehand.
Successfully sneaking up on Irontooth (in Balgron’s place), the avenger attempted to end his life quickly, but the guards were alerted. A battle followed, and the group narrowly defeated the warriors garrisoned around Irontooth’s quarters. The bard appropriated himself of the magic wand in the locked chest (after smashing it open; the key was on Irontooth’s body), and the group took to the woods to rest for the night.
We’ll be playing again Thursday night, and I’ll hopefully remember to take better notes. If you want to check out the band, go to http://myspace.com/brighterbrightest. They’ll be releasing a new video blog episode tomorrow, with a little bit of D&D thrown in.
Hey, it’s better than more Halo jokes.
