BACK TO DUNGEONEERING!

Ok,
Enough talk about gaming, and back to actual, hard-core DUNGEONEERING!
We have so many projects in the cauldron right now, I just need to get photos up.
Canyons,
Ruins
Ponds
And a swinging medieval tavern-like sign...let me explain.

There comes a time when it becomes difficult to craft new Dungeoneering projects, when the outdoors calls me more than the seclusion and silence of the Tower. Unfortunately, this "calling" is as directly related to weather in the Spring as it seems to be in the fall, and as a result, the more the sun shines, the less I seem to do.

But as the season melts into Spring, this year the Dungeoneering focus will be on improving the gaming club.
Yes, gaming club.

See the Ursus Templari Gaming Club (not even sure that's the final final name yet...) started as a potential future "private" RPG club, that has yet to truly come to fruition.
Here is the basic outline as it now stands in it's early stages:

• The idea is that the private club will have a monthly fee, ($10 or less) where in all players pay a one-time monthly fee, and the money is used for refreshments for each of 2-4 gaming sessions per month. The money stays in a collective pool. 
• If a player misses a session that month, they receive a credit towards their session next month, so your never contributing to a game your not going to take advantage of. 
• At the end of each month, each player who attends a game session gets 1 credit towards the monthly drawing: a reward if you will, that consist of some item of D&D paraphernalia. Dice, a mini, a map, maybe even a magic item or other D&D related item they, and only they, may use as they wish. They can, however, trade, sell, barter, or lend the item as well. Just like it was real. Similar to D&D Adventurers League Magic Items, but with no limit on trades or borrowing. 
• Membership would be done through an application process, to ensure that we get a variety of well balanced players, but most importantly, so that we can establish a group of consistently committed players for ongoing campaigns, friendships, and hopefully, lifelong game play. 

As a result, the gaming club needs a name!
The hanging medieval inn-style sign is ready to be painted, but it has yet to receive a final name!
Of course any reader who finds this blog, and submits a name, is welcome to claim such rights and as a result, be given the first free membership in the (insert name here) gaming club....or...something like that. This is all just an idea of course....

We would of course love to have a sponsor, and report frequently on upcoming events, cons, etc....but again. Just brainstorming. The idea here comes from how cycling teams tend to operate, but without the frequent use of every available legally available nutritional supplement known to man....

Not sure how this will pan out, if ever. The interior of the club needs some work, space mostly. And while I wish it had room for a nice long war-game style table, I am afraid it might be restricted to a smaller, round, type. But its a work in progress....


   
 

Salt con T-Shirt Design contest 2016

In an effort to push myself to being involved with all things creative, for better or worse, I opted to submit a quickly-sketched logo design for the SaltCon 2016 T-shirt contest.

Now to be fair, it didn't win, and thats ok. I don't think it was my best work, but I tend to go more towards the clean and simple look anyways. Although I have to say, the winning design was fantastic! Retro and yet almost "50's space-age" cool.

SaltCon Miniature creations...

So I love the Saltcon Miniatures contest! But unfortunately this year, I will not be submitting any entires. You can find out more here if your a local and attending this weekend:

http://saltcon.com


I thought since I am not able to enter any new creations this year, it might be best to visit a couple "virtual" entries I wish I had the time to submit.

Large Black Pudding:

This was created from wire, foam core board, and hot glue. then painted to several varying depths, and varnished with a  thick gloss to give it a wet look. the complete original posting can be seen here: http://creativedungeoneering.blogspot.com/2015/04/from-tentacles-to-crystals-to-puddings.html

This was a planned entry for the medium miniature category, and while simple, I think gathers a sense of "depth" and movement. With this iconic creature, the simplicity is often its horror.

For my planned Large entry, I thought I would re-visit the Smaug's Horde treasure pile:
http://creativedungeoneering.blogspot.com/2015/01/smaug-horde-found.html



The Treasure pile is quite large, and unfortunately in these images I do not feature a standard D&D mini for comparison, but I wanted something for players to really see as a massive horde, not just a small treasure pile from a wandering monster that for some unknown reason, seems to always be hoarding gold pieces. No, this needed to be true Dragons Horde. Modular of course, so that in creating future piles I could arrange them into being multiple piles of a grand scale, eventually, resulting in a Smaug size horde.




I am somewhat disappointed in myself for not committing to showcasing some of the DUNGEONEERING! work this year, but perhaps its ok for the focus to be on being the one to actually enjoy another creative Dungeon Masters efforts...not just always making them....maybe...

Gulp.....

So this blog is my own personal avenue of creative journalling one might call it. It is often as I can, updated with the REAL purpose of Dungeoneering, which is to highlight creative tips, tricks, and projects for Dungeons & Dragons and table top roleplaying.

But since re-locating to the Western mountains of the Salt Lake Valley, I have found there are not too many D&D only players nearby. It's proved increasingly difficult to find a group that is not only made  up of consistent adult players, but ones that have a more "old-school" mindset as well. 

I am not a fan of just playing board games for board games sake. Nor am I a huge fan of Roll20 or Virtual Tabletop applications.  I like the idea of old-school, role-playing heavy and miniature tabletop heavy D&D. I'd even be a LARPer too if I thought I could get away with it, but I have a long history of not meshing well with that hobby. I don't see too many adults heavily involved in that past time either, which is somewhat of a deterrent. 

                          

Dungeons & Dragons is truly where my heart is at. 

But I am old. 

I am not a "gamer." I am a "started with B1, The Keep on the Borderlands, Red Box basic set, watched the cartoon when it was still in syndication" player. 1980s....Not a video gamer who dabbles in RPG's. Not a LARPer who dabbles in table top nor a Wargamer that has stepped sideways into D&D. I am a purist. I'm so uncreative in this regard that I do not even play Pathfinder, much to the shock of many. 

Now, there is NOTHING wrong with these other types of gaming nor the people who play them. I just happen to find a sense of simplistic story telling and pleasure from just playing D&D. Now to eb fair, in the past, I have played Star Frontiers, Palladium, Robotech, MERP (Middle Earth Role Playing), 007 James Bond, and Star Wars. And I loved them all. But D&D will always be my first love. 

But because I am old, I have slid into being a bit of a Hermit gamer. I am dabbling in solo Basic D&D gaming, but love a good tabletop session. Tough to do with solo games. As a result, I have taken the leap, and singed up for my first official dabble into D&D 5th edition at my local gaming Con that starts this weekend. Of course my hope is that there is somewhere, a "hidden room" that holds old-school style "play by candlelight" and "cloaks required"type D&D games..aka Mazes & Monsters.....the quintessential image in my mind of a good-old-fashioned "cult-like" D&D game. 

While it may not result in the "cloak wearing play-by-candlelight-type cult gathering" I would love, it will hopefully, at the very least, be a riotous good night of gaming. And who knows, maybe somewhere, hidden in the mist shrouded forested hills of Western Salt Lake cOunty, perhaps there still exists others with this same old-school mindset. 

On a side-note, this is one of the first years I will not be entering any of the Dungeoneering 

Time will tell...

The Continuing Quest

                                         


Most people like the spring.

The thaw of the winter snow, the increase in daylight, the amount of sun. Open water, summer breezes billowing the sails, and the feeling of the warmth upon the skin...

I do too, but it also saddens me a bit. It's like seeing the light at the end of the dark tunnel of winter and knowing that the mystery of that dark will soon be coming to an end. 

The mystery of which I speak is this elusive, quite difficult to describe sense of  esotericism and creative magic that seems more present in the winter than in the spring and summer. Disappearing are the days of mist and fog and stormy skies, the days where there was little else to do than be inside alone with ones imagination. 

And yet each year, like a death toll being sounded to this winter magic, comes the last gathering of the genre I will experience for many months. 

The SaltCon gaming convention. http://saltcon.com

Each year I've gone hoping to find THE game of D&D I've always dreamed of (although to be fair, my expectations are probably far too high ) or a great class or panel to rocket my creative writing to the 'published' level, and each year I find myself not finding either...
I tend to be a hermit D&D player. There are no 5e groups near me, nor 1, 2, or even 3-4e groups for that matter. I somewhat detest Pathfinder, of which there seem to be plenty, and I am not in any way, shape, or form, a LARPer, SCAdian, or even board-game geek. In this respect I am wholly unoriginal and I guess one would say, unimaginative. So I find that  at SaltCon I am often alone, ignored, and disappear in the crowds with little attention paid.

Ahh anonymity... It can often be like a warm blanket, but sometimes leaves me wondering what I am missing just beyond the folds... 

And that is exactly how SaltCon seems to me. I always leave feeling like there is something I am missing. Like there was something else going on that I did not know of, or was not "in the loop on" because of my anonymity. Was that dream D&D game really going on somewhere until the late hours that I simply did not know of? Was there in fact something else to be done than sit in the hallways and watch the myriad of half-hearted cosplayers socialize and flirt to the echoing sounds of poorly executed Filk music?

If it is possible to be a "D&D Snob" then I suppose I qualify. I have nothing against Filkers, or Cosplayers for the matter. Or even Pathfinder players. But perhaps this self-introspection is just the sad fact that while the winter melts away, so does my hopeful expectations of finding like-minded individuals who take their D&D way too seriously and have the constant flow of imagination to see its likeness in nearly everything...
Of course I'll attend, and continue the quest to find that elusive imaginative treasure...one that lasts through he spring and summer heat and sun and into the misty fog of another imaginative dark winter.