Yeah, I know I’ve been quiet. I’ve practically been off the grid, so to speak. The last six months haven’t been the greatest in my headspace. I pretty much always get this way around the approach of my father’s birthday, which was around the time I stopped posting. Another reminder of getting older, things changing, and remembering those who’ve passed on. It puts me in a real funk where I withdraw and avoid a lot of social interaction. I don’t see myself as good company and I don’t want to bring anyone else down. Also, I question myself fitting in often. Mainly, I don’t have that many friends my age group. I never have, really. Even when I push myself to be more social, I have a difficult time with it. I’m private by nature. Trusting people with my thoughts and feelings isn’t easy. Most times, I put up walls and show people what I think they want to see, such as a serious professional at work. I surprised some co-workers by laughing at a comment at a meeting one day. I can’t even remember what was said but, it was unexpected coming from me. Other than those friends I’ve first made on line no one knows about my spiritual beliefs, but this is okay with me. I don’t think anyone would really understand anyway, hence the whole questioning where I fit in. The 80s were a very different time and I do often feel nostalgia for those days. I could go on for a while about that, but that’s not what I’d like to focus on right now. The funk usually lasts until after my birthday passes and a little after where I try to force myself to be more social and get out of this state of mind. So here we are. It’s that time again. My birthday has come and gone and it was a rather significant one, affecting my state of mind more than it has in the past.
So where have I been and what have I been doing these past six months? Admittedly, not all that much. The table top game I was running has stopped. I wasn’t in the headspace to do it and there were some conflicts in the group, so it’s probably for the better. I miss it, but not the arguments. I have since joined a few other online games with Embyr. The first being a PF2E game where the party is composed of dragons going to dragon university. A lot of dungeon crawling and some puzzles and challenges. We’ve just recently gotten to level 5 in that one where I play my Time Dragon Nara. I’ve mentioned her before. I had just started playing this game before I went quiet. She previously was a Lore Oracle, but I’ve retrained her to an Exemplar. It’s funny, I changed mainly since the enemies we had encountered up to that point weren’t of a type I could do much with and we were a very caster heavy party without a lot of melee classes. Still, she is a fun character and I’m adapting and getting used to the specifics of the Exemplar class as this character is higher level than the first exemplar I’ve played.
Story wise, we just finished the first year of college. Nara has made some new friends, and through the game I have as well. She has shown her ability to screw up at the perfect time and has delved into discovering the secrets going on around the college. Iouna, Nara’s sister and Embyr’s character, has just taken a year off and she replaced her character with a Wellspring Dragon Magus named Iyri. I’ll let her speak more about that if she wishes.
We just started the first session of the new school year yesterday with a new PC being introduced as well. The new player brings an excellent energy to the table. The character has a lot of personality and seems to be a good fit for our group so far. With the two new characters, I’m hopeful there will be an added roleplay dynamic to the group now. I’m looking forward to the next session.
The next game I’ve joined in is a Pathfinder 1E game based on SpellJammer and some elements from One Piece. This one started out with me having to make a bit of a hard choice. First off, PF1e games are rare, I’ve had wish to bring back a character I have very much loved but because of some scheduling conflicts I wasn’t able to continue the game she was originally in. This game, however, is a SpellJammer game, which is a fantasy space game. I have long had the desire to play one of the Outer Dragon races where space flight would be possible. However, the other part of this game is pirate themed. While the game I played Treori in previously was an open world fantasy adventure, I created the character to be in a Skulls and Shackles game, also pirate themed adventure. The advantages of an Outer Dragon were obvious, and the party at the time already had another Oracle so the decision was between an opportunity to play a character I’ve been longing to play, One I can only do in a PF1e setting, or to take something more appropriate to the story and more suited to the party’s needs. With some pushing from Embyr, and a little more research into the rest of the party, I found the other Oracle would not have more than the most basic healing abilities. I compromised by changing Treori to be a hybrid between her original dragon type, Imagos, and a Lunar dragon. This is changing her abilities some. She won’t get all the abilities she would have otherwise, but I can get the outer abilities I wanted and the most important of Treori’s other abilities, but that won’t be until higher level.
The choice seems, for the moment, to have been the right one. Our party has shrunk since the game’s start, as they often do with online games. Now down to four active people, having a dedicated healer is a must. We’ve reached level 5 and Treori’s dream abilities will kick in at level 7. The game is more combat focused with few roleplay opportunities, but so far one of the other remaining players besides myself and Embyr has seemed to take some interest in roleplay. I’m hopeful about the game, but I have my concerns.
The last of the new games I got involved in is a PF2E game based on Power Rangers Time Force. Yeah, I know. By its description, it wasn’t one that I was too excited about, but I shared the game’s recruitment information with her and she was quite interested. This game had a more in-depth recruiting process involving a questionnaire, writing a backstory, and two stages of interviews, the first with the GM and the second with the GM and the current party team lead. Power Rangers never were my interest. I was legally an adult when it first aired, so I never paid it too much attention other than not changing the channel between other shows I wanted to watch or simply catching a few minutes here and there as I was getting ready to watch something else. While I expressed an interest in it, my knowledge of Power Rangers’ content was pretty limited. My application did mention, however, that Embyr was very excited about it and I wanted to be a part of it. The GM reached out to me and Embyr a couple of days after our application. At first, looking at my application, I could tell he wasn’t impressed. He wasn’t fond of my race idea and mentioned if I was selected that I should find something else. Embyr, however, got the GM’s attention. They had a few discussions about Discord, about her character idea, her backstory and about Power Rangers, including favourite seasons, etc. The GM shortly afterwards came back to me and was reluctant at first but said he could probably make the dragon work depending on a few elements. I quickly got to work on a back story, one or two back and forths with the GM, and had something finished. I was pretty convinced that the only reason I got into the game is because the GM wanted Embyr in his game. He needed exactly two players to fill the current party gap, and the only way Em would join in was if I was in the game, too. When the game started we found out that four others (I think? At least two others, but I think it was two sets of two) were previously in the game but left for various reasons. This group has a high interest in actual roleplay and while at first it took a little to find my place in the game, I found my place and the party seemed to like my creative thinking and I have apparently raised the bar for giving the weekly adventure recaps. Embyr took longer to find her place; she wasn’t sure she liked her class and myself, in game, am a bit more outspoken than her.
Anyways, that was a long way to get to this point, but my character Aeon here is an Exemplar and a half-brother to Nara. He was ultimately what lead me to taking Exemplar with Nara, as I really enjoy the class and its abilities. Embyr’s character, Reika, has found her place in the group as well. There are some interesting potential opportunities coming up and there have been requests for her in some play by post roleplay during downtime between sessions.
Now outside of TTRPGS I’ve been working, same office job, for over 20 years now. At home, my health has been poorer, however, the past few days have been significantly better with the new medication. More medical things are planned, mainly checkups due to age. Em and myself, and now another friend, have been going through the Amazon series Wheel of Time. Em’s gotten more interested in the books as she’s gone through the Amazon series. We’re about a third of the way through the fifth book, which we often listen to while she’s working on art. We also finished the last season of Star Trek: Lower Decks. Em’s been expressing more interest in the other Star Trek series and we’ve started watching Next Gen and Enterpise. Other than that, it’s pretty status quo. Some concerning events with the political climate and relations between USA and Canada. It’s pretty quiet and a boring update. The friends I keep close and my kitty Oreo helping keep me from taking things too seriously. He talks, I swear it. I just don’t have a clue what he’s saying most of the time.
