PDA

View Full Version : Finding a game...



AtwasAwamps
2009-09-21, 02:38 PM
Halp!

So, here’s the skinny and why I’m coming here for help, rather than my standard practice, which is to shake the down the local criminal element for information.

A bit ago, I made a post regarding my first DnD game and character. I was super excited and getting ready to go and my friends were happy with my character, whose basis was a mostly drunken fellow who was a 4E warlord. I had insults and praise written up and planned for all my wonderful abilities and things I would do. It was great. I was damn happy and looking forward to the game.

…well, that’s fallen straight the heck through. No game. People got too busy, which I totally understand…except…except…I got less busy. My girlfriend started taking classes. My roommate has been playing pick up soccer (oh god no, no, no). The majority of my other friends just don’t have free time on the weekdays or live way out of the way for it to be a casual trip.Between work and the gym, my weekdays have been reduced to boredom and WoW and random hobbies I try to pick up and fail to entertain (except for the beer tasting one, which lasted some time. I have been told, however, that you have to have DIFFERENT BEERS for this to qualify as a hobby. Drinking a lot of guiness every night apparently just makes you a drunk. Live and learn.)

I got bit by the DnD bug and if I can’t play with my good online buddies via a ventrilo server, I’d like to just bite whole hog and play with a bunch of strangers face to face.

…Now how the hell do I do this? Keep in mind I have zero…and I do mean absolutely none whatsoever, nada, zilch, nothing…experience at tabletop gaming, though I love to RP and have done so via message boards many times. I RP in WoW. I stopped an entire raid from killing Sartharion to deliver a heroic monologue (that’s what you get for letting the RP lover lead a raid, people). So pretending to be a drunken half-elf in a room of people I don’t know doesn’t remotely intimidate me. I just don’t know how to find these people and how to convince them they should let me play cause I’m fun.

I am also not a pretty girl, nor in fact a girl at all, which I feel is an automatic strike against me when attempting to infiltrate a geek culture I do not know.

So…basically:

TLDR: Are there any resources I can use to locate DnD groups looking for players in my area? Would Craigslist serve this purpose? I’d appreciate any help or direction you might give. Thanks, folks!

PS: If this should go somewhere else, I will delete it and repost it and stuff. I don’t mean to mess up the forums, so my apologies in advance to administrators!

Croverus
2009-09-21, 02:43 PM
I formed a DnD group by walking around my dorm and popping when I found a room witht he dorm open I peeked inside and asked if anyoen was interested in DnD. Ended up recruiting 5 people to play a pick up game of 3.5 lv 1 and it turned into an epic session of many dead orcs and goblins with everyone leveling up and the bard being possessed by an evil dagger that they now need to figure out how to get rid of.

IthilanorStPete
2009-09-21, 02:46 PM
There's always the play-by-post forum here.

AtwasAwamps
2009-09-21, 02:46 PM
I formed a DnD group by walking around my dorm and popping when I found a room witht he dorm open I peeked inside and asked if anyoen was interested in DnD. Ended up recruiting 5 people to play a pick up game of 3.5 lv 1 and it turned into an epic session of many dead orcs and goblins with everyone leveling up and the bard being possessed by an evil dagger that they now need to figure out how to get rid of.

That is awesome. U

nfortunately, going door to door in my neighborhood (I should specify: roommate as in apartment roommate, in a place with three apartments, the other two tenants who are not...really...the DnD type, let's say) is not really an option.

EDIT: And yes, there is the PbP forum here and when I work up the nerve, I will poke around and ask if anyone will take in a newbie for a 4e game, but yeah, till then...

9mm
2009-09-21, 02:51 PM
1st. Local game shop; most have tables at some time set aside for the RPGers, ask if they do and when, most DMs would be happy to make room for a new face. Also they usually have a bulleten board that people use to advertise games, check it, heck even put up a flier.

2nd. If your in college talk to the clubs office, there might be a club for table tops, (this message brought to you by the Radford Role-Players Guild).

3rd: http://nearbygamers.com/ This site is slow but it can show you places to start looking.

Croverus
2009-09-21, 02:55 PM
Also, despite what rumors about some DMs go, a good number of DMs like having new players because they enjoy teaching... I know I loved how after only setting off 3 traps I had the group's bard (who was standing in for the rouge) was searching every inch of every room they went through despite there being very few traps in the rest of the dungeon. Course, him deciding to appraise anything he could pick up is what caused him to get possessed. The paladin in the group was not very happy abotu the whole ordeal.

Lycan 01
2009-09-21, 02:57 PM
Talk to every friend you have. Ask them if they have friends who'd be interested. Friends and friends of friends are how all my groups got started.

And pbp games are fun! :smallbiggrin:

In fact, my current Call of Cthulhu pbp game is on the fast track to self-destruction. If/when it implodes, I'll be starting a new game. More than likely, it'll be a 4e game. If/when this happens, I'll be sure to give you an invite. :smallwink:

AtwasAwamps
2009-09-21, 02:58 PM
1st. Local game shop; most have tables at some time set aside for the RPGers, ask if they do and when, most DMs would be happy to make room for a new face. Also they usually have a bulleten board that people use to advertise games, check it, heck even put up a flier.

2nd. If your in college talk to the clubs office, there might be a club for table tops, (this message brought to you by the Radford Role-Players Guild).

3rd: http://nearbygamers.com/ This site is slow but it can show you places to start looking.

Local Game Shop. I wonder if we have one. Huh, I'll go look. Thanks for the website. And I am no longer in college, but as a note, holy carp, the DnD kids in college scared me. I have to assume they aren't all like that because if they are I am a sad, sad man. One of them put a curse on me. I have yet to feel ill effects.

...unless this is the effect of the curse! I am doomed to walk the earth as a man without a DnD game! Nooooooooooo...

(And yeah, I know not all DnD players are the stereotypes they show in movies and chick tracts, but these guys really were...)

EDIT: I tried the friends of friends thing. That was my group that fell through :(

Lycan, I'd be flattered if you did throw me an invite. I'd like to play on these boards...lotta smart, fun folks here (I'm a lurker) but I am always nervous about new communities.

AtwasAwamps
2009-09-23, 09:01 AM
Update of Sadness and Woe:

No game sites reveal meet-ups or anything in my area of Queens.

The only gaming store near me, which I got very excited about discovering, apparently closed down some time ago. Thus my standing outside the door looking forlornly inside was a wholly ineffective method of securing gaming compatriots.

The local comic book store is my current next option, if I can figure out how to get up there (they moved from the 1st floor of a strip mall to the third and I have no idea where the stairs are. And I left my grappling hook at my mom’s house.)

It’s rather weird. I always avoided DnD and similar stuff…and here I am trawling queens for hints of it.

Man, if only I’d cared about this when I was waiting in line for WotLK’s release. I probably had every potential DnD player for miles in arm’s reach that night! Curse you, hindsight. Curse you.

Anyways, thank you for your help, guys. I will keep watching the PbP boards, since that looks to be my best shot. And if anyone has any more suggestions, I’d be glad to hear ‘em!

Mitth'raw'nuruo
2009-09-23, 09:14 AM
Queens. Like Queen NY?

Keep looking, you'll find something - I found a group here and my whole county is 22,000 people. Have faith. Find the comic book stores, we'll be there. Even the local barns a noble as a D&D section. Hang out there, someone well come look at the books sooner or later. Then introduce yourself.

AtwasAwamps
2009-09-23, 09:17 AM
Queens. Like Queen NY?

Keep looking, you'll find something - I found a group here and my whole county is 22,000 people. Have faith. Find the comic book stores, we'll be there. Even the local barns a noble as a D&D section. Hang out there, someone well come look at the books sooner or later. Then introduce yourself.

Yeah, NY. Forest Hills. Wheee.

Barnes and Nobles has a DnD section?

Spoon. Why don’t people tell me these things?

Still, I feel it would be rather creepy of me to hang out near that section and then jump at customers. “HELLO STRANGER WOULD YOU HELP ME PRETEND TO BE A CLERIC?!?!”

I shall investigate regardless.

Where the hell am I gonna get dice?! ::PANIC::