Everybody walk the dinosaur. Well, except for you. You’re not working out.

I have no idea what the title of this post has to do with the content of this post. In fact, I think there's no relation at all, other than the fact that I wrote them both. But when your brain compels you to quote Was (not Was), it's best to just do what it says, and slip in a Simpsons reference if you can manage it.

So. Moving on.

RinCon was awesome this weekend. The delves were a huge success, even though both parties managed to finish them, despite my best efforts to kill them all. I am absolutely going to run Child's Play Charity delves at future cons (and may even organize a special event here in Los Angeles at a local game shop, if enough people commit to playing) and those delves will all be of my own original creation, because running these two delves and listening to our D&D Podcast has made me want to write and run a campaign more than at any other time in my life. I know I keep going on and on about how easy it is to pick up and play 4e, but … dude, it is so easy to pick up, play, and run 4e, the only reason I'm not playing every week is because I haven't had the time to do it. (Fun fact: we had players in both delves who were totally new to 4e – one of them hadn't even played since 2nd edition! – and it took all of about 5 minutes to get them into the swing of things. I know 4e has its detractors, but I just love it that this system is so easy for new players to pick up, whether they're PCs or DMs.)

I had an incredible time playing a lot of new games, as well as many of my old favorites. I especially enjoyed an indie game called Castle Panic
, and an unreleased game from SJ Games that I wish I could tell you all about. I also picked up a storytelling game called A Penny For My Thoughts
that I think was the sleeper hit of the convention. The Rock Band party was also a lot of fun, and some of you may be interested to know that James Ernest is an absolute beast on the drums.

A full con report, including some various thoughts I had about gaming at cons and why they are such an important part of our community is forthcoming, probably as this month's Geek in Review column.

Now, on to business:

My episode of The Big Bang Theory airs next Monday, October 19, on CBS. Yes, I'm excited enough about this to use the silly bold letters in my blog. Yes, this also means that I won't get to watch it live because I'll be performing at w00tstock San Francisco while it airs, but it also means that those of you who wanted to see w00tstock San Francisco on Monday but could only get tickets for Tuesday can still get your USRDA of Wil Wheaton sightings (snort) without ever leaving the comfort of your own home. Because, um, that sounds funny in my head.

SPOILER ALERT! Info about my episode of The Big Bang Theory follows:

The ‘Star Trek: TNG’ alum is guesting next week as a nastier version of himself. And as it turns out, this Wil Wheaton has a longstanding rivalry with Sheldon. How did this geektastic casting come to be? Says Kunal Nayyar (Raj), “The writers were discussing, ‘Who would be a good villain for Sheldon?’ just as Wil Wheaton was writing into them, saying how much he loves the show.”

(via)

Okay, the final bit of business before I hit publish and go to work on the Memories of the Future release post and a few related bits: the project I've been working on that I wasn't sure if I could talk about, has been revealed. I'm voicing Bill Willingham's Peter & Max: A Fables Novel. It's been a delight to spend five hours a day exploring Bill's world and brining his characters to life, and we're going to have something very special when the whole project is completed.

“…tactical terrain for building utilizable dioramas”

Gabe:

The box of Dwarven Forge
stuff I ordered showed up yesterday, and when Kara saw it she told me
it looked like a dollhouse for boys. I laughed and explained that it
was actually tactical terrain for building utilizable dioramas.

This afternoon as I was placing the
tiny mugs of ale in the tavern I had built, my mind drifted back to her
words from yesterday. I shook my head to clear the thought. Come on,
this is clearly not a dollhouse. I chuckled softly to myself as I
placed the miniature basket of butter-horns on one of the wooden
tables. Dollhouses are for girls.

In my day we didn't have awesome sculpted terrain and hand-painted miniature figures! We had graph paper and our imagination, and we liked it!

Well, except for when we started playing Warhammer 40K, and we had shoeboxes filled with terrain, and foam-filled suitcases to carry our Chaos Marine armies.

…man, now I want to play D&D, and I want to paint minis.

in which i find something unexpected during a Journey Through The Silver Caves

This weekend, I had a last-minute change in plans, and discovered that I had the free time to go play in World Wide D&D Game Day, which was set up by Wizards of the Coast to promote the release of the Monster Manual 2.

I went to my friendly local game shop, where I was able to join a session that was just starting out. I picked a Dwarf Paladin, because I've never played either of those things before, and I thought it would be pretty fun. As it turned out, I was correct. Even though it was a dungeon crawl with people I didn't know, I role-played the Dwarf, as they said in Sherman Oaks in 1983, like totally to the max.

Anyway, it was a lot of fun, even though I had to leave before the final encounter because — you know, it's easier if I just tell the story:

Having dispatched the dreaded Rust Monsters in the second encounter, we turned our focus onto the godddamn beetles who kept immobilizing me and the Tiefling. I was getting ready to use one of my daily powers when my phone rang.

I saw that it was Nolan, and sent the call to voice mail, planning to call him back when the encounter was over. He called again, and I ignored it again. When he called a third time, I figured that something important was happening and he really needed my attention.

"Hey Nolan what's –"

"I need you to come pick me up right now and take me and Calvin to the hospital."

My heart jumped into my throat. "What!? What happened? Are you okay?"

"Calvin fell out of a tree and broke his collar bone. His parents are gone and you're the last last last last resort. I know you're playing D&D, but can you help us?"

My heart dropped back to its normal place in my chest. "Yes. I'll be right there."

I told the guys I was playing with what had happened. Luckily, my friend Martin had just come into the store to meet me, so I handed my character over to him. I reminded him to keep role playing heavily, and make sure he didn't roll higher than 7, just to keep things consistent.

I left, and spent the next few hours taking care of Nolan's friend (who was ultimately fine, but isn't going to be climbing any trees for a few weeks.)

When I got home, I called Martin and asked him how the rest of the adventure went. He told me that Eomer (the Dwarf we played) pulled off some last-minute heroics, and the PCs ended up "winning" the delve:

"That Eomer is a bad mother -"

"Shut your mouth!"

"I'm talking about Eomer!"

"I can dig it."

All of this is preamble to the whole reason I'm writing about it, though. I read this gaming blog called critical-hits. It's awesome, and if you like RPGs, you should read it to.

Anyway, there's a post today about playing the WWD&DGD, written by a guy who ran the delve.

The adventure was Journey Through The Silver Caves, a
straightforward dungeon-crawl that puts the PCs on the trail of a
kobold wyrmpriest who stole an important book of prophecy from a local
fortress. (I will spoil some about the adventure, so if you’re planning
on playing through it at some point later, consider yourself warned).
The PCs meet at the fortress and receive information about what they’re
seeking, the caves nearby, and most importantly, their reward. I
explained that the PCs had traveled together for a short time, but were
forgetful about each other and so should make short, awkward
introductions about their race and profession before continuing. After
the typical introduction around the table, the group arrived at the
caves.

Brief interlude about the D&D game days: I love the Wizards does these things, because it helps build the gaming community in a number of ways. An obvious one is making it really easy for new players to give tabletop RPGs a try, but a less-obvious one that I don't hear people talk about is how fun it is for all of us who play, all over the world, to share our individual experiences playing the same characters in the same encounters. It's so fun to hear how some other party handled the rust monsters, for example, and how other players who chose Eomer decided to use his powers.

Okay, back to the reason I wrote this post: I was reading the post at critical-hits, enjoying myself thoroughly, and then I saw this picture near the end of the post. I may have let out a little squeal of joy, because the DM was wearing the shirt I designed for shirt.woot.

I love that. I love that so much, I wanted to share it with the world. Which I just did.

So there.