I finally found a way to do it. It wasn’t easy though. It took a lot of skill, charm, and ruthless determination, but I managed to win at D&D. While I was in San Diego at the Comic Con I fought my way through the seething masses (40,000 + a day) to the ballroom hosting rpg play. It was slim pickings with only D&D 4th Edition and Pathfinder being offered, but none the less the place was packed. On the D&D side of things they were offering LFR mods, learn to play with the red box, and 1 hour delves. It was the later that scratched my itch as I found out you could earn points based on team performance that could be traded in for loot. Basically you earned points for monsters killed and encounters completed within the hour time limit. As I lazily scanned the loot table my eyes popped out of my head like some cartoon character getting a glimpse of Bugs Bunny in drag (on a side note does anyone else see that as an erection metaphor or is that just me and my juvenile default to cock?) as I spotted the condition cards. Now the thing is you can’t actually buy these things anywhere as they were originally created as DM rewards back in the day, trust me I have tired. This always seemed strange to me given the prevalence of conditions in the game and a little bit of ball dropping or fondling on WoTC’s part, particularly since the other more popular and better looking half of the company is a card making machine. The great thing about these cards is the awesome artwork on each one depicting and action scene in which said condition is being applied.
When my friend and I sat down at the table we were joined by the standard motley crew, the type of cat that frequents the dark corners of cons, you know a real nerds nerd. With so much riding on the outcome I needed to take stock of the situation and see what kind of hand I had been dealt. I was a little worried when 2 of the players turned out to be relative noobs. That left my sidekick (who I have personally trained in the ways of the 4th edition) and a young dude who said his group stuck with 3.5. He was wearing a paper Magic the Gathering crown and spoke with a little too much denial so I had a hunch he was sandbagging. Something needed to be done as I had a horrific vision of my precious condition cards slowly tumbling from my hands. So I took charge. I quickly and nonchalantly put forth the treatise on focused fire and subtly maneuvered myself into one of the striker pre-gens. What followed was the worst display of bossy boots I have ever witnessed at a gaming table. I was all over the place with “helpful hints, reminders and suggestions”. It was slightly shameful but as the final seconds ticked down and the BBEG fell like a sac of doorknobs I knew I had achieved my goal; I had won at D&D. When the volunteer placed those cards in my hand I felt like Robert Duval in Apocalypse Now as he surveyed the napalmed beach and heard his voice echo in my head “it smells like..victory”.
So that’s it for this week. I will probably post more about the comic con next time with some pictures when I am back into the non-vacation routine.
The Middle-Aged DM 
