One of my players perspective

Bob and I have reconnected on Facebook after years of not seeing each other. He was a Very prominent player from the beginnings of the Mysantia game from it's beginning in Oct of 81. We talk on the phone a couple of times a month and a couple of times a year we get together to play. He called me yesterday and brought up a couple of things from the old days. I put forth my lack of understanding of why peeps were so compelled to play in Mysantia.

"Kids these days are always talking about their magic items, I remember being HAPPY with a ball of rice"

"We struggled and struggled and when we accomplished somethings, a good magic item or going up a level, I really felt like I accomplished something!

Gives me some perspective .

Sanity stat in any D&D

I've looked for YEARS for a way to do this, I think Crypts and Things Remastered is THE way to go with this. Simple and Elegant. I could spoil it here but you peeps need to support D101 games, they are doing AWESOME stuff(although I am basing this solely on Remastered). C&T Sanity system I think will work well in actual play, we shall see.......

Evolution of a Killer DM 1B: A Players Perspective

Bob and I have reconnected on Facebook after years of not seeing each other. He was a Very prominent player from the beginnings of the Mysantia game from it's beginning in Oct of 81. We talk on the phone a couple of times a month and a couple of times a year we get together to play. He called me yesterday and brought up a couple of things from the old days. I put forth my lack of understanding of why peeps were so compelled to play in Mysantia.

"Kids these days are always talking about their magic items, I remember being HAPPY with a ball of rice"

"We struggled and struggled and when we accomplished somethings, a good magic item or going up a level, I really felt like I accomplished something!

Gives me some perspective .

The Cheating DM: Player Death

Ok so we've established my cheating ways. How do I justify player death? The short answer is mostly I can't. I haven't killed a PC in the longest time. There actually have been complaints. Came very close this week thou, critical hit on Stone Mage put him 1 hp from death. It's something I've grown so soft on. I almost always reserve PC death to poor playing and very special boss encounters (That I have completely stated out) The 21 yr old me would be MYSTIFIED by the games I run today. I am planning on bringing back the "soirit a littel thou. We'll all see if I pull the trigger on this.

Evolution of a Killer DM 1 :The Brutal Begining

In October of 1981 I started the Mysantia game that would ultimately run for 31 yrs as a weekly game.
I was a Killer DM, death was frequent. Starting all chars at First and making them roll hp, several were forced to play w/ 1 HP. WE were playing at a community collage and we played 6-8 times a week.
The players were fanatical. The city of Mysantia was heavily influenced by the Thieves World books.Not many TPKs(none that I can think of) but many sessions would end in 2-4 deaths.Treasure was near non existant, they often adventured for food. Looking back I am amazed that the players put up with the cut throat street level adventures I ran. I caused several peeps to fail out of college because we played around my class schedule, not anybody else's.  It's one of the things that proves to me I am a compelling DM else they never would have put up with it.

Shortest lived PC in Mysantia

Ok so my younger nephew rolled up a character late, we were just about to start a big fight w/ multiple dragons. I told him to put himself anywhere on the map. He placed himself directly behind the barbarian who was attacking the biggest dragon.Dragon wins initiative to start fight, breathes and kills the new first level fighter. PC lived exactly 1/2 of one round. Looking back on the incident, I barely remember it, so I don't know if I was being an ass or not. Probably. That was back in my "killer DM " days. More on that later

My WEIRDEST TPK

Two man 1st L party going into my dungeon, Fighter and MU I believe. Almost immediately they are met by 4 hp, short sword armed skeleton. Very, Very, Very long fight ends in TPK. We quit for the night. Also the shortest session I ever ran about 30 min.

My Most Controversial TPK

The year was 1987 and the Mysantia game was in it's 6th year. The players were 5th Level(very high L for me around this time). The players were full of themselves because they were at the "lofty" level and loaded with magic items. I decided to knock them down a peg with a super organized, low level major threat: The Bloodbath Orcs.

The orcs all had 8 hp and were lead by a death knight , who was the equivalent of one of the 8 or so pcs. The orcs had crossbow orcs each  with 2 females to reload. The warrior types slit the throats of unconscious PCs.

The PCs saw they were "only" fighting orcs, and underestimated them from the beginning, that is until the first throat got slit, then they panicked and proceeded to let the orcs decimate them .

The PC Mage was prob most responsible for the TPK, he was sloppy but most of all he had 2 scrolls., each of which was capable of ending the encounter in the parties favor but he refused to use them and his fireball was horribly used.

To this day the players remember this and say it was deliberate on my part, I admit it was a tough encounter. Ijust smile and remember the truth.
(Damn, Ive used my 3 posts for the day!)