I’ve begun the quest for a gaming group, with less-than-spectacular results (though my luck may have just changed.) I posted flyers at game and comic stores in the area, posted on several “Gamer Search” forums, and even posted on the forums for a local game store. I did get one response immediately, but it was for a Dungeons and Dragons game.

Now, I like D&D. I’ve played me a lot of D&D. So much so, in fact, that I’m really burned out on it. I did the two-year campaign with Shepard the Cleric, then I ran the Arnheim game, and I enjoyed both of them, but I’m ready for something different. So I politely declined the invitation, explaining that I was kind of looking for something else.

That seems to have been a mistake. It really looks like everyone in this area that isn’t playing Warhammer is playing D&D. I think part of my problem with finding a group is saying up front that I’d rather do something other than those two games.

This is really frustrating. Go into any game store and there’s hundreds of games, in dozens of genres. Science fiction, espionage, superheroes, mystery, action, horror, wild west, World War 2, pulp adventures, modern-day, etc. Yet I can only find people playing D&D.

The most utterly absurd moment of this was when Dave T. and I went to a gaming convention and signed up for a Star Wars game. At last we’d be able to try out a non-D&D game. Imagine our sheer amusement when the game master decided we were Star Wars characters — on a D&D world! Oh, the humanity! Instead of fighting orcs with swords, we fought them with lightsabers. And yes, there were elves. There’s always elves.

I feel like the guy who can’t seem to convince other people that there are comic books that don’t feature superheroes. Other comic book readers, that is. “Oh sure, I know there’s plenty of non-superhero books — some of them even look pretty good! But superheroes are what I know!”

The irony here is that the current version of D&D — the best one, in my opinion — has a somewhat generic ruleset called “d20″ that has been adapted to a number of different games. So if you know how to play 3rd edition D&D, you know pretty much how to play Spycraft (espionage), Pulp Heroes (pulp adventures), Traveller T20 and Star Wars (science fiction), Deadlands (wild west), Call of Cthulhu (horror), and Mutants and Masterminds (superheroes). So you don’t even have to really learn new rules, just learn how the existing rules fit the genre. But it’s all D&D.

Or, if not D&D, fantasy in general. Companies are still coming out with new game worlds to play in that mostly consist of humans, elves, and dwarves fighting orcs for gold. Yawn. Each one, though, touts its ‘difference’: “this one has ROCK ELVES!” “this one has CANNONS!” “this one has NEW HATS!” To bring back the comics metaphor, it’s like all the comic companies who have ‘brand new’ takes on superheroes, usually involving them swearing or having sex. Superheroes getting their proverbial freak on are still superheroes. Elves that are gregarious and social rather than distant and aloof are still elves.

Role playing games were in a big slump a few years ago. Love ‘em or hate ‘em, through getting people back in game stores with the Magic card game and coming out with d20, Wizards of the Coast has injected new life into the hobby. There’s now scads of new stuff out there. If you don’t like the d20 system, GURPS has tons of sourcebooks in a myriad of different genres. Many generic systems give you a basic ruleset that you can adapt to whatever you want. It’s a great time to be gaming, with all the games and genres available. So how come I can only find people who still want to hit orcs with swords just like 30 years ago?

Well, I may have found another group to hook up with. Again, they’re playing D&D. But I talked to the DM, and he is looking to get something different going on, so maybe there’s hope that eventually we can do something a little different, on the side. At the very least, I’ll be able to start forming a network of game geeks and maybe eventually find ones who want to do something other than D&D. Here’s hoping!

Next: Friends and Family