Since my last missive, we’ve played three more sessions, bringing our total sessions to five. Some general thoughts first about playing a 5th Edition game again (as opposed to running it), followed by a break for spoilers and then session notes at the end.
Firstly, I’d like to say that switching from hand-writing notes to using my tablet and a Bluetooth keyboard has been fantastic. Eliminating the need to go through my notes and decipher them as I type them up has eliminated a major pain point. I remain a steadfast proponent of a shared player document, with a player or players taking notes as a great way to create an easy to reference record of the game. We play every two weeks on Wednesdays but skipped a date as it fell on Halloween and our intrepid DM’s birthday, but having the notes let me quickly recap the previous session when we returned to the game.
With our sixth session tonight, this is the longest I’ve gotten to play a single 5th edition character. I don’t know that 5th edition is my favorite edition to play, but I’ve still enjoyed it. Frankly, the best decision I made about my character was taking this Archaeologist Ideal: Death Wish: Nothing is more exhilarating than a narrow escape from the jaws of death. (Chaotic), which has served as a prompt for me that my character should be active and helping to push the plot forward when otherwise I might hesitate. Instead of giving in to the urge to protect my precious PC at all cost, the ideal reminds me that he should be taking risks, even, or perhaps especially, potentially deadly risks, which means Ordulin Bellweather is jumping onto the backs of Zombie Tyrannosaurus Rexs and rushing forward into trapped areas to test solutions instead of hanging back and watching everything from 120ft away to plink away at foes with Eldritch Bolt.
I’m enjoying playing a warlock, though the spell slots increasing in level rather than in quantity is slightly frustrating in one regard, which is that not every spell scales with level. It’s annoying to have to decide on using a second level spell slot on Shield, which gets no bump from a higher slot or taking an extra hit from a foe to save that slot for Branding Smite which does benefit from that increased spell slot level.
Firstly, I’d like to say that switching from hand-writing notes to using my tablet and a Bluetooth keyboard has been fantastic. Eliminating the need to go through my notes and decipher them as I type them up has eliminated a major pain point. I remain a steadfast proponent of a shared player document, with a player or players taking notes as a great way to create an easy to reference record of the game. We play every two weeks on Wednesdays but skipped a date as it fell on Halloween and our intrepid DM’s birthday, but having the notes let me quickly recap the previous session when we returned to the game.
With our sixth session tonight, this is the longest I’ve gotten to play a single 5th edition character. I don’t know that 5th edition is my favorite edition to play, but I’ve still enjoyed it. Frankly, the best decision I made about my character was taking this Archaeologist Ideal: Death Wish: Nothing is more exhilarating than a narrow escape from the jaws of death. (Chaotic), which has served as a prompt for me that my character should be active and helping to push the plot forward when otherwise I might hesitate. Instead of giving in to the urge to protect my precious PC at all cost, the ideal reminds me that he should be taking risks, even, or perhaps especially, potentially deadly risks, which means Ordulin Bellweather is jumping onto the backs of Zombie Tyrannosaurus Rexs and rushing forward into trapped areas to test solutions instead of hanging back and watching everything from 120ft away to plink away at foes with Eldritch Bolt.
I’m enjoying playing a warlock, though the spell slots increasing in level rather than in quantity is slightly frustrating in one regard, which is that not every spell scales with level. It’s annoying to have to decide on using a second level spell slot on Shield, which gets no bump from a higher slot or taking an extra hit from a foe to save that slot for Branding Smite which does benefit from that increased spell slot level.
We played a session in a local brewery...
