Features// Michael Fox's Table Top Gaming Column

Hello loves! Are you ready to learn about The Fear? Sit yourself down and have a read.

Last weekend I did something I'd not done before – I ran a D&D game. While I recover though, you can read this... I wrote this just before... I know, I know, you're shocked. A nerd like me, over thirty seven years on this godforsaken rock and I've never been a DM? It's a sad thing to admit to, it's true, but (to the best of my recollections) I haven't ever put on my robe and wizard hat, shined up my d20 and butchered a party of amateurish adventurers in cold blood. Come this weekend, all that's going to change.

Excuse me for a moment. A little bit of poo just came out.

*Ahem*

I'm not exactly a novice. I've run a few RPGs in the past; GURPS, Marvel Super Heroes, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the one by Palladium, that was AMAZING), even half of a Doctor Who adventure with Editor Tim of SPOnG over a really shoddy net connection. I've played in countless others including plenty of Dungeons & Dragons but in a couple of days I'll be going to the source. Well, the fourth edition of the source, anyway. And I am really quite terrified.

For once I don't just have to show up and play. Now I have responsibility. It takes a certain kind of gamer to take the lead in a D&D game. You've got to know the rules, of course, but those take up only the smallest amount of the load that you bear as a Dungeon Master. You need the ability to think on the bounce, to react to the decisions of your players while keeping the adventure moving. You need creativity. You need bloody voices.

(Actually, you don't really need to do voices but in all the games I've played I've always enjoyed interacting with the DM as they adopt new characters and guises. Inexplicably, dwarves are always Scottish, no matter who's in charge of the game. Weird.)

So, yes. I am scared of what's going to happen but thankfully The Fear is tempered with no little excitement. One of the reasons I love RPGs is that you never know what the players are going to do, and when you're playing with friends who you've known for years it's even better – you know their level, what kinds of jokes will work and what will fall on its face. I could never do this with strangers. I wouldn't have the balls to. I need discussion and fun around the table when I'm playing, I need creative minds who aren't afraid to take a really bloody odd route to solving a problem.

After all, that's what makes it fun. I'd happily do an entire session of a role playing game without a single roll of a dice. The important part is the story, and that's what D&D should be – an exercise in collaborative storytelling.

The only problem is... well, it's me. For a couple of people, this is going to be their first time ever playing in an RPG and I really do not want to screw it up for them. I'm going to try and do absolutely everything I can to make sure that it's as enjoyable an experience for them as possible but what happens if they don't like it? Is that down to me, the system, the adventure that I've chosen, the way the dice fell, the choice of crisps...WHAT DID I DO WRONG?

Perhaps I'm putting too much thought into the whole damn thing but I really want this to go well. I'm trying to keep the actually adventure as straightforward as possible – at most there's only going to be three or four separate encounters for the heroes to deal with, and like I say it's the first time for a couple of them. Hopefully it'll be a good learning experience for everyone. Hopefully no-one will swallow any d4s – those bastards are spiky – and we'll all have a good time.

Of course, all the best super fun times only happen after meticulous planning, so: here's the plan. We're all going to sit down with some lovely hefty books (namely the D&D 4th Edition Players Manual) on Saturday evening and roll some characters.

None of the pre-generated shite that you get in the starter set – my players are going to have free reign to create whatever they like (as long as they're level one). If they fancy building a slightly deranged sentient robot with a predeliction for stealing shiny stuff, then so be it (although my wife has already done that in a previous campaign). Depressed half-Orc? Camp barbarian? Let's do it. Whatever floats your boat.

Making your own characters is important; it gives you ownership of your part of the story. There's no problem in using ones that came pre-prepared, but where's the fun in that? Doing your own means you get to create them from the ground up, giving them backstory and flaws, fleshing them out and turning them from mere words into a little piece of you. Albeit one with a bloody massive sword.

Come Sunday, there'll be a bit of lunch and a brief rundown on how combat works. There will be ceremonial presentations to the newbies of Their First Official d20s.Then our heroes will wander into an inn that doesn't exist outside of our collective imaginations and start what will hopefully be a fantastic adventure.

Only then will The Fear disappear for good, letting me get on with my job – which in this case is hurling a metric fuckton of goblins in their way while trying to keep the heroes on the right path... it should prove interesting at least.