The Keep on the Borderlands

I believe I've mentioned before how Monkey Girl and Fairy Girl have been enchanted by the siren song of the online MMO Wizard 101. Since their parents are cheap, they've only played the limited free areas, but have been clamoring for paid accounts to move beyond the limited arena combat they spend most of their online time playing. Hoping for a distraction, I showed Monkey Girl my old Dungeons & Dragons books and modules a few weeks ago, and the urge to play this strange game with books, paper and oddly-shaped dice grew until she was pestering me incessantly.

So, over the course of several nights this week, in between Girl Scouts and piano lessons and the like, we rolled up some characters for the girls. Monkey Girl is a half-elf fighter/thief. Fairy Girl is an elf magic user/thief (you can see they go for the elfin multi-class schtick). Yours truly, in addition to being the DM, rolled up a cantankerous dwarven cleric/fighter, because I like to be ornery and know full well that healing spells will be needed early and often. With all that out of the way, tonight we started our first campaign.

Remeber the classic old B2 module, "The Keep on the Borderlands"? Yeppers, that's what they're experiencing for the first time, much the same as thousands of gamers before them. The girls got to the keep, were challenged by the guards and made their way to the tavern where they rented a room and met up with my dwarf. Monkey Girl picked up on the DM's narrative clues right away and pursued the path to adventure with gusto. Fairy Girl took a bit longer to get into the spirit, standing in the doorway giggling a lot, hiding under her bed in the tavern room and generally trying to avoid any interaction with any of the NPCs. She loosened up a great deal once they reached the Caves of Chaos and barbecued a squad of attacking orcs with a "Burning Hands" spell. Unfortunately, after just two encounters with orcs in the first cave, my dwarf has already exhausted his supply of healing spells. Uh-oh. Once gameplay resumes, the party will likely beat a hasty retreat to recharge the old batteries and spells while recruiting additional fighters/cannon fodder to come along on future excursions.

Hopefully, Fairy Girl will keep the giggling down to a minimum.

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