"Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez"

"Let the good times roll," as they say in New Orleans!

Last night was the first run of the Crescent City campaign of Mutants & Masterminds that I have been looking forward to for so long. I was not disappointed! Despite the extremely icy roads we were all able to make it to the game and we had a great time! The game was great, banter was fun, the company was wonderful, and I left with a smile on my face thinking about the events of the evening.

I have been gaming with Eric and the gamemaster Lowell (aka Sander) for 20 years now, Rob for 15, and Scott and Derek for 10. This was my first formal introduction to Will, who was very funny and cool. I thought we played well together. There were certainly laughs. For those of you not familiar with roleplaying games, you have to play your character as if you are acting and directing. Not only do you have to describe the actions of your character, but you have to speak as your character as well. I was using a southern accent (my character is a NOLA native) but I was trying to do a Harry Connick, Jr. impression. Let's just say my accent needs work, but I'll get a handle on it sooner or later. Anyway, the funniest bits of the night came not from when people were speaking in character, but the comments that players were making that their characters might have said were they not superheroes. At one point, Will's character, Anima (sung to the tune of Van Halen's "Panama") was trying to do CPR on a woman who turned out to be dead. For the rest of the evening the running joke was about him kissing a dead woman.

When Eric's character, Metalhead (can change into various metals) introduced himself, we all made that hand sign that rockers use and started head banging. We told him he had to do that every time, but I think it would be funnier if we did it for him.

We often joke about waterboarding in our circle. We all think it's ridiculous to even consider that it's not torture. At one point, after all the bad guys were caught, Rob's character was going to interrogate them to find out who they were working for, etc. Sander said, "They won't talk." Rob replied, "Oh, they'll talk. First, I'll take one of them and strap them to a board..." Sander's eyes lit up as if he thought he was serious, and then saw that he was kidding.

As I've written before, it's the commonalities that we share and the special sense of humor that gamers have that makes these events so much fun. Good-natured ribbing is part of the game, and this one was no exception. Here's to many more evenings just like last night!