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Also how long ago was it?

I am asking to see where gamers are coming from in the past and presently.

You make me to feel old making video games an option.

I started because of a friend. It was 1986 (or 1988 ). It was AD&D first edition. Later I was introduced to Palladium Fantasy RPG and TMNT and other from Palladium's games.

My cousins got me started in about '77 or '78. If gaming was a career I could've retired with over 30 years experience by now.

Gypsy-Dancer wrote:My husband got me started.
It helped me to learn English better. I also read all of his game-world novels and the game-books, when I wasn't studying.

Yep it really helps me to learn it better. When I first started playing all I did was look at the pictures and fumble through the text understanding probably less than half from it.

Back in 1984 I played in a D+D game once. It was a horrible experience.
11 year olds with no 'guiding' older gamer to help, made the GM look at D+D maps and come up with his own adventure, which consisted on me being lvl 1 warrior facing a dragon and dying.

A little later I saw the Robotech RPG colour ad in a GI Joe comic. I loved the Robotech cartoon and begged my mom to send PB a check.

That lead to many checks in the mail to PB (and letters+reponses-we had no LGS) for more Robotech and then PFRPG for me. TMNT, HU, and N+S for my brother. I got BTS then Rifts. PB is really what led to everything else I experienced, including writing my own fantasy RPG. I had about a 10 year hiatus from PB (A little after PFRPG 2nd ed.-It was nothing like I hoped and wanted), but recently got sentimental and got my group to go back to doing a dual Rifts-BTS-2 'dream cross-over' game.

*I checked both friend and my own, because I first gamed with a friend, but never would have been a gamer if that was it. It took my own buying Robotech that turned me hard-core-this-is-my-life for 10 or so years. Now it is my hobby, I won't die without gaming, but its fun to do with friends.

A friend got me started in d&d back in the mid eighties and then another friend of mine showed us the original heroes unlimted book which got us hooked since then.

My father indirectly started my RPG experience. He was(and still is)an avid reader. I started reading a collection of Hardy Boys and Perry Rhodan books he had. One day while going through one of his boxes of books I found the first two Robotech novels. I was thirteen(1989). After I read those two novels, I was hooked! I read the entire series over that summer. Wow! What a magical time. This post is bringing back so many good memories. I became the biggest Robotech geek ever after that and tried to get my hands on anything Robotech. If I remember correctly, I saw an add in a Robotech comic for the game. I immediately went out and bought it. None of my friends at the time were RPG'ers so I set about converting them so I would have someone to play with. A few years later whilst looking for the new Robotech sourcebook I discovered Rifts. The rest is history.

Ye gods, it was back in high school. Our science teacher got a few of us together and we started playing AD&D. It was actually kinda fun.
I eventually branched out into MSH, TMNT, Robotech, HU and a few others.

in 1987 a friend introduced me to Dungeons&Dragons.

I'm a SDF-Macross fan so I got the RT ed1 game books about 4-5 years before a friend got me gaming.
about 15 years now with about 10 of it on-line

However, back in the early 80's, I played some D&D for a summer, but lost interest in it after that because I was playing with my older brother and his friends and that broke up & it took the friends I didn't have to actually play the game.

summer camp

My Dad sent me to one without electricty or any other other modern amenites.

every summer growing up.

The nights we were actually in the camp and had free time we didn't have much else to do other than play PF. I don't think that class is even around anymore. This was in the early nintes mostly. Playing by lantern or by the fireplace oh joy.

csbioborg wrote:Playing by lantern or by the fireplace oh joy.

I've had some (brief) conversations about this with people here. I love it a lot and got to play by flashlight in tents due to the pouring rain over the weekend (our little hiking trip was rain from start to finish... ick); we had to put our two tends nose-to-nose and cover the gap with some ponchos. We played PF. The story was pretty simple: one of the PCs was a spoiled Noble and we composed the party hired by his family to show him around pretty much anywhere he wanted to go.

funny story

the cabin doors were half dooe up to your waist.
so we are playing in our cabin (six man to a cabin). We are doing a battle when we hear a scream and some cursing. We look out and the cabin near by had a bear hanging over the door.

The genius next door hand't listened to the 20 or so lectures on no food in the cabins becasue of bears.

csbioborg wrote:funny story

the cabin doors were half dooe up to your waist.
so we are playing in our cabin (six man to a cabin). We are doing a battle when we hear a scream and some cursing. We look out and the cabin near by had a bear hanging over the door.

The genius next door hand't listened to the 20 or so lectures on no food in the cabins becasue of bears.

It was you wasn't it?

I kid!

I like this story very much.

Friend got me started into AD&D back in 1985.

Still got the character sheet for my first character around here too...

Friend pulled me to it as I was getting frustrated and bored with DD back in 1989.

I actually voted for "Friend" because I started playing 1st Edition D&D in 1980 (I was , but I stopped from 1982 until I started playing Marvel Super Heroes RPG in 1988. Then I remembered 'The Gates of Barrador' on the PLATO computers at Chanute AFB way back in 1976. This was a Text-Only computer RPG based on the Lord of the Rings; my dad used to take me and my sister over there every week to play on the network. But, then again, it wasn't really a video game since it was Text-Only, so I guess I was right to say 'Friend.'

When I was in 4th grade (1981 or so), my best friend introduced me to D&D. He moved away a year or so later and I spent a couple years reading the books and dreaming up adventures, until I introduced some friends I made in Jr. High to D&D and Marvel Super Heroes and MERP. We didn't start playing any Palladium games until Freshman year in High School--first Robotech, then PF & TMNT.

Ø

Friend's b-day party back in '95 or '96, he convinced his older brother to run a game for his guests. I've been hooked ever since, playing under that same GM over several BSA summer camps, and finally starting to GM when another friend got the books and decided he couldn't run.

I guess I should have known I'd end up where I am today when James and I stayed up nearly until dawn developing our own RPG after that first game...

Natasha wrote:You make me to feel old making video games an option.

I started because of a friend. It was 1986 (or 1988 ). It was AD&D first edition. Later I was introduced to Palladium Fantasy RPG and TMNT and other from Palladium's games.

That would be 1988.

I put down Friend as my first actual game was because of a mate in high school in about '84 or '85. He asked if I played D&D. I said no, but I had been wanting to play it for years.

This goes back even further, a date that's murky in time. I don't recall the year, I was just a wee tyke. But I saw an ad on tv about this game that you played with your mates, where you could be a knight or mage, fighting ogres, dragons and the like. I was hooked. Only saw that ad twice on tv. Never saw it again.

And everyone I've ever mentioned that story to, have no idea of what I'm talking about. RPG's being advertised on tv? It would have had to be around '78 or so. And no, it wasn't for the cartoon.

It was way back in the early '80's and a friend introduced me to D&D. Then Robotech came out on TV. Then I saw the Robotech game being advertised in comics. Then I finally got to play the game. And that's what got me into Palladium.

It seems almost as if I've come full circle. Right now I'm mostly playing D&D 3.5 but with no interest in 4th edition it seems just a matter of time before I'll be looking for something else to play. And there will be Palladium.

Back in 4th grade (1982?) a friend brought the Basic D&D set to show-and-tell and we played it with a couple other friends in the gym.
Something about the artwork and the simplicity of making choices in a story while rolling these funny shaped dice captured my imagination.

And I'm still hooked.

I got started back around 1989 or 1990 (can't remember exactly) with some friends who I found playing and asked if I could join in. It was some D&D. I also playing with my dad and brother a couple of times. Then during high school I made friends with a guy who played HU and also others who played Rifts so I played a bit. DIdn't do anying gaming though college and uni and only recently in the last couple of years got back into it with a friend who I introduced to HU.

I think that another kid in my third grade GATE class introduced me to D&D but it's been too much wiskey and wild women over the years.

I grew up watching my brother play D&D while he baby sat me. I think the first PB game I got in to was Robotech because I was a huge fan, but i was 11 or 13 cant rember, then I found out about Rift's and was hooked in 2000 I actually played many games and have a 3 year vetren PC. in 07 my GM went to iraq and I moved out of town so havent been playing since....

To thinK I rember the cartoon when I was young and growing up my brother told me that japan is like that. sad thing is I actually belived him and thought that japan was this super city with robots mechs and faught aliens...

Basic D&D box set. Me and some friends played in the school library St. Mary's Catholic School.

My character was killed by another PC before our first encounter. His reason? "I'm Chaotic!"

Brian

Me and several friends who collected comic books saw the TMNT RPG; as we were big fans of the cartoon, comics & movies - 2 copies were bought to be shared. And the rest is history. So easily 20 yrs of playing PB And no more than a year off at a time, perhaps total of 3yrs off over that 20yrs, which includes 2 marriages, 2 breakups, birth of a child and working 2-3 jobs in addition to being a single mom.

You need an option for "other".

In 7th grade, we had this thing called "Student Appreciation Day". It was a fun day but not a free day. You still had to come to school and do stuff. But we had a lot of crap to do. One of the less popular options was learning how to role-play with the owner of the local Great Goblin running a game. He taught us Middle-Earth Role-Playing.
I liked it.
When noon rolled around and I was supposed to get on the bus for Activity 2 (bowling) I chose to stay behind. Had even more fun.
Next year they didnt have that option, so I went bowling the whole day.

I'd say that one even changed my life. My role-playing experience up to that point had been Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior.
The only downside is I often spend a lot of time on computer forums arguing about what real RPG's are.

the only danger their is that you may over develope it to the point of invariability and rail roading. but if you are simply dveloping the setting then I think you will do fine

Wow. It was 1991 and I was a sophomore in high school in Southern Oregon. I had no friends to speak of and had always the victim of an overactive imagination. One day in the library I happened to see a group of about a half dozen players gathered around a table in a corner. They were all seniors, so naturally I was too nervous to approach them, so I sat at a nearby table and kind of eaves dropped for a couple of sessions. Eventually the GM, a truly cool guys named Mike Martin noticed me and called me over. He said they were playing something called Palladium Fantasy RPG and did I want to join? I said I would and so he had his best friend sit with me and help create my first character, a human ranger named Falcon (who is still my primary today) and they started to teach me the rules. I grew to love the game with a passion that actually surprised me, but it lead Mike to realize that he had a good person to pass the mantle of GM on to. I wound up purchasing his books from him shortly before he graduated and have been running the games ever since. That's about seventeen years now and I still hae a loyal group, mostly family, that I play with frequently. Some of you have seen, and commented on, my various submissions here on the forums and eventually I plan to see publication by the company itself. I love this game... it changed my life. I went from a tall, lanky nerd with no friends to a tall, lanky nerd with a fan following of more than fifty throughout the years. (Not all at once, but that's about how many different people I've gamed with in my life.) I owe PF a lot. It's been a great outlet.

I popped out of the womb with a D20 in my hand, 20-side up.

Killer Cyborg wrote:I popped out of the womb with a D20 in my hand, 20-side up.

You lie!! We all know you came off a factory production line.

My folks got me my first RPG. D&D box set in either 77 or 78. I don't remember either. So I've been on of those lifers, I'll probably game until the day I die. Although I was a war gamer before that playing all of the war Games I could get my fingers on.

in 1995, on the playstation. started rifts in 2000. I now have, like, 1000 dollars(actually more) in palladium products. somewhere between 1300 and 1600 dollars, I haven't taken inventory in a while.

it was a friend that got me started playing D@D the first ed. then went on to other games then found RIFTS. I think it was in 1983 or 1984 in the summer time.

My stepbrother got me into AD&D back in the early 80s. I was trying to continue my adventures with my Legos in RPG from. After seeing Robotech on TV, years later in 89 I got my first PB RPG book Robotech: Southern Cross & into RPGs. (I also learn how to read better from RPGs Thanks PB)

I think it was the early 1980's, I was still in school and the two science teachers gathered a few of the brightest in their class and started up a lunch-period D&D game. Ah, good times, good times.
Later, this branched out, for me anyway, into MSH, TMNT, Robotech, Shadowrun, Heroes Unltd. and Rifts.
I did find a rare 3rd edition of KILLER on Ebay a while back.

Panalties for female characters?? What?
Never heard of it.

Anyhow as for gender benders I don't allow it. I know some people can pull it off but too many can't and I'd rather not just tell someoen look you suck at it don't play it.
Also they think they are being creative somehow by playing a dude with breasts. I have never met a gender bender who was willing to play a non-lesbian female character who got into romantic moments with male NPCs

It isn't creative. It's just lame. It isn't offbeat, it isn't cool, it isn't surprising, it isn't shocking, it isn't "mind freaking" it is just some guy playing anatomical female with big guns, bug "guns", katanas, and suped up hyper bikes
Are there variations yes. Are they enough to change my mind no.

if you can't come up with an interesting character short of sex changes, then it is your fault. Gender is only a part of a PC, history, tormented presents, looming futures, bad relationships, family problems etc.

Hi, my character's name is Gregroy Filman. He was in the army for a few years to pay for college. Unbeknownst to him he was genetically screened for a super soldier program. Takign the lure of extra money for college and a fat bonus, for "minor" invasive testing I was wisked away to a government lab. They wouldn't tell me where we were going, when I would be back, nothing.
After several, I want to say weeks, but it could have just as easily been days or months, of injections, dermal peels, endurance tests, shock therapy, psychological profiling and extended training, they let us see the light of day again. Some of the 20 members of the original squad made it. Only 4 of us survived. My only friend through the ordeal was laid low during a training session with live ammo. His muscles siezed due to the enhancements and he couldn't stop firing, endangering everyone else around. I knew what I had to do and didn't want to. I lined up my shot and put a bullet in his head. I will never forget the look of horror as his arm wouldn't respond to his commands. Desperately trying to regain control as he knew what must be coming if he didn't. I see him less and less in my nightmares but he is one of my first ghosts. After the precess was complete they wanted us to attain plausible covers, lives. I went to schoola nd had government backing for when I couldn't attend class due to special calls. I got married and I lie to my wife every day. We have a kid on the way now and I know that if my identity gets out they are targets. I try not to think about the day that must come when someone tells her I won't be coming hom, or worse yet, she never finds out that the bits of my corpse will be spread over some foreign lands battle field, left to rot as we never existed anyway
good job
And you Sammy?
Yeah I got an ancient master who is a master of Ninjistu with a kick ass sword and and kawasaki Ninja, get it. She is 1000 years old but look like a hot 21 year old. She wears kevlar miniskirts and cammo halters. Her other favorite weapon is her 90mm recoilless rifle that her father gave her on her 10th birthday which she practiced with to perfection.
Isn't this your last character?
No this my last character's daughter, Samantha FoxyDeathBreaze-igama

Capt. Amundson wrote:Maybe you fine folks can answer something for me. When I started gaming, there were very few women gamers. I didn't want to take the stat hits that came with playing a female character, so I generally played male characters. And after a while, none of the guys complained about my running a man, so I ceased to think of it.

Took a hiatus, and came back to gaming in the late '80s/early '90s. Of course, first game I roll up a male character only to discover that most of the guys at the table are running women. How, when, and why did this happen?

I haven't been around quite as long as you but I remember penalties for female characters. As for guys playing female characters, I haven't seen it being terribly common although it happens more often than it used to. I might find one male player per gaming table playing a female character. I find just as many female players using male characters (when I find female players, that is).

Personally, I think it's just fantasy and role exploration and I have no particular bias against it. As long as a player doesn't get obnoxious (and most I've encountered aren't... except one female and one male player I've run into) I don't see it as a problem and certainly allow it at my table.

You do encounter those who do have a strong bias against cross-gendered characters for whatever reason. Can't say I've ever gamed with anyone like that though. It boils down to different strokes for different folks.

1982 D&D Basic Rules (Orangish-colored Box)

1986 Robotech RPG followed by 1988 TMNT & Other Strngeness and HU Revised--that's what cemented my love of Palladium.

I voted on my own/By accident.

Way back in the day, 86-86, Battletech used to be sold in a wide variety of stores, including K-marts and toy stores. I remember seeing the huge boxes with the Warhammer/Robotech Excaliber on the cover. Since it had all the Robotech markings, I thought they were models or toys or something and begged my parents to buy one for me. They, of course, always said no. So as with all things, they eventually disappeared off the shelves. Then years later I was visiting a comic book store a couple miles from my house, and while drooling over the latest Iron Man comic, I saw one of those boxes on a shelf in the back of the store. I spent the whole summer summer saving up cash, and building up favors with my mother, so that I could make a special trip out to the store in the middle of nowhere. So it was that in the summer of 1989 I purchased a copy of Battletech, having no clue as to what it was, and wondering why the box had only cardstock and books inside, instead of the plastic model or toys I always imagined (yeah, 13 years old, a book nerd, and I didn't read the label).
I played it a couple of times with my sister during our summer trip to Colorado, during which she beat me in every battle (then swore never to play with me again). That September I went to high school, and as luck would have it, my school had a gaming group. We played Battletech, Aerotech, F-16, and various other board games on our mixed group days, but mostly the upper classmen played AD&D, and the rest of us played Robotech and TMNT. I remember when Rifts first came out we played one session, then dropped it because we felt it was too overpowered when compared to Robotech. We hated that Rifts pretty much had no place for SDC. Go figure....

After high school, I pretty much played AD&D exclusively, until, on a whim in '98, I placed a bid for someone's Rifts collection on eBay, and won. The rest is history.

Capt. Amundson wrote:Maybe you fine folks can answer something for me. When I started gaming, there were very few women gamers. I didn't want to take the stat hits that came with playing a female character, so I generally played male characters. And after a while, none of the guys complained about my running a man, so I ceased to think of it.

Took a hiatus, and came back to gaming in the late '80s/early '90s. Of course, first game I roll up a male character only to discover that most of the guys at the table are running women. How, when, and why did this happen?

That's hilarious, cause I used to run female characters for the longest time. I did it for two reasons: 1) it always used to throw the DM and the other players off when it came to their interactions in the gaming world. When I game, I like to immerse myself in the roleplaying aspect of the character, and a female character is going to look at a situation differently than a male character, no matter how much you buff her up to be. So by being different, I made the DMs and players approach a situation from a more roundabout way than the usual bull in a china shop method that most players use. 2) I liked drawing pictures of my characters more when they are female versus male.

Back in the late '80 in middle school, I saw a bunch of guys playing TMNT in the school cafeteria and I asked what they were doing and the GM said I could sit in and give it a try since some of their regular players were MIA. He handed me a mutant skunk and by the next day I had rolled up a mutant gerbil and started playing in earnest. From there I moved on to Robotech and eventually Rifts. Funny thing is that I bought the Rifts main book when it came out but really didn't look much at it until about a year later and now I have every book in the Palladium catalogue and it only took over 20 years to do it.

Sleepover with a guy I met in church when I was... 11..12.... I don't think I was in high school yet. His older brother had the Battletech rpg and ran a solo game where I played this guy in a tank, I ended up leaving the tank to set explosive trip wire, and then hijacked a tank to to take out the defenses of this base. I don't remember if there was any storyline or motivation to my actions. I remember clearly though what the tanks looked like in my mind's eye. I remember how I blinded the sensors on the tank so that someone would peak out and I could streal the tank. I remember the sense of accomplishment that rivaled anything I've ever done before. And, most of all I remember running... which as crippled kid... I was hooked.

Though it was about 4 years later in high school that I played a game of 2nd edition AD&D and revitalized that brief spark. I got on e-bay, not really sure about the difference in things and bought Palladium Fantasy, I ran a few games in high school for friends here and there. I'm not sure how I ended up with a library of books with the small ammount of gaming I actually got into, but yeah. That's how it started.

Late 1979, I actually bought the D&D Basic set for my sister whose friends played. She looked it over but wasn't really interested, I was. The rules were really kind of a strain for me ( I was 6), but I really enjoyed the game. Most of my friends were older than me and I got them into it. Haven't stopped since.

Met most of my close friends through gaming, and my sife through one of them..... of course my wife also games.

Unlike alot of you folks, I began with video games; the old nintendo, with mario world and duck hunt. Later I got a game called Swords & Serpents (guess what that was a copy of ) which really got me in to the whole fantasy/dungeon crawl thing. I basically played strictly video games until I was 16. Then with the help of a friend and my own interest I persued the table-top genre. It's been a favorite of mine ever since, even if I don't get to play as often as I want.

Dog_O_War wrote:Unlike alot of you folks, I began with video games; the old nintendo, with mario world and duck hunt. Later I got a game called Swords & Serpents (guess what that was a copy of ) which really got me in to the whole fantasy/dungeon crawl thing. I basically played strictly video games until I was 16. Then with the help of a friend and my own interest I persued the table-top genre. It's been a favorite of mine ever since, even if I don't get to play as often as I want.

I remember Swords and Serpents.
It was a ***** to play, and having to enter 5 passwords every time you started back up was a pain.
But for some reason I kept going back to it.

I started out with video games, Atari 2600, Jump Man Jupiter, sitting on my dad's lap while he taught me how to use the single button controller. I didn't start on RPGs until 2002, I was in the Army, stationed in Germany. I was bored one day looking for a book to read and my friend handed me off his collection of the Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny. I read all ten in about a week and a week after that I was in Dave's Amber Diceless RPG game. After that it was WoD then D&D.

I am a relative newcomer to RIFTS and Palladium in general. I got hooked on it about two years ago now. My GM was running a game world and system that he wrote himself. I keep getting him to try and look into getting it published, but he refuses. We (the PCs) ended up screwing the pooch a bit and our world was eaten by undeath. Thankfully (unbeknown to us) one of the NPCs was a rifter and took the group off of the dying world. It's been Rifting and LOVING IT ever since then.

I'm now running a BTS game every other weekend and Jeff runs RIFTS on the others.

My oldest sister and brother were responsible for getting me into gaming. He had copies of AD&D and Rifts, and I fell in love. I was able to play a couple of times when I was in high school, but their schedules never really allowed for them to get a regular gaming group together with me (plus my mom really disapproved of me gaming, especially since the first time we did was after midnight, on a Sunday night/Monday morning!). But it really opened my imagination when I was in school. It wasn't until I had gotten in the military that I had a regular gaming group. And the rest is history.

Edit: This all happened about 15 years ago when I started browsing through my brother's and sister's gaming books.