So I DM’d another game of Dungeons and Dragons today. Not much happened. They were finally in town after being gone for months (for a year in the real world) so most of the game was taken up with selling loot and doing the downtime stuff. I tried to make it interesting by sprinkling in some minor town encounters with the locals. What really hit the group hard was the fact that their home base is a small town. They couldn’t get nearly what they wanted for their stuff, because no one had the money for such valuable items.

One of my players wanted to play a new character. He had been playing someone else’s and now wanted to make his own. We decided to try and sneak the character on the party with a bait and switch tactic. So I had a non-player character introduce himself and imply that he wanted to join the party. I was planning to switch him with the real character at the last minute. So I’m role-playing this man, while the person they think is going to play him is sitting next to me.

I couldn’t help but think of an old Bloom County comic. The one where Opus and Michael Jackson have switched places. At one point, while Mr. Jackson’s accountant is talking, Opus is thinking, “Surely this man must suspect something.” To which the accountant eventually says “Michael, did you get another nose job?” I felt like the Opus in that comic. The players bought it hook, line and sinker. The switch happened and they were all suitably surprised.

If that’s the high light of my day, I’ve really got to get a better hobby.