My First Table Top Role Play Game Ever

- For my first session, I was invited to a legit Table Top Game with my Ren Faire and Board Gaming friends. The GM and I were Catholic and everyone else was Christian.  I had known these people for many years through Church and Ren Faire activities. The married couple in our group hosted our sessions in their home. 

- The GM had been working on a modern fantasy novel series. He wanted to run a game with the premise, setting and characters from his novel.
At first, I was excited to create my own character set in this world but was surprised to find he had a cast of characters for us to pick from. I ended up picking a teenage girl who was rebelling against her Mormon parents. We were using the d20 Modern system. (The d20 system is the basis for D&D 3.5 edition. d20 modern translates the magic into modern superhero type systems.)

Here' were our first characters: 

• Jessica (My character) - a teenage girl --> Psychic 
• Kevin - a black, research professor --> Elemental martial artist
• Mai - an Asian photographer --> Element Magic User
• Mark - the scientist --> Technology magician

- The setting was we were all going to go to the Hill Cumorah Pageant...which is a real thing! Mormonism did take an interesting role in the setting and story. So it was an alternative present day (2014) setting in the United States. Something supernatural would happen that made our normal human characters a bit more fantastical. 

- I had my dice in hand, a finished character sheet which I was sure was full of errors. I had a frustrating time trying to fill out stat numbers and powers. I had my laptop connected to wifi to look at the references (this was 2014.) We started socializing while waiting for all the players to arrive and making healthy snacks. I also showed up in an outfit reflective of the character: 

- Eventually, we were all called to the table so we could begin. The GM began by reading the prologue of events that he roleplayed with one of the players before our session started. Then he began describing the Hill Cumorah Pageant. Traffic was backed up because the President was attending with his family. (He was the first Mormon President in this story.) The GM then said where each of our active character were located. 

- Mark was on the road with one of the GM's characters trying to get to the pageant. 

- Kevin was mingling in the crowd and talking to people because he was doing research on race-relations within the Mormon Church. 

- Mai was hired as a freelance photographer for the event. 

- Jessica (me) was stuck in the backseat of her parents car on the way to the Pageant. 

- Once everyone was in place, the GM turned to one of the players and asked what their character was doing. I should mention too that some of the group are patrons of the theater and pretty good with improv. Kevin was trying to talk to someone but got caught with a flask of alcohol and got into an argument with security. 
Mai was talking with one of the coordinators and setting up to get some shots of the crowds coming in and the stage where the President would give a speech. 
Then it was MY turn. The GM asked what my character was doing. After listening to my fellow players I was thinking "this is just like the MUCKs and Forum RP I did. Story stuff! I can do this!"

"She's sulking in the backseat of the car trying to text her friend."
The cell phone service is spotty. Her parents try to talk to her. 
The GM took the role of her parents and I would respond like a petulant teenager. It was a little awkward to say things out loud and not really have much time to think about what to say. I did start to panic a bit. I was kind of hoping for a menu of responses to come up in my brain so I could select an option! 

Finally, the GM shifted focus to another character, then came the big event, the President's speech. As the President gave a speech, something awful happened. Mindless soldier creatures suddenly appeared in droves and started to open fire on the crowds. PANIC ensues. 

The GM had us all in different spots so each player got individual scenarios to respond to. Kevin dodged around to find an exit. Mai leapt a fence to get to her car. Mark was finally driving in with the GM character. My character was still stuck in traffic with her parents in the car. 

I will say I have a very active imagination and listening to the situations of the other characters seemed pretty grave. But they had adult characters and they could run and dodge. My character had no place to run and the scenario the GM had for poor Jessica still haunts me as it's so very reminiscent of a school shooting. 

The masked terrorists were on the road looking into each car and firing point blank at the people in the car. People who tried to leave their cars also got mowed down. The figures got close Jessica's car and as a player I'm scouring my character sheet for ANY talents she may have to save herself. Without the fantasy powers she had all the abilities of a teenaged Wiccan-wannabe (which was part of her character. She was an online practioner.) I had a lot of skill in charisma but I really didn't have much of an idea what that meant. My mind was racing as I legit starting to emotionally shut down. There was no way in my mind my character COULD survive. The GM had given me an impossible situation. I figured, wow...she's going to die now. I spent all that time trying to learn the rules for NOTHING. 

The terrorists shot her parents from a distance through the windshield. Even more panic flooded my system. So, I looked to my fellow players for a bit of guidance. A fellow player suggested I try "disguise" or use deception. So, I had my character play dead. The terrorists looked into the car. Jessica was covered in her parents blood so she just tried to keep still. I had to roll dice and boy did my heart just drop. What if I roll poorly? Would they shoot her? What's preventing them from shooting anyway? Make sure that corpse is a corpse and shoot it. 
Thankfully, I passed the check and the terrorists moved on. But now she had to escape. 

Panicked and sobbing, Jessica leaves the car and runs toward the pageant to find more people and meet with the rest of the group. 

Eventually, all our characters ended up pretty close together. We followed the President and his family into a bunker, then our big bad villain showed up with the Golden Tablets with her lackey and kills the sun. This event awakens powers in my character and Mai. Now this is a SUPER boss character and we're all level 1 noobs. This is a fallen goddess and she sends her lackey to attack. We have a combat encounter. This I feel a bit better about because this is video game violence and I have super powers. But like any overconfident teen, Jessica attempts to attack the goddess. The GM asks if I'm sure. I said, "Yeah, it would be in-character. Jessica just got powers and thinks she can do something. She doesn't know this is impossible." (And it's true, I knew as a player it's a dumb move, but for the story it would be good.)

And wouldn't you know it, I rolled HIGH. And with the bonuses, I actually got a HIT and HURT the goddess a tiny bit. At this point, my character is the focus of ire. BUT in a sort of Deus ex Machina move, another of the GM's character swoops in and provides us an exit. After all the stress, it was a welcomed literary trope and our characters started heading toward a safe house. Oh and we captured the goddess's lackey. And that ended our first session. 

Needless to say it was invigorating! It was FAR more intense than any online forum game because I had little time to think. Even chat based RP was slower than this. I was uncomfortable with the improv conversations and even more disturbed by the plight of my poor teenaged character. She wasn't my original character but by golly I was protective of her! 

Despite some of the disturbing elements, I had a good time and was eager to find out where the story would go next! 

This campaign would take many twists and turns, change rulesets, change characters. But that's for another time.