The Time I Almost Played a Wizard

On Saturday I went to Amtgard in Mystic Seas (Portland, OR). It was a hard choice between going to Mystic Seas and going to Silvermoon (Salem, OR). Mystic Seas was having a BBQ and Chili Cook Off and Silvermoon was hosting the Phoenix League match between Black Company and Arcana (Arcana won by the way, huzzah!). What pushed me towards Mystic Seas was that my squire, Indra, said he would join.

I arrived at the park shortly before 1pm and I was greeted by an old friend who I had no idea who would be there, Falcon. Not only does she live an hour away from Portland she doesn’t really come out to Amtgard anymore. I hadn’t seen her since last year. It was great getting to catch up.

I also arrived just in time for the chili cook off although I wasn’t entering anything myself which I came to regret. It would have been fun and also a good chance to show off my skills, even if they are a bit rusty. I don’t enjoy cooking as much as I used to. One of the reasons for my regret is due to a pet peeve I have about chili. Chili in its pure form does not have beans. If you look at cans of chill it says chili WITH beans. Beans are an additive. It’s fine if people like it but it’s just not pure chili. As you might have guessed my chili doesn’t contain beans.

I don’t recall how many entries there were but I did get to taste each one. My favorite was probably BamBam’s. I liked the flavor and especially liked the pulled pork he put in it. It was a nice alternative texture and carried a pleasant meaty flavor that ground beef often doesn’t have. In the end Aurura won the competition.

I actually went to the park intending to play in a battle game for once. I had a dream the night before about playing a wizard in Amtgard and I woke up with the urge to play it. I haven’t played wizard at all in Version 8. I brought out all my spell balls and sashes, made a spell list and I thought I was ready to go. Then when it was time for the battle game I realized I had no idea how to cast any of the spell balls. So rather than try to figure it out in the middle a game I decided I would wait till next week and take the time to try and memorize the spells by then.

In the mean time, since I wasn’t playing in the battle game I spent the time sparing with with Gustav. We weren’t fighting long before Indra showed up to the park and joined us. I got some good kills in but mostly I died.

We decided to take a break around the time the battle game ended. I took the time to introduce Indra to a few people. I hadn’t seen him out in several months, although he did go to Dusk Hallow (Dallas, OR) the previous Sunday. I would have joined him if he’d just sent me a message. It was really nice to see him catch up. He wasn’t able to stay too long, just for an hour or two. He had his daughter and girl friend with him.

A ditch started up right after Indra left and Gustav and I joined in. It lasted for quite a long time and it was nice to get some more fighting in. I fought this day more than I had in a very long time. I hope I’ll be able to continue that trend in the coming weeks at my local park.

After the ditch ended up chatting with people for quite some time. Derek Roth had also shown up and it was great to get to chat with him, it had been a while. In the end I didn’t leave the park till about 7pm, it was a pretty long Amtgard day which I greatly enjoyed.

Originally I had some pretty solid anxiety going into to the events of the day. Everyone at the park is pretty much a new player, which means I knew no one there, which is something that is worrying to me when it comes to social events. That’s one reason I tried to get Indra and Gustav to go Then on top of the people I knew were going to be there I was surprised by Falcon and even Aurora, Terarin and Derek Roth were there. Not only did I know more people than I thought I would, the people at Mystic Seas are very welcoming, as is often the case I had nothing to worry about.

Next week I’ll be playing Amtgard at my local park, Silvermoon, and if everything goes as planned I’ll be playing in at least one game as a wizard. I also hope there are some decent fights to be had too. I hear we might even have a meat grinder going.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.