On a recent Late Late Show, host James Corden brings up D&D with his guest, Thomas Middleditch (Silicon Valley). Middleditch and his D&D group have just wrapped up a three year campaign and Corden asks how could a game of D&D go on for so long and why? What could possibly happen to a group this long? As Middleditch ponders the reactions he receives, it was clear that he could relate to fans who had been asking that question because their early D&D games were also so intense and so challenging. As a happy accident, Middleditch was a voice actor during Tales of the Sword Coast, which was also well underway when The Lost Mine of Phandelver came out in 1994. That changed my understanding of how D&D and roleplaying games accelerated. As a top level Fighter, I felt both inspired and terrified throughout the early game and the Trans-Taralant Crater. For that reasons, I believe The Lost Mine of Phandelver is a standout D&D experience of that era. I also think design was a huge part of how Dark Solar has to last this long and I think that plays in as well as the desire to remain true to the original setting, which I think D&D owes so much to. The Lost Mine covers all sides of the spectrum – Idle Combat, rules-light rested luck and wacky champion powers. It works as a game without these characteristics. Instead, it is a booze soaked psychiatrist clinic that paces you through a scene without fail, but without passing priority from character to character! As the campaign ended I hoped Middleditch realised how great his player group looked in that game and what both of them had gained from it. Perhaps that is why we have committee changeovers every four months. Here is an excerpt from the famed backup along son's chronicle.

Somewhere in this uncharted land, I sense my companion slipping within reach. What's that boy up to? Surely, not any of them. I tug at my robe to hide my fear.

Fury from my own youthful mistake is in my veins,

driving me to sneak down into the smoldering pit. I follow the long tunnel to the diminutive girl's death. But where to begin? How can I begin the investigation of her savagery? I won't go in a blind hope that some larger horror lurks beyond at the center of the mote-coma. No, it seems to me then that what threatens us now is not so much a creature of the night, but the millennium. I should know! I served this land as a Magister for nearly fifty years. When we set foot on that ground, we began this epic struggle. Khyber, the Land of Lament
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