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Incidentally, 2024 is also the Year of the Dragon.
Tentatively, I am looking at the following "theme months."
January will be part of TardisCaptain's New Year New Character challenge. Mine though will be delving into some of my favorite characters since I started playing D&D.
April is the A to Z Challenge, where I will write about D&D and its history.
May is Sci-Fi month and I'll do a deep dive into Gamma World, Star Frontiers, and the d20 Star Wars. I'll also looking into games with a solid D&D connection with me.
June has typically been Basic-era month where I focus a lot on B/X, BECMI, and OSE/LL. I really want to be sure I do that this year.
August is Dave Chapman's RPGaDAY month. I pretty much do this one as is. But I might focus on D&D more than other games.
October is "horror" month for me. I want to focus on Ravenloft. All my horror movies will also all be connected to D&D in some way. Either movies from Appendix N authors or horror movies that mention D&D or fantasy/horror. I'll start putting together my list soon.
Additionally, I have something else fun planned throughout the year that I am keeping close to my chest for now.
But the big thing for me next year is going to be my year-long exploration of the Forgotten Realms.
The Forgotten Realms and Me
I was never a Forgotten Realms fan. I dismissed it in the 1980s as an "upstart," ignored it in the early 90s, and actively disliked it in the late 90s. But it seems my ire was misplaced. Around the time the 3rd Edition Realms book came out I was beginning to soften my stance. By the 4th Ed era I was considering moving a campaign to the Realms. In the 5th Ed era I made it official, more or less.
Honestly, my coverage of Ed Greenwood's work in the pages of Dragon magazine changed my mind.
These past few months, I have been playing the hell out of Baldur's Gate 3, and my desire to play in the Realms has only grown.
To this end, I have amassed a small collection of Forgotten Realms books. Nothing special, just ones that I have come by easily either at game auctions, Half-Price Books, or as in the books pictured above, Print on Demand from DriveThruRPG. So I will go over them in detail throughout the editions.
I'd like to run a Realms-based game someday, but I am still figuring out what edition to use. Part of me thinks I need to do it in AD&D 2nd Edition since that was the edition that was the most "Realms" to me.
The Forgotten Realms to me was always viewed through the eyes of a character, whether that was Elminster or Drizzt or whomever. Likewise, I am going to look into the Realms through the eyes of a new character. Presently I am leaning toward my half-elf sorceress Sinéad. I know I want use someone that has magic, and someone that I can tie to the rich lore of elves in this world. She is also one of two characters I had specifically created for the Realms in all my years of gaming. I think I owe it to myself to actually give her a spin someday. However, my wife reminded me the other night that Keller the Silent Monk might also be fun.
In any case, 2024 is going to be a busy year of posting here and I am looking forward to it.