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The great news is that I have found not only a group that i am running. I also am playing in a group.  The group that I am running is from my original encounters group. The group that I am playing is from some Navy Buddies that I met through Mark over at Dice Monkey.

I am hopeful that the rest will fall into place.

I have been busy lately, however there have been some updates and some of them have been good. I thought to actually list what my bucket list actually is.

1. Organize a Willing Party
2. Create more interesting encounters
3. Take one of my Characters to 30th level
4. Have PC's in my game reach 30th level
5. Get my 'A-Hole of Adventure' character sheet signed by as many game designers as possible.
6. Ride a Dragon willing or not willing.

2. Create more interesting/fun skill challenges

A couple of weeks back during the last encounter of The Elder Elemental Eye. The heroes were at local bar celebrating when things go awry. There was just some roleplaying opportunities to just chit chat between pc's before the encounter. I had an idea to make it more interesting. If anyone ever played the Encounters when they were still doing twitter buffs. You might remember one time when the highest hero was able to get temporary hit points equal to their renown score. It was a game changer to say the least.

I came up with something similar as a reward, but threw this challenge towards them: The pc's have been partying with the townsfolk for about 8 hours before the encounter. I made a simple skill challenge. The DC was 13 and it went up by 2 every hour. They could use either endurance, bluff, or heal as their primary skill. They could attempt to use any other skill as a secondary as long as they had a logical explanation for it.  They could only do it twice per skill and it gave a +2 to the primary. If they failed once they were out of the contest and had an effect on them.

If they made it all the way. They gain their renown points in temporary hit points. If they failed between 1-2 hours they were dazed until the end of their next turn. The 3-4 hour mark became dazed (save ends), 5-6 was dazed and going 5 poison damage (save ends both) 7th hour was dazed, ongoing 5 poison, and weakened (save ends all) and the 8th hour was unconscious (save ends) and the after affect was the previous 7th hour.

The bulk of the party ended at the 2nd hour. There were 2 people who went down on 6 and two who went down on the 8th hour. It ended up being alot of fun and added that interesting mix into the last fight. It empowered me to think up more role playing encounters like this when I get a chance.

We tried the other store, but quickly found out they had stopped doing D&D encounters due to everyone at the store tired of going from 1st to 4th level. They were getting ready to do some Pathfinder and asked if I wanted to join. I declined and head out. I have no problem with Pathfinder since its my main gaming groups choice currently. However, I am on a mission to fullfill as much of my bucketlist as possible. I was pretty bummed for a bit after coming home. I finally had a set schedule to balance my two jobs, married life, and gaming. It's just one of those things that can happen.

The good news is that I was able to get ahold of some of my players from the first D&D encounters group and we are set up to play this friday. I hope we can keep it going. They are excited since they get to play from level 4 and on. My wife updated her pixie skald and she is pretty excited.

I am not going to just give up playing/running 4th edition first off. I just kind of like the title and with all the buzz going on with the D&D Next as well as the general consensus that 4th edition is near its end. I have decided to write up a series of posts surrouning some of the things I want to do before I can let it go guilt free. The basic plan of this series to list the things I want to do and write about my experiences to accomplish the goal. 

1. Organize a willing group

I use to run a large D&D encounters group for about a year. I recently had to depart from running it with a schedule change and it conflicting with my work schedule. My wife and I bid a farewell and set out to find a new location and a chance for me to play instead of running for a change. We found another store that was just starting to run encounters. I want to add that I have heard all the critics of this edition and their reasons. I have learned to just roll my eyes and shrug my shoulders. My wife on the other hand has not really had to deal with that.

First, the guy running it is one of the store employees and was an avid Pathfinder Game Master. He claimed to be the Anti-4th edition guy. I asked him why he wanted to run encounters in the first place? He answered with just that wizards supports it. We also had a guy who kept saying this was ridiculous every five minutes. Another guy who agreed and made the empty promise of running a Pathfinder/3.5 game. The other people in the group who are were just on the fence and attempting to learn.

We tried out this store for 3 weeks until my wife pleaded to check out the other store. She did not want to ever go back and She wanted to wring the neck of the ridiculous guy. She was upset that she had to keep defending 4th edition from these people and she wasn't having any fun. I agreed and we have decided to check out the other store.  It was on that ride home we did miss our encounters group becuase we knew them for so long and we enjoyed the game. I understand that for some people that any gaming is better than none and everyone has the right to like or not like something. The line is crossed when it hinders other people to enjoy. 

We are hopeful the other store will be better suited. We have also been talking to a few of the other members of the first group to get together. I am very optimistic that I will check this box.