Earlier today, I got word that the mother of one of my good friends has passed away.  I wish him and his family my condolences in their time of grieving.  She was a wonderful person and was the consummate hostess to me and my gamer geek friends.  There was never a time when I showed up and was made to feel unwelcomed.  When I stayed with them, she made sure to try to get us to eat some breakfast and just generally took care of us like her children.  She will me missed greatly.  *sigh*

On top of this, I saw this later:

MILWAUKEE (AP) -- Gary Gygax, who co-created the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons and is widely seen as the father of the role-playing games, died Tuesday morning at his home in Lake Geneva. He was 69. He had been suffering from health problems for several years, including an abdominal aneurysm, said his wife, Gail Gygax.

Gygax and Dave Arneson developed Dungeons & Dragons in 1974 using medieval characters and mythical creatures. The game known for its oddly shaped dice became a hit, particularly among teenage boys, and eventually was turned into video games, books and movies.

Gygax always enjoyed hearing from the game's legion of devoted fans, many of whom would stop by the family's home in Lake Geneva, about 55 miles southwest of Milwaukee, his wife said. Despite his declining health, he hosted weekly games of Dungeons & Dragons as recently as January, she said.

''It really meant a lot to him to hear from people from over the years about how he helped them become a doctor, a lawyer, a policeman, what he gave them,'' Gail Gygax said. ''He really enjoyed that.''

Dungeons & Dragons players create fictional characters and carry out their adventures with the help of complicated rules. The quintessential geek pastime, it spawned a wealth of copycat games and later inspired a whole genre of computer games that's still growing in popularity.

Born Ernest Gary Gygax, he grew up in Chicago and moved to Lake Geneva at the age of 8. Gygax's father, a Swiss immigrant who played violin in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, read fantasy books to his only son and hooked him on the genre, Gail Gygax said.

Gygax dropped out of high school but took anthropology classes at the University of Chicago for a while, she said. He was working as an insurance underwriter in the 1960s, when he began playing war-themed board games.

But Gygax wanted to create a game that involved more fantasy. To free up time to work on that, he left the insurance business and became a shoe repairman, she said.

Gygax also was a prolific writer and wrote dozens of fantasy books, including the Greyhawk series of adventure novels.

Gary Sandelin, 32, a Manhattan attorney, said his weekly Dungeons & Dragons game will be a bit sadder on Wednesday night because of Gygax's passing. The beauty of the game is that it's never quite the same, he said.

Funeral arrangements are pending. Besides his wife, Gygax is survived by six children.

*LE SIGH*

I Am A: Lawful Good Human Cleric (5th Level)


Ability Scores:

Strength-11

Dexterity-11

Constitution-13

Intelligence-14

Wisdom-15

Charisma-13


Alignment:
Lawful Good A lawful good character acts as a good person is expected or required to act. He combines a commitment to oppose evil with the discipline to fight relentlessly. He tells the truth, keeps his word, helps those in need, and speaks out against injustice. A lawful good character hates to see the guilty go unpunished. Lawful good is the best alignment you can be because it combines honor and compassion. However, lawful good can be a dangerous alignment because it restricts freedom and criminalizes self-interest.


Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.


Class:
Clerics act as intermediaries between the earthly and the divine (or infernal) worlds. A good cleric helps those in need, while an evil cleric seeks to spread his patron's vision of evil across the world. All clerics can heal wounds and bring people back from the brink of death, and powerful clerics can even raise the dead. Likewise, all clerics have authority over undead creatures, and they can turn away or even destroy these creatures. Clerics are trained in the use of simple weapons, and can use all forms of armor and shields without penalty, since armor does not interfere with the casting of divine spells. In addition to his normal complement of spells, every cleric chooses to focus on two of his deity's domains. These domains grants the cleric special powers, and give him access to spells that he might otherwise never learn. A cleric's Wisdom score should be high, since this determines the maximum spell level that he can cast.


Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail)




I figured I would be Neutral good and I almost was.. just slightly tipped the scale into Lawful... But the Cleric doesn't surprise me.

Detailed Results:

Alignment:
Lawful Good ----- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (26)
Neutral Good ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (25)
Chaotic Good ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (19)
Lawful Neutral -- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (17)
True Neutral ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (16)
Chaotic Neutral - XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Lawful Evil ----- XXXXXXXXXXX (11)
Neutral Evil ---- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Chaotic Evil ---- XXXX (4)

Law & Chaos:
Law ----- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Neutral - XXXXXXXXX (9)
Chaos --- XXX (3)

Good & Evil:
Good ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (16)
Neutral - XXXXXXX (7)
Evil ---- X (1)

Race:
Human ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXX (13)
Dwarf ---- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Elf ------ XXXXXXXX (8)
Gnome ---- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Halfling - XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Half-Elf - XXXXXXXXX (9)
Half-Orc - (0)

Class:
Barbarian - (-25)
Bard ------ (-21)
Cleric ---- XXXXXX (6)
Druid ----- (-27)
Fighter --- XXXX (4)
Monk ------ (-4)
Paladin --- (0)
Ranger ---- (-2)
Rogue ----- XX (2)
Sorcerer -- XX (2)
Wizard ---- XX (2)

I saw this and wanted to share it: