I've heard that the majority of Pathfinder players are older players who've been playing a long time. I'm curious as to have much truth this has, so I ask all you guys how old you are and how old you've been playing. I myself am 20 years and 8 months old, and I've been playing 5 years, having started with D&D 3.5 when a friend at school loaned me his PHB.
As a secondary question, are you a guy or girl? I've generally seen D&D as a more male than female hobby, but I've seen more than a few girls here, and Paizo has a lot of female staff. I myself am female (male body transgendered).
As a third question, where you ever in the military? I've seen a lot of people post here who were, and I'm curious about how common that is in the RPG community. I served in the US Navy, but I received a medical discharge before getting the chance to deploy anywhere.
I tried to get my 12 year old brother into Pathfinder, and it just confused him. You must have been really smart at 8 :D
Male. No military though I'm thinking of going Navy. 21 years 1 month old. Started playing with 3e when I was 13, played terribly till I was 17 when I managed to scrape together a real game amd keep it together. Learned the rules almost entirely through word of mouth/playing/rules arguments. Good times.
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Male. Never was in the military. I started at 18 with the blue dragon box, pre-BECMI, in 1980. There were no RPGs in my childhood in the 1970's up here in Canada. Age? Well do the math :-D
I have mostly GM-ed, starting late 1980's, with games ranging from, the BECMI sets, to MegaTraveller, GURPS, AD&D 2nd Ed, and 3rd Ed. Now GMing PF for a group of co-workers in their early 40's.
Cheers!
Im 38, and getting my son ready to play D&D, Ive been plaing since I was about 6 with my older brother. My best friend is also my age and his son is 15 and his classmates join in on Friday night D&D games every week so he is preparing the new generation of course with Pathfinder not 4th edition crap.
41, male, started when I was 12, back in the 70's. Also read Shakespear's Midsummer Nights Dream, Tolkiens Lord of the Rings, Hobbit, Silmarillion, the Chronicles of Narnia, Iliad and Odyssey and various others before High School. Got into weight lifting and kickboxing in High School. Was in the Canadian Reserves. Was also a model and in lots of plays. Started with 1st edition D&D, did lots of 2nd edition. Marvel and DC Heroes, GURPS, Palladium- TMNT, Rifts, skipped 3rd edition, and did 3.5 edition. Then when they snubbed us and stopped making D&D and Paizo started publishing D&D as Pathfinder I started playing that.
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42, I signed up for the military but one of their doctors jacked me around for 9 months and I never ended up serving (lots of swearing at the recruiter on my dad's part), and I've been gaming since I was in the 7th grade back in 1980. I used to GM for my friends in high school at every break and during every lunch and pep rally.
I love how Pathfinder brings back the feel of those old AD&D days.
I'm even adapting old TSR UK modules (the best things TSR ever published) for Pathfinder Beginner Box for my kids.
38 year old male. Started Playing D&D in the summer of 83. I know this list is not complete but it gets the idea across:
- old Basic D&D (through the many boxed sets that followed)
- AD&D (Greyhawk, Dragonlance,Forotten Realms and countless homebrew campaigns)
- Numerous Palladium games (TMNT, Heroes unlimited, Robotech, Recon)
- Gamma World (Old Box Set & 3.5)
- Top Secret SI
- Marvel Super Heroes (yellow boxed set)
- MERP
- Cyberpunk (2013 & 2020 eras)
- Shadowrun
- Gurps
- Mechwarrior
- Ars Magicka
- Old World of Darkness (primarily LARP Vampire and tabletop Werewolf & Mage)
- d20 Modern
- Dungeons & Dragons 3-3.5
- and finally Pathfinder.
My wife and I are now beginning to teach our 8 year old daughter Pathfinder.
Never served.
1) I started playing D&D when I was 8 with my older brother. I am now 37. So about...29 years.
2) I am male.
3) I never served in the military.
Male, just a few days shy of 38, been Dming since I was 10, gaming for about 4 months longer than that. Started with the redbox, went to 1rt, 2nd, 3rd, 3.5 wasn't even worth acknowledging as the differences were so minor, and then to Pathfinder when the Wizards lost their minds abandoned their game. Along the way spent time in Shadowrun, Marvel, Gurps, Paladium, Mutant's and Masterminds, Champions, Star Frontier, Star Trek, Vampire/Werewolf, and more Home brews than I can count. Have never been military, but 3/4's of my current playgroup is either a veteran, a reservist, or on their way in.
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Male, 41, no military service (but did 2 years of Peace Corps). Started playing Basic/Expert and AD&D in the summer before 6th grade (1982). Played all the TSR games - Boot Hill, Top Secret, Gamma World, Star Frontiers, mostly the latter two. Played A LOT in middle school, less in high school, D&D crowed was too geeky for my taste in college. Skipped 2E. Picked up 3.0 Players Handbook while in the Peace Corps 'cause I could goof around with it w/o electricity (unlike computer games). Liked 3.5, loved Dragon magazine, stuck with Paizo through alpha and beta and am now pretty devoted to Pathfinder/PFS.
I'm 27, Male, I started playing RPGs when I was 16. We started with RIFTS which is a cool setting but I find the rules horrible, I've tried Paladium to. We must of started playing 3rd Ed dnd pretty soon after that and I made the switch to 3.5 gladly. The switch to 4e was harder but we did it. My old gaming group plays 4e and Saga StarWars pretty exclusivly now. I only found out about pathfinder about a year ago after moving away from my home town. I've never served in the military.
32, male, been playing for 11 years. Started with the 3e PHB, introduced to it by a girl I liked who had it and a bunch of other RPGs scattered around her dorm room when I was over to hang out. I'd already played Planescape: Torment though, which kinda corrupted me before finding the books and other gamers (and technically technically I found a number of old 2e AD&D Endless Quest choose your own adventure style books).
I got a really late start, which allows me to make statements like my spouse has been gaming almost longer than I've been alive. But I did get to discover all the older stuff all at once, which was kinda awesome.
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35, male, never served. I started playing D&D (or better MERP, (A)D&D one year later) around 1990. My regular players (I don't know when tey started playing D&D - some don't even play D&D/Pathfinder now, but I guess you are more interested in when they started roleplaying) would be
40, female, never served, plays for about 20 years with some longer break
40, female, never served, plays for about 20 years with some longer break
44, female, never served, plays for about 10 years (introduced by me)
40, male, never served, plays for about 10 years (introduced by me)
32, male, served, plays for about 20 years (D&D for about 10 years)
45, male, served, plays for more then 20 years, no D&D
46, male, served, plays for about 24 years, little or no D&D
39, female, never served, plays for about 6 years
39, male, served, plays for about 10 years, least regular player
I'm 37, prior Air Force officer. I started young with the Erol It is cover Basic, and we went pretty quick to the 1E rules. It's been about 30ish years. With any luck, in a year or two, I'll introduce the kids to it.
-Ben.
I´m 32 and started gaming with 16. Served one year. Had my first contact with (A)D&D second edition. Learned two know Pathfinder two years ago while I was searching for a new system with which I could start my homebrew "Ancient Greece" campaign. Worked well and after me and my group concluded the campaign we moved over to Golarion.
I'm 41, non military, male Australian. First started playing gamma world in 1979 (I think) then AD&D until 2nd edition. Wandered through various systems until 4E came out, at which point went back to DnD.
I am male, 34 been playing since 91. I started with Mechwarrior, moved to Marvel superheroes then Ad&D 2e. Never been in the military
I'm 27 years old and I've been playing D&D for about 12 years. I am male and have never served in the military.
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37, never served but tossed the idea around in my early uni days. I started gaming in year 8 with a system called dragon warriors. It was written by Steve Jackson who'd done a bunch of choose your own adventures which I was right into back then. We moved on to 1 st edition war hammer fantasy roll play, then Earthdawn (which was damn hard to dm) . I picked up 3 rd Ed when it came out, got into Pazo because of dungeon mag. Now I play both Pathfinder and 4 th edition. Good times.
Male, 37, non-military (but work for the VA). Started playing with BECMI in 1984.
I'm 32, have been playing since 1993. I have never been in the military. The first game I played was d6 Star Wars because D&D was EEEEEEEEEEEVIL!!! But then I played good ol' FASERIP Marvel Super Heroes and then I got into D&D. I'm a dude. My wife plays too, she is 35, and has been playing since she can't remember when. Her first game was Vampire, though.
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I tried to get my 12 year old brother into Pathfinder, and it just confused him. You must have been really smart at 8 :D
Well keep in mind it was AD&D I learned to play with as that is what my brother was playing and I joined his group. Mostly they just told me what dice to roll and when after I would say what I wanted to do. But it didn't take to long to get the hang of it. The game was a lot simpler then.
27 Male, never served, playing for 12 years or so started with EarthDawn, then 3e to 3.5, WoD, and finally PF. Read lots of other RPG books, too, but didn't play/played little of them.
37, male, playing since age 7 or 8. Started gaming with my dad with a Basic/AD&D mashup in 1984. We switched to Runequest I a few years later (using D&D modules), and were playing CoC and other BRPG when I was 11 or 12. I played WoD (and D&D 2.0 & a lot of other games) in college, and Runequest in Middle-earth in grad school. Came back to 3.0 when the edition came out. In the last few years I've run 3.5, nWoD, and PF.
Male, 42, never served but grew up with a Drill Instructor for a father... so you can count part of my childhood as military service if you like. :-) Starting playing D&D at 14 and ran all kinds of RPGs through my mid-twenties when I gave up RPGs for miniature wargaming and M:tG. Starting playing RPGs again in the last two years or so though I have volunteered for True Dungeon at GenCon for the last four years.
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OK, here goes nothing. I am a Grouchy Old Fart. I am male, 63, retired U.S. Army, started playing in 2000 just before 3.0 came out. So in terms of playing I am still wet behind the ears.
26 year old guy, playing since I was 12 (so 14 years) with 2nd edition D&D. I went art school- not exactly military material.
Male, 38 almost 39, was introduced to D&D with old Red Box set in 1980. Played Basic off and on until 1989 when I discovered 2E AD&D - my go to favorite version of the system. Played pretty regularly up till now. Never served. Tried to get into the Navy in 1991, but couldn't get waivers for a single Asthma attack I had the first time I ran a mile when I was 16.
Have played pretty much every incarnation of D&D whether it's come from TSR or WotC, Pathfinder from Paizo, Basic, OSRIC, Castles & Crusades, Labrynth Lords, Conan, Myth & Magic. Still fall back to 2E.
In over 30 years of gaming, only 20 of which has been regular - ranging in frequency to as much as 3 or 4 times a week to my current of less than once every 3 weeks, I can count on one hand the number of women with which I've gamed - 3 an ex-girlfriend of a gamer, two wives of two gamers. They all stopped after a half dozen sessions. It just didn't maintain their interest, and don't undertand how it draws their husbands back for more.
I do have to admit, I have grown tired of gaming as of late. New systems catch my interest, like Eclipse Phase and Alpha Omega, but not for long. We'll see what happens. I find I get bored way too easily anymore.
Male, will be 35 by the end of the month.
Never was in the military, but I was a member of a revolutionary communist organization from 16 to 23 or 24.
When I was little, I read The Hobbit and my local library had a lot of the 1st edition ADD books and modules. Played a couple of times with the kids in the neighborhood (Temple of Elemental Evil), but it never really took. I read them all, though, like real books, imagining a band of adventurers battling through the Caves of Chaos and whatnot. Read all of the original issue TSR novels, read Dungeon and Dragon every month until puberty hit and I put away childish things...only to pick them up again years later!
Was working in a record store when one of the other clerks mentioned that he and his brother were starting a new campaign. This was when third edition had just come out--I remember going to Pandemonium in Cambridge, MA, when it was still in The Garage in Harvard Square. The clerk had coke-bottle thick glasses, lisped, and greeted me by saying "Welcome, mortal!" Hee hee!
Anyway, went over my co-worker's house and he whipped out a bunch of dice and a bong. Have been hooked on D&D ever since!
The other day my father asked me if I was still going to be playing D&D when I was 65. I said it certainly looked like it.
Male 40 (41 in a month or so), never went in military.Started playing with the "red box" basic D&D in 1986.Mostly played D&D (basic, advance, 3 and 3.5) but long love affair with Marvel Super Heroes, Robotech, Gurps 3rd ed, MERP, Cyberpunk 2020. A bit of twilight 2000, Star Wars both the West End Games and the D20 and can't remember, too many other titles.
Also, i'm italian.
Male, never served, 44 years old, playing since 1977.