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The goblins are invading! This is the first time I’ve tried to tackle a large scale battle, and I’m finding it to be an interesting challenge. Do I want to focus on the heroes, and let the imagination fill in the rest of the battle? Do I metaphorically zoom in and out to different parts of the battlefield? 

Being a story about our heroes, it’s pretty clear that the champions on both sides will face off at some point during the battle. But is that the most interesting thing that can happen? Is it anticlimactic to have a peasant with a bow take out the big scary mage with a lucky arrow? 

And, of course, there is the ever-present question of whether or not to kill characters. Like most fantasy stories, the reader has a pretty good idea that the three protagonists are going to live to see the sequel, but there is a wide cast of characters. I try to give them each enough reality and personality to be interesting, which also means that they would be missed if they were killed. Now I just have to convince myself that I’m willing to let some of them die instead of trying to tell everyone’s story all the way to its conclusion. 

I'm sure I'm not alone among gamers in that when I read a fantasy novel, I tend to either envision it as a campaign I could run, or envision how the story evolved from someone else's game. Often when watching a movie or tv show, when the plot takes a turn for the worse, I'll turn to my wife and say, "Boy, their DM is a jerk."

Now I'm working on my first fantasy novel, something I've wanted to do for many years. And I'm basing it, unsurprisingly, on a game that I ran several years back. One of the things I'll be writing about in this blog is where I stayed true to the game, and where I made major changes.