However, the guy that taught me how to play, and eventually how to be a good DM, played with a lot of the older modules from years gone by. During my college years, I was able to play and/or DM the entire GDQ series (Giants, Drow, Queen Lolth), as well as the Temple of Elemental Evil, and the Slave Lords' Series. So, not only is my past experience in the pre-published material, it also happens to be steeped in the Greyhawk campaign. I also spent a considerable amount of time running campaigns in the Dragonlance world, mostly due to my fascination with Dragons in the game.

The end of college also marked the end of my rollplaying opportunities. I met my future wife, and since she was not a gamer, my gaming habits fell by the wayside (although I played my fair share of Magic:The Gathering for a few years). I soon learned that a co-worker of mine was a gamer. I challenged him to the "please draw me a nine", and when I saw how he wrote his "number 9", I knew I had a gamer with me at my office. Soon, 3rd Edition came out, and the two of us decided to invest in the product, and give it a shot. Which worked out okay, but we just couldn't find enough dedicated players to run adventures that I had planned. Plus, I was rusty as a DM, and the new system had us all confused (where is THACO, and where is the save table?). Needless to say, d20 was a rough system to try from scratch, but in my opinion is a much cleaner system than its preceeding incarnations. However, we shortly abandoned our campaign, and joined another. But that fizzled out quickly, too. Oh, what to do - the fate of the DM is never so prevelent than when he has no one to play his game.

In the meantime, I picked up some stuff here and there as some great reference material and started to build up ideas for a campaign to happen in Greyhawk (yes, my roots called me back). I also joined a new campaign, one in which my friend unceremoniously called "The Crusades", as three of the players were born-again Christians (read John 3). After 18 months (a very good campaign, lengthwise, indeed), that group fizzled out. But I met a great new friend, and with him, and my other friend, we started a new group. I tried the "write a 9" test on another co-worker, and when he failed miserably in trying to write a "rollplaying geek" 9, I was a little disappointed. But his mind was meldable, and I invited him to join us. The fourth player was an invite from one of my new friends.