DEC COR Waterproof Dry Bag Backpack - Gamer Gear Review

As some of you know I am always on the hunt for gear that makes my gaming life, and/or recording life better and easier.

Not long ago I decided that I was going to hang up the old JanSport backpack. A well-earned retirement for the old girl who got me through 10 years of role-play gaming. I am notoriously hard on my backpacks, loading them with heavy ass rule books and other accoutrements. I am stickler for quality and durability when I get a gaming back.

So when the fine folks as DEC COR offered a test drive of their Waterproof Dry Bag Backpack, I agreed.

I am not what you would call an outdoorsy kind of person, hell I’m barely an indoorsy kind of person. So my review of the DEC COR Waterproof Dry Bag Backpack will not be from the perspective of the occasional hiker or anything like that, but of someone who beats the hell out of a backpack daily.

I had the choice of green or black. I chose green, mostly to have something different than my usual. My knee jerk reaction was to select black.

When I first opened up the box that the bag was shipped in I was amazed at the size of the backpack. Easily twice the size of my previous one, I quickly acknowledged that I could store more in the new one.

The design is a bit wonky. It’s not bad, but just took me a minute to figure out that the top didn’t cinch, but was rolled, then clipped on either side and then sealed with a strap on the top.

Inside there’s a pouch with a Velcro strap to secure a laptop or tablet. When I saw this, I knew that I would like this bag. Not only is it roomy enough to haul several game books, folders and whatnot, but now could be used to transport podcast gear. This made me very happy.

The outside of the bag is rather typical for a waterproof bag, material wise, with mesh bottle holders on both sides. The shoulder straps are thickly padded and the back of the bag itself is lined with padding. I know that it’s intended for hiking, but I began to think about how useful, and comfortable it would be while I walked the con floor at Gen Con. The usefulness of this bag just seems to get better and better. There is a chest strap to help with weight distribution as well as rings to clip gear to the main shoulder straps. There is a separate zippered pouch on the outside, which I assume is to put small wet items,, but it has a clear plastic window to it. I can’t figure that one out, but I’m likely missing the point of it.

The inner pouch is huge, meaning tall. Not very wide though. With a laptop or tablet in there also, the inside can hold 2-3 large core rulebooks (Pathfinder or Dark Heresy sized) in addition to folders and dice bags.

The bag itself, fully loaded is very comfortable and not too bulky.

Over all I would score this bag as an A- (taking very few points off for lack of width).

How does Katarina rate it? #2ThumbsUp

I have range

I have a tendency to play dicks in role-playing games.

I know that it is a character flaw of mine, I can be a pretty large asshole from time to time and that translates into my gaming. Many times I start out with this cool character concept, like an elvin wizard who's sole purpose was to catalog every experience he had. His was a career of intellectual pursuit. Then he died, and not in a cool way.

The party was attacked and he was shot by a stray arrow that caught him. As he lay on the floor bleeding, his "friends" left him to die rather than give him succor. As a result of his death I created one of the most one-sided killing machines our game has ever seen (yes, I am tooting my own horn... fuck you).

Kallador was a frothing meat-grinder of death.

Frazetta Bitches, Fuck Yeah!

 

D&D 3.5 was, for me, the beginning of the end. I always had an immature sense of power gaming, even in the old days. 3.5 cultivated that into a full blown addiction. Now I could map out a character from 1st to 20th level and maximize their potential. It became like an art to me, needing practice, patience and know-how. Kalador was my Sistine Chapel.

I used builds that I found on message boards and other sources to cultivate a character that did so much damage that it unbalanced the game. It really didn't matter what the die result was. He would rush, headlong, into battle and utterly destroy the enemy.

This brings me to the present day.

We recently started a 3.5 campaign (wisely using only the core rule books and one other sourcebook) that is pirate centric. I decided to play a weaselly noble that is out for himself (not a big stretch). Now the problem is that I came up with a pretty decent back story and a lot of effort in making him a believable character.

I have a feeling he ain't gonna make it.

Something tells me that I am going to be making a meaningless goon that blasts the enemy into tiny bits.

 There it is. Thanks Brother Maynard.

I don't want to perpetuate the cycle, but it sure makes me feel good making an ass beater that everyone runs from (including his friends).

Oops I did it again

For those who do not know me, I am an avid (or rabid) tabletop gamer.

I have been gaming for 26 years and am not showing signs of slowing any time soon. For many of those years I have taken the mantle of gamemaster (GM or DM) from time to time. In those games, where I am the primary storyteller, I have developed a reputation as a harsh GM.

This is not necessarily without merit.

Now, I do not consider myself a "killer DM" per se, but I do allow things to happen in the most realistic way possible. If a character does something to draw attention of a foe or puts themselves out there in an unusual way, I let the chips fall where they may.

Fuck em.

I am not here to hold your hand and wipe your ass. I am here to present a gritty and raw game that will kick you in the plums and leave you begging for more.

In my latest game, a 4th Edition D&D game centered around a home-brew campaign setting (term for a completely self populated fictional world of my own), I am running the characters through a dwarven ruin en route to a forgotten city (I said it was my own world, not completely original).

It was in the final stages of this trek through the ruins that the latest character death occurred: Dundrick the dwarf.

To give you some background;

Dundrick was not the character that his player had intended to play at the outset of the campaign. You see, his first character was killed in a rather nasty way. He was eaten alive by the digestive juices of a gelatinous cube.

Suck it Cavender

 

In D&D, much like life, it takes a while to adjust to life after a breakup. So he inevitably bounced from one-night stand to one-night stand, playing various trial characters for a single game session only to announce the next week that he has changed his character... again.

 

Then along came Dundrick. We all thought that it was another case of love em and leave em but this one took. He started off dull and cliche. Gruff Dwarven priest of Moradin. But after a few sessions, he began to take on some personality.

 

He had a drug induced vision of his ancestors refusal to allow Tiefling refugees through their gates following a genocidal cataclysm (my campaigns have some fucked up themes). As the innocents burned alive they cursed the watching Dwarves. Thus began Dundrick's hatred of the Tieflings (referred in the negative connotation "Diobae" in my world) for the fall of his race.

 

He was a cleric, but not a usual walking healing potion. He had some real spark. Then he died.

 

Shit. 

 

That means that we are in for a few weeks of bimbo-slut characters until the next real one comes along. The problem is that the initial leg of the campaign is winding down and we are going on hiatus. I hope he finds one before we are stuck with douche-bag character #15.

Poor Dundrick.

 

You will be missed

 

This is My Blog

 

This is my blog. There are many others like it, but this one is mine.

My blog is for all my friends, old and new.

It is a slice of my mind.

I must master it as I must master my own mind.

Without me, my blog is useless.

Without my blog, I am useless.

I must write my blog with integrity.

I must write my blog better than those who wish to ignore me.

I must out-write him before he out-writes me.

I will.

Before all I swear this creed: my blog and myself are watching, we shall speak as one in spite of the enemies we may provoke, we are the mirror of an insane world. So be it, until there is no others, just us.

Amen. 


With apologies to the brilliance of Stanley Kubrick.