Jon

During my travels out west, Tamara and I determined that part of our trip would include a drive through Washington State, including our passing through Seattle.  In fact, this was deliberately arranged so that JB of B/X Blackrazor and I could meet face-to-face, which we did Friday evening.  Finding a hotel within 20 minutes of his residence, Jon came and met me there, and we went out to find a simple bar so that I could, at last, "buy him a beer," as I had promised to do many times ... though he bought the first round himself.

Oddly, no doubt because of our age, we didn't think to take a selfie together; in fact, the subject wasn't brought up.  We played a couple of games of pool, stripes and solids, but our focus wasn't on the game and while he won the first, he blew the cue ball off the eight and lost the second.  The conversation engrossed us throughout, as we talked for four hours, apart from breaks for the bathroom and our spouses.

My impression of Jon is that he is, first, a family man.  I'd first considered the possibility of meeting his family, but is soon became clear to us both that this meeting had to include only ourselves.  Anyone else, my Tamara, his wife and children, would have been inconvenienced by our discussion.

Now, what did we talk about?  Well, much that we would talk about on our blogs, of course.  Jon and I have a long, long history of going around on various topics, some of which we no longer disagree about (player-vs.-player, alignment) and some of which we continue to spar over (rules as written, the use of modules).  We did not debate; there would be no point, since in a single meeting we're not likely to change each other's minds.  Rather, we presented our views, such as we would in writing, and I think came out a little clearer on the other's point of view.

Take rules as written.  Jon isn't fanatical about that, but he is very conscious that many participants of the game change the pre-existing rules of forty years ago without knowing the reason for which those rules exist.  I agree with this.  Much of the time, I believe, people have little understanding of what purpose in the game a rule serves, or how that purpose is compromised, leading to a less robust system, when that rule is casually tossed aside.  For me personally, whatever a DM may feel about the presence of experience or encumbrance, and the "inconveniences" they bring, casting those things aside does not improve the game.  The game is worse without them.

Yet this is hardly understood, and even less appreciated.  Of course we can still play D&D without those things.  Of course the players can still move from place to place, they can still fight, they can yet role-play and even accumulate status and influence upon the game world.  But these things — and this is almost impossible to explain to the average player — ARE NOT THE GAME.  They certainly seem to be; and most would argue with me on this point ... vehemently.  But they'd be wrong.

This is not something that Jon and I talked about, merely the extension of our discussion about rules as written.  It's a post for another time, but not now.

We talked about writing and publishing, about the process of getting work out to our readers that's paid for.  We talked about Lulu, we talked about other platforms, we talked about Patreon and we gave each other advice on those things.  We debated our relative importance with respect to the D&D community (not much) and we discussed this very thing that I'm doing now: writing about each other on our pespective blogs.  [checking as I write this, he hasn't done this yet].

But to be honest, mostly, we simply enjoyed each other's company.  Jon is funny.  He's quickwitted, he's appropriately droll and sarcastic, he has a dry sense of humour ... and occasionally, there's a little blackness there.  He's not only nostalgic in his game ideals, he possesses this characteristic about a number of things.  We drank our beers, for example, in a near-empty dive in a dead mall, with carpets that hadn't been replaced since, um, the 1980s?  We played pool.  We discussed media and the internet and he expressed many thoughts that would be in keeping with the sort of straight-up white male who identifies as a pre-internet Democrat but not a supporter of Bill Clinton.  He respects those institutions the internet is killing and, guessing here, has the usual sentiments of someone who worries how the world is going to get on without those things.

So, yeah, if the reader has been a follower of JB these last ten years, then the man is exactly what his blog conveys him to be.  There were no surprises.

I think it's harder on those who meet me.  Like the statement I made above about what D&D is not, I'm difficult to predict.  I take a rigid line on things that make no sense.  Soon after meeting each other, Jon commented, in response to the radio program being turned off, on the demise of both local and national news as a meaningful source for people's understanding of the world.  I said, "good."  I have zero respect for newspapers.  I don't care if they all die.  And Jon, confronted with this, wisely dropped the subject.  I respect that.

See, four hours isn't enough for us to be friends.  I found this when I met Sterling and Ozymandias last year.  These are all people I got along with at once, whose company I immediately appreciated, whose discourse was vibrant and intelligent.  But it isn't enough time for those other things that make us friends.  Friendship is built of hardship, of labouring together, of bearing each other's sins, of having the time to break free of the need to impress and be polite, getting down to the brass tacks of meaning and disagreement and honest, tough-minded evaluation of one another.

This cannot be done when one is merely in Seattle overnight.

But, since I know Jon will be reading this, thank you.  Thank you Jon, for your smiles, for your generosity, for your understanding and your patience.  Thank you for the right place for us to talk, and thank you for your advice.  I'll try to follow as much of it as I can.