tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post4234808800998635320..comments2023-10-14T03:58:59.333-06:00Comments on The Tao of D&D: ImmersionAlexis Smolenskhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10539170107563075967noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-38880809133492890762012-10-08T11:46:24.311-06:002012-10-08T11:46:24.311-06:00Serendipitously, I am trying again to read Moby Di...Serendipitously, I am trying again to read Moby Dick. This time I am old enough to be engaged, not confused or bored.<br /><br />I disagree that dealing in death -must- make men entirely nasty. Hard heartedness can be selective. I have worked with SEALs and Marines who were quite decent men - outside the context of their work.<br /><br />Personally I imagine adventurers as being much like gangsters. They most likely have regular molls, but their lives are focused on death, not on family.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-84499782772421222942012-10-07T00:15:57.128-06:002012-10-07T00:15:57.128-06:00My sister-in-law has a favorite saying: "Movi...My sister-in-law has a favorite saying: "Movies lie." I would expand that observation to stay that TV shows lie; novels lie; games lie -- all stories lie.<br /><br />There's certainly no shortage of things in this world to be outraged or bitter about. But roughly 30 years ago, my big brother handed down the GM's ruling that my druid was NOT allowed to heal the broken bones of the abused orc slaves of the hill giant chief. He declared it would be an alignment violation. Don't ask me to defend his reasoning. I just know that was the first and last time I ever allowed myself to be bullied into pretending I was willfully and needlessly ignoring the suffering of NPCs in an RPG. From that moment on, I have only ever role-played larger-than-life heroes.<br /><br />I'm afraid I would give up the hobby entirely before I'd ever play a PC that you would consider palatable. And I really don't care if that makes my characters lies, because the whole game is a lie already. Just like I'd rather watch 100 hours of Nathan Fillion as portrayed in Firefly than five minutes of Nathan Fillion as you tell me he should be. It's not for a moment because I think he's realistic, it's because I find the lie of him to be an entertaining one.<br /><br />You have a right not to be entertained, but I can't see that as any sort of moral high ground.Giacomohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09394854064455879344noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-33326033908972824662012-10-05T10:03:51.706-06:002012-10-05T10:03:51.706-06:00Fair enough, and I won't go postal again.
But...Fair enough, and I won't go postal again.<br /><br />But my POINT, JD, was that your D&D characters aren't going to be those middle class effete characters that turn up in shows like Firefly. They're going to be the mean bastards aboard the Pequod, and their captain isn't going to be a dumbass squill like Nathan Fillion, but a cold-hearted dangerous man like Ahab. The player characters may be steeped in the richness of middleclass strata, but their hardbitten, orc-slaughterin' puppets won't be!Alexis Smolenskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10539170107563075967noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-74290319719466053862012-10-05T06:36:37.232-06:002012-10-05T06:36:37.232-06:00Not everyone in the middle started there. Not ever...Not everyone in the middle started there. Not everyone in a bar drinking themselves into deeper stupidity and poverty is tough or of any character worth noting.<br /><br />My perspective might be skewed as someone from the low-end that worked his way on up. There are people of strength and character in all social strata and occupations. No one group has a lock on true nobility. I'll put my money on a man with a plan any day of the week. <br /><br />I'll agree floundering in the middle isn't any distinction of skill or character.<br /><br /> The two yahoos in the bar were likely foolish middle class boys who never lost anything in their lives and were chased off by my monologue because I made them consider the cost of their stupidity and lack of character.JDJarvishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07691101939920824546noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-49012789737126672852012-10-04T11:58:06.573-06:002012-10-04T11:58:06.573-06:00JD,
You may have missed the point.
There is a di...JD,<br /><br />You may have missed the point.<br /><br />There is a difference between bar 'hopping' and drinking heavily because you have a mean, miserable, dangerous, non-intellectual job. And however you feel about the people who have those blue collar jobs is irrelevant; 'character' is not subject to moral judgments. 'Character,' which is what I pitched for, discribes a perspective on the world that - however "boring" - is potentially more truthful than the soft-cushioned, denial-ridden worlds I view from my office tower.<br /><br />I have seen both these worlds up close and personal, and I can tell you that what I see among people with homes, kids, careers and so on is terrified subjection because they have something to lose, not fighting spirit. Look how the whole middle class rolled over and took it straight up the ass, rather than fight for their schools, their right to privacy or their dignity. Take a flight lately? Negotiate with a bank lately, or a credit card company? Your breed ain't fightin', its crying in its kitchen begging, "Please, please massa, don't take away my pop tarts and my gas subsidy, I promise to pay a hundred dollars for a football game, I promise massa!"<br /><br />Fight? The middle class is barely qualified to get its pants down properly from the bent-over position.<br /><br />I wasn't saying that "fighting" defines character. What I said was that the hard working class, the sort that is regularly killed and injured on their jobs, fights to kill. The spoiled infant class, the office worker, doesn't fight at all, except in Hollywood movies, and then the fights are "funny" and "clever." The spoiled infant class has a hand so soft from credit card use that a punch would break it.<br /><br />So go cry to your infant class about how tough you've got it. I used to work daily in an environment where it was 115 degrees, with fire, with boiling fat and oil, on greasy, slippery floors, around angry, frustrated people, while serving a plate of food every ninety seconds for one quarter of the money I'm making now punching buttons in the right order.<br /><br />Don't confuse "spoiled rotten" with "winning plan."Alexis Smolenskhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10539170107563075967noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-37968008455119054812012-10-04T05:19:25.928-06:002012-10-04T05:19:25.928-06:00plenty of folks are immersed in real life and it&#...plenty of folks are immersed in real life and it's often sad an boring, the chief antagonist in most people's lives is their own selves. Going to a bar and drinking isn't immersion in life it's avoiding it. The best lesson to be learned from bar-crawling is to stay the heck out of bars they are designed to pump money out of your wallet.If you want to be immersed in real life you build yourself a life. I recall two younger yahoos starting up with a buddy and i in a pool-hall I put them off with something like this "oh tough guys? Your what 21, 22 and think your bad asses who can't bleed and you will not be spitting out your teeth, your young and you have nothing to lose, my friend and I have homes, kids, careers, something to lose, just stop and think how hard we are going to fight, it's going to cost us afterwards and we are going to make it cost a lot for you because of that."..the yahoos left. Who is fighting the harder fight, the person with a winning plan or the idiot throwing themselves against a wall?JDJarvishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07691101939920824546noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-88970451769546604652012-10-03T18:06:11.341-06:002012-10-03T18:06:11.341-06:00Cry if you will for a more immersive game ... but ...<em>Cry if you will for a more immersive game ... but don’t look to the designer. You must immerse yourself in real life before you have any hope of doing it in a game.</em><br /><br />Spot on. A clean kill.<br /><br />Well done.scottszhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10327316054801308727noreply@blogger.com