Today's D & D rerun

Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
61

glee, you really need to calm down. It’s just a game. Cecil was unimpressed by it. So what? Unless you can point out somewhere where he’s written something deliberately untrue about the game, you’re just getting all wound up because someone you’ve never met doesn’t have the same interests you do.

For all your complaining about how badly he’s maligning the game, I think it still beats the Hell out of how D&D was generally treated by the non-gaming press back in the '80s. Back then, if you were reading about D&D anywhere outside of Dragon Magazine, it was probably because the writer was trying to get the game banned before it turned all the innocent children everywhere into a pack of blood-crazed, pint-sized Satanists. If anything, Cecil deserves praise for ignoring the hysteria around the subject at that time, and seeing it for what it was: a weird, overly-complicated game played chiefly by a small, insular community of teenaged and twenty-something guys who didn’t date much. If you’ve got a problem with that characterization, I think you might be pursuing the wrong hobby.

62

Did you read my earlier posts?

  1. Cecil is a professional journalist representing the Chicago Reader on a website whose motto is ‘Fighting Ignorance’.
    He has now published two columns on roleplaying (about 20 years apart), yet his entire ‘research’ in all that time has consisted of flicking through one of the early rulebooks.
    He has called upon staff writers for expert advice, but apparently he ‘knows enough’ about the game from that 5 minutes of ‘work’ not to do so here.
    He’s not ‘unimpressed’ by it, he has no knowledge of it.

  2. Cecil was asked ‘What I would like know is the different types and rules of these games, and where I can learn more about them.’
    Do you think Cecil did well in his answer?

  3. Cecil described roleplaying as ‘demented’, ‘weird’, ‘mystifying’ and combining ‘the charm of a Pentagon briefing with the excitement of double-entry bookkeeping’.
    He astonishingly described roleplaying referees as ‘vaguely Mansonesque’.
    Would you like to interpret this remark?
    I am a teacher whose job includes running roleplaying for pupils. Would you like to suggest my reply when a parent asks why a journalist has described me as vaguely like a notorious mass murderer?

Are you serious? :confused:
The SDMB is supposed to be a quality message board, where people provide cites and give interesting and valuable information.
So it would be all right by you if Cecil stated the Moon landings had never happened - because there are plenty of Internet pages that claim that?

So you won’t be interested by the fact that my School Special Needs Department are delighted by my (1980 version of) roleplaying, stating that it has valuable effects in several areas.

You think I should ignore the many parents who thank me for giving their children several absorbing hours of an after-school club? (One pupil got a special commendation for writing his best English essay ever - it was entirely inspired by roleplaying.)

I have pupils who have sent me Xmas cards and presents, and others who regularly e-mail me after they leave school. Funny how such respect for a teacher grows out of a ‘weird, overly-complicated’ game.

Perhaps you have no idea what you are talking about?

63

Let me correct slightly, that Cecil hasn’t written two columns about D&D, he wrote the original and then did a little updating of sources at some point. The column was re-issued as a “classic”, it wasn’t a different column except in some trivial references.

It’s frankly been a bone of contention, I’ve been working on him to try it rather than just go by his impression, but he’s stubborn. Hey, he’s an eccentric genius. Sometimes his comments are factual, sometimes his comments reflect his opinions (political, religious, moral, whatever). Take this one as being heavily influenced by his initial impressions and let it go at that.

Besides, it let him get in some cheap jokes, and he always loves that.

64

I only find this article to be an amusing look back at the way things were. Cecil’s comments are pretty stereotypical of the public perception D&D enjoyed back then. Cecil, no doubt, helped to fuel the fear and misunderstanding that players endured during the 80’s. D&D was a media sensation in the same way that regression therapy was latched onto to expose child molestation soon after. It was an era when the media subsisted on half-baked expose’s.

My parents forced me to sit through every news story further exposing the horrors of D&D. Every tearful mother that blamed their teen’s suicide on D&D and Satanic rock music. Every church group that cited lessons for casting spells and summoning devils hidden in some D&D manual. Every school official who warned that DM’s were child molestors who used the game to lure unsuspecting kids into their lair. Cecil’s article was par for the course. It wonderfully encapsulates the outpouring of misinformation and baseless accusations leveled at the game and anyone who played it. It revels in slamming the game and those who plays it. For those who weren’t fulfilled with the death of disco, here was the new frontier of D&D bashing.

The game survived the sensationalist attempts of the popular media to sacrifice it for their profit. Today, we mock Jack Chick tracks accussing D&D of Satanism. Televangelists who tried to use D&D as a stepping stone have fallen through their greed and vice. Sites, like this one, have sprung up to provide the truth and help keep the media honest. Roleplaying has been largely exonerated and espoused for it’s beneficial qualities, as Glee has shown.

I wouldn’t mind seeing Cecil tackle the original question with the integrity it’s due (after 20+ years,) but only as a new article - keep the old one. This article survives as a thorn in Cecil’s side that we should, perhaps, poke from time to time if he looks to be bowing to popular opinion rather than the straight dope.

65

Then are you really playing 1st Edition, or are you playing a personal “hybrid” with a few 2nd Edition rules thrown in?

You say that as though using cheat codes is a bad thing.

“Farm buildings? Cool! I waste the inhabitants with my crossbow! How many experience points are they worth?”

66

After reading this article, I would expect Cecil to decribe poker as:

  1. a game of chance, based on the odds of collecting certain selections of cards.
  2. less exciting to watch then bowling (at least people are moving around in bowling
  3. an anti-social activity played by people who are unwilling or unable to interact with others in a verbal manner.

Well, poker is much more about the interaction of people then that description, and so are paper-and-pen roleplaying games.

Mark me up in the “big hit to Cecils credibility” group. If you can’t take the time to learn the truth, don’t write the column.

67

geez-frickin’-louise

You know what the great thing about the column is? Twenty years ago a person could read through it and say, “gee, DnD really isn’t about worshipping the devil” and decide that Jack Chick is full of BS. At worst it cast Dnd players as eccentric and not a threat to the metaphysical fabric of our culture. Guess what? If the vast majority of people in a culture treat a subset of that culture as simply eccentric, then we’re doing pretty good.

I think the real issue is that people don’t like the flippant attitude which which Mr. Cecil treats their deeply revered pasttime. You gotta be able to laugh at yourself people. IMO, it’s the difference between being self-aware and self-righteous. Cecil didn’t say anything more inflammatory than such ribbing as from a good natured episode of “Knights of the Dinner Table” and their Hackmaster escapades.

Look at you’re hurt feelings objectively:

First of all, anyone who plays DnD (Mr Triple X himself not withstanding) is a geek, by definition. Infact, I think its like an undefined term in math, or a litmus test, if you will. It’s one of the defining characteristics of geekishness (Not necessarily DnD per se, but any eccentric, isolated hobby- Some of the biggest geeks I know are ham radio operators) The fact is, it’s okay to be a geek. I’m a geek and I don’t care. When you stop living your life inside of a high-school locker room mentality you grasp that its okay to be whatever you want (within reason).

That means two important things:

I think the real issue is that

First, everyone doesn’t have to like you. And that’s okay too. You certainly don’t have to like everyone back.

Second, everyone doesn’t have to like what you you like. And that’s okay too. You certainly don’t have to like everything everyone else likes.

In light of that you can’t expect people to understand everything with which they have only the most passing familiarity. That fact that Cecil managed somehow, to flip through a book filled with an astounding number of arcane formulae and esoteric jargon is great, because that’s more of a chance than most people will ever give DnD.

fwiw
guac.

68

Welcome to the boards!

I enjoyed the “Knights of the Dinner Table” series (and still have some of the cartoons).
Please note three important differences between that and Cecil’s column:

  • the cartoons are knowledgeable about roleplaying
  • they are good-natured
  • they were entertainment (Cecil is a journalist who was asked for information)

I resent being compared to a mass murderer. Do you think that’s acceptable?
My pupil players detest the label ‘anti-social cutthroat’.

I expect a journalist whose motto is ‘dispelling ignorance’ to do some research (or ask a staff writer to do the column).

Perhaps you could give more examples of the ‘astounding number of arcane formulae’ you claim are in the D+D roleplaying manuals.
Have you actually read these books yourself?

69

I resent being compared to a mass murderer. Do you think that’s acceptable?
My pupil players detest the label ‘anti-social cutthroat’.

I’m not quite sure that being an “anti-social cutthroat” and a “mass murderer” are quite the same thing. I see being a “mass murderer” as a CE type of activity, while being an “anti-social cutthroat” merits a CN at best. :smiley:

By means of various murky protocols involving the use of charts and dice, each player establishes the persona of the “character” he or she will manipulate in the game, who typically ends up (if male) being an antisocial cutthroat of some sort, or (if female) possessed of large, grapefruit-like breasts.

For the record he didn’t say the players were anti-social cutthroats, but technically that the Player Characters were anti-social cutthroats. It’s a subtle difference, but its an important one.

**
I expect a journalist whose motto is ‘dispelling ignorance’ to do some research (or ask a staff writer to do the column).
**

Meh. It’s a typical reaction, I tells ya. I’m not surprised and it was funny enough that I didn’t care if it was vaguely inaccurate.

**
Perhaps you could give more examples of the ‘astounding number of arcane formulae’ you claim are in the D+D roleplaying manuals.
Have you actually read these books yourself?
**

Strictly metaphor. By that I meant, for example, that taking the player’s handbook you would find, within the first chapter or so on “character creation” you would 6 tables with the numbers 3-18, each devoted to one of the primary attributes and each detailing exactly what bonuses or penalties you get with a given statistic. Especially funky would be the fact that the strength table, with it’s cumbersome quality of having a percentile rating for exceptional strength, would be extra long. I mean we’re talking things like bonus spells and potential for spell failure ( for Wis; Clerics only in Ad&d), ability to resist illusions, have MU spell failure, or even which level of MU spells ones wizard could attain (Intelligence), extra hit points and possible fast natural healing (consitution), number of henchman or followers (charisma), and bonuses to hit and damage (strength). You haven’t even gotten to reaction rolls for potentially non-hostil encounters, methods of figuring morale for NPCs and monsters, or even the funky intials used to signify the psionic attack and defense modes. There were even charts for determining how much filthy lucre your typical anti-social cutthroat without a bag of holding could carry and how fast he (or she) could run while encumbered to various degrees or which familiar your Magic User could get (assuming the slight chance of spell failure didn’t happen): Hmmm would I like a pseudo-dragon or a toad? You could know from the charts and tables how frequently your barbarian could resist magical attacks or illusions, find an explanation for how many spells per day your illusionist, magic user, druid, or cleric could cast. If you were dilligent enough, the last few pages had the precise formula for a bard or the astronomically bad chance that your character might have some sort of latent psionic ability.

Now I might have gotten some stuff from Unearthed Arcana, the Players Handbook, and the DM’s guide mixed in with that (it’s been a while since I played first edition), but you get the idea. If you step outside yourself and think about what it must look like to people who don’t play the game (or any sort of hobby type game: and believe me, the demons bound by the arcane formulae in the Advanced Squad Leader game are far more powerful than the ones bound by the arcane formulae in the DnD game :wink: ). Heady heady stuff indeed.

I think the best thing people could do is point Cecil, and anyone else interested to some really outstanding story-hours on “en world”. That way he or anyone else could get their fill of RPG antics but not have to risk their eternal soul;) :

Defenders of Daybreak, archetypal DnD imo: http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=779

Alea Iacta, Mythic Rome:
http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=49805

Medallions, D20 modern:
http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=53798

Drunk Southern Girls with Guns, Darkmatter/D20 hybrid:
http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4912
fwiw
guacamole

70

I didn’t see anything in the column that refuted accusations of Satan worship. I didn’t see anything, for that matter, refuting any of the claims of the time. What I did see was someone throwing scorn at the game and it’s participants. Some of his quotes:
“I have some reservations about bestowing further publicity on this demented pastime…”
“…I managed to get my hands on a couple of those sacred rule books, and let me tell you, R. buddy, this game is weird.”
“To play D&D you need at least two acolytes, who play under the guidance of a vaguely Mansonesque personage called the Dungeon Master (DM).”

There you have it. The laymen with no prior knowledge of the game is told that it’s demented, sacred, weird, and has acolytes who follow freaky, hippy-looking, mass murderers types. The article is chock full of hidden allegations and half-truths (meaning half-lies.) Sure, there are charts for communicable diseases, they are not, however, the preliminary requirements he states them to be.

At no point does Cecil attempt to cloak his disdain by suggesting his article is tongue-in-cheek. Rather, he scanned the cover and pictures of the books he was provided, and filled in the details with the prejudice and misinformation already being shoveled to the general public. Cecil shows himself to be a victim of the very forces ignorance he is supposed to be exposing. Whats more, by being a victim, he became a tool of their lies.

It’s easy, perhaps, to look back twenty years and laugh off the hysteria of the time. It had real impact back then, however. Parents were bombarded by messages warning of the dangers D&D presented to their children. News magazines like 20/20 and 60 Minutes warned of psychological effects caused by the game - murder and suicide. Church officials railed against the game in their pulpits and church groups. School officials pulled the books from their libraries, forbid it’s playing on school property, and further warned parents against it’s influence. Everywhere you turned gamers were attacked for simply playing a game.

The result of the hysteria was more than just slumping sales for TSR. It went deeper than the lawsuits against the gaming industr; accusing them of promoting suicide and murder. As a teenager, I was forbidden to see friends who were known to play the game. Based on the plethora of information provided by the various groups, fellow players were quickly suspected of drug dealing, child molestation, satanism, and every other deviant behavior that could be imagined. My own playing time was closely monitored, and there was a constant fear that I might succumb to some hidden influence. I was, quite simply, constantly having to prove my sanity to my parents.

My experience was hardly unique. Where my friends didn’t deal with the same pressures from their parents, they at least felt the heat from parents like my own, and the media and anti-D&D groups aligned against them.

Then there’s the stereotype of geekiness attached to the game. It’s one thing for us, as players to jokingly refer to ourselves as geeks. It’s quite another for others to do it - especially when they mean it in a derogitory way. There was nothing warm and friendly about Cecil’s article. Many of my friends who play roleplaying games would call themselves geeks. I simply call them my friends. I admit to a small vein of geekdom in myself, but it would take a real ass for anyone else to call me a geek. I’m a war veteran, I stay physically fit, I have a successful career, and am married to a beautiful woman who happens to be a doctor to boot. Simply put, I quash all the stereotypical earmarks for geekiness. The idea that I like to spend an occassional day sitting around a table with a group of friends, talking, laughing, and enjoying their company, however, is the true benchmark by which I judge us as anything but geeks.

71

Oh, so you do think describing all referees as ‘Mansonesque’ is funny?
I teach roleplaying as an afterschool activity. What would you advise me to say to parents concerned by the article about their children being taught roleplaying by me?
(Your answer should include reference to the recent murders in Soham, UK of two schoolgirls by a school caretaker.)

I know what he said.
As I said, my pupil players detest the label ‘anti-social cutthroat’.

Vaguely inaccurate? :rolleyes:
Cecil gave 3 ways to find out more about roleplaying:

I doubt anyone could get hold of the 7 year old CD (it’s not shown on Amazon).
TSR sold D+D years ago, so the phone number is undoubtedly useless.
He advised ‘visit a store’.

It took me about a minute to find a searchable database of current stores selling D+D products:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=welcome/stores

I’d hate to see what you call inaccurate…

So you don’t know the difference between a chart and a formula? :rolleyes:

72

ether dragon writes

At no point does Cecil attempt to cloak his disdain by suggesting his article is tongue-in-cheek. Rather, he scanned the cover and pictures of the books he was provided, and filled in the details with the prejudice and misinformation already being shoveled to the general public. Cecil shows himself to be a victim of the very forces ignorance he is supposed to be exposing. Whats more, by being a victim, he became a tool of their lies.

Um. I don’t know how long you’ve been reading cecil, but…tongue-in-cheek is pretty par for the course for him. Anyone who reads cecil on a regular basis is going to know this. Anyone who doesn’t know it because they don’t know it can’t be helped anymore than a person who over hears only a part of a conversation only knows part of the story.

**It’s easy, perhaps, to look back twenty years and laugh off the hysteria of the time. It had real impact back then, however. Parents were bombarded by messages warning of the dangers D&D presented to their children. News magazines like 20/20 and 60 Minutes warned of psychological effects caused by the game - murder and suicide. Church officials railed against the game in their pulpits and church groups. School officials pulled the books from their libraries, forbid it’s playing on school property, and further warned parents against it’s influence. Everywhere you turned gamers were attacked for simply playing a game.

The result of the hysteria was more than just slumping sales for TSR. It went deeper than the lawsuits against the gaming industr; accusing them of promoting suicide and murder. As a teenager, I was forbidden to see friends who were known to play the game. Based on the plethora of information provided by the various groups, fellow players were quickly suspected of drug dealing, child molestation, satanism, and every other deviant behavior that could be imagined. My own playing time was closely monitored, and there was a constant fear that I might succumb to some hidden influence. I was, quite simply, constantly having to prove my sanity to my parents.**

Gee, thanks for the mini-history of the hysteria. You will of course note that nowhere in his article, other than tongue-in-cheek references to a “vaguely mansonesq personage” and “acolytes” does he identify DnD with anything remotely promoting suicide, murder, “drug use, child molestation, satanism, or any deviant behavior” other than perhaps a sort of harmless mild obessesive compulsiveness with charts and book keeping.

Bluntly put, your issue is with Jack Chick and the 700 club, not Cecil. You ought to perhaps take it up with them.

<b>Then there’s the stereotype of geekiness attached to the game. It’s one thing for us, as players to jokingly refer to ourselves as geeks. It’s quite another for others to do it - especially when they mean it in a derogitory way. There was nothing warm and friendly about Cecil’s article. Many of my friends who play roleplaying games would call themselves geeks. I simply call them my friends. I admit to a small vein of geekdom in myself, but it would take a real ass for anyone else to call me a geek. I’m a war veteran, I stay physically fit, I have a successful career, and am married to a beautiful woman who happens to be a doctor to boot. Simply put, I quash all the stereotypical earmarks for geekiness. The idea that I like to spend an occassional day sitting around a table with a group of friends, talking, laughing, and enjoying their company, however, is the true benchmark by which I judge us as anything but geeks.</b>

Yeah, that’s great, but in the context of this discussion what you do and your self image are hardly relevant determiners of wether or not you are a geek. I do find it alarming though, that you care so much what people without legal authority over you think about you or what you do for fun. See my first post, especially the section about everyone not having to like you and what you do, and what that means for you in return.

glee writes

Oh, so you do think describing all referees as ‘Mansonesque’ is funny?

Actually, considering what I know about Cecil’s writing style, I do find it funny.

I teach roleplaying as an afterschool activity. What would you advise me to say to parents concerned by the article about their children being taught roleplaying by me?

I would refer such parents who had aparently only read that article to other articles by Cecil so they could grasp his tongue-in-cheek demeanor. Logically, if they were remotely familiar with “Straight Dope” it wouldn’t necessarily seem odd.

(Your answer should include reference to the recent murders in Soham, UK of two schoolgirls by a school caretaker.)

Tragic. It’s an issue of school safety and quite probably mental illness however, not one related to DnD (unless there is something else about the story I don’t know from your summary).

**Vaguely inaccurate?
Cecil gave 3 ways to find out more about roleplaying:

I doubt anyone could get hold of the 7 year old CD (it’s not shown on Amazon).
TSR sold D+D years ago, so the phone number is undoubtedly useless.
He advised ‘visit a store’.

It took me about a minute to find a searchable database of current stores selling D+D products:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=welcome/stores

I’d hate to see what you call inaccurate…**

Given that the piece was written aparently 20 years ago, and updated once or twice, you can’t expect that all the information is up to date. It’s simple enough. Citations change.

My reference of “vaguely inaccurate” was in reference to his description of the game in general.

<b>So you don’t know the difference between a chart and a formula? </b>

So you don’t understand “Strictly metaphor”?

Or perhaps I ought to expound at length on the calculations of THAC0?

You guys are taking this WAAAAAY too seriously.

73

Let’s start with the insults.
Cecil describes D+D as ‘demented’ and wonders about the ‘nation’s mental health’ because they buy roleplaying products.
He describes the game as ‘weird’ and referees as ‘vaguely Mansonesque’.
The protocols are ‘murky’; the characters are ‘antisocial cuttthroats’.
Players are ‘acolytes’ and the rule books are ‘sacred’.
He ‘reassures’ us that if you call TSR for information, the police are not notified.

And the basis for all this is that he has never played the game, nor spoken to a player.

Now for the game details.
According to Cecil, ‘players have to determine their chance of contracting communicable diseases or becoming infected by parasites’.
There are ‘a billion rules’.
The game requires ‘non-stop mathematical finagling that would constipate Einstein’.

Of course none of this is true.

Oh good. I tell them to read some more articles, because I’m not really a mass murderer.
Are you a parent? Have you any idea how they react to hearing their children are being taught about ‘anti social cutthroats’ by a ‘Mansonesque’ person?

Apparently there’s quite a lot you don’t know. For example, school safety was not relevant.
But this nicely illustrates my point. The first time you read a story by a journalist, you make assumptions. It’s difficult to get people to change that first attitude.

Oh dear. Cecil was asked this question just a few days ago. This professional journalist left in all the out-of-date information (buy a 7 year old CD! phone a useless number! ) and did nothing whatsoever to answer the question.
But all the insults and inaccuracies stayed.
It’s simple enough. Cecil is a journalist who usually researches his answers carefully. Sadly he has a complete blind spot about D+D.
(Have you ever worked on a newspaper? Well you won’t if you think ‘you can’t expect that all the information is up to date’. Do you know what a sub-editor is? Do you know what researchers do?)

Cecil claimed the book was ‘laden with mystifying pronouncements’. He gave one example, which of course nobody would ever use…
You in turn state that the books have an ‘astounding number of arcane formulae’.
So far you’ve managed to mention THAC0, which can involve a couple of additions and a subtraction or two. That’s ‘arcane’ to you, is it?
Do please list the many remaining arcane formulae (which you ‘claim’ exist). That should establish your level of accuracy.

74

Considering the “players are your enemies” DMs I grew up with, against whom I had to develop a munchkin-like sense of powergaming out of sheer self-defense for my characters’ lives … yes!

75

As a roleplayer I am a little puzzled by your early DM’s. If they were really out to get you, why couldn’t they succeed?!
Did they not understand that roleplaying should be enjoyable for everyone?

But seriously, as I have said repeatedly, I teach roleplaying at a UK School.
What would you say to a parent who confronts me with this article and demands that I stop roleplaying at the School, because she doesn’t want her children to learn to be ‘antisocial cutthroats’ taught by a ‘Mansonesque’ person, especially since the recent child murders by a School caretaker in Soham?

76

glee I think that both the question and answer are 20 years old, not just the answer.

Agree with the rest of your points though. It’s a shame Cecil chose to go with cheap insults rather than accurate information.

/Past player of D&D, AD&D, Warhammer FRP, Warhammer 40K, MERP and others.

77

Let’s start with the insults.
Cecil describes D+D as ‘demented’ and wonders about the ‘nation’s mental health’ because they buy roleplaying products.

Wooo. Big deal. I’ve been called worse and I’ve managed to shrug it off. Once again, the fact that the article is tongue in cheek ought to mean something to you.

**He describes the game as ‘weird’ and referees as ‘vaguely Mansonesque’. **

Are you fourteen years old? Whow cares if he thinks its weird. Compared to games like monopoly, scrabble, and settlers of catan it is weird. Once again you mistake his writing style of a serious slam. It’s not surprising considering you still don’t grasp “strictly metaphor” either.

The protocols are ‘murky’; the characters are ‘antisocial cuttthroats’.

“Murky” means “vague, unclear”. Hardly anything about which to get your panties in a wad, especially considering the sheer number of gaming groups I’ve experienced where the “protocols” were “murky”. I covered the “antisocial cutthroat” bit before but you managed to confuse players and player characters. I’m still not sure you understand the difference so I’ll let your perseveration about this particular phrase go for now.

Players are ‘acolytes’ and the rule books are ‘sacred’.

Geez if I had a nickle for every player or dm to whom the rules were “sacred” I would own the first edition of deities and demigods by now.

He ‘reassures’ us that if you call TSR for information, the police are not notified.

And yet you manage somehow to take that seriously?

Oh good. I tell them to read some more articles, because I’m not really a mass murderer.
Are you a parent? Have you any idea how they react to hearing their children are being taught about ‘anti social cutthroats’ by a ‘Mansonesque’ person?

Nope. Not a parent. Are you a parent? How do you react to reading one article? Do you fly off the handle and get all huffy? Oh, wait. I guess you do. Nevermind.

Apparently there’s quite a lot you don’t know. For example, school safety was not relevant.
But this nicely illustrates my point. The first time you read a story by a journalist, you make assumptions. It’s difficult to get people to change that first attitude.

Okay. No Einstein, I don’t know about the case because in the US they don’t broadcast the specifics about every single murder that happens in the UK. And no, it doesn’t illustrate your point either, because I didn’t read an article by a journalist. I read a couple lines of text written by someone hastily trying to justify the reason they took the article way to seriously. If you want to give me a link to the entire article, I’d be happy to opine on it then. Sadly it still won’t help your argument.

Kids getting murdered in a school is not an issue of school safety? Are you serious?

**Oh dear. Cecil was asked this question just a few days ago. This professional journalist left in all the out-of-date information (buy a 7 year old CD! phone a useless number! ) and did nothing whatsoever to answer the question.
But all the insults and inaccuracies stayed. **

LOL. The article was written in 1980 and updated sometime thereafter when the pentium was still a pimped-out rig, so no, he was not “asked this question just a few days ago”. If he, or someone else, refered a reader back to a 20 year old article, they ought to expect 20 year old information.

It’s simple enough. Cecil is a journalist who usually researches his answers carefully. Sadly he has a complete blind spot about D+D.

Meh. It’s typical, I tells ya. It’s the way people treat a “strange” subculture.

(Have you ever worked on a newspaper? Well you won’t if you think ‘you can’t expect that all the information is up to date’. Do you know what a sub-editor is? Do you know what researchers do?)

:rolleyes:
And that would be relevant (I mean aside from another thinly veiled slam at my intellect) to this issue how? Why would a syndicated columnist have a “sub-editor”? Do you know what reading comprehension is?

Cecil claimed the book was ‘laden with mystifying pronouncements’. He gave one example, which of course nobody would ever use…

Frankly, if step outside of your tidy little mental box and try looking at it from another person’s point of view, you’ll find that the books are infact filled with “mystifying pronouncements”. I was gonna say, I still don’t understand why this gets you bent out of shape, but I think understand.

You in turn state that the books have an ‘astounding number of arcane formulae’.
So far you’ve managed to mention THAC0, which can involve a couple of additions and a subtraction or two. That’s ‘arcane’ to you, is it?

At this point, if I were a parent, I’d be alarmed that my children are spending time with someone at school who can’t grasp plain english like “strictly metaphor”. I’ll spell it out for you in very short phrases:

Take any person off the street who does not play DnD and let them read the explanation of thac0 and explain it back to you. They won’t be able to. Hence, we can understand, in a metaphorical way, how someone could see it as “arcane”, or in the common parlance, “hard to understand”.

Now do you get it?
Do please list the many remaining arcane formulae (which you ‘claim’ exist). That should establish your level of accuracy.**

78

Sorry, Guac, I’ve been reading Cecil for a very long time. I’ve long enjoyed Cecil’s sense of humor and “tongue-in-cheek” manner. What’s missing in his D&D article is any of that humor. If he were just being humorous, he would’ve cushioned his statements with facts and disclaimers. Instead, his article, from start to finish, is nothing more than a diatribe denouncing the game as weird and unfathomable. Where the original writer was seeking information about role playing games, Cecil was providing a clear warning to stay away from them.

Your overly apologetic attitude towards his article, as well as your caustic dismissal of the real concerns expressed here, aren’t going to wash that reality aside.

Glee, I thought Cecil’s suggestion that D&D formulas were arcane was a bit bizarre as well. There’s nothing beyond simple addition and multiplication used in the game. I actually converted to games like Rolemaster because I felt AD&D was overly simplified and more suitable for children. Indeed, I’ve known kids as young as eight who played the game. I myself started at the age of ten. In light of that, Cecil is really embarassing himself by suggesting that the game was beyond his comprehension. :wink:

79

I don’t know why you were called demented. Was it justified? :smiley:
(See, that’s humour!)
Let me just remind you that the article:

  • contains numerous factual errors
  • has undoubtedly been reprinted twice over 23 years (as a ‘classic’ :rolleyes: ) , without ever being corrected
  • is written by a journalist who knows almost nothing about this subject
  • is consistently hostile, one-sided and full of insults to every player and referee

Somehow we are supposed to see that the game is a worthwhile pursuit, suitable for the whole family - because you think the humour is evident.

No, I’m 50 years old and teach at a prestigious private UK School. And I object to being compared to a mass murderer (whether or not it’s supposed to be a joke).
And I care about what Cecil prints because he has a responsibility as a widely published journalist.

Oh dear. :rolleyes:
My pupil players resent being told their carefully chosen characters are ‘anti-social cutthroats’.
Is that clear enough for you?

(By the way, you may be rude but your vocabulary- perseveration - is excellent!)

Perhaps you should talk to an adult. Ask them the question above.
In case you really don’t know, parents do indeed take their children’s welfare extremely seriously. Think about Megan’s Law, the instant community response when a child goes missing and the reaction when an accused paedophile is brought to court etc.

The US doesn’t have the Internet?
Or you don’t know how to look up foreign news?

And it doesn’t matter who wrote it - you instantly made a wrong assumption.
And you still think it’s going to be easy to persuade an agitated parent that a lengthy article by a journalist is entirely wrong?

Proving my point yet again.
What makes you they were murdered in a school?
Did you, by any chance, make an … assumption?
You actually think this case has something to do with school safety - are you serious?!

Do you not see the important difference between people and a publication by a journalist whose motto is ‘fighting ignorance’?

My pupils certainly don’t have particular difficulty with a couple of additions and subtractions.
But I will generously allow that as one - so now you can list the many remaining arcane formulae (which you ‘claim’ exist). As I said, that should establish your level of accuracy.

80

Arguing about D&D takes me back to the good old days.

Okay, as a former D&D geek, I just want to weigh in with this thought: I always assumed arcane formulae was the whole point of the game. That’s why we bought all those manuals, right?

Now, get out there and slay some dragons, people.