Johnathan Bane wonders why anyone would judge what a man does in his spare time.
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I have a bright red 20 sided die sitting my my desk, named “Artaxor, Destroyer of Goblins and Annoying Bards”. When I get bored with writing an article, I roll it on my floor. If it comes up on a 13 or higher, I get to stop what I’m doing and take a break. If I roll a 20, I get to immediately stop and play some Skyrim. If it comes up at a 12 or lower, I continue for a little while. That is, unless I roll a 1. In which case, I HAVE to finish what I’m writing to the end.
And now you know the base mechanic for most editions of Dungeons and Dragons. HAHAHAH!! It starts as a small infection. Basically I have smallpox of the geekiness, and I’ve just sneezed while hugging you. You may as well go out and buy the books now, it’s only a matter of time before you start thinking of the world in terms of Hit Points and ability stats. Pick up a few comics and miniatures while you’re at it (I recommend anything from Top Cow), you know you want to. Oh, and some dice. You’ll need those for the climactic battle against the King of Evil Centaurs on top of the Spire of Crystal Manic-Depressive Meat Loaf Recipes. I’m just kidding, centaurs don’t eat meat loaf. Any 1st level rogue just out of Thieves Guild boot camp knows that.
It’s a rule of thumb. If you meet a centaur, DON’T under any circumstances offer him meat loaf. He will kill you and your entire party, then find where you live and punch your dog repeatedly. So, now we all know this. We can move along.
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For those of you living under a rock (or just with “normal” interests), Dungeons and Dragons is just one game series in a genre known as “Tabletop Role Playing Gaming”. It is also the most popular and well known of the games in this genre.
The premise is simple. Get a group of friends together and tell a collective story within a given set of rules. The stories can range anywhere from the world of J. R. R. Tolkien-esque fantasy (Dungeons and Dragons), science fiction space opera (Star Wars Saga Edition or Edge of the Galaxy), run from zombies in survival horror (Resident Evil or Call of Cthulhu) or even just become a superhero/villain (Mutants and Masterminds). Want to reenact a Supernatural episode? There is a Supernatural role playing game, or you can easily adapt the rules of currently existing systems to serve the same motif.
It’s fun. Good fun. You sit around with your friends, eating pizza, drinking Mountain Dew (these days I stick to diet MD, or just plain old coffee, with my pinky out because I’m a classy adult) and inserting movie quotes into in-game situations. My wife and I play whenever we can find players around here and have introduced our daughter to the funny shaped dice and miniatures of dragons and such. She usually just kisses them then goes back to her Bubble Guppies toys. (Footnote: a Bubble Guppies RPG might be interesting…)
You talk and you roll dice, and you see these stories come alive in your mind, with the aid of miniatures and your gamemaster’s descriptions.
What I’m curious about, and the question I hope starts a discussion is, “What’s wrong with being a little (or in my case, a LOT) geeky?” Everyone has their obsessions and things they absolutely love to do. For some it’s playing or watching sports. For others it’s reading, writing, music… I mean you could go on and on. Why should engaging your mind in a fantasy world be looked at as any less acceptable then playing a sport? Granted, the percentage of gamers who are incapable of running a mile without collapsing from heat exhaustion is rather high, but then again the same could be said for programmers.
What bothers me when meeting someone new, after a few hours of conversation I’m invariably asked about the things I like to do. (This usually happens after they see the tattoo I have on my left arm.) When I mention gaming I get one of two responses. The first is a variant of “What the hell is that?” The second is outright laughter. Very rarely will I get a reply to the effect of “Oh, right on. I used to (or currently) play, too.” One particular response which still tickles me to no end is a particular gym-rat who called me a “f**king fa**ot”. It doesn’t bother me though. I am who I am, and I wouldn’t change it for anything. Fact of the matter is, if you constantly wear a “Gold’s Gym” muscle shirt without ever having set foot in the place, I’m incapable of taking you seriously in the first place. I get that you live at the gym. We all get it. You go ahead and do some deal lifts and I’ll sit here and drink my bourbon.
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What tickles me, and I suppose this is my general thesis, is that people have these rigid judgments about what men and women should be spending their spare time doing.
Right now, I’m living in a small town in northwestern Pennsylvania. The values here fall in line with every single red state in this country. “A gun in every house and FOXNews on the telly. God damn Obama. F**king Muslims coming over here and taking all our jobs. Glenn Beck is god. ‘Murica! Ad nauseum…”
So as you could imagine, finding people around here to be accepting of not sharing interests is a little bothersome. Mentioning that you play D&D to a good majority of the population around here is tantamount to saying that you skin cats and have a hit list. Can’t we all just accept that not everyone is interested in camo, driving pickups and being sexually attracted to their cousins? (I’m looking at YOU Mercer and Venango counties…) Whenever the Super Bowl comes around, I always feel super happy, because football bores me and I get to know that every single person will leave me alone for the day.
No one who plays D&D worships Satan. They do occasionally borrow gas money from him from time to time, but that’s where the association ends. We draw the line at ritual sacrifice. Well, MOST of us draw the line at ritual sacrifice.
When people stop playing “Candy Crush” or “Words With Friends” on Facebook, then we’ll pretend that the things six guys (or gals) do around a coffee table can be considered “weird”. Some people collect glass unicorns. Some people watch Duck Dynasty. Some people play fantasy football. (And I’M called a geek…) All of these things are awesome! Just not to me.
The difference between “geeks” and “non-geeks” is that we usually won’t judge you for watching a show about a bunch of guys in camo manufacturing duck calls. We’re too busy rolling dice and debating which version of Battlestar Galactica was better.
And let the mockery begin…