TOPIC: R.I.P. E.G.G.

He apparently got an earful on the forums for the site. One person referred to his article as 'whiny neckbearded contrarian trollery'. Still, you can't not expect this sort of thing, right? For some libs, it's an easy target. D&D promotes violence and racism, which seems to be this guy's beef. I haven't seen the flip side rake Gygax over the coals for promoting witchcraft or anything yet. Maybe they flipped a coin and this particular batch of insanity won the right to repsond.

True - GURPs is my role-playing game of choice (although role-playing adventures are few and far between now - pretty much just at GENCON), but I started out on D&D, and even with it's flaws it was very innovative and trend-setting. 

<br />He apparently got an earful on the forums for the site. One person referred to his article as 'whiny neckbearded contrarian trollery'. Still, you can't not expect this sort of thing, right? For some libs, it's an easy target. D&D promotes violence and racism, which seems to be this guy's beef. I haven't seen the flip side rake Gygax over the coals for promoting witchcraft or anything yet. Maybe they flipped a coin and this particular batch of insanity won the right to repsond.<br />

<br /><br />Yup - I had a cousin who told me I was going to burn in hell just for owning the books - and that if I wasn't careful, a demon might rise out of them and steal my soul in the middle of the night.<br />I thought she was just joking and laughed it off - but then I found out that's what she really believes.

Did the books come with a free cat? Because then she would be right.

No - I got the cat a couple years later.  And my friends sometimes refer to her as satan - if she had a catch phrase, it would be, "Kill all males!"  For some reason, she usually attacks any guy that comes over.

That explains a lot. If you ever want her, 'taken care' of, let me know. My parents have a chinese resturant (well, for another month or two anyway).

Oh no... it's all good.<br />She's 14 anyway - the meat is probably too tough by now.

Our cat is the demonic cat.  Last Thursday I hit her again with the car as I pulled into the driveway.  She has been hit once by my son and twice by me now.  She is gray and always runs out right in front of the car in the dark.  She is 15 years old and she just refuses to die.  She kinda limps around after laying in a box for a week now and I suspect she will go for another few years.  <br /><br />About Gygax--no matter what anyone says, role playing games would not have evolved at all without him trying to codify some rules.  Role playing games caught on when there was a rule book that players could reference.  Look at how many times people have asked about the new token guide.  There are other good role playing games, but most all have grown out of D&D in one way or another--just somebody who thought they could make it better or they wanted a different scenario or whatever.  But most of those develop a small following and then die (like my cat should).<br /><br />Fantasy genre in general probably would not have developed without Tolkien.  It would have stayed in the realm of Greek or Norse myths as portrayed in The Ring operas and Greek tragedy plays.  Tolkien took the Arthuresque type stories and coupled them with underlying legends and fantasy, and an entire genre has grown out of it.  The guy who wrote the article doesn't understand Tolkien when he says "This (meaning D&D) is not Tolkien's Middle-Earth, with its anti-fascist political commentary and yearning for an end to glory and the triumph of peace. This (meaning D&D) is violence without pretense, an endless hobgoblin holocaust."  It is too long of a discussion to debunk this statement, but suffice it to say, in Tolkien's writings he said he set out to create a heritage of legend for England that he felt had been destroyed by the invasions of the Norse, Saxons, Normans, and just about everybody else.  He felt other great cultures, Rome, Scandanavia, Germanic, Greek, Middle Eastern, Chinese, Indian, etc. had legends upon which their civilizations had been built, and England deserved the same.  "Anti-fascist political commentary and yearning for an end to glory" is just a stupid statement in the face of Tolkien's writing.  Quite frankly the glory is the triumph of peace under a benevolent king--not a president or parlaiment, or congress or representative legislature.  Tolkien's view is that the best and most efficient government is a kingdom under a benevolent king.  That could be taken as kind of a fascist government.  The guy who wrote this article is an idiot.<br /><br />I think in a way Gygax did they same type of thing--not as well as Tolkien maybe, but his efforts grew a whole new arm to the gaming industry.  For that we who enjoy our games owe him.<br /><br />Too much said, but my blood boils when I read crap like that.  BTW one of the best nights I remember was a night when I DMed a group who in about 4 hours didn't even get out of the town.  They spent all night seeking out clues, and interacting with merchants, etc.  No one even drew a sword that night, and they all got great experience before they even entered the dungeon.<br /><br /><br />Widseth<br /><br />

There's something to be said for hack 'n' sash, but I prefer the role-playing Widseth talked about.<br />

In my campaigns, if the people are stuck in town, they do things like lay on the ground and make dirt angels (true story).

one annoying sob in my group would always stop and 'build a house'. My response was usually 'out of what you dumbass?'.

I made them draw up the plans, find a contractor, explain where/how they were going to get the materials, and then have the local magistrate reject their request for a builder's permit.<br /><br />They stopped asking.