Panicking the Children
Thoughts on Constructive Criticism in Gaming & in Writing
Constructive Criticism as a
GM Training Technique
Some years ago, I made it a practice to
go around to different gaming groups
in my area to see what different
gamemasters were doing. Each time I
would learn something new.
Sometimes it would be a new
technique. On other occasions, I
would see the GM doing something
well that I knew I wasn't terribly good
at doing on a regular basis in my own
campaigns. There is, after all, a
difference between recognizing a
technique when it is being
successfully employed and actually
using it often enough that it become a
regular part of one's GMing style.
Likewise, in many of these games, I
would often see the GM making a
whole host of what I consider to be
GMing errors. In some ways,
perceiving these was even more
educational, as it reinforced in my
mind some of the lessons I had already
learned, and it persuaded me not to
forget them.
Lately, I've been thinking that there
are two different levels of GMing
skill. There's the stuff we know, and
then there's the subset of that stuff that
we actually use, and I think that
perhaps the former is a lot bigger than
the latter.
Now, why is this? Well, I think it
boils down to a lack of practice, which
in turn is the result of a lack of
constructive criticism. I talk a good
deal about the quandary of criticism in
my comments to Lee Gold in this
issue. In short, I don't think it's always
useful or appropriate for players to
criticize their GMs or even for GMs to
necessarily invite criticism during the
course of actual play. It would be akin
to the director of a play stopping a
scene right in the middle in order to
ask the audience what they think.
Granted, a GM can always ask their
players for criticism between sessions,
but while this may be useful, I don't
think it has the same psychological
impact as on-the-spot/at-the-moment
criticism. After all, we aren't
necessarily trying to increase the
amount of GMing theory that the GM
Jim Vassilakos (jimv@uia.net)
knows somewhere in the back of his
head. What we're really trying to do, I
think, is to build on that subset of
knowledge that he or she actually
uses. We're trying to get him to change
his behavior. That means that bad
habits have to be broken and good
ones have to be reinforced, and that
means we need immediate feedback
right in the middle of play as the plot
is unfolding.
How this is to actually occur begins
with a rather unrealistic assumption.
I'll assume that you know enough
gamers that it is not impossible for
you to put together a group of GMs
who meet for the sole purpose of
improving their skills at GMing. This
is unrealistic for two reasons. Most of
us don't know that many GMs,
although if you live near a hobby shop
or an annual gaming convention, it
probably isn't impossible for you get
into contact with any number of such
creatures. The second reason it's
unrealistic is that many GMs may
assume that they already know
everything they need to know and that
attending any sort of GMing workshop
would be an admission of
imperfection.1 Nonetheless, let's
assume that you can somehow manage
to put together such a group. Once you
have these GMs together, here's my
idea for what you have them do:
Welcome to this GMing workshop. I
hope we can hold these on a regular
basis, but I want to warn you all
ahead of time that although we'll be
doing gaming as an essential part of
this workshop, our purpose here isn't
to game but rather to constructively
criticize during the actual game.
Gaming, therefore, takes a back seat.
Criticism and discussion takes the
front seat.
I'm handing each of you two sets of
index cards, one red set and one green
set. These are crit-cards…crit for
criticism. As you can see, each set has
the letters A through G inscribed upon
it's surface. Green is good. Red is bad.
Criticizing constructively means using
both sets.
1
I’ll talk more about pride in the 2nd half
of this essay.
The letters on the crit-cards
designate the following:
A. Action/Apathy
B. Believability/Bogosity
C. Characterization
D. Description
E. Energy/Enthusiasm
F. Fairness/Favoritism
G. God Complex2
So, for example, if one of the players
is thinking that the game is getting
boring because nothing is happening,
they throw a Red-A on the table. At
that point, play stops and all the other
players put a card on the table. They
can put a Red-A if they agree, or they
can put a Green-A if they disagree, or
they can use another card entirely, but
they need to throw at least one card on
the table.
Then, the entire group takes a
minute to discuss the cards. The
discussion can be as long or as short
as they like. Once they're done, they
pick up their cards and play continues.
If half an hour passes without anyone
tossing a card on the table, everyone
rolls a die, and the highest roller must
select a card pertaining to anything
that happened during the last half-
hour. After a few hours of this (or at
the next session), the next player takes
a turn GMing.
Once the group gets good at this,
explanations of the crit-cards3 will
2
Just a joke, although you can include it if
you like. You can designate other letters to
handle other sorts of issues: "R" for
railroading, "S" for stingy, "T" for
tyrannical, tasteless or perhaps tongue-tied,
"U" for U R an idiot. Hence, if you don't
like this essay, you can just comment that
I've proven myself worthy of a Red-U. I'll
understand.
3
One question that comes to mind is "Why
use cards at all?" Of course, you don't have
to, but I think their use would help in terms
of providing a checklist of what the
workshop regards as "good-GMing" versus
"bad-GMing". Also, the physical nature of
the cards, I think, would give the other
GMs something to hold and ponder as they
consider how the GM in the hot seat is
performing his duties. Finally, they
emphasize the fact that the craft of GMing
is a complex set of interwoven tasks that
are not easily mastered, but that by
barely be necessarily, and rather than
merely criticize, they'll be able to
experiment with some advanced
techniques. Here's one possible
example of what might happen:
Karen (GMing): Okay, three points of
damage to Larry.4
Larry puts a Red-D on the table. Mike
follows it with a Red-E, and Nina adds
a Red-C.
Karen: Okay, let me try that again.
The orc's blade connects with
Larimond's flesh, although just
barely. Nonetheless, blood begins
oozing from the wound, the orc
seeming to somehow grin and hiss
menacingly all at the same time.
Larry & Nina withdraw their red cards
and put green ones on the table in
order to say "well done", but Mike
leaves his Red-E where it is. "More
oomph!" he finally says.
Karen: How?
Mike: You're talking like you're
reading from a book. Try changing
your tone of voice or throwing in
some body language to match the
situation.
Nina: Also, when you moved the
miniature representing the orc, you
set it on the table without any sort
of force. Put it down with
authority, and give the player a
look like you mean to hurt him.
Mike: …and that you're planning to
enjoy it.
Larry: Yeah, the whole point of
combat is to make the players just
a little bit afraid. If they don't feel
any fear, then it's just a
mathematical exercise. One
technique I've seen used it to have
one of the players playing the
monsters.
Karen: A guest player?
Larry: Yeah.
Karen: Hmm… would you like to play
the orcs in this encounter?
delineating and defining each, they each
can be approached and examined as issues
naturally arise during the game.
4
Incidentally, this is an error that I commit
very often. I obviously know how to do
better, but the habit of doing better hasn't
been drummed into me to the extent that I
think it needs to be. And so too with many
other aspects of GMing.
Larry: Um…okay, but on one
condition.
Karen: What?
Larry: The orcs need to have a chance
of actually winning.
Karen (changing some of the stats in
order to beef up a few of the orcs):
Okay, let's start this scene over
from where you entered the natural
cavern. I'll say that you already
found some fresh orc dung just
outside, so you know what you're
going to be facing. Larry, come
with me to the other room so that
we can quickly go over your
strategy. They made enough noise
in the previous encounter that your
orcs already know somebody's
coming.
Larry: Heh-heh… you guys are toast.
Having not tried this idea yet, I don't
know how it will work in practice. It's
possible that the participants may just
get angry at one another over
incompatibilities in their various
GMing philosophies, or that
somebody may feel unnecessarily
picked-on.
I think it's vital to remember that this
technique isn't so much about teaching
as it is about rehearsing. After all, it's
one thing to know that combat should
be descriptive and fear-inducing and
that no chance for characterization
should be missed. It's quite another to
do all three things simultaneously.
Hence, what this is really about is
establishing good habits.
Once GMs are criticized with a few
hundred Red-C's, they may actually
start forcing themselves to speak for
NPCs "in voice" and to analyze
situations from an NPC perspective.
Then, after a few hundred Green-C's,
characterization will become second-
nature, so easy, I hope, that they won't
even have to think about it very much.
They'll just do it, and as a result, their
games will improve.
But in order for any of this to
happen, I think a process of
constructive criticism must be
enmeshed into the actual play of the
game so that a GM can see what he or
she is doing at the very moment that
they are doing it wrong. Likewise, I
imagine, each natural talent that each
individual GM possesses may
hopefully and after much practice be
successfully emulated to some degree
by the other GMs in the group. In this
way, I think, the entire group may be
able to improve their game well past
the level of the average GM. In short,
I think such an activity could improve
the quality of the entire GMing pool.
Constructive Criticism in
Alarums & Excursions
Over the past few issues of A&E,
perhaps starting with A&E #357, I've
been thinking about criticism in the
APA. It was in that issue that I wrote
my "Perspectives on History" article,
trying to provide a framework to
encompass the various political &
historical perspectives I saw different
people adopting. I brought all this up,
I suppose, in order to show that while
we might not necessarily agree with
one another with respect to our
political conclusions, at least we might
agree that all of our various
perspectives have some degree of
merit. That, I think, is the essence of
pluralism and social liberalism: the
toleration of different points of view,
as well as showing the ability to
confront and explore our differences
without resorting to personal attacks.
However, it was also in that issue
that I thought I'd gotten personally
attacked. Patrick Riley was rather
upset with my politics, and he let me
know it in no uncertain terms. He
didn't come out and tell me
specifically what I'd said that pissed
him off, so I wasn't sure if it was my
thoughts or my presentation. Probably
a bit of both. In any case, I replied in
A&E #358 with a rather long
comment on how I thought he could
have handled the situation better, and
in A&E #360, he informed me that his
words had not been intended as a
personal attack, and that my
impression to this effect had been in
error.
Since then, I've considered how we
should decide whether or not we're
being personally attacked, and I've
come to a few conclusions. The first
one is that that we're essentially all
children at heart, all of us, the young
as well as the old, the experienced as
well as the inexperienced, the
thoughtful and deliberate as well as
the thoughtless and reactionary. And
because of this inner child who we all
carry within us, I think that it's quite
easy for us to get panicked when we're
faced by behavior that we view as
inexplicably rude or needlessly
confrontational. Sometimes, we're the
recipient of an attack, or at least we
think we are, and sometimes we're the
attacker, whether or not we intended
our comments in that way.
Communication, after all, is a two-
way street, and how a criticism is
received can be every bit as important
as how it is initially set forth.
I'm guilty of making errors on both
sides of this street. Sometimes I might
write something in a moment of
thoughtlessness or even arrogance that
could have been better worded. Other
times, I read something that seems like
an attack, and not knowing exactly
what to make of it, I imprint the most
hostile of the various possible
perspectives. That we will make such
mistakes is unavoidable. We're merely
human, after all.
But what causes us to make these
mistakes? By and large, I think it is
pride, and this is a particularly
insidious vice, as those who suffer
from it the most are often the least
aware of their addiction. If you don't
have the ability to seriously ask the
questions, "Am I being prideful?" and
"Am I in the wrong?" that's a sign that
you don't have control over your pride.
If you can't apologize when you make
a mistake or you can't ever admit it
when you're wrong, that's another
sign. If you can't put yourself into the
shoes of someone else and imagine
what they might be thinking or
feeling, there again, you are too
committed to your own perspective. If
you can't phrase another person's
argument in your own words and
shape it into a convincing statement,
then once again, you aren't seeing
things from their point of view, and
you are too committed to your own
view of the world, to prideful as to
your own opinions. Finally, if you are
one of those people who can dish it
out but who can't take it, it may be that
you have become too prideful.
All of us are prideful, and that's not
necessarily a terrible thing depending
upon the circumstance. Taking pride in
one's work, for instance, is generally
viewed as a good thing. Likewise,
what we call taking pride in oneself,
which much of the time is a catch-
phrase for taking care in one's
presentation of self, is commonly
viewed as a good thing. But taking
pride in one's opinions or perspective
is a little bit different. I think it leads
to an inflexibility of perspective, a
narrow-mindedness, which I think
ought to be avoided, at least, that is,
assuming we want to all get along
with one another in a society that
treasures diversity of thoughts and
opinions.
We won't always agree with one
another. Conflict of opinion is
unavoidable. But on issues where
there is neither an authoritative voice
nor a resolution mechanism save for
the machinations of living history, we
can at least agree to disagree.
But while all of this lays some
groundwork, it doesn't really offer any
suggestions on how we are to proceed.
How do we make discussions in A&E
more constructive and more open to a
diversity of opinions? Well, I have
some thoughts on that topic.
• When we read a comment that we
find offensive, we should stop and
ask if we are certain how the
author meant it. Since we aren't
face to face with one another, we
can't see the expression on the
other person's face. Was it meant
as a joke or in an offhand
manner? Are there different ways
to interpret the subtext of the
comment, and are some of those
ways less offensive than others?
These are some of the questions
that we should be asking,
assuming that is, that we can't be
certain of the truth.
• It's okay to point out to the author
the possible negative
interpretation of the comment, but
when doing so, it is best to be
specific and to offer a remedy.
"Here is what you said, this is
why I found it to be offensive, and
this is what you could have said
instead." By going into this much
depth, we don't leave any
ambiguity in the author's mind as
to the substance of our objection.
Hence, our criticism is less likely
to be interpreted as being a
personal attack. I would add
further that criticism is perhaps
the most important function of
A&E. It is though receiving
criticism that we hone our
methods and ideas, so if you were
to ask me, "Should we criticize?"
then my answer is emphatic:
"Yes, we should!" But we should
never be lazy about it. It is too
important a function to just do it
in an offhand manner. If we are
criticizing, we should invest time
and thought into it in order to
make our critique as specific,
constructive and useful as
possible. This is especially true
for personal criticism.
• If there's a possible positive
interpretation of what appears to
be a personal attack, we should
explore that as well, rather than
merely focusing on what may
appear to us to be the obvious,
negative interpretation. We might
assume for the moment that the
author is a good person who just
made a misstatement. It happens.
Perhaps they were unusually busy
and didn't have time to edit their
remarks. By interpreting their
comments in the least offensive
light imaginable, we can then
reply to them in a positive
manner, setting an example of the
sort of dialogue that we wish to
read throughout the APA. That is
assuming that we care enough to
take it upon ourselves to set such
an example, or that we even care
about the nature of the APA's
dialogue.
• Finally, if we find that we're in the
position of having written
something that was phrased in an
unnecessarily abrasive manner,
we should admit to the mistake
and say that we're sorry.
Apologies go a long way toward
mending fences. But should we
promise not to do it again? No, of
course, not. We're going to do it
again, and again, and again,
because we're human. Being
human is not about being perfect.
It's, at least in part, about
accepting our inherent
imperfection and trying to remedy
our mistakes when they injure
other people. This is an essential
component of the process of
trying to "get along" with one
another, and I think that if we
truly want the governments of the
world to get along, we should find
it within ourselves to set an
example in our personal lives by
 showing that we can swallow our
pride and make amends where
amends are appropriate.
I admit that all of this is easier said
than done, and so following these
guidelines consistently is probably not
going to happen any time soon.
Nonetheless, maybe it's worth trying.
In any case, rather than continue what
is probably a pointless lecture, I'll
simply try to follow these guidelines
in my own comments in order to
demonstrate the type of dialogue that
I'm advocating. However, I'm also
perfectly happy to follow examples set
by others, so consider this merely an
idea for your collective contemplation.
Comments on A&E #362:
Myles Corcoran: re the intelligent
space dust organisms: Your idea is
pretty far out there, but since we've
never met an alien, we don't know
really what is or isn't possible.
Nonetheless, at least in the
Ragamuffin setting, I'm presently
steering clear of organisms such as
this one, unless they've been
genetically designed like little von
Neuman machines to do terraforming
or clear a space lane or what-have-
you.
ryct Spike Jones on the double roles
of RPG books (as learner and
reference): How would you suggest
organizing an RPG to best address
both roles? Or are there any examples
on the market that you think have
achieved "optimal design structure"?
Michael Cule: ryct Joshua
Kronengold re the Church of the
Sacred Porn: Yes, it was foretold long
ago that an invisible path would one
day be bestowed upon mankind,
providing all men with a means for
entering a place that would make
blush the ancient ghosts of Sodom and
Gomorrah. Now, indeed, it has come
to pass. Praise be to the Internet!
<grin>
Robert Dushay: re genetic
manipulation: I tend to agree with
your concerns on this, although I’m no
expert. I would also add that while
there's an obvious risk in doing
something, there is also risk in not
doing something. In short, risk is
unavoidable. Finally, I should state
that I think it's a difficult problem with
repercussions that are probably very
difficult for us to accurately envision
at the present time, although I'd be
delighted to discuss it further.
re the war, the grieving widow test,
and your query that "If it's not worth
shedding the blood of people you
know, why is it worth shedding the
blood of people you don't know?":
Well, my answer to this has to do with
the problem of trying to apply rigid
moral standards in a world where not
everyone plays by the same rules.
Thucydides wrote on the true nature of
man, and what he witnessed was
evidence that men will do what they
must in order to win. Our weapons
have improved, but we’re still the
same humanity, and while being the
good guy makes for an uplifting story
on the silver screen, I’m not sure how
well it pans out the real world. In any
case, I have mixed feelings on this, but
rather than launch into a long essay,
I’ll put my reply on the web so that we
can discuss this topic outside of A&E.5
However, before moving on, I'd like
take the opportunity to mention that
something good happened. Kenny, the
newly enlisted private who I
mentioned in A&E #361, seems to
have a bit of a problem (aside from the
more obvious problem that he's being
sent to Iraq). As I mentioned, the plan
was that he'd be a driver and
transportation mechanic, a very
dangerous MOS in Iraq, since
insurgents love to target military
vehicles. Well, I asked you folks to say
a little prayer for him, and I think
some of you must have done so, and
further, I can't help but believe that
somebody up there was listening.
Kenny, it turns out, doesn't have a
driver's license. It was suspended for
some reason by the California DMV,
and (this part cracks me up)
apparently the military is held hostage
by civilian authority when it comes to
determining who is allowed to drive
military vehicles in foreign countries.
So, Kenny is grounded. He's going to
be working in a maintenance bay at a
base. He is so much safer in this new
position that words cannot express my
gratitude. But I'll try anyway. Thank
you! Thank you! Thank you!
5
I'm setting up a weblog at
www.livejournal.com/users/jim_vassilakos
re me being inconsiderate and now
inconsistent in your mind: In A&E
#362 I hope that you’ll note that I was
trying to get to the bottom of your
comment to try to see if I’d really
done something wrong or determine if
you were just taking offense at some
imagined slight. At first, because you
didn’t say exactly what it was you
were taking offense to, I wasn’t sure if
you had a valid point or were just
having a bad day.
You wrote, “your c’est la vie about
pissing people off strikes me as…well,
inconsistent.” Here I assume that
you're referring to my comment to
Lisa in A&E #361 where I stated, "…I
wanted to get folks here to think about
some of the things that I see going on
(in the world), and if that pissed a few
people off, oh well. My main regret is
that it detracted from the gaming
content of the APA while helping to
ignite a few pointless brushfires…"
Like I said to Patrick Riley in A&E
#359 (the comment to which Lisa was
referring), I think people choose their
own reactions to comments that get
made. My choice (usually) is to
attempt to bend in favor of civility and
constructive discussion, perhaps
sometimes even beyond the point
where it’s useful to do so. Of course,
that’s assuming that I have time to
think about it. My first instinct, I’ll
admit, is less mature, but I try to
moderate that by questioning myself
and also questioning whether I'm
really sure of what the other person is
saying or why they're saying it. And,
of course, this is easier said than done.
Perhaps all this leads to some degree
of inconsistency. I mean, maybe I
make a better effort on some days than
others. That's probably true. Also,
there are probably days where I'm in a
flippant mood, and I say something in
an offhand way that has the effect of
offending people. Simply forgetting to
put a smiley face at the end of a joke
can have that consequence as well.6
Nonetheless, if you could go over
precisely what I said and why you're
apparently taking offense to it and
perhaps what you think I should have
said instead, maybe that would help
6
Incidentally, my smiley faces last issue
seem to have mysteriously transformed
themselves into mailboxes, perhaps giving
some readers the impression that I was
really angry and was thinking of going
postal. <grin>
me understand your point of view a
little bit better. I make no claim to
perfection, but neither do I tend to
flame people outright, a statement
with which I hope you'd agree.
As for dropping provocative
conversation bombs, I admit that I do
have a tendency toward doing this in
my political essays.7 Some wicked
turn of phrase will come to mind, and
I’ll just have to use it, or I'll make a
joke and not realize that it's not funny.
Rather juvenile, I realize. I don't think
I have enough self-control to stop
doing this entirely, so my best option,
I think, is just to avoid political
discussion except with those who have
a greater tolerance to my more ill-
chosen zingers. Unfortunately, so far
that seems to be pretty much nobody.
Probably, I should be learning
something from that fact. <sheepish
grin>
re me being one of those people that
supposedly enjoys “the chaos that
ensues”: Like I said before, I admit
that I'm sometimes guilty of the
occasional flippant remark. These
show a lack of consideration at the
very least, so perhaps I should plead
guilty to your charge that I'm
inconsiderate. However, I actually
made an effort to try to stamp out
some of the little brushfires that I saw
erupting in A&E a few issues back.8 In
any case, if I came across as one of
7
See my comment to Joshua Kronengold
in A&E #359, but also note that I've been
reconsidering the part in footnote #19
about our "obligation to question authority
and to verbally smack it around." Recently,
I've been thinking, "Hey, leaders are
people too. Don't they deserve to be
treated with the respect to dignity that
every other human being deserves? Just
because they're leaders, why do we think
it's okay to treat them like punching
bags?" I don't think it's right, and not only
does it detract from our arguments when
we do that, but I think it also says
something negative about ourselves. In any
case, my thoughts on this are presently
evolving, although my Rice-comment (see
the 2nd paragraph of the 2nd column of the
3rd page of my essay in A&E #357) didn't
receive quite so much attention as some of
my, at least to me, seemingly less
belligerent comments, such as "trying to
get people to think" (discussed above),
which I didn't really view as being at all
belligerent at the time I wrote it and the
response to which still surprises me. For
more on this and my point of view, see my
comments to Lee in this issue.
those people you mention, someone
who just likes to see turmoil, I do
apologize. I like to get people to
discuss topics that I find interesting,
because then we can all ping off each
other, but I don't like to see the
discussion become so heated that
suddenly everyone starts fighting. I
think this all comes down to judging
the temperament of the group,
however, what I seem to chronically
forget is that in every group of a
sufficient size, there always seems to
be someone who will descend to using
personal attacks. I probably dive in too
deeply when I see this begin to
happen, where I think somebody's
comment is unfair or unnecessarily
abrasive or just out of proportion with
respect to the supposed offense.
If there seems to be a personal attack
of some sort, for instance, I prefer to
approach it head on so as to get it
resolved as quickly as possible, rather
than letting hurt feelings needlessly
simmer. Often, I've found, good
people get mistaken impressions about
one another, particularly in the written
medium, and the way to deal with it is
not through avoidance or sniping at
one another but rather through a
thorough examination of the various
points of view. That, of course, is
assuming that everyone is at least
attempting to be calm and reasonable,
and that there aren't people in the
discussion who are sniping at one
another as a form of entertainment or
in order to "get back at the other
person."
But, the upshot is that I would like
to see the discussion and comments in
A&E become more civil and
constructive rather than less so. I'm
also trying, perhaps unsuccessfully, to
present a model in the way that I make
my arguments and steer away from
cheap-shots while still trying to make
my points as plainly and clearly as
possible. I will grant you, I'm not
always successful. Perhaps I'm very
rarely successful, but I'm trying, so I
hope you'll bear with me.
Also, I should add, it would
probably be a good idea for us to
move these sorts of discussions to the
web where they won't become a
bother other readers who might
8
See my comments to Joshua Kronengold
and Marco Subias in A&E #359 as well as
my comments to Paul Mason and Brian
Misiaszek in A&E #360.
actually want to discuss RPG-related
topics.
Lee Gold: re random tables: I use
more random tables during
background generation and so forth
than I use during actual play. The ones
I use during the game tend to
determine such details as the weather
or to which party member something
good or bad happens. However, I also
use lots of “luck rolls” or “activity
rolls” on a d6 to decide all sorts of
stuff that hasn’t been pre-determined.
I’ve talked about this before9, but
perhaps a brief example of this will
help explain the idea.
GM (rolling a d6 to determine how
busy things are; the result is a 5):
The inn is pretty busy. It seems a
caravan is passing through town,
so getting lodging for the night
might be a little bit difficult.
Anna: If worse comes to worse, we
can always pitch our tent outside
of town.
Ben: Or set ourselves up in a loft in
one of the stables.
Chris: First things first. I’ll approach
the innkeeper and ask if they have
any rooms available.
GM (rolling a d6 to determine the
players’ luck; the result is a 4):
“You can stay here in the main
room if you don’t mind sharing the
floor with others.”
Ben: Hmm… “What about breakfast?”
GM (rolling another 4): “Bread and
beer. Don’t worry, I wouldn’t shoo
you out on an empty stomach.”
Chris: Is this innkeeper a man or a
woman?
GM (rolling a 1): Man. (rolling again
for height: a 2) Short and bearded.
Maybe some dwarf blood in him.
Anna: “Do you have any bathing
facilities?”
GM (rolling another 1 cascaded by 4):
“We’ve got here a river, m’lady.”
(rolling again to see if the
innkeeper will try to be helpful: a
5): “Most of the womenfolk bath
at the south end from dusk to dark.
You’ve still time if you hurry.”
I play many of the details by ear, even
the reactions an NPC might have to a
PC’s offer or argument. Of course, I
modify the rolls according to what I
9
See my article in A&E #299.
think is reasonable given the situation.
However, because of this random
element, not all “nameless” NPCs
react to the PCs the same way I would,
nor are all situations resolved in the
most obvious way imaginable. A
particularly low roll (a 1 cascaded by
another 1) might indicate that I have to
throw the players a curve ball. A
particularly high roll (a 6 cascaded by
a 6) might mean that something
unexpected and beneficial happens.
Some examples:
GM (rolling a 1 cascaded by a 2): Roll
your spot check (or against your
perception stat). While you're
bathing in the river, you notice a
pair of "peeping toms" lurking in
the bushes. They're teenagers.
None of the other women have
noticed them yet.
GM (rolling a 1 cascaded by a 1):
While you're bathing in the river,
you notice some movement in the
bushes. There's the glint of steel.
(Taking out a page with a pre-
generated encounter) Eight orcs
are suddenly charging. The women
around you start screaming, and
many begin swimming toward
deeper water. What are you doing?
GM (rolling a 6, cascaded by a 6):
While bathing in the river, your
foot brushes against something
sharp. (If the PC investigates, it
turns out to be some valuable item,
possibly magical, lost in the mud
along the river bank a very long
time ago.)
I've found this way of doing things to
be beneficial to the game, because
while curve balls are rare, they do
happen every so often, and they have
the tendency to create their own chain
of events that flow naturally in
accordance with whatever the players
happen to be doing. For example,
instead of setting up an orc hunt
before the session, the hunt begins as a
result of the orcs taking several
women captive, which happened
because a PC chose to go bathing and
rolled a double-one.
One might cry foul and argue, "But
the whole episode would never have
happened if the PC didn't set foot in
the river." True, but do they
necessarily know that? Hopefully, not.
But even if they should find out, it's all
make-believe anyway, and at least this
mechanism cancels the need for me to
have a random villager approach the
PCs "because we've heard of your
heroic exploits" and tell the party the
tragic tail of the bathing women.
Instead of doing a GM-designed
mission for an NPC patron, the PCs
end up reacting to what's going on
around them, making their own
decisions about what they want to do.
The GM, meanwhile, has his world
react to them in the same way. Hence,
the game itself become more of a
chaotic synthesis of both sides playing
off one another, and as a result, I
think, the players feel more
empowered and become involved in
the setting. Instead of trying to figure
out the GM's secret script, everything
the players do, both collectively as
well as individually, has the potential
to lead them in an entirely new
direction, possibly changing the
course of the campaign.
Granted, this tends to do three
different things. First, it puts pressure
on the GM to improvise.10 I would
argue that using this method at least
part of the time would teach more
GMs to improvise. After all, the only
sure way to learn improvisation is to
take the plunge and actually do it.
Secondly, adventures can become
rather mangled with side-treks and
stray plot-threads that lead off in
different directions. The player may
eventually differ in opinion as to
which one ought to take precedence,
that is, which thread the group ought
to pursue. This will likely generate
internal friction that can be good for
characterization but bad for the
campaign, so this natural conflict will
have to be wisely managed.
Third, if used uncritically, this
method can turn each PC into
something of a weirdness-magnet.
Granted, a certain amount of this is
good, but too much becomes
ridiculous. After all, a double-1 or a
double-6 will occur on one out of
every eighteen rolls, which is better
than the odds of rolling a "natural 20",
so the GM should keep this in mind
when using the luck die.
10
Before a session where I'm GMing, I'll
typically generate (or have one of my
programs generate) a variety of
"unplanned" encounters that I can drop
into the game at various intervals
according to whatever situation arises.
As for myself, I currently keep a
program running on my laptop that
has luck rolls programmed as a single
keystroke option. I hit "L", and the
computer quietly rolls the d6 for me
and then cascades it if the result turns
out to be either a 1 or a 6. This helps,
because the players never know if I'm
doing luck rolls or having the
computer roll perception checks for
the whole group or checking the
weather or simply rolling up a random
encounter.
Also, I've found that my players tend
to approve of the luck roll mechanic
where is it applied in an obvious way,
and the game tends to run faster as a
result. Where other more focused rules
don’t apply to a particular situation,
for example, an open luck roll can be
used to resolve all sorts of arguments.
Individual players may not like the
outcome, but they'll usually accept it
because they perceive it as being fair.
Having said all this, I still would like
to add an assortment of random tables
to “Rand”, my random stuff generator,
so that I can access them during play.
That might provide a sort of
brainstorming device during the actual
session for all those details I wouldn’t
normally be able to think up on the
spur of the moment. My only worry is
that using this tool in the middle of a
session might slow down the game, so
I’d have to find a way to make the
interface quick and easy. One
possibility may be to just keep it
running in it’s own window
throughout the session.
re your qualifications on “the story
is what is important” where you add
“as long as the group agrees”: Yes, I
agree, however, there’s a lot more that
can be said on this topic. I mean, when
two players disagree as to direction,
the GM may end up casting the crucial
vote in any number of ways and for
any number of reasons. It can be a
difficult situation for a GM, because if
taken to the extreme, being the neutral
arbiter means not having a particular
plot or story that you want to tell. And,
of course, I think most GMs have
some idea of the story they want to
tell, so staying out of this conflict,
being perfectly neutral, is naturally
difficult. The GM, after all, has a
traditionally central role in
determining the story.
In any case, I think this is deeper a
topic than it at first appears. It might
be useful to have an igTheme on how
much GM-steering of the plot is
appropriate, or whether the GM
should somehow endeavor to be
completely hands-off.
re the so-called “crime gene”: I tend
to agree with your thoughts, however,
I’m in no position to comment with
any authority.
re “single parents families”,
“marriage as we know it”, and “the
explosion of women in the workforce”
being code phrases for people with a
political axe to grind: I have mixed
thoughts on your comments. I think
what you’re saying is historically
accurate, but I’m not sure exactly how
it applies to what I was saying.
I was saying that society is changing
and maybe we are also. What I see
you saying, in general, is that society
has always been changing and that
certain “code phrases” seem to
incorrectly suggest otherwise. But this
still doesn’t address the question over
whether or not we are changing, and
by that I mean biologically.
One other question that springs to
mind is that if these code phrases are
to be avoided, what phrases should be
used in replacement of the ideas they
represent? Granted, perhaps there are
no perfect phrases that completely
encompasses the historical and social
realities, but then how do we quickly
refer to these ideas in order to have a
conversation about them without using
short phrases to refer to these ideas?
I should also probably mention that
while I share the conservative view
that society is in a state of decay, I
don’t necessarily share their rationale
as to who is at fault or how we should
address the problem. I’d rather talk
about all this outside of A&E, as my
thoughts here are likely to go well
astray of gaming, and as you probably
know by now, I have a tendency at
times to ramble for pages on end. I’ll
post my thoughts to the web, and we
can continue the discussion there if
you'd like.11
I think it's also worth noting that it
isn't merely highly politicized words
or phrases that have the tendency to
lead to these sorts of shifts in the topic
of discussion. Sometimes a word or
phrase or particular sentence may have
no political significance yet still be
11
I'm setting up a weblog at
www.livejournal.com/users/jim_vassilakos
charged with a negative connotation or
subtext. For example, you bring up my
"trying to get people to think"
comment, and you note that "this
phrase implies that your targets aren't
thinking until they encounter you, a
very unlikely situation." I see your
point, and to the extent that I
conveyed this impression, I apologize.
I perhaps should have instead said
something like "…trying to get people
think about and discuss matters that I
see as being critically important for
the future of our entire society and yet
which are, somewhat paradoxically,
being presently ignored by the major
media."
Keep in mind, we were just coming
out of a discussion about how bad the
news media is in the U.S. Likewise, I
had brought up concerns about a
coming economic depression the likes
of which we perhaps haven't seen save
for those of us who've lived through
the 1930s. This is the reason, in fact,
that I likened Fallows' article in the
July/August issue of The Atlantic to
the "Holy Grail"12, because he stated
so well what I'd been trying somewhat
ineffectually to state.
And, if you will recall, I had already
made noises that I thought that the
RPG industry could be doing more,
that RPG designers, as the masters of
a potentially highly educational
medium of consumer art, if you will,
had a duty to our greater society to
raise awareness of issues that matter.13
I stated, although not in so many
words, that the times in which live are
too critical and that what we stand to
lose is too great for us to merely
devote our energies to elves, magic,
spaceships and vampires to the near
complete exclusion of the real world.
As writers and publishers living in this
time and place, the RPG industry has a
responsibility, or so went my
argument. Hence, I suppose I thought
that my meaning of "trying to get
people to think" would be taken in this
general context, not in the context of
"I think you're not thinking."
In any case, you're right in that it
could have been better phrased, but I
think also that I'm right in that it could
have been better received. In A&E
#357, for example, I didn't have any
12
See my review of his article in A&E
#361.
13
See the tail end of my comment to Brian
Misiaszek in A&E #354.
problem with your comment to me.
You merely pointed out that my
phrasing could have been better, and
so I thought you were being
reasonable. But I thought Patrick's
comment in that same issue was
needlessly angry, and at the time, I
wasn't even sure exactly what he was
angry about. I'm still not 100% sure14,
but I suspect that it wasn't so much
one particular remark as it was the fact
that he really objected to my overall
perspective.15 The pressure must have
been building up for some time, and
then I finally said something that just
pushed him over the edge, as it were.
Maybe he'd had a terrible week, and
he had to blow off some steam, or
maybe I'd said something that struck
him in exactly the worst possible way.
Whatever the case, I accepted that he
was pissed and immediately shifted
gears into reconciliation mode, and
maybe I did this badly, but I think that
I was at least on the right track.16
Nonetheless, I still thought that his
response was over the top, and it was
his response I was referring to when I
commented to him in A&E #359,
"How one responds to them
(provocative statements) is a decision
that one makes as an individual." And
I still think that's true. Once again, I
don't have a problem with your
comment, but I do have a problem
14
He stated to you in A&E #358 that it
was also this "to get people to think"
comment that was "pissing" him off.
15
I think his comments to me in A&E
#357 bear out this interpretation.
16
The problem, perhaps, is that I really
don’t have much experience at this.
Although I’ve been a member of A&E for
some years now, I’ve only been actively
participating in the “dialogue” aspect of
the APA for a little while, so it’s still
somewhat new to me. And I’m still
learning that much of what I write contains
“edges” that perhaps ought to be filed
down through a more thorough editing
process.
I suppose that part of the reason that I
mention all of this is that A&E is a
monthly publication. This isn't Usenet
where as soon as you hit <enter> it's too
late to take it back. We have a month to
formulate our replies, a month to think
about what we want to say and how we
want to say it. Although we are still certain
to make mistakes, having this amount of
time between deadlines should give us
enough opportunity to at least make the
attempt to edit remarks that were initially
composed in anger.
with any comment that seems to have
been written in anger, and his
comment to me in A&E #357 certainly
seemed to fall under that general
designation.
In any case, this is all water under
the bridge, and as you stated several
issues ago, this is not the forum for
politics, never mind that RPGs are a
highly educational form of art and that
the times in which we are about to be
living may be among the most critical
times in the history of humanity.17
Regardless of those arguments, both of
which are certainly debatable18, you
decided that politics are not what we
do here, and rightly so in my
opinion.19 Hence, the rightness or
wrongness of trying to get people to
think about political issues seems to
me, at least as pertains to this forum,
to be a rather moot topic. Therefore,
I'll try to get people to think about
such topics no longer, or at least I'll try
to restrain myself and push political
commentary to the web.20
To move along a little bit further
with this general topic of words being
taken out of context and arguments
resulting from misinterpretation, you
wrote in A&E #362, “the fact that
you think that honesty would
firebomb a friendship while
lying/hypocrisy wouldn’t also
puzzles me.” Now, please notice that
this remark you made could be taken
at least two different ways. I could
think to myself that you're being a
little bit sarcastic and implying that
I'm terribly immoral: a liar and a
hypocrite. After all, even after I've
expressed concern about my friend's
feelings and talked about how I didn't
see much good realistically coming
from the direct and honest approach
17
I'm speaking here of the period that will
transpire between the passing of Hubbert's
Peak, which is now upon us, and the world
population peak, which we probably won't
reach for several decades sans a world
nuclear war or some other sort of
unprecedented cataclysm. For purposes of
the Ragamuffin history, I'm thinking about
calling this interim between the two peaks
"The Valley of Death" in an somewhat
obvious nod to Psalm 23:4.
18
Prognosticators and Doomsayers have a
long history of wiping egg off their faces,
and I certainly hope to join them.
19
See my comments to Joshua Kronengold
in A&E #358.
20
Following Joshua Kronengold's
suggestion in A&E #357.
that you seem to advocate, still you
write that you're puzzled by my
thought that honesty might firebomb a
friendship. So my first reaction to your
statement is to think, "How could Lee
honestly be puzzled? Is my concern
for my friend's feelings a completely
alien concept?"
However, it's quite possible that
you're not being sarcastic and that you
are, in fact, genuinely puzzled.
Despite the fact that your apparent
puzzlement puzzles me, I'll go with
this interpretation. Nonetheless, I
think a better way to state your
criticism would be as follows:
"Jim, I understand that you don't
want to hurt your friend's feelings, but
in my view, friendship is about trust,
honesty and mutual respect. By lying
to your friend about your true reasons
for dropping the game, I think it is
fairly obvious that you would be
violating all three of these conditions
of friendship, violating, in short, the
very essence of what it means to be a
friend. Hence, I would urge you to
reconsider and have the courage to do
the right thing."
I think that's a stronger and more
constructive way of making the
argument that I think you were trying
to make, and I hope you'll agree with
the way that I've chosen to phrase it.
Nonetheless, as I said, perhaps you
really are puzzled. I will assume this
and state my case as follows:
My friend, the GM in this game,
who I'll call John, although that's not
his name…he and I originally met
back in college. A friend of his was
running a Birthright campaign, and if
you don't know anything about
Birthright, it's an AD&D setting which
basically involves confrontation
between nations, and there are rules in
there for what is essentially army
versus army combat. And so I met him
in what was basically a wargaming
context. He wasn't a friend before that.
He was what I'd call somebody who
became a friend because we were both
gamers, and gaming was the basis for
why we would get together.
Now, I'm going to tell you a story,
and the point of it is to illustrate a debt
that I feel toward John. I ran a game a
few years later. It was at the apartment
of a friend who I'll call PW. PW had
just gotten married, and his bride was
also a gamer, but she had a problem
with one of the players we had
brought into their apartment.
At this game there was John, myself,
Kurt and his brother, PW and his wife,
and this other player who I'll call Eric
who I'd gotten to know through
another gaming group that I was
attending a year or two earlier. Well,
Eric had a tendency to make slightly
off-color comments, sometimes sexual
innuendoes, and PW's wife found this
to be highly offensive, and she wanted
Eric gone from the game.
I talked the situation over with
Kurt21, and he agreed with me that
what Eric was doing wasn't
particularly terrible, at least not by
"guy-standards" of behavior. Maybe it
was terrible by "girl-standards", but
we didn't feel the need to hold
ourselves to those standards. Eric's
comments were of a general nature,
often silly and self-deprecating, as that
was his peculiar form of humor,
preferring not to make fun of anyone
else. Eric was a really nice guy, but
because PW's wife was the only girl in
the game, she probably felt
uncomfortable about hearing that sort
of humor in her own living room from
somebody she didn't know very well.
In any case, both Kurt and I felt that
PW's wife was simply somewhat of
the intolerant sort and that perhaps she
was subconsciously setting a
precedent in her new marriage,
expressing her power as it were.
Certainly it was her and her husband's
apartment. She had a right to set
standards for her guests to follow, and
we knew we couldn't argue with her
about it. So, we discussed the situation
with John, and John offered his
apartment for the game, which was
only a few blocks from PW's
apartment. Because of how far the rest
of us were already driving, the game
had to be at either of their two places.
So we agreed with this plan and
simply moved the game over there.
I'm sure that PW's wife must have
been offended. We'd clearly chosen
Eric over her, and we stood to lose two
players as a result. But we felt that we
couldn't just kick Eric out of the game
because she'd taken a disliking to him.
We didn't think that would be right,
21
This is the same Kurt who plays Jinx,
although this may have been before the
beginning of the Jinx campaign, or perhaps
it was during one of the intermissions. My
memory as to such details is not so good.
and he wasn't attempting to be
offensive. He held no grudge against
her or anyone else for that matter. In
fact, in all the time that I knew him, I
don't remember ever seeing him get
angry…exasperated perhaps, but then
he'd just start laughing.
In any case, to move this little story
along, we'd invited PW and his wife to
come to the game at John's apartment,
and Kurt basically called what would
happen next. He predicted that PW
would come to the first two or three
sessions, but that his wife would view
this as a betrayal, and she'd put
pressure on him to quit the game, and
so he'd inevitably find some reason to
do so. He wouldn't tell us what was
really going on, but we'd all know.
And, true to Kurt's predictions, this is
exactly what transpired. PW became
increasingly annoyed with the game
and voted with his feet. It took him
two or three sessions.22
Now, the reason I mention all this is
that it illustrates a certain indebtedness
we feel toward John. He basically
saved that campaign, and he allowed
us to maintain our dignity as men.
Please note, I don't mean to insinuate
that "the woman is always wrong".
Had we judged her demand to be
reasonable, we would have kicked
Eric out of the game. But the whole
group (even her husband, who was
embarrassed more than anything else)
felt that she was being overly-sensitive
and overly-critical. As the hostess, I
suppose, that was her right, but we
also had the right to vote with our feet,
and so we did.
In any case, the game went on for
quite a while, and it was fun. Speaking
as the GM, it wasn't one of my best
campaigns, but it wasn't among the
worst either. However, I think the set
of personalities we had present made
for a good exchange. Getting a good
group is always key, and this was a
pretty good group of people. Needless
to say, we always remembered that
John was the one who saved the game
by offering the use of his apartment,
and I think our camaraderie grew
because of this.
22
Although the way he left was sort of sad,
I did end up learning from it, as he pointed
out some of the things he thought I was
doing wrong. So, your argument that
honesty is always best does have some
merit. Without honesty, learning is much
harder.
Eventually, however, the game broke
up. John went north to further his
education, Eric went even farther
north to begin a new career, and Kurt's
brother joined the army. Young
people, as you perhaps know, have the
tendency not to stay put, and this is a
good thing. It shows ambition. So the
game broke up, and everyone wished
everyone else well, knowing that we
would, in all likelihood, lose
connection and drift apart as far flung
friends are wont to do.23
Years later I reconnected with John,
and eventually he moved back to
Southern California, and he began this
game, the Warcraft campaign that I've
talked about in these pages. I asked
Kurt if he'd like to go check it out with
me, although the drive for both of us
was a good deal longer than any we'd
willingly suffer unless the game were
to turn out to be surprisingly good.24
Sadly, the game, which is now
over25, wasn't surprisingly good. It
wasn't the worst game that I've played
in. Overall, I'd have to say that it rated
about average.26 If we had more free
time on our hands and didn't have to
23
Incidentally, the guy who I derisively
call PW in this story is still a friend of
mine. To speak for a moment in his
defense, he was in his first few months of
being married, and as anyone who's been
married knows, there's a learning process.
He hadn't yet had ample time to go
through that process, but he would in later
years. Without putting any details on it,
he's not quite so PWed today as he used to
be, and in any case, he seems to be very
happy, and I should also add that he's
generally a really nice guy and a fun
person to be around. Despite that one
rocky point, his is a friendship that I
treasure.
24
I should add that it's not just the drive,
but it's also the time. All of us face this
trade-off between what we want to do and
what we have to do, and as we get older, it
seems, the former gets increasingly
squeezed out by the latter. Kurt's teaching
AP English this semester, and several of
the books he has to teach he's reading for
the first time. Add to that his
responsibilities as the father of a one-year-
old, and it's not hard to see why his "spare
time" is under attack. As for myself, I
stand to lose my weekends if things work
out the way I assume they will. In short,
the time constraint is a real one, and
difficult choices have to be made.
25
Aside from myself and Kurt not having
enough free time, it turns out one of the
other two players is moving away in order
to go back to school.
drive so far, I think we'd probably
have tried to keep it going if only for
social reasons.
But we don't have that sort of time
any longer, and we didn't want to keep
investing time in a campaign that
probably wouldn't substantially
improve. Why do I say this? Well,
John comes from a predominately
wargaming background. He's a nice
guy, but he's doing all sorts of things
that I consider as examples of bad-
GMing.
For example he doesn't appear to
have much interest in
characterization.27 Also, he runs the
campaign as a series of NPC-
designated missions.28 It's a format
similar to what one might experience
while playing the computerized
version of Warcraft. Hence, the
players don't really control the
direction of the campaign, and as a
result, all the strengths inherent to the
face-to-face roleplaying medium seem
to be ignored.
Of course, I wanted to be honest
with him about my opinions. I talked
to Kurt about it, and he had pretty
much the same opinion of the game,
but we just couldn't see ourselves
going to John and laying our
unsolicited critique on the table as it
were. I mean, it would be pushy of us
to do this, and John might have
perceived our criticism of his style as
a personal attack of some sort, perhaps
a bad case of GMitis. He might have
viewed us as arrogant or guilty of
One-True-Wayism as I've seen it
called here.
26
Back when I was single and had more
free time on my hands, I used to make it
practice of visiting different local gaming
groups with which I would come into
contact either through friends or via the
Internet. I found a lot of campaigns that I
didn't enjoy, but in many of these, I also
found the GM doing certain things very
well, and so I came to realize that these
expeditions were little learning
experiences from which I could improve
my own GMing. Regardless of whether I
enjoyed the game or not, I would always
try to take at least one lesson or idea to
emulate in the future. I discussed one of
these ideas that came from this WarCraft
campaign in A&E #359.
27
See footnote #8 from my article for
A&E #359.
28
This is something that I view as being a
very common failing, so common that one
could argue that it's really a matter of style.
 But I'm not 100% sure. He might not
have done any of those things. He
might have approached the criticism
reasonably and logically and tried to
make some sort of change. Perhaps we
should have been honest and
approached him about it. Perhaps
you're right, and we should have given
him the benefit of the doubt.29
When I think about this, I try to
think in terms of what is the
commonly accepted practice. In most
campaigns, I think, players are free to
tell the GM what they think, but most
don't do it. They merely vote with
their feet, and it's up the GM to
request opinions and feedback and
make the necessary corrections before
that happens. But in order to do that,
the GM has to take time out of the
game to talk about the game and how
it's going from a player perspective.
Many GMs don't do this, and I think
that perhaps it's a flaw in the way we
do things in this hobby that leads to
the demise of too many campaigns.
The natural solution that you
suggest, that of just being honest, may
be confounded by the fact that not all
the other players know what the rest of
the group thinks about a particular
GM's style, and there may be an
honest difference of opinion within the
group. Even if a systemic GM-
evaluation process were introduced
into the rules system of a particular
game, one might see "grade inflation"
since the participants all know each
other and presumably, at least for
social reasons, don't want to be viewed
as being overly-critical of the guy
who's running the game.
Likewise, even if everyone were
brave enough to be honest, one might
see wildly varying evaluations. Some
players might love the game. Others
might see areas that need significant
improvement. The point, I think, is
that even if you could get everyone to
be completely honest, different people
have different likes and dislikes.
29
I'd be curious to hear the experiences of
other players with respect to this question
of trying to get the GM to "improve" the
game. We often hear about players being
arm-twisted into improving their game
(see my article for A&E #308), but is there
any effort out there to get GMs to improve,
and if so, how does one go about this
process? Of course, I've offered my own
ideas in the top-half of this month's essay.
I encountered this back in the 1980s
when, on a friend's suggestion, I went
to Cal-Tech to play a game that they'd
created just for their own roleplaying
club. There were a small group of us
from UCR who went to see what the
Cal-Techians were up to, and I recall
being surprised by how all the players
had calculators on hand to figure out
how much damage they were doing
and how much fatigue their characters
were suffering and so forth. Likewise,
their characters didn't have names.
The guy next to me was playing "the
dwarf". No name. Just "the dwarf".
I remember looking at one of the
guys from UCR, a guy named Brian
who I only vaguely knew at the time,
and he had this dreary astonishment in
his eyes, like he could neither believe
nor stomach what he was witnessing.
When he looked up at me, and he saw
what must have been bemusement on
my face, he knew that I was thinking
the exact same thing. We both nodded
toward each other30 and
simultaneously excused ourselves to
go find the campus snackbar, because
sitting there was torture. We ended up
walking around the campus, bitching
and moaning about the desecration of
roleplaying that was occurring, and
generally having a good time thinking
ourselves somehow superior to those
calculator-wielding Cal-Techians with
their nameless PCs.31
30
That, strangely enough, was all the
communication that was necessary.
31
Although I mention the calculators only
in passing, I think that there's also a story
here, however I'm certainly not the right
person to tell it. What we need is a social
historian. I was thinking about this around
the same time we had that swashbuckling
theme. My thoughts on this are still very
confused, but I think that in some way the
Cal-Techians, being the genius-folk that
they are (one has to be incredibly smart to
get into that school), may have been
holding on to one of the last vestiges of a
dying pastime.
As I said in my earlier comments on the
swashbuckling theme, the reason I think
that D&D-style battle doesn't work so well
for me is that combat should tell a story,
and it should get the adrenaline pumping.
It should be exciting. But whereas D&D
may have been "sports for nerds" twenty
years ago, I think that video games now
hold that title (such is the fun of blowing
things up), just as, perhaps, wargames used
to hold it before D&D came along, and
just as math or engineering in its various
forms used to hold it before wargames
And yet, as I think about it now, the
Cal-Tech gamers may actually have
been participating in an earlier form of
role-gaming. Remember, our version
of roleplaying came out of wargaming.
In their eyes, the sort of games that
Brian and I prefer might be viewed as
the abomination, and they might view
their form of gaming as the original,
uncorrupted experience.
Now granted, my friend, who I
called John for the sake of anonymity,
was nowhere near as bad at those
gamers at Cal-Tech, but his
philosophy and experience seemed to
derive from that same general mold.
Furthermore, there were at least two
players there aside from Kurt and I
who seem to enjoy the style of game
he was presenting. So, who was I to
tell him how to run his game? Who
was I to say, "I'm leaving because your
game sucks," which is, in essence,
what he would likely hear no matter
how kindly I might try to phrase it.
The truth is, there are different styles
to this thing that we do, and while all
of us probably think that our style is
best, none of us have a monopoly on
the concept of how a roleplaying game
ought to be run. Perhaps what my
friend is doing is just fine for a wide-
ranging segment of the roleplaying
public, and perhaps Kurt and Brian
and I are the odd men out. In such a
circumstance, trying to get the game to
conform to my personal expectations
would have been bossy and rude.
What gives me the right? Moreover,
even assuming that I have the right,
what would have been my chances of
overcoming John's perceptions,
philosophy, and experiences of what a
roleplaying campaign ought to be? Nil
to none, I think.
If he were to have asked me for
advice, that would have been a
different situation. But he didn't, and it
wasn't my game. He was the one who
was running it, not me. As much as I
would like to try to steer him toward
my own ways of doing things, I just
don't see how such an endeavor would
realistically work. Nor, I think, do I
(aside from Chess) became common.
My point is that we ("we" meaning
society) seem to be getting dumber or
perhaps lazier. We unlearn the making of
things, and then, in the very next moment,
we learn the vice of the unmaking of them.
How ebulliently sorrowful; like war itself,
I suppose.
necessarily have right on my side,
because this might not be a situation
of right and wrong; it may instead be
one of personal preference. Hence, my
quandary.
In all of these comments, I hope you
can see that I’m trying to wrestle with
the various issues. I don’t come to
decisions about such things very
easily. Furthermore, I think it's all too
easy to just take a position and pretend
that the other side doesn't even exist,
and your comment that “the fact that
you think that honesty would firebomb
a friendship while lying/hypocrisy
wouldn’t also puzzles me" tends to
illustrate this point, at least to my way
of thinking.
I acknowledge that the argument that
I think you were trying to make has
merit. I felt it was important enough
that it ought to be rephrased, and so I
did so, hoping that you will agree with
the language that I used. However, as
good as that sounds and as important
as are those concepts that it advocates,
it's not the only argument. Hence, I
hope you'll now be able to see that and
that this will cure your puzzlement
with respect to my worry that there
may be such a thing in certain
situations as too much honesty.
re the American educational system:
Thank you for your sympathy, and I’m
glad you feel you had a good
experience compared to my own. Part
of this may be due to us being of
different generations and localities.
Perhaps you grew up in a better time
and place. Also, I should point out that
not all of my teachers were terrible. In
fact, I can’t really place blame at their
doorsteps. I tend to view the problems
with our educational system as being
systemic in nature. In short, even back
when I was in high school, I thought
of my teachers as being good people
who were collectively in a difficult
situation.
I remember once chatting with one
of them, one who I was more or less
on a friendly basis with, and I asked
what interesting stuff went on in the
teacher’s lounge. Not quite trusting me
enough to talk about school politics,
this teacher replied that when I
became a teacher I’d find out. I
couldn’t help but laugh, and I told her
that I had no such designs. This
sentiment seemed to surprise her, and
when she asked why not, I told her
that I wouldn’t be able to tolerate the
students.32
Even back then, I seemed to have
realized that what teachers do is
difficult and that their profession is
terribly under-appreciated by our
society as well as by the very
individuals who they directly serve.
And this is not merely tolerated; it is
essentially accepted as being normal.33
However, your comment did make
me remember some of the especially
good teachers that I had. My English
AP teacher during my junior and
senior years was really outstanding.
He had the advantage of a fairly small
class size, and he was only dealing
with the cream of the crop, so to
speak. Hence, classroom management
was never an issue. But he also ruled
with an iron hand, and he demanded
what I initially thought was more or
less impossible. To my surprise and
after several all-nighters, I turned out
to be wrong.
This, of course, only created more
work for himself. His car was always
the first in the faculty parking lot
every morning, and he always had a
stack of papers to grade.34 I doubt he
had much of social life. I think his
entire existence was teaching, but that
devotion made him the best.
32
Of course, I didn’t mean all the students.
I was referring here to a certain, seemingly
inescapable subset.
33
I remember once, I came to talk to this
same teacher about something, and one of
the school's minor creeps was giving her
shit. She must have given him a detention
or something. In any case, he told her as he
was leaving that she was the worst teacher
in the school. He seemed so pleased over
this remark that I remember actually
considering busting his skull. Regretfully, I
didn't. But I did let her know that he was a
known dick and that she was one of the
best teachers the school had. Nonetheless,
when I told this story to my Taiwanese
wife just last night, she was shocked that a
student could say this to a teacher and get
away with it. Only in America.
34
I know this because during the winter of
my freshman year, my Mom would drop
me off at some ungodly hour so she could
get to the YMCA before work. I was
literally the first person on campus, and
he'd pull up in his little car, unlock the gate
and let me into his classroom where he'd
make coffee, listen to classical music, and
grade papers. For me it was just a chance
to get out of the cold and have a place to
sit and do homework.
I went into that class knowing
almost nothing, and I came out,
somewhat miraculously, being able to
write with some small semblance of
competency. He was the best teacher I
ever had, and I think that it’s high time
that I track him down and thank him.
I was thinking about this last night,
and I came to the conclusion that we
really ought to thank those who make
a contribution to our lives. I may not
be writing for money, as are some
A&E members, but writing still gives
me pleasure. Putting thoughts down
on paper is somehow important to me.
It’s almost a form of stress relief.
Yet as I look at many of the people I
know, writing doesn’t seem to be a
part of their lives. Many people, even
many smart people, don’t write on a
regular basis, and I think there’s some
tragedy in that. I can’t help but wonder
if they’re letting some part of
themselves slowly wither and die, and
perhaps if I didn’t have this teacher,
maybe I’d be among them. So I want
to track him down and just say thanks.
There’s somebody else I also want to
thank, since I now find myself on the
subject of thanks, and fortunately I
don’t need to track this person down.
As it turns out, I’m writing to her at
this very moment. I know we usually
save our thanks for anniversary issues,
but I just want to say here among
everyone, thank you for doing this.
When I go to your house and see the
overworked photocopier and the
stacks of paper arranged over every
available horizontal surface, and when
I see how you accept this continuous
labor without regret, seemingly
without any hint of retiring, I can’t
help but be amazed.
You’ve brought together a great
group of people, given them a forum,
and maintained it now for what…
thirty years? My only regret is that I
didn’t join sooner. I really love being a
part of A&E, and I hope you’ll
continue running it for as long as
humanly possible.
Spike Jones: ryct Mark Kinney that
one of your players threatened to
break your legs: Whatever possessed
him to do that?
Also, regarding your many political
comments over the past few issues, I
asked you if you'd like to start an APA
on the side, but you never got back to
me. Perhaps you'd prefer to take the
discussion to the web.35
Joshua Kronengold: re AIs spawning
processes of themselves: Interesting
thought. Here’s another. Suppose that
you came into being as the process of
an AI. You can remember almost
everything the AI that spawned you
can remember. You have its intellect,
so to speak. But unlike it, you are a
process, and when you finish running,
your new memories go back to it, and
what happens to you, “your being” as
it were, is a question still posed by
philosophers, but as an independent
mind, at least, you cease to exist. How
would you feel about that, and what
would you try to do about it?36
re your suggestion that I write the
Jinx campaign from the shifting point
of view of various NPCs: I’ve briefly
considered this idea a while back, but
I worried that it might be too bizarre
and too difficult to follow because of
the shifting focus. I mean, part of the
fun of first person is getting into the
character’s head. But the problem I'm
confronted by is that Jinx doesn’t tend
to stay with any single individual for
very long, and during some critical
scenes she even masks herself from
scrying. Even if I were to somehow
use this idea, what would end up
happening is that I’d build up a given
NPC in terms of characterization, and
then I’d have to abandon them and
shift focus to another NPC. It’s
certainly an interesting idea, but this
constant shifting of focus might be a
bit disconcerting. On the plus side, as
you say, it would help characterize the
various NPCs, and the reader would
learn more about them and about Jinx
by watching their different reactions to
her from their disparate points of view.
I’ll try to think more about this, but at
the moment I’m just not sure how well
I could pull it off. Hmm…37
Brian Misiaszek: re Flatlanders:
Interesting alien, although I think what
I wrote to Myles also applies here.
Nonetheless, I like the detailed
description. However, I still have a
hard time imagining creatures so
35
I'm setting up a weblog at
www.livejournal.com/users/jim_vassilakos
36
This again seems to go back to footnote
#31 of my article in A&E #358.
37
You've certainly given me food for
thought. Thank you muchly.
physically and environmentally
challenged actually making it into
space and building Dyson spheres.
Part of my mammalian bias, I guess.
re my vacation: Greece was fun,
although I didn't get into the water as
much as I'd have liked. Too much
sightseeing. Also, ouzo packs a punch,
even the cheap stuff. Had some at the
island of Rhodes, and it definitely put
a smile on my face.
ryct Louis La Mancusa re On Killing
by Dave Grossman: Never read the
book, but I've heard stories that the
first experience with killing in war
usually involves losing the contents of
one's stomach as the realization of
what one has done sinks in. I've also
heard that those few who are not
affected by this sickness are
sometimes shunned by their comrades
as being the type of sociopath you
mentioned. Would be curious to learn
more about this.
Jonathan Nicholas: re Space Battles
Systems & Fighter Games: What in
your opinion makes a game good or
bad (fun or not fun) in this genre? I'm
not much of a wargamer, so my
experience is rather limited.
Lisa Padol: re Ghost sippers:
Interesting idea. Too bad you missed
the panel on sex scenes. I would have
appreciated a review. <grin>
Simon Reeve: re AIs: Like I said, I’d
prefer not to include them simply
because the likely ramifications are so
hard to predict. Nothing else, I think,
will be so transformational in terms of
what will happen to humanity and our
society. However, I also feel that not
including them would be a cop-out.
After all, I really think that they’re in
the cards, that the technology is
possible and that it will eventually
happen. Even if sentience (you call it
sapience) is an analog phenomenon, as
you suggest, it seems to me that we
can model analog processes in a
digital environment, so why should
self-awareness be any different?
Hence, it seems to me somewhat
cowardly not to bite the bitter pill and
try to investigate this in some detail.
re starship material independence
being at odds with scavenge
operations on Earth: You raise a good
point, although just because ships may
be able to fabricate replacement parts
for machines that break down doesn’t
mean they can fabricate whole
machines as quickly and in such
quantity as they can pilfer them from
down below. Also, I’m wondering if it
might be harder to fabricate food,
which is made out of a complex
matrix of biomass, than it is to
fabricate space parts, many of which
are probably made out of a single,
homogenous substance, such as an
alloy or polymer.
As you might recall, in my
Ragamuffin adventure seed of A&E
#355, the communications officer at
Orbital Fleet Traffic Control asks
specifically for life support equipment
and foodstuffs. The reason I had them
do this, at least in the back of my
head, was that they needed the life
support gear right away. No time to
fabricate all the air and water filters
they'd no doubt need over the next few
days. Likewise, while they might not
need food so badly over the next few
days (they'd have some already),
they'd be sure to need it over the next
several weeks or months as their food
supplies would dwindle. If food is
particularly hard to fabricate, non-
perishable foodstuffs would be high
up on their shopping list. Just some
stray thoughts to add to the discussion
and to illustrate where my thinking
has been. However, please feel free to
continue to mention any possible holes
that you see, as the whole point here is
to find out what doesn't make sense so
it can be fixed. You're doing a great
job of prodding me into thinking about
the necessary design considerations in
a more conscious way.
Brian Rogers: ryct Lee re a "gaming
dating service": The article you're
probably thinking of is the one I wrote
for A&E #311, "How to Start a
Gamers Guild & Why Bother". I can
send you the program and the
questionnaire if you're interested.
Marco Subias: It’s good to see you
back. I was afraid that we’d lost you.
Also, I’m glad to hear that you’re
enjoying your current job, and in a
way, the old one was beneficial as
well. If nothing else, it showed you
just how bad things can get and helps
you appreciate where you’re at all the
more.