Quote from: JimBobOzWhy? Both he and Forgers say that roleplaying is good for therapy. Jocelyn just says you should do it deliberately, while the Forgers say that all roleplaying is group therapy whether you intend it or not. Same shit, different shovel.

I don't know the Forge's position on therapy. I do know that there is a lot of Forge theory that offends Jocelyn on other grounds than that.

Just because you and me and Nox don't value the Forge theory much doesn't mean all three of us are going to agree with everything else.

If you have moderation you have I suspect to have a no backtalking mods policy, else the mods will struggle to maintain their authority.

I see it as a necessary concommitant of having mods, and as such it doesn't especially bother me.

QuoteWhy not just call them Games or RPGs?

Because I´m not as radical as the Pundit. He would deny the RPGness of Thematic Games, and thusly can say RPG, whenever I must differentiate.

But that backfires, so he has to constantly say: "traditional RPGs".

I prefer Adventure Roleplaying Games, as a word, and as a game.

Quote from: BalbinusIf you have moderation you have I suspect to have a no backtalking mods policy, else the mods will struggle to maintain their authority.

Not really.

In the first place, mods don't really need any air of authority, they have the ability to ban and such, that achieves the purpose. You don't need a badge when you have a stick.

Secondly, "no backtalking" means no disagreement with them. If it were simply "no personal attacks", well you can easily have that for your entire forum, mods need no special protection.

It's just ego. "Don't diss me, bitch!" The "no backtalking mods" has the practical effect of "no strong criticism of mod decisions," which has means that a few people decide what "the community" will be like. Which is fine - but you can't really refuse to listen to people, and then claim you're representing their wishes. What you get is that they just listen to the people expressing opinions they already agree with.

And then you get it becoming "an emotionally safe environment" - with talk of anal sex, h4wt cosplay chixxorz, and... er...

Sad. It's wasted potential. It's as sad as the absence of women gamers on this forum, because of its moderation's prescriptive style of "rawr manly hard talk women lying bitches!" Wasted potential. The purpose of a forum is to have a free and open exchange of ideas, though focused on some particular topic; when you're excluding certain ideas, or certain speakers, well... (Doesn't mean no-one should ever be banned, of course - if they're not there to have free and open exchange of ideas, well...)

Quote from: Consonant DudeIndeed. But there will always be people like you to look down upon more ambitious roleplaying goals and I think that's not a good attitude.

I don't see how aiming to have a fun, interesting and fulfilling experience is a low ambition, or how "therapy" or "education" (the other goals most commonly mentioned apart from "fun") are "higher" ambitions.

The right tool for the right job, and the right tradesperson to wield that tool. Most people are not qualified therapists or educators. I wouldn't let a gamer do first aid on me simply because they'd done it in an rpg, nor would I let a gamer do therapy on me because they thought gaming was good for it.

Roleplaying games are not designed for therapy and education, nor are they well-suited for those goals; still less are most roleplayers in any way qualified to do so, except of course just as any friends are suited to help and teach one another.

I look down on roleplaying as therapy or education in the same way that I look down on someone getting a hubcap off their wheel with a chisel. Okay, you can try it, but there are better tools for the job, and probably if you try it that way you'll get a mess.  

My feeling is that those promoting roleplaying games as therapeutic or educational are just a bit embarassed about pretending to be elven princesses, so they're trying to cover over their embarassment by looking for "more ambitious" things they can do with it.

Quote from: JimBobOzRoleplaying games are not designed for therapy and education, nor are they well-suited for those goals;

Swimming, cooking, graphic novels or jogging aren't designed for therapy either and have been used as such. I would guess the same with education.

I'm not qualified to discuss therapy. But I'll take your opinion on what is or is not suited with a grain of salt.

Quote from: JimBobOzMy feeling is that those promoting roleplaying games as therapeutic or educational are just a bit embarassed about pretending to be elven princesses, so they're trying to cover over their embarassment by looking for "more ambitious" things they can do with it.

This really exemplifies the side of your personna I don't agree with, or really like. A whole lot of assumptions and bullshit simply because someone doesn't want to sit on his ass and eat cheetos.

We could reverse-engineer those assumptions and label anyone with them, including me and including you.

Quote from: JimBobOzI don't see how aiming to have a fun, interesting and fulfilling experience is a low ambition, or how "therapy" or "education" (the other goals most commonly mentioned apart from "fun") are "higher" ambitions.

The right tool for the right job, and the right tradesperson to wield that tool. Most people are not qualified therapists or educators. I wouldn't let a gamer do first aid on me simply because they'd done it in an rpg, nor would I let a gamer do therapy on me because they thought gaming was good for it.

Roleplaying games are not designed for therapy and education, nor are they well-suited for those goals; still less are most roleplayers in any way qualified to do so, except of course just as any friends are suited to help and teach one another.

I look down on roleplaying as therapy or education in the same way that I look down on someone getting a hubcap off their wheel with a chisel. Okay, you can try it, but there are better tools for the job, and probably if you try it that way you'll get a mess.  

My feeling is that those promoting roleplaying games as therapeutic or educational are just a bit embarassed about pretending to be elven princesses, so they're trying to cover over their embarassment by looking for "more ambitious" things they can do with it.

It's something I'm beginning to notice as a cultural trend, and it doesn't just apply to roleplaying games.

A generation of folks who've grown up, but are still attached to things they loved when they were younger, but those things still bear a mark of being childish.

So they overcompensate.  In some case they even take these things and try and remake them to be "more grown up".

So we get over the top cartoons that go crazy on the sex and violence, a Transformers remake with spikes all over Optimus Prime and promises of lots of violence, the "so edgy it hurts itself" new Battlestar Galactica.

And roleplaying games about being holocaust victims or lynch mobs or sexually abused children, or guys going on about games as therapy.  Or games as some kind of academic course of study.  Or a whole host of silly ideas.

They've the conviction to not give up the things they liked, but not the self-respect or the dignity not to freak out about what everyone else will think.

maybe the definition of being a grown up has gone beyone having interests that are limited to:

Football.
Basketball.
Baseball.
Boxing.
Wrestling.
Drinking.
Sex.
Stamp collecting.
Model Railroading.
Golf.
Bowling.
Politics.
Watching TV.



Seriously, it seems that a lot of people assumed that those were the only interests/hobbies that "grown ups" were allowed until recently, and some people think they still are.

Other people see nothing wrong with so called grown ups liking things that aren't related to watching sports on TV, or watching TV at all.

Er, role-playing was going on in a therapeutic context long before D&D was written. Now, modern role-playing games probably aren't great for therapy, but it's not like this is some random new thing - combining roleplaying and psychotherapy - from the past five years or so.

Quote from: PseudoephedrineEr, role-playing was going on in a therapeutic context long before D&D was written. Now, modern role-playing games probably aren't great for therapy, but it's not like this is some random new thing - combining roleplaying and psychotherapy - from the past five years or so.

As I said above, I'm well aware of the use of roleplaying in therapy, but we're talking about sometihng very different, and also something that's done (and should be done) by trained psychiatric professionals.

Roleplaying games are a form of entertainment where a bunch of folks get together and pretend to be elves and dwarves and vampires, and even in some cases, Mormon lynch mobs.

Conflating the two is just a rhetorical gamble to try and puff up roleplaying's image as "serious business".  It's pretentious nonsense, not worth the bits on the screen used to babble it.

Quote from: Consonant DudeThis really exemplifies the side of your personna I don't agree with, or really like. A whole lot of assumptions and bullshit simply because someone doesn't want to sit on his ass and eat cheetos.

You cannot agree or disagree with a "side of a persona"; you can only agree or disagreee with their opinions and ideas.

And again, we're up with the old "fallacy of the excluded middle."

Here we have, roleplaying as art, therapy and education. Now let's head on down to,

















































"I show up to game to sit on my arse and eat cheetos."

Did you see all that space between those two statements? That's what we figuratively call "a middle ground." There's quite a lot of space there. We can have all sorts of games which are neither art/therapy/education, nor merely an excuse to mindlessly consume cheetos.

We can have a fun, interesting and fulfilling game session, and in that game session produce nothing we'd call "art", do no deliberate therapy or education, and at the same time, if we eat cheetos it's only because we're hungry and sharing food is a nice social thing that makes everything else go more smoothly.

I'm not sure how I can make you remember the fallacy of the excluded middle. I mean, when you see a zebra crossing, if the paint's a bit cream-coloured rather than pure white, do you just go on ahead and drive over it? "But officer, the lines were not white, therefore they are black and I couldn't see them." If your boyfriend complains that he's a bit cold and would like to warm up, do you set him on fire? If your friend says it's the day before payday, and she's a bit short of cash compared to usual, do you advise her to file for bankruptcy?

There's a sensible middle ground. That's where most of us live our lives.