Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 23, 2022, 06:00:36 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on July 23, 2022, 10:55:17 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 23, 2022, 10:25:28 AM

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 23, 2022, 07:52:40 AM
Christians have thoughts? Don't they just follow their made up instruction manual? Usually badly.

Considering how much of our modern intellectual world is based on Christianity, and how much of our intellectual world derives from said instruction manual, yes they certainly do have thoughts.

Didn't Christians pretty much lift all those intellectual elements right out of Plato and Aristotle, though? It's not like the philosophical elements of Christianity arouse out of a vacuum of Abrahamic purity. Most of the Western intellectualism people attribute to Christians these days comes from pagan Greeks and enlightenment thinkers who were often critical of church dogma.

Don't you know Christian's invented everything, even their own god! Not at all based on a god from someone else's religion who was probably also ripped off from older religions.

Nope original fairytale all around.

Oh for fuck's sake.  Yes, we get it, Christians are dumb and bad, atheism is smart and good.  Nobody has ever made a point as well formulated and impactful as you have.  Thanks ever so much for sharing your unique and insightful insights that will surely change someone's mind.

I mean fuck, you're just plucking the lowest hanging comedic fruit too.  Lazy, obvious, polite-smile-at-the-pathetic-SOB tier humor.  And for what?  You're not getting thumbs or likes or any other "look at me, I'm so clever" internet cool kid points.  Hell, I think the thread is stupid as shit too, but (until now) I at least had the etiquette to keep my mouth shut about it.  (EDIT: to the OP, I think lots of threads are stupid as shit.  Don't take it too personally.)

Come back when the OP is hand-wringing about how their faith won't let them play with "the gays" or something.  What?  The OP wouldn't do that?  "But he's a Christian!  He has to!1!!  Says every bigoted atheist who needs a reason to justify to themselves why they act like jack-offs.

Evangelical atheists are still evangelical, and evangelical is just a synonym for "loud mouthed asshole who everyone wishes would shut the fuck up".  So if you dropped out of the thread we'd all be better for it, and you'd quit giving smart intelligent atheists a bad image.

They're Christian, they'll forgive me...the instructions manual says so.

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 24, 2022, 11:02:25 AM
They're Christian, they'll forgive me...the instructions manual says so.

Repent or be purified by fire!

I'm Christian and played a game at GenCon which used tarot cards for some random stuff although I cannot remember the name of the system.
I did not find it problematic as there were no readings by the DM nor did he try speaking with the dead.

Quote from: VisionStorm on July 23, 2022, 10:55:17 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 23, 2022, 10:25:28 AM

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 23, 2022, 07:52:40 AM
Christians have thoughts? Don't they just follow their made up instruction manual? Usually badly.

Considering how much of our modern intellectual world is based on Christianity, and how much of our intellectual world derives from said instruction manual, yes they certainly do have thoughts.

Didn't Christians pretty much lift all those intellectual elements right out of Plato and Aristotle, though? It's not like the philosophical elements of Christianity arouse out of a vacuum of Abrahamic purity. Most of the Western intellectualism people attribute to Christians these days comes from pagan Greeks and enlightenment thinkers who were often critical of church dogma.

It's going a bit beyond the limits of topicality here, but Christianity was the product of a mix of philosophies. If Christianity's philosophy was just like the Greek Pagans, there would have been no reason for why it would have been able to take the ancient world by storm.

It had an incredibly powerful and radically progressive message compared to the paganism of the time. This message was a combination of elements of greek philosophy, elements of Judaism, and the (possibly original) ideas of the early influences of the church. The core of that message was that everyone mattered equally to god, as opposed to paganism where it was mostly heroes, kings or magicians who had the special connection with the gods.  That idea, the Universal Fatherhood of God and the subsequently derived Universal Brotherhood of Man, was an incredibly powerful idea.

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 23, 2022, 06:00:36 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on July 23, 2022, 10:55:17 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on July 23, 2022, 10:25:28 AM

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 23, 2022, 07:52:40 AM
Christians have thoughts? Don't they just follow their made up instruction manual? Usually badly.

Considering how much of our modern intellectual world is based on Christianity, and how much of our intellectual world derives from said instruction manual, yes they certainly do have thoughts.

Didn't Christians pretty much lift all those intellectual elements right out of Plato and Aristotle, though? It's not like the philosophical elements of Christianity arouse out of a vacuum of Abrahamic purity. Most of the Western intellectualism people attribute to Christians these days comes from pagan Greeks and enlightenment thinkers who were often critical of church dogma.

Don't you know Christian's invented everything, even their own god! Not at all based on a god from someone else's religion who was probably also ripped off from older religions.

Nope original fairytale all around.

Wow. Your point of view is so incredibly edgy! What method of time travel did you use to get here from 2004?

I guess it's a bit like having a thread on GURPS or Rolemaster, some guy's bound to show up and rant about how bad it is.

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 24, 2022, 11:02:25 AM
They're Christian, they'll forgive me...the instructions manual says so.

Sorry, but there is no rules lawyering here. Manifest impenitence precludes forgiveness. That's called Cheap Grace. It doesn't exist.

Greetings!

Let the heretics and blasphemers be judged. Break them on the wheel, scourge them in wrath, and cast them into the fires!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Quote from: SHARK on July 24, 2022, 05:10:56 PM

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

We had a lot of Marines in my family. Two WWII, two Korean War, and two in the late '50s.

Quote from: Timothe on July 24, 2022, 05:32:21 PM

Quote from: SHARK on July 24, 2022, 05:10:56 PM

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

We had a lot of Marines in my family. Two WWII, two Korean War, and two in the late '50s.

Greetings!

OOH RAH! OUTSTANDING!

Yep. I was a machine-gunner, and rifleman serving in the Infantry in our illustrious Marine Corps. Good times!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Quote from: Omega on July 24, 2022, 12:54:47 AM

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on July 23, 2022, 03:10:29 PM

Quote from: DocJones on July 23, 2022, 01:31:03 PM
Any opinions on using a ouija board as a random adventure generator?

That it would take way too long to be worth the effort? 

It would completely and utterly fail as a random anything.

And ouija board when its actually functioning is everything but random.

I am though surprised no one has tried press-ganging one of these entities into being the DM or an extra player. Slow as heck but would make the perfect Call of Cthulhu GM.

There was a posthumously written and published book using the Ouija during the Spiritualism age of late 19th Cen. Took a trio of people to meet for repeated sessions for years to compile the chapters. It was published under the received name of the posthumous author. Should already be in the public domain, naturally.

Insert pithy rejoinder about Hamlet, monkeys & typewriters versus Victorians, planchette & Ouija board here. 

If anyone does use it, I do strongly recommend following the three main rules, as per even written in the Parker Bros. box.  No solo gate opening and communing! And be tidy, always close the gate when your done. 

Quote from: Timothe on July 24, 2022, 04:58:46 PM

Quote from: Leon_ap_Hywel on July 24, 2022, 11:02:25 AM
They're Christian, they'll forgive me...the instructions manual says so.

Sorry, but there is no rules lawyering here. Manifest impenitence precludes forgiveness. That's called Cheap Grace. It doesn't exist.

That's technically correct! The most useful kind of correct! 

But yeah, 'sorry not sorry' means 'forgive not forgiven'. 

Word games for everyone! And now back to the topic.  I hope our counsel has guided them in a positive direction.

It's quite interesting... Even though I'm a devout atheist I often talk to my mates who are Catholics (and who are true believers). There seems to be quite a disconnect between American Christians and European Christians (in the British isles at least).

I'd mentioned this thread to a few of my RPing buddies again who are all believers, incidentally, and they couldn't believe some of the responses about being in 'spiritual danger' by using the likes of Tarot cards (or toys like Ouija boards) in an imaginary RPG game.

It was greeted with much mirth tbh.

Quote from: Rob Necronomicon on July 24, 2022, 07:22:05 PMI'd mentioned this thread to a few of my RPing buddies again who are all believers, incidentally, and they couldn't believe some of the responses about being in 'spiritual danger' by using the likes of Tarot cards (or toys like Ouija boards) in an imaginary RPG game.

Again, as long as one sticks to the game there's no danger. The only thing to worry about is the possibility that someone gets the bright idea to take it outside the game and try it in real life, and as already noted, most times this is either vanishingly unlikely or pretty easy to spot in someone who might have that inclination (and as likewise noted, someone with problems distinguishing fantasy from reality might do well to steer away from RPGs at all, whether they use ostensibly "occult" tools or not).

It's like drinking; as long as someone only does it with his mates once in a while to make hanging out more fun, it's not likely to be a problem. The problems come when people start using it as a coping tool for things outside having fun, or when it becomes a necessary prerequisite to having fun at all. Most people can spot the difference and stop before things get bad, but that doesn't mean it's not a good idea to at least be aware of the possibility, and keep an eye out for those who can't.

Quote from: Rob Necronomicon on July 24, 2022, 07:22:05 PM
It's quite interesting... Even though I'm a devout atheist I often talk to my mates who are Catholics (and who are true believers). There seems to be quite a disconnect between American Christians and European Christians (in the British isles at least).

I'd mentioned this thread to a few of my RPing buddies again who are all believers, incidentally, and they couldn't believe some of the responses about being in 'spiritual danger' by using the likes of Tarot cards (or toys like Ouija boards) in an imaginary RPG game.

It was greeted with much mirth tbh.

The moral of this story? 'Murican Christians are more gullible than British Christians.

In fairness, it probably depends a lot on who you talk to, and this thread probably amplifies the gullible voices through self-selection. But I live in a depressingly Christian island (at least if we believe census data, which I'm a bit skeptical about given the number of atheists/agnostics, as well as people who at least dabbled in Eastern religions or New Agey stuff, even if they still technically identify as "Christian"), and most people here wouldn't bat an eye at an actual deck of real Tarot carts. I've definitely run into Christian nuts a bunch of times over the years, but most are Christian in name only, or don't seem to really care as far as I can see.