Quote from: James J Skach...and just say "I don't know why you, Jim, support his rhetoric."

Hey, I'll take the bait.

Do you feel as if you do support his rhetoric?  And if so, why?

Quote from: Levi KornelsenHey, I'll take the bait.

Do you feel as if you do support his rhetoric?  And if so, why?

Having fought off a forgie swarm or two in my time, I absolutely do.

They attack as a collective, they promote as a collective. They must be judged as a collective.

Quote from: James J SkachJimmy - always nice to see i can still get a laugh without having to take off my pants :eek:

I'm not even sure what that means, unless you're making a joke about your own dick size? But fear not, I will never take off your pants. That's not my bag, baby.

Quote from: Levi KornelsenHey, I'll take the bait.

Do you feel as if you do support his rhetoric?  And if so, why?

Some of it I do, some I don't.

For example, I do believe that there are more than a few people who not only dislike "traditional" games because it did not work for them, but see those "traditional" games as some how broken or of lesser quality; they see the people that play those games as not really role-playing; they consider those happy with that type of gaming as close-minded, lazy, even unable to understand their own happiness.

And when I say more than a few, I mean thousands.

Do I think they are some sort of conspiracy? Nope. I think many are part of a large groupthink.  I think many start with the notion of a theory that explains to them why they weren't having fun (which could be spot on for all I know), but end up getting sucked in so much they defend items like "brain damage."  Religion is funny that way, it's no different, to me, how some born again [insert your religion here] become almost overly devout. Others are just plan pretentious, superior assholes.

And I think there are those that are using all of this to market games that would otherwise not be a blip on most radar screens in terms of sales.  That's not a slam at the people who play them or like them - Rock the Fuck On. It's an indictment of the "Theory" that really is nothing more than an elaborate marketing scheme. That's the "conspiracy" as it were.

And it's sad - because as in all "wars" - the guys in the middle, like you, and probably Tony (though yes, I too sometimes get the pretentious vibe, sorry Tony, just being honest) and others, people with interesting ideas and neat things to say get caught in the middle.

I think if you look at my posts, I try to be relatively opne minded about gaming.  I don't look down on people who don't play D&D or d20 (my preferred).  I don't call them fruit cakes or hippies.  I do question alot cause some of the "revolutionary" theory ideas I saw in gaming back in 1980.  I do get insulted when someone insinuates I'm lazy for not wanting to try other games then the ones I currently play, like, and spend most of my limited time playing.  I'm insulted when someone implies, even states explicitly, that game X, usually D&D, can't be used to play a certain kind of game - when I personally witnessed otherwise.

So...yeah...that's just off the top of my head....

Quote from: James J SkachIt's an indictment of the "Theory" that really is nothing more than an elaborate marketing scheme. That's the "conspiracy" as it were.

Hmmm.

Could you name a couple of games that wouldn't be a blip if it weren't for the marketing, that you think ended up actually being more than a blip because of it?

I'm not looking for hard figures or facts here, just those games that gave you that fuzzy sense that they were doing this.

Quote from: James J SkachThere's so much passive aggression in forums, it's hard to tell sometimes..ya know?

Sure.

In my defense I always try to be upfront when picking a fight

Regarding your comments to Levi. I agree with most of it but would you agree that the Pundit's behaviour online is the very definition of Swinnish (every time I type this word, I'm reminded of a buxom Scandinavian school mistress administering punishment to eager male students) behaviour he accuses most of?

Regards,
David R

Quote from: Levi KornelsenHmmm.

Could you name a couple of games that wouldn't be a blip if it weren't for the marketing, that you think ended up actually being more than a blip because of it?

I'm not looking for hard figures or facts here, just those games that gave you that fuzzy sense that they were doing this.

First, it's right an proper to say that the games themselves are neutral.  That is, I don't see the games as part of the marketing scheme. It was the marketing scheme that was built up in conjection with and to sell the games.

Secondly, it's important to point out that anything these days in this hobby is nothing more than a blip.

Thirdly, I would like to point out that though my wording, upon review, was not good, I could see how it could be taken this way. But I did not mean to imply that the games did end up being more than a blip. I simply believe that there was a kind of "malice of forethought."  That a group of people hit upon this idea as the only real way to market games and make any sort of impact on the market.

And that the way they chose was to denigrate everything that came before so they could be revolutionary.  It's why you see people with comments like beat poet and the war analogy. The truth is they're full of shit.

OK - having said all that: Sorceror, Dogs in the Vinyard, that Roach game, etc. As I said before, I don't have an opinion about the quality of the games, In fact, in some cases I hear interesting things about DitV that I could see being implemented outside the limited scope it provides. But, IMHO, they would likely have sold as many copies without the marketing scheme that came out screaming "GM's suck! Three Teir Distribution Sucks! Task Resolution Sucks! Killing things and taking their stuff Sucks! Simulation doesn't exist! Stories derived from D&D are broken! Narrative Rulz!" So really, the entire thing could have been avoided - which is the sad part to me.

One last point - I think Abyssal makes an interesting point. The endeavor seems to have this collective aspect to it.  We're all fighting the three-tier distribution empire together (hey! a Star Wars analogy! I can see it now!)!  But then when you point out that not only is their fight with distro collective, so it seems with their theory, and that if one of them said "brain damage," the collective did, they seem to take offense. It's a bit of a weak tea response.

Quote from: David RSure.

In my defense I always try to be upfront when picking a fight

Regarding your comments to Levi. I agree with most of it but would you agree that the Pundit's behaviour online is the very definition of Swinnish (every time I type this word, I'm reminded of a buxom Scandinavian school mistress administering punishment to eager male students) behaviour he accuses most of?

Regards,
David R

David - I think I've actually said so in this thread. I called Abyssal on it in this or another thread.  I think Sett gets close, though sometimes it's hard to tell if it's just a misreading/miscomunication due to language barrier (I have to get my wife and in-laws to speak more German). That's the long answer.

Yes is the short answer.

First of all, none of you guys seem to understand what swine refers to. You just take it as general feeling of "my way is the best way". Well, that's not what it is.  

Tony's last post struck me as completely dishonest.

He says he has the "luxury" of not accepting that there is any such cultural conflict- yet one obviously exists or else there would be no argument here. In fact Tony himself has from the start been one of the primary combatants. In any case, he misunderstands the use of the term 'luxury'. It doesn't allude to "I have the ability to post whatever I like because I just pretend this conflict doesn't exist".

Luxury in this case, is the ability not to be held accountable. It refers to the status of someone who is not going to be directly benefitted from trying to subvert gamer-culture into conspicuous consumers who buy all the "right" games which espouse the "right" moral teachings from the "right" websites. This may apply to some people- maybe most people. But in Tony's case-- that just isn't so.  Tony is here to keep an eye on us and to put out public relations fires. He's doing his part for the collective, and in the end, he stands to gain status with them, and hopefully get some sympathetic posts because he's trying to sell his game too.  He's now doing this Jane Goodall thing where he walks amongst us and hands out bananas, but less than a year ago he was primarily trying to stealth-market forgie terminology and doing his best to put in plugs for the rest of the guys who were eagerly following along from outside. And they are eagerly following this as well.

I think one of them even quoted "I enjoy watching Tony's unique brand of performance art" about his dealings with us savages. Ho-ho, that Tony, out here tweaking the nose of us "haters" without us ever noticing. Except sometimes we do notice. What is Pundit going to do, after all.. ban him? Ho ho.

This is not to say Tony's a bad guy. I just think it's dishonest as hell for him to pretend he's not intimately involved with the dynamic of us vs. them though.

The bottom line is this:

This whole conflict is about deep, highly-justified, resentment. If you can't even acknowledge that the resentment exists or is legitimate, then we have no reason to even communicate, let alone stand down. If you think we can be silenced by dismissal or casual slurs, think again, because casual negativity is dead fucking easy. It is, in fact, too fucking easy. And if your'e going to put yourself on the line trying to sell us stuff, or sell stuff to other people in our community in places where we have the ability to just casually tear down your work, philosophy and self-image.. then it would be to your own benefit to treat us with a little goddamn respect.

Or we can continue along on the path we are on. In the end, WE are here for the gaming, not the selling and not the theory or the philosophy. We'll still be gaming, and your potential audience will be growing weary of the stupid nastiness surrounding your cult.

The diminishment has already begun.

We will outlast you.

Quote from: Abyssal MawHe says he has the "luxury" of not accepting that there is any such cultural conflict- yet one obviously exists or else there would be no argument here.

Can you please explain this sentence to me? I think I know what the words all mean when put together, but it doesn't make sense to me. It sounds to me like you're saying that the fact that people argue about whether there is a conflict proves that there is a conflict.

It should seem pretty obvious at this point that people only pretend to argue about whether or not there is a conflict. Not everyone is involved in this particular battle, but the people yelling loudly about how there is no real war, are almost always the same ones who are the most deeply involved.  

If you watch close, you can often see some of the same guys then go back to their hidey holes and talk about how they should formulate responses, and carefully planning out their tactics in order to benefit "the movement". You'd be surprised how often they used to link us around in a "Oh my god, we've got to do something about this!" kind of way.

Some of them even took up the cause and specifically appeared out here to battle us (Whitter/Georgios was one of the last of those). On my LJ, I've even got two hardcore forgies who basicly friended my journal in order to monitor me back around the time I verbally disemboweled Chris Chinn. (My LJ is totally boring, however).

Ok, thanks. I think it's total bollocks, but at least I know I get what you were saying.

Tony defeats himself in the last post.

He says he has the luxury of crossing the border, because he doesn´t participate in the war.

Thereby admitting:
1) There´s a border.
2) There´s a war.
3) There´s different parties in it

The only thing debateable is Tony´s role in it. As he is fighing the Pundit, but not Ron Edwards, the case is pretty easy to settle.

I took that as simply his phrasing, not an admission that the so-called war exists. I think you're being too literal in your reading if you see that as a reversal of his stance for the prior 24 posts.

Quote from: Abyssal MawThis whole conflict is about deep, highly-justified, resentment. If you can't even acknowledge that the resentment exists or is legitimate, then we have no reason to even communicate, let alone stand down.

Personally, I'm not shocked by the resentment.  

But I sure do question the targeting.