Interesting criticism I found about us "RPG guys".

Alzrius · Jun 12, 2010

It's also worth noting that the internet is probably the worst place for any sort of critical discussion anyway. The relative degree of anonymity that you have while communicating with other people means that you can let your worst impulses run wild and not suffer any social consequences for it.

I've yet to see a "flame war" between people discussing different RPGs at my FLGS.

Dannyalcatraz · Jun 12, 2010

TarionzCousin said:
Why do you hate Tron Guy and Shemeska?

Curse you for making me remember Tron Guy!

Oryan77 · Jun 12, 2010

[No message]

coyote6 · Jun 13, 2010

Yeah, try PC vs. Mac vs. Linux, .45 ACP vs. 9mm, [martial arts style A] vs [martial arts style B], Cowboys vs. Steelers, football vs. soccer, AL vs NL, etc. I've seen arguments/flame wars over all of the above, some in real life and not just online.

Or go visit some websites dedicated to particular TV shows, and look for a shipper flame war. Heck, they've monetized Edward vs. Jacob -- I'd be shocked if there weren't flame wars somewhere over that.

Then there's Wikipedia edit wars.

Pseudonym · Jun 13, 2010

Oryan77 said:
But still, you RPG guys are saints when compared to the Call of Duty guys

Yeah, folks get tunnel vision with their hobbies and interests. The Mods run a tight ship here, so things never rise to the acrimony level of other forums concerning other interests. Give me a D&D edition war over a "discussion" of hunter/jumper versus dressage any day, or even just English versus Western. Them horse folks are vicious.

JoeGKushner · Jun 13, 2010

Yawn.

the hobby will never grow yadda yadda yadda.

Let's ignore WoW, resurgance of board games, and you know, reality, and blame it on the behavior that you see in any area where people have passion or think they're experts. Heaven forbid this guy come to Chicago and start talking that crap with a room fool of Sox and Cubby fans. Dude be lucky to get out alive. "And seriously, Baseball will never grow if...." quickly followed by the first shot to the head with da sausage and coup de grace with da cheese bourger.

Seriously lame.

(Psi)SeveredHead · Jun 13, 2010

Same with video games. There's near-constant flamewars on StarCraft II boards, over ... chat channels. (That's not even important! *Puts on flame-resistant suit, in case someone thinks that is important.*)

nedjer · Jun 13, 2010

JoeGKushner said:
Yawn.

the hobby will never grow yadda yadda yadda.

Let's ignore WoW, resurgance of board games, and you know, reality, and blame it on the behavior that you see in any area where people have passion or think they're experts. Heaven forbid this guy come to Chicago and start talking that crap with a room fool of Sox and Cubby fans. Dude be lucky to get out alive. "And seriously, Baseball will never grow if...." quickly followed by the first shot to the head with da sausage and coup de grace with da cheese bourger.

Seriously lame.

Little unclear about how WoW or boardgaming are related to tabletop RPG sales and use? Surely more time spent on WoW is less time spent on real roleplaying?

At least I don't have to worry about Sox and Cubby fans. In Glasgow the first shot to the head is a beer glass moving at 80 mph, followed by a nut-crunching coup de brazils.

Sox and Cubby fans need to start sprinkling nails on their porridge if they want to figure

Peraion Graufalke · Jun 13, 2010

(Psi)SeveredHead said:
Same with video games. There's near-constant flamewars on StarCraft II boards, over ... chat channels. (That's not even important! *Puts on flame-resistant suit, in case someone thinks that is important.*)

[sblock]A friend of mine thinks it's important, and I can see his point - in contrast to the old BattleNet, there are no chat channels in BattleNet 2 at all. From what he told me, this combined with the new automatic match-making system makes it difficult (if not virtually impossible) to join a game with your friends (and the new friend system seems to be another issue). That's facepalm-worthy in my book. YMMV.

Anyway, I'll rather play D&D. It's much more fun.

[/sblock]

(Psi)SeveredHead · Jun 13, 2010

Peraion Graufalke said:
[sblock]A friend of mine thinks it's important, and I can see his point - in contrast to the old BattleNet, there are no chat channels in BattleNet 2 at all. From what he told me, this combined with the new automatic match-making system makes it difficult (if not virtually impossible) to join a game with your friends (and the new friend system seems to be another issue). That's facepalm-worthy in my book. YMMV.

Anyway, I'll rather play D&D. It's much more fun. [/sblock]

At the risk of making this a totally private conversation:

[sblock]I'm a beta tester for StarCraft II, and I found this no problem at all. You sign up your friends ahead of time, and the system lets you know when they're on battle.net (sort of like MSN Messenger, or any other IM system). You create a party by inviting your friends, and the entire party goes from game to game.[/sblock]

Like RPGs, StarCraft II (and lots of other such communities) are split into groups which often have different needs, desires and playstyles. People sometimes get upset when someone implies their playstyle is "bad". Witness the old Eberron vs FR flamewars. Or the Old FR vs New FR flamewars. If someone says they like Eberron's lack of high-level good-aligned NPCs, this is seen as a criticism of the "preferred playstyle" of a bunch of FR fans, even if it wasn't meant to be (although it often is)... and so the FR fans respond. Sometimes well, sometimes with "you're too lame to run a setting like FR".