Killjoy Cooking With the Dungeons & Dragons Crowd
Dungeoneer
First Post
Funny article, but a couple years old.
A
amerigoV
Guest
And it continues to be spot on!
Well that is easy, a book just reprinting the same recipes, only slightly altered won't sell, so they don't try to reprint a cookbook as something new, unlike RPGs.
An eggplant recipe book that has the exact same recipes as the old one, is not a new book, but a reprint, and people don't need it if they have the old one. Nothing was changed except the cover art maybe. So a 2nd edition printing of a cookbook is just that, while RPG uses the term "edition" incorrectly.
In the book world, and edition of a printing is really just typographical and/or grammar fixes, and each new edition uses the same things the previous did, but applies these typographical fixes.
RPGs on the other hand just slap "edition" to mean the next "version" of the product. Ergo a naming convention for these so-called editions using software denotation.
3.0
3.5
3.75
etc
So if the RPGs, printed in books, would use the term edition correctly rather than try to redefine it just for them, and called their products what they were, there would be les arguments over editions.
Trivial Pursuit 80's Edition, is the same game in all ways, just themed to one type of questions. Closer and more appropriate use of the term Edition, but still not right.
An eggplant recipe book that has the exact same recipes as the old one, is not a new book, but a reprint, and people don't need it if they have the old one. Nothing was changed except the cover art maybe. So a 2nd edition printing of a cookbook is just that, while RPG uses the term "edition" incorrectly.
In the book world, and edition of a printing is really just typographical and/or grammar fixes, and each new edition uses the same things the previous did, but applies these typographical fixes.
RPGs on the other hand just slap "edition" to mean the next "version" of the product. Ergo a naming convention for these so-called editions using software denotation.
3.0
3.5
3.75
etc
So if the RPGs, printed in books, would use the term edition correctly rather than try to redefine it just for them, and called their products what they were, there would be les arguments over editions.
Trivial Pursuit 80's Edition, is the same game in all ways, just themed to one type of questions. Closer and more appropriate use of the term Edition, but still not right.
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
Sounds a lot like the hardcore chefs/foodies I know.
Anthony Bourdain, Mario Batali, and Michael Pollan do not agree on what makes good food, and will hotly (and not always respectfully) debate these topics. They can sometimes agree on broad strokes, but the details will get anyone hung up.
The reason the Food Network has its own channel while D&D does not isn't because of the crowd, it's because the food network is pornography (link to South Park episode).
These kinds of articles raise my hackles. Pretending that the D&D crowd is somehow more obnoxious of an audience than any other slice of humanity certainly makes arrogant, condescending bloggers feel better about entirely disregarding them, about complaining about too much complaining, about appointing themselves "THE VOICE OF REASON" for pretending to be above the fray, while at the same time backhandedly engaging in it with passive-aggressive sniping like this, becoming some sort of UR-whiner, a singularity of buttclowernery that disappears in upon itself in infinite recursion.
I sympathize with the point. Really, I do. D&D has an unpleasable fanbase (tvtropes link), absolutely. But so do sports franchises and political parties, and I don't see awkward, overweight, neckbearded Cat Piss Men rising to the street to burn cars and break stuff (and break people) just because elves no longer get a -2 CON the way Lakers fans do on a win (or loss) or the way some people do when marginal tax rate on the top 2% of the nation is hiked to provide food for the poor.
There are ways to deal with an unpleasable fanbase. Look at Paizo. They know how to listen without taking orders. That's part of the reason they're successful. They can find signal in the noise.
Giving up and saying "D&D fans are just angry!" like that somehow offends your delicate sensibilities is just the talk of cheese-eating wusbag surrender monkeys. People aren't sunshine and rainbows and politeness. Work retail in December. Stop being a sensitive crybaby princess about The Internet. Find the signal in the noise.
Or whatever.
But now that I've written a post complaining about complaining about complaining, it is time for me to disappear up my own orifice in infinite recursive meta-griping.
Alan Shutko
Explorer
Cooking is not immune to these arguments. For example, the 1997 Joy of Cooking was reviled because of the changes it made, dropping some stuff that was traditional and changing the voice. The 2006 edition went back to the traditional feel and was much better received.
In fact, before 2006 came out, there were lots of people recommending you find one of the older, used editions of the cookbook rather than purchase the 1997 edition.
In fact, before 2006 came out, there were lots of people recommending you find one of the older, used editions of the cookbook rather than purchase the 1997 edition.
1Mac
First Post
PS You decry the sin of claiming that "the D&D crowd is somehow more obnoxious of an audience" than other groups, then go on to do the same for sports fans and political activists, talking about their propensity to riot. It's true that sports fans and political activists are probably more likely to riot than gamers, but the author wasn't claiming otherwise.
If I say, "gamers are uniquely prone to anger over arcane and irrelevant minutiae," saying "other groups are uniquely prone to violence" is not a relevant comment, unless you can show that the violence results from equally arcane and irrelevant minutiae. I don't recall the MLB Wild Card riots of the 90's, and I don't think any political movement could ever be as irrelevant as what gamers tend to argue about. That is, whatever you think of tax increases, or any other political issue, it's more important than whether the Cataclysm made a travesty out of the Forgotten Realms.
The folks who are saying that the world of cooking has equally intense and silly arguments are more on point.
If I say, "gamers are uniquely prone to anger over arcane and irrelevant minutiae," saying "other groups are uniquely prone to violence" is not a relevant comment, unless you can show that the violence results from equally arcane and irrelevant minutiae. I don't recall the MLB Wild Card riots of the 90's, and I don't think any political movement could ever be as irrelevant as what gamers tend to argue about. That is, whatever you think of tax increases, or any other political issue, it's more important than whether the Cataclysm made a travesty out of the Forgotten Realms.
The folks who are saying that the world of cooking has equally intense and silly arguments are more on point.
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
I don't know who he is, and it doesn't matter to me so much.
It's nothin' personal, just that I've seen a lot of folks trot out the "D&D fans are SO UNPLEASANT" stereotype who clearly have not seriously dealt with significant slices of the public before. Because if they had, I think they'd realize that D&D fans are no better or worse than any other group of people, especially any other group of (sometimes over-)zealous fans.
Just makin' the point that people everywhere are irrational and over-emotional; D&D fans not especially so.
I also said that.
Canor Morum
First Post
Wow, you guys turned a humorous article into a debate. Bravo.
