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The gaming community: online compared to the physical world
- Thread starter wingsandsword
- Start date
I have noticed a big difference between what I see in my gaming real life community and what I see on the internet.
For example in my 30 some years of gaming with groups and conventions I have never once met a Drizzit clone. I have seen some drow characters but not the type I read about in forums.
I have also met some fans of Forgotten Realms who read all the books and know all the little things about the world I have played with them but I never seen them derail a game or get pissy if the DM changes things.
I have never really talked to or played with anyone who feels that magic users are so over powered that they stomp and suck the fun out of the game for everyone else. Usually the complaints about magic are that is hard to play a low magic game with the RAW.
About the only thing I have seen is the idea that fighters suck a lot when it comes to having anything to do outside of combat and some people find them a bore to play.
I am not saying that any of those things are not true for other groups and players just that I have not encountered them. I also think that when things happen in a group a person starts thinking that it happens a lot and that every group has these issues and if you don't well you must not be playing by the RAW.
My roommate is an avid gamer but she rarely reads the boards because they drive her crazy. One of her pet peeves is magic debates where someone uses a scenario to try and prove a point. Like the wizard is 11 level and has these spells and these magic items and the fighter has these feats and weapons and so that proves that the wizard is going to win every time. And that is why magic is over powered.
She is always saying that it is all just theoretical and does not really represent what happens in actual play with dice, players and the GM. That there are to many variables involved. I kind of agree.
Her favorite class is the monk and she has never found it unplayable or weak yet on gaming boards she was being told she was wrong. In her experience playing one and playing with others who play them this has not been her experience .
For example in my 30 some years of gaming with groups and conventions I have never once met a Drizzit clone. I have seen some drow characters but not the type I read about in forums.
I have also met some fans of Forgotten Realms who read all the books and know all the little things about the world I have played with them but I never seen them derail a game or get pissy if the DM changes things.
I have never really talked to or played with anyone who feels that magic users are so over powered that they stomp and suck the fun out of the game for everyone else. Usually the complaints about magic are that is hard to play a low magic game with the RAW.
About the only thing I have seen is the idea that fighters suck a lot when it comes to having anything to do outside of combat and some people find them a bore to play.
I am not saying that any of those things are not true for other groups and players just that I have not encountered them. I also think that when things happen in a group a person starts thinking that it happens a lot and that every group has these issues and if you don't well you must not be playing by the RAW.
My roommate is an avid gamer but she rarely reads the boards because they drive her crazy. One of her pet peeves is magic debates where someone uses a scenario to try and prove a point. Like the wizard is 11 level and has these spells and these magic items and the fighter has these feats and weapons and so that proves that the wizard is going to win every time. And that is why magic is over powered.
She is always saying that it is all just theoretical and does not really represent what happens in actual play with dice, players and the GM. That there are to many variables involved. I kind of agree.
Her favorite class is the monk and she has never found it unplayable or weak yet on gaming boards she was being told she was wrong. In her experience playing one and playing with others who play them this has not been her experience .
You'll get no argument form me on that, as I think you are 100% correct.
There's really a basic problem here, in that we tend to talk about "the gaming community". THE community, as if there was only one, when in reality there are tons of communities, partially overlapping in some ways, thoroughly disjoint in others.
Wingandsword, I agree with your thesis that online gaming communities are not neccesarily representative of real world gamers. OTOH, my real world game experience is very different than yours.
I run an AD&D 1E game, and I have since the eighties. Of the circle of gamers that I know (around 20 people) three are currently playing 3e, and none are playing 4e. Is that a representative sample of gamers as a whole? Certainly not! But maybe your real-world experience isn't representative of gamers as a whole either.
I run an AD&D 1E game, and I have since the eighties. Of the circle of gamers that I know (around 20 people) three are currently playing 3e, and none are playing 4e. Is that a representative sample of gamers as a whole? Certainly not! But maybe your real-world experience isn't representative of gamers as a whole either.
GreyLord
Legend
It's odd. Much of what I see on the forums isn't reflected in real life, but much of what people say they see in real life isn't reflected in what I've experienced outside the Con/Game store experience.
For example, none of the people I play OD&D or AD&D with have been in a FLGS, or Game store in almost a decade, many in two decades. NONE. You won't meet them in the gamestores, you won't meet most of them at the CONS. The people who I associate with my AD&D groups and those who are in game stores are really like two different sets of people in two very different sets of hobbies. In some ways it's almost wierd. I'd say there is NO representation from that crowd on EN world or any of the RPG sites (then again, I think about 3/4 of them would be considered old grogs who don't even use the internet unless they have too).
Of that bunch, only about a fourth are somewhat regular players...the others will play at a reunion of the occasional meet up for something other than a game and the game just happens to occur. I've actually gotten some of their old books because they use them so little they handed them off...they have other things that occupy their time these days.
On the otherhand I have met one or two that play AD&D in game stores...but it isn't often. I stand a better chance of meeting AD&D players and OD&D players at a Wargamers meet up than via the RPG scene these days...oddly enough I think I stand a bigger chance of meeting them at work than any gamestore. I DO meet them occasionally at gamestores.
Everyone of the very few AD&D players that I've met at the gamestores have played 3.X at some point, and in fact those that played AD&D that I meet at the gamestores seem to prefer 3.X or Pathfinder.
I've met some that play Rolemaster, and I found a BIG Rifts fan along with some Rifts players.
I have found 3.X players that are hostile to 4e, but only one that ever resorted to violence and that was more over some criminal activity than anything dealing with the game. My experience has seen far more playing 3.X or Pathfinder recently...but even Pathfinder isn't selling in droves at the FLGS's I've frequented. Normally the mainstay of those stores seem to be Magic the Gathering or some other niche they have carved out amongst the players there.
I haven't actually found 4e players that are hostile to 3.X or pathfinder players.
The conversations I see online aren't like any I see in the stores typically, but in some ways I think they may reflect some people's views much more closely than what they'd express in a public setting. They do tend to be closer to what I see at FLGS's than otherwise though.
They are nothing close to representing what I see from those who don't go to the FLGS's or play with those groups of people.
On the otherhand I think perhaps those who are online discussing these games take RPGs a lot more seriously than the average person I may play with...just an opinion.
For example, none of the people I play OD&D or AD&D with have been in a FLGS, or Game store in almost a decade, many in two decades. NONE. You won't meet them in the gamestores, you won't meet most of them at the CONS. The people who I associate with my AD&D groups and those who are in game stores are really like two different sets of people in two very different sets of hobbies. In some ways it's almost wierd. I'd say there is NO representation from that crowd on EN world or any of the RPG sites (then again, I think about 3/4 of them would be considered old grogs who don't even use the internet unless they have too).
Of that bunch, only about a fourth are somewhat regular players...the others will play at a reunion of the occasional meet up for something other than a game and the game just happens to occur. I've actually gotten some of their old books because they use them so little they handed them off...they have other things that occupy their time these days.
On the otherhand I have met one or two that play AD&D in game stores...but it isn't often. I stand a better chance of meeting AD&D players and OD&D players at a Wargamers meet up than via the RPG scene these days...oddly enough I think I stand a bigger chance of meeting them at work than any gamestore. I DO meet them occasionally at gamestores.
Everyone of the very few AD&D players that I've met at the gamestores have played 3.X at some point, and in fact those that played AD&D that I meet at the gamestores seem to prefer 3.X or Pathfinder.
I've met some that play Rolemaster, and I found a BIG Rifts fan along with some Rifts players.
I have found 3.X players that are hostile to 4e, but only one that ever resorted to violence and that was more over some criminal activity than anything dealing with the game. My experience has seen far more playing 3.X or Pathfinder recently...but even Pathfinder isn't selling in droves at the FLGS's I've frequented. Normally the mainstay of those stores seem to be Magic the Gathering or some other niche they have carved out amongst the players there.
I haven't actually found 4e players that are hostile to 3.X or pathfinder players.
The conversations I see online aren't like any I see in the stores typically, but in some ways I think they may reflect some people's views much more closely than what they'd express in a public setting. They do tend to be closer to what I see at FLGS's than otherwise though.
They are nothing close to representing what I see from those who don't go to the FLGS's or play with those groups of people.
On the otherhand I think perhaps those who are online discussing these games take RPGs a lot more seriously than the average person I may play with...just an opinion.
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Hussar
Legend
Yeah, I'm going to chime in with "me too" post here. Like others have said, there's stuff that gets talked about here that just never really applies to my experiences.
I was listening to an interview with Fear the Boot Blog Archive Interview Episode 17 – Ryan Dancey - Ryan Dancey and he talked about Burning Wheel selling about 7-8000 copies total. That's it. That's the sum total of the sales of BW, despite being one of the most talked about games on online forums. Not so much anymore, but, it used to be that BW was the Savage Worlds of Internet fora.
So, yeah, I'm thinking that we tend to place WAY too much emphasis on what goes on around here sometimes. Perspective is a very, very good thing.
I was listening to an interview with Fear the Boot Blog Archive Interview Episode 17 – Ryan Dancey - Ryan Dancey and he talked about Burning Wheel selling about 7-8000 copies total. That's it. That's the sum total of the sales of BW, despite being one of the most talked about games on online forums. Not so much anymore, but, it used to be that BW was the Savage Worlds of Internet fora.
So, yeah, I'm thinking that we tend to place WAY too much emphasis on what goes on around here sometimes. Perspective is a very, very good thing.
Aeolius
Adventurer
What happens in EN World stays in EN World?
I am hardly qualified to ascertain the differences between online and offline play, as I have not run a face-to-face game since 1994. I do not have a group of friends that I game with offline, nor is there a gaming store within half an hour's drive.
Of course I miss the odd accents, silly voices, and made-up languages... but at least I'm still gaming
Jack7
First Post
I'm probably gonna tick off some people by saying what I'm gonna say. Maybe some won't even understand what I'm saying. To me though both gaming and gamers can be very, very odd. And totally unrelated to my experiences in real life. But not because of anything to do with venue. I'll explain.
To cite but two examples: Once I was in a with my family at a movie store getting films. They had comics there and I started reading a comic. I collect comics, and wanted to see if they had anything worth buying and they didn't. But a guy there saw what I was doing and struck up a conversation with me. He looked like a stereotypical gamer, including the particular tee-shirt he was sporting. I do not, I look like a Cop. Unless I'm working undercover, then I don't. But I guess he equated comic book with both comic books and gaming.
Anyways it went from, "Yeah, I like to read justice League," on my part to an almost explosive conversation on his part on how his Superhero Character was far better and more god-like (and a vast improvement upon) Superman and how he thought that if they were statted correctly then his superhero character would kill Superman in hand to hand combat. I had to disengage fast because the farther he went along the closer I thought he would come to stroking out, or slipping into erotic ecstasy, or both, and I hate to say this but it's absolutely true, I thought to myself, "this guy has never had a girlfriend." But the louder he got about how his character had a special kind of mega-ultra vision that could kill Superman instantly the more I realized this is not for me pal. This is something for your gaming table.
Another time, after getting back to my hometown, (and the crime rate was bad there at that time) I thought about starting up a group of local Vigilantes. Granted I have a very different idea of vigilante than is the pop-culture one, and I wanted us to help out the cops with basic neighborhood patrols, reporting, etc. I thought to myself, after going to another comic book store/gaming store, and hearing so many of the patrons go on and on about superheroes and Batman and so forth, decided, well maybe some of these guys will be very useful. (And by listening to them, the thought stuck me, well many of these young fells are quite smart they just have no direction of how to channel their "heroic energies" and cleverness at anything other than wishes and games.)
So I spent about month developing a training manual and prepared it and put up a flyer on the gaming store saying that I was looking for people who would consider helping out reduce crime in the surrounding beat areas. (I wanted to keep the actual area of operations small and manageable.) The manual was basic, it wasn't anything elaborate, and it stressed observation and neighborhood security and personal security and crime prevention rather than the typical idea of Vigilantism. I stressed avoiding direct contact with criminals or dangerous situations. And receiving good, solid training from local authorities and organizations. Several people called me up, eager to get involved, it seemed, and I interviewed many of them by phone and a couple by initial personal interviews. Let them review the manual. From my conversations I asked them what they would do to reduce crime, to help out local law enforcement, and to make the surrounding neighborhoods safer. Many had what I thought were clever ideas (at least in theory) and a couple seemed brilliant. Universally however, when I explained to them that the efforts would be real, and not imaginary game efforts (that I was talking about real life and not games), they all dropped it immediately. A couple of guys asked me if I was crazy and said something to the effect of, "that's dangerous!"
They could develop all kinds of clever ideas to solve imaginary game problems, could develop 30 something level this or that to kill Cosmic Dragons and fight minor gods on the plane of Tartarus, but couldn't spare any energy, effort, or cleverness to face even miniscule danger in the real world, or to fix the dangers of the real world. They could not at all make the leap between Great Imaginary Hero to even the most simple real life vigilant, and they couldn't get past the idea that I had a great idea for a game (which really excited them), or so they thought, that was in actuality not a game. Many were very excited about "playing a game as if it were real life," but could not imagine playing their "imaginary interests in real life." The thought to me that one would want to be an Heroic character in a game, but not want to do anything even remotely similar in real life, well, it kind of mazes me. And to be honest, disturbs me. I always saw that aspect of gaming as an ambition, not as an emage.
I never understood it, and it always gave me the creeps personally, and it's why I don't hang around what I consider hardcore gamers, or have their gaming or other interests. (That is, of the idea that someone imaginary worlds are better and more exciting and more challenging places to live in than the real world. Or that one should be mentally or imaginarily a hero, but in real life shun or avoid the same general principles. I've seen this in on-line games too, which to be honest, often give me that same kind of creepy feeling, and I avoid them for that reason. I told a guy once, "You know if you can spend 40 hours a week playing this MMOG, then you could train to be a cop, medic, soldier, or anything you want to be. And help out others and even make far more money at it than this." He seemed totally stupefied by my statement.)
If I'm around a group of buddies I can enjoy a game, talk about it, and so forth. Once it's over though, I can't think of it as real and it doesn't interest me in the same way the real world does, nor do I think of imaginary adventures and experiences as anywhere near as dangerous, thrilling, exciting, or important as real life ones.
Now me and my buddies all grew up playing D&D, and other games, and although it was fun it was also like imaginary training for real life to us. For practicing, or at least learning about, really useful skills, like map-reading, logistics, military tactics, manhunting, stuff like that. It was a game useful for training our minds and imaginations in real skills. It was not an artificial, escapist world, but a sort of imaginary overlay we placed over the real world to test out and mentally prepare for problem-solving in the real world.
So on the one hand I think gaming is a very valuable tool, and generally beneficial for a person's development. On the other hand I've seen some gamers I will outright avoid.
I am not of course saying all gamers are to me are like the ones described above. They are not (a goodly number of gamers I know are cops and soldiers and so forth), but the real divisions to me are not between on-line and real world gamers, but between gamers who are escapists, and those who employ games as a problem solving tool. Though that might not be the only function of course, games can and should be enjoyable entertainment, but once they become a secondary, escapist, or artificial world and are discussed as if they have a separate reality all of their own, that's a line I will not cross, and such people make me uneasy, even wary. I have no interest, aside from the appropriate venues (EN World is such a venue), of discussing a Level 30 character or of discussing gaming at all, other than in general terms. So again it is to me not on-line versus real world gaming, but what I might call Real World Gamers versus Gamers who think Games are Real Worlds. (Or are just as important or are more important than the real world.)
That's the line for me and the one I have no interest at all in crossing.
Now to be absolutely fair I know a lot of people who consider me weird because I can sit up all night with my buddies talking about a mission, a case, counter-terrorism, vigilantism, and Intel work. I can also stay up all night drinking beer and talking philosophy, religion, history, art, and science. That's weird to a lot of people I know, including my teenage daughters. Everyone has a departure point I guess, and that's fine by me.
But I grew up with gamers, and maybe this is my age showing, who would play OD&D or AD&D, then after the game stay up all night talking everything from Occam to the latest Pink Floyd album, to breaking the Siegfried Line, to shark fishing, to William Blake, to how we were gonna have a big bottle rocket fight at the new bridge on New Years Eve.
But I never once struck up a conversation, and never will, with a stranger about how my god-like Superhero character could kill Superman in an eye-beam match. Or how I had a 30th level Eldritch War-Forged Atomic Powered Arcane Golden Battle Dwarf in Half-plate Golem Touched Ruby Red Djinni Slippers. I wouldn't have that conversation with anyone probably. I don't even like Eldritch War-Forged Atomic Powered Arcane Golden Battle Dwarves in Half-plate Golem Touched Ruby Red Djinni Slippers.
Dwarf Paladin is about as far as I feel the need to take it.
That's my view of it. I've got nothing against games, or gamers. But there is a auricular sub-group of hardcore gamers I steer clear of. To me though it's far less about where they congregate, than how and why.
To cite but two examples: Once I was in a with my family at a movie store getting films. They had comics there and I started reading a comic. I collect comics, and wanted to see if they had anything worth buying and they didn't. But a guy there saw what I was doing and struck up a conversation with me. He looked like a stereotypical gamer, including the particular tee-shirt he was sporting. I do not, I look like a Cop. Unless I'm working undercover, then I don't. But I guess he equated comic book with both comic books and gaming.
Anyways it went from, "Yeah, I like to read justice League," on my part to an almost explosive conversation on his part on how his Superhero Character was far better and more god-like (and a vast improvement upon) Superman and how he thought that if they were statted correctly then his superhero character would kill Superman in hand to hand combat. I had to disengage fast because the farther he went along the closer I thought he would come to stroking out, or slipping into erotic ecstasy, or both, and I hate to say this but it's absolutely true, I thought to myself, "this guy has never had a girlfriend." But the louder he got about how his character had a special kind of mega-ultra vision that could kill Superman instantly the more I realized this is not for me pal. This is something for your gaming table.
Another time, after getting back to my hometown, (and the crime rate was bad there at that time) I thought about starting up a group of local Vigilantes. Granted I have a very different idea of vigilante than is the pop-culture one, and I wanted us to help out the cops with basic neighborhood patrols, reporting, etc. I thought to myself, after going to another comic book store/gaming store, and hearing so many of the patrons go on and on about superheroes and Batman and so forth, decided, well maybe some of these guys will be very useful. (And by listening to them, the thought stuck me, well many of these young fells are quite smart they just have no direction of how to channel their "heroic energies" and cleverness at anything other than wishes and games.)
So I spent about month developing a training manual and prepared it and put up a flyer on the gaming store saying that I was looking for people who would consider helping out reduce crime in the surrounding beat areas. (I wanted to keep the actual area of operations small and manageable.) The manual was basic, it wasn't anything elaborate, and it stressed observation and neighborhood security and personal security and crime prevention rather than the typical idea of Vigilantism. I stressed avoiding direct contact with criminals or dangerous situations. And receiving good, solid training from local authorities and organizations. Several people called me up, eager to get involved, it seemed, and I interviewed many of them by phone and a couple by initial personal interviews. Let them review the manual. From my conversations I asked them what they would do to reduce crime, to help out local law enforcement, and to make the surrounding neighborhoods safer. Many had what I thought were clever ideas (at least in theory) and a couple seemed brilliant. Universally however, when I explained to them that the efforts would be real, and not imaginary game efforts (that I was talking about real life and not games), they all dropped it immediately. A couple of guys asked me if I was crazy and said something to the effect of, "that's dangerous!"
They could develop all kinds of clever ideas to solve imaginary game problems, could develop 30 something level this or that to kill Cosmic Dragons and fight minor gods on the plane of Tartarus, but couldn't spare any energy, effort, or cleverness to face even miniscule danger in the real world, or to fix the dangers of the real world. They could not at all make the leap between Great Imaginary Hero to even the most simple real life vigilant, and they couldn't get past the idea that I had a great idea for a game (which really excited them), or so they thought, that was in actuality not a game. Many were very excited about "playing a game as if it were real life," but could not imagine playing their "imaginary interests in real life." The thought to me that one would want to be an Heroic character in a game, but not want to do anything even remotely similar in real life, well, it kind of mazes me. And to be honest, disturbs me. I always saw that aspect of gaming as an ambition, not as an emage.
I never understood it, and it always gave me the creeps personally, and it's why I don't hang around what I consider hardcore gamers, or have their gaming or other interests. (That is, of the idea that someone imaginary worlds are better and more exciting and more challenging places to live in than the real world. Or that one should be mentally or imaginarily a hero, but in real life shun or avoid the same general principles. I've seen this in on-line games too, which to be honest, often give me that same kind of creepy feeling, and I avoid them for that reason. I told a guy once, "You know if you can spend 40 hours a week playing this MMOG, then you could train to be a cop, medic, soldier, or anything you want to be. And help out others and even make far more money at it than this." He seemed totally stupefied by my statement.)
If I'm around a group of buddies I can enjoy a game, talk about it, and so forth. Once it's over though, I can't think of it as real and it doesn't interest me in the same way the real world does, nor do I think of imaginary adventures and experiences as anywhere near as dangerous, thrilling, exciting, or important as real life ones.
Now me and my buddies all grew up playing D&D, and other games, and although it was fun it was also like imaginary training for real life to us. For practicing, or at least learning about, really useful skills, like map-reading, logistics, military tactics, manhunting, stuff like that. It was a game useful for training our minds and imaginations in real skills. It was not an artificial, escapist world, but a sort of imaginary overlay we placed over the real world to test out and mentally prepare for problem-solving in the real world.
So on the one hand I think gaming is a very valuable tool, and generally beneficial for a person's development. On the other hand I've seen some gamers I will outright avoid.
I am not of course saying all gamers are to me are like the ones described above. They are not (a goodly number of gamers I know are cops and soldiers and so forth), but the real divisions to me are not between on-line and real world gamers, but between gamers who are escapists, and those who employ games as a problem solving tool. Though that might not be the only function of course, games can and should be enjoyable entertainment, but once they become a secondary, escapist, or artificial world and are discussed as if they have a separate reality all of their own, that's a line I will not cross, and such people make me uneasy, even wary. I have no interest, aside from the appropriate venues (EN World is such a venue), of discussing a Level 30 character or of discussing gaming at all, other than in general terms. So again it is to me not on-line versus real world gaming, but what I might call Real World Gamers versus Gamers who think Games are Real Worlds. (Or are just as important or are more important than the real world.)
That's the line for me and the one I have no interest at all in crossing.
Now to be absolutely fair I know a lot of people who consider me weird because I can sit up all night with my buddies talking about a mission, a case, counter-terrorism, vigilantism, and Intel work. I can also stay up all night drinking beer and talking philosophy, religion, history, art, and science. That's weird to a lot of people I know, including my teenage daughters. Everyone has a departure point I guess, and that's fine by me.
But I grew up with gamers, and maybe this is my age showing, who would play OD&D or AD&D, then after the game stay up all night talking everything from Occam to the latest Pink Floyd album, to breaking the Siegfried Line, to shark fishing, to William Blake, to how we were gonna have a big bottle rocket fight at the new bridge on New Years Eve.
But I never once struck up a conversation, and never will, with a stranger about how my god-like Superhero character could kill Superman in an eye-beam match. Or how I had a 30th level Eldritch War-Forged Atomic Powered Arcane Golden Battle Dwarf in Half-plate Golem Touched Ruby Red Djinni Slippers. I wouldn't have that conversation with anyone probably. I don't even like Eldritch War-Forged Atomic Powered Arcane Golden Battle Dwarves in Half-plate Golem Touched Ruby Red Djinni Slippers.
Dwarf Paladin is about as far as I feel the need to take it.
That's my view of it. I've got nothing against games, or gamers. But there is a auricular sub-group of hardcore gamers I steer clear of. To me though it's far less about where they congregate, than how and why.
The Shaman
First Post
Seriously, does any of this have anything to do with the subject of your post? If you had left all of this out of your post, would it have made any difference at all to your argument? Or is the opportunity to slag older editions of D&D just too tempting to pass up?
First, do you understand that your view of the physical gaming community suffers from selection bias?
The people with whom you play is largely made up of gamers who play more recent editions, therefore when you look around at other gamers, guess what you see? Yup, gamers who like the same things you like.
See, if I look around at the gamers I know in meatspace, I see lots of gamers playing pre-3e D&D and none playing 3.0e or later. Should I draw from that the observation the presumption that no one plays 3e, 4e, or Pathfinder? No, 'cause that would be selection bias as well.
Now, as to your initial question?
No, because many of the gamers with whom I play I met through online communities of one sort or another.
There're the guys from Dragonsfoot with whom I play at an annual con and other events. There's the guy in my face-to-face group I met through a Yahoo group (and who plays in four - FOUR! - BECMI D&D groups, by the way). There're the guys I met through a gaming Meetup. There's the guys I met through Obsidian Portal for whom I'm going to run a one-shot with an option on starting a regular campaign after the holidays.
And more importantly, there're the people we know outside of the various forums, groups, and what-not who play the same games we do but don't participate online. Like two of the four players in my Flashing Blades game. Like two of the five players in the OD&D one-shot in which i participated this spring, and who play in a regular AD&D game. Like one of the players in our Dragonsfoot con games last summer who is an avid AD&D Greyhawk gamer.
So, to answer your question again, no, I don't see a disconnect; in my case, the online and physical gaming communities are filled with many of the same people.
Dude, offense is often where you look for it. The guy's just relating his experiences and thoughts. If you really want to talk about weakening your main point, your own passage here is worse than his.
Please remember that those old editions are not maidens that need you to defend them. Folks are allowed to talk about not liking them, and should be able to do so without being jumped on.
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