#400: Jesse Decker's EnWorld embarrassment...

[S'mon]

Aww, wouldn't let me XP Celebrim! Anyway, cool post Celeb.

 

[Windjammer]

However, it's only necessary to do a simple thought experiment to undermine that sort of logic. You think that overindulging in food is the best way to remove the temptation to gluttony, or that overindulging in alchohol is the best way to remove the temptation to drunkenness. Well, how about moderate indulgence in heroine?

Haha!

Ah, hold on, you were serious.

Well, Gorgoroth is spot on. Life's the best teacher for life, and the moment someone treats everything in it analogous to heroine I'm inclined to wonder how much of life they've really taken in. Seems they've been rather busy keeping life at arm's length.

But as to that old point about throwing yourself in the occasional bout of gluttony, and then get it over with? That's ancient virtue ethics (Aristotle mentions it in the Nicomachean Ethics), and was practised by the Greek desert fathers, one of the oldest and first monastic Christian traditions. It's a step on the road, nothing more, but certainly nothing less. And it corrupts only the poor of heart, not the pure of heart.

 

[Ulrick]

I can't believe that happened about 9 years ago...

I still have Dragon #300. And yeah, it was a bit of a let down. But back then the mag seemed to take on a more darker and edgier tone anyway.

I actually held off buying the Book of Vile Darkness for awhile. I gathered plenty of "evil" ideas from all the White Wolf sourcebooks I owned at the time. A friend recommended I get the Book of Vile Darkness because it had updated stats for Archdevils and Demon Princes--which really hadn't been officially seen since AD&D 1e. (As Necromancer Games said when it came to 3e: "Where the heck was Orcus?")

But maybe that darker, edgier, trend hurt the hobby in the long run? After all, the average D&D player isn't getting any younger. Who knows?

 

[TheAuldGrump]

However, I do have enough of experience with such things, to know that if I go into an 'Adult Movies' section, chances are I won't be renting 'Schindler's List' or 'Citizen Kane' or 'The Third Man'. Chances are I'm not going to be buying something that appeal to my higher brain functions.

Wanna guess where I found Kiki's Delivery Service at the local Blockbuster? I had to ask a clerk to find it for me, because I had expected it to be under 'Family'*....

The Auld Grump

* For anyone unfamiliar with Kiki's Delivery Service, yes, it really is a family movie, and rather a good one. By the same studio that did Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, and Howl's Moving Castle.

 

[Dire Bare]

Personally, I found the whole "Vile Darkness" thing, not offensive, but "meh". There were some good ideas in the collection of hardcover book and magazine articles, but other than some creepy pictures in the hardcover, nothing struck me truly as "eviler than evil". The attempt to bring adult content to the D&D game was a good idea, IMO, but not well handled. Not in an "my-god-what-of-the-children" sort of way, just in effectiveness.

That some found the attempt offensive was not surprising, and fair. D&D caters to a wide audience (in a niche hobby, parse that!) and many prize its family friendliness.

That Hickman was offended, worried about the direction of the hobby, and decided to speak up was fine. But Hickman went over the top in his criticism. With the use of the word "terrorist" and really, his whole diatribe.

Now, nearly 10 years later, it's a footnote in D&D history and all involved parties are pretty much over it. Except for the easily excited hardcore fans on the interwebs! (and yes, that includes me) Decker wasn't trying to be negative on Hickman in the recent interview, but rather just the opposite. And to criticize him for misremembering the exact details of Hickman's rant nearly ten years prior is silly beyond imagining. And Decker was close enough. It's a charged word, often overused (certainly in this case), and tends to stick in the brain when someone uses it to attack you and/or your work.

 

[TerraDave]

Down with EnWorld. Long live EN World!

Seriously, while I can understand this mistake is easy and common (I frequently omit the space), the one place you might want to make sure you're pedantically correct is in an article about an editor.

Since I am a "newbie" compared to you, I typed it the way I pronounce it.

 

[Maggan]

Personally, I found the whole "Vile Darkness" thing, not offensive, but "meh".

Yeah. I wrote for Kult, so most of what was in BoVD was rather bland, IMO. Not that Kult was some kind of paragon of maturity, it's more like "been there, done that, ruffled some feathers" kinda thing.

Which is why Hickman's response was a bit of a surprise to me.

/M

 

[Keefe the Thief]

I remember. That was the "you have to decide what you want to be: a firefighter or a terrorist" article. Well well well. How mature.

 

[I'm A Banana]

In the article Decker says that Hickman called him a terrorist. Not so. That part was about him comparing the topic of the book to people wanting to play as terrorists. Not really the same thing.

Well, the article was entitled "D20 TERRORISM" and the opening sentence was "Yesterday, I found a terrorist attack in my mailbox." Then there's "This is sociopathic behavior," and essentially the equating of anyone who ever wanted to play an Evil character with ACTUAL evil, and the awkward praise of the Comic Book Code.

Though I think for me personally, any scream of "TERRORISM!" after about December 2001 became the equivalent of Godwinning.

Anyway, cool find!

 

[jonesy]

Though I think for me personally, any scream of "TERRORISM!" after about December 2001 became the equivalent of Godwinning.

It was pretty close to the anniversary when he found out about the book.