D&D helped me answer a question in Scholastic Bowl!

[shadow]

Oh Scholar Bowl! I fondly remember my high school days when I was on the scholar bowl team. D&D helped me answer countless mythology/folklore questions. Oh the memories!

 

[Barendd Nobeard]

I had a similar situation in a scholastic bowl meet of my own in high school. There was a question about Olliver Cromwell, a figure from the English (UK) Civil War. The only reason I got the question right was because of a song by Monty Python that tells pretty much his whole career.

Monty Python is great for that. The Galaxy Song from "Meaning of Life" is very accurate, and helped me with a couple of questions on an Astronomy final my first year in college.

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour,
That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,
A sun that is the source of all our power.

The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see
Are moving at a million miles a day
In an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour,
Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars.
It's a hundred thousand light years side to side.
It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick,
But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide.

We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point.
We go 'round every two hundred million years,
And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions In this amazing and expanding universe.


The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding
In all of the directions it can whizz
As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,
Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is.

So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
How amazingly unlikely is your birth,
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.

 

[Terraism]

Everyone knows that D&D is educational!
...

In fact, there are several organizations trying to get that message accross - that RPGs can really be educational tools. They teach math, good writing skills and more.

Yup - I'd say it's the language skills that take the biggest boost.

 

[Greatwyrm]

Language and math are boosted, but let's not forget about planning and creative problem solving.

Some people try to "think outside the box." Most gamers will walk over to your box, throw in a frying pan, then go solve the problem and be off to lunch before Joe Non-gamer even knows what's going on.

 

[Grim]

I took a course on probability once. Man, after years of rolling dice, that course was so EASY.

I actually think DND really helps my math skills. I can add up things so quickly now, after rolling for damage a few thousand times. And playing scrable, DND lends so many words that most people never think of.

Thats why it roxxors my world.

 

[Sir Hawkeye]

So my school's scholastic bowl team went to a tournament this past Saturday, and I happened to be with them. We're playing and all of a sudden a toss-up question about a multi-headed dragon goddess comes up. The minute they start saying Dungeons & Dragons I buzz in and answer Tiamat.

Never thought I'd find trivia about D&D in Scholastic Bowl... and for those of you wondering... it's sort of like jeopardy or trivial pursuit. 5 person team gets asked toss-up questions and the first team to buzz in the with the correct answer gets the first chance to answer a 3-6 part bonus question with 20 points.

My team got slaughtered, but I just thought I'd post my happy news... LOL

Small world! I was at the same tournament and got that question.

Of course, in the eyes of my teammates I've sunk further into geekery.