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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5891565" data-attributes="member: 54877">I'll give you an example that is not at all hypothetical, though I'm paraphrasing from a composite of all the times I've seen it. The "argument" goes something like this: 1. Gamers who don't use extensive character backgrounds are hack and slashers. 2. We know this because you can't really get into your character unless you know where the character is coming from, and can get into his head. 3. Oh, you don't use extensive backgrounds? Well, I guess you could still be doing a little bit of real roleplaying if make sure to name your character something profound sounding and have a tragic past, but that is kind of a pastiche of real character development. But you couldn't possibly be consistent with it over the course of a campaign. 4. I know this because all the people that I game with either write extensive backgrounds or are hack and slashers with no interest in roleplaying whatsoever. Of course, it's never presented that plain, because it isn't that plain in their heads. And in fairness, not everyone that has ever uttered that tired canard of "we roleplay, not rollplay" means something like the above. (Replace "extensive background" with their pet gaming fetishes.) If they thought it through more carefully, they'd reject it, given all the logical holes when you write it out more carefully.  But some people do mean it. It's quite plain that this is, at best, an expression of the felt need to justify their hobby--which, frankly, I find rather sad. The nasty bit is after someone like me says, "You know, we don't write extensive backgrounds because we enjoy having the characters develop in play. If you read around a bit, you'll find that this is an alternate form of artistic expression that doesn't require, and can even be harmed by, setting too much in stone before play starts. There are variations on it, too, where people establish canon for that campaign as it goes, and others where it is deliberately more freewheeling."  Then we get the argument that it cannot be as we say. At that point, the original person is projecting their own limitations or inexperience or bloody muleheadedness on gaming onto others who do something different. At no point have I said they can't play the way they play, and get a lot of enjoyment out of it. At no point have I said they should stop what they are doing and try my way (though if they want to branch out, I'm all for that). But they have insisted that not only can I not do what I say I do, that it isn't worth discussing, because it doesn't even exist. It's the height of gaming snobbery, and an insecure snobbery precariously based on an aggressively narrow-minded ignorance, at that. Have all the illogic you want. Ask for your illogic to be supported in the game, as much as possible. Meanwhile, I'll ask for my crazy brand of illogic to likewise be supported. The more the merrier. This is more or less what some of us have been doing. That you are doing this is why we are having this conversation still. Don't take that fatal but small step of trying to justify your illogic as somehow inherently a good fit, using as a basis your own conception of how games must work, especially if your experiences are narrow compared to the reported experiences of the other participants. This has also happened, if not directly in this topic, it has been done by some of the participants in this topic, in other topics.</blockquote>

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