Grognard good...grognard bad

[dagger]

I guess I am a grognard, because I spent a year playing 4e and spent about 25 bucks total, then went back to 1e and now play Pathfinder.


That pretty much sums up everyone in my game group, all ages 24-39....the most money anyone spent is buying 3 core books. So we gave it a fair shake....



We all spent over 500.00 (each) easy on 3/3.5 though.

I know wizards misses our money, and I would buy old PDFs from them if they are high quality.....*shrug*

 

[ancientvaults]

One of the reasons that I love being a grognard is the nostalgia. Back in the late 70's, early 80's, as a little nipper buying those books was amazing. Reading through them and the concepts, it was unlike anything else. Wrestling with playing and being a little too young to understand the DIY aspect of the game. I remember enjoying just reading through the MM, PHB or DMG on hot summer afternoons and early evenings, the idea of gaming was still so new and fresh.

Now there are video games that simulate roleplaying and pen and paper rpgs coming out of the woodwork, but back then, it was so new, and so weird that is was really an awesome time. Now, rpgs are everywhere, they are not demonized like they used to be and they are rather commonplace in some circles.

 

[Ariosto]

Now there are video games that simulate roleplaying and pen and paper rpgs coming out of the woodwork, but back then, it was so new, and so weird that is was really an awesome time.

It was, in a similar way, an awesome time for the video games, and the related field of personal computers, too, eh?

Now is an awesome time in other ways, in those and other fields.

Somewhere else -- maybe closer than one might think -- is another field not yet even at the 1976 stage. (What it is, I don't know.) Come 2016, perhaps, pioneers will be making for themselves the names that will be legend to a later generation. Maybe a decade and a half later, the age of the entrepreneur starting with little more than his or her own time and energy will probably be largely over, if the business has boomed.

Maybe as long again later, the same technological and economic factors that facilitate a new generation of entrepreneurs will also help an older one do its 'retro' thing. By then, something else will be the next big thing.

 

[Gort]

Grognards - ageing has-beens trudging towards inevitable defeat, shame and dishonour following a once-great but increasingly senile and syphilitic cause...

I'm not sure if the whole Napoleonic metaphor is really all that flattering a label.

 

[The Shaman]

Defeat, perhaps. Shame and dishonor, never.

Vive le mort! Vive le guerre! Vive le joueur militaire!

 

[Bullgrit]

To me, the whole concept of calling oneself, (self-identifying), a [gaming] grognard sets up an antagonistic stance. It also suggests one is sticking to a classic game edition out of duty and loyalty, rather than from a reasoned choice or a considered preference.

Bullgrit

 

[billd91]

To me, the whole concept of calling oneself, (self-identifying), a [gaming] grognard sets up an antagonistic stance. It also suggests one is sticking to a classic game edition out of duty and loyalty, rather than from a reasoned choice or a considered preference.

Bullgrit

Spin it the way you want to, doesn't make it appropriate or hold true to the historical meaning of the term. You're also suggesting that the grognards' sense of loyalty to Napoleon couldn't be a reasoned choice or considered preference. Given the Corsican's track record of success and fairly obvious competence at points in his career, sticking with Napoleon makes for a pretty smart choice.
Like I've said before, I first heard the term out of a wargaming background, where your sense of the term is pretty much alien.

 

[Bullgrit]

doesn't make it appropriate or hold true to the historical meaning of the term

Like I've said before, I first heard the term out of a wargaming background, where your sense of the term is pretty much alien.

I was answering to the meaning presented in the first lines of the OP:

From various threads here, and one on the Piazza....
Folk tend to use "grognard" in different ways:

1) Lover of an older edition/setting of their fave game.

2) Pig headed twit. Either so stubborn he simply won't or can't try anything else fairly, Or, unable to graps that the nostalgia and original wonder of a new thing can never be repeated and is thus more in love with the emotions of their first gaming days, than actual facts.

You're also suggesting that the grognards' sense of loyalty to Napoleon couldn't be a reasoned choice or considered preference.

I'm not suggesting anything about Napoleon's army.

Bullgrit

 

[Gort]

Defeat, perhaps. Shame and dishonor, never.

I can't think of many activities more shameful and dishonourable for a soldier than occupying sovereign nations against the will of their people and massacring unarmed protesters, but maybe your standards are different to mine.

Admin here. Let's be spectacularly clear about this: one of the cardinal rules about EN World is that we don't allow religion and politics. Want to guess which this is? Whatever your beliefs may be, it isn't appropriate to discuss on this site, so p[lease stay far away from the topic in the future.

PM me if this is in any way unclear.

~ Piratecat

 

[The Shaman]

I can't think of many activities more shameful and dishonourable for a soldier than occupying sovereign nations against the will of their people and massacring unarmed protesters, but maybe your standards are different to mine.

Yes, 'cause that's exactly what I meant.



. . . or maaaaaaaaybe that's not what I was talking about at all?



(Hint: "Long live the dead! Long live the war! Long live military gamers!")