If our Hobby has a problem, it is the difficulty of interpersonal communcation.

[William Ronald]

I see that the elitist geek fallacy about roleplayers being more intelligent, personable, and hardworking than other people is still alive and well.

Sad, but true. I have known many roleplayers, and I think that it is pretty hard to make broad generalizations.

 

[jdrakeh]

Sad, but true. I have known many roleplayers, and I think that it is pretty hard to make broad generalizations.

To be fair, there are some exceptionally intelligent, sociable, hardworking roleplayers out there - but to suggest that all roleplayers are intelligent, sociable, and hardworking (to say nothing of suggesting that only roleplayers are these things, as an earlier poster seemed to do) is arrogant, eltitist, and ultimately very anti-social. A richer irony, I do not know. It makes me sad to see that this fallacy is still alive and well.

 

[Chainsaw Mage]

(sighs)

Interpersonal communication can be hard. If I was better at it, I might just write reasonably sized posts, and not book sized posts.
But if you can somehow ignore or get past all the Fluff in my above post, I did have some Crunch in there (somewhere in there. It's there. Promise!)

Well, I read the first paragraph or so before my head started hurting, but I promise to try again later.

 

[Chainsaw Mage]

I see that the elitist geek fallacy about roleplayers being more intelligent, personable, and hardworking than other people is still alive and well.

I should have clarified that. I was not saying that all roleplayers are more intelligent, personable, and hardworking than other people. I was saying that all *good* roleplayers are more intelligent, personable, and hardworking than other people.

Bye
Chainsaw Mage

 

[Aus_Snow]

Chainsaw Mage - for what it's worth, it was clear to me what you meant.


For the OP though, I have nothing in particular to add that hasn't been said already. It's a problem for which I see no solution arising in the short-term. And the future, well. . .

 

[jdrakeh]

Such things will never be mainstream. They are simply beyond the reach of the common man.

I think that it was this anti-social, baseless, and arrogant claim that confused me. Clearly this was meant to infer that roleplayers are somehow better than or superior to the 'common man' (otherwise the comparison would not have been made).

 

[Chainsaw Mage]

I think that it was this anti-social, baseless, and arrogant claim that confused me. Clearly this was meant to infer that roleplayers are somehow better than or superior to the 'common man' (otherwise the comparison would not have been made).

No, it was meant to imply that roleplayers are superior to the common man. How you interpreted it was an inference.

 

[Herobizkit]

Advertising doesn't work.

At least, not the advertising of the new 3.x Basic Edition Box Set that encourages people to play D&D.

If people don't know what Role-Playing is, or what is involved in a "live" RPG, they'll be just as likely to completely overlook the box as anything else in which they're not interested. Personally, I would love to see an infomercial for D&D. I don't know how interesting it would be to watch someone PLAY the game, but if they explained the basic rules and demonstrated a small adventure, maybe they might spark some interest. But I've always found that word-of-mouth is still the best way to advertise RPGs to new people.

The d20 market is flooded with new material every day, and it is a lot like computer software. Some companies make great products, some make poor products, and some make products that are barely compatible with the machine for which it was made. And since the machine -- d20 -- is constantly changing, it is nigh impossible to keep up. I completely agree that introducing today's d20 to new players is mind-bogglingly difficult, given the tactical nature of the game as is. But old players hate going back to basics; I know I do. Sometimes, though, I look to my Blue Rose campaign setting and hope that I will use its simplistic engine... and then I look at my collection of Monte Cook stuff and want more. It's just... too... much.

Teens are better at RPGs and interpersonal communication because, as a teen, there isn't a lot much more they can do or of which they have complete control. The older one gets, the more responsibilities are thrown to them, and the less time they will then have to indulge in any kind of personal hobby.

I mean, when *I* was a teen, I was a geek. As a result, I wasn't a very social person. But, put me in the right element -- creating a magical world for a group of six, every day I could, many times 4-7 times a week -- and I shone; creating mass amounts of imaginary personae came easily, as I had (and still have) a very active imagination. What else did I have to do but go to school and play video games? And what else did THEY have to do? Sports, dating, movies... but they still wanted to play 8-12 hours of D&D a day.

But look at the same group now. Ten years later, we have relationships, jobs, kids -- all of which place pressure on our free time on a daily basis. Nowadays I'm lucky IF I can get a short 4-6 hr. game once a week. We already have 3 or 4 campaigns on the go, and there just isn't enough time in the day to advance any of them.

 

[Flyspeck23]

I wish to make an additional comment here, though: for some reason, teenagers seem to have the knack of freeform interpersonal communication down better ... in roleplaying games.

Maybe that's because teenagers haven't had that much bad experiences in personal interactions? They don't have anything to loose (or so they think), and therefore are acting on impulse (at least more so than adults) and are generally less shy (teenage angst notwithstanding).
I'd guess that this is even more true for younger kids. The older you get, the more careful you are of what you say.
A theory, nothing more.

Unfortunately, I'm guessing many of you might say that our Hobby is not a simple, laid back, good natured, pleasant way to expend time and energy. Some of you might say the whole atmosphere of the Hobby is poisoned.

Your analysis of why the hobby's poisoned is IMHO dead on.

A LITTLE beer or wine is fine. But of course, what is a little beer or wine varies from person to person. And sometimes a little becomes a lot, in a hurry.

Too true. Alcohol is never the solution. It's a drug - better treat it that way.

In my experience, the Hobby punishes creativity and imagination. It vigorously suppresses both.

While it definetly can happen, I'm not sure if it always does. Care to explain why? (I don't see a general explanation in your post, only examples.)

WHAT? You mean you actually READ through this entire post, and soaked up all my drivel?! What are you, a masochist? You're a worthy candidate to be a Cleric of Loviatar, Our Lady of Pain, then!

Yes. Not really. Probably not

To be fair, there are some exceptionally intelligent, sociable, hardworking roleplayers out there - but to suggest that all roleplayers are intelligent, sociable, and hardworking (to say nothing of suggesting that only roleplayers are these things, as an earlier poster seemed to do) is arrogant, eltitist, and ultimately very anti-social. A richer irony, I do not know. It makes me sad to see that this fallacy is still alive and well.

Agreed. And I'd take it a step further: seeing that most roleplayers are more or less geeky, some might be sociable while playing the game but not at other times.
Furthermore, the only hardworking person in our current campaign is the GM. All others are downright lazy

 

[Kuld]

WHAT? You mean you actually READ through this entire post, and soaked up all my drivel?! What are you, a masochist? You're a worthy candidate to be a Cleric of Loviatar, Our Lady of Pain, then!

I read through the entire post, and went through a cup of coffee In the process .

It was well worth the time.

Time is the greatest of problems, isn’t it? It is the product of our culture.

At any given time of the day (all 24 hrs) and at any given day of the week, I could be up and working. My weekly hours are 40 (min) to 80+ (depending on circumstances and which job requires my presence or "what went wrong").
*Welcome to the world of constant changing schedules and procedures.*
I also need to spend time with my son and some time with my wife, and I desperately need to go back to school and finish my degree.
I DM a small group roughly 120 miles away about once a month (sometimes every other month) and it is true. They don’t really appreciate the time and effort that goes into it. However, I really want to play and this seems to be easier then to screen or find new players in my vicinity.