What! Limper has a gripe?

[Storm Raven]

And you continue to either not understand the analogy I was making or feign it to try and discredit my analogy in the first place thus making me look bad in the process. Either denotes a lack of understanding (Or intelligence.) or some truly deplorable debate tactics.

Oh, I understand your analogy, I just don't find it valid. You analogize rewards in role playing games to rewards in professional sports, making the resulting argument that since those who are superior pro athletes get rewarded with cash for their performance, those who are superior role players should get rewarded with additional experience points for theirs. You argue that this will encourage people to become better role players just as it encourages professional athletes to become better at what they do, to some extent, you argue that it is necessary to encourage better role playing.

(As an aside, I will leave aside the fact that many professional athletes who get the most money are not the best at what they do, for a variety of reasons, and that seniority is a bigger factors in salary most of the time than actual performance. I will assume that your claim that the better athletes get more money is valid).

But it isn't a good analogy. Your analogy assumes that people play role playing games for the same reason that professional athletes play sports. They don't. People play role playing games for the same reason that amatuers play sports. Every day thousands of amatuers go to play in various sports with no hope of renumeration. And many of them try to excel at their game for the reward of having done well. How many amatuer softball players hit the batting cages twice a week to try to improve their stroke? How many amatuer golfers practice their drives and putting with an almost religious zeal? These sorts of "self-improvements" are prevalent in the world of amatuer sports, and none of these people have any realistic hope of being compensated for their efforts in any more material way than the compliments of their fellows.

Why are role players held to be different? Why is the admiration of your fellows for a job well done not enough to encourage good role playing? Why is a job well done in the role playing arena not reward enough? For an amatuer runner, having a personal best time is its own reward, even if no one else notices, why is good role playing different in that it needs to be paid for in order to be considered worthwhile?

Until you answer that question with something cogent, then your analogy will be off base.

 

[Morrus]

Well, after reading on another messageboard that most of the people on this thread (including the originator) are all working together in order to "stir the goombas up", I guess this thread's getting closed.