D&D General Who shouldn't play D&D

[tetrasodium]

Wow. What a terribly pretentious, horrendous attitude. "Obviously, anyone who ever gets upset about the things that happen in a game is bad for the game." Particularly when 5e has done far more to remove, as it says, "edges and contours" than 4e ever did.

That's quite an extreme whitewashed misrepresentation shifting who I pointed out to "anyone who ever gets upset about things hat happen". The post you quoted included the entire tyranny of fun explanation back in because the nuanced context of who specifically was marked out in bold & why is critical to avoiding this very reaction. I would clap at the excellent example of parody demonstrating how those people in oost 90's bold section often react but your barb seems serious.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

That's quite an extreme whitewashed misrepresentation shifting who I pointed out to "anyone who ever gets upset about things hat happen". The post you quoted included the entire tyranny of fun explanation back in because the nuanced context of who specifically was marked out in bold & why is critical to avoiding this very reaction. I would clap at the excellent example of parody demonstrating how those people in oost 90's bold section often react but your barb seems serious.

There's nothing "whitewashed" about what he's saying and I'm not even clear what "misrepresentation shifting" would even mean in English, let alone in this context. Feels like you overcooked the descriptors to the point where it's a burnt mess and we can't tell what it was meant to be!

He's simply factually correct that the "tyranny of fun" post is a pretty bad, mean-spirited, and frankly rather reactionary (which it does seemingly admit to, at least) and thoughtless, however fancy the language used.

There's nothing "nuanced" about the larger post you link either. It's just sneering, contemptuous, and condescending! Worse, it's kind of a rather silly bit of writing that takes itself deadly seriously. Whoever wrote it had no idea what they were talking about (I can't work out who - the link to the original goes to a dead page). They're just veiling ignorance in terminally failed attempt at being "high falutin'".

Specifically, they're ascribing motives to Gygax that he demonstrably did not possess, and using this as a justification for their reactionary sneering. That's ridiculous as a position. Their whole "anti-balance" screed is way off and the "how dare anyone complain about things that aren't fun for them!" attitude is one that Gygax was pretty inconsistent on in his own works, both writing very much in favour of that, yet also coming out against it at other times. He was all over the road.

Further, the idea that Gygax (or Arneson or others) was anti-balance at any time he was working on D&D/AD&D is laughable, because the very concept of balance in TT RPGs didn't really exist (it didn't even really exist much in wargames of that era - simulationism ruled over balance! I can demonstrate with examples if required). He didn't balance things because no-one did! It wasn't really until points-based systems came in that balance started being discussed much, and not until the late '80s that you even saw RPGs beginning to even moderately seriously attempt it* (and AD&D 2E wasn't really one of them, initially). That's like saying Galen (the Roman doctor) was against CPR. Or that the Wright Brothers didn't approve of jet turbines. It's anachronistic to the point of being purely ridiculous and silly. That anyone took it serious is incredible.

Also, as pointed out, this applies more to 5E than it did 4E, so it's quite astonishing to use it as an argument in 2024 AD, especially if one is DMing/playing 5E.

* = HERO etc. had nods towards it but the first one I remember that obviously trying quite seriously to balance the characters was Shadowrun, all the way from first edition. The character creation approach was very balance-oriented. Maybe it wasn't good at it (okay it definitely wasn't), but it was trying pretty hard.

 

[MichaelSomething]

I thought Gygax did all sorts of things to balance the game? Have different exp requirements for classes so weaker classes would level faster. Have the random treasure tables spit out magic weapons that favor Fighters more often. Put all sorts of barriers and difficulties on casters to balance out their power???

 

[tetrasodium]

There's nothing "whitewashed" about what he's saying and I'm not even clear what "misrepresentation shifting" would even mean in English, let alone in this context. Feels like you overcooked the descriptors to the point where it's a burnt mess and we can't tell what it was meant to be!

He took a toxic negative behavior exhibited by "people who shouldn't play d&d"∆ and described it as a neutral or reasonable one stripped of the specific examples included in the bold section so the result could support a barb.

"People whose characters got their swords destroyed by a rust monster and who threw a hissy fit over it. People whose characters died to a hold person spell and who wrote angry letters to Dragon magazine. People who didn’t have fun, whose entertainment was destroyed by this monster or that spell." Is not at all the same as. "anyone who ever gets upset about the things that happen in a game" even if there is some small degree of overlap between the narrow and incredibly broad groups.

∆ the topic being discussed in this thread.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I thought Gygax did all sorts of things to balance the game? Have different exp requirements for classes so weaker classes would level faster. Have the random treasure tables spit out magic weapons that favor Fighters more often. Put all sorts of barriers and difficulties on casters to balance out their power???

The argument I've heard, from people who say Gygax wasn't keen on balance, is basically that that was mostly/all simulationism rather than conscious attempts at balance, and to be fair to them, nothing I've actually seen from Gygax himself has really suggested otherwise. Hence I'm sort of taking that for granted. I think realistically he probably was aware that things shouldn't be too wildly out of whack, but wasn't really paying a lot of attention beyond that. Certainly early D&D and AD&D included a lot of stuff that doesn't make any sense from a balance perspective, like XP bonuses for high stats.

I think the idea that he was super-thoughtful about balance and intentionally eschewed it though, is obviously laughable. Because it just wasn't really a "thing" in TT RPGs until later (and again, barely even features in wargames from the early 80s and earlier).

 

[Ruin Explorer]

He took a toxic negative behavior exhibited by "people who shouldn't play d&d"∆ and described it as a neutral or reasonable one stripped of the specific examples included in the bold section so the result could support a barb.

"People whose characters got their swords destroyed by a rust monster and who threw a hissy fit over it. People whose characters died to a hold person spell and who wrote angry letters to Dragon magazine. People who didn’t have fun, whose entertainment was destroyed by this monster or that spell." Is not at all the same as. "anyone who ever gets upset about the things that happen in a game" even if there is some small degree of overlap between the narrow and incredibly broad groups.

∆ the topic being discussed in this thread.

No those two statements are pretty much identical, I would suggest. Maybe the latter could be changed to "anyone whoever gets upset about rules/rulings/scenario things that happen in a game", for clarity, so we could exclude social stuff, but my experience is someone who sneers at people for the reasons listed above, also sneers at people who are upset at a game depicting say, rape, or slavery, or the like. Indeed if the original author is who I suspect they are (and I don't know, maybe you could enlighten me), then they have specifically said exactly that.

There's nothing neutral or reasonable about accusing people of "hissy fits" or the like either lol. That's just shenanigans.

 

[Scribe]

12 pages based on the OP, is not what I expected when the answer is 'People who dont want to play it.'

Everything else looks pretty hilariously biased.

 

[tetrasodium]

No those two statements are pretty much identical, I would suggest. Maybe the latter could be changed to "anyone whoever gets upset about rules/rulings/scenario things that happen in a game", for clarity, so we could exclude social stuff, but my experience is someone who sneers at people for the reasons listed above, also sneers at people who are upset at a game depicting say, rape, or slavery, or the like. Indeed if the original author is who I suspect they are (and I don't know, maybe you could enlighten me), then they have specifically said exactly that.

You are still shifting the label from one describing people who choose to take certain actions (like those described) to a label for people who simply feel a particular way & stopping before any choice of action is taken. "gets upset" was the misrepresented rewording of actions like like "[throwing] a hissy fit" or writing angry letters to dragon rather than talking to their gm & seeing if something could be worked out.

There's nothing neutral or reasonable about accusing people of "hissy fits" or the like either lol. That's just shenanigans.

Except that's a misrepresentation too, Hearst would be proud... A situational behavior that should not be demonstrated in people who play d&d has been pointed out as an identifier for the sort of "people who shouldn't play d&d". Nobody has been "accused" of anything. Nobody has been "accused" of anything.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Nobody has been "accused" of anything. Nobody has been "accused" of anything.

Saying something twice doesn't change facts lol.

It's certainly not a "misrepresentation", that's laughable. It's absolutely not an "reasonable or neutral" thing to claim.

ou are still shifting the label from one describing people who choose to take certain actions (like those described) to a label for people who simply feel a particular way & stopping before any choice of action is taken.

A distinction without a real difference. Basically you're saying "Someone who is pissed as hell and hates what is happening but does and says absolutely nothing about it, just fulminates = cool dude" but "Someone who is pissed and dares to show it - thus risking being accused of a 'hissy fit' (note: risk triples if the person is female)" is not cool. It's a nonsense. Or at least a very darn silly bit of shenanigans.

I mean, let's be real for just 30 seconds here - at least 70% of the people in the world accused of having "hissy fits" - particularly by awful snobby reactionary jerks (practically their own words lol) like whoever wrote the piece you seem to be so keen to defend, were actually being pretty reasonable, but someone took exception to it, so decided to characterise them in a cruel and somewhat sexist way. When it comes to women complaining, the issue is about 3x as bad. I've seen men who write like the self-declared "reactionary snob" (their own words!) accuse women of "hissy fits" for the absolute mildest of complaints.

 

[tetrasodium]

Saying something twice doesn't change facts lol.

Well the fact that I sait it about two different statements you made raises the question of why you kept doing it.

It's certainly not a "misrepresentation", that's laughable. It's absolutely not an "reasonable or neutral" thing to claim.

I never said that the behaviors I pointed out are reasonable or neutral, explicitly the oppositel because it was something seen in "people who shouldn't play d&d". Your reinterpretation is an effort to reinterpret it into a more reasonable or more neutral form by shifting from the actions taken to the mere feeling.

A distinction without a real difference. Basically you're saying "Someone who is pissed as hell and hates what is happening but does and says absolutely nothing about it, just fulminates = cool dude" but "Someone who is pissed and dares to show it - thus risking being accused of a 'hissy fit' (note: risk triples if the person is female)" is not cool. It's a nonsense. Or at least a very darn silly bit of shenanigans.

There's a difference between thinking or feeling something but behaving reasonably despite those thoughts & feelings compared to thinking or feeling something but behaving unreasonably while using those thoughts & feelings to justify that unreasonable behavior.

I mean, let's be real for just 30 seconds here - at least 70% of the people in the world accused of having "hissy fits" - particularly by awful snobby reactionary jerks (practically their own words lol) like whoever wrote the piece you seem to be so keen to defend, were actually being pretty reasonable, but someone took exception to it. When it comes to women complaining, the issue is about 3x as bad. I've seen men who write like the self-declared "reactionary snob" (his words!) accuse women of "hissy fits" for the absolute mildest of complaints.

We aren't talking about that. If people are engaging in what could be described as a "hissy fit" because of the circumstances pointed out then they probably fit within the mold of "people who should not play d&d".