Jef’s been complaining about merits and flaws for long enough now that people are starting to ask what’s his damage exactly. So this week we examine his damage by discussing the concept of spotlight purchasing in flaws. Then we answer every question. Except yours. We didn’t get to it this week, sorry. Soon though.
System Mastery 
I’m kind of a self-hating nerd, I’ll admit. But I think we need to start taking the charges you mentioned personally. We all fiscally support an industry that is tacitly accepting of unconscionable behavior, or if somehow we don’t we’re still involved in it. I’ve been having a harder and harder time justifying being involved when I know that I’ll be in a demographic of people that hate women and minorities and love violent speech and their privileged position. The best that I can say is that I have the most diverse Pathfinder tables I’ve ever had, half men and half women (technically 4-3 respectively with me DMing) , not entirely white, not entirely straight; and it’s one of the best table’s I’ve ever had the pleasure of running. I’m also trying, as much as I can, to bring more non cis-het-white-men into my other favorite game, Netrunner. We’re having our first “Lady Netrunners” night tomorrow in fact, (hosted by one of the games handful of female tournament organizers) inspired by MTG’s “Lady Planeswalkers’ Society.” But even with that, I’m not sure that I can justify “staying in.” The best thing I may be able to do is to burn all of my gaming kit, because then there’s one less cis-het-white man in the hobby. I’d really like someone to talk me down here, because I like my hobby. I put a lot of value on preserving face and it seem increasingly unbecoming to play tabletop games. Both from a social-contribution aspect, for being immature, and from a social-progress aspect, for being complacent with privilege-violence.
–Nicky Cheeses
I think the most compelling reason not to quit this hobby is simply that I don’t want to see it be given over entirely to the worst of us. Every traditional gamer out there that sees these problems in the hobby is one more person that can try to change it. We live in a time where choice is not limited. If a company is being awful, don’t support it and let others know why. There are always more games out there. If a game store has terrible customers or employees, take your business elsewhere and let them know that you are doing so and why. There are always more options for getting your nerd items, even if it’s just through online stores. The biggest thing is not being quietly complicit. Nothing motivates a business to change its policies like a loss of money.
Ummm, I am tempted to say “go ahead and burn it, can’t be worse that what I have been told anyways”, but hey, I am a bitter self-hating semi-white semi-non het woman – it’s not like anyone in the greater community gives a f*** about what I say
In more practical terms, I would recommend you to find yourself a little group you would like to play with, and isolate yourself from the greater community: you don’t have to engage them unless you want to.
I am rather tired of fighting these attitudes in real world and keeping my hobby stress free wins over changing the world.
My last D&D group was far from what you would call average: mostly women, non-Americans [weird people who speak with weird accents out of character, ya know] and most of us are not white either [in this assessment I do count myself as white: whiteness works differently in the US, so I am ambiguously white there].
And you know what, it felt safe: I knew that people won’t say sexist stuff or make people into walking ethnic stereotypes. Yes, I am not enlightening random dude-bros by being an example to the greater community or something but a chance that somebody would see the light does not worth losing the fun for me.
You should concentrate on bringing good players to your table, not just non-white people. If someone wants to join your table and they’re a good player, it shouldn’t matter how they were born. Being a bigoted sexist racist isn’t good for either side.
Umm, I do not think you understand the issue, to be honest. We are talking about the system the community operates under, not individual people: the starting positions differ; therefore the reverse argument is not exactly applicable.
@ElliEne
It’s not okay to be a bigot, racist, or sexist. No matter the “starting position”.
I’d recommend just not continuing this argument in general, at least not here.
Please please please don’t make me moderate our forums. I’m already so close to burning out, you guys. I literally picked next week’s book by page count.
Please note that this is Jef posting, I forgot how to log in with my non-admin account.
@systemmastery
I will respect your wishes and stop commenting, but now you know how game store owners feel.
I both understand and appreciate it. Feel free to comment about other stuff!
No need to quit an awesome hobby because of widespread douchebaggery. If that’s the plan, acceptable hobbies would be pretty thin on the ground, no?
If gaming matters to you, stay in and be awesome. By all means, boycott companies and call out people who behave badly, but don’t leave gaming altogether. Don’t cede the territory to douchebags. Fight for every last inch.
You know, there was an anime that’s basically “Grimdark DnD cartoon” that came out recently, if memory serves. It’s called Grimgar, and it’s about the loser party who everyone else ditches because they suck.
Some of them die horribly. The rest grow into cynical killing machines. Might not be what you want, but it is pretty much what you’re asking for.
The 4E option is called Inherent Bonuses, and it’s just what you said. All characters gain an inherent +1 to hit and damage at levels 2, 7, 12, 17, 22, and 27; and +1 to all four defenses at levels 4, 9, 14, 19, 24, and 29.
If you have a magic item that would give you a bonus to one of those things, use the higher value between the bonus of the item and the inherent bonus.
Thanks, that name was completely escaping me and my 4e books are in my garage.
Heh, sure guys, I honestly should have expected something like that [referring to my and other gent argument ]. I understand you not wanting to moderate this issue, and I have seen it escalate rather fast in the past.
Your podcast seems rather chill, so I expected people being able to maintain the discussion without it going full rage. Better, safe then sorry I guess.
Any chance you would do a more world building related review like Synnibarr or something World/Mechanics interplay-ish like the stuff you did in AD&D and D&D reviews ? The whole “let’s apply exp/gold gain rules to deduce the nature of our existence as characters” thing was brilliant.
Sure, that’s an interesting request! Next time we review a system we’re super familiar with, we’ll do exactly that.
That sounds like a call for Rifts.
Quick note the page five language regarding balls is apparently being removed in Mk 3 of Warmachine and Hordes. So there is some progress on that front.
“Pulp!” Of course! Brilliant. Thanks!
A note on role-playing for training purposes – every military exercise ever is a giant role playing game. I cannot tell you how funny it is to point out to other Soldiers that we are all, every one of us, LARPers.
Kudos for pointing out Riot’s approach. They’re willing to kick out crybaby shitlord trolls in order to keep constructive players. And that’s what’s needed: A willingness to shun people who drive good players away from the hobby. But then you run into GSF #1, so …
You seem very quick to demonize people simply because they don’t like you. I urge you to realize that these “shitlords” are real people too, with complex motivations for their actions, and have every right to be entertained and included.
Did you just #notallshitlords
So wait … which is the best thing we can do? Stand up against people acting horribly or just focus on ourselves? Seems to me those aren’t mutually exclusive but you started with saying that one guy’s assessment of himself as non sexist is useless and that each of us needs to be willing to speak up, then went on to say that speaking out isn’t helpful so each guy should just think about whether or not he is a turd.
Hah. Pedantry. My take is that both approaches are important and work well together. Maybe you didn’t mean to back over yourselves but that was the impression I got. I really liked your “1 vs the 99” example, though. It was very thought provoking and a good call to action.
I try to avoid politics and social issues on the web as much as possible, largely because I’m just tired of it and the effort needed to fight internet assholes seems to not be worth the reward.
That said, I do want to reinforce how much I appreciate what you guys do in this field. Good podcasts dealing with gaming like you guys and the One Shot crew are so important for people like me who would otherwise start to wonder if we were the only ones in a sea of hate.
Not to make this about me. I’m a white(ish) straight guy and got it pretty easy personally in this environment. But it helps me (and I suspect lots of others) to stay positive about the hobbies we love when positive voices like yours are out there.
I know it can be hard, and tiresome, and painful, but keep up what you do. You guys are awesome.
I think we need to really get to the heart of the most important issue raised in this episode.
Jon, buddy, you gotta stop saying “lol” so much. Once or twice an episode has become about 20 in an hour. Your friends and family are concerned about you. I’ve got some pamphlets here, when you’re ready to read them.
Don’t do it for us. Do it for you.
Lol
I seriously thought there was some sort of secret contest going on. There’d be some announcement in the next episode or show notes to the effect:
“If you care to count the number of times Jon LOLed this episode, then send that in. Of the correct entries we will choose one random winner who can go to hell.”
Speaking of scary kids properties:
My wife swears by that that episode of Punky Brewster.
But the only thing intended for kids that comes to mind as really weirding me out is one scene from The Wiz:
Like something scene from an actual nightmare. Bit of genius there.