The Perils Of Old School Gaming

[Ed the Coastie]

My daughter Chelsea has been playing RPGs since she was old enough to kinda-sorta understand what was going on, but it has only been in the past year or so that she has been able to play in a group made up almost exclusively of her peers. I serve as DM for the group with which she most frequently plays, the current composition of which is two boys ("Eric" and "Tyler") and four girls (Chelsea, "Brandy", "Holly", and "Janet"), all of them in the 8th Grade.

(Note: the names of the gamers in my daughter's group have been changed, since they are kids.)

This particular group (active membership has changed a time or two) has been meeting more-or-less consistantly on Saturday afternoons for the past year, playing their way through (and recently completing) an AD&D 2e adaptation of the Temple of Elemental Evil. They generally only play the campaign if everyone is present; if not, the attendees get the opportunity to try one of the other games on my shelf. So far, they have sampled Dawn Patrol, Gangbusters, Boot Hill, and Indiana Jones.

Tonight, "Eric" showed up at the elementary school where I work sporting a black eye. (He is in Flag Corps; they practice here in my gym.) When I asked him what had happened, he confessed that he and "Tyler" had gotten into a bit of a scuffle with some other gamers at the Middle School -- gamers who proclaimed that d20 was the only "real" gaming system and that anyone who played any of the "old fogey" games was a "loser"...and anyone who gamed with girls was a "fairy".

Bully gamers? Has our hobby grown that much that we now have violent extremists?

Incidentally, the bullies quickly found themselves outnumbered when the girls waded into the fray. The PE teacher and the Vice Principal broke up the fight and sentanced the kids to detention for the rest of the week, although they are allowed to serve it during lunch rather than after school.

[GhostInTheMachine]

They really fought over something as insignificant as that? I mean a hobby is a hobby. You do it because you love it, but still...Why fight over something petty like that?

Now I can't comment with entire certanity on this situation as I was not there physically nor did I hear what was commented, but I'd write it off as an immature comment (you did say they were middle schoolers, but as to what grade IDK). Everyone makes one every once in a while, but I wouldn't be too concerned about extremism.

[Irish Wolf]

You know, I'm surprised "Eric" didn't point out the bullies' poor logic. After all, his hobby puts him in close contact with more girls than boys every week. Or do the bullies not like girls? :)

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Irish Wolf

You know, I'm surprised "Eric" didn't point out the bullies' poor logic. After all, his hobby puts him in close contact with more girls than boys every week. Or do the bullies not like girls? :)

Straightforward junior high school logic. Anyone male who actually likes to spend time with girls is homosexual; heterosexuals only like to spend time with boys. Surely that's obvious?

(It may be an application of the logic of contagion: femaleness is a kind of uncleanness or contamination, and if you come in contact with it you acquire some of it, and therefore you aren't a real male any more, and if you're not a real male you're a homosexual. And real males have to abuse males labelled as homosexual to prove their own masculinity.)

(Or in gaming terms, boys who game with girls are chaotic, and fair targets for lawful aggression. You get eeps for hitting them.)

Bill Stoddard

PS. I probably should note that all this is very dry humor in a deliberately pedantic style, lest it be too dry for its own good and get taken seriously. . . .

[Apache]

Well, Ed, I suppose its a step up from when WE gamed at that age, back in the day.

When you would get into fights with the jocks because you were a gamer, period......

Not to mention the whole 'Satanic' crap.....

And the fact that Girls. Didn't. Game. Back then.

[Qoltar]

Girls DID game back then.

Thats one of the first things about RPGs that kept me interested in them.

This would be early 1980s that I 'm referring to.


- the Klingon Ed

[Darkwalker]

Originally Posted by Apache

Well, Ed, I suppose its a step up from when WE gamed at that age, back in the day.

When you would get into fights with the jocks because you were a gamer, period......

Not to mention the whole 'Satanic' crap.....

And the fact that Girls. Didn't. Game. Back then.

I didn't get in fight with the jocks back then. I played RPG's with them when we where not chasing girls or beating up nerds.

It's good to be a jock with a 130+ IQ :)

[Ed the Coastie]

This particular bunch of boys have been a problem for a while, and not just in school. They have been banned from congregating as a group from not only the local video game store (which is the closest thing that our community has to a FLGS) but also the public library. Plus their rather "boisterous" D&D sessions last year are the primary reason why RPGs have been banned from the Middle School campus this year, and why the public library is now reluctant to allow gaming groups to reserve rooms.

Originally Posted by Apache

Well, Ed, I suppose its a step up from when WE gamed at that age, back in the day.
When you would get into fights with the jocks because you were a gamer, period......

I seldom got into any fights about gaming back then...and my Senior year, the jocks tended to leave my group alone. Probably because one of the guys I gamed with -- my sister's boyfriend -- was the center on the football team and the captain of the wrestling team.

Not to mention the whole 'Satanic' crap.....

Oh yeah...that tended to be a problem. We once had a ringer join our group for the sole purpose of gathering "evidence" to be used in an attempt to have RPGs denounced by the local churches and banned from the schools. (Didn't work, though...my DM was the son of a local minister, who had read the rulebooks cover-to-cover and had no problem with them. My aunt -- an Army chaplain -- would even sit in on the occasional game. The local anti-gamers quickly found themselves hoist upon their own petard.)

And the fact that Girls. Didn't. Game. Back then.

Actually, I knew a handful of girl gamers back then. A rare beastie to be sure...but they existed. Most of the ones that I knew were even cute.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Qoltar

Girls DID game back then.

Thats one of the first things about RPGs that kept me interested in them.

This would be early 1980s that I 'm referring to.

I discovered RPGs in the mid-1970s, when I went to my first sf convention, walked into a room, and saw some people playing a peculiar game with maps and narratives—it turned out to be D&D, but I'd never heard of it back then. I became part of that group. It was pretty large—a game might have a dozen players—and maybe a third of them were women, I think; I can remember four who were active players when I first got involved, and a couple more who became active later. It was only several years later that I encountered an all-male group, who introduced me to RuneQuest II.

Bill Stoddard

[Apache]

*shrugs*

I didn't see a female gamer (in my age group or younger) until the mid-90's, and that was only when I was running Vampy:Da Maskyrade.

Guess I was...special.