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Coding and Roleplaying - Is There a Connection?
TossCobble asks: "With table-top roleplaying giant Wizards of the Coast (makers of Dungeons & Dragons, for those not in the know) broadcasting an open call for adventure designers and developers (including an entertaining developer test to gauge your own game-design talent and knowledge), I found myself once again considering the odd appeal of gaming for us programming types. It's interesting that something so free-form-ishly creative, socially dynamic, and utterly fantastical be fun for folks so grounded in logical programming. Of course, my theory is that gaming and programming actually have more in common than we might think. Tabletop roleplaying involves coming up with creative solutions to problems set in a clearly-defined ruleset, involve constant data-tracking and minor mathematical equations, and involve working together with small groups of people toward like-minded goals. Conversely, love of roleplaying can illustrate how important creativity is to good programming. What do you think?"
A lack of women!
Well, I used to code, and me and the wife like to role play every once in a while, so I guess there is a correlation.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
It's sad but true, and we know it.
Everybody's a libertarian 'till their neighbour's becomes a crack house.
We can't interact as easily in the real world...which makes knowledge as a pursuit much more interesting to us. It also means that being able to experiment with a world that obeys laws we can understand is much more satisfying.
I'm sorry. The number you have reached is imaginary. Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and try again.
I second that.
I've noticed that cooking is also a big hobby for us computer nerd types.
Home brewing, too.
--saint
I don't think that's the point of this discussion. Isn't that just another irrelevant tagline designed to inflame us?
I ... [rolls d20] ... agree totally!
Whenever you have a set of people who can creatively think outside the box you will get unique solutions to common problems. A lot of the time people are told this is the way you must do something. By reinforcing play at with no constraints except for the effect from the choice you will get different ideas and solutions from the norm.
If you contrast table gaming with no rules for the players versus console gaming in which you must do x to get to y you will alwasy have more creative solutions in the table gaming. This doesn't mean a standard solution will not work or will not be better, but you can't change the boundaries of a console game for a unique solution to a problem so you never challenge the creative juices of a player and reinforce creative ideas; just the opposite you reinforce finding a solution only within the rules. Is this what you are talking about?
Quality Hosting e3 Servers
You see, it's actually that coders have no life sitting in front of their computer screens all day, and thus they try to make up for it by roleplaying.
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(the sound you just heard is the myraid slashdotters modding this into oblivion)
I've always characterised software engineering as "the only engineering that doesn't do physics" (true at my university).
I think us programmer types are drawn to the appeal of being able to create our own virtual worlds, within which we define the laws of "physics" based on elegance and usefulness in the problem/game domain. The real world is too arbitrary and chaotic to be able to understand all the interactions in any given system properly. Programs and RPG worlds don't have that problem.
Tabletop roleplaying involves coming up with creative solutions to problems set in a clearly-defined ruleset, involve constant data-tracking and minor mathematical equations, and involve working together with small groups of people toward like-minded goals.
That applies just as much to the workers at McDonalds and to farmers as it does to basically any other job that requires an ounce of skill. Before the 1960s such tasks were often called "common capabilities". That is, they were the basic tasks that pretty much anyone and everyone was expected to be able to do. It's only now, with declining education systems in many western nations, that we consider mastery of such menial tasks to be an accomplishment.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Just a sec... *Rolls* *Natural 20* Yeah, I totally agree.
Myu:
We like to dream , and we like to make our dreams reality .After all programming is about turning thoughts in to something tangible .Role playing is about turning the dreams of adventure we all have in to some sort of reality .
The only reason some people look down on it , is because they don't have the courage to do it for fear of looking silly.
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
Or am I missing some non-obvious shared characteristic?
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
number-crunching + play-acting = f***ing crack, man
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Your correlation may be right, but your reasoning isn't.
Tabletop roleplaying involves coming up with creative solutions to problems set in a clearly-defined ruleset, involve constant data-tracking and minor mathematical equations, and involve working together with small groups of people toward like-minded goals. Conversely, love of roleplaying can illustrate how important creativity is to good programming. What do you think?
You could say the same about football and roleplaying or coding, but there happens to be no correlation between the two. It is more that the roleplaying person and the coding person are both subsets of the same dork/nerd/geek culture.
eclecti.cc
Thinking abstractly about "what-if" is key to creating code that does what you want and expect it to do. Thinking about what-if is fantasy, by definition.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
It's like asking, why do football players attend keg parties? Coding and roleplaying are part of geek culture
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
Have you tried cutting down on your caffeine intake? Indeed, too much caffeine often makes one nervous, and jittery. Such things can lead to social awkwardness.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
In both programming and FRPs, you can make things happen so long as you can imagine it correctly. As someone once told me, "Programming is like building with pure thought-stuff." Everything happens in an alternate realm from the physical world (the computer's memory or the group's imagination) and isn't limited by what you can do in the physical world.
I think people who are attracted by programming's allure of creating programs just by thinking are also attracted by a FRP that lets you create a world with your own imagination.
-Peter
Geeks in general, and programming geeks in particular, seem to be very much interested in systems of all sorts. Not just systems in the IT sense, but any group of objects and/or forces with interactions between the elements of the group.
The combination of various skills, languages (another reason a lot of geeks like Tolkien), lands to explore -- and above all, magic -- comprise a field day for the geek intellect.
Either that, or it's the improbably skimpy leather armor those amazons are wearing...
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
This reminds me..... *dons wizard hat and robe*
I always found roleplaying boring and the same goes for star wars cultism. Well, people still call me a nerd as I fulfill many other qualifications (socially awkward, hw/sw tinkering, programming - of course).
Somehow (this is not meant as an offense) I feel that those roleplayers like to detach themselves from the real world in their games and that this is their primary motivation to do this.
Maybe some people are fascinated by detached fantasies and others are fascinated by the real world around them and maybe extrapolations (how the world could be changed).
Wizards of the Coast? I thought Dungeons and Dragons was from TSR.
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
Hence the correlation with RPGs. My initial thought would be that that correlation (ie take someone off the street[*] who likes RPGs, and they are relatively likely to like programming) is probably stronger than say enjoyment of computer games (ie take people off the street who like playing FPS games, there would probably be a lower percentage who like to program, but still a higher percentage than, say, that of random football fans. Because RPGs usually require more abstract visualisation than FPSs)
I expect you would find a similar correlation with things such as chess and puzzles, and traditionally geekly pursuits such as astronomy, rock/stamp/dinosaur collections, etc. (ie things where the attraction tends to be cerebral rather than visceral.)
The fun thing I found when I took up fencing long ago was that there was also a strong correlation between fencers and RPGs - wannabe hack'n'slashers, I assume. :-)
The above of course is highly generalised, but it's something I had previously wondered about.
fn *: Although in my experience most RPGers spend too little time outdoors to be accosted, even for the the purposes of idle thought experiments.
Given the make up of our current group (3 programmers, a game level designer, and an accountant (who used to work for a computer gaming company), there is most certainly a correlation. I got hooked on RPG's in College by a programmer, though the group I gamed with the most consisted of accountants, paramedics, engineers, and other non-programmer types. After college, our gaming group was highly programmer oriented or people who worked in the computer field. But given the various people I've gamed with over the past 25 years, lack of confidence in ones self seems to be the best description of the people I've gamed with. It gives the "shy nerds" a chance to be around people they are comfortable with and provides them an outlet for their natural creativity. Programmers tend to be "shy nerds" too. Since programming requires a similar mental creativity to gaming (creating intangable functionality out of nothingness), its only logical that the two should co-exist.. In other words, it takes imagination to program. Its a quality that almost every good programmer I've met has. Playing RPG's requires imagination.
Rob Miracle http://www.robmiracle.com
If you look at the different psychological patterns (Thinking, Feeling, Intuition and Sensing), you will find that they may or may not be the same.
Yes, us coders often are very much thinkers and have good intuition. But, game playing requires an emense amount of feeling and sensing. These are completely offseting from one another.
PRogrammers are completely logical. Well, most of ys are. You want one to equal another. You are always "thinking" about what will happen next. You are assuming that your "Intuition" will predict what the other players are going to do.
Looking at poker, you play on pure percentages. There is a known chance of getting a known card. Perhaps programmers would do better, but, no. There is the bait and catch portion of the game which defies percentages. And we all know the good progammers do things because they are the most efficient. Well, except C/C++/C#/Java programmers. I'm talking about us ASM programmers.
The reality is that you have a compltely random chance of winning if both players have the same deck. YOu don't even know the opponents deck. So, it's even more random. The best you can do is pay lots and lots and lots of $$$ for an expensive deck. So, unlike poker, money controls the world.
Poker is more likely to be won by programmers. WOC games are more likely to be won by money and a little luck. The luck being the sequence the cards are revealed/played.
h
the social aspects of roleplaying are far less dynamic than real social interactions, because they are so much more controlled. you understand what your fellows are driving towards, the dialogue and situations are often cliched, or at least familiar, and there is less at stake, less responsibility, socially - if you make a jackass of yourself you can just claim you're roleplaying, and you already know that the people you're playing with are of a like mind to yourself, especially given the intelligent nature of a "game" such as RP.
there are less unknowns, less uncertainties - and this is what is usually a problem for the socially inept - lack of confidence because of lack of certainty, which is what comes across as nerdishness.
add into this the familiarity with the subject matter through books, films, and more recently computer RPG games, and the (to the mainstream) hurdle of a fantasy world is a non-event. the other aspect, which certainly will appeal to the mathematically design minded (not to mention the neurotic obsessive-compulsive detail freaks) is the range of stats, rules - *formal* descriptors of how the world interacts. if someone chucks a baseball at you, it's not down to something an unsporty nerd has little practice/familiarity with (ie catching it with his hands), but rather something quantifiable and determinate, stats, modifiers and a dice roll.
this may sound harsh, particularly as i'm a programmer and have been a roleplayer quite extensively myself, but in our heads we're all great actors, witty people, conversationalists, sometimes we just need to find the right outlet for it to come out in.
A succesful programmer is one that can sucessfully characterize and identify a problem. Far too often, I've seen people jump right into solving what they think the problem is (often during a meeting with a client), without first doing the (admittedly boring) legwork of ensuring that you understand the domain of the problem and the specific things that require solutions.
Unless, of course, you're talking in the realm of 133t h4x0r programmers. But there, the concern is being the hot coding stud, not in delivering a workable, maintainable, stable software product.
Both benefit from the ability to adopt an alien perspective, whether a fictional character or a fictional user.
Two of the three best programmers I know have no interest in role playing games, or game coding. They work primarily with hardware interface/control and embedded systems.
However, I can imagine game programming talent might benefit from RP playing.
Way back before real network connectivity started appearing in RP games (Muds, etc.), there were similar games that you played solo. "adventure" is the classic one which comes to mind. It was quite popular, and still can be found in the BSD releases. This game was one of the first, if not the first, of the exploring-a-fantasy-world times of games. It was also mentioned in the book "The Soul of a new Machine".
Perhaps the phrase "maze of twisty passages all alike" might ring some bells with people.
There's something inherent about the problem solving nature of that type of game which simply appeals to good hackers. One thing I've noticed is that good hackers are (or were) drawn to this game. Lesser talented people generally weren't.
It's like a variation of the typical computer problems which one solves, but with "adventure", it's done as entertainment.
It's this problem-solving-as-entertainment which plays a key part in the appeal to real hackers, IMHO. And which, incidentally, leads these people on to greater understanding of other things far more complex. Like Operating Systems for one. And in turn, it's this understanding which makes people better with their technical abilities.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
Since when did working at McDonald's require creativity?
There's a well-defined ruleset, well enough defined that no thought is usually required. This also removes the need for cooperation--I don't call it that when one finite automaton passes an item to another for further processing, just as I don't call it cooperation when an application uses GTK libraries.
Minor math may be required sometimes. On the other hand, some of the cash registers these days require no more than counting skills.
Face it, if the hardware were cheap enough, we could replace McDonald's workers with a very short shell script. And that situation is insulting to McDonald's workers.
At one point I recall reading a paper that, while perhaps a bit too self-praising, described unix culture (and similarly the programming crowd associated with it) to be a very literate culture, viewing the flow of information through various streams, filters, etc, as something that draws similar people to those who have a love of words, wordplay, and literature. Anyone recall the specific paper/website/source?
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
Oh yes, all role-players are sexually frustrated male nerds who dream of wielding a +3 staff of smiting.
My D&D group consists of great variety of people. We have people who do well in school, people who excel at sports (not that those two are necessarily exclusive). Several of us have girlfriends (an important accomplishment for a role-player!). I think I can safely say we all enjoy our lives.
Role-playing is merely a game, an outlet for creativity in my case. Role-playing allows us to do things that we could never do. I don't think it's any different that playing a FPS (Counterstrike) or an RTS (Command & Conquer).
You shouldn't be anonymous, and you should be modded up. Just because it's painful doesn't make it a flame.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I really enjoy getting into the characters - developing them.
Its not about the problem solving. Its about using my imagination to shape things. Coding is the same. I build upon the world, and the structures that I make please me.
A lot of the entertainment in role playing is in the fact that doing so is easy. I can code a behaviour I envision in perhaps a few hours or a few days, but I can create a character in a few minutes - and act him out with much greater detail.
I think that the reason behind this is not so much that coders like to solve problems, but that people who roleplay are drawn to programming for the same reason - its a personality type thing. Which personality type?
This one.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
Geeks tend not to be terribly athletic, and tactical puzzles of the sort 'How do we get the ball past this stinking heap of muscle?' aren't exactly brain intensive. Or rather, they require reflexive tactical decisions rather than careful pondering.
Programming well requires careful pondering; programming poorly usually uses more reflexive or instinctual decisions. So roleplaying situations which involve algorithmic puzzles or other such problems would likely be more suited to most programmers.
Though culture is a large influence, I'm sure.
...having sex with fairies. We jocks do all that in the real world, except we don't call them fairies, we call them jocks
Although I'm a geek, I'm not gay, so please refrain from making generalizing statements like that.
Thanks for the info that jocks are fairies, though. One more reason to stay away from them.
So true. Both require a solid imagination, enjoying using it and an ability to see the effects of your actions and how they ripple out into the whole system over time, wether it's a game or a program.
It's like asking, why do football players attend keg parties? Coding and roleplaying are part of geek culture
i thought kegs were part of geek culture too?
beer is pretty universally cultural... football players, geeks, coder, gamers, accountants, scientists... granted, the people i know who've worked for nasa and the hard-core gamers seem to be more likely to order fruity drinks in huge vases with multiple straws when out for an evening... but *everybody* likes a keg
And I think those kinds of games (non-computer RPGs) are a ridicules waste of time.
So there's that.
Beyond flash games on the web, the only video game I've played in the last year has been Grand Tourismo 4
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
This is certainly not on topic, but I thought I'd put this out and see if anyone else agreed:
I'll admit it - I'm no longer a true geek as I haven't coded in a long while. But I did take 4 years of computer programming in high school and did a fair amount of coding afterwards. While my meager coding skills have slowly withered away, I've used the same skills to manage people and workflows to optimize efficiency. It's helped me hone my logic and search for the exact flaw that holds the system up (debugging, looking for that one little problem in an otherwise great program that messes the whole thing up), it's helped me better understand interpersonal and interoffice communications (passing arguments between functions - data must be passed around in a usable format), understanding the order things should operate in, "black boxing" when necessary, and of course teaching me how to use a computer efficiently and helping me pass that knowledge along to others.
If my life depended on writing a simple C++ program right now, I'd probably meet my maker sooner rather than later, but a knowledge of programming helps in much more than D&D and coding itself - it can really make you a better manager in my humble opinion.
What I think he was trying to say was that rather than pretending to have sex with fairies - presumably female creatures - jocks have sex with each other.
A strange troll, indeed - one that mocks both its intended audience and their enemies at the same time.
I'm not a big roleplayer, but I did used to dabble in WOTC's MTG when I was a youngun and I've noticed that MTG probably led me to my fate as a computer scientist... which led me to be a home-brewer, too, both (back to MTH and computer science) required a good amout of logic, even though the types of logic and rules differ and do so on different levels, they still require you to think what's to come in the future and how everything will interplay with everything else, all of which is very logical. I can't help but wonder what the people who are saying "programmers have no life" do for a living, are you extreeeeeme snowboarders that skateboard on each other's back and get paid for it?
I like suggestions, but I don't like contributing towards them.
Lots of D&D players may have bad social skills, but I don't think there is much of a correlation (negative or otherwise) between "analytical thinking" and "performance in social situations"
Geeks on slashdot tend to band together, but to claim a monopoly on Intelegence betrays a lack analytical thinking skills more then anything.
Plus, most slashdot types aren't even that smart. Being able to whip up a Perl script isn't the same thing as being smart.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Their probably isn't a correlation between rolplaying and coding. But the editorial staff of this forum knows that its audience consists primarily of young people who have an interest in technology. Games, in general are targeted toward the young. The typical slashdotter doesn't write much code, but assumes other slashdotters do. Hence...the erroneous belief that coders are into games as well as other adolescent activities like downloading "free" music, modding their computer, and product/OS zealotry. What the headline should ask: Youth and Roleplaying - Is There a Connection?
Same here. They're a waste of time.
Gamers have several reasons to be less-than-satisfied with WoTC, compared to TSR, including:
- "Updating" the ruleset (ie. version 3.5) to the point that half the "current" DnD books are using incompatible rules which require serious work by the DM in order for their material to work with the 3.5 rule-system.
I could go on... but I think I've proven my point: WoTC hasn't always shown consideration to its customers. The parent was perfectly justified for voicing dissatisfaction with WoTC. Mod him up./dev/random
Wizards of the Coast did NOT make Dungeons and Dragons. It was made by Gary Gygax, sold originally by TSR and then TSR was bought by WotC. When will people start recognizing this????
Left Wing Dominated Education == Declining Education
Today our education systems are almost entirely dominated by The Left. Also, everyone feels that the quality of education has substantially declined.
I can't help but feel that a poorly educated populous is in the Left's best interests. Often to believe The Left's philosophy you have to believe two or more mutually exclusive things.
For example, consider the two axioms:
a) Homosexuality is an innate trait that one is born with.
b) Homosexuality is a personal and private choice, and society can't question that choice.
Now I don't know or care which, if either, axiom pushed by The Left is correct, but obvious they both are not correct. However, Political Correctness demands that we all recite both axioms as if both are unquestionably true.
This ability to DoubleThink is made much easier when you have a population that is incapable of logical thought. "Who you going to believe me (The Left and Political Correctness) or your lying eyes?"
Political Correctness, which is standard indoctrination in the schools systems of the West, requires that it adherents deny reality when it comes into conflicts with their belief system. This is discussed in a very competent series here.
Our educational system is currently controlled by a biased closed-mined group (The Left) that has little or no interest in teaching people to think rationally or question ideas in a logical methodical manner. Instead they are a group that has a tough time winning in a democracy (hence their retreat to the courts, and judges who act as philosopher-kings), and often resorts to emotional devices such as racial, gender, and sexual politics. During the last elections a street sign in my local town proudly declared "When women vote, Democrats win." It is hard to believe that the appeal to gender politics could be any more obvious. Emotion is what The Left want, not logic. Emotion is what they t now each in schools.
Those currently in control of our education system are not interested in teaching facts or abilities, but are more interested in pushing an agenda. The result of pushing the agenda at the expense of education is what results in our declining education system. No about of money, alone, is going to solve this.
Also, you have less incentive to learn to take care of yourself, when your teacher constantly teaches that the State will take care of you. Self-reliance isn't necessary when we have the Nanny State. It is more important to be a victim than to be competent. The soft bigotry and racism of The Left is on display with the idea of Affirmative Action (or as the British call it "Positive Discrimination"). (Ah yes. That policy based on the idea that two wrongs do in fact make a right.)
Those on The Left feel that black people and other minorities are not capable of achieving the same things as whites. Therefore, there is no need to hold them to the same standards. "You can achieve less, because we know you're not capable of more." The Left (and allow me to paraphrase here) feels that they have a White Man's Burden to give the poor blacks an advantage because they know that blacks just are naturally as capable as whites. It appears that racism is OK , when it is Politically Correct racism.
And, therefore why should blacks achieve as much as they possibly can? Their educators don't expect it of them. In fact, when one of them achieves and shows this Politically Correct racism wrong, they are ridiculed and harassed. For example, they are accused of "acting white," or they get the rapist black man stereotype thrown at them (Justice Thomas), or they get political cartoonist Oliphant drawing pictures of them with big lips and referring to the them as "spear-chucker" (Rice).
When the education system was concerned with diversity of ideas, not just skin color it used to teach facts. Now, it merely teaches ideology. And, we wonder why the education system is in decline.
They're so close, I imagine soon they'll be far right-wing Christians telling us that coding is 'thuh devil's work' and urge us to burn our notebooks...
I don't know that there's necessarily a correlation. I enjoy programming, and I also enjoy role-playing, but without the influence of my friends, I never would have started RPing. These friends have pretty much zero interest in programming. In fact, one of the best roleplayers I know is definitely not the logical, problem-solving oriented type, at least in a programming/engineering manner. I think it's more of the whole geek/nerd culture thing going on...my friends come from a video-game playing background, but I do not but am a geek in a variety of other ways.
People who are born to program have a predominately 'male' brain. It is easier for a programmer to imagine an abstract system with defined rules rather than a chaotic intuitive system like human emotions. RPG's are heavily rooted in numbers which are about the most abstract concept that human beings deal with every day. The only reason we use base 10 is because we have 10 fingers. Pi, Phi, e, and all the other mathematical constants are simply relations between these abstract concepts. Let's not forget that every element of nature is rooted in fractal systematic recursion. Objects are made up of smaller elements whose rules can be more easily defined than the whole. That's why when you program you take a bottom up approach; perfect the quark and then use the quarks to build atoms. Legos, Erector, Kinex, Lincoln Logs, Tinker Toys, all these building toys utilize rule based systems to form larger more complex objects. That's why all us programmers grew up on Legos. We like rule-based systems even if they are abstract. That's why programmers play RPG's, love Legos, and don't have girlfriends.
DankLogic - There is a system to everything.
On the other hand, the neurotypical jock types are absolutely abysmal at interacting with myself and my "geek" friends. It works the other way around too, of course.
But how is throwing a football back and forth more "real world" than playing an RPG? Is watching Oprah, NASCAR or WWE wrestling on TV more "real world" than playing D&D?
Just because most people act a certain way doesn't make it the "right" way.
Yes, who would have though that programming (aka hacking) is done by highly creative people.
:/
Oh wait, this has been covered before: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html
It's bad enough when the suits think programmers are not creative; worse when I read it on slashdot
It's a pity that there is no correlation between statistical significance and Slashdot. Some hanyack suggests a weak-ass connection between roleplaying and programming. This is taken as legitimate? Funny how much crime happens around churches. Must be the result of religion. Down with religion!
Flamebait is designed to arouse angry response contrary to the jist of the bait. WotC would have to have rabid lovers here for that to be. True geeks are TSR adherents who remember the glory days of AD&D when Gygax was the name of renown. Before the hardcover books came out when staple bound pamphlets gave the guidelines and rules and most of the game was made up by mad DMs and loony players having fun and being creative before it got the M:tG treatment and was made more formularized than it ever should have been. Heck, that process began during the period of Gygax's waning and exit. I share the parent's attitude: WotC wouldn't know what to do with a truly creative franchise if it bit them on the behind.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
Programming and art are two sides of the same coin. They're merely different ways of reasoning, exploring, and doing. People who tilt too far one way or the other may be very good at that narrow task, such as coding or drawing, but not so hot at its opposite, which explains a lot of coders with no social life and artists who can't run a business.
Being successful requires the ability to deliver a product and understand relationships, and is true whether you're designing and playing games, working in the garden, or decorating a house. Image what would've happened if Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs had never got together, if you want to test the theory.
Many religions, business theories, and ways of war have known this, and the best leaders, the best achievers, have made themselves and been made by a balance between logic and emotion, a positive drive, and the ability to move people. None of this is new, none of it is a secret. The only difference between those who make it happen and those who don't is in its application.
The Best Boss Is...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4357938.stm
Conflict Resolution Pair Wins Nobel Economics Prize/ 0,9830,1588912,00.html
http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/news/story
I know a lot of folks who play tabletop RPGs, boardgames, tabletop wargames, and other "old-fashioned" types of games. A LOT of these people (and they are not all male) work with computers all day; many of them are programmers or engineers. They get sick of staring at a PC monitor all day and like to hang around with actual people every once in a while.
-----
Sorry, I'm only a 1336 h4x0r.
The open call is for design, not development-the development test was just for fun.
The role of the writer is not to say what we can all say, but what we are unable to say. -Anais Nin
Being nerdy is really about one thing - enjoying the use of your mind. It's why nerd humor tends to focus on sarcasm and wit. They require that extra bit of use of your head. Same for programming and role playing games - nerds gravitate toward them because they have fun playing with their minds.
I think the only true link is that 'nerdyness'. Programmers tend to be nerdy, and nerds - for the reasons above - like RPGs. Nerdy physics majors like RPGs too, but programming has few appeals other than it's nerdy ones, so tends to have a higher nerd-density, leading to the appearance of a direct, rather than indirect correlation.
nerdiness aside,
imagination can be pretty exciting
I recently discovered a board game called Heroscape, which is awesome because it looks like a table-top D&D type game, but plays with a much simplified set of rules. The sets/maps/characters/story are completely customizable, which adds to the fun.
I just wish to thank Hasbro for creating this wonderful product to let us "minor" geeks play to. And to keep this post on topic, I am a computer geek and consider myself creative. So, I would say that geeky and creative people like to play games. Duh.
Meh.
As I recall, the most fun game sessions I was involved in back in the day were where the DM basically threw the rules to the winds. They existed as a framework so that we all more or less had the same picture of what was going on, but the DM decided who got hit and how badly generally without stopping to record the score. In fact, the DMs who spent 10 minutes scoring a 10-second round of combat were major killjoys.
Perhaps that's why the D&D-branded computer RPG's have not been the top performers. As a backdrop for the imaginatino it was fantastic but if you actually followed the rules it was no fun.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
Role Playing Games encompass a lot. One big part of role playing games is designing logical systems for determining the outcome of events. Example: You are Jay D'Canton, a Paladin, you are wearing chain mail and carrying a mace. You enter a room with four Orcs. Three of the Orcs are armed with wooden clubs and wearing thick animal furs, the fourth has a short sword and studded leather armor. How does the battle go?
Well, figuring out whether the Orcs get Jay's head for their pointy stick, or whether Jay makes short work of them depend on a lot of factors. Is Jay fresh out of Paladin school, or has he been at this for a while? How much protection does his armor give? Are the furs the Orcs are wearing purely decorative or do they offer cushioning versus Jay's mace?
So, varous systems are created, if Jay has killed x number of Orcs, he'll become a "level two" Paladin who is better at fighting and avoiding attacks. The Orcs will get a damage and "to hit" penalty based on Jay's armor, which will also be represented by a number called an armor class. So too will every aspect be determined, with each step be given a logical number value and with the steps relating logically. You should be able to take a list of numbers, including numbers created by die rolls, run them through your system, and figure out the outcome.
Ah, the systems... the beautiful beautiful systems. Everything from systems for determining the weather to a system determining the random effects of the Wand of Wonder.
This all works until those horrible Players come along and mess up your beautiful system. "I don't think the Orcs should be able to hurt me with wooden clubs. Oh, and," quick edit to Jay's character sheet, "turns out my mace is a magical mace +5 versus Orcs."
Meanwhile, you have some people across the street dressed up as Vampires, but they aren't rolling dice at all. They are treating the game as improvisational Theatre. They may have a system, too, but they seems to see things in terms of "roll playing" versus "Role Playing." (I really don't know much about them, though I have one of their game books, for the collection of course. Still... I got a distinct impression from reading White Wolf magazine while looking for Call of Cthuhlu articles.)
Personally, I prefer board games in the popular genre's to their role playing equivalents. They have a nice, rigid sense of order. Of course, you don't get to create your own systems, or build a big "Dungeon" or "Module" system out of the smaller systems provided in the books. However, what does it matter when your fellow players would rather ignore the rules or shoot the breeze.
Besides, I more likely to get a "non-gamer" to play a game of Dungeon! or Black Morn Manor with me than a game of Dungeons and Dragons (and believe me I've tried!)
Of course, my brother (call him "Inu Yasha"), who is deathly afraid of computers loves getting together with the guys for an evening of pizza and D&D. I think it is more for the comaradery than enjoying of watching a rigid system designed to determine the effects of an undead invasion in a small medieval hamlet. Trust me, the guy just started using Email, and when he sees some of the things I do with my computer, he's like, "That's horrible, that's like the inventions of that guy from Gremlins. I'll be happy using a DVD player to watch movies rather than that complicated set-up." Actually, he may have said The Goonies, but I think Gremlins is a cooler movie...
What was my point again?
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
your suggestion about formal quantification is a very interesting one. rpg rules are an abstraction of the real (or fantasy) world into a limited set of numbers, lists and forms. pretty much the same as what a programmer does when he turns an application domain into code.
when i used to be into pen & paper roleplaying i was always much interested in the design of the different rule systems and how they affected gameplay, ease of play vs realism vs support for interesting stories.
i think making game rules kann be seen a form of programming in the broadest sense, much like legislature to run a society, the memes of a religion or even the way the technical and nontechnical features of a programming language lead to the way it is used.
all of that is defining some form of "code" beforehand in the hope that it is leading to the desired results when it is later executed/lived by/used/followed. rarely a sequential script but still code.
btw: the "power gaming" that you see way too often in pen & paper games that mainly consists of tweaking the highest battle performance out of a certain character class by finding the best combination of skills, spells, equipment and the various kinds of "point allocation", usually at the very limits of the rule set, is another task that sounds like something a typical programmer might like: it is completely "software" (words and numbers written on a piece of paper, nothing but data), it is creating something and it fits the desire to get a job well done.
[i have an opinion and i am not afraid to use it]
Your analysis is brutal but spot on. It made me take notice and I have roleplayed off and on for quite a while (mostly off). Carefully controlled circumstances and environments are nothing compared to keeping up a casual conversation with the girl and her two friends standing over there at the party. Never thought about it like that.
Just remember to buy Neverwinter Nights 2 (PC) when it comes out. You can write mods for that, and it ensures the developers make money. See? It's a true win-win. =)
I need to roll 3d12 with my Karma +1 Bonus
...Put the dice away before I take them away!
I've done some from role playing over the years (and not just in the bedroom), and my biggest personal problem with it is that I could never make a big enough commitment to it as my social life kept "getting in the way". It was not fair to the other role players for me to join them as I would miss too many sessions. My other big problem with it is that most of the role players were all kind of odd and other than in their tightly confined circle, it was hard to do anything with them, including behaving normally. At work they're often a pain in the arse to deal with as they're just not normal.
Musicians OTOH are a different story. Most of the best programmers I've ever worked worked with have a musical background of some sort. Be it having gone to univeristy for music or having played in their spare time for pleasure.
I'm surprised no one else has mentioned this already. A great software design technique based on role playing!
Cantankerous old coot since 1957.
oh good. That settles it.
They both require robust systems. To me, it's all about the systems, and not so much the roleplaying. In my expereince, the geeky'er kids were usually the "rule lawyers" who'd constantly look for ways to boost themselves and/or supress others via the game's system.
- I voted for Nintendo and against Bush
Sad but true. Most computer geeks end up socially inept because they don't grow up and thinking about things outside their constructed computer worlds. That's why so many computer geeks are politically apathetic, and why in my school so many of them are so intellectual single-tracked. (The definition of frustration is a computer science major taking a class in which he has to write essays on topics one has to actually think about. Oh the agony!)
Fantasy gaming is a vestige of youth, when we are still figuring out our capabilities in this, real, world, and where the idea of being able to control aspects of it (being a wizard, casting spells, having awesome power) are very appealing. People who grow up grow out of fantasy gaming mainly because we start to pour our energy into constructing a realistic, pragmatic, and hopefully happy life for ourselves, and becasue the gravity of actual existence takes a frontseat to any imagined worlds you'd like to participate in. If you never grow up, the love for fantasy gaming (or MMORPG gaming, or whatever) never goes away. Simple as that.
Cockburn's papers describe the evolution of his ideas on software development as a cooperative game.
I'm a non-gamer but like someone else wrote, I have no idea HOW RPG'ing is supposed to be creative. I had a good friend who was intensely into gaming. Loved it, spent 40-60% of his weekly income buying the DnD books and practically every other system that came out (note, however that he spends 0% of his income on any kind of savings and at the age of 28 he lives with between 4 and 6 guys in their early 20's who all sit around having nerd wet dreams where they try to impress themselves by bandying about non-sequiter one-liners and the virtues of some of the worst anime I've ever been forced to watch) and although I resisted his influences enough general knowledge seeped through and it doesn't look very creative.
It's not an attempt at flamebait, I just want someone to correct what I (and I'm assuming a whole bunch of other people, granted, nobody here) believe so I can understand the gist of the argument. I'll try to respect the concept and hope anyone who tries explaining it to me is just as respectful.
The guidebooks themselves seem like nothing more than an ADD attempt at sci-fi. This magic sword was forged from the ribs of a huge dragon and can slay zombies. Here's the stats. With this cloak covered in the blood of a hundred dead mages, the user can not be seen but slowly will be corrupted by its evil. It's like someone has a jones for some Tolkienesque knock-offs but can never get beyond the concept, so they just throw that down and be done with it. I'm sure it makes for some "interesting" stories in some cases but by and large the product will probably look like somebody took a big bag of half developed cliches and threw them on the floor. The giant dragon blocked the door. Bob grabbed his big honking sword of zombie blammo but it couldn't hurt the dragon. Joe put on the corrupting cloak of bloodsoak and walked past it.
The concept, at least as far as I understand it would be the same if you were to go through your DVD collection and take out all the key plot points and then try to make a new movie using only those pieces. Sometimes it works, in a Kill Bill kind of way. Other times it doesn't, like the worst parts of the Austin Powers franchise. One could argue that those are examples of HOW gaming is creative, but for each borrowed element in those works (and yes, I know there's many) there's some novel take on it, some interesting juxtaposition or kitbashing of the genres and it comes off as a novel take on familiar concepts. Except for the third AP movie. That was just awful.
From what I know, you get to play in certain worlds. Certain books apply only in certain worlds. Certain properties apply to certain items. Theoretically there's nothing stopping you from saying "there's this cool creature/sword/whatever in some other system but wouldn't it be so keen if our characters in this campaign could battle it?" and you can just come up with compatible stats. Theoretically, you can create your own creature and shoe-horn it in. Then again, theoretically, these guys could just go home and write a book.
Like I said, that's my working knowledge of the system and I'm more than willing to entertain corrections but I think it represents a fair working model of what the average person knows about gaming. Actually, I think its a slightly more educated view of gaming than your average man on the street (but I'm sure someone else is going to say "uh-uh, my aunt is the average man on the street and she knows all about the inner workings of a standard d20 system", and to them I repeat, the average person.)
It really does take a programmer to classify a role-playing game as "creative". No matter how many options and add-ons and rainbow colored suits of armor a game provides you, the real attraction of a mmorpg is that it provides you with a static, usually mathematically defined universe. Yes, there is a social aspect of online games, and Yes, gamers are notoriously bad at it. The reason programmers love role playing games so much is that they can understand it in logical, procedural terms. (Also, because you can play as a huge warrior with the head of a bear and the body of a lion without excersising)
You want something more like this:
which also shaves a few cycles by only performing a single addition instead of 3 of them.[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
I've always been curious if those with Asperger's syndrome (whether they are aware of it or not) commonly migrate towards stereotypically "geeky" fields, such as programming. This would explain a lot, on both aspects of an attraction to logical and well-defined systems in both employment and recreation and a particular ineptness in regard to common social interactions.
Or perhaps Asperger came up with a fancy psychological term for "socially inept geek". I'm not sure which.
--Myrkabah
I'm not sure the issue can be laid on escapism as well. I mean, if you think about it, non-geeks find ways to escape that don't necessarily involve gaming, and often are significantly more self-damaging.
I think the point that people who find it easier to focus analytically may find it difficult to deal with the escapes available in a more social crowd needs further analysis before being put off as people sinking to new lows for lack of their social abilities.
Being able to watch analytical people interact with each other, many of the social norms that are apparent among people who aren't as technical develop. This is something I've noticed studying at an institute of technology. Sometimes, the comfort level that people express when exposed to other people with similarly 'geeky' natures is extraordinary. You would never expect it placing the same group of people in the center of a loud party.
The point that the world of a role playing game is a creative solution to a defined set of rules is very interesting. That makes the fact that rules are not well defined or even static in a normal social relationship apparent and significant. It's possible that the lack of rigid structure behind non-technical human interaction is what makes it difficult for most geeky and technical people to interact.
The issue has so many facets that it can't be approached by saying it's blindingly obvious to everyone. There's more to it than meets the eye and has some amusing subtleties that are worth noting.
I wouldn't consider the mad hatter mad. Just reality impaired. He sure can make a mean cup of tea.
before I steal their lunch money...
when i used to be into pen & paper roleplaying i was always much interested in the design of the different rule systems and how they affected gameplay, ease of play vs realism vs support for interesting stories.
this always had more appeal to me than the really wacked out geeks who would hang around the halls of highschool talking about who got the crit. hit with what vorpal weapon. For me there was definitely an appeal to coming up with different ways to model a universe and make it playable. I was turned off by the guys who would actually (I shit you not) wear their DM's wizard robe to freakin' school. These are the same kind of guys who you'd probably find arguing, seriously, about esoteric bits of Enterprise power conduits at the Trek-Con. Most of these guys couldn't code themselves out of a paper bag.
In my experience, the overlap between coders and RPGamers was superficial at best with the most extreme members of each set in diametric opposition.
Frankly, the most fun I ever had with rpg's was later in life when it was an excuse to sit around, smoke a fatty, and stay up all night without the wives/SO's hanging around...
man, I feel like mold.
If you have no evidence of a connection between youth and roleplaying, don't make the supposition. If you have evidence, let's hear it.
Off topic: Follow my "homepage" URL to find proof that I code.
People don't want to admit it. But roleplaying(as in D&D) as is today (along with Wargaming which roleplaying game from) is nothing more than a statistical simulation. People who enjoy "tweaking" numbers for efficiancy usually like to play roleplaying games. Especially where there are LOTS of numbers involved and trying to find the best combination of statistics.
People who code naturally like efficient systems. It's like debugging code to get the tightest, fastest executable.
It's how MMOG publishers like Blizzard and Lucasarts keep people addicted, there is always one more level, a gun with better stats, better shields ect...so you can get more money....so you can get better stats so you can kill something quicker...so you can get better stats....(I think you get the point)
Sure, there are some people who really do "roleplay" vs "rollplay" but the game designers KNOW that the latter brings in more players...er..um...number tweakers that is.
I would bet you'd see a completely different set of people playing a MMOG if NO stats were given to the players about themselves or others and no set formula (build in unkown randomness as in life) to situations.
I'm not holding my breath though
I'm a pretty good programmer, with eight years experience in the field working on some fairly large projects.. and I've never had the urge to indulge in any of this nerd shit - LAN parties, D&D, home-brewing, Linux advocacy, finding Dilbert amusing, etc.
I guess I never felt the need to be part of the 'nerd group', so none of this stuff ever grasped my interest as my peers were (and are) not a bunch of sad nerds. For this, I'm very glad indeed.
I ATTACK THE DARKNESS!
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
A coder, plays D&D, AND takes them both way to seriously...
Everyone who thinks he has a chance of getting laid before his mid-thirties raise your hand.
yes, but some code reviews I have seen were very much like that ;-)
Now we'll have a wave of LARPers applying for coding jobs, and all office disputes will be resolved by a fiesty game of paper-rock-scissors.
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
You need abstraction and fantasy do model a real-life problem in a computer language. And you must not be within the problem but outside looking onto it. Same applies to social roles. First step is to be able to take a look from the outside on your role (abstraction), second is to image how it would be to play a different role (fantasy). I find the correlation pretty darn obvious.
On se Internetz nobody noes your German.
Anyone who has a wife or a girlfriend knows how to role-play just to make the relationship work! So role playing games or no, most programmers, uh - have ...um... oh. Sorry. Nevermind. Didn't think. Go ahead and roll.
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
Before I got into writing video games for the Vic-20, I was running Traveller games (Sci-Fi role playing) out of a game store in Indiana. I actually got paid for coming up with Traveller sessions and then GMing them at the store. Then when I got into programming, a lot of the creativity, randomness, and tree branching logic of role playing applied to what I was doing in programming. I also feel that there's a lot of coorelation between creativive writing and programming. Timothy Trimble The ART of Software Devleopment
TheTiminator
Which means that computer programs generated from said satanic code are satanic.
Which means that, if there's a correlation, and Chick comes to this conclusion, his website will be off the net pretty soon.
This sig no verb.
You put yourself in the "mind" of the computer and tell the GM (compiler) what you want to do. If you're not breaking the rules (no compilatiuon errors) then you run the program (roll the dice) and see what happens.
Pity the poor sods who started out as a level 1 BASIC interpreter running in a DOS campaign.
While there are a large number of IT types that are heavily into role playing, my experience in the past 15 years has been that it's almost exclusively non-coding IT personal that are into it. I've met very very few coders that role play (though the vast majority of them are into FPS games for some reason), and not a single of the truly great coders I've known had any interest in them. Sysadmins/netadmins and field techs, however, seem highly enamored of them.
this is getting old and so are you
blog
I'm a programmer by education and trade, and i've been heavily involved in roleplaying since i was 17 until i was 22 (i'm 24 now). This year i have started studying acting as a hobby and boy, was i surprised. It challenges a totally different part of yourself and i think it makes you understand a lot of things about yourself. I started doing an introductory course on february (and having trouble speaking the first day from the nervousness) to doing a clown course now, which is totally about ridiculling yourself.
It's really a leap from what i do daily, which is basically program in various languages, and i totally love it. It's a break from all of the math and logic that ends up taking too much space in my mind.
And if you played tabletop RPGs, it won't be that big of a leap (at first). It will help you for all of your life.
Everybody has a purpose in life, maybe mine is to lurk in slashdot.
The only real connection between programmers and roleplaying games is when Operation Sundevil (http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/SJG/)raided Steve Jackson Games' offices over the Cyberpunk RPG. I think the correlation you mention would also be found among polymer scientists, physicists, chemists, or any other field filled with moderately intelligent, nerdy people.
I'm kind of surprised not to see SJG/GURPS mentioned alongside TSR in the followups, it was a much more flexible and open system. Or Shadowrun? It was pretty interesting too.
(%i1) factor(777353);
(%o1) 777353
...roleplaying and programming are just like real life, except you can get away with not looking people in the eye.
Gary Gygax: "It's a..." (rolls dice) "...pleasure to meet you!"
(later in the program, Gary rolls dice to make a decision, and Al Gore grabs his arm. Al Gore: "Put the dice away, or I'm taking them away!"
BAJAJAJA!!!
(%i1) factor(777353);
(%o1) 777353
It's more than creating a character; that's insufficient. If it were the case, there'd only be MUSH's around. Personally, I think just creating a char is rather pointless unless you actually DO something with it.
This is why I mentioned adventure. In a nutshell, it was D&D boiled down to the basics. If the excitement was about creating a character, adventure never would never have been such an excellent filter for spotting talented hackers. Rather, it was about having an adventure. In one's imagination.
So I think this is the key connection; namely, having an imagination, and being able to DO something with it. This is why D&D appeals to talented coders. Such people like to use their imagination to create new worlds, whether those worlds are in real life, or virtual.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
You can say that it's because coders have no lives, and need imaginary ones to feel good about themselves - might be true for some. You can say we game because we are inherently more creative than the general population - also might be true for some. I think the coding - gaming connection comes from imagination. Not to say that we have better imaginations than other people, but to say that gaming requires maintaining another world in your head, and coding requires maintaining another world in your head - in this case one made of variables and interwoven systems. Variables and interwoven systems - could be characters and political alignments, etc. I think the act of coding because it relies so much on keeping track of an invented, possibly not implemented yet system in your head, is rather like DMing an RPG, keeping track of a system, implementing it part by part (telling the players) adapting it to bugs (player behavior) and simulating and estimating what it will do (response to player behavior.)
The mathematical sides to both was a good observation. The other obvious connection is that both programming and pencil & paper roleplaying appeal to introverts.
Finally, I am able to help with the amazing mastery of Microsoft BASIC v5.21 on CP/M 2.2 that I had in my youth. I never thought that this moment, and my hours spent in front of the computer writing programs to create D&D characters would pay off 22 years later!
.4, 1.2 and 2.2. That should be 1, 1, 2 for a total of 4. Your function would return 0 + 1 + 5. Yeah, you're adding in those extra 1s, but because they aren't within the INT() they aren't being used properly.
INT() doesn't round, it truncates.
So let's say the 6*RND does return 1.6, 2.4 and 3.3... You're right in that his function would return 2.6 + 3.4 + 4.3 = 10.3... truncated to 10.
Now yours:
INT((6 * RND(0)) + INT(6 * RND(0)) + INT(6 * RND(0) + 3 )
But your function is just as wrong. Suppose RND*6 returns
It should be simply written as this...
INT((6 * RND(0) + 1) + INT(6 * RND(0) + 1) + INT(6 * RND(0) + 1)
Or if you were a master at BASIC, you would do something like this, knowing that this is a routine that you will use over and over again:
DEF FN D(D%) =INT(D% * RND(0) +1)
Then write your line:
D(6) + D(6) + D(6)
I think this is a lesson in, always break things down to their simplest components, and then just do that. Don't try to be fancy and shortcut steps... it makes your code harder to read, as well as potentionally introduces bugs.
Role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons strike me as a unique fit for the computer. In a lot of ways, I think RPG games very much "distribute" the work that would be handled by a computer to the players. When I first put my hands on a computer, the first thing I wanted to do was program it to play role playing games. Social anxiety and the tensions that follow from it are very real problems for a lot of people, but I think there's more than that to the story. Role playing games have a set of very detailed rules that describe a complex algorithm. The interplay between the relatively rigid system of the RPG and the more free-form creativity of the players creates the thing that we enjoy, the game. It is fascinating in a lot of ways, and I think it is something that all coder's come in contact with daily.
At one point in my life, I belonged to the Society for Creative Anachronism. I was serious enough about it to own and ride a 2000 pound black Percheron warhorse. Gorgeous animal. Now that's the way to do role-playing games. Tabletop RPGs are for wimps.
Most serious gamers don't buy games out of a shrink wrapped box any more - they take packages from a number of sources and roll their own rules distro ... wait, what was the the article's original question? :)
Just want to throw this in: I'm thinking I can't be the only person who really likes writing code but is wholly uninterested in any form of role-playing game or sci-fi/fantasy stuff. Sure, I liked watching Star Trek. And, I went to see the "Lord of the Rings" movie because I wanted to give it a chance, and it was really good. But that's about as far as it goes. I didn't have much desire to see the other two LOTR movies, although I did see one with a friend because he wanted to see it. I've never read a fantasy book, and I've only read like 5 sci-fi books (and that's only if you count both 1984 and Brave New World as sci-fi, which is a huge stretch). People have invited me to AD&D games, but I just can't muster the interest. It's not like I think there's anything wrong with it. I mean, sure, it seems a little dorky, but then I don't mind being dorky, and I do it regularly in other ways. But I just don't get all the wizards and magic and spells and mythology and everything. People seem to go totally ape over the stuff, and I just don't.
For what it's worth, I have the same feelings about period pieces. People make these movies where they go to huge, elaborate efforts to reproduce the costume and the buildings and the speech and all that of some era exactly, and I just don't get why that's interesting. It doesn't bother me (unless it's done in a way that's pretentious), but it neither adds value to nor takes away value from the movie in my opinion. Oh, and the same thing about movies about the wild West or movies about American Indians (like Dances With Wolves). For me, unless they have some other interesting element, they are a total snoozefest.
I guess what it boils down to for me is this: I just seem to be incapable of romanticizing other periods of time or nations or cultures or realms of existence. And all this sci-fi and fantasy stuff seems to be all about romanticizing stuff. Either we're romanticizing the future, or the past, or the ancient Chinese, or the noble savage (as in the case of Indian movies), or something else.
The funny thing about this is, I agree that sci-fi and fantasy and role-playing games are really quite common among geeks. The effect is that, since I don't really go for that, I feel like an outsider among geeks. Which is ironic, since I am definitely a geek myself. (Ask any of my friends...)
They did this before with a contest. They get every fanboy they can to send in ideas to them in which WOTC gain copyrights to (read the fine print). Then they MIGHT actually give out a prize (or in this case a job) and use whatever they see fit from the ideas they gathered from fans.
DEAD DEAD DEAD DELETE ME
I thought we had seen the last of dear old Cliff...But Nye he is back and I have to admit I was a bit out of practice I read nearly the whole question before thinking man that sounds like Cliff. I was really hoping that I would never have that feeling agian.(after my last rant he had the since not to grace slashdotters for nearly at least a week though I think he was witnessing ing New Orleans) I would like to start a pot to buy Cliff a pop tart and a tootise roll I figure that will gum up his keyboard for at least a week when the slobber dribbles from between his teeth while he is slobbering about his next great question. Agian Cliff please stop posting for the love of humanity ....
My father said RPGs were a waste but boy did they help me out for my future career in accounting.
Working in groups.
Laws attempting to reflect reality or define it.
Mathematical calculations which made sense.
Brainstorming.
I couldn't think of anything better.
Nope. Just a coincidence.
Sitting around night after night with the same people, hiding behind made-up identities mathematically parameterized from crude stereotypes, looking up rules in books?
Gee, I wouldn't expect to find computer geeks doing that; it's way too free-form and social.
If you aren't sure exactly what a spell should do in some situation, you can just make it up to fit the story.
API documentation, on the other hand...
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Wait a minute. WotC didn't even exist 15 years ago, while D&D is like the forefather of all role playing.
Back in '95-98 I remember playing a lot of WotC's Magic card game, and except for two other card games (Jyhad/Vampire and Netrunner) that was the only thing they made. Did they happen to buy everybody else along the way?
How many actually roleplay, as oppose to powergame?
Visit any MMORPG and you'll find a vast excess of "K3wLd00dZ" over those trying assume a role. They run around talking smack and looking to exploit any flaw in the game design that they can. In fact, often they don't even seem to want to play the game at all, so they beg for resources from other players to shortcircuit the advancement process.
I suspect that the reward for the majority of players (if not most) is the advancement in "power" of their characters and the excitement of risk in "combat", rather than dialogue and character development.
These advantage of these games is that the ruleset is well-defined, unlike life. Life and social relations are messy. What is social success? It's a state rather than an accomplishment. Its measurement is relative and subjective. You can never finish and move on to the next goal. It requires constant effort and it can still fall apart for reasons outside your control.
So it's no wonder that people who have a strong affinity for defined structure (unambiguous, follows a logical ruleset, black and white) are less likely to find social situations rewarding, and more likely to find both games and coding (what could be more black and white?) very rewarding. The creative aspect of roleplaying games is just icing on the cake for some.
Yeah, well, it's called Forgotten Realms for a reason now, isn't it?
On vit, on code et puis on meurt.
I think you need to get out more... cheers!
How did this garbage get modded "Insightful"? Wow.
First of all, creating a fantasy world in a computer game is an incredibly collaborative effort these days. The days of some lone geek sitting in his garage making a game is long over. Even small casual games have teams of at least 3 people. You need a minimum amount of people skills if you're going to create a fantasy world in the medium I'm most familiar with.
Now, let me give you some real insight: a book doesn't have to be set in a "magical fairy realm" or "deep space" or "an alien planet" to be escapist. Hell, most "mainstream literature" is escapist; why do you think people read books like The Hunt for Red October or Patriot Games? Because they're fascinated by Russian sub or missile technology? No, because they want some adventure and excitement in their lives. They live vicariously through the spies, CIA operatives, and other characters as much as the person reading A Game of Thrones lives through the knights, schemers, nobles, and other characters in that book. Of course, that book isn't all "pleasant", and hopefully you didn't identify too closely with the character that gets beheaded or died of a seemingly minor wound....
So, stop with the tired "lolz @ teh dorks!" attitude already. Everyone engages in a bit of escapism once in a while. And sometimes people read a book because it's genuinely a good story, whether it's fantasy, science fiction, or "mainstream".
Brian "Psychochild" Green
MMO developer's blog
this may sound harsh, particularly as i'm a programmer and have been a roleplayer quite extensively myself,
Sounds like you had some really boring roleplaying, though, and possibly a terrible GM.
You should perhaps try playing some modern games where you don't put your intentions on the top of the page in the form of "Lawful Good" or "True Neutral". For example, in White Wolf's World of Darkness game settings, everyone is generally in the same group, but they could be working at cross purposes. Some of the best events in the game are when you pull off the perfect political maneuver to spite a character you don't see eye-to-eye with; or when you have to cajole, threaten, or negotiate to get a bit of vital information. Of course, this is on top of the challenge of considering things from the point of view of a completely separate character with different morals and motivations than you might have personally.
As for the "formalness" of the worlds, that really depends on the players and the GM. What's the modifier for turning over a table during a bar fight and using it as cover? What happens if an opponent in heavy steel armor crashes into the front of table? What if an acrobat leaps over the table and pins you against it? What if a mage sets the table on fire? I don't know what game you were playing, but these situations happened often in our role-playing and there were no hard and fast rules for them. The DM had to come up with rules and we collaborated to make a great session.
Finally, you should consider that not everyone is the same. In particular, there are introverts and extroverts, although these terms are very often misunderstood. I highly recommend the book, The Introvert Advantage which talks about these things in depth. I credit RPGing with allowing me to learn to extrovert as an introvert; this isn't something that comes naturally to introverts, so it's good to have a practice area where you can "just claim you're roleplaying" to ease anxieties. Learning to extrovert well has helped me a tremendous amount as a business owner. Of course, not everyone is as willing to learn and grow; people are often happy to fall back on old, comfortable, familiar patterns.
My thoughts,
Brian "Psychochild" Green
MMO developer's blog
And full of himself. He's looking for justifications for his sinful little pleasure, sinful not because it actually is but because HE believes it is. He's embarrassed by his enjoyment of role-playing and needs to rationalize an explanation that will help him get past his shame.
As for me, I was always judged to be an above average and definitely outside-the-box coder, but I *HATE* role-playing games; in fact, I've been in the habit of disabling or sidestepping the socio-political elements of every computer game I've ever played.
If there's any connection between coding and role-playing, it's an inverse one: socially inept types engaging in a "safe" form of social interaction that doesn't carry the usual consequences. It's a form of social training; that's why they still call it "role playing", duh!
Me, I don't want to learn those rules: I find most "social" behavior offensive, demeaning, and above all manipulative.
No sir. I program for fun and profit, and I don't like Role Playing or any other sort of "games". Not even video games.
Given a choice between playing something, or just talking to someone, I would take the conversation anyday. I prefer reading to both. The same thing goes for other supposedly "geeky" stuff, specially comic books which I abhor.
I would pass for a jock, except I completely lust after vintage electronics and mathematics texts, and my apartment is litered with both.
Damn it, I just used up all my mod points, and then I come across *this*. Brilliant. Mod parent up.
Bingo. Dorks like tabletop roleplaying for the same reason they like to read pulp science fiction/fantasy, read comic books or watch harem anime: not because they're more "creative" or whatever but because they want to escape into a pleasant fantasy land.
Mod that tripe down. Is is pure stereotyping without so much as a scintilla of fact or real experience supporting it. It looks, reads, and smells like a troll.
In fact, the pen-and-paper gamers are pretty much the opposite of the reclusive computer-gamer geeks who never interact directly with anyone. Unlike computer games which the most antisocial jerk can play in his basement, pen-and-paper gaming REQUIRES social interaction and cooperation. Know why you don't hear about PK'ers in tabletop roleplaying? Because they soon find they don't have anyone to play with, so they get an Everquest account where they can hide their anti-social tendencies and poor people skills through the anonymity of the 'net.
In my tabletop gaming circles are lawyers, accountants, engineers, teachers, civil servants and many other kinds of people who have to interact with the public on the daily basis. Programmers and IT people are by no means the majority, but those who are have to be the kind of people who can work and play well with others. Go to any convention with a significant tabletop roleplaying presence, such as RPGA tournaments, and you will discover that while some tabletop roleplayers also play and enjoy computer games, they are by no means anti-social geeks or basement trolls. Quite the opposite in fact -- they are the very people whose jobs and incomes are generally associated with "winners". Check your facts before you pontificate next time, Poindexter. Stereotyping kills your brain cells.
You know, there's a disturbing trend I'm noticing among a lot of nerds, and your post, complete with name calling (" Dorks like roleplaying") and armchair shrink trolling ("the sooner they stop the self-denial and start becoming adults, the better") is just a prime example of that: the "I'm Mr Perfect, you're all idiots, losers and in denial to boot" kinda mentality. In fact, I'll postulate that that should be _the_ definition of a "nerd" or "dork", and might well be the reason for social ineptness.
I know society as a whole is judgmental, relatively self-centred and "us vs them", but (like many other activities and social rituals they don't understand) nerds take this to an extreme it was never supposed to be taken to. It's like noticing that people use salt and vinegar in their soup, and deciding to make your soup out of _only_ salt and vinegar.
The social "us vs them" theme is supposed to find some common ground for the "us" part in that gossip. It's real purpose, conscious or not, is to find some common grounds to backpat each other in that "us" group. E.g., yeah, we might have other differences of opinion, but we're both fans of the same football club, so we're great. Not to become an "Me vs the rest of you losers" extreme.
Basically you know you're a nerd when your world is made of one Mr Perfect prototype, yourself, and sad losers who fail to measure up to that. And every single tiny difference of interests or difference of opinion is put on a pedestal, as definitive proof that everyone else is an idiot. And hey, it was said by Mr Perfect himself, so it _must_ be true.
Basically you know you're a nerd when you find yourself passing such broad sweeping judgments, like:
- did you study, say, law or medicine while I was learning to optimize assembly? Bah, what a sad loser. I bet you can't even code your own kernel drivers. Is that sad or what?
- ok, so you studied CS too, but do you use the same OS, language or editor that I do? You use another one, huh? (E.g., so we're both on Linux, but you code in C++ while I do Java, or viceversa, and use vi instead of emacs, or viceversa. Or worse yet, you use an IDE.) Ah-ha! I knew it. Idiot. It's people like you who are what's wrong with the world today.
- and how long is your uptime anyway? Only two weeks? Hah. Loser.
- what hobbies do you have anyway? Is it books or movies while I prefer gaming, or viceversa? What a sad loser you are, then. You're in denial. Grow up, get a life, get the One True Hobby.
- Ok, so if it's the same hobby, what flavour of it is it? E.g., do you prefer SF/fantasy books movies while I prefer murder mysteries, or viceversa? Haha, I knew it, it sucks to be you. You only read those because you don't have a life and are in denial. Or if it's games, do you like story-driven games while I like Mario-style jump puzzles, or viceversa? You guessed, you're a loser again for failing to measure up to my perfection.
Etc, etc, etc.
It's a sort of a sieve that really doesn't let anything through. There is no "us" in a nerd's "us vs them", it's one big case of Mr Perfect vs 7 billion sad losers who fail to measure up.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
yes there is abig connection thatswhy big companies are using the same tecxhniques http://www.thewebbrains.com/
What's the difference between roleplaying and coding?
One involves constant data-tracking and minor mathematical equations, and involves working together with small groups of people toward like-minded goals usually for long hours in a smelly and dank room, and the other is roleplaying.
EWM.
1st of all WotC aren't the creators of D&D. TSR was and was bought by WotC after they took down the entire RPG market with the invention of modern trading card games (TCG), read: Magic. Thus the wise saying: "Save gaming! Kill a Magic player today!"
... or something like that. :-) . (Posters please cue Old-School Fidonet RPG rule debate / flamewar below)
:-)
2nd:
The only likeness of RPG gaming and programming I can come up with is that both try to emulate/simulate certain aspects of the real world. You can have endless discussions on the pro's and con's about different RPG rulesets just as you can have endless debates about different Appserver Frameworks and PLs. Usually you can even have them with the same people. Probably even draw comparsions.
D&D rules == Brainfuck, World of Darkness == PHP, GURPS == Perl, Torg == Ruby
And you can blow huge amounts of time explaining a D&D player that the rules are crap just as you can blow the same amount of explaining an MS user why Windows sucks
The other thing they have in common is a meta attribute of both: Both are praticed by uncool people who are low on sex and like to stay indoors.
-----
Slightly off topic trivia: A few weeks ago I went surfing for some RPG tidbits and found the old folks of Palladiumbooks. They are still around and publish stuff! I find it amazing that a company sticks purely to RPGs (even during the excessive TCG hype) and still is alive and kicking after more that two decades. And their RPG "Rifts" is the last large multi-genre RPG still around, surviving all others. Very interessting indeed. Check out their site, they have all the cool stuff still there.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
"Thanks for the info that jocks are fairies, though. One more reason to stay away from them."
/. eyes, so I'll assume you're not really homophobic but actually a decent chap... your comment was pretty funny up until then.
Given that you were modded up, you're obviously the good guy in
Wizards of the Coast (makers of Dungeons & Dragons, for those not in the know)
AAAAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH
Have we come to this? Nobody remembers TSR anymore? WotC just BOUGHT them. They did not make anything at all. Actually, Gary Gigax and Dave Arneson made D&D.
I demand immediate beheading of the OP for this mistake! Unless he saves vs Traps, that is...
Global warming is a cube.
When I was first exposed to MtG I realised that the system it worked with was a large group or monoid or some such fundamental algebraic structure.
I researched the designer and sure enough - he has a Phd in Math. It has to be a large group (or whatever).
Has anyone with more education explored this deeper than me, so I can learn more than 'whatever', please?
Mumia Abu-Jamal is *laughably guilty*. Check the evidence.
Did I see the crash comming? Yes. Did I do anything about it? No. Instead I spent time in the world of RP ending up as a wizard writing my own part of the world. That was mush easier than trying to work with the real world and make it work for me and the people around me. After the crash of my life I haven't spent anywhere near the amount of time in the world of MUD:s again.
It's all about where you can get in control. For me it was clearily programming and RP in combination. Today I am a dormant mudoholic.
Uhm, you mean anyone could use a light pistol?
But a lightsaber is much cooler!
All of the things you mention are part of creating a character.
If you think that making notes on a sheet is creating a character, then you're probably not a very good RPGer. Doing something and creating are one thing, just as writing a program and writing a program that does something are one.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
Off-topic: http://www.meridian59.com/M59-About-01.shtml - spelling mistake: Alphabet soul instead of alphabet soup.
What do I think? I think I stopped playing Dungeons and Dragons when I was a teenager in the early 80s, and never looked back.
Coding and knitting? As both an avid coder AND knitter, it's easy to see how the two relate.. ;)
Cross stitch, embroidery..
stay fluffy.
You know how I know you're gay?
...Conversely, love of roleplaying can illustrate how important creativity is to good programming. What do you think?"
Ever since the 80's, the RPG scene has been the domain of smart but socially mal-adjusted people. I think you folks would do better to get outside and exercise daily and not waste any mental energy on those tedious games that serve no interesting purpose.
In my opinion the real-life correlation is between programming and playing a musical instrument, in particular improvised music where a creative mind is also useful.
They want to be artists (yeah, we know coding is art, sure), they want that their hobbies are validated as great intellectual pursuits.
What they can't accept that coding is just a profession to earn an honest living and RPGs are just an enjoyable passtime?
I can't think of any other group of people that is constantly trying to agrandize whatever they do.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It's been a lot longer than 20 years for some of us. :-)
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
Great point. This brings back memories of when I read through the GURPS Cyberpunk book back in high school, when I'd game with my classmates. Definitely was the reason why I started reading Gibson and made me much more interested in computers. Granted, I can't "jack in" to the net, but the layers involved in the game were pretty mind stimulating.
Crap aside, the cyberpunk book was realistic enough to cause a lot of fanfare and a total misunderstanding on the part of the govt.
When I see you playing roleplaying games?
RPGs are extremely attractive to emotionally repressed people who, nonetheless being human beings, desparately need a way to express their emotional side in a "safe" way (BTW, up until very recently I would have accounted myself as such).
Both programming and RPGs are rule-based systems with vast opportunities for creative thought and problem solving.
RPG gamers are socially repellent to people that view them as nerdy. Programmers are, naturally, immune to this effect or they wouldn't still be programmers. And vice versa. This is an anti-selection, but none the less powerful for all that.
Other people go to bars to hang out with their friends. Programmers need their brain cells.
Many programmers are nerdy and feel socially and physically powerless. RPGs provide a mechanism for feeling powerful. GMs create entire universes, and players get to be Conan and Merlin, if only vicariously.
While many of these statement may seem to denigrate either gamers or programmers, please realize that a) a generalization doesn't have to be used against individuals, and b) I'm just trying to be coldly accurate.
I just gained 231 EP from my last quest, I mean, project. And I'm 421213 EP away from being promoted to a lvl 39 Developer. Oh and I just put on eBay my Linus Torvalds Keyboard (+50%Coding Speed, -80%Bugs, +100Ego) in case you folks are interested...
Tyranny isn't the worst enemy of a democracy. Cynicism is.
Would it be more elegant to write a d6 subroutine and call that 3 times? Yes. But that's not the point I was addressing, which is that the INT must be applied to each die, not to the sum of the floats generated by the RND*6.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Refocusing resources into creating entirely new realms (ie. Eberron) instead of updating much-loved and heavily-played pre-existing realms (ie. the Forgotten Realms). (note: I'm not saying Eberron sucks. I'm just saying that FR needs a lot of work before it is updated to d20, still.. and it's been 5 years since 3.0 debuted.)
Ok, I agree that they need to put some more effort into existing worlds. But to say that Forgotten Realms needs a lot of work seems a little strange. There are a ton of Forgotten Realms books so far. What about Planescape? Dark Sun? Even Dragonlance only has one book. They have a bunch of existing franchises that already have a fanbase.
Of course, the only way to send them a message is to not buy the Eberron stuff. Then again, I haven't bought anything from 3.5 yet, and I'm mostly trying to escape from d20 at the moment. But if they put out a good main book for one of the left behind settings, I'd pick it up.
Got Apathy?
Releasing books that seem more focused on pretty artwork than solid material -- and, of course, the artwork costs more to print, so the cost for the book is increased. Go figure
A picture is worth a thousand words though? Personally I never read the text in RPGs (atleast not initially). I mostly rely on the pictures to get a look and feel of what the game is about, similar to how I always look at the screenshots before reading the game review. I'm an artist however, and probably... different.
Many RPGs have terrible amateur artwork, often printed in B/W. I haven't seen that many RPGs in full color/art magazine dpi/gloss160g. Small RPG companies pays maybe $0-100 per illo. WotC pays a couple of hundred.
The Chair Corp. comic(*00-12)
Sounds like you had some really boring roleplaying, though, and possibly a terrible GM.
Not at all, I'm glad to say the RP sessions were wonderful fun, both from a purely social point of view, and also in playing the games. For what it's worth, we mostly played WFRP and AD&D 1st Ed (yes, this was a long while ago) but played around with many other systems including Shadowrun and Paranoia.
Most of our players were good Roleplayers, both able to get into character convincingly and add that extra dimension to the game, but also fast and inventive thinkers who entertained each other with their witticisms. And annoyed the GM to no end by continuously thinking up new things to do.
As for the "formalness" of the worlds, that really depends on the players and the GM. What's the modifier for turning over a table during a bar fight and using it as cover? What happens if an opponent in heavy steel armor crashes into the front of table? What if an acrobat leaps over the table and pins you against it? What if a mage sets the table on fire? I don't know what game you were playing, but these situations happened often in our role-playing and there were no hard and fast rules for them. The DM had to come up with rules and we collaborated to make a great session.
Ah, but that is the formality exactly - when one of those situations happens, the GM formalises it - it's a Dexterity roll at -4, it's a Save vs Fire, and so on and so forth. Players can get a formal idea of what they can do, because they know that their Dexterity is low, or so on and so forth. Not only does it allow the players to excel in areas where they may not do so in Real Life, but it gives them a solid grasp of what their strengths and weaknesses are.
Going back to the players, most of these people, though obviously witty, funny, intelligent and inventive, were shy and retiring in real life. They needed the comfort zone of the game in order to loosen up, to feel confident. As someone else posted in reply below, they were no less witty while walking through school as they were while gaming, but could they come up with the confidence to talk to a pretty girl, or to be outgoing in a group situation? Invariably not. It sounds like you went through the same situation too, that gaming has "taught" you how to extrovert, as I'm glad to say it helped me with as well.
It comes as no suprise to me that programming and roleplaying go together.. after all,
:-)
I'm not a programmer but I roleplay one at work.
> Although your post barely warrants the dignity of a reply, I feel that it is my
> duty to help stop the spread of such nonsense.
This reminds me of the squawking that mainstream media does whenever someone dares to accuse them of tilting to the left. =)
> Your maniacal focus on "The (evil) Left" is quite hypocritical. If you don't
> believe that "The Right" doesn't have just as much influence, if not more on
> the education of school children, then you are sadly mistaken. Remember
> "Intelligent Design"?
The GP's criticism was completely valid. The Left TEACHES irrational thinking. TEACHES IT. It's not even a consequence of the muddle-headed way they approach life, they directly teach kids to deny reality and believe in contradictions. Why are we failing in our schools? I'd argue the decline of American education is due largely to an influence of ESL kids skewing the curves, but the real decline, if anything, is attributable to the breakdown of scientific thought in our schools.
My AP Biology teacher, Mr. Rick Halsey, was kind of a hippie/liberal sort. But he had a keen, keen mind, and was one of the greatest teachers I've ever had. But he brought in a lecturer (from the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, IIRC) to talk about Intelligent Design (this is back in '93, when nobody had heard of it). Why? Why would he do that if he personally believed ID was wrong? Because he felt that intelligent minds should be exposed to every idea possible. Even if you disagreed with ID, it could stretch your mind in a new direction, and make you consider things you'd never thought of before. THAT was the thing that rational minds do, to cultivate a true scientific mode of thought.
Rather than what we have today, which is Republicans tuning in to FOX News/Druge Report and Liberals watching ABC/CBS/NBC/CNN/MSN, people should consciously expose themselves to multiple viewpoints on every subject. I trust nothing I hear on the news... but the news is still valuable to provide starting points to my own research on a story. I don't make up my mind on something until I've read at least one decent article on each side of the fence.
I challenge liberals to read State of Fear, and Republicans to read the articles on RealClimate.org. I challenge Republicans to subscribe to the ACLU newsletter, and liberals to subscribe to the NRA's. Our current climate of intellectual provincialism cannot continue.
Robo Rally
Well I've wrestled with reality for thirty five years doctor, and I'm happy to say I finally won out over it.
I see a connection. Here is an article about collaborative role-playing development, in case you are interested:
, 1,0
http://interactingarts.org/index.php?id=35,59,0,0
You seem to think I said a lot of things that I didn't actually say. Parents' basements??? Where did you get that from? Try not to be so remarkably sensitive in the future, 'kay? That would be greeeeeaaaat, thanks.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.