I tell myself that gamers aren't worse than the common man...

...and from what I can tell, that's true. They're not. They just happen to be a group of people that I tend to have more contact with and so they seem worse.

Self-centered, entitled, thoughtless, clueless of their limits and immoral both in their fantasies and in their online actions. Children basically, in a modern world where Extended Adolescence defines the new common man. The impact is everywhere and is of course increasing.

• In the 70s gamers were a small crowd playing complex historical wargames
• By the 80s the wargames with their values of history and simulation had been replaced by complex table top fantasy RPGs
• By the 90s the assault on complex RPGs was well under way. Amber, FUDGE and the like.
• The 00 saw the rise of the Forge GNS movements, not only were the games mechanically simply in the extreme- they by design could only contain one campaign idea.

Same in video games. I played complex flight sims in the 80s and mystery games. Today we have Angry Birds.

Today the gamers say that the games of the early 80s are impossible to play. Too complex. No matter that people played them and did quite well. They remind me of people who claim mankind couldn't have built the Great Pyramids. Small minds thinking small thoughts. Of course they'd have to play small games.

The moral side of the hobby has decayed as well. It always had it's underbelly. But it was either by today's standards almost innocent (D&D's succubus artwork) or known to be a niche stupidity.

In the age of moral relativism, things can't be that simple. From Little Fears to FATAL to  poison'd  to LotFP we have the progress of fifth and increasing acceptance. Now days even the mainstream of online gaming is willing to accept artwork of women being torn apart from their sexual organs out as long as they think the game design displaying it is... what? A cool rewrite of original D&D?

That's how low we sell our morality. We don't even require a new game, just a fluffed up version of an old one.



What set off this, my latest rant on the subject? An experiment of a sort. I wanted to see if the OSR crowd was any different.

So I decided to respond to a recent post (together with this older one on the same site) that was something of a bugbear for me, the idea that a modern gamer can take history and remake it in their own image. Not a genre (like say Westerns), but history.

A timely concern, given today's efforts to rewrite history. Even Texas is considering removing the Alamo from being taught in school. Too offensive you know.

I wondered what response a call for respect of history, and the people who were part of it would receive from the OSR crowd. I got the same one I would have expected from the gaming world as a whole.

Self-centered, clueless, and lacking in any respect for others. They felt the dead were owed nothing.

I asked them if they were dead, would they feel that they would be owed something? What if what we considered horrid deeds today were accepted in the future? Would they then be accepting of future gamers labeling them with those deeds because it made them more acceptable to that future?

I got no answer, only claims that I was vile for asking the question. They hold their values dear, but they won't even accept the question asking if those standards should be applied to themselves.


In over 100 posts, there was not one person besides me willing to claim that people deserve the respect of truth after their death. Not one. We may as well get rid of the graveyards now, and let the vermin eat well. For that is now what we are.


Self-centered, entitled, thoughtless, clueless of their limits and immoral both in their fantasies and in their online actions.

Extended Adolescence indeed.

Home Grown Rules Update

Things are going well with my attempt to get Age of Heroes into a printable form. I've recover from LuLu format changes, the first 152 or so pages have been proof-read twice by different people (which will only reduce the errors by 80% or so, but perfection isn't the goal).

Another 20 pages need to be proof read but are otherwise complete.

Just need to take a deep breath and push through the last of it. Getting a bit weary and I've been distracted by visiting friends and family.

We are our Fantasies

Looking back over the hobby started in the 70s is difficult in many ways. So much loss of potential. So much decay. Not that it ever was ideal, but foolishly we thought it could be- at least for us.

I (like so many others) snorted at the overblown worries of BADD, claims of satanism in D&D, and worries about kids dying in tunnels. And with good reason. They were overblown, founded on basically no facts, and they ignore the simple truth that games (like so much else) are tools. Games don't corrupt people, people corrupt people.

We didn't consider that corrupt people would produce corrupted games. And if those were accepted, the very nature of what defined corruption would be lost. In time, nothing would be off limits.

Archimedes said, "If you give me a lever and a place to stand, I can move the world". Games are excellent levers. Still, the world is a big place. Games are small things, and only one of many influences. It's impossible to say how large or how small their influence is, and I claim no outstanding significance for my little hobby.

But I do think it's something of a mirror. Where we stood. Where we now stand.

As recently as the turn of the 21st century, games such as Lamentations of the Flame Princess, or Courtesans would have been viewed as the filth they are with but the rare trollish defender. Now they are effectively accepted (online at least) as just another RPG. Slowly, things get worse year by year. And the moral corruption predicted by 70s turns out to be in too many ways correct, wrong only in the details.

Assisting in this was a major change in RPG design itself. Originally RPGs were an outgrowth of wargaming. And simulation of reality was a major goal of wargaming itself. For a while, RPGs continued in that path with many designs seeking a more complete and accurate simulation.

This changed with the move towards story focused games. With the move, games no longer worried about being a simulation of reality- but instead a vehicle to unleash the imagination of the player. To give them free reign, and the ability to wander where they will. As unconstrained as possible.

Freedom from even moderately complex games is freedom from learning. Freedom to create whatever story is desired is a surrender to hedonism. These games were meant to give the player more power. And power corrupts.

Lines have moved. And once moved, they become the new line to cross. Decay seeks ever more decay. I have a simple test for any doubtful reader. Come back in ten years and see if you can tell me that things are better, or if items like LotFP now look rather old fashion and innocent in comparison.


I greatly doubt games caused any of this. But they reflect it, and they certainly didn't stand in the way of it.

We are our Fantasies. They are what we seek to become.

Look in the mirror, are you proud of where you are going? Is that where you want your children to end up as well?

And sadly, I expect many of you will answer 'yes' for the simple reason you know not what you do.

Captain America was a Solid Movie

Went with friend over the weekend to see the latest Marvel movie. Completely enjoyed it.

Despite some waffling on the part of the people behind the movie (who for some perverse reason refused to openly embraced the American values of their title character), things still turned out very well indeed.

Indeed in a bit of irony, their attempt to downplay patriotism really only highlighted it. Having been raised by a member of the Greatest Generation, I'm familar with some of their traits. Understatement, deeds instead of words, and doing the right thing flowed naturally while lofty speeches were left to generals and Politicians.

At times they claimed that they were making a movie not about an American, but about a good man. They forgot to mention that he was a good man because of his American values. This may have been intentional, so as to not damage their future in the very left wing Hollywood. If so, good job.  If that wasn't the case and they really were attempting to remove America from Captain America, one can only be amused at their failure.

On other matters, they used the World War III German 'future weapons' look very effectively. Chris Evans was perfect in the role, and I never once saw the human torch. Hayley Atwell was amazing as Peggy Carter, and was one of the few superhero romances I've believed in while watching a film.

I give it a strong thumbs up.

Too Little Time, Too Much Work

Been very busy of late, and what free time I have has been going into finishing up Age of Heroes for printing and working on the Claymore Campaign Supplement.

On the core rules front- my wonderful editors (my wife and an old friend) are just about caught up with me on their proof reading. Massive pain that and I doubt it will ever be 100%. But it should be good enough for us to use without it being instantly too painful to continue.

Lots of work, and I'm really not very good at this. It's why it's taken so long to do it. But if I don't do it now, it may never get done. So it's time for doing.

Currently at 142 pages in the proof-reading. About another 30 already written pages to go. Need to finish up two more sections.

Currently on the magic item creation part. This should be short as I don't intend this to be a major part of the game. For one thing, it really won't allow the creation of permanent items. Few things can more quicky ruin a setting than unrestricted creation of magic items. Cost and rarity of materials are no real control of this problem.

On the Claymore front, all the key rules are in place, and we play-tested it a little this last weekend. Went quite well with mid-level characters. This weekend we'll see how it does with high level ones.

Quite happy with the write ups of the primary monster from the series and one of the series characters. I'd post them but since no one has the rules it's rather pointless to.