RE: [Epic] SV: satans work

From: Miller, Chris <CMiller_at_...>
Date: Tue, 24 Mar 1998 16:10:29 -0600

> > ---------> And the reason for that would be...? Maybe alcohol
> companies
> > have made a good run at making people believe you have to have
> alcohol
> > to have a good party? I've had a problem for a long time with people
> who
> > , if you take their alcohol away, scream that they can't have fun
> > anymore.
>
> Drinking games sure aren't much fun without it. =)
--------> OK, got me there...

> > Besides, most states (U.S.) have pushed the drinking age up to
> 21,
> > which means most of the people in a frat can't legally drink anyway,
> so
> > the ban shouldn't affect most of them, right?
>
> ...uh, yeah... right... Or do you mean that since they
> were drinking illegally to begin with, further bans shouldn't
> affect them? That doesn't really follow; wide-spread underage
> drinking on campuses is possible because it's generally
> tolerated/ignored as long as it's not openly flaunted. So an
> actual crack-down is definitely going to change things (at
> least until the folks in charge forget about it and the status
> quo returns).
-------> I mean if you have to implement a campus-wide ban on something
that's illegal anyway for 3/4 of the people on campus, you had a problem
to start with. And if you are upset because something already illegal
was banned, well, you could have had that yanked away at any time anyway
so stop whining. The people who are of legal age have a legitimate beef,
but everyone else - too bad!

> Semi-ontopic: Slaanesh says alcohol is for weenies!
> I'm not sure what the drug of choice is for Slaanesh cultists,
> but it's probably pretty damn strong...
>
> > The main game under fire in the U.S. right now is Vampire and its
> > ilk,
>
> Really? I haven't heard much in the way of RPG-bashing
> for years now... Although Vampire certainly seems like a ripe
> target.
>
---------> The two court cases I mentioned were fairly high-profile -
the Springfield one was on "Dateline" or one of those shows last year.
The Florida "Vampire Cult Leader" thing was in the paper a bunch around
the start of the year, I think Dragged out for a few weeks.

> > I never liked Vampire anyway, and honestly it seems to
> > attract a different crowd than most other RPG's.
>
> From what I've seen, the Vampire players are generally
> more role-playing-oriented than, say, DnD players. That and
> the goths seems to like it...
>
--------> I don't know about more roleplaying oriented - they just like
vampires. It's a fad like a lot of others, and appeals to a certain
crowd. "Role playing" is what you make of it, regardless of game system.
I've seen people choke and fail under the latest "role play enhancing"
system, and I've seen people come up with great characters using the
older versions of D&D and play them for long periods of time. If the
concept grabs you, the ruleset won't get in the way.
 
> > There's a lot more
> > people taking it a lot more seriously than they really should, which
> is
> > fine until it gets out of control and into the news and any of us
> who
> > play any kind of game are painted as "nuts" - I don't appreciate it
> > when someone else's lack of maturity/control/brainpower/whatever
> screws
> > up things for me, whether it's driving drunk or getting my hobby
> smeared
> > as "evil."
>
> I wouldn't say that Vampire players are more nuts than
> other RPG players... Certainly they're not any more nuts than
> people heavily involved in the SCA. I kinda wonder if old-time
> RPGers regard Vamp players as odd or different because of the
> heavy emphasis on role-playing over dice-rolling...
--------> Well, people running around in all-black or lacey
lingerie-type stuff look a little odd to non-gamers. The SCA guys
usually don their gear on-site. A lot of Vampire players around here
wear it all the time. I think the game tends to attract a certain
"type", like many games do. I also don't think most of them are any less
stable than the rest of us, but some of them have read too many Anne
Rice novels and try to turn it into a lifestyle, of which the game is
merely one part. It's almost a sub-cult of goths, just fascinated with
the Vamp thing. When one of them goes nuts, that's something that gets
a lot of pub. In the 50's it was comic books...course you never hear
people going on about how professional sports must do something weird to
people too...look at the things THEY do.

(and as a game, I thought most of White Wolf's stuff had pretty weak
rules. Lots of interesting background material, but the rules were a
mess. I could say the same thing about Rifts...doesn't make it a bad
game. I've just heard a lot of crap about how it "emphasizes role
playing" when that really depends on the players and GM more than the
rules, and I don't think it should be used when the actual case is that
the rules suck forcing one to improvise and de-emphasize the rules as
part of the game. If you are going to play a "game" without "rules" try
getting a part in a play. Or that heresy, "Diceless Role Play"
<shudder>.)

Chris Miller
Vampire Hunter (?)
Ardent Champion of Mechanical Randomizers
Awaiting the first "Diceless Miniatures" system
(Oh wait, that was army men...)
Received on Tue Mar 24 1998 - 22:10:29 UTC