Shoot Club: Sanity Check

[TomChick]

"You want to play the Charles Dexter Ward card."

[JPR]

I had given up on ever seeing another one of these.

[Troy S Goodfellow]

I never make a comeliness check.

Good story, and something that I guess all us adult geeks have to deal with.

Assuming that some of this is autobiographical, Tom, I wonder if you have tried online role playing in a NWN DMed environment or if you would have the same issues with the "pretending"?

Troy

[Hawkeye Fierce]

Heh. Knowing when to "fade to black," as it were, is a key skill to avoid creeping out your players.

Nice to see a new Shoot Club.

[BobJustBob]

Wow, that was, uh, angsty. Why do I get the feeling that I just read the public version of a personal resignation letter from PnP RPG night?

[Jancelot]

Hmm, that pretty much nailed my experiences with PnP RPGs. I always ended up rolling a strong, silent man-of-action because I always felt awkward with the acting parts. Besides I was too much of a control-freak back then and was better at running the Star Wars RPG. Good stuff, Tom.

I tried to play D&D a few years ago when the 3rd edition came out and couldn't cut it. I ended up just attacking most of the NPCs and pissing everyone off.

[Charles]

Tom Chick said "fun".

[Podunk]

Yay, a new Shoot Club! Yeah, I've been there too.

[ElGuapo]

This is either based in reality, and Douglas is the guy who went "I fucked your mother's cunt, right up the ass!" or it's a continuation of the events from other Shoot Clubs with the same characters, or it's a coincidence name use (unlikely with the "Doug is what you do to a hole" line).

Anyway, good story.

[ElGuapo]

I think Tom's been quoted wrong with the "fun" thing. I think his argument is that saying "this is a fun game" in a game review is not the mark of a good reviewer, because a good reviewer should give you better description. I think it's ok to say "fun".

Personally, I think it's ok to say "fun" in a game review, but who cares.

[Charles]

Originally Posted by ElGuapo

I think Tom's been quoted wrong with the "fun" thing. I think his argument is that saying "this is a fun game" in a game review is not the mark of a good reviewer, because a good reviewer should give you better description. I think it's ok to say "fun".

Of course. That's why it's fun to needle him.

[Alan Au]

It's Minsc, unless you really mean the Belarussian capital.

- Alan

[Rywill]

Good column. Although as someone who just went through a breakup, I hope the "no sex for a year" part was made up. Or at least that you smell or something.

[Troy S Goodfellow]

Originally Posted by Alan Au

It's Minsc, unless you really mean the Belarussian capital.

- Alan

You fell for one of the great literary devices of all time! The misspelling is intentional to show how detached he has become from RPGs altogether.

Clever, huh?

Troy

[Thrag]

Now I read the article quickly, but I don't think I saw any mention of drinking. I think that might be the essential problem. I found that after a certain age drinking is a necessary part of any RPG session.

Plus, what's up with this flirting crap? I love CoC, it's truly my favorite RPG of all time. There's no flirting in CoC, there's discovering horrific mysteries and being driven insane as the hidden truth is revealed, punctuated by moments of fleeing in terror from nameless horrors (and if the game master is nice, he'll let you blow holes in some cultists on the way).

[Enidigm]

I liked it in it's sad and slightly degenerate lifestyle that the narrator is always questioning. Like the character called in sick from work and stayed home to watch the 3pm cartoons, only to wonder if he really still enjoys watching them.

From the other Shoot Clubs i've read i can't help but get the feeling something horrible is going to happen to Trevor to "wake him up". I imagine the last Shoot Club (whenever that is) will have Trevor sitting alone in his room, his whole family dead or something equally dramatic, staring blankly at a fistful of d20's.

[Winifred]

This a good read. It totally captures that "can't go home again" vibe that I've felt on the rare occasions when I've been cajoled into joining a PnP again. Don't get me wrong, I loved PnP. I still have all my first edition D&D books and 3 ring binders full of campaigns and notes and world design. But somehow, it just feels weird to break out the dice bag and attempt to play any of them now. This article was a good capture of that disconnect.

[Troy S Goodfellow]

Originally Posted by Winifred

This a good read. It totally captures that "can't go home again" vibe that I've felt on the rare occasions when I've been cajoled into joining a PnP again. Don't get me wrong, I loved PnP. I still have all my first edition D&D books and 3 ring binders full of campaigns and notes and world design. But somehow, it just feels weird to break out the dice bag and attempt to play any of them now. This article was a good capture of that disconnect.

I've been tempted to try to get a human game going, but, in spite of being fully out of the closet as a gamer, I'd feel very peculiar going up to my friends and suggesting rolling up a dwarven cleric.

The urge is still there, though.

Troy

[Jason McMaster]

Cool, good to see another Shoot Club, Tom.

[Aleck]

Originally Posted by Winifred

This a good read. It totally captures that "can't go home again" vibe that I've felt on the rare occasions when I've been cajoled into joining a PnP again. Don't get me wrong, I loved PnP. I still have all my first edition D&D books and 3 ring binders full of campaigns and notes and world design. But somehow, it just feels weird to break out the dice bag and attempt to play any of them now. This article was a good capture of that disconnect.

Amen to that. Great piece, Tom. Thanks!

[Damien Neil]

A PNP RPG really demands that the characters be doing something that the players find interesting, and not horribly embarrassing. If the players want to be bashing orcs, and the GM is handing them romance or political intrigue, the game is going to go downhill, fast.

One other trick that I've learned from my experiences with some indie RPGs is that you don't need to waste time on the minutiae. You definitely don't need to require the players to speak every bit of dialogue that the characters do.

The players arrive in a new town. "So, what do you want to do?" "I dunno, we're kind of in between quests. I guess we look around for something to do." "Okay, you split up and see the sights. That evening at the tavern, a tattooed man comes up to your table..." You don't need to role-play visiting the blacksmith, getting new horseshoes, accosting random passers-by, and so forth. Skip to the good bit. (Of course, to some players, that fiddly stuff is the good bit. So for them, you focus on it.)

That bit in Tom's piece where the GM says, "I need to know exactly what you're going to say"? That's bad GMing. He doesn't need to know that. Go with what the player gives you and improvise from there.

[Brooski]

Originally Posted by Troy S Goodfellow

You fell for one of the great literary devices of all time! The misspelling is intentional to show how detached he has become from RPGs altogether.

I'm pretty sure the misspelling of Gregg Araki, though, is completely unintentional.

[Kyle Wilson]

Originally Posted by Charles

Tom Chick said "fun".

Yes, but as he's pointed out, Tom the narrator of Shoot Club isn't the same as Tom Chick the game writer/actor/half of The Entity.

And to the real Tom Chick: thanks for the story.

[Post-It]

Nice read. I always enjoy these. I think we all find ourselves in these types of situations on occasion. Doing something we used to, but not sure if we still enjoy it.

[TomChick]

Originally Posted by Troy Q. Goodfellow

Tom, I wonder if you have tried online role playing in a NWN DMed environment or if you would have the same issues with the "pretending"?

I actually haven't done, or even tried to do, any RPGing in at least fifteen years. I wouldn't, on principle, object to a Neverwinter Nights thing, partly because the computer game itself is a very rules-based intermediary between me and whoever's DMing. But even then, I'd probably just opt for a single player RPG or to dink around with an MMO.

It might also have something to do with acting. Doing theatre was always, for me, like a very structured RPG. I'm going to get together with a bunch of folks and roll up an adventure, although we all know how it's going to turn out, and we're doing it for the benefit of whomever shows up to watch us tonight. I dunno, maybe that's stretching it. But outside of acting in a play or something, I really have no desire to do that sort of thing.

Originally Posted by Bruce Geryk

I'm pretty sure the misspelling of Gregg Araki, though, is completely unintentional.

Why does Bruce Geryk know that Gregg Araki's name is spelled with a double-g? Hmm. Watching a lot of Doom Generation lately, Geryk?

Originally Posted by Kyle Wilson

Yes, but as he's pointed out, Tom the narrator of Shoot Club isn't the same as Tom Chick the game writer/actor/half of The Entity.

Exactly. Except that the narrator of Shoot Club isn't named 'Tom', at least as far as I know. Ever since I've been doing it, all the way back to Daily Radar, he's been nameless.

Originally Posted by Thraq

There's no flirting in CoC

Would someone please explain that to Stuart Gordon already? That dude has shoehorned some kind of half-assed Cinemax-style nekkidness into all of his supposedly H.P. Lovecraft movies. Sheesh. Lovecraft was as utterly sexless as any writer I can think of. Did he even know girls existed?

-Tom

[Moggraider]

Originally Posted by TomChick

Exactly. Except that the narrator of Shoot Club isn't named 'Tom', at least as far as I know. Ever since I've been doing it, all the way back to Daily Radar, he's been nameless.

Are these older pieces available anywhere, or are they just the older ones on the site?

[MauxFaux]

This is just some sick plan to get people to chime in about how they haven't had sex in over a year or they are too fat to tuck their shirt in as well.

Nice try, Tom, it almost worked. You almost got me to admit that those also apply to me, but, as you can see, I am too smart for that.

[RepoMan]

I actually did GM some live PnP recently with some guys from work. It was a modern Cthulhu setting. Nobody was playing a female character, though, which probably helped. I was running it with the d20 CoC rules, and a campaign based on the At Your Door adventure from Chaosium.

We got through the first major chapter (with the evil gel creature creating horrible animal plants), and then my wife got pregnant, and bye bye all evening time forever. Otherwise we might have kept right on going, they were all enjoying it :-)

Maybe I'll do it again one day, years down the line....

[Unicorn McGriddle]

Originally Posted by TomChick

Lovecraft was as utterly sexless as any writer I can think of. Did he even know girls existed?

Oh yeah -- and he knew they were all secretly dirty old men who had stolen the bodies of young girls by black magic.

[azzl]

I lost my sanity check when confronted with a gazebo.