“Have you ever had the unsettling experience of going into a dungeon you’ve already done before, and you have to fight monsters you’ve already killed?”
Here’s something for all the D&D players in the audience. Enjoy.
6 thoughts on ““Have you ever had the unsettling experience of going into a dungeon you’ve already done before, and you have to fight monsters you’ve already killed?””
I enjoyed this document. It illustrates the soul-searching that every serious D&D player experiences regarding their relationship to the game and its effect on their lives.
“About the worst thing you can say is that [D&D] was a waste of time, but then so is life.”
Does A&E stand for Alarums & Excursions? If so, wow. I wrote for A&E at roughly the same time; my first contribution was in #103. (Also, I’m surprised you’d be talking to them about D&D, as they, and I, were terrible system snobs.)
Same! I was not a regular in A&E, my submissions were more Letter of Comment, as my ‘zine was in the east-coast spinoff TWH. Wish i’d made this connection when i attended a couple of Andrew’s guest lectures at Harvard Stats last decade (or was it the Naughty Aughties, which is already the antipenultimate decade? argh; Guinness sponsoring the reception at the Student Centennial Symposium was fabulous!). I fear i was a bit of a fan-boi. ( FWIW there’s a FaceBook group for A&E contributors that has announcement of when physical and virtual copies are released and miscellaneous chatter, which is where i found the link to this article. Former contributors such as myself are tolerated there. )
Every now and then I still think about our adolescent discussions about how someone can see if they’re invisible, since your eyes have to absorb light in order to sense it. And whether you can kill someone by transforming them into a deep sea fish and letting pressure do the work…except a “deep sea fish” is just a species, it’s not like the object you’re transforming would automagically be under pressure just because it takes the form of something that is found in the deep ocean.
And any time I have to carry a very long object indoors — like a new banister I was installing a couple of years ago — I think about how absurd it is that we used to carry a once-standard ‘ten-foot pole’ that we could use to tap the floor for traps or whatever. Outdoors, OK, mmmmaaaaybe if you’re not going through heavy forest, but the idea of somehow carrying a ten-foot pole around corners in narrow corridors…yeah, maybe you can make the geometry work but you would give up in the damn thing within minutes.
Lovely and highly recognizable, in particular the bit about searching for that initial, old spark of excitement.
I regret being unable to answer your important and presumably still open questions about the unattractive kobold wife. As real-world data seem hard to come by, perhaps simulation would be useful? Just need a good DM.
I enjoyed this document. It illustrates the soul-searching that every serious D&D player experiences regarding their relationship to the game and its effect on their lives.
“About the worst thing you can say is that [D&D] was a waste of time, but then so is life.”
:)
Does A&E stand for Alarums & Excursions? If so, wow. I wrote for A&E at roughly the same time; my first contribution was in #103. (Also, I’m surprised you’d be talking to them about D&D, as they, and I, were terrible system snobs.)
Same! I was not a regular in A&E, my submissions were more Letter of Comment, as my ‘zine was in the east-coast spinoff TWH. Wish i’d made this connection when i attended a couple of Andrew’s guest lectures at Harvard Stats last decade (or was it the Naughty Aughties, which is already the antipenultimate decade? argh; Guinness sponsoring the reception at the Student Centennial Symposium was fabulous!). I fear i was a bit of a fan-boi. ( FWIW there’s a FaceBook group for A&E contributors that has announcement of when physical and virtual copies are released and miscellaneous chatter, which is where i found the link to this article. Former contributors such as myself are tolerated there. )
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alarums_and_Excursions says “publication continues to the present day.” Fantastic.
Every now and then I still think about our adolescent discussions about how someone can see if they’re invisible, since your eyes have to absorb light in order to sense it. And whether you can kill someone by transforming them into a deep sea fish and letting pressure do the work…except a “deep sea fish” is just a species, it’s not like the object you’re transforming would automagically be under pressure just because it takes the form of something that is found in the deep ocean.
And any time I have to carry a very long object indoors — like a new banister I was installing a couple of years ago — I think about how absurd it is that we used to carry a once-standard ‘ten-foot pole’ that we could use to tap the floor for traps or whatever. Outdoors, OK, mmmmaaaaybe if you’re not going through heavy forest, but the idea of somehow carrying a ten-foot pole around corners in narrow corridors…yeah, maybe you can make the geometry work but you would give up in the damn thing within minutes.
Those were the days, my friend.
They just had their 566th issue!
Lovely and highly recognizable, in particular the bit about searching for that initial, old spark of excitement.
I regret being unable to answer your important and presumably still open questions about the unattractive kobold wife. As real-world data seem hard to come by, perhaps simulation would be useful? Just need a good DM.