Category: cultural analysis

Keep it up, fellas! The world little understands, nor appreciates, how much you do. Nor does it realize how bad off it would be without you. Do it anyway. You’re doing God’s work, and even your worst attempts do more to make the world a better place than the...

Let’s walk back some of the derision that I heaped on Matrix Games last week, shall we? I’ve been reading up on the subject because somebody smarter than me recommended them.  Also, they look like a style of gaming that has something to offer the #BROSR in the way...

It just keeps happening! The #BROSR: Giving you tomorrow’s D&D headlines…today! Several months ago, friend of the blog Mike DiBaggio interviewed friend of the blog Rick Stump on YouTube to discuss the latter’s 42-year old AD&D campaign.  It’s a great interview.  So great I’m posting it here for your...

The topic of matrix games has been popping up on my radar a lot lately. For those of you who are uncertain about the term, allow me a brief introduction. A matrix game is a talky talky exercise adjudicated by a referee and structured in such a way as...

The #Trollopulous MegaVerse is the most interesting thing to happen to D&D in decades. Those glorious edgelording bastards in the #BROSR found a way to reinvigorate a hobby that had plateaued and they did it by taking a game everyone owns but doesn’t play and, for the first time...

The 2005 adaptation of Douglas Adams’ “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” is an underappreciated gem. Sam Rockwell’s performance as the president of the galaxy presents a perfect blend of Clintonian and Bushian “aw shucks arrogance and charm” that is refreshingly non-partisan from a Hollywood production.  He even manages to...

We’re really doing this again? Not even a breather from the last barn dance? All right, let’s do this. You would have to be a special kind of stupid to get involved in a border clash in eastern Europe without death on the line, and make no mistake about...

I’m in the process of filming my third extensive war game campaign using William Sylvester’s excellent “Solo Wargaming Guide”, and let me tell you, the process really gets the noggin jogging. Particularly at a time such as ours, when armies are on the march, and pencil-necked warriors declare themselves...

Remember in school when stupid teachers decided a quiet kid throwing down was ALWAYS the aggressor? Remember how they ignored the long periods of antagonism he endured before that punch? Man, that was crazy! As a friend on social media pointed out, that’s right now for setting my remembered...

There are two kinds of smart fellers in this world. Maybe more.  For the sake of today’s analysis of the culture of D&D, let’s lump the smart fellers into two groups, anyway. The first group contains the smart fellers who know they are smart, who make being smart their...