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Joined: Dec 06 2007 Location: Connecticut Posts: 11244

The other day, while I was eating a protein bar and drinking some water after a martial arts class, I began to talk with one of the other students about the class lessons we had just gone over.

In the corner of the room a few of the other class members were having their own conversation.

When I ended my discussion and was on my way out I began to say my goodbyes when I overheard that other conversation.

"Well any type of club is just fine, it doesn't matter if it is a stick or a mallet. Blunt objects are blunt."

Intrigued by the weapons discussion I asked what the debate was about. I did not expect the reply I got... not even a little.

"We were just talking about Dungeon's and Dragons and version 3.5 vs 4. There are differences in how blunt objects are considered.

And this is where I am guilty... my first instinct was to think (not say) "What a dork". I continued on my way out and drove home as usual. While on my route I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that I play video games, I used to play D&D video games and even a few board games like it. I have been a geek my whole life and by trade and professional location I fit right in with that population.

So what was with my split second judgment? Who am I to call someone, even in my head, a dork because they enjoy something? The messed up thing is that I think I felt a lack of inclusion.

Frankly, my reaction is the one I expect from my friends and family who have no interest in gaming whatsoever. Perhaps I have been hanging out with them too much? It is also possible that my negative farewell to WoW three years back left me with a severely bitter taste for time consuming games of any kind.

Whatever the case, I don't actually think that people who play D&D are dorks... but maybe it is dorky to talk about it at a martial arts studio when those actual weapons are mounted on the wall directly next to the conversation.

Just thinking out loud here... I know a bunch of you guys play D&D regularly, I promise I'm not trying to critique you or give you a hard time. I actually think it is kinda cool that you have the common interest and the platform to share the experience with each other.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 12:58 pm

I understand what you're saying. I think about people being dorks all the time during situations like that, but I imagine people call me dorky too occasionally, so it's no big deal. I think a lot of things about a lot of people, even if I don't really mean it. It's just the way my brain works. I try to make fun of everything equally, after all, this is America.

Besides, wouldn't it be more dorky to pull a conversation about weapons in D&D out of thin air rather than having the relative stimulus of the weapons?

Title: Kenka Bancho Joined: May 05 2010 Posts: 227

I see your point in regards to putting somebody down over their hobbies, but at the same time if they're adults they won't give a damn and continue regardless.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 03:00 pm

I've always kind of embraced my dork-dom. It allowed me to connect with virtually any sector of the highschool social community. I could talk videogames with the dorks, wrestling with the athletes, metal with the metalheads, etc. I had friends in every clique.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 03:21 pm

I kill people all the time but I look down on other killers.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 03:44 pm

To be honest, this is something that I've seen an awful lot of, but it's not really a big deal. I've seen D&D people call Magic players dorks, tabletoppers or vid gamers call LARPers dorks, etc. I think part of it is compensatory for having others react the same way to 'nerds' in general. Shit always rolls downhill, right?

Posted: Sep 02 2010 03:55 pm

I think people who eat protein bars and/or drink water are dorks.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 04:04 pm

aeonic wrote:

To be honest, this is something that I've seen an awful lot of, but it's not really a big deal. I've seen D&D people call Magic players dorks, tabletoppers or vid gamers call LARPers dorks, etc. I think part of it is compensatory for having others react the same way to 'nerds' in general. Shit always rolls downhill, right?

This. It's the whole fandom totem pole. Unfortunately I couldn't find the image that illustrates this.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 04:08 pm

D&D better be at the bottom of that totem pole! Pen and paper RPGs? Psshaw! Why don't we do our taxes on an abacus while we're at it?

I guess it's better than Warhammer though.

Joined: Dec 06 2007 Location: Connecticut Posts: 11244

Klimbatize wrote:

I think people who eat protein bars and/or drink water are dorks.

I officially feel better now.

Wink

Posted: Sep 02 2010 04:30 pm

I don't know about dorkiest, but water is the gayest of all the beverages.

Joined: Jul 31 2010 Location: Callifornia Posts: 11

It's weird. Back in high school I wrestled, boxed, and worked out a lot. I wasn't necessarily a real cool guy or anything but i for sure cared about my image and every time i saw those damn kids who played magic on the same table everyday, i was so jealous lol. They really didn't care about what other people thought of them, they would just play their game and have a great time. I loved magic and dnd too but no one at my school knows that. I was too worried about getting laid and all that high school stuff.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 04:38 pm

Mountain Dew is probably the dorkiest beverage. You never see anyone cool drinking Mountain Dew, except Jackie Chan. And Jackie Chan's not cool anymore.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 04:45 pm

Syd Lexia wrote:

I don't know about dorkiest, but water is the gayest of all the beverages.

Indeed. I mean, gay people are like 75% water.

Title: The Self-Titler Joined: Aug 14 2010 Posts: 598

I hate people who like to stir up shit with stupid replies on forums, but I am myself guilty of it on occasion.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 05:02 pm

Sarge wrote:

I hate people who like to stir up shit with stupid replies on forums, but I am myself guilty of it on occasion.

You're in the wrong place, brah

Posted: Sep 02 2010 05:02 pm

Syd Lexia wrote:

Mountain Dew is probably the dorkiest beverage. You never see anyone cool drinking Mountain Dew, except Jackie Chan. And Jackie Chan's not cool anymore.

Regular Mountain dew maybe, but LIVEWIRE is for real men, like Terry Bogard.

I can see the commercial now...

"Are you okay? LIVEWIRE will Rock You! Like CrackShoot, but with half the Crash!"

Also, ZIMA is the manliest beverage known to mankind.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 05:42 pm

I drink nothing but butane and Everclear.

Title: Kenka Bancho Joined: May 05 2010 Posts: 227

Quote:

D&D better be at the bottom of that totem pole! Pen and paper RPGs? Psshaw! Why don't we do our taxes on an abacus while we're at it?

Everybody I've ever talked to about it placed card games like Magic at the bottom without fail. For some reason, cards with dragons on them came off as nerdier than rolling dice pretending to fight a dragon.

Note: I like both, but ate a lot more shit over Magic than D&D.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 10:39 pm

See, it was always the reverse for me. Weird how those things work, and are different in different areas, huh?

Posted: Sep 02 2010 10:50 pm

I think Magic is way more respectable than D&D. Magic requires skill and cunning, and can even be profitable, whereas D&D is almost entirely luck-based. And the parts that aren't luck-based are placed squarely in the hands of a Dungeon Master who 9/10 times is either an idiot or a sadist.

Plus people get more passionate about D&D, and noticeably caring about stuff is lame. If I wanted to care about something, I'd adopt a child. Actually, it would probably starve to death.

Posted: Sep 02 2010 10:58 pm

The fact that you spend hours rolling die and writing stats down before you even think about actually playing D&D makes it far nerdier than Magic.

Posted: Sep 03 2010 05:21 am

There are levels of dorkitude so it is possible for one to consider himself a geek or dork, but still be caught off guard by the level of dorkiness eminating from someone else if they are higher up on the dork scale.

I play video games, love Star Trek, and enjoy Collectible Card Gamess but I felt very out of place when I visited a comic shop in my home town a few weeks ago. I just could not fathom the level of dorkitude in that place and I had the same reaction you did GP.

So what I'm saying is it is perfectly normal for a dork to scoff at other, bigger dorks.

Posted: Sep 03 2010 10:29 am

^ This

I went to a MTG draft last Friday which people will argue is pretty dorky.

I got their early and I was talking to some guy and he brought up D&D... and he went on for about 20 minutes non-stop about his last adventure. I don't think he stopped to breath.

"So I'm playing Gardwyn, my M.O.M.S. (Man Of Many Shapes I found out later) and we have to break into a heavily guarded vault and steal some magic daggers for a powerful wizard. So I turn in a pixie and pixies can perform one true shapeshift per day. So I change into a ___________ (I forgot what it was... some kind of earth creature thingy) which can phase through dirt and rock so I'll just walk through the walls and steal the stuff. Piece of cake right? Wrong! Its full of ghosts. And as a rule, I don't mess around with ghosts. Because when you fight a ghost its '1 Con, 2 Con, 3 Con Dead!'."

And he kept going on and on like that. Now I've played plenty of D&D in my day. But I kept thinking "This guy is a TRUE dork."

Posted: Sep 03 2010 11:32 am

For the record, Fanta is absolutely the gayest beverage in existence. Just saying.

I do the same thing sometimes, GP. Usually I think that sort of thing about tween phenomenons like Twilight or whatever--usually not D&D or games, obviously, since I play those myself. I wouldn't feel guilty though; you didn't say anything to them or put them down, and that's the important thing. This isn't yet 1984, and you can't be expected to control every single idle thought that crosses your mind.