The parent of a role-playing gamer or any gamer who is concerned for his spiritual health is well-advised to consider the power of role-playing as a behavior modification tool. If you pretend to be heroic long enough, eventually you can become heroic. The danger of pretending to be an atheist or pretending to be an evil character should be obvious and should be avoided.
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Don't make me get my level 20 dual shield wielding Red Dragon disciple. I will shield bash your head in.
(real men dual wield shields, only women and gnomes use weapons)
"If you pretend to be heroic long enough, eventually you can become heroic."
The kernel of awesome represented by this sentence here deserves better than to be surrounded by the rest of this bullshit.
Dude, you're SO. FUCKING. LATE.
But i have to say, seeing the world in a politheistic perspective DOES give you a hint towards atheism. Then again if someone is mathematically/logically inclined enough to play any RPG he/she is probably already on the path to atheism by a good part
They're right, you know. If it hadn't been for Super Mario Bros., I would have never rescued all those princesses. Although I sure got tired of always having to go to another castle, let me tell you.
Yes, but the actuality of being an evil character in the real world as opposed to only pretending to be an evil character in a game is something about which Conservapedia members are able to give us first-hand experience.
As well as being actually evil, Conservapedia members are also playing roles in an evil fantasy game of extreme right-wing madness with preposterous and rabid views and, unfortunately for mankind's future well being, some of them are also parents.
I only learned that carps are vicious waterborne monsters. I think toady one made them too hardcore.
(If you get the reference, you get a reward.)
Eh? The funny thing is, becaue the it is just fantasy, I usually play Elves, Druids, Monks, Paladins etc which are very religious and not Atheist. Or Warriors which I can only presume are Heroic! I've even played a Rogue who was from a Thief from a religious sect.
Actually RPG covers many scenarios, I enjoyed playing a GURPS version of Firefly, where I've played an Atheist, and next time I'm thinking of playing a Preacher.
"If you pretend to be heroic long enough, eventually you can become heroic"
Bush must have spent hours pretending to be dumb then...
I played a Fighter who worshipped Thor for an entire campaign. At the end I, personally, was neither proficient in a Battle Axe, nor desired to worship Thor.
It seems from this post, that Conservapedia's posters, are obviously using their INT as a "dump stat"...Idiot character class from 1st Edition AD&D (INT 3 Max) ...
My lvl 22 Paladin of Helm will kick your furry butt up and down the street for your silliness. Your hateful god does not belong in a city under his protection.
Edit: actually, after having read the article, it's surprisingly well done. It's mostly even-handed, only including a comments on how it relates to Christianity under a couple specific headings, noting that while a small minority has a problem with it, most do not. It even includes a commentary from a United Methodist minister comparing the freedoms of D&D to the free will so widely vaunted by Christians.
I give the article a b+, a rather surprising thing for Conservapedia.
So I can become a man because I prefer to play male characters in games? I can get a gigantic pet cat that will only attack people whose names I write in red ink? I'll be able to carry thousands of pounds of gear in a tiny bag just by buying the right one? See how silly you're being?
And pretending to be an atheist doesn't make you one. That's what not believing in gods does for you. If you were right, there should actually be a whole hell of a lot more polytheists out there.
I've been a Dungeon Master for nearly fifteen years, roleplaying everything and existence itself!
Why am I still not omniscient?
What about those who take the Path of Humanity (White Wolf, particularly Hunter the Reckoning, Vampire the Dark Ages and Werewolf: The Apocalypse), Lawful good, Chaotic Good or Netural good? Even if they are atheist? What about some fanatics in the game? Paladins who fall and whatnot?
cue horrible D&D jokes...
I had to roll a will disbelief check to make sure you actually just said that.
someone took a few levels of fail recently.
is bringing up 20 year old issues a class feature or a feat?
I'm gonna guess INT was your dump stat.
you must have rolled a natural 20 on your stupid check.
Life does not work that way.
I play an immaculately evil, insane kleptomaniac in the Sims 3. But I am only one of those things.
I agree, crush the weeaboo scum by banning JRPGs from the household.
Don't you be touching my precious Dungeons and Dragons now. That's 'Merkan gaming at it's finest.
I'm snickering at the jokes, they just seem to write themselves.
This guy rolled a critical miss on his INT check, didn't he....
"If you pretend to be heroic long enough, eventually you can become heroic."
Or you just become annoying.
Plus, if the kid sits in the house all day and gets fat playing video games, he'll be immune from the subversive elements of reality and much easier to indoctrinate with your psychotic cultish behavior!
Having RPed a particular character for the better part of a year (though in the internet written-story way, not the tabletop gaming way, because I'm better at the writing side and woefully don't know anyone who does tabletop RP stuff) I can confirm that I did not turn evil, nor did I become a sadist, nor did I become a psychopath.
I also didn't turn into an alien, which kind of sucks, because I'd have been humanoid enough to go without being noticed as long as I didn't end up in hospital and I'd have become super-intelligent and lived for potentially millenia. Which would have been awesome.
Or it's an outlet, you get to play heroic or strong or evil or religious or whatever, and then you turn off the computer and go back to your regular life. Just like going to a movie, or taking a part in a play.
I know people who have been in all-evil campaigns. And have not done evil things IRL.
Hell, the one I'm in, while not technically "Evil Only" because our system doesn't have alignments, tends more towards the macabre and the morally questionable (not to mention that the de facto leader of the party is a misanthropic necromancer, who "likes the dead because they're less trouble than the living") because it's at a magic school at a time where you had to do morally questionable things to keep yourself alive long enough to practice magic. And yet, I would trust anyone in my campaign more than I would trust a Conservapedian. Because we can tell fantasy from reality and are better friends in reality than our characters are, whereas fundies seem to have that particular disjuncture switched off.
Except for the section submitted to FSTDT, I was pretty surprised how neutral and almost completely factually correct the Conservapedia article was. It even goes out of its way to criticize the Chick Tract mentality that since D&D has demons/devils, it must be EVIL!
Then I got to the quoted section and it all went downhill...
"The parent of a role-playing gamer or any gamer who is concerned for his spiritual health is well-advised to consider the power of role-playing as a behavior modification tool"
PROTIP: Chick Tracts are like the characters in RPGs: FICTIONAL
"If you pretend to be heroic long enough, eventually you can become heroic"
And if you pretend that what's in the Bible is real long enough, eventually you will become stupid. Your point?
By this logic, I'm going to turn into Quentin Tarantino, become a forensic scientist, pick fights with vampires and end up taunting a werewolf badly enough for him to bite me =B
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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