The New Yorker: The Uncanny Resurrection of D&D

[ripx187]

The New Yorker Magazine published an article that you might be interested in called, The Uncanny Resurrection of Dungeons & Dragons.

It discusses what people are using the game for, and it points out that there are now some trendy ways to play! It is wordy, but interesting too.

In 2017, Dungeons & Dragons, a game played outside the realm of the Internet, can feel slightly rebellious, or at least pleasantly out of place.

I kind of like that!

[Admin Pete]

Great link, a bit of nonsense here and there, but overall I find it encouraging that 5E with the tiny, tiny leavening of old school gaming that it possesses is bringing people back to D&D.

Example of nonsense is the bolded part that follows:

the game was too open-ended, and didn’t have a straightforward cognitive benefit

Apparently someone doesn't understand as much as he thinks he does. The bolded statement is about as separated from reality as you can get.

[ripx187]

Yeah, D&D's ability to convince others that "This Edition is the best" never fails to impress me. At least it is positive feedback! Typically products that encourage folks to think for themselves are frowned upon. We know the benefits of gaming, but it is nice to see it finally in print.

[robkuntz]

Leave it to the dumbed down "literati" of today to say that anything that is open-ended equates to no straight forward benefits. Talk about cognitive dissonance! You see, linearity in thought has been accepted as a cognitive equation for too long in education and thus its byproducts in every institution, including the game design "industry". This perforce champions the A+B=C course of thinking (the shortest course between two points), the exact opposite of what was espoused in OD&D. The shortest course between two points is a contracted throughput which adheres to a production protocol in thought and application (i.e., what is constant and immediate). The genius of OD&D is that it can be sculpted to flow diametrically upward while denying the immediate and constant "medium" curve in thought and application, thus shattering the linear model that was a standard in the games industry for hundreds of years. Its persistent results are in a prolongated building of continual abstractions and information and thus its use has direct as well as indirect outcomes as well as a marked unpredictability which at the least creates more choices and at the most new thinking and cognitive angles for future application, material or philosophical. The extended use of such a system creates active cognitive growth whereas production is geared only to its cyclical results, rinse and repeat. This is what, in the larger societal view, the mainstay of our thinking today has become (linear, based upon immediate throughput) so it is no surprise seeing that quote pushed forward as having merit and the dissonance connected with it. I won't be reading the article for obvious reasons.

[Deleted]

Coverage of D&D in the mainstream media has never been worth a bucket of lukewarm Orc whizz.

I see no reason to believe that has changed.

[Admin Pete]

A few quotes from the article:

A few months later, a parent stopped him on the street with tears in her eyes. “What are you guys doing?” she asked him. Her son was dyslexic and had been role-playing at Brooklyn Strategist for a couple of weeks. Before D. & D., he couldn’t focus on writing for more than a few seconds. Now he was staying up all night to draft stories about his character. “Whatever it is, bottle it and sell it to me,” the mother said.

Two popular role-playing shows, “The Adventure Zone” and “Critical Role,” sent Freeman’s older patrons to their knees, begging for more D. & D. time in the store. Soon, Freeman had to hire half a dozen paid Dungeon Masters for the kids and has now begun training volunteer Dungeon Masters to guide adventures for the adults who drop in on Thursdays to fight goblins, trick castle guards, and drink wine.

And the fear that a role-playing game might wound the psychologically fragile seems to have flipped on its head. Therapists use D. & D. to get troubled kids to talk about experiences that might otherwise embarrass them, and children with autism use the game to improve their social skills.

If a player thinks of something clever, you don’t have to thumb through a handbook for a strictly defined bonus. The Dungeon Master can ponder the idea for a moment—could a dwarf with low charisma, with a few well-chosen compliments, really convince a city of elves to love him?—and then decide to reward the player with an extra chance to succeed.

[robkuntz]

Aren't these, in particular the last, open-ended benefits? Thus the contradictory nature of the. "the game was too open-ended, and didn’t have a straightforward cognitive benefit," appears out of place with the examples. ...As we all know that open-endedness and the examples you quote were present at the beginning, so how does this change from what is now seen as being equal then and now by way of standardization and the contraction through that for being "too open-ended"? The answer, in part, would be the comparison of a general RPG board and forum to let's say, RoM to separate out the types and degrees of impact by both ideologies rather than to say that both have similarities to some degree when, and finally, the one reaches an apex and stops for kind while the other continues unabated for both degree and kind. The game has always had its merits in whatever form, but what it lacks in its newest forms is what has been stripped out of it, and those are some mighty big deductions when it comes to supra-cognitve growth and real, rather than tailored, choice.

[Deleted]

You're applying common sense and logic to what somebody spewed out to meet a deadline?

You're so cute.

[sixdemonbag]

Great article. I'm glad I took the time to read it.

The clinical psychologist, at first, doesn't foresee any "straight-forward cognitive benefits" to a game that is "too open-ended" compared to traditional board and card games. Then, once they actually play, he realizes all the tremendous, latent cognitive benefits therein.

Seems like the old D&D/RPG stereotypes are still hard to shake. It's good to see articles like this in mainstream media tout the numerous advantages of open games.

Thanks for sharing ripx187 !

[robkuntz]

Oct 30, 2017 13:24:51 GMT -5 @gronanofsimmerya said:

You're applying common sense and logic to what somebody spewed out to meet a deadline?

You're so cute.

Most journalistic standards may have disappeared but mine haven't.  

[Warrior Twin Two]

Oct 30, 2017 10:39:08 GMT -5 robkuntz said:

Aren't these, in particular the last, open-ended benefits? Thus the contradictory nature of the. "the game was too open-ended, and didn’t have a straightforward cognitive benefit," appears out of place with the examples. ...As we all know that open-endedness and the examples you quote were present at the beginning, so how does this change from what is now seen as being equal then and now by way of standardization and the contraction through that for being "too open-ended"? The answer, in part, would be the comparison of a general RPG board and forum to let's say, RoM to separate out the types and degrees of impact by both ideologies rather than to say that both have similarities to some degree when, and finally, the one reaches an apex and stops for kind while the other continues unabated for both degree and kind. The game has always had its merits in whatever form, but what it lacks in its newest forms is what has been stripped out of it, and those are some mighty big deductions when it comes to supra-cognitve growth and real, rather than tailored, choice.

I read the article as they started by thinking it is too open-ended that must be bad and then they discovered several times throughout the article that the starting assumption was wrong.

[robkuntz]

Oct 30, 2017 16:17:36 GMT -5 Warrior Twin Two said:

Oct 30, 2017 10:39:08 GMT -5 robkuntz said:

Aren't these, in particular the last, open-ended benefits? Thus the contradictory nature of the. "the game was too open-ended, and didn’t have a straightforward cognitive benefit," appears out of place with the examples. ...As we all know that open-endedness and the examples you quote were present at the beginning, so how does this change from what is now seen as being equal then and now by way of standardization and the contraction through that for being "too open-ended"? The answer, in part, would be the comparison of a general RPG board and forum to let's say, RoM to separate out the types and degrees of impact by both ideologies rather than to say that both have similarities to some degree when, and finally, the one reaches an apex and stops for kind while the other continues unabated for both degree and kind. The game has always had its merits in whatever form, but what it lacks in its newest forms is what has been stripped out of it, and those are some mighty big deductions when it comes to supra-cognitve growth and real, rather than tailored, choice.

I read the article as they started by thinking it is too open-ended that must be bad and then they discovered several times throughout the article that the starting assumption was wrong.

Well, OK.  I will take your word that they were arguing amongst themselves, then.  lol!  

[Admin Pete]

Oct 30, 2017 16:44:30 GMT -5 robkuntz said:

Oct 30, 2017 16:17:36 GMT -5 Warrior Twin Two said:

I read the article as they started by thinking it is too open-ended that must be bad and then they discovered several times throughout the article that the starting assumption was wrong.

Well, OK.  I will take your word that they were arguing amongst themselves, then.  lol!  

I will take his word that he is giving it a charitable reading.  It does read as though they were surprised by the results. 

[Admin Pete]

Oct 30, 2017 10:39:08 GMT -5 robkuntz said:

Aren't these, in particular the last, open-ended benefits? Thus the contradictory nature of the. "the game was too open-ended, and didn’t have a straightforward cognitive benefit," appears out of place with the examples. ...As we all know that open-endedness and the examples you quote were present at the beginning, so how does this change from what is now seen as being equal then and now by way of standardization and the contraction through that for being "too open-ended"? The answer, in part, would be the comparison of a general RPG board and forum to let's say, RoM to separate out the types and degrees of impact by both ideologies rather than to say that both have similarities to some degree when, and finally, the one reaches an apex and stops for kind while the other continues unabated for both degree and kind. The game has always had its merits in whatever form, but what it lacks in its newest forms is what has been stripped out of it, and those are some mighty big deductions when it comes to supra-cognitve growth and real, rather than tailored, choice.

For me the encouraging thing is that the guy who started this had played an earlier form of the game and apparently let the kids run with the open-ended part even if he did have reservations about it and did/does quite a bit of rulings on the fly and the kids and the adults are eating it up. I would love to be able to go see what they are doing firsthand.

[mormonyoyoman]

Oct 30, 2017 15:47:25 GMT -5 robkuntz said:

Oct 30, 2017 13:24:51 GMT -5 @gronanofsimmerya said:

You're applying common sense and logic to what somebody spewed out to meet a deadline?

You're so cute.

Most journalistic standards may have disappeared but mine haven't.  

Even in 1972, my journalism professor (a failed journalist and a classic example of "them as can't do, teach") showed by her example and choices that "journalistic standards" was becoming an oxymoron.

College - where good brains go to conform.

[robkuntz]

Considering that the original game's benefits were as persistent and apparent then as they are today I find your initial reaction, "The bolded statement is about as separated from reality as you can get" more to the point of it all.  Here we are, how many decades later? and we must still be noting  (yawning more like it) that the stripping of the game down to its entertainment components only must give way, on occasion, to a "tiny leavening" of openness?  This, to me, is not a victory.  It is a 40 year plus sign of what ranges were cast aside, a glaring example of defeat compared to what could have been if the entire system had been left to its own devices, which it was not.

Oct 30, 2017 17:53:09 GMT -5 Admin Pete said:

I cannot argue with this beyond noting that in spite of the deliberate and pervasive suppression of the open-endedness of the original concept, somehow when kids take hold of it in the hands of any adult that is even a little bit open to that open-ended concept, kids don't seem to have any trouble picking it up and running with it. If you could get the original concept out front and center on public view, it makes me wonder what could happen. And you are right, it is depressing to compare what could be with what is.

[Admin Pete]

Oct 30, 2017 18:40:13 GMT -5 mormonyoyoman said:

College - where good brains go to conform.

Did you say to conform or to be chloroformed?

[mormonyoyoman]

Same same, only different.

[robkuntz]

PD said:  I cannot argue with this beyond noting that in spite of the deliberate and pervasive suppression of the open-endedness of the original concept, somehow when kids take hold of it in the hands of any adult that is even a little bit open to that open-ended concept, kids don't seem to have any trouble picking it up and running with it. If you could get the original concept out front and center on public view, it makes me wonder what could happen. And you are right, it is depressing to compare what could be with what is. * the part I bolded *

It was in the public view at the beginning and flourishing.  Thousands of people were their own masters of thought, thousands of comparisons were made, thousands of different POVs were shared and grew, evolving the concept along with the people who used it.  Now we gauge a victory by comparison to that past as a "tiny" movement in an uncertain direction which we must question in hindsight, for free thought and imagination have both been reigned in by having them constrained to a market model and the "one true way" of the consensus POV which is but an echo-chamber of the market view of repeatedly circling the wagons.  The battle was lost my friend, this one at least, and there are only so many veterans now left sharing a story that is ill-understood by those others that were weaned from a different bottle.  When one must wonder and concern themselves about the human mind's capacity for thought and evolvement as expressed in that article, then the battle -- a mere chipping point this time around -- has not been joined anew; there is no resounding battle cry as it was to my own ears now almost 46 years removed.  The kids are meant to "grow up" don't you know and then proceed to "adult" systems of play, ordered, exact and un-compromisng -- that which Arneson proved was a false canard.

[Admin Pete]

Hmmm, I see myself quoted but I don't know what happened to the original post, it seems to be gone, strange.

[robkuntz]

Oct 31, 2017 14:51:54 GMT -5 Admin Pete said:

Hmmm, I see myself quoted but I don't know what happened to the original post, it seems to be gone, strange.

It's embedded in my other post upthread, yes, very strange.

[ripx187]

Dungeons and Dragons is still a learning tool, it always asks more and more of us. The more that you know the better the engine functions. I find it is silly for people to play any system as written as if there is some point to it. I also think that it is a damned travesty that there are people out there that know more about the world of Forgotten Realms than they know about this one. 

[mormonyoyoman]

Then they're not forgotten but we are? Superamalgamated bummer.

[hengest]

Bumping this. The link in the OP still works.

One comment on a quote from the article:

A few months later, a parent stopped him on the street with tears in her eyes. “What are you guys doing?” she asked him. Her son was dyslexic and had been role-playing at Brooklyn Strategist for a couple of weeks. Before D. & D., he couldn’t focus on writing for more than a few seconds. Now he was staying up all night to draft stories about his character. “Whatever it is, bottle it and sell it to me,” the mother said.

Now, I'm not making light even a bit of the struggles of dyslexia or anything like that. Just how this anecdote is presented in the article. We all know that this kind of hobby can be very engaging. But there are other engaging things...or were. Right? That also have creative elements?

It seems to me that a lot of the engagement has been bled out of our culture and especially our recreational activities. So many activities now are not engaging but "stimulating," almost like a drug. I'm all for promoting gaming, but...if this is the first thing a young person encounters that's engaging rather than stimulating...and I can imagine that it might be for some these days...that's quite a problem, isn't it? 

[The Perilous Dreamer]

Feb 5, 2022 11:24:24 GMT -5 hengest said:

Bumping this. The link in the OP still works.

One comment on a quote from the article:

A few months later, a parent stopped him on the street with tears in her eyes. “What are you guys doing?” she asked him. Her son was dyslexic and had been role-playing at Brooklyn Strategist for a couple of weeks. Before D. & D., he couldn’t focus on writing for more than a few seconds. Now he was staying up all night to draft stories about his character. “Whatever it is, bottle it and sell it to me,” the mother said.

Now, I'm not making light even a bit of the struggles of dyslexia or anything like that. Just how this anecdote is presented in the article. We all know that this kind of hobby can be very engaging. But there are other engaging things...or were. Right? That also have creative elements?

It seems to me that a lot of the engagement has been bled out of our culture and especially our recreational activities. So many activities now are not engaging but "stimulating," almost like a drug. I'm all for promoting gaming, but...if this is the first thing a young person encounters that's engaging rather than stimulating...and I can imagine that it might be for some these days...that's quite a problem, isn't it? 

I fully agree with you and it is IMO a major problem.

[The Semi-Retired Gamer]

This is an interesting topic. I can speak for my own situation and no one else. My son is on the autism spectrum; mostly manifesting on the social level. We discovered this because he was something like a year and a half and was doing very little verbal interaction. Now, his verbal stuff is pretty spot on. He does socialize and he does have some friends that he talks to and interacts with at school. I'm still not accustomed to the fact that he is 15 years old and has never had anyone stay the night or stayed the night at a friend's house. I see no reason to force the issue on that.

I went through a roundabout way to get to my point, but my point is I completely understand what is going on with the child with dyslexia. When my son was young, I put him on my Wii to see what he would do. I also had YouTube and Netflix on the Wii so it was like an all-in-one entertainment setup. The interaction with the game - don't know if it would have happened the same with any game system but the Wii was particularly interactive - got him not only more mobile (really not a problem with him at the time) but the important thing is he started talking much more than he previously had. His speech was improving as he would come get us to show us something on a game. It wasn't uncommon to go in his room and he would be watching something semi-educational on YouTube about science. One day there was a small group of adults outside talking about the flowers, etc. during the spring. He had walked up on this conversation and after listening for a bit he said, "That's pollination.". Then he went on to explain the process and what takes place. IIRC he was 7 at the time. Everyone just looked at each other like what in the world is this little guy talking about.

I know a lot of people like to talk about video games and TV "rotting the brains of the youth" but I don't see it that way. Can it get out of hand? Certainly. As with anything, people just need to use moderation and discretion. I let him maintain a game console in his room, but he understands that schoolwork comes first and so far, it hasn't been a major issue. Like any kid there are times he tries to push it a little, but I've never had to be stern about it. I just ask him, and he says, "Oh yeah." and stops playing and does his schoolwork. He did have a birthday celebration one year and we took him and a friend to watch a movie, eat, and play video games in the arcade. Still no staying overnight but that doesn't really concern me. I can understand that. People can be jerks. 

He also has discovered D&D and loves going to the hobby shops with me.  He will engage in conversations with strangers and the store workers about different games.  You can't convince me that games (of all sorts) can never be beneficial.  It just takes a little moderation and discretion.

[hengest]

For the record, I really didn't mean my comment as directly related to the situation described, neither. Simply that it made me think: well, didn't a LOT of things used to be engaging? And if there were more of them still in active use, maybe D&D wouldn't "pop" so much?

Again, for the record, what I meant by stimulating but not engaging was things like:

• scrolling, apparently in anguish, through social media, stopping on nothing, reading nothing, viewing nothing, just thumb, thumb, thumb (I have mostly seen adults do this, but also some younger people, and I admit, I have done it some myself)
• today's political / social discourse, which seems to admit even less nuance and originality than it did twenty years ago -- just say your pre-fab opinion or watch out

The various activities that are strangely addictive but...where there is nothing to do.  

I certainly didn't mean everything that involves a screen!

[The Semi-Retired Gamer]

Feb 5, 2022 13:52:15 GMT -5 hengest said:

For the record, I really didn't mean my comment as directly related to the situation described, neither. Simply that it made me think: well, didn't a LOT of things used to be engaging? And if there were more of them still in active use, maybe D&D wouldn't "pop" so much?

Again, for the record, what I meant by stimulating but not engaging was things like:

• scrolling, apparently in anguish, through social media, stopping on nothing, reading nothing, viewing nothing, just thumb, thumb, thumb (I have mostly seen adults do this, but also some younger people, and I admit, I have done it some myself)
• today's political / social discourse, which seems to admit even less nuance and originality than it did twenty years ago -- just say your pre-fab opinion or watch out

The various activities that are strangely addictive but...where there is nothing to do.  

I certainly didn't mean everything that involves a screen!

No, you're good. That's exactly how I understood it. I was relating my experience. I got rambling...lol. I completely agree with your comments. Things used to be engaging and substantial. Now, most things are filler, no killer...lol.

[hengest]

If every video people watched was some instructional thing about pollination...or mathematics...or painting...we'd be living in a very different world!

The stuff your son does, by the way, sounds pretty cool to me...

[The Semi-Retired Gamer]

Feb 5, 2022 14:21:33 GMT -5 hengest said:

If every video people watched was some instructional thing about pollination...or mathematics...or painting...we'd be living in a very different world!

The stuff your son does, by the way, sounds pretty cool to me...

Agreed. Very different indeed!

Thanks! I appreciate it!