Some Autobiographical Thoughts on Gaming (part 3)

     So, in the second installment, I left off talking about my autobiography in Gaming up to the end of the 1990s. In the third installment, I'll go into the year 2000 and beyond . . .

     In the year 2000, I moved away from the great state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations to live in exile in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, specifically in the town of Plymouth, which has designated itself as "America's Hometown" . . . Around the same time, a great revolution in Gaming took place: the Third Edition of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (although now they dropped the "Advanced" and went back to simply calling it "Dungeons & Dragons"). The release of 3rd Edition coincided very closely with my move - I bought it right away, of course, and so I owned the latest version of D&D, but had nobody to play it with.

     The 3rd Edition took a systematic approach to rebuilding D&D from the ground up. Instead of having new ideas, each using entirely different mechanics, simply tacked onto the rules (as was prevalent in AD&D 1st edition from the start, and slowly crept into AD&D 2nd edition over the years), the new system provided a "Core Mechanic" - the d20 roll, with higher always being better - and built everything else from there. This led to the new version of the game being called the "D20 System."

     The 3rd Edition of D&D was a pretty big deal in and of itself, but there was something else that came with it - the revolutionary "Open Gaming List" (OGL). This allowed other game companies to create and release materials relating to the D&D game rules, as long as they followed certain guidelines and didn't infringe certain copyrighted materials. What followed was a major boom in the game industry - it seemed like nearly every established game company started putting out D&D materials, and everyone with a personal computer who didn't have a game company seemed to start one. It was a time of unparalleled growth in the game industry, the "D20 System" was everywhere, and spin-offs like "D20 Call of Cthulhu" proliferated. And I was away from my gaming group.

     I was faced with two major problems - where to find a gaming group, and whether or not to convert my homegrown campaign world to the new edition. The first problem was solved when in December 2000 I moved into the basement suite of a co-worker who became a close friend, Mike B. In his basement, I had enough room to host game sessions . . . and I was able to convince members of my old gaming crew to make the 2-hour trek to Plymouth to play. So my crew consisted of Harry E. and Ray F. ( both founding members of the group, though Ray F. had to stop playing fairly soon, unfortunately), Bob B., and David C. Occasionally we also gamed with Ken S. Increasingly over the years we also gamed with Liz, who married Bob B. So I had a gaming group, though its composition varied a bit. The other challenge - what setting to use? - was a bit more difficult.

     I wasn't sure I had it in me to completely re-write my entire campaign world from the ground up to the 3rd Edition. Plus, my group felt that in the last 8 years or so, we had exhausted most of the possibilities of my core setting. So a compromise was settled upon - I would create a new setting based on the southern subcontinent of my campaign world, in the region of a city called "Delensar" (so we sometimes called it the "Delensar campaign"). Since I had never really detailed this region of my world, I wouldn't be rebuilding old material with new rules - I would be free to create setting and rules as I went. The other plan we came up with was a unifying plan for the types of characters - everyone wanted to try a "swashbuckling" campaign, and the names of the characters came first - "Robertt The Righteous" (Ray F.), "Garrett The Daring" (Harry E.), and "Everett The Downtrodden" (David C.). To these were added "Crevius the Wayward" (Bob B.), "Kurt The Cunning" (Ken S.), and occasionally "Rianne The Cautious" (Liz B.).

     I found that the new "D20 System" allowed for a more freeflowing style of play that coincided nicely with the "swashbuckling" style of the campaign. We ran rollicking adventures that were fun and funny, played both seriously and for laughs. It really injected new life into playing D&D. Maybe it was just the theme of the campaign, but most of us felt that the new D&D is what D&D should have been all along. And in 2003 came an upgrade - a revision of 3rd Edition, called "D&D 3.5" Although there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth over the supposed "nerfing" of certain classes, powers, and spells, for the most part this was accepted as a perfecting of the D&D RPG.

     Up until the advent of 3rd edition I kept notebooks (generally spiral bound at first, then 3-ring binders) full of all the lore of my campaign setting. Starting with 3rd edition, I tried moving to various other formats, including standard and large index cards, Microsoft Word document files, and file folders of handwritten notes.

     During these years, we did try branching out to other games and systems. We brought to a finale my long-running "Chicago By Night" game of Vampire: The Masquerade. I ran some Mage: The Ascension games. We had a short-lived "Las Vegas By Night" chronicle of Vampire. I even tried - briefly - to start a completely new campaign setting based on the Viking Age using D&D . . . this never really took off, but I have since based my new Pathfinder Campaign on the bones of a setting I wrote then.

     I began to discover the fringes of what would become the OSR (Old School Renaissance). Necromancer Games put out materials for D&D with the slogan, "Third Edition Rules, First Edition Feel" - and their stuff really did have it! It felt like those heady days in the mid 80s when 1st edition ruled! They managed to capture the feeling and ambiance of those old games perfectly! And then I found a company called Goodman Games which put out a line of modules called "Dungeon Crawl Classics" - tributes and homages to classic D&D modules (original D&D and 1st edition AD&D), with 3rd edition and later 3.5 rules. These even had the look of the old school modules. It felt like being young again. That's the only way to describe it!

     I ran games in Plymouth from around the spring of 2001 up until the spring of 2006, by which time the games had tapered off quite a bit. I was working two jobs - teaching Latin and working for Borders Books and Music at the Kingston Mall just north of Plymouth. Bob B. and Liz had gotten married, had a child, and family life was increasingly making demands. Ken S. couldn't get out to play much, and ended up eventually moving to Canada and settling down, getting married. Ray F. couldn't get much time, and he also had a child and the demands of family life.

     In the summer of 2006, I moved back to Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. I moved back in with my mother in West Kingston, briefly. Bob B. and Liz were living in Cranston and were able to host occasional games there. I wasn't really ready to run a campaign, so I started running modules of Dungeon Crawl Classics. I was stringing together individual modules to make a sort of campaign. It was fun. In July 2007 I moved into an apartment in Cranston with my then-girlfriend, now ex-wife Danyell M., who joined our gaming group (I married her in October 2008, and she became Danyell B.) Our Cranston apartment was just minutes from where Bob and Liz lived, and they hosted the games since they now had 2 children and parenting demands made it hard to get away.

     From 2007 to 2011 I continued to run D&D 3.5. We had Dungeon Crawl Classics, and a "next generation" of the "Delensar Campaign" with new characters set a number of years after the "Swashbucklers" had left off. In 2008, a NEW edition of Dungeons and Dragons was launched - 4th edition. Despite the initial excitement, this fell flat for us. We tried one game, and barely got off the ground. We never even finished the first module we tried. D&D 4th edition was an abomination - a version of D&D that was no longer recognizable as D&D. It strongly resembled the video game "World of Warcraft," and even used a lot of the terminology of WoW (like "character builds"). Despite this brief flirtation with 4th edition, we never returned to it. Harry E. reported that his sister Heather's generation started gaming with 4th edition, and having never really known anything else, considered it normal. But we could just never bring ourselves to look at it again. It was that bad.

     The change in the Open Game License (OGL) after the advent of 4th edition caused some big ripples in the Gaming world. One of these was the decision by Paizo to continue a version of the 3.5 game rules, modified and perfected into a sort of "3.75" as people called it - the Pathfinder RPG. I didn't really begin running this until November 2011, but I became aware of it in the Beta testing stage, and began to fall in love with the idea. A way to continue D&D! REAL D&D, not that 4th edition monstrosity!

     Anyway, I ran 3rd edition or 3.5 D&D between spring 2001 and June 2011, so a whole decade. These were very good times for Gaming. 4th edition barely touched us. But for financial reasons, in the summer of 2011 Danyell and I were forced to look at moving to a part of the country where I could find and maintain a job. So in June 2011, we wrapped up out D&D 3.5 campaign set in Delensar and we moved across the country to Phoenix, Arizona. Of all the things I left behind in moving, I honestly think the hardest thing to leave was my gaming crew. We had been together in some form since 1992. 1992-2011 was a heck of a good run.

     When Danyell and I arrived in Phoenix, we were determined to find a Gaming group as soon as possible. I was no longer going to try to maintain my old campaign world, which I had been building in some form from the 1980s up to 2011. I returned to a plan for a world based on the Viking Age. I also decided that since D&D 3.5 was officially supposed to be "dead" and thus unsupported, I would look to the "3.75" alternative - Pathfinder, then the fasted-growing fantasy RPG on the market. Using the Obsidian Portal website (since I had yet to find another format of storage flexible enough for my needs), I began planning out the broad outline of a new campaign setting and a new campaign . . . More to come on this in a 4th installment . . .

Some Autobiographical Thoughts on Gaming (part 2)

      In the first installment, I reflected on the beginning of 29 years of Gaming, and my first encounters with Dungeons and Dragons and Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (1st edition). Continuing from that point, I wanted to write a bit about the next decade of gaming: AD&D 2nd edition and branching out into other RPGs.

      In 1989, at which time I still lived in North Smithfield, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, the second edition of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons was released. I was an early adopter. I know a lot of Old School purists who insist that the 2nd edition ruined the game. But at the time, it was everything I wanted in a fantasy RPG. It took a system that had grown by accretion into a monstrosity of inconsistent rules, and transformed them into something of an organic whole. The rules were clearer, and better written. No, it wasn't as "Gygaxian" . . . but I loved it anyway.

      AD&D 2nd Edition was a big step forward in design and marketing. On the other hand, it did lose something in the transition, something that might be thought of as "Old School" flavor, "Appendix N" flavor, or even "Gygaxian" flavor. But flavor ought not to be dependent on rules and systems. Any Game Master (in D&D they're called "Dungeon Masters") worth his or her salt ought to be capable of evoking any flavor he or she wishes with almost any rule set. On the other hand, newer systems that make the "flavor" an integral part of the rules (most notably the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG) have demonstrated the importance of considering the feeling that one is trying to evoke from participants.

     In 1989 I began my first real campaign using the AD&D 2nd Edition rules, though I still used a lot of 1st edition rules and mixed systems somewhat freely and with growing skill over time. I didn't have a big group: mostly my friend Timmy, his friend Mike, and my brother Eric. Occasionally we would have "guest stars" game with us, but this was so infrequent, it scarcely bears mentioning. I was 14 years old when I designed my first fantasy campaign setting. I continued to use that setting through 3rd edition and 3.5, up until the year 2011, although it had changed significantly over the years . . .

     In a way, the second edition of AD&D fell victim to precisely what it had been intended to correct - the creeping accretion of extra "optional" rules that did not always fit together well. AD&D 2nd Edition had what I then considered some brilliant options, including the "Complete Handbooks" for various character classes full of great ideas and optional rules, including a feature called "kits" that could give a character built-in backgrounds and story hooks. This is precisely what some "Old School" Gamers dislike about 2nd edition - it moved things like character backgrounds and story hooks from the realm of pure role-playing into the realm of rules. But I knew no one at the time who didn't enjoy and use those optional rules. I liked that it allowed me as Dungeon Master to quantify such things and keep them from unbalancing and disrupting my game. Yes, I know that "Old Schoolers" might say that I wasn't a very good DM if character backgrounds without rules could disrupt my game. Maybe I wasn't. I was only 14.

      In early January of 1991, I moved rather unexpectedly and abruptly from North Smithfield to South Kingstown, in the great state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. The reasons for this move are not important to my autobiographical thoughts on Gaming (it had to do with the divorce of my parents and moving from my father's house to my mother's home at the other end of the state), but what was significant was the impact it had on my Gaming.

     At first, it meant my Gaming world fell apart. I couldn't play with Timmy and Mike any longer. I only had my brother, and he and I didn't enjoy playing one-on-one anymore. So I retreated into myself a bit. It's depressing to look back on it. I continued to expand my campaign world - lovingly writing notebook after notebook full of details about my world - but I had no games to play there.

      But in September of 1992, I met David P., who has been my good friend ever since. We met in Chemistry class - "Chemsitry in the Community" - at South Kingstown High School. We were both being antisocial and refusing to work with anyone in chemistry lab, so our teacher put us together as lab partners. Surprisingly, that worked. And David lived less than half a mile down the road from me. So we became friends. We hung out. We studied for Chemistry together (badly). And one day, when David was hanging out at my house, he saw my D&D books. What follows is my best recollection of how the conversation went:

     "You play D&D?" he asked.
      "Not anymore," I said, "I don't have a gaming group here."
      "What are these?" he asked, looking at the huge pile of notebooks in which I was lovingly fleshing out my campaign world.
     "That's my world," I answered, and explained how my only outlet for fantasy role-playing was writing about the world I had invented. I had immense details of the history, linguistics, cultures, religions, and so forth.
      "You're still putting in all this time and work creating a world, and you don't even play? What the heck?" David's expression was pure disbelief. Then he said, "My friends and I used to play D&D. Kind of. My friend Harry used to make dungeons and run us through. But there wasn't really a world. Just a bunch of dungeons. It was kind of fun. But I bet it would be better with a world and a story behind it. Maybe we could play with you?"
     "Uhhhhh . . . maybe. I guess. But . . . well, I don't know. I don't know your friends . . ." You have no idea how shy I used to be. The fact that I had David for a friend was a minor miracle. The thought of making a bunch of new friends was terrifying. I hoped that would be the end of it. How sick is that? I actually hoped I wouldn't make any new friends or have to participate in social activity, even if it meant participating in my favorite hobby.

      Little did I know, but David had no intention of letting it go. He nagged me about it over the next couple of weeks. I tried to give noncommittal answers. Then one day he asked me how many players I needed. I said, "Well, really, like 3 or 4 would be good, I guess, but I don't really want . . ."
      "Great!" said David, "I'm going to play, and I've got 2 friends that want to play. What about your brother? Would he play?"
     "He probably would," I said, "if I were going to run a campaign. But I'm not, really. It might be fun, but I'm not really ready . . ."
     "You do nothing in your spare time but read books and write your game," he said, "so I think you're ready."
      "Well, maybe someday . . ." I said.

      A couple of days later, during a pouring rainstorm, there was a knock on my door. I opened it and found David P. and his friend Ray F. standing there, soaked. "What are you guys doing here?"
     "We're here to make characters for the game! Ray wants to play!"

      And so, due to my friend David's persistence, I was back in Gaming. David wanted to play a Wizard named Thor Zenglar. Ray wanted to play a Fighter, and using The Complete Fighter's Handbook, created one with the Berserker kit, named Vic Destiny. A few days later, their other friend Harry E. created his Thief character, Rade (pronounced "Rad") Jackson. My brother started with a couple of characters, but the one he settled on was a Paladin, Nolverio Siroval. The names didn't really fit the campaign world - I later retconned them a bit to explain them as nicknames or translations of their actual names in the world. But thus began my longest running campaign for most of my life (1992-1998 with the same characters and setting, played on-and-off), and a group that lasted from autumn of 1992 to summer 2011. We ran those original characters a long time. When they started to get high in level, and others wanted to join, we ran another campaign to get new characters up to the same level, and gave them the chance to join up with the other characters. David C. and Bob B. joined as regular players. David P., the founder of our group in many ways, left in later 1993 when he joined the Army after we graduated from high school. My brother left in 1995 when he graduated high school and joined the Marines.

     I ran lots of D&D 2nd Edition campaigns in those years. All connected to that same main campaign and setting, eventually. It created an expanded setting that grew in ways I never expected. It was awesome.

      In addition, we began to branch out and try other games. Harry E. ran a Marvel Superheroes RPG campaign (known as the FASERIP system for the main attributes of the characters). It wasn't a very serious campaign - it was mostly slugfests of super-powered heroes smashing each other and villains. But eventually, a real storyline developed. I enjoyed it because I got to play instead of just being Game Master.

     In early 1993 was also tried the relatively young Storytelling game of Vampire: the Masquerade. This game was based much more on deep role-playing and telling a compelling story rather than fantasy adventure. Players took on the role of vampires - cursed, doomed monsters - and were meant to confront the paradox of the monstrous things they would have to do in order to avoid becoming worse monsters - "A Beast I am lest a Beast I become" was the riddle of the vampire. But as a 17 year old schooled in fantasy RPG adventure, I found it hard to get in the proper spirit as Storyteller, and my players treated it much like D&D or, more accurately, like Marvel. They ran vampire characters with super powers. Yes, it was very sad that they had to hunt humans and drink blood to fuel those powers - so sad, really - but look at all the cool stuff they could do! It was years before we had a really good Vampire campaign, or "chronicle" as that game termed it.

      But the Storyteller system also produced one of my absolute favorite RPGs of all time, which we picked up in autumn of 1993 - Mage: The Ascension. I enjoyed this both as player (David C. ran it) and as Storyteller. I can't get too much into how and why I love this - I would gush - but check it out. The 20th Anniversary Edition of Mage (which was due out for 2013) is getting finished up at the end of 2014. Check it out. Seriously. Do it.

      We tried other games, too. I ran Call of Cthulhu one-shots. I ran Tales from the Floating Vagabond one-shots. We tried all the Storyeller games (besides Vampire and Mage, there was Werewolf: The Apocalypse, Wraith: The Oblivion, and Changeling: The Dreaming). There were even spin-offs, some of which spawned fondly remembered chronicles, like "the X-Files Campaign" (a chronicle using the World of Darkness setting of Storyteller games and a supplement called Project: Twilight which focused on characters who were government agents who delved into the supernatural threats facing the world).

     I finally ran a truly great Vampire: The Masquerade chronicle we just called "the Chicago Game" because it ended up in the Chicago By Night setting. It featured a vampiric detective (inspired somewhat by the TV show Forever Knight) named Radford I. Jackson played by Harry E., who was seeking to become human again. He was opposed by another player character, a demonic Baali vampire known as Johnathan Brisby, played by David C. Just thinking about how David C. played Brisby still gives me chills after all these years. He was truly evil, and trying to drag Chicago down into Hell - literally. Bob B. played an elder vampire named Terrex, who was caught up in the city's vampiric politics, and ultimately became the city's vampire Prince. Others played with us on occasion. I think we ran precursor campaigns in 1994, but it became a campaign of its own in 1995 or early 1996, and we ran it through 1998 or so. It really ended in the early 2000s, finally.

      But through it all, D&D remained my first love. We always came back to that. I always came back to that.

      In 1993, I graduated from high school and went to college at the University of Rhode Island. Most of my friends went to Community College of Rhode Island. We kept gaming together, but as I mentioned, we lost founding member David P., who joined the Army.
      In 1995, my brother joined the Marines, as I mentioned. We kept gaming.
      In 1998, I graduated from URI. We continued to game, but I went to graduate school at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. This made it harder to game, but we still got together and played whenever I was back in town. Talk about a dedicated gaming group!

     The real big leap came in 2000 when I graduated from the M.A.T. program in Latin and Classical Humanities from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. I had overcome that youthful shyness and was ready to go out into the world as a teacher. I took a job as a Latin teacher in Plymouth, Massachusetts. I was going to move away - permanently. Could my gaming group survive? We would be about 2 hours of driving apart, in a region of the country where people don't drive more than 20 minutes if they can help it.
     Worse, it was announced that AD&D 2nd Edition was coming to an end. The new owners (D&D was originally Gygax's company, TSR, but they were acquired by Wizards of the Coast) had decided to release a 3rd edition of the beloved game. And they were dropping "Advanced" from the title. The third edition would not be Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 3rd Edition - it would be simply D&D (or so they hoped - in reality, everyone I knew called it "3rd edition," and when they later released an update, "3.5"). Would I adapt to the new edition, or stick with the 2nd edition? I couldn't fathom the amount of work it would take to revise my entire campaign world into a new rule set.

      More thoughts on this when I have time . . .

   

Some Autobiographical Thoughts on Gaming (part 1)

     I'm a Gamer. A REAL Gamer, an RPG Gamer, not those video-game n00bs who dare call themselves "gamers." I sometimes use the capital letter to indicate the difference between (video) gamers ("Dude! I just got a PS4! I'm a gamer!") and (RPG) Gamers ("Dude, last night I lost the 13th level fighter that I've been playing in my friend's Greyhawk campaign for like 5 years!").

     The point is, I'm a Gamer. And I have been for some time. This is on my mind because I just celebrated my 39th birthday on September 10th. And I remember that my love of RPG gaming began with a birthday in the 1980s.

     Oddly enough, I cannot now be 100% certain what year that was. My recollection now is that it was September 10th, 1985, but my recollection may be flawed. It might have been 1986. I know that by 1987 I was already a fledgling Gamer, so it had to be before then.

     So this birthday marked 39 years on this planet, roughly 29 of which I have been involved in RPGs. It is a significant year to consider these things - the RPG hobby began with the first publication of Dungeons & Dragons in 1974, so this year (2014) marks the 40th anniversary of the hobby. My hobby has been around just one year longer than I have, and for nearly three quarters of its existence, I've been involved.

     I had been playing those adventure books that let you choose your own adventure. My family couldn't keep up with my demand, so I used to get them from the public library (in Woonsocket, in the great state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations). I remember first seeing AD&D (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons) books there. So I became aware of the existence of RPG games by about the time I was 9.

     So, my birthday in about 1985. I knew of the existence of D&D. I didn't know how it worked, but I knew it existed. I was entranced by the idea. So when we went to the local Waldenbooks at the Lincoln Mall (a now sadly defunct bookstore and, last I checked, largely defunct mall), and my family asked me to pick out something I wanted for my birthday from the bookstore, I picked a D&D box.

     At this point I knew nothing about RPG gaming, really. I remember wondering if the box had a board in it like other boxed game sets (like Monopoly or something). I wondered how the game was played. I couldn't wait. I did not realize I had picked out the wrong box - I picked up the black box because it looked cool. This was the "Master Set" for ultra-high-level D&D. I probably should have gone for the red one - the "Basic" set. I also didn't realize that this basic D&D was different from the Advanced D&D books I had seen at the library. I remember being a bit disappointed when I finally opened the box and started looking through the contents . . . and quickly figuring out my mistake. I couldn't play D&D for my birthday with only the Master Box.

     This did not deter me. I took out books from the library. I eventually picked up the Basic Box. I slowly figured out that there was a difference between D&D and AD&D, although I (and every other Gamer I met in those years) mixed the two systems somewhat freely. I taught myself the rules. I started making dungeons - using massive amounts of paper making wonderfully illogical dungeons. Eventually, I started playing by making solo dungeons for my little brother Eric and running his characters through them. My friend Billy used to play with his own group (he went to a private school, and I went to a public school, and I think his group was friends from his school, but I could be wrong). So Billy and I rarely played together, but we shared stories and ideas and swapped modules and such.

      Humble beginnings. I would be years before I had a full table of Gamers. In the beginning it was just me as Dungeon Master and my brother, and maybe a friend. On a couple of memorable and fun occasions, my brother and two friends.

      I remember how hard it was making sense of all the rules. The original editions of D&D and AD&D I played had evolved organically over a decade. New rules were just tacked on every so often. It could take a lot of cross-referencing to figure out how things were "supposed" to work . . . but we were young kids, and rarely played the games strictly by the Rules As Written . . . we took to heart the refrain found in many D&D books that the game was meant to be played however it was most fun for all concerned. Even so, I dearly wished someone would publish a version of the game which had  been planned from the ground up, not just allowed to sprout in all directions organically without any plan behind it. Bring a little order to the chaos.

     My wish was granted with the advent of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Second Edition (2nd Edition AD&D). Many people in the Old School Renaissance (OSR) now look back with horror on the coming of 2nd edition, but I welcomed it at the time. It was just what I had thought the hobby needed . . .

More thoughts to follow when I have time . . .

Thoughts on "Corrosion of Culture" (based on a review of Alain Finkielkraut)

Thoughts on "Corrosion of Culture" (based on a review of Alain Finkielkraut)

     I was reading in The Times Literary Supplement a review of Alain Finkelkraut's

L'identité malheureuse, and came across some thoughts I found interesting:

     "This 'European tradition of anti-tradition' worries Finkielkraut. Self-criticism has turned into self-hatred, he contends. Quoting Clause Levi-Strauss, he denies that cherishing your heritage and customs is racist. Europe's cultural inferiority complex is not the only - or even the main - threat to national identity.

     According to Finkielkraut, the modern world as a whole corrodes the chain that anchors us to our past. Technology is killing culture. Books, which allow you to focus on timeless essentials, are being replaced by devices that keep you connected to transient trivia. 'Reading a book is like walking along a path; reading on a screen is gliding along', he writes. The internet may provide free access to the treasures of mankind, but that is not how most people use it. It only 'enriches those who are already rich'. 

      Our wired world encourages the young to scorn the past. 'Theirs is an ethnocentrism of the present, which is no less narrow-minded than old-style jingoism'."

From Aulus Gellius I.VI

From Aulus Gellius' Noctes Atticae (I.VI):

"Verba Metelli haec sunt: 'Di immortales plurimum possunt; sed non plus velle nobis debent quam parentes. At parentes, si pergunt liberi errare, bonis exheredant. Quid ergo nos ab immortalibus dissimile ius expectemus, nisi malis rationibus finem faciamus? Is demum deos propitious esse aecum est, qui sibi adversarii non sunt. Dii immortales virtutem adprobare, non adhibere, debent'."

Great Quote from "The Many Deaths of the Black Company"

A great quote from The Many Deaths of the Black Company by Glen Cook, spoken by the narrator, Sleepy:

"A law as ancient as coinage itself says bad money will drive out good. The same is true of principles, ethics, and rules of conduct. If you always do the easier thing, then you cannot possibly remain steadfast when it becomes necessary to take a difficult stand. You must do what you know to be right. And you do know. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred you do know and you are just making excuses because the right thing is so hard, or just inconvenient."

The Bene Gesserit "Litany Against Fear"

From Frank Herbert's Dune, the Bene Gesserit "Litany Against Fear" -

"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."

On Thomas Jefferson and the Classical Philosophers

     From Carl J. Richard's The Founders and the Classics: Greece, Rome, and the American Enlightenment:

     "In 1803, Jefferson wrote regarding the classical philosophers: 'Their precepts related chiefly to ourselves, and the government of those passions which, unrestrained, would disturb our tranquility of mind. In this branch of philosophy they were really great. In developing our duties to others, they were short and defective.' In 1819 he declared: 'Epictetus and Epicurus give laws for governing ourselves, Jesus a supplement for the duties and charities we owe to others." (p. 187)

Great Quote from John Adams on Cicero

     Found on p. 61 of The Founders and the Classics by Carl J. Richard, a quote from John Adams in his diary in the winter of 1758 on the pleasures of reading the Latin orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero aloud:

"The Sweetness and Grandeur of his sounds, and the Harmony of his Numbers give Pleasure enough to reward the Reading of one understood none of his meaning. Besides, I find it a noble Exercise. It exercises my Lungs, raises my Spirits, opens my Porrs, quickens the Circulation, and so contributes much to Health."

Ah, Cicero! He's good for your health!

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 31 (Art of Manliness)

The final writing prompt:

Day 31: Reflect on the last 30 days of journaling. Did you enjoy the experience? What did you learn about yourself? What was most difficult? Will you continue the practice? If so, take some time to map out how you’d like your journaling habit to continue. It can be entirely up to you; don’t worry about following a set of rules. Maybe you want to write every day, maybe you’re okay with a slightly longer session every month or so. Just make sure it’s something that youwant to do.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 30 (Art of Manliness)

Here are the writing prompts for day 30:

Day 30: Jot down a list of all the things you’re grateful for. It could be as simple as “Family, Job, Home…” or as detailed as “The bacon I had for breakfast, the weather being warm today, the chance to sleep in this weekend…” When we aren’t feeling chipper, thinking about what we’re thankful for can help get us in the right mindset. No matter how down and out you may be, there is always something to be thankful for.

The Universe Is Not Indifferent (from Pressfield's "Do The Work")

Some thoughts on the nature of the universe and Resistance from Steven Pressfield:

The Universe Is Not Indifferent 

"I blame Communism. I blame Fascism. I blame psychotherapy. They—and a boatload of other well-intentioned ideologies that evolved during the mass-culture, industrialized, dehumanizing epoch of the late 19th and early 20th centuries—all posited the same fantasy. They all preached that human nature was perfectible and that, thereby, evil could be overcome.

It can’t.

When you and I set out to create anything—art, commerce, science, love—or to advance in the direction of a higher, nobler version of ourselves, we uncork from the universe, ineluctably, an equal and opposite reaction.

That reaction is Resistance. Resistance is an active, intelligent, protean, malign force—tireless, relentless, and inextinguishable—whose sole object is to stop us from becoming our best selves and from achieving our higher goals.

The universe is not indifferent. It is actively hostile.

Every principle espoused so far in this volume is predicated upon that truth. The aim of every axiom set forth thus far is to outwit, outflank, outmaneuver Resistance.

We can never eliminate Resistance. It will never go away. But we can outsmart it, and we can enlist allies that are as powerful as it is.

One thing we can never, never permit ourselves to do is to take Resistance lightly, to underestimate it or to fail to take it into account.

We must respect Resistance, like Sigourney Weaver respected the Alien, or St. George respected the dragon."


Pressfield, Steven (2011-04-20). Do the Work (pp. 33-34). AmazonEncore. Kindle Edition.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 29 (Art of Manliness)

Here are the writing prompts for day 29:

Day 29: Try writing out your own personal manifesto. I’d describe the benefits and the how-to, but this short post does it much better than I could: http://www.artofmanliness.com/2012/02/13/how-and-why-to-write-your-own-personal-manifesto/

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 28 (Art of Manliness)

Day 28 writing prompt:

Day 28: Finally in this three-day journey, you need to gather the tools necessary to make your life a masterpiece. Take a look at the article, and define the various tools that you will need and use to work towards those purposes and goals you laid out a couple days ago.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 27 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 27:

Day 27: The importance of where you live: our home and environment have a tremendous impact on our lives. Take a look at the eight factors that should be considered when choosing where to live. Maybe you’ve never actually chosen, and you’ve just ended up where you are by default. Take the time today to think about the idea and importance of place. You may determine that where you are is perfect, or you may realize that you belong somewhere else.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 26 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 26:

Day 26: For three days, we’ll work from AoM’s “Craft the Life You Want” series. While many things in life are out of our control, there are more things than we often realize that are in our control. Most often, we simply don’t realize that we have the power to change things in our life when we aren’t happy. Today, work on crafting a life plan. It can be a long process, so if you’re short on time, start by defining your various roles as a man, and your ultimate purpose and goals within those roles, including specific action steps.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 25 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 25:

Day 25: There comes a time in every man’s life where he just feels…meh. He’s not happy about things, but he’s not depressed either. In fact, it’s probably a place where many men spend most of their lives. Take a look at the 5 switches of manliness — the things that ignite passion within us to live fully. Which of these is missing from your life? It’s not likely that all five are fully present, so take some time to jot down ideas on how you can better integrate these switches into your life so that you can have the motivation to seize each day as it comes.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 24

Here is the day 24 writing prompt:

Day 24: In modern times, men have become more spectators than doers; more consumers than creators. Yet one of the marks of a mature man is being someone who doesn’t just consume the culture around him, but actually helps create it. Think about all the ways you consume the world around you, and the time you spend doing it. Next, think about the ways you can reverse that, and start to actually be a creator. That’s an intimidating word to some, so come up with ways that you can get off the couch and do something productive instead of just mindlessly intaking.

What Elicits Resistance, and What is Resistance? (from Do the Work)

"On the field of the Self stand a knight and a dragon. 
You are the knight. Resistance is the dragon."

Pressfield, Steven (2011-04-20). Do the Work (Kindle Locations 63-65). AmazonEncore. Kindle Edition.


What elicits Resistance?

"[A]ny act that rejects immediate gratification in favor of long-term growth, health, or integrity. Or, expressed another way, any act that derives from our higher nature instead of our lower. Any of these acts will elicit Resistance."

Pressfield, Steven (2011-04-20). Do the Work (Kindle Locations 98-99). AmazonEncore. Kindle Edition.

What are the characteristics of Resistance?

Resistance Is Invisible
Resistance cannot be seen, heard, touched, or smelled. But it can be felt. We experience it as an energy field radiating from a work-in-potential.

 Resistance is a repelling force. It’s negative. Its aim is to shove us away, distract us, prevent us from doing our work.


Resistance Is Insidious
Resistance will tell you anything to keep you from doing your work. It will perjure, fabricate, falsify; seduce, bully, cajole. Resistance is protean. It will assume any form, if that’s what it takes to deceive you.

Resistance will reason with you like a lawyer or jam a nine-millimeter in your face like a stickup man.

Resistance has no conscience. It will pledge anything to get a deal, then double-cross you as soon as your back is turned. If you take Resistance at its word, you deserve everything you get.

Resistance is always lying and always full of shit.


Resistance Is Impersonal
Resistance is not out to get you personally. It doesn’t know who you are and doesn’t care. Resistance is a force of nature. It acts objectively.

Though it feels malevolent, Resistance in fact operates with the indifference of rain and transits the heavens by the same laws as stars. When we marshal our forces to combat Resistance, we must remember this.


Resistance Is Infallible
Like a magnetized needle floating on a surface of oil, Resistance will unfailingly point to true North—meaning that calling or action it most wants to stop us from doing.

We can use this. We can use it as a compass.

We can navigate by Resistance, letting it guide us to that calling or purpose that we must follow before all others.

Rule of thumb: The more important a call or action is to our soul’s evolution, the more Resistance we will feel toward pursuing it.


Resistance Is Universal
We’re wrong if we think we’re the only ones struggling with Resistance. Everyone who has a body experiences Resistance.


Resistance Never Sleeps
Henry Fonda was still throwing up before each stage performance, even when he was seventy-five.

In other words, fear doesn’t go away. The warrior and the artist live by the same code of necessity, which dictates that the battle must be fought anew every day.


Resistance Plays for Keeps
Resistance’s goal is not to wound or disable.

Resistance aims to kill.

 Its target is the epicenter of our being: our genius, our soul, the unique and priceless gift we were put on this earth to give and that no one else has but us. Resistance means business.

When we fight it, we are in a war to the death.


Pressfield, Steven (2011-04-20). Do the Work (Kindle Locations 101-134). AmazonEncore. Kindle Edition.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 23 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the day 23 writing prompt:

Day 23: Make a list of things that distract you. Every man deals with distractions, whether at work or at home. It could be the internet in general, it could be a specific website, it could even be something that’s actually beneficial, and yet distracts to some degree from something that’s important to you. Making a list creates awareness, and you can better slay those distraction dragons.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 22 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 22:

Day 22: Imagine you’ve been provided with a livable income for the rest of your life. You have no need to work, but aren’t rolling in money either. How would you spend your time? Your answer will say a lot about you and what your passion may be. Perhaps this discovery confirms your career choice, or maybe it makes you realize you’re not actually where you want to be in life. If it’s the latter, think about how you could make money with that passion, and even draw up a game plan for getting to that point. As much of our lives are spent at work, to dislike what you’re doing will not only drain you of energy and willpower, but also leave you looking back and wondering why you didn’t do anything to change it.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 21 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 21:

Day 21: Take a look at our excellent series on the four archetypes of manliness. Read the descriptions, and think about which archetype you most strongly resemble, and that which seems to be your greatest weakness. Write about how you can achieve better balance between all four archetypes and identify the specific ways in which you can strengthen your weaknesses and harness your perhaps overpowering strengths.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Days 19 & 20 (Art of Manliness)

I didn't get to post yesterday, so here are the writing prompts for both days 19 and 20:

Day 19: Reflect on your romantic relationship(s), and identify one area in which you’d like to improve. Be it your wife, fiance, or new girlfriend, there’s sure to be something you can do to make the relationship even better. If you don’t have a romantic partner in your life, perhaps you can identify past failures that you’d like to improve in your future relationships. You can choose to talk about this with your partner, or not. Either way, you’ve now put your relationship top-of-mind and will be more attuned to being intentional about keeping it healthy.

Day 20: Think about the period of your life in which you have the greatest nostalgia for. For me, it’s definitely college. Staying up late with friends, being forced to be creative with date ideas because I didn’t have any money, doing nothing but learning all day long…it was fantastic. Once you identify that time period, think of why you’re so nostalgic about it. There’s a good chance that there’s something from that time that you’d like to regain or recapture. Maybe you realize the importance of having close friends, or perhaps you’ll come to understand your desire to bea lifelong learner. Nostalgia can be healthy if reflected on and not obsessed over. You may not be able to recapture the past exactly (see Jay Gatsby), but there are elements of it that may make you a happier fellow.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 18 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 18:

Day 18: Identify one project you’d like to complete with your hands. There’s something special about a man doing work with his bare hands, and most men today have lost that. Maybe you want to start a garden, or build a workbench in your garage. Maybe you’ve been meaning to upgrade your bathroom on your own volition. Once you identify that one project, write about what you have to do in order to complete it. Detail the steps, the resources, the help you’ll need, etc. Then, set about doing it. Come back to this entry as motivation when you see yourself wavering.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 17 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the day 17 writing prompt:

Day 17: Hop on the internet and search for the biggest news stories in the year you were born.Infoplease is a great resource for this. Think about how these news stories, or even statistics, may have shaped your childhood or who you are today. For example, the year I was born, it was discovered that 98% of American households had at least one television set. I could write about how television influenced my generation, and continues to do so today, either positively or negatively.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 16 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 16:

Day 16: Imagine that someone has decided to write a book about your life, just up to this point. What would the cover blurb say? Be honest here. Is it kind of boring? Are you happy with it? Now imagine what you’d like that blurb to say at the end of your life. What changes need to made for that to happen?

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 15 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 15:

Day 15: Come up with your own Cabinet of Invisible Counselors. There are innumerable great men from history who we can learn from today. When thinking about your life or pondering some question or problem, yes, go to actual mentors and friends, but also take in the advice of men of yore. Write out who you would have on your list and what you admire about them. Having trouble coming up with a list? The comments in the post should offer plenty of ideas.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 14 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 14:

Day 14: Write a review of some form of entertainment you recently took in. Whether book or movie or TV show or Broadway play, write out what you liked and didn’t like about it. Was the acting/writing good? Could you follow the story? Is there anything you can take from it about life, or was it purely entertainment? This is often one of the most enjoyable entries to write, as it’s especially fun (and quite nostalgic) to go back and read these in the future. I can imagine that 10 years from now I will thoroughly appreciate my thoughts from this week on Roy Baumeister’sIs There Anything Good About Men?.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 13 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for Day 13:

Day 13: Perform a mind dump of everything you’re worried about. From the leaky dishwasher to your family member’s poor health — get it all out. Dwight D. Eisenhower did it, and it significantly helped him manage his stress. Just as your body needs to…cleanse itself of waste, so does your mind every once in a while. Getting all your stressors on paper may alleviate some of that pressure. Use  David Allen's GTD Trigger Listto help you out.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Days 11 & 12 (Art of Manliness)

     Unfortunately, I was not able to post the writing prompt yesterday, so today I will post writing prompts for day 11 and 12:

Day 11: Memento Mori. “Remember that you will die.” Admittedly, this isn’t the most pleasant topic. There is, however, great benefit in meditating on the reality that at some point, you will in fact die. It motivates you to live the life right now that you want to be living. Meditate on this, and write out your thoughts. Does death scare you? Does it motivate you? It’s okay to be honest.

Day 12: Give stream-of-consciousness writing a try. This is where you basically just write out whatever comes into your head at the moment it comes into your head. It can feel bizarre, and it’s certainly not structured, but it can lead to some valuable insights into what’s going on in your mind. I’ll give you a 10-second example from right now, while looking out my window: “Boy, I have a nice-looking grill outside and the weather is beautiful…just what we need after all this cold and snow. That cloud looks like a ship from Star Wars… it makes me want to be outside.. maybe I need to spend more time outside and appreciate the fresh air. Perhaps I’ll open a window!” Random? Absolutely. Offering some helpful insight about my desire/need for fresh air? Affirmative. Try this out for 10-15 minutes. You may uncover something — no matter how small — you hadn’t previously realized.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 10 (Art of Manliness)

Day 10: Check out the "hero's journey", and identify where you are in that journey. Doing so can help you better understand where you are in life, and help you figure out where to go next. You can take it in the context of your entire life, or you can take it in the context of a certain phase of your life. Either way, you can be sure that you’re part of a greater journey, and knowing what comes next can help guide you along.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 9 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 9:

Day 9: On this day, simply write about your day. This may seem especially boring, but write out the events of your day. What time you woke up, what you had for breakfast, what your commute was like, what you did during at work, how you spent your evening. If you’re journaling in the mornings, write about the previous day. The beauty of this exercise is that you may discover something that you hadn’t realized. Maybe you weren’t very productive at work, and reflecting on it can allow you to analyze why. Perhaps you finished a big project on the house when you got home; you can think about what motivated you, how it made you feel to finish something big, etc. Don’t discount the seemingly simple task of writing about your day.

Quote of the Day on Manliness

“To have done no man a wrong…to walk and live, unseduced, within arm’s length of what is not your own, with nothing between your desire and its gratification but the invisible law of rectitude—this is to be a man.” –Orison Swett Marden

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 8 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the day 8 writing prompt:

Day 8: Take some time today to reflect on your career. Jot down a timeline of it, including all the ups and downs. What was your best experience? And the worst? What would you like your future to look like, in terms of your career? If you’re a young man and haven’t started in yet, focus on that future part. What do you want your work to look like?

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 7 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the day 7 writing prompt:

Day 7: You’ve made it one week! Reflect on what this newfound practice has been like. Getting through the first seven consecutive days is truly the hardest part. Have you enjoyed it? Has it been difficult? Has it been what you expected?

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 6 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the writing prompt for day 6:

Day 6: Pick a quote from our 80 or so quotes on manliness and manhood and reflect on why it stands out to you. Does it reflect a man that you aren’t yet, but hope to be? Does one of them remind you of a great man in your life who you’ve tried to model? If you can’t seem to reflect on a single quote, just take the time to write out a few of them that you like. Doing so will keep them top-of-mind and perhaps lead to some thoughts later down the road.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 5 (Art of Manliness)

Here is the day 5 writing prompt:

Day 5: Write a letter to a loved one. Chances are high that there is someone in your life that you’d like to say something important to. Maybe it’s a wife, a parent, a grandparent you never really got to say goodbye to…take the time today to write that out. It can be positive, negative, or anywhere in between. The beauty of this letter is that you aren’t sending it in the mail, you’re simply “voicing” something that needs to be said. Should you choose to share it later, that’s okay, but you don’t have to. Doing this can be a great way to heal anger that’s been pent up inside, or to release a pressure valve of sadness we may have been harboring over something lost.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge, Day 4 (Art of Manliness)

     Here is the writing prompt for Day 4, on breaking bad habits:

Day 4: Via negativa; today, pick a habit that you’d like to eliminate from your life. Bad habits are like armpits, we all have ‘em and they all stink. Whether cutting soda out of your life, or putting a stop to your porn addiction; either way, as with yesterday, think about the steps you’ll take in order to put the kibosh on that negative habit. And again, also think about how you’ll keep yourself accountable to that goal.

Sign of the Labrys (Margaret St. Clair) - Appendix N and Beyond!

Title: Sign of the Labrys
Author: Margaret St. Clair
Appendix N Status: Part of the original Appenix N list by Gary Gygax

     One of the books that was part of Gary Gygax's (in)famous "Apppendix N" in the original Dungeon Master's Guide, this book is more what they call "weird fiction" than anything else. It is unfortunately not nearly so good as The Shadow People, the other Margaret St. Clair book mentioned in the appendix. 

     Set after a biological apocalypse (caused by "yeasts" that wiped out more than 90% of the population), this book follows a character named Sam Sewell as he quests through an underground world (partly natural caverns and part bunkers built for the nuclear war that never came) in search of a witch named Despoina, and slowly realizes that he is himself a hereditary witch of a sort. There is a weird mix of sci-fi, fantasy, and both Wiccan imagery (St. Clair was, in fact, connected to the early Wicca movement, and was apparently an initiated Gardnerian witch) and ancient Minoan and Greek imagery (hence the name "Despoina," Greek for "Lady," and the title's reference to the sign of the "labrys" (the double-bladed axe of Minoan iconography). 

     Some of the D&D elements I found in the book were:

* Dungeons and Dungeon Levels - The "dungeons" are part of a bunker complex built for a nuclear war, and most of the "monsters" in it are either experiments gone wrong, human enemies, or hallucinations, but still, the elements are there, as well as strange portals and traps and such. There is even something particularly D&D-like about the way each dungeon level has its own unique flavor, and they talk about the way things are on one level or another. This theme of exploring a weird underground world was also strongly present in The Shadow People. 
* Mythological elements connected to Minoan/Cretan myth and Greek mythology
* Magic is present, and strange, the adventurers possessing unique magic through the power of Wicca, though their enemies possess adaptations of "some of [their] techniques."
* There is a sort of rugged survivalist element to the tale, the heroes forced to endure the strange elements of its underground Otherworld, which seems to be a pretty common element in D&D campaigns. 

     All-in-all, it was fairly enjoyable, but not nearly so much so as The Shadow People. Still, a good read for fans of Appendix-N-type literature. 

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge - Day 3 (Art of Manliness)

     Here is the day 3 writing prompt from the 31-day challenge from The Art of Manliness:

Day 3: Decide on one positive habit you’d like to implement in your life. Whether seemingly mundane (like flossing) or perhaps life-altering (exercising every day), think of something you’d like to add to your life that will be beneficial. Then, think about the steps you’ll take to get there, and how you’ll keep yourself accountable.

Jumpstart Your Journaling 31-Day Challenge - Days 1 & 2 (Art of Manliness)

     I am undertaking the 31-day "jumpstart your journaling" challenge from The Art of Manliness. I'll be writing in my private journal, so I shan't necessarily be posting my journaling to this blog, but I figured I would share the writing prompts from the challenge. I started yesterday, but didn't get around to posting to the blog until today, so here are the first two writing prompts:

Day 1: Start with answering the question of why you want to journal, and beyond that, why you decided to embark on this 31-day experience. Write out what you’d like to get from journaling.

Day 2: Continuing to work within that idea of constraints, try to write a six-word memoir of your life so far. This idea is rumored to have originated from Papa Hemingway. The benefit is that with only six words, you really have to filter your life to what you deem most important. It may take you many iterations, but you’ll end up with something that speaks largely to who you are, if notin toto, then at least in this moment in time.