The Culture: The Play Is Serious, But The Players Are Not

(Following from yesterday's post.)

Friend of the Retreat nailed it when he made this post on The Site Formerly Known As Twitter.

We all know which of these guys is more fun to game with, don't pretend like we don't! pic.twitter.com/0jJqdx8SkJ

— Mr. Wargaming (@NotJonMollison) August 22, 2023

And the point is this:

I didn’t even notice this. Jon is on point with this. It’s all rule zero as long as it means DM gets to lord over the players. Cc: @ashofcreativity

— Best Friend Dubs (@Bdubs1776) August 22, 2023

The Cargo Cultists are getting mad about irreverent character names that show up in #BROSR session reports. This, of course, proves that they don't Read The Fucking Manuals.

Look at all the stupid nicknames in real life, even of kings! Charles the Fat, Charles the Bald, Aethelred the Unready, Julian the Apostate.

Look at the names of Western gunslingers, people in gangs, kids growing up. Militaries all over.

Nothing is as immersive as stupid names.

— D.J. Schreffler (@DJSchreffler) August 22, 2023

One of my old crew (a banker when I last crossed paths with him) was a guy that stood taller and bigger than me. We all called him "Tiny". My first ex-girlfriend (now a State Department official and lawyer) was known as "Rook" back in the day, and it wasn't due to her acumen at Chess or any affilation with birds.

In short, familiar and irreverent names are hardly out of line in a fantasy context. "Lord Robert" starts out as "Bob the Fighter", much like Lawrence Fishburn began as "Larry" (see Apocalypse Now), and people can and do reinvent themselves by renaming as circumstances allow (or demand).

Oh, and if you think this has no application to real life here and now, you have no familiarity with how Callsigns are done in military circles (Hint: You don't get to choose.) or spent much time around veterans recounting war stories.

The objections, however, exposed the real pattern that Jon above made explicit. This is about Totaliltarianism at the Table.

What the naysayers object to, it turns out, is not merely that there is a clear display of superior skill but also of an irreverent spirit- the very spirit present in the AD&D1e manuals and often lacking elsewhere.

Somehow it never crosses the minds of these Cultists that they are unable to comprehend players that play seriously, but are not themselves so serious, and the latter manifests in irreverent character names- names wholly in the spirit of the game as well as its source material.

Jon, Jeffro, and the boys are right: these people don't even play the game- they aren't part of the hobby. They should just go write stories; OldPub is where they belong.