Role-playing Rants: the life of an elitist shitlord

This hobby hasn't been kind to me lately. The flare is gone, it seems, and more and more I reminisce about the old times, better times. Which in turn brings me to rethinking some important stuff. Important for a gamer, that is.

Melancholy aside, the thing that I've wanted to talk about this day is the notion that "mine is better, you are wrong". You know how it works, like when one of your friends buys a new bike from company X and he'll do everything to prove to you that all other bike companies are for plebeians. Yeah, everyone knows a person or two like that. Well, I've found out that in the RPG fandom, such people are more numerous that flies on a piece of crap.

Worst of all, I think I am one.

Why hello there

It's very easy to become like that. You start of small - find yourself a favorite game system, be it a tabletop miniature game or an RPG. It dosen't necesserily have to be a little known, obscure title. Where I live most elitist shitlords are of the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay camp, the "one, true polish RPG". Of course that dosen't mean that every polish WFRP player is a douchebag, no, no. It simply means that among all those, who claim that "mine is best and yours suck", the majority spends most of their gaming time in the taverns of Old World, drinking beer (because of course they do).

If you go to any, random polish RPG forum, chance are that you'll bump into a discussion about the superiority of WFRP over, let's say, DnD, World of Darkness or Savage Worlds, or something else. Usually the arguments for that are laughable to say the least, with some of them outright claiming that "DnD is for kiddies, while WFRP is a true man's game" or that "no one here plays anything else". One may wonder where do these people get research to back up their claims. I can tell you where - from their unshakable conviction in things that they hold dear and want to be true, even if they are not.

Something like that

To avoid accusations about being a Sigmar-hating bigot, I'll provide another example and one that is much closer to my heart. For many, many years fans of Classic World of Darkness and those of the New WoD have been clashing with each other, both on internet forums and real life RPG conventions. Lately, after Paradox Entertainment claimed the rights to White Wolf's games and started the Chronicles of Darkness, tensions have been running high. There are those who wish for the classic WoD to return, with all of its splat and overgrown backstory. Then there are those who like the easy to learn and adapt style of the New World of Darkness and wish to see it prosper. Finally we have the CoD (not to be mistaken with a certain video game franchise), which I know fuck all about, so I'm not going to write anything about it.

Personally I always liked the oWoD line of games, mainly for their rich story, memorable characters and easy rules. For me, when it comes to background, the more the merrier. That’s why I never understood why some people were in opposition to this, claiming that it interfered with the game itself. It is at this point, that my elitism became apparent, since I thought “well that’s fucking stupid”.

The worst part is that I still think it’s true.

Words of wisdom

It’s easy to be convinced about something so much, that you’ll want it to be the one and only, true way. It also takes a lot to get rid of such notion of mind. What’s worse is that once you start thinking like that, there are many traps along the way that will hamper your attempts at leaving this mindset behind. You’ll be sitting with your friends, playing your weekly game session, when suddendly one of them says something that immediately triggers your inner shitlord. You’ll think to yourself: “that’s fucking stupid” and will try to prove to him, that his way of thinking is wrong. While not perfect, this way is much, much better than sitting quiet and letting your inner elitist fester with impotent rage, until you’ll finally let him lose upon the world.

But, like I’ve said before, the more you sit in your comfort zone, the bigger the chance is for this of kind of shit to happen. When people do something for long periods of time, no matter if it’s knitting, cooking or playing pen and paper games, they eventually get better at it. The better they are at something, the more they see other folks “flawed” way of thinking when it comes to their favorite thing. Someone will say something marginally different on a subject of your favorite thing, and suddendly he’s a cretin who dosen’t know jack and shit.

Of course it’s up to you to educate the poor, deluded fool on said matter and to show him the error of his ways. Remember that a true elitist shitlord should do so with a bit of irritation in his voice, while rolling his eyes and making odd sounds with his mouth. Looking bored also helps, as it shows that you’re obviously sacrificing your time for that fool who dosen’t know what’s what.

Oh yeah, I’ve been there. I’m like that almost all the time lately, and it really pisses me off. There used to be time when I was just a guy who like what he was doing, who loved his hobby and the chance to share it with his friends. Now it’s just waiting for someone else to piss me the hell off or remembering some stupid slight from previous years, that no one in their right mind would even consider important. I guess we all change with age, but if that’s the case then I’m changing for the worse. That’s not right. That’s not what this should be all about.

It’s time to take a break. A long break.

But not from this blog. There are still many things to write about and only the call of the grave will persuade me to stop doing that.

On a final note to fellow gamers: if you’ll ever observe such tendencies in yourselves, don’t wait for them to grow, act. Talk with your friends, change the system, try something new but above all – work hard to change it within yourselves. Because in the end no one else is going to do that for you and it’s not worth being an elitist shitlord. Trust me on that.

Lonely, cold and miserable

Until next time!

Xathrodox86