Greetings traveler,

Welcome to the thirty-second edition of the alcarin.com newsletter.
There is an archive of the previous newsletters in the Townhall and the columns are added to the Town Square, so you can always read it again.
It has been reasonably busy on Alcarin this month. Some new links and additions to the RPG Archives. Unfortunately, I've again been way to busy to write a Close-Up and also to finish what I had actually hope to add to the site as well. My holidays have just started and the coming two weeks I've got a decent amount of time available. We'll see how far we'll get in the coming month.
Enjoy reading.

This letter's content:
1. What's New
2. Coming Up Soon
3. Column: Men with a Mission

-------
WHAT'S NEW:

27/06/2003 - 2 new links in The Gate

18/06/2003 - new character in the School: Lev

09/06/2003 - new link in The Gate

07/06/2003 - new spell in the School: "Jibble's Jolly Jetpack"

06/06/2003 - new monster in the School: "Yurgim"

Visit http://www.alcarin.com/townhall/updates.htm for the latest updates.

-------
COMING UP:

The submissions that I've had on the waiting list are up and running on the site. The Tinker Rod (a sort of Rod of Wonder; for Dungeons & Dragons Third Edition) project is not finished, though and I hope to work on it in the coming weeks. At least 2 new spells must be written and the Rod itself must be described as well. The list and percentages of the Rod's total of 40 random effects is ready however.
Furthermore, work is being done on reducing the Forum's size. The software seems to have a bug that causes it not to delete private messages that are "pushed" out of an in/outbox (due to going over the maximum number of messages). Getting rid of those deletet-yet-not-really-gone messages would save me about 40 mb. This issue has top priority, because I am almost going over my discspace limit. Any other work on the Forum will have to wait for now.

-------
COLUMN: MEN WITH A MISSION
A column by Wouter vd Zandschulp; wouter@alcarin.com

"D&D and religion" First of all I invite you to take a look at this: http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0046/0046_01.asp
Talking about this comic should get me started up this month.

So, here we have it. A chick-tract. About Dungeons and Dragons. What to do now?
Thinking about it I do not know where to start. There is so much I can say about this thing. Of course, saying what I do not like about it is very cheap and easy. Saying what I do like about it would be much more of a challenge. But that is quite hard, and I have been quite busy lately, so I think I'll make it an easy to write column this month (yes, AGAIN) and burn the thing down. It's probably what you expect of me anyway. And it's much more fun. Although I won't burn it literally, because it's on my computer.

Immediately when I read this, I noticed what a strange vision on role-playing this man has. I mean, I guess about 99% of the role-players are man, so how does he even come up with the idea of showing us a role-playing-community consisting of mostly women? And a woman DM-ing? What are the odds about that? And who ever had to leave a party because his/her character died? And how big would the risk be exactly that someone commits suicide because his/her character dies? I'm pretty sure the numbers that are the answers to this questions will show us that the image of Mr. Chick about role-playing is a bit off.
And what about real powers that you get with a cleric at level 8? Let's look it up. Ah, level 4 spells! Oh no! Air Walk! Control Water! Cure Critical Wounds! Death Ward! Dimensional Anchor! I must burn this book! I must... I must... wait a minute... These spells can't be used in real life! You can't use mind bondage on your father for real so he will buy D&D stuff for you! That way we rpg-ers already would be terribly rich! That way a role-player would be president of the United States!

I think the most terrible thing Mr. Chick does is once again making believe that role-players get dragged into a real occult scene. D&D would be 'an intense occult training'. Well, in reality I think that if one of us went to a real witches coven and tell them: "Hello, I'm ready to join you after months of occult training through D&D!" they would either laugh at you REAL hard or start to kick you after feeling to be ridiculed. Of course, ridiculing them would not be such a bad thing, but I wouldn't go to them for real, though.

I believe Mr. Chick has missed a vital part about the players handbook, at page 6. "'This gave is fantasy" it says. Well, actually I believe Mr. Chick has not seen the Players Handbook. Actually I believe he does not know much about role-playing in reality.
I myself am a church-going Christian. I also play D&D. D&D, after all, is FANTASY. It's as wrong as reading a fantasy-book in my eyes. Because one aspect about fantasy is that it IS NOT REAL. Yes, not all that hard to understand now, is it? It is just not real. The magic is very unlike occult magic. It's just old-fashioned bashing the bad guy with magic missiles and fireballs and stuff!

So I think it's just as with lots of other things: it's in your own hands. If you don't believe it is real than it's a very relaxing hobby of escaping in another world. Just like watching a movie or reading a book. As soon as you start thinking it's real or it's starts to take over your life, then you should watch it and realise it's only fantasy. I don't want any of you out there to start throwing fireballs around for real!

So I don't think role-playing is more wrong than acting and reading fantasy, of which it seems to be some sort of crossover. Mr. Chick's attack on fantasy does not seem to be very relevant because of the ridiculously wrong image he seems to have on the subject. Maybe some people do find it easier to start with real occult business after having started with D&D. But then in my opinion only the step from fantasy to reality is where the person takes a wrong step. Youth might be triggered more easily to get interested in real occult behavior by the growth of magic on tv, movies and games these days, but do not judge the role-players that do know the difference of fantasy and reality.
To all the people that do not know this difference I have one last message: PLEASE NOTICE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FANTASY AND REALITY WILL YOU? Thanks.

-------
Well, that's it for this month's newsletter. I hope you enjoyed it.
Lord Gildor
"May the stars guide you on your journeys"
http://www.alcarin.com

Back to the Notice Board

Home | Submit content | Contact | Legal info | Top of page

This website © Copyright 1999-2008, Arjan Wardekker.
All rights reserved.
All trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners.