Tournament Arc, Part 4/8
What’s that you say? Fantasy football is just D&D for jocks? Good one. Here’s your T-shirt.
Now that we’ve dispensed with the obligatory joke, let’s talk about about actual geeks and actual jocks. Remember when those two categories were fundamentally opposed? It’s a familiar stereotype, but for me it always felt like more of a mythical 80’s trope that reality. As I think back to the long-long-ago of my own high school days (class of ’03), I can recall reading an article about these different subspecies of human. Bonus XP for anyone who can track down the correct issue of Inquest Gamer Magazine, but as memory serves the categories were “card-flopper,” “dice-chucker,” and “jock.” But what stuck with me—and what rang especially true even then—was the existence of a fourth category: “flopjock.” This was that rare breed who could somehow play Magic: The Gathering in the cafeteria at lunch before heading out for football practice in the afternoon. That was me.
I’ve never been a particularly talented athlete, but I always enjoyed my little league as a kid. There was football in middle school, wrestling in high school, and ultimate Frisbee in college (go Team Nawshus!). I’ve dabbled in the SCA and disc golf since then, but these days my sporting activity is mostly limited to major league baseball fandom. Laurel and I both follow the NL West, and we get no small amount of entertainment from our running rivalry when the San Francisco Giants (woo!) and Colorado Rockies (boo!) face off for a series. She still refuses to wear the Giants cap I bought her.
As for my geek credentials…. Well, you are reading this comic. More to the point though, I think we can all stand to learn a little something from those weird football fans. Being over-the-top, balls-out in love with your hobby is a good thing. Finding something you’re passionate about, holding it close, and geeking out about it with your buddies is straight up cool, no matter whether it involves dice or inflated pig skins. So my advice? Don’t worry about which tribe you belong to. Love what you love. That way lies happiness, +1 longswords, and all of the finest touchdown dances.
So what do you say, gang? Are there any other flopjocks out there? Are all those “other hobbies” of yours gaming related, or do you manage to keep your geekdom separate from more mainstream pursuits? Sound off in the comments with tales of your own favorite fandoms, and tell us how you manage to mix them with gaming!
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This may just be my favourite comic of all time. It would appear that comic #4 has won the tournament; the remaining four can have a go, but I don’t see any way that they top this… magnificence.
Aw shucks. 😀
I like Wizard’s pigtails. Is cute.
My only real talent for sport is tennis, but I’m pretty not-terrible at it, I like to think.
More than being good or not, though. It’s fun. I like having fun. It’s why I play tennis, and it’s why I play RPGs too. They don’t typically mix, though.
Ditto on the pigtails. Why are they an iconic cheerleader hairdo, I wonder?
Also, I think this comic confirms Wizard is being voiced by Tara Strong.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lollipop_Chainsaw
But Wizard isn’t proficient with chainsaws!
But she IS a nerdy/adorkable magic user with an affinity for books.
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/mlp/images/6/6c/Twilight_S2E25_cropped.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/200?cb=20160315121005
I get twitchy whenever I hear the word “fun” these days. The team I’m working with for my latest aca-game will tell you how “fun” is too vague of a word to be useful before you can finish your sentence. :/
It does make me want to ask though: How is the fun of tennis different from RPGs? Is there any overlap in the type of fun?
I guess it’s the spectator effect or competition of it, of cheering your team on. The same reason why half the world stops everything because a bunch of people are pushing a ball around a grassy field every few years. As the athlete, you’re trying your best, doing hard ‘combats’ to scrape out a win and get all the loots. As a spectator, you’re pogchamping all the cool plays.
Also, here’s one use of fun:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MaximumFunChamber
Eh. I’m not a fan of trying to put super technical definitions on complicated concepts like ‘fun’. For me, at least, I enjoy what I enjoy. What perfectly suits me probably isn’t perfect for anyone else, so I don’t really see much point in hardcore defining it. At least, not my own personal fun.
If you’re trying to figure out what lots of people enjoy, or what might appeal to as many different sorts of people as possible, though, then that’s different, I suppose.
To try and answer your question, though: With tennis, I like the rhythm that I can get into, and the feel that exerting for a while gives my arms and legs. I like aiming my shots and the challenge of returning what my opponent sends my way, and returning it precisely at that. In terms of overlap with RPGs, I suppose the overlap lies in both pastimes involving challenging myself. RPGs challenge me to roleplay well, to build new and exciting characters, to solve puzzles and political problems alike, and to be a great hero (or villain).
…I’m a bit casual when it comes to challenging myself, though. I don’t like failing repeatedly and pushing through all that too improve. It’s why I’m a terrible artist. I want to play, not practice. XD
Me neither. As a player, that is. It risks turning a hobby into a job when you get too in-your-own-head about it.
But as a designer (and to a lesser extent a GM), thinking about the kinds of fun people are looking for can be useful. A lot of this comes from Man, Play, and Games…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man,_Play_and_Games
…Which gives rise to this useful Session Zero taxonomy:
https://sites.google.com/site/amagigames/the-what-i-like-glossary
Figuring out what kind of experience people are looking for can help to craft the kind of game you’re looking to build. It’s crazy-making when you’re talking about “building fun experiences,” because this kind of analysis can very much be the opposite of fun.
While i havent really played for a while, i used to do alot of tennis and soccer, while also just doing so much reading, dnd, and so on. For something fun that mixed these more jockish and geekish activities, i used to be part of our humans vs zombies club in college. It was a group of around 50-100 people, who would be seperated into humans and zombies, with the humans often having to complete some task while shooting and stunning zombies with nerf guns, while the zombies try to stop them by tagging them, converting them into zombies as well after a minute. This would take place over a very large portion of the school campus, with usually everything outside being fair game. There were also 2 weeklong games per semester, where there would be 1 or 2 starting zombies, everyone else would be humans, and the game never ended from monday to friday, no matter where you were as long as you were outside and not doing something like working at a job or being in class. This led to extreme events like people hiding out in a van outside of peoples houses waiting for them to leave, or staying hidden in trashcans with spotters far away telling them with walky talkies when humans were approaching so them could be tagged. I never went that far into it, but I did actually survive the week once, along with one other human, which was pretty awesome since usually only the top few players really stand much of a chance at managing that.
What made humans vs zombies jockish was how much and how fast you needed to run in it, as well as the really high agility you often needed to dodge around zombies and obstacles, as well as shoot them, or throw socks at them, as they come towards you. Some of those people could really sprint and weave.
……. Throw SOCKS at them???
You could also stun zombies by throwing socks, and while you couldn’t throw them as fast as you could shoot a nerf gun, or as accurately at longer distances, they were a lot better at close range cause it can be surprisingly hard to shoot a nerf gun at a fast moving, close by target.
I’m pretty sure your high school is the premise for a kids’ movie. That sounds straight up hilarious.
It really was so much fun, though it was my college, not high school. Of course, while it was a lot of fun, those weeklong could get so stressful since you never knew when people would just jump out at you or start chasing you. Still loved them though.
I need to go to college so I can play in the zombie game.
Not all schools have dedicated clubs for it unfortunately. I know UMBC, princeton, and a few other east coast schools have clubs, and in fact occasionally participate in cross campus games, but im not sure about most others. For example, at the school i currently work at, the closest thing they have is a 1/semester game through the gaming club, in which zombies just chase and convert humans as they try to run to a location, with no other objective or game variation. Its still fun, but its not like the club at umbc.
Yep, all those highschool films weren’t very authentic. People enjoying soccer/table tennis/handball as players or spectators were the same people that joined me in Yu-Gi-Oh during recess. I do remember a substitute teacher loudly wondering why we (card game enthusiasts) were wasting our time, we were adultescents after all and had to concentrate on adult ventures blahblah. It was an only occurrence, which is why I still remember it.
And that substitute teacher was most certainly not in the majority. There was a Magic the Gathering after school club, headed by the Japanese/English/German teacher with a triple doctorate.
That contrast still hits me years after: here’s a barely capable near-sighted paper-pushing dork denouncing my hobby and here’ the pentalingual Dr³ chad, whom half the female school staff thirsts after, who has dance moves so sick that I literally saw same staff redden with excitement and who dishes out lessons in the classroom and on the playmat. All in addition to winning countrywide dictation contests, raising two daughters single-handed and I presume slaying ungodly amounts of pussy.
That MtG club is still going strong my friend’s siblings tell me, near 15 years soon.
The cool teacher in my high school was a math prof. He was the lead singer in the teachers’ battle of the bands band, and I’ll never forget them doing a metal cover of “Earth Angel.” He was also a pretty slick Magic player.
I occasionally play social soccer with a bunch of co-workers… either at one of the local parks, or at an indoor court. I’m hopelessly bad at it, but it’s fun, and it’s exercise.
The phrase “social soccer” make me imagine two clique/teams trying to round up new recruits for their clubs.
Heh… no, just a common term (but maybe not in your part of the world) for playing the game casually with friends, rather than serious competition. No fixed teams, a loose interpretation of the rules, nobody tracking scores, that sort of thing.
Obligatory other fantasy football joke:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/uUrXTd0Gui1I8qigy2MmbD_1CeqUJrho7dNBr2v74YrKdQK3pQKXjWrWEj1E6sna6_AT-IbwPofMzkDd409OEBL2FCdMPgoKEKgqJEAYjY0
That’s a gag I can get behind!
What does Thief Rogue’s shirt say?
I’m the kind of hulking mass of a person who is permanently stuck being the guy who has to help all my friends move, and bikes long distances because I ain’t giving the MTA my money for their mediocre service! I always found the Jock/Nerd dichotomy to be a false one.
A rare look at non-hair-concealed Thief! Also, apparently wizard is flat as a board, or using illusion magics.
Also, is Wizard booing the opposing team… Or does she just dislike Fighter’s performance that much? None of them seem thrilled to be there, excluding maybe Cleric.
We’ve been over this: https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/crossplaying
😛
tl;dr Wizard says Trans Rights
It’s been a personal struggle for her:
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/core-values
Then again, most things are:
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/ailurophobia
Friggin’ drama queen. 😛
One player in the online game I’m in (and now one of the GMs for!) has Drew Brees listed under Diety on her pathfinder character sheet. She has recently decided that her character was born on Earth before being teleported mysteriously to Golarion (and then abducted to this fighting arena the game is set in) but has lost most of their Earth memories. Mostly because the character is a huge goofball, but it fits surprisingly well.
Yeah it does: https://www.tabletopgaming.co.uk/news/theres-a-new-pathfinder-rpg-comic-book-spin-off-starring-john-carter/
I really like Pittsburgh because it’s got both a game shop owned by an alumnus brother of my fraternity and of course PNC Park. Everything I need for a great weekend trip.
I’ve always wanted to go on an epic quest to do all the stadiums in one summer.
So far I’ve hit the Braves, Giants, Rockies, Yankees, Dodgers, and Mariners, but that’s lifetime rather than in a single season. Bucket list I guess.
Eh? Um… What? I don’t understand anything 🙁
I have so many questions. What has geek and a codpiece has to do with each other? Why you consider yourself a defective protective undergarment? What has to do with Magic? What i am missing? What is that Star wars thing and what SCA means? I am full of doubts and i can’t even barely understand this… arcane… gibberish o_O
I, kinda, think that i understand what the question is about, sports passions and TTRPG, but i lack the context to answer it 🙁
This may help:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jock_(stereotype)
Important parts:
” a jock is a stereotype of an athlete, or someone who is primarily interested in sports and sports culture, and does not take much interest in intellectual culture”
“It is believed to be derived from the word “jockstrap”
So is something from US. That is why i didn’t know it. And each time i looked for jock google only give me the arse-less thing 😛
Thanks 😀
It’s really very simple: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQF8rQaIjUE
Thanks, that only added more questions including some existencial ones. Thank you very much :/
One of my friends in highschool fit the bill pretty well. MTG, DDR, YGO and D&D? Down for ANY of them, and was a blast to play with!
…When he wasn’t in marching band practice. In which he played Tuba. He used to be a line backer on the football team, but the nice relaxing football practice sessions were getting in the way of the agonizing torture-workouts that were Band Practice. Dude was six and a half feet tall and built like the terminator, with the doofiest grin I have ever seen.
If you’s 6’5″ and built like a terminator, your only options for band are tuba or triangle. Everything else is wasted comic potential.
Hahah, hah, haaa… no, sadly, the Triangle guy had to retire from marching band after the incident. Poor bastard…
While my high school was a little unusual in the cross-over between “brains” and “jocks” (8 of the top 10 in class rank were also multi-sport letter recipients, and I’d have to guess probably 18-20 of the top 25 were as well)…but as far as I know there were only like 3 of us that competed in any varsity sports and “chucked dice”.
This was well before MtG was a thing…but not before King of the Tabletop existed so it could be apologetically plundered to “invent” MtG (1988), but I am willing to bet the middle section of the Venn diagram of card-floppers and jocks would have been much more densly populated.
I really ought to post an anonymous demographics quiz at some point. I’d be curious to know the age-range of my readers.
First I’ve heard of “King of the Tabletop.” Do you know if Richard Garfield actually cited it as an influence?
It was an insert-game in Dragon Magazine issue 77…had multiple land types used to call creatures affiliated with those land types to fight for you…included first strike creatures, magic and ranged attacks…instead of needing to kill the opposing wizards your goal was to gain 30 “prestige”. You can find pictures, review and descriptions at Board Game Geek if interested.
Several things that to me screamed out as “inspirational” for MtG (even to the point where I wondered if Tom Wham was a psuedonym that Garfield later dropped), but no.
My original post should have said “…could be (un)apologetically plundered…” because I never saw any direct crediting. There is an anecdote where someone asking Garfield about it wherein he denies direct knowledge of it but admits he likely saw it and was perhaps subconsciously influenced by it.
I’m certain I still have one of the sets we made out of index cards floating around here somewhere…there were some great insert games in that magazine!
Don’t have much to add other than to say, yes, those old Dragons had some very good, very enjoyable insert games.
Looping back to the above “jock” discussion, they even had one called something like “Monsters of Midway” that was American Football, but all of the players were all D&D monsters. Each had something special. Halflings were kickers. Don’t remember much more than once my cloud giant player saved the game by blowing up a long pass with his once-a-game lightning bolt.
I’ve always thought it would be interesting to do the sports movie as an RPG. Mighty Ducks, Major League, Rocky… They’ve all got this great arc where you fight your way through rounds of play before taking on the Big Bad Evil Game in the finals. I’m just not sure how a single system could represent all the possibly team sports on the tabletop.
I really ought to make it a project to go back and read through the Dragon Magazine archive. There’s wisdom to be had in the tomes of the ancients!
Ancients…pah! For that you need to turn to The General or Strategy & Tactics.
Dragon is more…venerable.
But your point still stands. Some amazing work done back then in the early days of the industry. Some less, but that’s not the point.
One of the guys in one of my old groups of gaming friends was a tall, built, intimidating black dude who dressed like a goth and carried a gun and owned his own security service. He was also an absolute teddy bear and really fun to roll dice with. One of my fave examples of not judging a book by it’s cover.
Me personally though total geeky nerdy type. My secondary passions are nowhere near sports, like music and art. I don’t play TCG as much as I used to but it’s fun. An expensive hobby though, or it can be. One of my cousins plays competitively however!
Your buddy sounds like a PC in a modern game, lol.
I feel like a better division would be: The people who like drama, the people who like statistics, and the people who like both.
Even among fellow geeks, I can feel estranged if they’re only in it for the roleplaying, and gloss over all the math and bean-counting of the game. It’s like having a game that’s all meaty plot, without any delicious and satisfying vegetables to support it.
But the more I learn about baseball, the more I feel like I should have gotten into it sooner, rather than making mewling noises about how sportsball is beyond me. It’s not about stick hit ball hard run go circle, it’s about getting those sweet RBIs.
I really do need to queue up Moneyball on Netflix one of these days…
But yeah man, I will agree that some of the narrative games go a little too rules-light for my taste. I fell in love with the Dragon Strike board game first, and crunchy mechanical bits are very much my jam (or healthy vegetables as the case may be).
Damn, I almost didn’t recognize Wizard with pigtails.
What are US% and BLA?
Check the hover over text.
Can we please talk about how good Thief looks with that hat on?
I think it’s the punk vibe. She had to DIY the horn holes.
What’s more concerning is what that plastic adjuster strip is doing to her 3rd set of eyes. It must be all manner of irritating.
Actually, fantasy and tabletops were my ‘second’ or really ‘fifth’ hobby after books, sport, fishing, gardening… Sorry, nerdiness, bahaha! I’ve drifted more towards them as I get older and weaker, but I miss meeting up with the rest of the gang to – gesturing upward at the comic. Every single one of them. A familiar, lovely comic.
I actually tend to disdain terms like geek or nerd, because they just never seemed real to me. If anything, money was the great divider; folks with lots of money had the coolest stuff, and the rest of us were basically hangers on, whether in sports, gaming, wargaming – what got me into all of this – etc. (And to avoid being a hanger-on, being something of a misanthrope, I ended up disregarding people and raising bees instead. No regrets.)
Nor did I ever see ‘nerds’ humiliated for being nerds; it was generally the thing-havers attacking the hangers-on they didn’t like at the moment. Then well-meaning authority figures who’d seen or read pieces with discriminated nerds assumed that was the cause of the problem, which lead them after people who weren’t responsible, which was – sad. I didn’t know what to do about it then, I wouldn’t know if asked now.
On a lighter note, a lot of the wargames I played at home were basically just poverty imitations of more famous properties, bahahahaha!