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Sunday 5 October 2014

If We Don't Define the OSR, Ron Edwards Will

Not only will he define it, but he'll simultaneously claim:
a) it doesn't actually exist
and
b) inasmuch as it does exist, HE was actually the sole architect responsible for its existence.

It sounds fucking cretinous, right?  But there we have it, the King Fuck Swine of all pseudo-intellectual swinery has claimed it, when he briefly crawled out of whatever rock he's been hiding under to give an interview with "runas explosivas" (who interviewed me first, though I'm sure that had nothing to do with his motives), where in this interview he said all kinds of insulting and stupid things. Things like ""Old school" is a marketing term and is neither old nor an identifiable single way to play".  And that absolutely anything good about the OSR is "all the Forge".

And frankly, this unmitigated bullshit is possible because of how Edwards is choosing to define the OSR.  Ron Edwards, at least in what has to do with gaming, has been absolutely wrong, and proven absolutely useless, in every aspect of his intellectual approach to RPGs in his entire life.  His "success" at being the King Swine, and at creating a movement that for a while posed an enormous threat to regular RPGs (and whose ideas even managed to hijack one edition, the least successful and most despised edition, of D&D), is largely due to the fact that he has always been a master at precisely one single thing:  the manipulation of language.

I can claim to have invented the Burrito, if I successfully redefine "burrito" as the mix of olives, chorizo, sharp cheese and potato chips in a lehmeyun wrap, and successfully 'undefine' anything people formerly understood as a "burrito".  That's exactly what Ron Edwards does.  Its standard university training these days of a bullshit pseudo-academic, following the examples of the deconstructionists.   


Shit, don't take my word for it, read the interview. He TAKES PRIDE in how he manipulated language to try to turn around the CENTRAL PURPOSE of RPG play (Immersion) into something utterly irrelevant to his NEW definition of what an "RPG" supposedly does and is about, and even gloats about how he used the equivalent of Linguistic Terrorism to deconstruct the idea of "GM" to the point that the most important power-structure of Regular roleplaying could be effectively neutered (and replaced by the "Genius Game Designer"). 

And this is what he does with the OSR in the interview, in order to take credit for it even as he simultaneously insults the notion that the OSR is anything other than 'marketing'.  He just twists around and reinvents the structure and context of the word so that it means what HE wants it to mean, so that he can actually (absurdly) take credit for a movement that holds Rulings, not Rules as its central motto (and is therefore the antithesis of everything the Forge ever actually stood for, as the cult of Trained and Forge-Certified Genius Designers making Perfect Theory-Based Games that must then never ever be allowed to be "ruined" by Evil Unwashed-masses GMs, who must be stopped at all costs from ever being allowed to act outside of the Designer's Sacred Rules because "SYSTEM MATTERS").

So,  here is your proof, of why it matters that within the OSR we create a set of boundaries, of Landmark-definitions that, at the very least, prevent the hijacking of old-school by the likes of Edwards.  There are times when it is necessary, even vital, to define the OSR; particularly when others are trying to define something as "this is OSR" when it is clearly not (that is, going beyond the landmarks of what old-school design really is) or trying to define something as "this is not OSR" when it clearly is (that is, well within the landmarks of old-school design).

Otherwise, Ron Edwards would be right about the OSR not being anything other than a marketing logo (that, therefore, ANYONE could use for ANYTHING, like he just tried to do).  

But he's not right (and thank Mordenkainen for that; I wouldn't want to live in the universe where he was), because we in the OSR all know when we're seeing something that is OSR, and when we're being bullshitted at.  You can argue within the movement about what is "real" old school or not, but the visceral reaction all old-schoolers would feel when some asshole on rpgnet tries to claim that "FATE run in a dungeon is totally an OSR game" gives proof to the fact that the definition of qualities, of landmarks, exists.   The OSR IS a definable thing, I just reject reactionary small-tent definitions as much as I reject post-modernist 'the OSR is whatever you feel like' definitions that are all too often opportunistic moves on the part of non-old-school designers to try to get more sales for their obviously-not-old-school games by calling those games "OSR".  Or of piece-of-shit pseudo-intellectual architects of failed, disproven 'theories' to try to somehow define their way out their track record of total fuckups.


RPGPundit

Currently Smoking:  Lorenzetti quiete + Dunhill 965






18 comments:

  1. You say "we in the OSR all know when we're seeing something that is OSR" and "The OSR IS a definable thing". How would you define it? (And please don't just say it's a framework for there can be an infinite number of other frameworks, and clearly all of them cannot be the OSR).

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    1. For me it is simply the outpouring of DIY projects recreating the game mechanics of early rpg's. Early rpg's are any commercially available rule book published prior to 1991.

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    2. I would classify the OSR as a design philosophy of creating systems, settings and adventures that fit within the boundaries of old-school mechanics and concepts; that is, either directly utilizing features that were in existence in the period before the advent of 2nd edition AD&D; or features that, in spite of not having historically existed at that time, could have existed in that period without the addition of material or design concepts that are clearly the product of subsequent ideas or later theories.

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  2. Do you not see the irony in complaining about how someone else has mis-defined your fun?

    Hint: You end up mis-defining their fun.

    Here's a rule to put in your book: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

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    1. They invaded my hobby, not the other way around. I don't go around trying to force them to change Storygaming. I just want it out of my RPGs.

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    2. So why the name calling? Why all the hostility? You and Ron have different opinions on what is and isn't a rpg, and probably some other issues. Having different opinions is not a crime against humanity, in fact the right to have different opinions, to peaceably disagree, is what America is supposed to be all about.

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    3. If you want to talk about name-calling and hostility, look to the guy who said all regular roleplayers are like "LITERALLY brain-damaged child abuse victims". Let's not play at nicer-than-thou here. The only difference between his hostility and mine is that I'm more honest, and that his is aggression, while mine is defense.

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    4. So glad you pointed out the DIFFERENCE. I get so sick of people (usually moral relativists) equating attack and defense as though one is as bad as the other.

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    5. Ron Edwards doesn't have "fun". He only engages in serious, enlightening sessions of collaborative storycrafting

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  3. Well Ron Edwards will run into the same problems as anybody else trying to define the OSR. That movement is a kaleidoscope of independent actors centered around the fans of the most popular roleplaying games ever made. That what the OSR means is a collective vote of all this individuals.

    Ron Edward is just one vote against thousands.

    Unlike the Forge the OSR has the older games themselves as a brake against being knocked off-kilter. The Forge was found on theories and then people tried to make games based on that theory.

    The OSR was founded on preexisting games first and people are coming up with theories on the movement. When it really all it ever about was a love of classic D&D and similar older games.

    Because classic D&D was the most popular roleplaying game of all time, it social network was very diverse. This means people coming in at the beginning had wildly varying expectations and other gaming interests. Something that continues today.

    Finally the technology of PoD and PDF publishing as eliminated that portion of the hobby as gatekeepers. There is nothing that anybody can do to stop somebody from publishing what they want.

    The result is that OSR has multiple communities with old one dying and new ones forming all the times. People can say what they want to OSR but in end they only have one vote.



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  4. I wonder if we could get Alan Sokal to create a gobbledygook Story-game and submit it to Ron Edwards for publishing.

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  5. First John Wick, now Ron Edwards... Who's gonna be the next one?

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  6. That's the beauty of RPGs. Ron Edwards can have his high faluting theory of whatever, RPG Pundit can have his high faluting theory of whatever, Ron Edwards can call me brain damaged, RPG Pundit can call me swine... I can enjoy both their games (Arrows of Indra, Sorcerer) and ignore their frothing-at-the-mouth rant-iness.

    It is all good at my table when it is time to play.

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  7. Never heard of Ron Edwards. Does he have a day job?

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  8. I'm not sure that to say about all this. Methinks Mr. Edwards protested too much but, on the other hand, he and the forge absolutely did had an impact on RPGs - even if that impact was to make a few players, GMs, and designers run screaming in the opposite direction.

    Ron Edwards sees things his way, RPGpundit sees things his way, and I see things my way. Three sides to the same coin...

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  9. "King Fuck Swine"? I'm getting the impression you don't have a very high opinion of him.

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    1. Well, you have to at least admire the kind of cleverness that put him on top of a movement of fawning admirers. But most of what he thinks is fundamentally flawed.

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