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Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

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Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#51

Post by chipsy »

jlesk wrote: post #40
harisenbon wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why did you choose isomorphic over a top-down view? It looks interesting, though. I had made a RPG mapping/gaming thing in flash WAY back in the day, and had always thought about making it into a web version. Never got around to it, though. Good luck with yours. =)

All of the top-down approaches just look ugly to me. You're either looking at the top of people heads, or tokens of disembodied heads. This also gives it a pseudo-3d look, with a bit of clutter to add that homey tabletop atmosphere.

I came to the opposite conclusion. When you add perspective to game visualizations, it becomes harder to judge distances, estimate angles, make out details, and identify borders. Small items tend to get reduced to squint-inducing shapes. Large items occlude each other and cause an infuriating visibility problem. The only advantage is that it looks a little bit more like a "real" world, but if you're using a simplified art style, it doesn't matter anyway.

From a UX standpoint, the best balance is "iconic" perspective - most things rendered flat with low occlusion, like an Egyptian painting, much of medieval art, or Japanese woodblock prints. All the boundaries can remain clearly delineated with this style, but aesthetics can be retained through careful composition of each icon.

I did exactly this style for the game I'm working on. My reference points(within video games) are Ultima 1-5, Heroes of Might and Magic, and Battle for Wesnoth. In these games you are never wondering what something is, because you can always make out what it looks like.

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#53

Post by hugh3 »

philwelch wrote: post #33
pjscott wrote: post #20

What happened to the idea that D&D led to Satanism and suicide? This was a big deal back in the 1980s. You never hear about it anymore, and yet I haven't heard any of the old scaremongers actually admitting that they were wrong. Ditto for Satanic ritual abuse, which used to scare people out of their wits.

It's called a "moral panic", and they happen all the time. There have been moral panics about rock music, comic books, teenage sex parties, fictitious drugs, and video games.

Is there not, however, such a thing as a Moral Panic Panic?

For instance, if I manage to round up a dozen mouth-breathing parents to join my group Concerned Parents Against ASCII Porn On Twitter and it'll immediately be picked up by thousands of new outlets. There'll be a hundred front-page articles about the "New Puritanism" by next Sunday.

Bingo, we have a moral panic panic, and there's a moral panic panic to go with every moral panic, usually on a much larger scale.

My real point here is to point out that the moral panic about Dungeons and Dragons was probably never more than a very small number of people making a small amount of noise, amplified by a media hungry for controversial stories about stupid people.

PS. 8======D ----* (.)(.) pew pew pew

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#54

Post by hugh3 »

mcantor wrote: post #46

Predictably, I used to play Dungeons & Dragons in high school. Just as predictably, I didn’t lose my virginity until I stopped. Um... it's 2011. Are we really still making "nerds can't get laid" jokes? I mean, Vin Diesel plays Dungeons & Dragons. I'm not offended or anything; the author is clearly joking, but it seems pretty low-brow for the opening hook on something posted to HN. EDIT: It's an established fact that…

Are we really still making "nerds can't get laid" jokes?

Yes we are. We are also still making jokes about amoral lawyers, lying politicians, vain and vacuous models, lunk-headed bodybuilders, drunken frat boys, obese and poorly-dressed Walmart customers, and unintelligent, docile cows.

If you're offended by the subset of these which are about nerds not getting laid then, dude, you need to get laid.

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#55

Post by jlesk »

chipsy wrote: post #51
jlesk wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All of the top-down approaches just look ugly to me. You're either looking at the top of people heads, or tokens of disembodied heads. This also gives it a pseudo-3d look, with a bit of clutter to add that homey tabletop atmosphere.

I came to the opposite conclusion. When you add perspective to game visualizations, it becomes harder to judge distances, estimate angles, make out details, and identify borders. Small items tend to get reduced to squint-inducing shapes. Large items occlude each other and cause an infuriating visibility problem. The only advantage is that it looks a little bit more like a "real" world, but if you're using a simplifie…

Normally I'd agree with you, for those exact reasons, and my first prototypes were all generally flat (also being a fan of the Ultima series.)

But when I tried the current isometric style on a whim, it managed to solve all of the problems I was trying to address. Probably because I use a hybrid approach: only the underlying battlemat tiles are isometric. The miniatures are flat, slightly-transparent stand-ups and always face the player.

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#56

Post by harisenbon »

jlesk wrote: post #40
harisenbon wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why did you choose isomorphic over a top-down view? It looks interesting, though. I had made a RPG mapping/gaming thing in flash WAY back in the day, and had always thought about making it into a web version. Never got around to it, though. Good luck with yours. =)

All of the top-down approaches just look ugly to me. You're either looking at the top of people heads, or tokens of disembodied heads. This also gives it a pseudo-3d look, with a bit of clutter to add that homey tabletop atmosphere.

Have you seen RPTools' MapTool? It's a really nice looking top-down java app.

http://gallery.rptools.net/v/screenshots/

And of course Fantasy Grounds is an amazing piece of software if you have the money: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/screenshots/

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#57

Post by wlievens »

code_duck wrote: post #36
burgerbrain wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leads to the question: if Singer and his fellow players just got a little more "serious" about playing DnD, to the point where they could argue it constituted a religion, would they then be allowed to play?

Oh dear... the groups that were going around in the 80s warning parents that D&D was satanism would have a field day with that.

They've since shifted their focus to Harry Potter.

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#58

Post by wlievens »

hugh3 wrote: post #53
philwelch wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's called a "moral panic", and they happen all the time. There have been moral panics about rock music, comic books, teenage sex parties, fictitious drugs, and video games.

Is there not, however, such a thing as a Moral Panic Panic? For instance, if I manage to round up a dozen mouth-breathing parents to join my group Concerned Parents Against ASCII Porn On Twitter and it'll immediately be picked up by thousands of new outlets. There'll be a hundred front-page articles about the "New Puritanism" by next Sunday. Bingo, we have a moral panic panic, and there's a moral panic panic to go wi…

It was more than a fringe phenomenon. There was even a movie based on this train of thought, starring a now fairly respectable actor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazes_and_Monsters

Like the book on which it is based, the film treats the playing of roleplaying games as indicative of deep neurotic needs. At least one protagonist is (or at least appears to be) suffering from schizophrenia (or some analogous condition) and in the end, the attainment of mature adulthood by others players is accompanied by the abandonment of role-playing games.

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#59

Post by loup-vaillant »

rst wrote: post #13
tzs wrote: post #2

The arguments the gang "expert" made about similarities between D&D player organization and gang organization would apply equally well to many organized religions, such as Catholicism. I wonder if a prison could get away with banning that?

The only part of the argument which got quoted in the article is that in D&D, some people give orders to other people, and in that way, it "mirrors the structure of a gang". Which is an argument that would encompass not just religion, but all sorts of other things. In a poetry group, one prisoner tells the others that today they'll be writing sonnets. A sure sign of gang activity! In fairness, there may be more to th…

Spot on: the so called "Master" isn't a chief, but a world. A Good DM fades into the background, such that only the deeds of the PCs are remembered. I heard a passionate recall from a Starwars RPG once. The game master wasn't even mentioned.

Re: Dungeons & Dragons ruled a threat to prison security

#60

Post by demallien »

SoftwareMaven wrote: post #45
stcredzero wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my bosses got a lot of his "think on your feet" chops from D&D. He was damn good. No one ever caught him flat footed without an answer and all of his answers sounded good and scored a point for his side. I asked him once where it came from, and he told me it was playing D&D.

I love D&D. Many of my best memories of my early teen-age years revolve around D&D. I think D&D could be part of a good therapeutic tool, and if it is used as one, great, seriously. I just have a hard time with the notion of "hanging out in prison, doing whatever I want." Prison should have a rehabilative aspect to it, for sure. It should also work as a very strong disincentive. Unfortunately, we don't seem to be doi…

The thing is, prison is already a heavy punishment. You don't get to see your family/friends. You can't stay current with your work environment. You don't get to go on holidays. You don't even get to choose meal times, bed time, or when you would like to do sport.

It's already a lousy experience for inmates - they've had a lot of freedoms taken away (note, I don't think this is a bad thing), but from there to denying them anything to distract themselves from their plight is quite cruel.

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