The unlikely resurgence of Dungeons and Dragons - <AUTHOR> https://www.inlander.com/spokane/nearly-45-years-after-its-creation-a-fantasy-game-played-with-paper-pencil-and-dice-is-having-its-biggest-year-yet-in-the-inland-northwest-a/Content?oid=15615918 <comment><USER3> My friends and I play D&D because we have no real other option. We used to play Minecraft and other collaborative building games as a group, but then one in our group went fully blind. There is a complete lack of good multiplayer computer games for entirely blind players (admittedly that is quite a challenge), but D&D requires only imagination, which all of us still have. Highly recommend if you have friends with vision disabilities.

<comment><USER4> No real other option? There are dozens of other excellent RPGs available that rely more on imagination than sight. D&D is merely the gateway game.

There are of course D&D spin-offs and clones like Pathfinder and 13th Age, old school (OSR) "retro-clones" like Dungeon Crawl Classics, Lamentations of the Flame Princess and many, many others. Then there are the classic non-D&D games like Shadowrun (in its 5th edition now), Traveller, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (4th edition just released), and GURPS. There's Savage Worlds for fast-paced pulp-style adventures, FATE for absolutely anything you can possibly imagine (including publications for Dresden Files and others). There's FFG's excellent Star Wars games (Edge of the Empire, Age of Rebellion and Force and Destiny), and dozens if not hundreds of smaller indie games, many of which are completely free.

We are truly living in a golden age for roleplaying games. D&D is merely the most visible and best-known one.

<comment><USER5> What non-D&D game would you suggest to someone who enjoys D&D but would like to explore other systems?

<comment><USER4> There are way too many options to give a simple answer to that question.

If you want to stick close to D&D, Pathfinder and 13th Age are obvious choices. If you prefer something a bit more raw, less polished maybe, deadlier, where survival is a goal in itself and combat may be better avoided, try one of the OSR systems, like DCC, LotFP, Labyrinth Lord, OSRIC, etc. Lamentations of the Flame Princess is weird horror and explicitly 18+. If you want the feeling of D&D but with a system that focuses more on the story and the experience than on all the numbers in D&D, then try Dungeon World. A lot of people lauded Dungeon World for recreating the feeling they had when they first played D&D.

If you want to get further away from D&D, well, what direction do you want? Fantasy? SF? Cyberpunk? Historical? Martial arts? Horror? Steam punk? Espionage? Military? Old West? TV shows?

<comment><USER5> > If you want to get further away from D&D, well, what direction do you want?

SF or Cyberpunk

<comment><USER6> Shadowrun is the canonical cyberpunk RPG.

Starfinder is, I believe, Pathfinder in space.

GURPS is setting-agnostic.

<comment><USER7> >Shadowrun is the canonical cyberpunk RPG.

Aside from the dated and weird essentialization of Native American cultures, Shadowrun's setting is really good and fun.

Unfortunately it's hard to run a game with a decent narrative flow just because the combat system is so complicated. My group decided to shame people out of playing mages or riggers just because we didn't want to have to deal with simultaneously doing combat in cyberspace and the astral plane at once. It really puts a damper on having a fun game that flows. I wouldn't recommend it for someone new to pen&paper RPGs.

On the other hand, the tedium of combat gave us a strong incentive to talk our way out of problems instead of going the murder-hobo route.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is it unlikely? Board games were already growing fast. Even CCGs were growing fast, not only through video games but still as physical games too. People want to sit down and get offline and spend time with each other, _and_ people who used to do that want to get online and hang out with each other.

All the RPG market needed was one publisher with good production values and broad distribution to discard a big chunk of its worst, thorniest rules. Wizards was happy to oblige...

Pathfinder saw it too with their precursor Beginner Box, which also threw out a big chunk of its worst, thorniest rules and sold like crazy off a Humble Bundle. They just didn't get the distribution (or the right YouTubers on board) until it was too late, and never plugged their Beginner Box into other content as elegantly as Wizards did.

<comment><USER9> Speaking of CCG's, any collectors who happen to be coders? I haven't met too many at the local shops I stop by so I always figured collecting cards wasn't very popular amongst engineers.

<comment><USER10> I collected the 1996 Netrunner CCG for years; last year I found someone who was more or less selling off their complete collection (I didn't have any of the 2.0 cards or the majority of the 2.2 cards, and was also missing a handful of the 2.1 rares - inheriting a couple boxes of all the miscellaneous spares was fine by me if it meant a 100% complete binder) so that very expensive chapter of my life has closed.

I also went out and finished my "first TCG appearence of the original 151" Pokémon collection with one of my first few paychecks after graduating (had to shell out the money for Charizard and a couple others that were never in my collection from childhood). I really wanted to retroactively declare myself the coolest kid on the playground at recess, otherwise what was all that work for? :)

Sadly, while card games were an important part of my life growing up, a lot of mental switches flipped over the last year or so and I honestly regret spending so much money and time in the card game world over the entire first part of my life. In 2012 Android: Netrunner introduced me to the LCG model and made me realize that the CCG model was exploitative and a terrible use of my money (obvious in retrospect, but when you're in the thick of it, you try and rationalize it, you know?). Then, working towards my degree for a few years after that kept me out of the tournament ecosystem for so long that I found myself not wanting to go back - there were simply more productive uses of my brain cycles than deck construction and playing games. I know they say "time enjoyed wasted is not wasted time" but if I would have programmed or learned a few languages or focused on competition math or read classical literature or learned to cook or any number of other things in that first 18 years, I'd be so much better off [1]. It's possible many coders feel the same way, and that's why you're not seeing them.

[1] In fact, should parenting be in my future, I don't think I'd let my kids have nearly as much post-pubescent "non-skill-building" fun as I was allowed to have; competition for income is fierce and it's only going to get worse.

<comment><USER11> > I know they say "time enjoyed wasted is not wasted time" but if I would have > programmed or learned a few languages or focused on competition math or read > classical literature or learned to cook or any number of other things in > that first 18 years, I'd be so much better off [1].

Better off in what sense? If we're talking about skills that apply to the rest of life, I honestly feel like deck optimisation was much better preparation for a real-world career (where the problem scope is never fully defined, the measure of success always involves an element of randomness, and hidden interactions abound) than competition maths was. And while it exercises a different kind of imagination and storytelling, I'd argue that games in a shared-world fiction can give a more intense practice of the things that classical literature give you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Paradoxically, tech has actually made DnD much more accessible to the masses.

When my friends and I first started playing 3.5 in middle school, we pooled our money for a single player's handbook (they were pricey back then!) and would constantly be passing it around any time anyone needed to do anything, which really slowed down the pace of the game and made it hard to get intimately familiar with the rules.

Eventually someone found a PDF dump of some books, and suddenly not only did we have access to useful stuff like the monster manual and DM guide, but we could search the text super quickly and get familiar with the rules at home, on our own time.

Now that we're adults who can actually afford the books, we don't need the PDFs - but we still benefit from using phone apps for dice rolling and spellbooks, and roll20 for combat.

<comment><USER13> I've timed it in actual play: it's quicker to google for a monster stat block (one from the SRD, obviously) than it is to look it up in the Monster Manual sitting right next to the laptop.

<comment><USER14> Sure, but from experience in play, sticky notes in the Monster Manual are much faster for switching back and forth than browser tabs are.

<comment><USER13> That's a cache, though, when the use case at hand is random access.

I mean, if I'm willing to do some prep work I can surely do even better than sticky notes (like, heh, "google for all the monsters ahead of time and line them all up in browser tabs").

<comment><USER14> Perhaps that's your use case, it's not mine.

How DMs prepare, if they do, is highly variable. But most DMs choose monsters ahead of time. This appears in survey data in _The Lazy Dungeon Master._ The questionnaires are interesting, when asked how they would prepare for a session if they only had 30 minutes, most DMs explicitly mentioned choosing monsters.

Over the years, my personal experience is that running things out of the browser or PDF is great if you need to search for random rules and other situations that come up during the game, but paper books and notes are overwhelmingly superior for expected conditions like encounters and monsters. I've used various laptop systems (wikis, docs, text files), apps, and paper systems (typed, handwritten, paper or notecard). On the balance of things I decided that running the game with a laptop was worse than running a game without one, at least the way I play the game.

That's just a personal choice, but it seems like most DMs do choose monsters ahead of time.

<comment><USER15> I've been running the old d20 Star Wars game for my kid, and with PDFs of all the rulebooks, one of my main game prep things is printing out the pages for the creatures / characters / spaceships I think are likely for a session.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> We started playing a year ago, it was my first time playing since the mid-80's, and we're doing it all from my old AD&D (first edition) books and modules that I had collected from then.

We really like it because as a group of newbies - four of the five players had never played before - it gives us permission to do things that are really fun but we never really would have found time to do before. We've incorporated poetry reading, table-reading of scripts, songs, and silly tasks (I made my wife pick a real estate lockbox we didn't have the combination for, before her thief could advance to level 2).

So for us anyway, it wasn't anything about Wizards of the Coast or 5e... this is strictly Gygax-level stuff we're playing. But I think some of it is a blowback from many of us just feeling exhausted and discouraged about online life, there is greater appetite for making these sorts of memories and being creative together.

<comment><USER12> That sounds like a good time! I've actually had some of the most fun role- playing experiences playing with new players who don't really have a preconceived on what the typical limits of role-playing should be.

For example, we've got one player who decided to try and buy drugs in-game at one of the seedier cities we were stopping at. Fast-forward many sessions later, and she's now a kingpin of sorts with an owl-delivery service and contacts of varying trustworthiness all over the place. It does help to have a very creative DM who likes creating random effects (inhaling ground up flail snail shell turned out to be particularly silly) and teammates who don't get bent out of shape over "less than optimal" play or whatever.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> In Germany there's at least one other big P&P RPG called "Das Schwarze Auge" (sold in the US as "The dark Eye" iirc and not very successful). I think it's a good system and the lore is pretty nice (even though compared to my child- self I now realized a lot of it is heavily influenced by real world history/cultures).

Which makes me wonder...what are other native language systems that are popular in the country but might not be known outside? My working hypothesis would be that those exist in many countries because P&P RPGs are language driven after all and so native language systems are the most natural tool for storytelling.

Please do share if you're from a non-US country and have an interesting system (and share if it is the go to system over DnD or comparable in popularity).

<comment><USER18> In Poland there were Krzyształy Czasu (Crystals of Time) - a generic high fantasy system made by people from Magia i Miecz magazine (pioneering magazine about RPGS in Poland - it was the only such press for decades). There was also "Wiedźmin - Gra Wyobraźni" \- an RPG based on Witcher franchise and targetting new players reoughly at the time that Witcher was first adapted as movie and TV series. It wasn't very good mechanically, but got some people in the hobby.

There was also Dzikie Pola (based on Polish 16-18th century - inspired by books of Henryk Sienkiewicz - Polish Dumas). If you've seen "Deluge" or "With Fire and Sword" movies you know the setting. Sabres, flintlocks, Polish nobility, Ottomans, Muscovites, Cossacs, and wide steppes of modern Ukraine :)

On sci-fi side there is Neuroshima - fallout-like setting with some quirks. It was popular a few years ago but I don't hear about it much anymore.

But the most popular was (and still is) fantasy Warhammer RPG. The first Polish edition was the first time an RPG system was marketed in Poland and it was a big deal, almost everybody to this day started playing RPG with first or second edition of that.

Apart from that the most popular is Call of Cthulhu I think? Or maybe Vampire:the Masquerade and related systems, but that's losing popularity recently I think.

D&D was never very popular, that slowly changes recently.

<comment><USER17> Very cool, I never realized that the boardgame Neuroshima Hex! (very recommendable, recently also "reskinned" as Monolith Arena) is actually based on an RPG :D

Poland is a great boardgame nation, Ignacy Trzewiczek is one of my favorite developers :)

<comment><USER18> In my previous job we played Neuroshima RPG after work sometimes. It was crazy - the whole office participated - like 12 people including our boss and the secretary, and one of the programmers were a DM.

We never really got to the point where plot happens, because it took forever to fight stray dogs on the way with 12 players, but it was a lot of fun. The fighting mechanics was inspired by Cyberpunk 2020 - a lot of dice throwing for each attack :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The article undersells the whole story.

The Open Gaming License of 3rd edition D&D was definitely open source inspired (despite my personal beefs with it) and kicked of a huge burst of new game developers, and that bubble collapsed right on the tails of the CCG collapse, which caused a big churn in the industry.

This led to a spike of online offerings, and the crowdsourcing era has meant that while the last 10 years is anything but safe for authors, for players it us as golden age.

Well beyond d&d (though there too) there is a wealth of options and better support and community than ever, between publishers and players, and amongst players. Tabletop games continue, as do video chat based games and play by post forums. All while the old school games, MOOs and MUSHes thrive. Different playstyles are supported, the communities are getting better about tolerance, and the Satanic Panic is not part of mainstream culture anymore.

<comment><USER20> I play D&D in person using a paper character sheet and physical dice, but I created that sheet using D&D Beyond. And most of the rest of the party uses D&D Beyond on iPads.

Holy hell is that more convenient for tracking spells and subtle rule interactions than what I used to have to do as a kid.

In my eyes, it's letting technology do what it does best -- get details right -- and frees up slightly more casual players to do the fun roleplaying part without being so bogged down.

<comment><USER21> Sorry if this is lazy but I can't really Google game related stuff right now, but can you link an image with that sheet?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I don't think it's surprising at all. As mentioned here, people are looking for alternatives to spending time online all the time. Then, as the article mentions, LOTR, GOT, and Harry Potter have primed the culture to be big into fantasy. And finally, we're a good 30 years past the peak of the D&D bashing by religious types and the stereotype of it being a game for basement dwelling stoners and creeps, which means we have a full generation of young adults who don't have huge preconceived notions about the game.

</comment><comment><USER23> If you enjoy D&D then Critcal Role[1] is a must watch. Matt Merser is an amazing DM. And the other players(all professional voice actors) are really good as well. It's great sit on the couch for a while or watch while working type of fare. Each episode is multiple hours of great voice acting and D&D.

[1] [https://critrole.com](https://critrole.com)

<comment><USER24> Also relevant - check out HarmonQuest[1], it's Dan Harmon (of Rick & Morty) doing a campaign which is then animated over. It's absolutely hilarious and very well made. Also, given each episode is only 25 minutes it's not quite as big of a commitment as Critical Role!

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HarmonQuest](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HarmonQuest)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> What a shame that all this attention goes to D&D. There are so many other good tabletop games with exquisite worldbuilding, languishing for attention... Vampire: The Masquerade, RIFTS (my personal fav)

<comment><USER26> Rifts has a wonderfully gonzo setting saddled with possibly the worst rules system available in this century.

The Savage Worlds conversion is pretty cool, though.

<comment><USER27> I know. I ran a campaign of RIFTs and globetrotting in that setting was awesome... But the rules were so very boring.

Palladium crashed catastrophically, sadly. There was some kind of theft problem, and then they had a disastrous Kickstarter.... Such a shame they couldn't find a way to modernize.

<comment><USER25> What was it about the rules you found to be boring? Rifts was my first RPG and I remember the rules being complicated AF but I think we all sort of accepted that as the price of entry or something

<comment><USER27> No customizing characters beyond rolling stats and picking skills/spells (and just picking them, not saying how good they are at them) and weapons.

Fighting was mostly attack/parry/dodge. Not much variety in combat actions, particularly with massive health values on everything.

Your stats hardly mattered unless they were above like 16 and got the skill or combat bonus.

Most of the rules for non-combat actions were just simple skill-tests.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> The saddest thing about having board games is not having anyone come over to play them.

In particular for me at the moment, I have Battles of Westeros [https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/67492/battles- westeros](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/67492/battles-westeros)

that many feel is one of the best tactical board games out there: [https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/979785/battles-westeros- imm...](https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/979785/battles-westeros-immensely- deep-strategy-experienc)

and yet I've played it twice in five years. ;(

<comment><USER29> To be fair, deep strategy games aren't exactly the most friendly thing to just "dip your toe into", especially two player deep strategy.

If you wanted more chances for people to come over and play games few things could be worse. Maybe 18xx (very crunchy simulationist games about early railways) or full blown scale wargaming (e.g. Napoleonic). But even lighter variants of those let people ease into it (e.g. skirmish wargaming, you can buy a couple of boxes of miniatures and play skirmish variants of 40K or various WW2 settings, and there are train sim games where you just run trains and don't have a stock market, a territorial map and so on)

I know I won't have people over often enough to justify big set piece games, so I carry things like "Love Letter" which you can play in a pub in 10 minutes.

<comment><USER28> That is very fair assessment that I also share. That is why I have other games. But I do lament it!

For the most part, I get my gaming in by playing with people using play-by- post in a Pathfinder roleplaying forum, which I like alot for the creative writing and rp.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I think that D&D is interesting in terms of the contrast with computer roleplaying games.

In a way it does a good job of showing both the current strengths and weaknesses of computers. Managing the rules and stats by hand can be fun, but I have seen many recorded sessions where it is obviously a burden that a computer would be perfectly suited for.

On the other hand, aspects of D&D like face-to-face interaction and language- based free creativity are things the computer can't handle well. Although video chat is a thing. Computers can't understand language at this point so they can't manage everything for you. Of course DMing is the most fun for many people so they wouldn't want a computer to DM.

I wonder if there would be a way to translate the freedom that you get as a DM or player in terms of world creation, scenario management, and freedom of action, to an interactive video-game type experience. Maybe in VR?

<comment><USER12> Neverwinter Nights 2 had some solid tools for campaign building that were the closest I've seen to creating a world with scenarios like those you see in DnD. It helps that the game was almost literalally DnD, but still impressive.

I don't think DM'ing is necessarily fun though. Most everyone I know who DMs sometimes, including me, finds it to be pretty stressful and a lot of work. The real value to me, is that a really good DM knows when to break the rules to enhance the game experience, and how to do it without making people angry. They create scenarios that specifically challenge the characters that are playing, not just for combat, but for role-playing purposes. Ie, a Lawful wizard is tempted to steal a scroll that would contain the knowledge he seeks the most, or a cleric who must decide whether to uphold her team's plan to ally with an unscrupulous NPC, or to go rogue in the name of their ethical code and deliver justice to said NPC. Good storytelling and cooperative play is just something that comes very naturally to some people, and having a human in the loop to respond to events in the context of an overarching narrative and party experience is really hard ot beat.

<comment><USER30> Thanks for the info on Neverwinter Nights 2. I will check it out.

I agree about having a human in the loop. My idea though was that maybe you could have the best of both worlds with a computer to help the DM. The trick would be making the sandbox rich and responsive enough that the DM and characters would really have freedom in the moment. Maybe the DM could have tools that easily allow him to rez and customize appropriate objects and NPCs in the visualization.

<comment><USER31> As far as I remember, in NWN1 multiplayer sessions you could have a player play as the DM. He had access to stuff like spawning items, could spawn monsters on top of the party etc. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3pclUiro-4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3pclUiro-4)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> There is one aspect where I think digital board games are superior: you don't have to spend time setting up, putting away, or resetting the game. If there was a way to do that in the analog version as quick as the digital ones, then I would more willing to participate. Another thing might be "saving" the state between long sessions: you can use a camera phone for certain parts, but its more difficult for when there are secrets and you need a neutral 3rd party (e.g. a card hand).

Edit/Update: My mistake. I've seen a few photographs of people playing D&D (even the ones in the article), and it seemed like there was more of a board and initial conditions represented by many pieces like board games. I've played board games like Settlers and Monopoly where set up requires more time and effort. Sorry again.

<comment><USER33> Digital board games are superior in almost every way except face to face player interaction. For games with a high level of complexity, the analog version is always terrible. Forgetting to move a bit when the game state changes is always a sore point. Unfortunately, these games are generally more challenging to port to digital as well.

For more casual games, I prefer to play in person with a beer in hand.

(PS My day job is running a game store. If anyone needs a recommendation on a board game, let me know.)

<comment><USER34> I'd love a recommendation on a starter game (or a few!) if you find yourself with a minute! I play with a group who, including myself, are novices when it comes boardgames. Between 3-6 players most of the time. We found ourselves getting really into Puerto Rico and recently tried Terraforming Mars but didn't _love_ it. I think TR would be better on a second playthrough when we actually know the rules though :). I played Battlestar Galactica once as well and found it great! Looking at boardgamegeeks is a bit intense with the selection there so I'm hoping you might have a narrower range to suggest.

<comment><USER33> Terraforming Mars is my favorite game. I think its worth giving it another try. I would remove the Corporate Era cards for now. These are the cards with the white triangle near the bottom left.

Here are some games I would suggest for a group that likes Puerto Rico:

      -Lords of Waterdeep
      -Castles of Burgundy
      -7 Wonders (scales well to 6 players)
      -Pandemic Legacy (co-op)
      -Clank
      -Azul
      -Splendor

These all have different mechanics and feel, so it is a good starter set. Let me know if you have more questions. Hope you enjoy these!

<comment><USER35> I played Splendor for the first time a couple of weeks ago when I visited my parents and immediately bought my own set, it's just such a simple premise that lends itself really well to interesting tactics.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I can confirm that my 15 year old daughter and her group of friends got into it because of Stranger things. Now have regular sessions with obligatory pizza. I'm rather jealous.

</comment><comment><USER37> Ironically, the best way to actually play D&D is...online, using Fantasy Grounds software. This saves on an incredible amount of time and micromanagement, creating time for actual RP and gameplay. Highly recommended, plus you can actually include your non-local friends.

<comment><USER38> Roll20 is awesome as well

<comment><USER39> Whenever I hear Roll20 I just think of this post [https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/9iwarj/after_5_years_o...](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/9iwarj/after_5_years_on_roll20_i_just_cancelled_and/)

<comment><USER4> I had not heard that yet. I've always had a positive impression of Roll20, although I'd never used it. This makes sure that I never will.

That thread is a good source of some alternatives.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Given the amount of studies/reports coming out talking about how bad screen time is for people, and how insane the amount of screen time we all log is - <USER2> foresee a big resurgence in anything "analog".

<comment><USER41> > the amount of studies/reports coming out talking about how bad screen time > is for people

I haven't heard of this, do you have any links for me?

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> A really nice D&D 'implementation' is Lamentations of the Flame Princess, at least in terms of the supplements, particularly Zak Smith's stuff. The last time I played D&D was during the 2e era (though I stubbornly stuck to 1e), and the LotFP has some of the flavour of the good I remember from that time (with its own twists).

</comment><comment><USER43> I personally know of at least 5 people that started playing D&D because of Stranger Things of all things.

<comment><USER44> Likewise, several people. Stranger Things also got some people (like myself) who never tried before to give it a whirl.

<comment><USER45> Watched stranger things with my teenage kids which led me to show them DND. They found a nice break from playing fantasy related computer games

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> I just realised what was really magical to me with pen&paper rpgs. My uncle used to have this funny / ridiculous trick of his, with a deck of cards where he would secretly see the bottom card of the deck while finishing shuffling it and then ask you: "red or black?". You'd say "red", then if the bottom card was red, he would say "then we take the red", or if the card was black he would say "then remains the black". Basically whatever you would say would lead to the bottom card and you'd supposedly be amazed when he'd show it to you.

In a rpg, it's like "you're in the forest, what you do?", "well I walk east". "ok you found a tower". Whatever you do, you'd find that tower haha. It's like whatever you say have fun consequences but with thousands more options than my uncle's trick.

</comment><comment><USER47> I love DnD 5e and its approachability/newb-friendlyness. That said, the game I have become enamored with here recently (one that I feel is underrated) is Shadowrun.

It gets a bad rep (somewhat deservedly so) because of its overwhelming depth and detail/learning curve, and the pretty horribly written core handbook. But once you get past the pointy bits and really learn the utility of the system, it's a pretty fantastic game that really scratches that itch for cyberpunk fantasy.

It isn't just DnD plopped into fake leather trenchcoats and hacky-hacky terminals (it has those things, of course). The gameplay is set up differently, and has a heist-movie like flow, consisting of "shadowruns" which are follow a meet client->make plan->prepare->execute flow, and lends itself well to one-off sessions.

Give it a shot if someone around is interested and has played it before. You might like it.

</comment><comment><USER48> Want to play but don't know how to get started?

Try my guide! [https://github.com/Miserlou/dnd- tldr](https://github.com/Miserlou/dnd-tldr)

<comment><USER49> I like this a lot; I'll be trying it on a few victi--er, boardgamers I think might be able to appreciate tabletop RPGs but are pushed back by both social stigmas and a belief that the rules are more complex than they are.

It solves the latter problem, at least. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Not only Dungeons and Dragons, board games are making huge waves around the world. As a game store owner, I have observed a huge growth in tabletop games, including board games. So it's probably not a coincidence that the most highly rated board game (at least according to Board Game Geek) is an RPG based board game. At the time of its kickstarter, I think it raised the most money as well.

[https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/174430/gloomhaven](https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/174430/gloomhaven)

Speaking of kickstarter, I believe some of its most funded ideas were board games.

<comment><USER50> I've found Gloomhaven, Pathfinder The Card Game, or other "hybrid RPGs" to be the better experience because it doesn't take up a full day.

<comment><USER51> Maybe my group is doing something wrong because Gloomhaven takes up at the VERY least 3-5 hours each time we play. That's only with 1-2 dungeons.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> I would think a major factor would be the surge of modern board games. Last year alone 5,000 new board games were published. This is called the golden age of board games, and D&D would seem to be just one aspect of this trend.

</comment><comment><USER53> I've tried and failed to get into some RPG campaigns in a few different systems (my general anxiety didn't help) but I listen to and absolutely adore The Adventure Zone podcast[1].

There's scope for some really wonderful collaborative storytelling in these systems, and the TAZ group are a few brothers and their dad and they gel together perfectly. Helps that they have lots of podcasting experience too, very high quality production.

[1]: [https://www.maximumfun.org/shows/adventure- zone](https://www.maximumfun.org/shows/adventure-zone)

<comment><USER54> I used to listen to TAZ but once the story started getting more and more away from traditional fantasy or even high fantasy, I got bored with it. Specifically the Crystal Kingdom arc drove me away. Just couldn't get into it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> I got into D&D by chance around 2009. Unfortunately I started with 4th Edition (I know...), but I'm very happy that I did, because all throughout High School I was one of the outcasts, but never had any of these mediums to confide in, and often made fun of "nerds" even though I technically was one. Just playing D&D has given me another way to meet new people and do something other than play video games in my free time. I only wish I had more time in the week. I have too many hobbies.

</comment><comment><USER56> There are two reasons to pick other game systems over D&D:

1\. You don't want the medieval + magic world and want to explore other timelines. Maybe futuristic, Star Wars etc.

2\. You don't like the mechanics. Maybe the game system complexity slows you down or else there is some weird arbitrage opportunity that messes up the incentives. (Let's spend the whole game killing orc babies to build up XP instead of solving the clues and then just beat up the bad guy at the end).

Do people have good recommendations for substitutes that solves #2?

<comment><USER57> Isn't #2 solved by a good Dungeon Master? The DM should be able to take control of the game so that players aren't just going around killing orc babies. "In the distance, you see a group of 1000 orc parents coming searching for the killers of their babies..."

<comment><USER56> I don't like too much explicit intervention by the DM.

Part of it has to feel like the player to feel like there are fair predictable rules that the game adheres to. Yes, the DM has to step in to make sure the game feels good, but the extra work to combat game mechanics doesn't feel like a good use of the DM's time.

Your solution is a good, creative one but I don't like that poor mechanics got us here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> 5e made great progrsss by stripping down rules and making things more accessible. I think they should do it even further.

The core game is fun, but combat is quite slow, tedious, and, in my opinion, not much of a good role play experience. Nix weapon stats, health, spell slots, etc. Differentiate more heavily on specialties. Ward off fear of death with a system of injuries and what not. Fighting can still be a huge part of the game, but it shouldn't be the underlying goal of most mechanics.

<comment><USER59> It sounds like you might like Dungeon World a lot more than D&D.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> I blame /r/dndgreentext and Critical Roll in part. Those highlights are addictively fun to read/watch. Sir Bearington level DnD is a life goal for sure.

</comment><comment><USER61> I'm just wondering, are there many casual D&D groups for non-geeks? (like the Adrian family featured in the article)

My only exposure to D&D was the episode of the "Community", and it looked pretty fun. I wonder if the demographics of that group is normal.

I only ask because most of my friends have this perception that D&D personalities are a little "awkward" and would not give it a chance, but have no issues going to board-game nights.

<comment><USER62> So I felt the same way about it; I'm a card-carrying nerd but most of my friends are decidedly non-geeks who still enjoy board game nights. At first, it started off with me being afraid of introducing them to the less mainstream boardgames. But one night I pitched Settlers of Catan (not exactly underground but also not Monopoly by any stretch) and surprisingly they took to it. And as we started playing more and more esoteric board games (some of them even having faux tabletop/RPG elements to them) I was continually surprised that everyone continued to enjoy them.

The most surprising thing to me, though, is that eventually _they_ approached _me_ about trying out D&D. It was something I'd wanted to do for a while but had never communicated it to them because I just assumed they wouldn't be interested.

Point being: You may be surprised. You have nothing to lose by suggesting it to them other than them saying "no". The 5th edition starter set even has the option of using pregenerated characters to reduce the friction. Maybe even start by showing them one of the CelibriDnD videos on YouTube; there's one with Vin Diesel and one with Terry Crews, not people who the general public usually think of as geeky.

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> Just figured I mention tabletop simulator which is a sandbox and editor that allows you to recreate and play nearly any boardgame ever created. I'm using it to play a tabletop RPG with some other people I met online, and it works very well.

[https://store.steampowered.com/app/286160/Tabletop_Simulator...](https://store.steampowered.com/app/286160/Tabletop_Simulator/)

<comment><USER51> And you can find almost any game you can imagine in the workshop for free. Best part is that some of the complicated games are scripted with Lua so you don't have to worry about setting up the game yourself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> I had a 25+ year gap in my D&D gaming. It started again when I moved to the PNW and met a couple in their 40's who took gaming very seriously, and started playing with them again. They introduced me to something I had overlooked: comic book stores that had Walmart-sized gaming arenas! Now I'm hooked again, but with people who care more about story than treasure. The amount of work my DM puts into backstory is insane, and he asks the same of us (well, not insane levels, but a commitment to character).

TL;DR - Playing D&D as an adult, with adults, is vastly different than playing as a teen.

</comment><comment><USER65> I don't like the new crop and the new style. Tables I played were overtly aggressive in a bad nerdy/intellectual way. I could sense the influence of mmorpgs and competitive tabletop games. I play for the story and the camaraderie, not to master loopholes in the rules and asserting dominance through numbers.

<comment><USER66> D&D 5 has a lot less of that than say 3.0 and 3.5 or Pathfinder, they're gone a long way to streamline the system. The general trend in RPGs over the last few decades has been towards lighter weight, more story driven games. I'm not personally a fan of D&D and it's tropes, and even then I'd go for something lighter like Dungeon World, but for what it is D&D 5 hits the nail on the head.

If you're interested, Meetup has a lot of local games groups listed you can try out to see if you can connect with a like-minded bunch of people.

<comment><USER65> Thanks. I checked meetup again but there are no groups where I live (Belgium).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> If anyone is curious, I run a Pathfinder (D&D fork) campaign in the Santa Rosa, CA area.

[https://www.meetup.com/Sonomacountyrpg/events/pvhbpqyzcbrb/](https://www.meetup.com/Sonomacountyrpg/events/pvhbpqyzcbrb/)

</comment><comment><USER68> My interest was rekindled by the Acquisitions Incorporated Podcasts with Chris Perkins and Penny Arcade.

<comment><USER69> It is kinda criminal that they are overlooked in this article. Some genuinely hilarious content in these videos.

[http://www.acq-inc.com/portfolio/category/live-show](http://www.acq- inc.com/portfolio/category/live-show)

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> I've always liked reading the sources and watching people playing RPGs more than playing them myself. So all the new litrpg's that are coming out these days (eg on royalroaddl) have been great for scratching that itch. I wonder if this is related to the current resurgence?

</comment><comment><USER71> How funny, I just started picking up some GURPS material because I wanted some RPG action that wasn't all dungeon crawling hack n' slash.

Between Cyberpunk, Illuminati, Atomic Horror, and a little Cthulhupunk, should be some good times; if I can get a campaign together...

</comment><comment><USER72> I am still running a campaign that started in 1979, with many of the same players. We can only manage once/month, because getting 8-9 adults together is a scheduling nightmare (thanks Doodle!), but we still love it just as much.

<comment><USER73> Have the lifestyles of the characters changed with the people who play them?

<comment><USER74> This is a great question. I can see changes reflected in the characters I want create as I go through different things in life, and I've only been playing for a few years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER75> For anyone interested in checking out what their old collection may be worth, head over here : [https://www.acaeum.com/](https://www.acaeum.com/)

</comment><comment><USER76> I was hoping it's catching with kids, but just adults..

<comment><USER77> Two of the photos in the article are of kids playing D&D, and there's mention of it in the text itself. Kids like D&D.

<comment><USER76> The kids are playing with their parents: "it didn't take too much convincing to get the whole family to play, including his 73-year-old grandmother."

The surge in Twitch and podcasting is adults: "One of the most popular live- play Dungeons & Dragons web series is Critical Role, featuring a core group of eight professional voice actors adventuring through custom campaigns written and led by dungeon master Matthew Mercer. "

Why you diss me man

<comment><USER77> What the hell are you talking about? Look for the ones captioned "Irvin Reynolds, top left, leads weekly D&D sessions for kids at Uncle's Games." and "RPG Research Vice President John Welker leads Dungeons & Dragons sessions for kids twice a month at Spark Central in Kendall Yards."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER78> I would love to play it but physical games require you to meet up and everyone is too spaced out in this city to visit.

<comment><USER27> Lots of folks play these games in video chats.

<comment><USER79> I am starting a starfinder (pathfinder in space) that is doing that as well as publishing on yahoo.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER80> I'd really like to see someone write "The unsurprising resurgence of Dungeons of Dragons".

</comment><comment><USER81> I keep thinking I want to get back into D&D. Would love to play some RIFTS or Shadowrun too.

<comment><USER4> I'm in the process of starting a Shadowrun campaign with old friends. We've played Pathfinder over the past couple of years, but want to try something else, particularly after our biggest Pathfinder-fan quit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER82> I play something similar to D&D for 20 years and won't stop anytime soon :)

</comment><comment><USER83> I am currently DMing The Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh, every Sunday at 8:30pm.

</comment><comment><USER84> offtopic! but very cool to see a story from the Inlander that includes bits and bobs from Spokane, WA come across Hacker News :)

</comment><comment><USER85> IRC is loaded with channels where games are occuring. mostly closed channels but very rich and real world complex espescially if you have a channel of players roleplaying NPCs in character vs a channel of characters playing the adventure. also echo dot understands what to do if i say echo roll 6d6.

</comment><comment><USER86> Anyone knows how to build alexa skills, i think this is a chance! Alexa activate D&D skill Alexa how many hit dice does a red dragon have? Alexa how many days walking from harkenwald to fallcrest?

<comment><USER87> I think there's some precedent using Alexa for DnD, although I'm not a user myself.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/6f0s97/i_started_using...](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/6f0s97/i_started_using_alexa_with_my_sessions/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER88> massive data hordes for D&D too.

<comment><USER89> Where? i see only an article about it being popular. please tell me where this data is to be found?

<comment><USER90> open5e.com has some stuff

<comment><USER91> thank you :)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why 'Follow Your Passion' Is the World's Worst Career Advice - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/betty-liu/please-stop-listening-to-the-worst-career-advice-in-the-world.html?cid=cp01002quartz <comment><USER2> Here is a summary of : So Good They Can't Ignore You by Cal Newport, which is about this subject.

[http://www.kevinrandom.com/1-page-summary-so-good-they- cant-...](http://www.kevinrandom.com/1-page-summary-so-good-they-cant-ignore- you-by-cal-newport/)

Quote: "The passion movement started in the 1970s. The core illusion: that there is a magic job out there that's right for you, and will solve all your problems. This illusion applies to relationships too :) "

<comment><USER3> Nobody said following your passion would solve all your problems.

Following your passion will make those problems worth the cost.

The problem is most people don't understand what "passion" is. Passion is what you can't _not_ do (not to be confused with a warm fuzzy answer to "what is your passion?" which you're not really going to ever follow thru on even if handed every resource to).

ETA: as far as I can tell, few people actually have passions. If you don't have one, don't pretend to follow it. A career based on lying to yourself is indeed following horrible advice.

<comment><USER4> > Passion is what you can't _not_ do ...

That's the thing I've never understood about following your passion. If you "can't _not_ do" it, once people figure that out they will stop paying you, secure in the knowledge that you will keep doing it anyway.

Perhaps the secret to wealth is that your passion has to be money?

<comment><USER5> The secret is that if people pay you to do this thing you can't not do, you'll be able to do _more_ of it.

For instance: I can't not draw comics. I just finished spending four and a half years on a graphic novel. I like to draw them and I seem to be pretty decent at them if the reactions I've been getting are any guide.

But I have to pay rent. And power, and internet. And pay for my subscription to Adobe's Creative Suite, and upgrade my computer now and then.

If nobody's paying me to draw my comics, I'm going to need to find a way to pay those bills anyway. If I'm not lucky enough to have someone else pay them for me, then I need to get a job.

There are only so many hours in a day. A job will take up a lot of them. And I'll have to wedge tiny bits of making comics in the edges of what's left. I'll need to deal with a commute, and with spending all my energy at work, and just wanting to come home and sleep instead of draw.

So I draw my comics, put them out for free, and put a tip jar out with them. If enough people start throwing money in that tip jar on a regular basis, I can start cutting back on my day job. Eventually I can get to a point where I'm able to pay all my bills from comics, and don't need to worry about taking time from them to keep a roof over my head. I can spend my entire workday thinking about making my comics and drawing them, and get a lot more pages out a lot faster.

A lot of my fans are taking advantage of the fact that I'll draw comics anyway. But a subset of my fans have enough money to throw a few bucks my way and help ensure that I can make a lot _more_ of the comics they like.

Does that make sense?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I wholeheartedly disagree with this article...

I firmly believe that if you're passionate at something, it's extremely easy to become extremely knowledgeable and/or highly skilled at it to a point that it's valuable to the world. Then it's just a case of applying your ingenuity to figuring out how to make your passion relevant. Once you make it relevant in today's ever changing market, it's then just a case of positioning it effectively to make it profitable.

I refuse to believe otherwise... every passion is worth something and makes a difference. If it didn't, then why are we genetically predisposed to them? What would be the purpose in this? Why aren't we all just worker bees, all genetically predisposed to doing the same few tasks?

Of course, the article is just one person's opinion and I suppose in many ways as relevant and valid as my own...

<comment><USER7> I'm in a weird place. I've always been passion driven, to an extreme. Now I'm running out of desire and suddenly things become insufferably painful. Beside passion I think it's good to know how to 'work' and be productive passionlessly.

<comment><USER8> Have you found that doing less things helps? Basically significantly reducing the demands on your time, and the overall number of things you have to tend to in any given day.

I've found that as I've gotten a little older, my tolerance for unnecessary complexity, unnecessary time demands, and doing pointless things, has plunged. I have also found that I'm much happier and more productive after stripping away as much of that as possible. There are various costs to doing so, but it has been worth it so far. When I was 20, I felt like I could juggle anything and everything (and no doubt reducing how effective I was in the process).

<comment><USER7> It's not doing less, it's actually doing anything, and yes it's very related to age and view on life. As You, in my twenties I would burn into flow to swallow a lot of things. Now I don't. The irony is that I was quite stupid younger, and have a much much broader and stronger understanding of abstraction, geometry, holism etc, all things life teaches you with time. But .. unnecessary complexity and other goals have taken hold of my `libido` if I may say so. My comment wasn't much about finding drive again but also accepting that passion isn't always there but life requires you to be able to work. I find that people that weren't passion driven at first thus spent a lot of time working on things that were tough or unrelated to their dream and are more stable in the long run.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The Scott Adams (of Dilbert) slides about "Passion is Overrated":

[http://www.slideshare.net/Scottadams925](http://www.slideshare.net/Scottadams925)

</comment><comment><USER10> I think Elizabeth Gilbert had a better take on the topic:

 _" I am a big advocate for the pursuit of curiosity. You've maybe heard me talk about this before? We are constantly being told to pursue our passions in life, but there are times when passion is a TALL ORDER, and really hard to reach. In seasons of confusion, of loss, of boredom, of insecurity, of distraction, the idea of "passion" can feel completely inaccessible and impossible. In such times, you are lucky to be able to get your laundry done (that sometimes feels as high as you can aim) and when someone tells you to follow your passion, you want to give them the middle finger. (Go ahead and do it, by the way. But wait till their back is turned, out of civility.)

But curiosity, I have found, is always within reach.

Passion is a tower of flame, but curiosity is a tiny tap on the shoulder — a little whisper in the ear that says, "Hey, that's kind of interesting…"

Passion is rare; curiosity is everyday.

Curiosity is therefore a lot easier to reach at at times than full-on passion — and the stakes are lower, easier to manage.

The trick is to just follow your small moments of curiosity. It doesn't take a massive effort. Just turn your head an inch. Pause for a instant. Respond to what has caught your attention. Look into it a bit. Is there something there for you? A piece of information?

For me, a lifetime devoted to creativity is nothing but a scavenger hunt — where each successive clue is another tiny little hit of curiosity. Pick each one up, unfold it, see where it leads you next.

Small steps.

Keep doing that, and I promise you: The curiosity will eventually lead you to the passion.

And that'll be the end of boredom."_ [1]

[1] [http://www.elizabethgilbert.com/one-of-the-greatest- quotes-o...](http://www.elizabethgilbert.com/one-of-the-greatest-quotes-on- creativity-ever-i-am-a-big-advocate-for-the-purs/)

</comment><comment><USER11> Bad career advise. But great life advise. There is more to life than money and being high on the exec ladder.

</comment><comment><USER12> Worst?

Surely not the worst possible advice.

E.g. it is much better than "work with the intent to cause as much harm as possible to yourself and those around you"

<comment><USER13> One I like is the "learn programming, there is a lot of money there".

<comment><USER14> It is a reasonably good advice. After all there is plenty of programming work that does not require ever learning how does quicksort work or what is a mutex. Accessible to nearly anyone with increased intelligence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> "I found:

a) Something I liked to do (writing) b) Something that people were willing to pay me for (writing) c) Something that I was good at (writing)"

My only problem with the authors solution is that if you break down "passion" into those 3 buckets then her answer is still a general answer of "writing".

I would've enjoyed the author to dig deeper into why the writing she does and the 3 points led her to find the thing she is passionate about.

</comment><comment><USER16> I agree that it's terrible advice, but the article is clickbait and lacking in substance.

</comment><comment><USER17> I hate the misleading + provocative title used to get me to click. It actually takes away from the nice framework for 'work' communicated in this article. The title seems to suggest that 'passion' should not be a component in ones career goals, which is bs.

<comment><USER18> Passion should not be a component of ones career goals. Something that you enjoy doing can be, but is not always, something you're passionate about.

I obtained a degree in one of my passions and I do it as a hobby, I would hate doing it for a living because of numerous reasons even though I'm good at it and people would pay. Instead I found something that I am not passionate about but enjoy greatly that has a better working dynamic for my personality.

It's my opinion that the concept of 'passion' should only play into career goals in so much as determining if the field you're interested in actually aligns with what you enjoy about the concept of that field.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> The odd thing is the author mentions that even if you don't make (a lot) of money, you are still doing what you love (and thus must be happy and succesful by any meaningful criteria), and then later fails to bring this back into the conclusion.

There is probably little chance that you'll be good enough at something, to use that skill to acquire vast amounts of money if you are not passionate about that skill. But the chance that what you love is something that is In demand enough to make you rich, is also pretty slim.

</comment><comment><USER20> From Somerset Maugham's novel "The Moon and Sixpence" (1)

Storeve : "I don't pretend to be a great painter," he says early on, "but I have something. I sell."

Yet he recognizes Strickland's (Stroeve's friend) work as genius.

He tells the dealer, "Remember Monet, who could not get anyone to buy his pictures for a hundred francs. What are they worth now?" The dealer questions this logic. "There were a hundred as good painters as Monet who couldn't sell their pictures at that time, and their pictures are worth nothing still. How can one tell? Is merit enough to bring success?"

Stroeve is infuriated. "How, then, will you recognize merit?" he asks.

"There is only one way—by success," the dealer replies. "Think of all the great artists of the past—Raphael, Michael Angelo, Ingres, Delacroix—they were all successful."

(1) - [http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/05/31/the-great- and-t...](http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/05/31/the-great-and-the-good)

</comment><comment><USER21> The author's recognition that luck is a critical factor is refreshing.

Happiness != success.

Career != life.

Work != career.

Life is not one-dimensional, and luck is a huge factor in all of these.

<comment><USER6> Luck is what outsiders label reasons that you get ahead and they don't. The reason a door opened for you and not for them. The reason that you're successful and they're not.

What they fail to see is that it wasn't lucky at all. It may have been luck that that particular door opened when it did, but realistically, from the inside, it was leveraging the best opportunity available at the time. If that door hadn't opened, you'd have taken another route to your objective. There is little luck involved. The only lucky thing I suppose is the probability of taking the route you did.

When you climb a mountain your goal is the summit. The climber who decides "Ah shit, I couldn't do it because there was bad weather, you were so lucky that you hit the mountain when you did and had that window to summit." There was no luck involved... you would've summited anyway, you'd have just taken a different route or persevered longer to get there. That's the difference between those who make it and those who say "If only I'd had their luck."

I guess you could say it took some luck for Edison to make the light bulb... but I daresay if you'd suggested such a thing to Edison, he'd have taken your head off. But that's the difference between seeing failure and seeing the thousands of incremental changes that led from something that wasn't satisfactory, to something that provides lights for the entire world...

<comment><USER22> It's lucky that I wasn't born as an aboriginee. Babe Ruth didn't have to compete against black players or get drug tested, ad nauseum. The whole "you make your own luck" is as wishful thinking as any other hokey religion.

<comment><USER6> It's lucky that you were born with such a sense of knowing your place in the world and not striving to be more than society lets you be... It must be a great source of comfort.

There are many many examples of people who have done what society said couldn't be done because of who they are, what race they are, what sex they are, what circumstances they are shackled by... by many accounts the honey bee shouldn't be able to fly.

Imagine where you could be if you said "Fuck that, I'll define my own destiny thanks."

<comment><USER23> > Imagine where you could be if you said "Fuck that, I'll define my own > destiny thanks."

Sometimes you'd be better off. Sometimes you'd be dead. Is society better off because of a person who stood up for his or her beliefs and paid a price for that? I'd say yes. Is that person better off for it? Debatable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I haven't read the article, but why not follow your passion that at least guarantees you a job in this industry. It's not what you "TRULY," want to do, but at least your making a living in the field you have an interest and a passion for.

i.e. I started up long ago & in the process learned how to code & design. A few years after I landed my first coding gig. I'm still coding for a living, while also still pursuing my startup/inventor goals.

Again, I didnt read the article, but I can't see anything negative in following your passion in our industry (tech), unless you you just waste money having others build your dreams and not gaining new skills yourself.

</comment><comment><USER25> If you wind up becoming Picasso or Eddie Van Halen or Meryl Streep, it's great advice. But if you're one of the many talented but marginally employed artists, musicians, or actors, it's not so great. The truth is that there are a lot of very talented people out there who have been seized with a passion that in most cases just does not pay out. Blessed are they whose passion is accounting.

</comment><comment><USER26> This is an issue that will never be settled at a high level - where it's some sort of rule everyone should live by. This is what the headline implies.

Your approach is relative to your current situation.

IF people realized this we'd:

\- have 50% less questions on Quora and Yahoo answers

\- better google matches for the things we need

\- a faster internet (or maybe not, more room for porn bandwidth?)

</comment><comment><USER27> clickbait bullshit...

how can it be the worst if it makes 1/3 of the advertised formula?

Also hardly anyone sucks at their passion (and admits it to himself, which would be crucial for the calculation, too). That makes it at least 1/2 of the formula...

<comment><USER28> > Also hardly anyone sucks at their passion

Anecdotally, I know far too many people who have devoted years to areas they have little to no aptitude in (in the arts, and in business). They have no natural talent and are getting nowhere (by any metric, not just financial), but they do love their field.

<comment><USER18> I could not agree more. I think people are conflating the things one enjoys doing with passion.

<comment><USER29> Are you implying that if people aren't good at something they love doing, they just aren't passionate about it... and that with real passion, being great at something is inevitable?

<comment><USER18> Not in any way. I'm saying that enjoying doing something is not the same as being passionate about it. There are many things I enjoy that I don't have a passion for.

Passion and pleasure are being conflated a lot here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> bs. first she says that she is one of the lucky ones finding the perfect job, 3 of 3, and in the next paragraph she says "Plenty of us aren't so lucky"... ... "of us"??? You've just excluded yourself from the unlucky in the previous paragraph.

<comment><USER31> There's no contradiction. Some of set U ("us") are lucky. "Plenty" members of set U are not lucky. Set U contains everybody.</comment></comment>


Loyalty in Online Communities [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://web.stanford.edu/~jurafsky/pubs/paper-loyalty.pdf <comment><USER2> _We define user loyalty on Reddit based on commenting behavior, which we view as a strong proxy for latent engagement. To focus our attention on loyalty in- stead of platform-level retention, all of the following defini- tions are restricted to users who commented at least 10 times within the relevant time period._

An interesting definition of loyalty for any site. I recognize that I am unusually skewed towards being a "lurker", but consider myself loyal to two sites (this being one of them). I guess you would need visitation data to be able to better distinguish between an "active loyal user" and a "passive loyal user", relatively speaking.

</comment><comment><USER3> its not so much loyalty, more addiction that i keep coming here and to reddit.

I've pretty much fallen out of love with both sites (i've been on both for almost 10 years) but I gotta get that dopamine hit from finding interesting articles and getting in internet discussions.

not even being sarcastic.

<comment><USER4> I finally took the step to consciously stop visiting reddit this week. I've replaced it with another forum specific to a new subject I'm trying to learn as my go to distraction place. It's only been a few days but if it goes anything like Slashdot and Digg after it in a week or two I'll forget to ever look.

It got to the point where it felt like I was going on reddit to be annoyed. I'd go to subreddits where I knew I would heavily disagree with the opinions, I'd read SRD, all this stuff that was just entirely negative.

The only problem with avoiding reddit is that on a lot of topics when you search for something reddit comes up frequently in the search requests.

<comment><USER5> > The only problem with avoiding reddit is that on a lot of topics when you > search for something reddit comes up frequently in the search requests.

That's probably because google or whatever else you use is filter-bubbling you...

<comment><USER6> Anecdotal, but I rarely get search results linking to reddit. I personally left reddit a few years ago so this may be the filter-bubble pointing me elsewhere.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Semantics, Representations and Grammars for Deep Learning - <AUTHOR> http://arxiv.org/abs/1509.08627?resubmit=HN <comment><USER2> The abstract implies it is a semantics for describing the different kinds of deep learning approaches rather than, say, a semantic system to be used by a deep learning system.

Seems quite interesting, though an effort at the later approach would be quite interesting too.

</comment><comment><USER3> All I get is the following error, with code 403:

      Access Denied

      Sadly, you do not currently appear to have permission to access http://arxiv.org/abs/1509.08627

What's going on?

<comment><AUTHOR> Good question. I've never heard of that happening before. As far as I know, everything on Arxiv is totally open for everybody.

Edit: I mirrored the paper here for anybody who's having trouble accessing it:

[http://www.fogbeam.com/1509.08627v1.pdf](http://www.fogbeam.com/1509.08627v1.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I for one look forward to our networked, distributed game theoretic deep learning overlords.</comment>