Pages

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

The importance of choosing appropriate RPG stats


Second last but not second least!

Aging is an interesting beast. It took me awhile to disconnect my feelings with that of society's, but I  have recently realized that I quite enjoy growing older. Obviously, there are lame things like my body falling apart after exertion that was previously fine (What bro? You want to party two nights in a row? Who does that?), but all in all, I've decided that growing older is great.

One thing that I enjoy is being able to better understand people. I find that as I grow older and talk and listen to more people, I'm better able to read people and understand what they're feeling and thinking. Looking back at myself when I was 5 or 10 years younger, I feel like my understanding of people, emotions, and thoughts were so naive. I'm really excited to extend this thinking for the future -- by the time I'm 50, will my ability to read people have increased in a similar rate as the past five years? Or, will society and people have changed so much so that my reading skills are outdated? Does this skill require considerable upkeep? Judging from how my people skills drop off after working at home without talking to another soul over a blizzardy few days, the answer is yes!

Similarly, I enjoy looking at my experiences over the last five years. I've lived in 5 cities in 3 countries, had a bunch of amazing experiences, and my fair share of negative and traumatic ones too. I feel like through experiencing these events that I'm much able to connect and feel empathy to a wider range of people and experiences. I really enjoy feeling connected to people and I'm excited to experience more things as I grow older that will help make more connections with more people.

I was relating something similar to this blog post to my friend Henry and he responded with "Scott, of course you like growing older. If life was an RPG, you would put all your stats in Wisdom and Charisma [, the skills that you have increased by growing older]." Henry knows me quite well and was indeed correct, as whenever I play an RPG, that is exactly what I do!  Perhaps my enjoyment with aging comes from identifying what attributes of life I enjoy and nourishing those attributes. I don't think I explicitly identified these attributes, I feel like I intuited them and perhaps got lucky. I have really enjoyed my progress over the past five years, and perhaps this enjoyment has made me optimistic about aging!

8 comments:

  1. This is a really interesting concept - I think I tend to create characters that are an odd combination of who I *think* I am and who I'd rather be. Thinking of aging as a process where you're trying to make those two things converge is lovely!

    Also, I like how your post bridges this month's topic with next month's (at least as it looks like it'll be)!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Somewhat related: last night I dreamt that for some reason like twenty people showed up here and voted for high school graduation or something.

      Delete
    2. Last night I played some Saints Row 3, a parody of the GTA universe. My female character has a blue unibrow, blue moustache, beehive hairdo, topless (except for a parachute backpack), and drives a black cement mixer truck with matching blue (to her unibrow) underglow and nitrous. I'm not sure if my SR3 character invalidates my RPG theory.

      Delete
  2. I've talked to you before about your crazy high charisma stats, Scott. Hopefully as they increase you'll continue using them for good instead of evil.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In fact, I'd like to learn about how to increase my charisma stats. Let's have a month where we share skills or talents or something!

      Delete
    2. That's a really fun idea. Cat. Perhaps we should do that as September's topic, after video games August.

      I'm reading a book right now, Cat -- How to WIn Friends and Influence People. Despite the total chotch title, it's an unbelievable read. The general takeway from the book is "Don't be an asshole, and you will kick ass at life". The world would be an amazing, supportive place if everyone read that book. A more contemporary read is "Love is the Killer App", another great book, but I'd recommend Win Friends first.

      Here is the list of specific takeways, but I strongly recommend you actually read it yourself so that you can understand what Carnegie is actually saying:

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influence_People#Fundamental_Techniques_in_Handling_People

      The book is probably in the public domain (1936?) I look forward to hearing your thoughts!

      Delete
    3. lol -- just read the last tip on the list "Read a good book on the sexual side of marriage." Can't wait to see how '30s mogul Carnegie handles this one.

      Delete
    4. I'm curious as to how we'd manage that. Do we request advice from one another for that month?

      What I'm saying is I'd have no idea what to write about.

      Delete