• Salsa dancing, but not since pandemic :mask:
• Dog agility (my dog's hobby too)
• Oil painting
• Surfing
• Wing foiling
• Cooking
• Newest hobby is growing kale* :grin:

*

Gym, 8-ball pool.

Tried writing, drawing, and keyboard recently but gave up.

"Hobbies" downsized to this short list by the pandemic:
- listening to music
- mostly re-reading
- urban hiking
- designing ttRPGs
- discussing philosophy (on & offline)

Listening to music, writing and recording music. I started running again this summer after a three year layoff, I'll keep it up as long as my knees last. Reading, of course.

Discussing philosophy online and in real life
Going to coffee shops to meet friends and to read and write
Listening to music, ranging from goth, metal, punk and emo, psychedelia, indie and alternative rock
Drawing and painting
Meandering around, including record and bookshops, charity shops and libraries

kale — praxis

Looks good, I love roasted kale with olive oil and salt.

designing tRPGs — 180 Proof

DnD, Shadowrun...?

I got into 5e back in college; during the pandemic I played some virtually on roll20 but it sort of fizzled out.

listening to music
- mostly re-reading
discussing philosophy (on & offline) — 180 Proof

Listening to music, writing

Reading, of course. — Pantagruel

Discussing philosophy online and in real life

Listening to music — Jack Cummins

I assumed reading, writing, music and philosophy to be a given around here :smirk:

I assumed reading, writing, music and philosophy to be a given around here :smirk: — darthbarracuda

:rofl:

Going to coffee shops ... Meandering around, — Jack Cummins

:up:

We Americans call our flânerie "urban hiking" because it sounds, I guess, more productive or something. :smirk:

DnD, Shadowrun...? — darthbarracuda

Well no, my own ttRPG designs (I haven't really played since the mid-80s), which are like – inspired by – published games such as e.g. Barbarians of Lemuria, On Mighty Thews & Torchbearer (sword & sorcery), Neon City Overdrive & Technoir (cyberpunk), Kult, Urban Shadows & Houses of the Blooded (dark fantasy), Earthdawn & Summerland (post-apocalypse), Scum & Villany and Mothership (space opera+) and Zenobia, 43 AD & Honor and Blood (alt-history). My designs tend to be rules-lite, very low crunch, GM plus 2/3 players (4 max), structured for one-to-four shot episodic gameplay (so no "zero-to-hobo" & almost no prep) and player-facing (e.g. GM doesn't roll dice). My nephews "playtest" them for me with their groups between 5e / Mythras / Star Wars campaigns.

Btw, I've only played oDnD about six times and that was back in '77. Even as a high school freshman I found it too cartoonish and wargamey and that playing DnD felt nothing like the experience of fantasy/scifi anthologies, novels, comics, or films it had window-dressed itself with, so I immediately homebrewed my own ruleset and found that I had a knack for running games. Of course I played other campaigns on occasion but ran my own rpg "worlds" for several years until I burnt-out on the hobby, and the group had scattered, etc. Only by chance two decades later did my interest in RPGs return (re: I'd replied to an online request to help someone with his design and wound up contributing a new "combat system" for the game Zenobia mentioned above), mostly as an interest in design and the more "narrative-focussed" innovations that were coming to the fore by the mid-2000s. I believe 5e's "advantage system" was a blatant concession to this trend away from hyper-crunchiness like 4e (or Mathgrinder) & Shadowrun.

Game designing is a (nostalgic) creative diversion; the goal is not publication (though, y'know, who knows?), just a proxy for fiction writing, etc.

I got into 5e back in college; during the pandemic I played some virtually on roll20 but it sort of fizzled out.

What games, if any, did you play before 5e? Are you playing now? Even before the pandemic, Roll20 & Discord seemed fairly popular; they'd turned me off, however, when I'd played some "virtual tabletop" sessions with my nephews and their father/my brother last year (I live in the US southeast, they in the southwest & pacific northwest 3 time-zones away), maybe because playing via screens allowed for too many distractions and much less social immediacy.

That's cool, had no idea you had that deep of a background in RPGs.

I played 5e off and on through college and afterwards; I was a DM for a Star Wars 5e clone for a few months until I got burnt out. The idea of playing D&D for me has always been better than actually playing it, in my experience. Maybe it was just the group I was in, but it usually was tedious and often boring; the food and the company were the real reasons I went. I would have my characters make impulsive decisions just to get things rolling and otherwise just sorta sit there and wait for my turn. I (vaguely) remember spending my 21st playing 5e with liquor integrated into the story, that was enjoyable. Designing my campaign was more fun, I put a lot of effort into making interesting stories, puzzles and encounters, but ultimately it ended up being too much to maintain.

I'm not playing any tRPGs right now, maybe again some time, idk. I grew up playing computer RPGs, I sometimes play them now but not very often; TheGreatWhatever once told me that he thought computer games were "chore simulators", I thought that pretty apt. Books are infinitely better.

Looks good, I love roasted kale with olive oil and salt. — darthbarracuda

I normally add it to salads but occasionally sauté it with avocado oil, onion, garlic, and fresh ground pepper and salt. Like spinach, a big gob of it cooks down instantly to a fraction of its original apparent mass. Delish.

TheGreatWhatever once told me that he thought computer games were "chore simulators", I thought that pretty apt. — darthbarracuda

:100: :smirk:

Horticulture (Gardening)

The new economic boom ushering in a new golden age will result from custom 3d printed squash molds. Everyone will store strange shaped squash on their shelves as food statues and it'll become an epidemic of crippling aesthetic addiction, especially around Halloween.

Squash statues, the genesis of a new religion.

That's cool, had no idea you had that deep of a background in RPGs. — darthbarracuda

Sometimes I kick myself when I think of what others have done with their ttRPG experiences from the '70s & '80s – converting their game worlds / favorite PCs into epic fiction: George RR Martin, R Scott Bakker, James SA Corey, Scott Lynch, Steven Brust, Raymond E Feist, Ian C Esslemont, Steven Erikson, ... Joss Whedon. This had never occurred to me and I've no idea why it didn't; I've always loved fantasy, scifi & horror, yet when I began writing fiction in the late 80s my literary interests were mainly absurdist, experimental (though not p0m0), and historical in novella & short story forms rather than novels or epic series.

Just the excuse I needed to get a 3D printer. Goodbye fiestaware.

Goodbye fiestaware. — praxis

Radioactive fiestaware should complement Squashtatues™. Maybe you can induce polyploidy in the seeds with those plates. Get yourself a lead china cabinet.

That's cool, had no idea you had that deep of a background in RPGs. — darthbarracuda

Continued reading contextualized what you all were saying. In my circles, RPG is rocket propelled grenade. I could see you and in your basements prepping god's good work. :lol: There has likewise been some confusion around BLM of late (Bureau of Land Management, or, as the enviros call it, Bureau of Livestock and Mining). I much prefer the new "Black Lives Matter." It's a chore keeping up with the changing acronyms.

:smirk:

I wonder, JR, what you make of this (@ the intersection of your RPGs & mine):

https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/09/us/six-days-in-fallujah-iraq-video-game/index.html

I agree with Abdulelah:

"I am disgusted that this is something that will be producing profit when people like me suffered the consequences of this war and will have to watch people play it for fun," Abdulelah, 28, told CNN. "I just can't get past the inhumanity."

While I take issue with the word "inhumanity" I get her point and think there is no "history" being taught here. It's simply a money-maker at best, and a confederate-statue of history at worst.

I agree with Abdulelah:

"I am disgusted that this is something that will be producing profit when people like me suffered the consequences of this war and will have to watch people play it for fun," Abdulelah, 28, told CNN. "I just can't get past the inhumanity."

While I take issue with the word "inhumanity" I get her point and think there is no "history" being taught here. It's simply a money-maker at best, and a confederate-statue of history at worst. — James Riley

Thanks for this. :up:

Thanks for this. :up: — 180 Proof

:up:

On a side note, the only "video game" I ever played was "Space Invaders" back in the late 70s. So acronyms are hard to keep up with. .gov is the worst. I feel very uncomfortable with and conflicted about war, so making a game out of it never appealed to me. My son used to do Counter Strike (?) but now he's distracted by his "intro to philosophy" course. LOL!

A bit infantile to engage in a hobbies thread.

so I like to read (over here for instance), doing some sport, viewing other sports, drawing and painting, baking bread and pizza (sourdough leavened) but not limited to, make some music but mostly listening to, photography (mostly birds), strolling through nature, programming (much less than I used to however) and about many other things, from movies to coming up with whatever solution needed to tackle any sort of problem, concocting various possible contraptions if needed and along the way, with which to make life easier or more pleasureable.

Hobby! :snicker:

Oil painting — praxis

I admired your paintings. Also the kale.

*not sure why I missed this thread?*

In my circles, RPG is rocket propelled grenade. — James Riley

:grin:

• Japanese literature, cinema and arts.
• Poetry
• Eating Persimmons

• Card magic (sleight of hand)
• Singing
• Computer games
• Lifting weights

"Hobbies" downsized to this short list by the pandemic:
- listening to music
- mostly re-reading
- urban hiking
- designing tRPGs
- discussing philosophy (on & offline) — 180 Proof

Update: downsized further mostly due health issues (slowly on the mend) ...

- listening to music
- discussing philosophy (online)

Addendum to ...
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/603428

As far as analogue role playing games go, my jam is (still) *low/no prep, rules lite & roleplay heavy* (i.e. so TotM, not maps & minis) rpgs such as

Blood & Honor
Cairn
Freeform Universal (FU)
Lasers & Feelings
Tricube Tales

(secondarily: FitD games, Houses of the Blooded, PbtA games (except DW), Sorcerer (+ suppliments) & Zenobia)

Lately, I like to watch actual plays of "narrative games" like these on Youtube. :nerd:

No digital games – for me, they automate (eliminate) too much players' improvisational creativity (since all possible actions / reactions are already scripted (coded) in the program), fully cybernetic illusionism / railroading.

When we had a contract in LA, back in 1996, the OG picked up a copy of Myst on clearance sale and we played it together. That was our first sophisticated computer game, but for a clumsy chess program. Then, of course, we got all the sequels and a bunch more mystery/puzzle games that never came close to the graphic quality and originality of Myst.
We both do some wood carving when arthritic pain allows and I still grow some vegetables every summer - in containers now, since digging is beyond my capability.

Writing mathematics programs in BASIC. Love that language. Physical exercise when possible.

What started years ago as a hobby eventually became a requirement.

Bread - french, focaccia, ciabatta, semolina, sourdough, cinnamon, cranberry walnut, naan

Pizza - anything from Margherita, to seafood - clam, scallops, shrimp, to goat cheese sun dried tomatoes and asparagus, to chicken tikka masala, to apple