Troll Lord Games

I have my own opinion.

I'm curious what meaning others may see in it if any.

First rule of Fight Club is, you do not talk about Fight Club.

2nd rule of Fight Club: You do not talk about Fight Club!

Calvin and Hobbes

Somebody just broke the first two rules of Fight Club.

Thanks for the insight guys.
I'll try to consolodate this and bring it to the next Wiggle show to see if that can add anything.

Joe, if you were talking about Decipher's Fight Klub card game, that's a different story.

I want you to wiggle as hard as you can!

Just wanted some feedback bro!
Not really into the newest release of a boxed version of blah blah blah, or fanboy stuff, and i already told you guys what cd I was listening too, wrote my tribute to EGG, and stated my opinion of the new color scheme for the forum.

What else is there left but Fight Club? besides...

If Tyler can break his own rules so can I!

Ok, let me break the ice.

I think Fight Club is about men's desperate attempt to remain men in a society that strives to emasculate them.

...yep, Joe, it is what you say...

and p'raps more: consciously embracing physical/brutal pain as
a way to connect with yourself and others in an increasingly
techno/non-human world...yeah, that too I think.

What was Tyler's mantra/rallying cry? (oh, yeah, Google is my friend,
here it is): Tyler Durden: "You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world." -- and the taking-down of
those centers-of-finance towers there at the end to bring financial
chaos was to force everybody else into that realization too.

Ok, that's my $0.02 worth.

Joe wrote:I think Fight Club is about men's desperate attempt to remain men in a society that strives to emasculate them.

A good analysis. But did the protagonist succeed or fail in his attempt to remain a man? I would say that he failed. In the book he succumbs to his madness and ends up institutionalized and thus emasculated. In the movie, while he is cured of his madness, he gets the girl and thus also becomes emasculated.

Transplant Fight Club's protagonist to John Norman's Gor, and watch what happens. Better yet, just read the Jason Marshall trilogy within the Gor series (Fighting Slave of Gor, Rogue of Gor, Guardsman of Gor) and find out what happens when an Earth man* is transported to a world where it's expected and perfectly normal to act as a Man* should.

*Capitalization or lack thereof is intentional here. Standard D/s parlance is to write out a submissive or slave's name, if they have one, in all lower-case letters. Dominants spell their names normally.

y'know, I was thinking about the movie Fight Club last night after my earlier post and came to another meaning (never read the book FWIW):

I think its meta-theme is all about connection.

The central character (unnamed protagonist/Tyler Durden) as the movie begins has pretty much lost connection with himself, life and others. He is disconnected from work (rarely at the home office, instead flying everywhere), his 'social life'/connection-to-others consists of attending various self-help/12-step meetings, and he's so disconnected from himself that he splits his own personality into Tyler Durden.
To get connection, he first has to literally disconnect from the norm to redefine his life: he blows up his apartment and everything in it, has that first fight with Tyler, sets-up his boss so he doesn't have to even BE at the office, etc.
(Interesting thought here: that first Tyler fight in the parking lot is where he starts to get some connection -- note: when a fighter lands a solid blow on his opponent, they say he connected).
All the other Fight Club participants have their own lost-boys disconnect going on and start connecting again with themselves through the shared bond of this secret club. And onward it goes with the other-part of himself (Tyler) disrupting the norm to redefine his reality.
His second connection with someone (Tyler being his first), to Marla, starts as a disconnection: to him, it's Tyler who is her lover, not him.
The rest of the guerrilla-war stuff the Fight Club guys do, culminating in the toppling of the financial system is all about disconnecting the rest of norm society to force people to have to reconnect with themselves .vs the consumer culture.
And, finally, he has to face that it was he who disconnected himself (acceptance of responsibility for his life) and kill the Tyler-part to be whole/connected.
So, yeah, it's all about connecting with your life.

That's my take on it...

Yeah...thats some good gravy guys!

He fails in many ways yet there is one distinct failure focused on in the movie and only alluded to in the book.(As far as I have read) His name is Robert Palmer.
There are no acceptable losses in this game and each fatal mistake weighs heavy.

I will read the Gor stuff. It's been a long time.
Jason Marshall?

Rikitiki wrote:y'know, I was thinking about the movie Fight Club last night after my earlier post and came to another meaning (never read the book FWIW):

I think its meta-theme is all about connection.

The central character (unnamed protagonist/Tyler Durden) as the movie begins has pretty much lost connection with himself, life and others.

To get connection, he first has to literally disconnect from the norm to redefine his life:

is all about disconnecting the rest of norm society to force people to have to reconnect with themselves .vs the consumer culture.
And, finally, he has to face that it was he who disconnected himself (acceptance of responsibility for his life)

So, yeah, it's all about connecting with your life.

That's my take on it...

Thats a very interesting take.

Now as for the last part...dealing with the norm how would one do this in a more positive way?

Without breaking any eggs?

"...without breaking any eggs?"

Nope, I don't think that's possible -- we're talking about a revolution here, both personal and societal...and you've gotta tear down the norm in order to replace it with the new. There have been bloodless revolutions, yes, but never any that weren't stressful - even personal, internal ones. So, I think eggs gotta break, even if only gently.

Photos of the holocaust forces us to face human atrocity.

Photos and stories of ghetto life forces us to face issues living in the inner city.

Don't tell me it's impossible to force the issue without doing crime or killing people! The author of Fight Club forced the issue and all you had to do was watch the movie.

I'm looking for ideas and tactics that force others to reconnect, or at least face the concept without all the crazy schtuff tagged on.

A social revolution does not require terrorism or self destruction...Ghandi...Martin Luther King, Martin Luther...Lebanon kicking out Syria...the fall of the Berlin Wall...all these are examples of omeletts without shells...or at least not ruining the omelette as a whole.

Besides, i'm not looking for epic strides...just baby steps.
You already defined the basic formula it took for the main character.

Now just apply that same formula to other individuals and how would that be done without pointing guns at people and crashing into traffic head on?
Surely theres SOMETHING we can come up with!

Just some tactics that forces a person to disconnect from the norm if only for a moment in order to reconnect with self. Movies have done it...so have books...so there MUST be ways an individual can influence other individuals.

Let me rephrase this. Forget the "social revolution" and think on a smaller scale.

How would Rikitiki "contact" someone in his own sphere of influence in order to get him to reconnect?

(geez, I had a loong response all typed out and the browser timed-out, so here goes again) -

Thanks, Joe, for expanding on what you were after. When I said eggs will always get broken, I meant any change will always cause stress whether it's a personal revolution/change or societal. You're right, it doesn't have to mean death, violence, killing, etc. But even in a personal change of a habit/attitude a "death" (letting go of) occurs: the old-norm dies off by being replaced with the new.

Two things I think are apropos here - basics of being human:
a) We are creatures of habit (a good evolutionary trait; once we figure out how to do something we don't have to re-invent the wheel every next time),
b) We all have fear of the unknown (all other fears are variations of this basic one).

Change, shaking-up-the-norm to a new/better reality has those two as hurdles - if we know how to do something (habit), there's no incentive to change it unless it stops working for us; and since we know it (it is familiar / no fear) why go through the stress (fear of the unknown) to change?

(Disclaimer: I cannot change anyone -- I can coerce, manipulate, threaten, beg, rant, entreat, etc, but can only change myself. No matter what I do to/at someone else, they'll only change when/if they choose to do so.)

So, how do I contact someone in my sphere of influence in order to get them to reconnect?
I can advocate (Wow, I took this cool seminar and learned a lot about myself and my attitudes, it was great!), exemplify (if they like what they see in me, they'll want it also), and observe/report (You always look a bit beat-up and I hear you saying a lot of negatives, maybe you need a change).

I think the first part (for me and others) is honestly facing what doesn't work anymore (what we want/need to change). An extreme example of the opposite of this would be an alcoholic who's still a practicing alcoholic -- doesn't work for him, yet unable/unwilling to face that.
If something doesn't work, do something different! Yeah, sounds simple, huh? Gotta shake up the habitual-norm (disconnect) to make room for the new.

Examples in the four areas (I've done many of these, though never done a 'ropes course'):

Physical: Yoga, exercise, deep-breathing, dance!, skip a bit while walking, make more dramatic/flambouyant gestures, SMILE, walk backwards, blindfold yourself and take a tour of your house, etc.
Mental: READ, play RPGs, do crosswords, take a class, do puzzles, etc.
Emotional: READ, play RPGs, watch a movie with the sound off and pay attention to your feelings, really listen to relatives and friends and what feelings develop from that, notice what triggers intense disgust in you, etc.
Spiritual: meditate, don't talk for an entire day, go out in nature, BREATHE (another word for inspiration/expiration), if you're religious pray and/or attend a ceremony, make up your own ceremony(s), etc.

Oh, and pay attention, pay attention, PAY ATTENTION! Especially to the words you use -- those you use habitually or habitual phrases you use are keys to thought/feeling habits you are in.

...there ya go, for what it's worth...

An example of this disconnet/reconnect change-stuff using RPGs actually is something I've done...although that wasn't my motive -

24 years or so ago (GawdsAndGawdesses, has it been that long?), when a member of a once-a-week game night, I decided to put together a different scenario the next time I GM'd. (Luckily, most of us players also ran games, so we traded off -- small campaigns for awhile, one-shots, etc.)
Tired of the hero/good-guys .vs badass/evils, I started running (usually one-shot, sometimes longer) games I called "evil crew" ones -- players could play neutral characters at best, the more evil the better. Very fun since many of the typical constraints were off.
What was interesting was how the players felt and reacted after those games. Most were surprised by how eviiil they could be ... and all felt more human and freer afterward. It's that honestly facing and tapping into your dark self; by doing so you're less inclined to go there -- avoid, deny, and project it onto others and you eventually end up being the guy who went postal because it's pulling your strings on the inside with you unawares...until you go nuclear.

Well I have tried the Tyler Durdin way and it hasn't worked so well.

Even though the physical, spiritual, and mental "rattling of my own cage" has only done nothing but good for my life and my mindset, yet when i wish to share what I have discovered by rattling the cages of others, all I get are angry and frightened faces looking at me from inside the cage.

Rattle a few forum cages and you get banned or attacked by people upon high horses.
Rattle a few professional cages and find yourself in hot water.
Rattle legal cages and find yourself in jail.
Rattle personal cages and find yourself losing friends and relationships.
Chase the guy down that flipped you off so you can rattle his cage and he just gets scared and thinks about calling the cops. The fact that the effect of his cause (finger in the air) was a surprise to him tells me he didn't think his salute thru at the time, nor did I think the results of my answering his salute.

Soooooooooooooooooooooo...instead of continuing to do what I have deemd as not working, I am looking at more sublime and positive ways to rattle those cages.

I have noticed that "connecting" on a Fight Club level usually just gets me into fights.

I plan to give your post some thought.

You have given me much thought Riki...I can just see myself at a yoga class telling the all female class...you are not your freaking spandex leotards...you are not the SUV you drove yourself here in...you are not your self help books...you are not the house your husband can no longer afford...

Ok, maybe I have a LOT of baby steps to make.

I look forward to any other insight, or opinions on what others think Fight Club is really about.

Or, if you really want to connect and just hit me as hard as you can...send a PM.

Joe wrote:Yeah...thats some good gravy guys!

He fails in many ways yet there is one distinct failure focused on in the movie and only alluded to in the book.(As far as I have read) His name is Robert Palmer.
There are no acceptable losses in this game and each fatal mistake weighs heavy.

I will read the Gor stuff. It's been a long time.
Jason Marshall?

Here's a somewhat tongue in cheek overview and review of the three books. In general, Jason started off as a typical Earth man, unlike Tarl Cabot, who was a Gorean raised on Earth. He progresses throughout the trilogy until at the end he is in control of things and refusing to let anyone strip him of his manhood again.

14. Fighting Slave of Gor
Tarl takes a vacation! In this book, the first of the Jason Marshall trilogy, we meet a new protagonist named, you guessed it, Jason Marshall. Jason is a he-man college frat boy from Earth who accidentally gets caught in the middle of a surprise slave abduction here on Earth, and winds up being transported to Gor as a "silk slave," or a Gorean free woman's "boy toy." Despite the fact that he begins the books as a total wuss, Jason quickly responds to the simple diet, forced exercise, and fresh clean air of his slave pens and miraculously transforms into: a clone of Tarl. He winds up being drafted into the Fighting Pens and trained as a slave gladiator. During the time in which he must endure enforced slave labor, he makes some friends who... well, you can pretty much figure it out from there. By the end of the book he is free and searching for Beverly, the girl he was trying to rescue when he got jumped by Gorean slavers in the first place.

15. Rogue of Gor
In this book, Jason travels to the river town of Victoria and finds work as a dock hand. He also finds Beverly, and upon doing so immediately reverts to his former wimpy Earth-weenie self. The job, and his equal-rights-based relationship with Beverly, both last for about two chapters. Jason gets embroiled in dire doings by river pirates and charges to the defense of his adopted hometown, marshaling (Hey! Marshaling! And his name is...! How ironic) the gathered forces of the river towns to resist the league of pirates. Following in the footsteps of Tarl, he becomes the Gorean version of a secret-agent, does his requisite period of being captured and led around in chains, and becomes a master swordsman between the end of one chapter and the beginning of the next. Still, the river warfare is quite interesting and Jason is an okay fellow, though I personally prefer Tarl, one super-hero being quite enough for a single planet. Norman ends this book by doing one of the most heinous things an author can do in a fantasy series: he ends it as a cliffhanger! The trumpets sound, the big battle is about to happen, and suddenly: BE SURE TO READ ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS IN THE NEXT EXCITING INSTALLMENT... Aaaaagh! Norman! How could you? Shame on you.

16. Guardsman of Gor
A year later, the next exciting installment was published, and the battle was fought. In this book much heroism is performed on the murky Vosk river, much fighting occurs, and Jason proves himself more than a match for a fleet of Gorean river pirates. Still, all's well that end's well, and the river cities get saved after much tumult and tons of action. Jason finds Beverly again, who has well-learned the benefits of Gorean slavery and can now appreciate Jason's newly discovered, finely-honed Gorean nature. He collars her in proper Gorean fashion and they settle down to a quiet life of marathon sex, interspersed with long discussions about how natural slavery is and how fulfilled they both feel.

I stayed up late finding the book on my wifes Kindle.

It reads like a mix of pulp fantasy, soft porn, and sociology. (Ever read Ishmael?) all mixed into one.
I totally see why you pointed me in that direction and how it is relevant. Now if I can just shut my own sick imagination down I should be fine...muah ah ha ha!

I had a friend turn me on to the first book, and I think I read some as a kid, but I am not a huge reader any more, and when I see a series of 20+ books much like any of these 'overlong" fantasy series, I dismiss them as something I will never have the resolve to finish reading to the end.

I would have never gotten to "Book 14" unless you pointed me to it.

THANKS!

I can see some potenitial for some hedonistic gratification thru live action role play but if its anything like WOD stuff it won't match the "kink potential" of my own imagination. Perhaps that was too much information. Don't give me rock paper scissors when I am shooting for dionysian rites...puhleese!

One thing I have noticed in just the first few pages that male gamers could benefit from...
The protagonist receives nothing but contempt from the female while he is concerned with being "polite" it is only when he expresses his base desires that the woman becomes affectionate.
This has been my experience in life.

Being the nice guy gets you walked on.
Being the brute with overwhelming testosterone gets you the girl. Of course that same girl attacks the very same qualities that attracted her over time (Due to feminist fallacies)...but I have learned to dump them about then and move on. I eventually found a woman that did not try to do what women do once they get their claws in...and I married that one!

So what I mean is...if you submit your doomed...if you think your a trog your doomed...but if you convince yourself you are a Conan deep down inside and express that to her...she's had.