I read the first 2 pages and gave up.

At a certain point the guy who was running the game night, James King, comes in to present his point of view. And then, continues to post looooooooooong responses (with the kind of "I'm smart and I know it" phrasing that just makes you want to punch him) to various people defending things that don't really need to be defended, and make crazy accusations along the way. This guys sensitivity and need to prove himself right about everything was just too compelling for me. I had to read the whole thing. It was a slow motion train wreck.

For example, Mr. King said:
After all, Claymore_57 had made a number of erroneous presumptions without contacting me, the group leader, to confirm and verify the facts of the matter regarding what "Zombies!!!" mini-variants we were playing.


To which someone else said:
As Group Leader do you get to wear a special hat?


To which he responded:
Since most of mine for the most part have been privately-sponsored groups, yes, I do in fact, especially since mine are not gaming associations or meet-ups.

What's more, in the above statement, I was commenting that Claymore_57 had made erroneous statements about the variant we were playing without first confirming with me what the actual play-through of the variants accurately were. But since Claymore_57 disingenuously judged "Zombies!!!" so grossly out of a context as if it had been meant to be a family cooperative game instead of the beer & pretzels light game that it is, fact-finding was beside the point altogether since his review had the tone and tenor of a child throwing a hissy fit because he hadn't gotten the game that he'd wanted to play. (More about that later.)

Second, "Zombies!!!" was the choice of game for the evening *made by his own two children* who wanted to play a game on their own rather than being paired with a parent. (They didn't get to do that anyway with "Zombies!!!"; Claymore_57 and his wife paired the kids with them just the same.)

Third, since Claymore_57 & his family usually only attended my Game Night once a month on the final Saturday of the month, I hadn't been expecting them to show up anyway. Nor had he emailed me in advance to inform me of their coming that next-to-last Saturday night in August. In either case, Claymore_57 turned down my offer for me to drive back home to pick up "Ticket To Ride" because -- as he stated -- they "already had that game at home."

So, afterwards -- especially after I happened upon his review of "Zombies!!!", I readily inferred that like his other two friends before him (both of whose then-recent efforts to try to use my group as their personal game-tryout group I'd already thwarted), Claymore_57 had been expecting me to bring a new family game (that they'd never played before) for him and his family to try out each and every time they attended. And because I didn't, he took his outrage on the "Zombies!!!" game that his own kids had selected for us to play.

Another telling aspect of his disgruntlement was the fact that upon his final move to actually win the game, Claymore_57 announced instead that he and his family had to go home for the night and thus would not be making the final move to move his and his son's character to the helipad. How much more off-puttingly game-spoilerish can ya get than that?

Admittedly, Claymore_57 was probably also upset with me by my having withdrawn my invitation to his two friends to prevent them from using my group as their personal game-tryout groups. A few months before, the first of his friends had contacted me about wanting to participate in my game group on the condition that we not play any games with a science fiction, fantasy or supernatural theme because he supposedly didn't play such games with themes like that because they "conflicted with [his] spiritual convictions."

I say "supposedly" because I learned soon thereafter after checking that worthy's games-owned stats here on BGG that among the games in his Top 10 he owned were games with science fiction, fantasy and supernatural themes. I also learned in a forum that he'd then-recently announced that he'd ordered "Space Alert", too. So, I readily inferred then that he wanted to restrict my group to playing games without those aforementioned themes so he could exploit my group just to try out new games that he ordinarily would not have considered purchasing for himself without trying them out first.

When I contacted him via email and asked him to reconcile the hypocrisy of what he'd originally told me about games with sci-fi, fantasy, and supernatural themes being against his religious beliefs versus the revelations to the contrary shown by his own owned-games listings and public comments confirming that he embraced such themes in games he'd purchased, he apparently was so embarrassed that he literally stopped posting on BGG altogether.

On his first and only visit to my group, Claymore_57's second friend confided to one of my female group members that he was only there to try out the new game we were playing that night; that he had no intention whatsoever of ever joining our group; and that he himself had his home private home game group anyway. (My female game group member alerted me to this info shortly after he told her about it) Although I tried to rehabilitate the situation by inviting him back to teach us one of my own games that he also owned but which I myself had never played, he declined. When I later learned from Claymore_57 that his second friend also wanted me to give him the game titles in advance that we'd be playing so he could decide whether he'd wanna come try one out or not, I set him straight that mine was not a game-tryout group and that his friend should instead consider going to a game convention if simply trying out new games was his #1 priority. (I also told him I wasn't running a SimplyFun group where the expressed purpose is to try out games for purchase from the SimplyFun Games host.)

I advised him that if/when his second friend ever asked him what game(s) we'd be playing in the future to simply tell him about only the ones we'd recently played (past tense) but otherwise, tell him that he'd don't know what games we'd be playing in the coming weeks or month. I also told him if his friend continued to press him on the matter, then he could then tactfully convey as best he could what I'd prior stated above.


So, yes, when you sponsor your own game group, you may be required to wear a variety of hats. In either case, I recommend if you're ever in a situation where you move somewhere that you don't know anybody and have to start your own privately-sponsored game group from Square One, I'd recommend you consider adding something to the effect of the following passage -- "We also aspire to strive to emphasize friendship and comeraderie as well as good sportsmanship and fair play in a positive atmosphere." -- to any game-group postings you make if you're wanting to ward off those who might even consider trying to exploit your own group solely as their own game-tryout group without any genuine intent of joining in earnest.










So...yeah. He said all of that. I don't know if he realized he was being made fun of, but regardless he had to really make it very, very, very, very, very, very, very clear that he was not in the wrong. A tragedy in his own mind.

TL;DR most of it. But I bet his has says "Douche!"

I saw GotG Vol 1.5 last night:

I saw vol. 2

It was very entertaining.

After 10 minutes of slogging through mundane postings, I curse you for not just linking to the applicable trainwreck section. I can never get that time back.

EDIT: I clicked the link and started the slog before I read the rest of our thread, where you guys went over this very idea. Darnit, should've just read the LPC tripe first.

Sunday winning is the best winning Especially since the Capitals won last night.

Any loss for those filthy Pens is a good one!

Went to a Greek festival today at a church. Everything was really nice but never got a chance to hear the traditional band play. Eye candy was the most popular dessert there but I got a slice of Baklava Cheesecake. It was a hit with myself and the wife.

Church eye candy? Ooooooh, did you see that ankle!?!!?

As a Devils fan, I agree.

What kind of festival was this?

I was trying to figure it out, too, but it's all Greek to me.

I've had a healthy respect for that club since the 90's where they ran it like there was a cap before there was a cap. Lou was a genius at trade time. He always got huge value back for the star he traded away. Almost never missed on a prospect and always got great veteran in the deal! That kinda made me hate him but not really (just wished he was the Flyers' GM).