Bad behavior

Geordie Tait, long-time player of Magic: the Gathering and writer about the same, posted a long article about the gender attitudes of some gamers, touching on the reaction to Finkelgate. There's a bit too much feminist... stuff. There's one comment he makes that demands a response. He talks about fear, quoting a book which states that a woman's worst fear from a romantic encounter is being raped and murdered. He continues:

Now, pumpkin, pretend you're a man. What's your greatest fear in a romantic situation?

Give up? More than anything, we fear being laughed at and made to feel humiliated by the opposite sex.

That is wrong. What a man fears most is the evening's mutual yeses are followed by her regret and self-doubt. She convinces herself that despite saying yes, she didn't really consent to the night's activities, and so she files a charge of rape against the man. A false charge of rape. A classic he said, she said situation. It will be investigated. It will be news. The man knows he did nothing wrong, and he knows he shouldn't be convicted, but for months, his life becomes a living hell. And when he's exonerated? He has thousands of dollars of legal bills. And his name is forever listed as an accused rapist. His exoneration isn't going in the police blotter. And her name? It's probably not even in the article, given the standards of most newspapers.

It's even worse for college students, and not just because of the lower levels of maturity of both men and women of that age. Such a charge could bring the man before an Honor Board, where basic rights such as the right to legal representation and the right to face one's accuser are not present. And the man may be judged by a person with prejudices like "A woman would never lie about being raped" and "All men are potential rapists."

A date with a World Champion

Over at Gizmodo, intern Alyssa Bereznak wrote about a date arranged online over OKCupid. It turns out this date was with Jon Finkel, one time world champion player of Magic: the Gathering, Hall of Famer, immortalized on a Magic card, and widely acknowledged as one of the best players of the game, ever. She apparently didn't like that this history wasn't a major part of his profile, even though *GASP* he still plays the game, and is still friends with fellow players.

I won't link to her post, as there's suspicion that she gets paid per link or hit, so I've linked instead to a Reddit thread where Jon Finkel answers questions on the issue (an Ask Me Anything thread).

Now, I'm not sure what would inspire a person to discuss a person, by name, in an article like this. It seems petty and vindictive. She would have known his history by just Googling him. Ironically, it is Alyssa who will forever be marked as damaged goods through the power of Google.

I haven't done online dating, but I doubt I'd put "player of D&D and M:tG" in any profile. Maybe "enjoys games," which suggests a wider variety of interests I may share with a woman. As I mentioned before, I cover.

It looks like my comment on the original article wasn't posted, so I'll put it here.

So your objection is he participates in a harmless intellectual hobby that you don't, and he has friends that aren't yours? You sound like a real catch for an independent man.

Were I in a long term relationship with a woman who didn't share my own geek interests and my old friends, I would expect to spend less time on them, and even less time were I to have children. However, I would not expect to spend no time on them. Nor would I expect her to spend no time on her old hobbies and old friends. Let's be honest, were the setup a man telling his wife or girlfriend that she can't see her old friends now that they're together, the Dear Abby advice would be "That sounds like an abusive relationship. Get out."

Update: Over Labor Day weekend, Jon Finkel won $4000 in that Magic tournament he was preparing for. What did Alyssa do?

Seeing what you want to see

About ten years ago, Wizards of the Coast created an online version of its popular Magic: the Gathering collectible trading card game. While the basic rules of the game can be taught fairly easily, the detailed rules run dozens of pages. Each of these rules is faithfully coded and debugged. With hundreds of new cards introduced each year, each possibly interacting with old cards in unusual ways, that's an impressive endeavor.

There's one element of the game that's not complex, however. Each player plays with a deck of virtual cards, and these decks are shuffled. The shuffling algorithm is a basic function, and is no different than coding the randomization of a 52 card deck for a game of poker. But if you play online, you'll hear players complain about the shuffler, as if it's some evil program designed to make them lose.

In Magic: the Gathering, a type of card called land is used to allow you to cast your business cards, and you can play one land a turn. Generally, these cards have no direct effect on your opponent and don't directly allow you to win the game. But you need to use mana from lands to cast the spells that will win you the game. Players use the terms "mana screw" and "mana flood" to refer to not drawing enough lands to cast your spells, or drawing too many lands instead of cards that will help you win.

Typically, a deck is 40% land, and you might expect to see three lands in an opening hand of seven, possibly four. Both of those are good results, but any number of lands from zero to seven is possible. A hand with 0, 1, 6, or 7 lands is typically mulliganed, and 2 or 5 is iffy. If you keep the two land hand and don't draw the third land until your fourth turn or later, you will not be able to cast many spells, and will be behind in the game. If you keep the five land hand and draw several more, you'll find yourself in the same position, for a different reason.

Say you're a person who believes the shuffler is broken. You will remember all those improbable opening hands. You will remember all the instances of mana screw and mana flood. You won't remember the opening hands with 3 and 4 lands, and you won't remember the hands where you draw the cards you need when you kept a marginal hand.

If you have already reached the conclusion, then your mind will only record the evidence that supports your conclusion. That's not a wise way to live. Try looking at the actual evidence instead. You'll see it's not so black and white.

New Magic: the Gathering expansion

MightyGodKing has the 2008 election described with Magic: the Gathering cards. They're funny, though of course they'd be funnier written from a conservative viewpoint. He's also taking reader submissions, to be posted Monday. So I've submitted some cards of my own.

(via alternatehistory.com, of all places)

Update: Part 2 is here, using some of my submissions.