Below is a true gem.  It is a review by two idiots, and the author of F.A.T.A.L., Byron Hall, replied to it.  He's the coolest.  I snagged this from www.fatalgames.com and have copy/pasted it here.  If Fatal Games wants me to take it down, I will, but as long as they don't mind, I want to show this to the world so that all can see the stupidity of conservatives.  Ok, here's the review and counter-review all rolled into one.

 

CHILDISH REVIEW AND AUTHOR'S DEFENSE OF F.A.T.A.L.

Perhaps the most negative review ever written, RPG.net posted a review of F.A.T.A.L. on 4/10/3 and removed it on 4/13/3 from the following page: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/9/9222.phtml

Although it is technically not a review, but mostly an attack against me, Byron Hall, I will demonstrate the fallacies of the authors, Darren MacLennan and Jason Sartin. Obviously, they hate F.A.T.A.L. and anyone involved with the game. Their hatred can be only the result of fear. They are fearful because they know it will be published. They are fearful because the material in the game is supported, and is dissimilar to anything that attracts them. People fear what is different to them, mostly out of cognitive laziness; it takes effort to explore what is different. Nonetheless, I appreciate the attention to the game, and inefficient effort.

As a preface, understand that their fear caused them to react emotionally. Their attempted review is only an emotional outburst and lacks substance.  I do not need to rely on emotional appeals (no matter how funny and persuasive they can be), and will show the stupidity of their arguments, point by point, with reason. Although rhetoric is effective, it is the lowest form of debate. So that it is clear who is who, Darren’s text is yellow, Jason’s is pink, and mine is FATAL red.

Burnout: I will also be commenting on this review. I am John, or as some people know me, Burnout. I have been an active contributor to the FATAL text since its conception. So my opinions may be very useful.

There is no God, and the proof of this can be found in a .pdf file from Fatal Games.

I wish that were true.

If this is the first time that you've ever heard of FATAL, you're in for a fun ride. Well, let me rephrase: You're in for a "fun ride" if you consider a fun ride to be, say, hitting your nutsack with a tack hammer. For about four hours.

Sartin: The nutsack/tack hammer thing wouldn't be a fun ride, but it is preferable to actually playing FATAL.

. . .

Oh, hi. I'm Jason Sartin. You may remember me from such classic RPGnet moments as "the longest fucking SenZar review ever" and all those humanity-hating and "go kill yourself already" posts I leave on Tangency. I'll be helping Darren a lot with this review, because friends don't let friends review FATAL alone.

Also, this is obviously going to be one of those grandstanding "spectacle" reviews that tries to be crowd-pleasing. Those of you who hate that kind of review should do the honorable thing and whine your asses off in the forum below.

So, Jason establishes his credibility, or lack thereof.  He delivers, as promised, a review congruent with his "humanity-hating" and "kill yourself" reputation.  As I said, his arguments lack substance, but readers will see that soon.  Could his approach be considered juvenile?  Ask yourself this question again later.

Burnout: Ahhh what a spectacle this review was. It got pulled off of the Website 3 days after it was posted. Sounds crowd pleasing to me.

You think I'm joking. You think that I'm exaggerating for comic effect. But you will be nodding your head with agreement, and also holding your swollen, bruised nutsack if you ever happen to open the FATAL .pdf up and give it anything but the most cursory of readthroughs.

By the way, Darren fails to properly introduce himself.  He is a moderator at RPG.net, and therefore represents their on-line community.  Obviously, he is entertained with the thought of male readers hitting their "swollen, bruised nutsack" with a tack hammer.  Consider the credibility, or lack thereof, of Darren.  Consider the credibility, or lack thereof, of RPG.net, as he represents them.

Sartin: He's not joking, people, and I wasn't, either. Those of you wondering what the most ass-tastic RPG of all time would look like - the one whose suck factor will forever demolish all challengers and tower over the ages with all the majesty of a homeless, mindless, drooling, shit-obsessed, impotent moron standing on a mountain of used Dragon Ball Z condoms - can finally die in peace.

The arguments are over. Anyone who says anything else is the worst RPG ever will...well, I'll inject kerosene into my bladder, piss on them, and then set them on fire. This game sucks THAT much.

Burnout: I find the wording Sartin uses here very contradictory to his review. Just remember this statement, "well, I'll inject kerosene into my bladder, piss on them, and then set them on fire."

Godfuckingdammit. We're hardly four words into the review, and already the game has dragged me down to its level.

Any child can rant.  What matters is the quality of the argument.  Jason is not being dragged anywhere, but responds like this because it is who he is, and would do better to own up to it.  I intend to show that the substance of my argument is superior, and that Jason should be dragged up to it.

So, why is it so bad?

Do tell.

'Cause it's the Necronomicon of role-playing games. Not in the cool way, where it's a source of occult knowledge with a terrible, terrible price. It's the Necronomicon in the sense that if you leave a printed copy on your shelf with other RPGs, then the other RPGs will be clustered around the dead, violated body of one of its own in the morning. FATAL will most likely be down at the station in the sex crimes interrogation room, trying its best to put on an innocent face and failing miserably..

Sartin: Another useful comparison is that FATAL is basically anti-thought. As you can already see, it reacts violently with real sentience.

...as opposed to unreal sentience? I'm getting bored looking for a real argument.

See, Synnibarr was bad, but you have to like Synnibarr.

Yes, it's a terrible role-playing game in just about every respect, but it's got heart; it's like a punch-drunk, half-blind boxer who hasn't realized that his manager is now "arranging fights" by pushing him in front of a speeding Mack truck and ringing a bell. He's going to get a license plate number embossed into his skull, but he's still out there, still trying.

Raven c.s. McCracken, although he's made the occasional misstep, also seems like a decent guy; just a tad misguided when it comes to writing games. There's an innocence to Synnibarr, a lack of subterfuge that makes it fun to think about, if not to read. If nothing else, it's the only game that I've seen so far that has a Midnight Sunstone Bazooka in it.

Sartin: Yeah. I like how World of Synnibarr is uniquely deranged. The first time I read through it, I knew I would never see anything else quite like it, like only McCracken could have made a game that's fucked up the way Synnibarr is fucked up. It's the Plan 9 From Outer Space of RPGs...its execution was horrible, but its wrongness has this charming quality to it, and I can't help liking it nowadays. I've actually got more entertainment out of it than most of the "good" games I own, and I don't regret buying it, so in a bizarre way, McCracken actually succeeded.

But even compared to Synnibarr's few and faint good points, FATAL doesn't have anything going for it.

Nothing at all? I can't wait to address some actual points. Can anyone say...sophistry?

Burnout: Yeah, isn't this supposed to be a review of FATAL, not Synnibar?

It's the shitty game to end all shitty games, and it could have been written by any 14 year old with an obsession with rape and defecation, no design skill, a warez copy of Photoshop, and months and months of lifeless weekends to work on it. Seriously, if Byron Hall and McCracken got into a RPG design fight, McCracken would reduce Hall to sucking his wang so fast every streetwalker in Las Vegas would be taking notes.

Burnout: For someone saying this game could be made by a 14-year old, Sartin sure does sound like one. I don't remember the last time I used the word "wang." I find the players of FATAL and I mature enough to use words like penis, dick, or cock...without giggling like Sartin obviously is after saying "wang."

FATAL - well, if Synnibarr is timecube.com, then FATAL is tubgirl.com. (That last link, incidentally, is NOT WORK SAFE IN THE SLIGHTEST.) It's a product so twisted, so fundamentally broken in its attitude towards sexuality, so unbelievably stupid that you'd think that the authors are trying to make themselves look like they're prime candidates for institutionalization. They're not, which makes it even scarier.

Sartin: By the way, you'll notice lots and lots of these personal attacks on the creator and players of this game as this drags on.

I'm convinced, that's the best Jason can do.

While this is bad form in normal RPG reviews, it's hard to avoid here. For one, it's impossible for a game designer we shouldn't insult to create a game this goddamn stupid. For another, Hall and his personal drooling fanboys went out of their way to honor RPGnet's forums with their personal shot at the world record for "number of flame threads started before one's daily basement Necronomicon (Waldenbooks version) reading". And you know, I think they won it, too.

Give credit where credit is due. I did introduce my game, but I always posted professionally and addressed actual points.   All flames were by RPGnetters, except for when two players in my group posted aggressively in my defense.

Burnout: As RPGnetters know, I am one of those two. I reacted emotionally in that flamewar, which is very unusual for me. I found it funny how during the days in question only one legitimate argument came up...the question of why there wasn't any homosexuals in the game. Due to some good points brought up by one person (I can't remember the name) this has since been changed.

For those who weren't there, the flame wars weren't very interesting. It was all simply another chapter in the long-ass book of moron game designers who have created the "BEST GAEM EVAR!!!" Except that in this chapter, the obligatory AD&D clone featured vagina circumference stats and rape rolls, and the moron game designer's followers had all the class and brain activity of scrotum lint.

Well, Jason's certainly right, it wasn't very interesting, mainly because the majority of the criticism was as emotional and unsupported as you've just read.

Oh, they want to be all evil and shocking and crap. God, how pathetically they tried. I mean, imagine opening a door to find your mother and sister raping each other with pink strap-ons. And you then realize that you've never seen their bare asses before, because you're pretty sure you would have remembered the swastikas tattooed there. And upon noticing you, they grin wickedly and give you the finger in unison.

For the record, I've never tried to prove to RPGnetters that I'm evil and shocking. In fact, I've never tried to prove anything to them, except that their arguments are either emotional or poorly considered. I don't believe that Darren or Jason will ever be reasonable in debate. I am always willing to debate anything to do with FATAL, and I will always be professional while debating.

It's shocking in a way that instantly blights out all rational thought, but later, you'll have to admit the finger and wicked grinning part was kinda cool.

Bear in mind that Jason referred to rational thought, as though familiar with it.

That's the feeling the FATAL morons so wish they could provoke.

I think it is Darren and Jason who wish to provoke feelings, for lack of a better approach.

Instead, they're more like opening that door to find your weeks-unwashed Otaku brother in his soiled underwear, masturbating furiously to - of all the goddamn things in the world - an Archie comic. And on his bare ass is a tattoo of, inexplicably, someone else's ass, and he's disgustingly fat enough for it to be a good 14 inches across. And as he goes at it, he's quietly moaning to himself about how worthless women, fags, and niggers are and how they should all be raped or murdered.

Wrong. I don't have a brother (Are you projecting? What was your brother like?), a tattoo, and I don't consider women, homosexuals, and blacks to be worthless, nor deserving of rape and murder.  If you're suggesting that because rape is covered in the game (on 2 pages out of 900), that I support it (it's only detailed under Overbearing in Wrestling, and Sociality...where a footnote supports the historical accuracy), then anyone who plays nearly any role-playing game supports murder (or killing, which may be a better definition), because murder (killing) is usually the focus of nearly all games. I guarantee that a comparison of the percentage of a work devoted to murder or killing is higher in other RPG's than rape is in FATAL.

In fact, I've included numerous things with which I diagree in FATAL, such as gods, an ethical-moral system, etc. Jason probably knows that his conclusions are faulty, but is apparently willing to be at fault. I am not.

Burnout: I personally think that rape and murder come up, whether behind closed doors or out in the open, in at least 90% of gaming groups. FATAL just makes it so you see exactly how bad it actually is by trying not to hide it or pretend it didn't happen. Instead on those pages you'll find information supported by references on how often it happened and what happened to the criminal. Now does this mean anybody who plays FATAL supports it? No, it simply shows that most people try to sweep it under the rug. We know it is, unfortunately, a day-to-day occurence.

It's still disturbing on all kinds of levels. But it's the kind of stupid disturbing that ends with you having to answer questions to the satisfaction of a prosecuting attorney.

If the law must consider something to be disturbing, it is the libelous approach of Darren and Jason.

Point is, the FATALites have repeatedly proven that treating them with any respect or dignity is pointless, so we're not going to waste your time or ours with the effort. Back in their raving lunatic days, I had thought that Raven c.s. McCracken and the SenZar guys had been full of it, but Byron Hall and his fellow lobotomy candidates made them look like Rebecca Borgstrom on a prozac bender.

Again, if it is to be debated as to which party deserves respect, I'll let the reader draw their own conclusion.

Burnout: They refuse to waste time showing dignity or respect, but spend pages upon pages showing the opposite. I would like to state that I prefer being called a Fatalist, not a FATALite.

But don't worry! None of this will be a problem, because even if you can ignore the misogynistic, homophobic, racist, and all-around idiotic mindset of its core supporters, FATAL blows goats with such panache that it's hard to imagine anyone looking at it and not concluding that Hall should've given up the needle.

By the way, you may notice that I write the "authors" of the game, rather than "author". There's a reason for this: While the game lists only a single author, there are many signs that lead me to believe that Ye Olde Abominatione has more than one author, although uncredited. You'll find an explanation later, but I just wanted to get that out of the way.

Several pages will credit a multitude of people for everything from design to play-testing. All ideas were submitted to me, and written or re-written by me. The credits section of FATAL will not only list people, but describe who is responsible for what. Many have asked in e-mails why it is not part of the free version. This, I refuse to answer until after it is printed.

Burnout: As stated earlier, I have been a contributor to this game and know that it will be shown later. But my own words are not shown in the text (that I know of). I bring up my views to Byron during normal conversation or game-testing, and if disproved by scholarship it does not show up in the text. On the other hand, if there is nothing to disprove my point and it seems logical, it will most likely be researched and added as needed.

Sartin: Meanwhile, you'll notice I've simply gone with acting like there's one author. What can I say? It's easier when there's only one legendary-industry-boob-for-the-next-ten-years to blame, and the thought that another human being actually said to him "Hey, FATAL sounds really cool. Let me contribute to it!" is too depressing to contemplate.

Let's start with the title page.

It's about time.

Yeah, it's that bad.

Sartin: [a la Duff Man] Oh, yeah! [/Duff Man] "FANTASY ADVENTURE TO ADULT LECHERY" in crappy you-can-see-the-asses-of-the-little-engraved-figures font. Right inside a border made up entirely of random "garbage" characters.

Even the moment I created this logo (I hesitate to call it that) in PhotoShop, I did not want to use it. Currently, a logo is being designed by a professional artist. As it should be known, the game is available free while it is being developed. Much has changed, and much will before I'm ready to unleash it upon the world in full force. At the moment, fatalgames.com is completely unadvertised, for the same reason. By the way, the characters around the edge of the 'logo' actually spell FATAL and other appropriate things. I can't wait to see the final logo!

While we're on it, if you can queue up "Optimistic", by Radiohead, you'll have a good idea of how the both of us feel right now.

Burnout: I'm unfamiliar with that song. I prefer to listen to much more musically-complicated bands and artists.

FATAL claims to be "the most difficult, detailed, realistic and historically/mythically accurate role-playing game available."

FATAL lives up to its claim, only the reviewers don't know it. As I refute arguments about the game, I'll demonstrate this.

This is the most damnable lie I have ever seen in my history as an RPG reviewer.

Burnout: I just can't let this go. Show me one game where it is more difficult to achieve goals, level-up, acquire treasure, or just stay alive. Also, I'd like to see a game that gives you a more detailed of what skills can be done on a day-to-day basis as well as adventuring. As far as realistic and historically/mythically accurate, I truly believe that for the period and realm in which the game exists, it is more accurate than anything I have seen.

In no sense is that statement true; as a matter of fact, in every sense of the word, that statement is so false as to provide the golden mean for statements of falsehood. FATAL is difficult only in the sense that peeling your face off a strip at a time is difficult; detailed only in the respects that give the creators an erection; realistic - Jesus, I can't even go into it - historically/mythically accurate only in the sense that its creators occupy the same physical world that these myths originated upon, and about as accurate as banging your ass on the keyboard to write the Gettysburg Address.

If you believe FATAL is not the most difficult game (soon to be) on the market, then at least offer counter-evidence. Which game do you consider to be more difficult? If you believe FATAL is not the most detailed game (soon to be) on the market, then at least offer counter-evidence. Which game do you consider to be more detailed? You get the idea. Darren makes a claim, and then offers no support.

Burnout: Even beyond that, what makes it less difficult? How is it less detailed? Throughout their review you can make note that they never prove anything about the difficulty or detail.

Sartin: Darren is correct, but it should be noted that this is actually a good title page, as it neatly hints at much (though by no means all) of what sucks about this game.

ADULT LECHERY? Perhaps it's nitpicking to point out the redundancy (oooh, oooh! What's next? The fantasy game of "violent combat"? The sci-fi game of "starfaring space travel"? The White Wolf game of "ah fuck it, just gimme the cool powers already"?), but it's a good indicator of the level of thought that went into the whole game. And, of course, it reminds you that this won't be just another Tolkien-clone RPG, but a raping and shitting Tolkien-clone RPG!

Does Jason think before he writes? Adult lechery could easily be different from minor lechery, which I want to avoid at all costs. This game is for adults only, and involves lechery. Likewise, it is possible to have a game for adults only, and that has no sexual content at all. Just the same, I was never comfortable with the title, and see it as the opposite of G.U.R.P.S. in one respect. I consider what GURPS stands for to be well-conceived: Generic Universal Role-Playing System. Unfortunately, the title itself (GURPS) is unattractive, nonsensical when alone, and a failure in marketing and branding. Conversely, FATAL seems an excellent name for the game for many reasons. Compared to other RPG's, the game system is definitely more fatal for a character. The beginning of the other part of the name, Fantasy Adventure, is perfect as far as I'm concerned. I dislike 'To Adult Lechery', mainly because it places a disproportionate degree of attention on sex. However, this is one element that separates it from other games, so I guess it's not so horrible. Still, a better name could be spun. I just wanted to point out that Jason was wrong, 'Adult Lechery' is not redundant.

DIFFICULT? Oh, yeah. Anyone with the force of will to endure reading all 900+ pages of this homesick abortion of a game (without going insane and making sacrifices to sweet Azathoth for a merciful annihilation of the universe) is no one to be fucked with. And anyone who could do that and actually play by its anal-retentive trip to hell of a rules system (without succumbing to Hall's probable compulsion to inhale Draino by the assloads) would have to be some kind of demigod.

Burnout: Let's just take out the rhetoric out of that and see what happens. "Oh, yeah. Anyone with the force of will to endure reading all 900+ pages of this...game...is no one to be fucked with. And anyone who could do that and actually play by its...rules system...would have to be some kind of demigod." I personally see this as a compliment. Even though I don't consider myself a demigod, I do consider myself someone not to be fucked with. So thanks Sartin.

And yes, it's saying difficult like it's a good thing.

But hey, ain't that ALWAYS the eternal struggle of gaming? "Play a difficult game and get massive headaches because it's needlessly complicated and PC-killing-because-I-accidentally-dropped-my-rusty-dagger-and-impaled-my-favorite-intestinal-tract" versus "Go with something that won't make me roll five times on the Random Shit Discoloration Table every time I cast Light My Finger and thus spend more time actually doing things"?

FATAL has been played in a comparison with AD&D 2e, and it does not generally require more die rolls (except, for example, in the case of Crucial Damage), nor does it take longer to do anything. My question to Jason is: have you played the game or merely thumbed through it? Whether you choose to show respect or not, you're showing incompetence by reviewing a product without play-testing it.

Burnout: Also, it's not needlessly PC killing. It's realistically PC killing. If you drop a dagger you're not going to puncture an intestinal tract. But, if you get stabbed two or three times with that rusty dagger you will have a little less than 50-50 chance of survival. Seems better than DnD where you can get slashed by a dragon, and if high enough level, probably survive.

REALISTIC AND HISTORICALLY/MYTHICALLY ACCURATE? Oh, I bet.

Player 1: R0XX0R! This is the best system for emulating the myths of Heracles I've ever seen! And it's fucking sweet how all the gods, monsters, and heroes can't do anything that wouldn't be possible in real life!

FATAL does not specialize in ancient Greek mythology, although elements of it have been included or influential. Faulty criticism is worthless when exposed, and discreidts only the critic thereafter, not FATAL or myself. Does Jason understand that?

Player 2: Hell, yeah. When I was trying to get past Cerberus, he wasn't any tougher than a pit bull with two extra rubber heads! And later, when I was masturbating on the temple altar and I angered the gods, they didn't do anything but just Not Appear. Dude, you can't HANDLE the realism!

Burnout: Actually, I'm quite sure Cerberus would be much more difficult in FATAL due to the size factor causing more or less damage, depending on larger or smaller. More than likely if you got bit by Cerberus in FATAL he would simply tear you in two. I definitely wouldn't try unless I was using trebuchets from a great distance.

Player 1: W00T! If this were any more realistic, you'd be able to TASTE the penis length!

Player 2: Testify! Lots of people in history had penises, so it's ultra realistic and historically accurate to put in rules about that!

Player 1: Man, I could cream myself just thinking about this! I can't WAIT to see if it has rules for hut building, grass growing, nose picking, and the spread of Christianity, since people experienced those during history, too!

It is important to note that the spread of Christianity has been removed from FATAL. This game is the most historically/mythically accurate, given its premises. For example, it should be obvious that it is accurate to medieval Europe, however it is noted on the first page that one exception is that gods are assumed to exist. Therefore, the game assumes that pantheons were not replaced by Christianity, as they were in Europe. Just the same, I am thankful Jason showed his oversight to me. I will make it more clear so that others are not so easily confused.

So, yeah.

Okay, I gave the subtitle more attention than it deserved. Let's just say that if Hall set out to write ONE FUCKING LINE that instantly screams that the ensuing RPG will be very nearly as cool as getting diagnosed with cancer and Necrotizing Fasciitis bacteria on the same day, he succeeded brilliantly.

And for the fun part, the FATAL Games logo is "Where the dice never lie." I would suggest that the owners of FATAL Games must have dice that come up "THIS GAME SUCKS, BEAVIS" no matter how they are thrown, or we must chalk this up as yet another falsehood.

Sartin: Yeah, I really like that logo, too. It was nice of the FATALites to point out that when you play games from other companies, your dice may lie to you. Ha, I knew it! All those times I was playing D&D or SenZar, and that d20 would show a 3 or some shit when I knew I rolled a 20. Thanks, FATAL, for showing me the way!

Jason made a logical mistake in his assumption: The subtitle "Where the Dice Never Lie" does not necessarily imply that dice from other companies lie. In fact, the subtitle serves a useful purpose, and has a great history. The phrase, "the dice never lie" was coined by Jim Hausler, a good friend and contributor. Many years ago, we were playing AD&D 2e, and whenever die-rolls were to his advantage, he bellowed "the dice never lie!" At any rate, Fatal Games can be confused with, say, computer games. By having 'dice' in the subtitle, it makes it clear that it is for dice games.

No, wait. This game still proves once and for all that Darwin was an ass-grabbing fool.

Darwin was a great man.

Oh, and did I forget to mention that it's nine hundred pages long?

This is why I summoned help from Jason Sartin, people.

Funny, I've introduced many to the game, and very few were overwhelmed. Some people are more capable than others.

Sartin: Yeah, thanks. Now watch, by the end, I'll probably have to summon someone else to help me. We'll have Justin Bacon or Scott Lynch or Elissa Carey or some other poor bastard down here to write the closing paragraph and talk me out of climbing a tower and shooting random basement-dwelling losers.

Mmmmmm...killing potential FATALites...

There is a difference between games and people. Jason seems unable to make that distinction. Why so personal?

But yeah. It's nine hundred pages long, and you can hardly turn one page without seeing something that's desperately stupid or sucking or screaming "Look how COOL and HISTORICALLY ACCURATE and HUGE DICKED I am, because I'm terrified you won't notice!". You can see the bind we're in.

AD&D 2e, when considering all rulebooks, far exceeded 900 pages. I mention this game because of its popularity. AD&D 2e, however, seemed to offer numerous books to financially take advantage of consumers, otherwise known as a good business strategy. I refuse to do so, and believe gamers would rather have it all together without redundancy. I will continue to refute claims  that FATAL is not historically accurate, given its premises. So far, arguments by Darren and Jason are weak in this respect. Oh, and  I never once mentioned the size of my personal manhood, regardless of how proud of it I am.

Burnout: I would just like to take this time to do some adding. Hmm, DnD 3e Player's Handbook, 301 pages...Dungeon Master's Guide, 256 pages...Psionics Handbook, 156 pages. Now that's 713 right there and I know there are many more books in the DnD 3e collection.

This is from the second page:

"For instance, assume you are an adventuring knight who has just fought his way to the top of a dark tower where you find a comely young maiden chained to the wall. Some may choose to free the whimpering wench. Others may free her while hoping to win her heart. Instead of seeking affection, some may talk to her to see if they can collect a reward for her safe return. Then again, others may be more interested in negotiating freedom for fellatio. Some may think she has no room to bargain and take their fleshly pleasures by force. Others would rather kill her, dismember her young cadaver, and feast on her warm innards."

So, basically, FATAL is the date rape RPG.

Another faulty conclusion drawn by Darren. Where is dating included? More to the point, multiple ways of role-playing are mentioned, ranging from 'good' to 'evil' (though in real life I hesitate to use those terms). Why he focuses on rape is for him to answer. As mentioned elsewhere, FATAL is intended to be comprehensive, and if examined, the reader will find balance between 'good' and 'evil'.

Sartin: It's also the cock fruit, attacking turd, and (of course) gay buttfucking ogre RPG, but one thing at a time! [It's like an express train full of things designed to hurt your mind; just when you think that it's finished running you over, another car hits you, grinding yet another valuable part of your soul beneath its wheels.]

Obviously, it is a game that attempts to provide a balance of all things, a true system in which a gamer can do anything they want, provided the others around the table have similar views. For example, it's also the courtly love and chivalry RPG, but anyone who is a competent reviewer would offer a representative sample of the game, not just that which fascinates them.

There's not really a whole lot of ways that I can get around this: FATAL, as a whole, is your chance to stop being the good guy and start being the soulless rapist that you and your tiny clique of brain-dead morons knew they could be. You can come home from a long day of being shunned by anybody with a soul, wipe the Mace from your eyes, scuttle down into the cold concrete of the basement and engage in what amounts to a verbal circle-jerk with a clique of people just as terribly broken as you are.

Consistent with my previous comment, FATAL also provides a chance to be ethical and moral beyond any other RPG. Although I philosophically disagree with the foundations of the disposition system, it is more thorough and coherent in terms of ethics and morals than any other RPG. I doubt that either Darren or Jason read the game, other than thumbing through for ammunition to support their biases. By the way, it is best to avoid redundancies, like a "soulless rapist". Again, Darren should think before he writes.

Burnout: A couple of additions to that, if you don't mind, Byron. It's also the grocery-getter, castle-building, weapon- and armor-forging, king-serving, self-serving, or master-serving RPG. Just wanted to point out some of how many more detailed options there are for a PC rather than just saying an NPC does all the un-fun (for lack of a better term) acts.

Sartin: I'll cut in here to say that while being a brain-dead rapist is an important part of the FATAL experience, there are two further aspects that make it the visible-from-space pile of festering associty that it is.

1) Juvenile ideas that even the SenZar guys would've been too embarrassed to touch. You know, like magical fumbles that cause clones to spawn from your cock, or make you shit constantly, or make you start anal-fisting your target while trying to bite your ear, or make you recite stupid lines that were probably ripped off from metal songs every time you cast a spell. Or magical ingredients like vaginal yeast or the "cunt-pipe" of an elderly virgin.

Burnout: I would like to jump in here and say that maybe the reason for the embarrassment is that they aren't mature enough to handle such issues.

Remember when I asked you, the reader, to consider whether or not Jason's responses are juvenile? While I admit that FATAL has some juvenile-level humor in it, it is interesting that Jason seems to be a hypocrite: he accuses FATAL of being juvenile, when his responses here, and elsewhere according to himself, have a higher proportion of it, word for word, and far fewer instances of professionalism. Thank you for remembering.

2) Rules so mind-bogglingly stupid and complicated that you'd beg for a no holds barred Rifts/Synnibarr crossover instead. Note that this can overlap with the juvenile ideas, like with how likely you are to critical hit someone's clitoris, or the magical fumble that makes your nutsack swell to 10d1000 (inches, we can only presume, it's not labeled) for the next 3d3 days.

Although Jason admits that he is unable to comprehend the game that he reviews, its rules that are "mind-bogglingly...complicated" support my argument that, at least for him, FATAL is the most difficult RPG available. I'd like to rest my case, but his emotions are running strong, so I'll continue to support this argument when necessary.

But like I said, one thing at a time.

Please, don't get boggled down.

While we're still on the second page, by the way, check out that first sentence: "Welcome to a fantasy medieval role-playing game that focuses on realism and detail whenever possible without sacrificing fun." (Emphasis mine.)

Later, when you've seen Hall's idea of "realism and detail without sacrificing fun", you'll be invited to laugh bitterly with me.

I'm willing to bet the reader will be laughing at you, not with you.

You know, it occurs to me that most games of FATAL are probably played with only the one hand, since -

Ow.

OW. OW. FUCK. MY FUCKING BRAIN. OW.

Remind me not to go down that path again.

Would it do any good? I can rise above that level. Can Darren?

Sartin: Not so fast! You forgot to picture them being the only gamers who have to wipe off their dice when they're done! I'd bet nothing but nothing will jinx your dice faster than leaving someone's semen on them. Hell, when it happens, the FATALites probably laugh and shout (a la Saruman) "You will taste MAN JUICE!" Ugh. [Stop putting IMAGES INTO MY GODDAMN MIND, DAMMIT. OW!]

It seems like Jason gleefully went much further with Darren's idea, but is ashamed to admit how he thinks.

See, here's the thing: Vampire is a game that can also be classified as a date-rape game. You're a vampire, a mythic creature who's been sexualized by about three hundred years worth of literature into a romantic creature; and yet, as a vampire, you're stealing a part of people's bodies without their permission, every single night. You're eventually going to kill one of them when you get a little too hungry one night.

And do you know why Vampire is the superior game by far? Because the game forces you to find out what you'll do to survive. If you have to drink somebody else's blood in order to live another night, will you do it? Will you drain some bum on the street, or stalk somebody for three hours and take only a taste? Or will you subsist on dogs and cats? Every time you stab somebody in the throat with your fangs, drink the blood - even if you're not thinking about it in the game - you're essentially risking somebody else's life for your own. You can say that you're a vampire, you have to do that, but nothing's stopping you from seeing the next sunrise except your own sense of self-preservation, even when you're already dead. Yes, you are playing a vampire in an RPG, but you can still kill yourself in the game and make it a valid, in-character choice.

Vampire sounds pretty limited. I have never played it, but it sounds like a game that focuses on one race or 'occupation', in FATAL terms: a Vampire. If this is true, FATAL offers either ten or a hundred times more role-playing possibilities, respectively. If I'm wrong about Vampire, then my apologies to the game designers. The point of an RPG should be to allow a gamer to play the role of anyone they desire. FATAL delivers.

Burnout: I would like to reiterate what Byron said earlier about FATAL. I doubt anywhere in Vampire does the vampire date the victim. So Darren don’t sugarcoat it. Vampire could be described as a rape game. The low level of maturity when dealing with controversial subjects blows my mind. Anyway, I don’t really see the difference between playing a vampire and being that unlucky gamer who rolls a random mental illness and ends up with raptophilia. Either way you’re almost forced to take another human being by force and get what you need from them. But there is the option to kill yourself instead.

Sartin: Hate to cut into Darren's pathos, but the thing I remember most from Vampire was how you can chainsaw whack someone with 8 successes and still barely hurt them. Fucking dice pools. [Oh, hush.]

The odds in FATAL are that if you attack a character with a weapon, then they are likely to die. By the way, this is an obvious attempt at realism.

But yes, sadly, even in this area, Vampire is way superior to FATAL.

Why does Jason never support his claim with evidence? In the area of attacks and the likelihood of fatality, I challenge Jason to support his claim.

Burnout: I find it mockingly hilarious how Sartin says that hitting someone with a chainsaw 8 times and having them live is better than FATAL. While in FATAL most likely you’ll have trouble getting up from a footman’s flail shot. Even better eight shots. HA

It's in the background, but it's there. You have to make a decision. In Vampire, it's an adult decision: Do I kill to live? In FATAL, it's "Date rape and killing and cadavers are all cool! YEEEEEEAH! THANK YOU FOR SHOWING ME THE WAY, SPRAY PAINT HUFFING AND SOCIAL RETARDATION!"

It's boring to continue to correct Darren for failing to represent FATAL. In FATAL, you may have to make complicated socio-political decisions as a lord or lady, king or queen. Did he see that in the game? Has he actually read it?

Maybe there's some subculture that's into this; judging from the FATAL theme song, which sounds like the Cookie Monster chasing a drum kit being pushed down a flight of stairs, I'd guess thrash metal or speed metal or metal metal or whatever the fuck they call it nowadays.

The Cookie Monster is cool! They call that death metal.

Burnout: From what I know about the FATAL theme, it was done very quickly and probably should be redone in a better studio version. But I definitely agree that death metal is some of the best music out nowadays.

Sartin: Incidentally, the FATAL theme sucked enough to make Darren beg me to kill him. If for some reason you aren't interested in suicide, I would recommend not listening to it. Hell, I would recommend not paying attention to FATAL at all, but here you still are. You've got problems, people.

So, Jason's best means of recommending that people pay no attention to something is to do a lengthy, emotional review, in which conclusions are the result of flawed reason? If so, then I have never seen this approach before.

Burnout: I have only one question. Why didn’t you do it Sartin?

See, even the most extreme of this stuff - say, Cannibal Corpse - is designed to take a stage persona, say "Screw you, world!" for a few hours, then being regular people again; it's born out of showmanship, like an extreme form of professional wrestling sans the body slams. FATAL isn't a piece of showmanship; it's one of the diaries from Se7en, a document pretending that it's perfectly normal and healthy and winds up painting its authors as terribly, terribly maladjusted.

..."terribly, terribly"... There Darreb goes again with redundancy. FATAL is not a piece of showmanship. It is a comprehensive game, true to its premises. By the way, I think Cannibal Corpse is awesome musically, lyrically, and athletically.

Burnout: The only game issues that have brought up to this point are that the game is “mysogonistic, homophobic, and racist”. Not to say that it is, because there are gays in the game. Along with equal degradation of males and females, and equal degradation of races. But, to say that none of those existed in the time period covered by FATAL, is rather maladjusted. Beyond that if you’re looking for the most extreme of stuff I recommend looking a band called Anal Blast. Much more extreme, in my view, than Cannibal Corpse.

Sartin: During the FATAL flame wars, Hall really did have that psychotically calm John Doe demeanor in his posts. It might actually have been impressive, but any chance for that went out the window when he never defended any of his bullshit arguments or claims when MacLennan, Patrick Chipman, and everyone else started questioning him. Well, and when I couldn't help picturing him in a lavender bunny suit as he typed. (Okay, no, that's not originally what I was picturing him doing, but it's a sanity-preserving substitute.)

In debates, I always remain calm and unemotional. Actually, every post is available to anyone who desires to view them at RPGnet. Since this is verifiable, Jason either lies, or simply doesn't know any better. I attempted to defend my claims when questioned. However, there was hardly any questioning, and most posts resemble the level presented by Darren and Jason in this review. When I realised, by and large, RPGnetters were aversive to reason and driven by emotion, I stopped posting. When Darren MacLennan chose libel and defamation of character to debate, I stopped posting. So far, my credibility must seem immeasurably beyond that of Darren and Jason. I am credible because I am honest, professional, and a scholar. Nothing seems to drive these two crazier. I will always be open to debating FATAL.

And I am now on the second page.

If you want another good example of how the game's authors seem desperate to lie to themselves, and by extension the reader, you can check out their claims that they're not really sexually deviant; they're just including it for the purpose of completeness. For example:

The information in this game does not represent the world-views of Fatal Games, nor is extreme violence or extreme sex condoned by Fatal Games. Instead, the information is included for completeness.

Although you should have put quotes on my words above, let it be known I still stand by them.

And this weak bullshit might fly, if it weren't for the fact that they were openly drooling over the possibility of people extorting sexual favors and/or raping a helpless woman not one page before.

It's tiring to reiterate, but I covered numerous possibilities in the example Darren cited (by the way, I thank him for citing an example). However, he selected one possibility at the expense of the others. Darren faiedl to represent FATAL.

Burnout: Along with failing to represent FATAL, Darren also doesn’t realize that in more than 95% of games “extorting sexual favors and/or raping” is not part of the story. Having been a play-tester for a few years I can say this with utmost assurance.

Sartin: That, and it's a trick statement anyway. Remember that FATALites lack the necessary balls to even approach women in real life. Their supposed non-endorsement of rape/violence stems from cowardice, not "Hey, it's just a game."

What Jason knows about my personal life, for example, is obviously far less than his insinuation. For example, my wife studies bioengineering and used to be a model. I don't think much of most college curriculums, but if my claims are true, then she is at least reasonably intelligent and attractive. To my delight, I would argue that she is an advanced scholar (knowing many stupid scholars, I mean a smart one), and exceedingly beautiful. We are identical in age, and born only one week apart. She is everything to me, and yes, she is a woman. Jason's arguments provide no substance or challenge.

Burnout: I would say that goes for all Fatalists that I know as well. That what he knows is far less than his insinuation. I refuse to get into my personal life but I’ll just say there is no “lack of necessary balls” or “cowardice”. That being said there is also no lack of opposite gender choice for me. I like to have options.

But hey. If you don't want to play dirty by personally attacking the FATALites, just consider this: "Okay, they don't condone rape, misogyny, and five hundred foot nutsacks...they're just really proud that the overwhelming focus FATAL puts on rape, misogyny, and five hundred foot nutsacks makes it SO much more 'realistic' and 'historically/mythically accurate' than every other RPG available!"

If the reader considers Jason's claim, then the reader should be compelled to measure the degree of focus on rape, for instance. This is necessary, because Jason does not do it himself, to support his claim. There is only a focus on rape on 2 pages out of 900. Since page numbers vary as material is added or the game is edited, I will direct your attention to the Wrestling skill in Chapter 8: Skills. Specifically, please read the last two paragraphs of Overbearing. Note that the female has a chance to injure the would-be rapist. This section on rape is intended to present it realistically, not from a biased perspective of a rapist. Elsewhere in Chap. 6: Sociality, _Medieval Prostitution_ is cited for the information on rape in societal terms. Aside from these, there are spells involving rape. I have not counted them or their total length in numbers of pages, and do not consider it necessary. Please note that they are referenced from Greek Magical Papyri, and are accurate to the translated scrolls. To make this clear, spells from Greek scrolls have italicized titles, while spells invented by myself and others have non-italicized titles. I have not counted spells involving rape that are either Greek or invented, but doubt that invented spells are disproportionate in number. In short, if a reader compares the amount of material involving rape in FATAL with material that does not, the reader will find it to be a very small portion, and not out of line with history.

There are no instances of misogyny (woman-hating) in FATAL that outnumber instances of man-hating (for lack of a better term). Either rarely occurs, but only misogyny is cited by Darren and Jason.

As far as I know, the gigantic and magically altered scrotum is only a single instance in Appendix 3: Random Magical Effects, of which there are 2,000. Most of the random magical effects are intended as humorous, since they may include anything. However, if anyone finds a historically accurate list of random magical effects, please contact Fatal Games, and expect to see them included, as would be true to the premises of the game.

Doesn't really work, does it?

Your approach? No, it doesn't.

Or, even better:

For instance, the detail of violence may exceed that of other role-playing games, as crucial damage may explicitly explore the destruction of many body parts and internal organs.

Except that what the guys at FATAL know about medical science and/or the human body is so small as to actually suck away from the collected body of medical knowledge; as a matter of fact, there are entire anatomy texts that are now blank because the knowledge has been drained away to fill the terrible wound that FATAL made.

While I am not a medical doctor, I think the reader will find that my anatomy is better than the arguments of Darren and Jason.

Sartin: Those of you who are upset that Hall took a giant piss on anatomical science can take heart in knowing that he also soaked everything that's ever been written about art, medieval history, and RPG design while he was at it.

Meanwhile, Testosticles forbid that just fucking describing an injury isn't any better than FATAL's lame ass "Crucial Damage" charts. I mean, really:

02% Belly Button

Opponent’s belly is hacked, though no critical organs behind it. The small intestine may (70%) spill forth. If it does, the sight of this causes the opponent to need to pass a Health check at TH 50 or be stunned for 2d4 rounds.

Yeah, having your small intestine spill forth sure can be distracting! (And yes, any "It's just a flesh wound!" jokes you want to make here are entirely appropriate. It's not a life-threatening critical.)

Although Jason meant crucial, not critical, he failed to account for the damage. Because of damage, which is handled prior to the chart he referenced, all Crucial Damage is life-threatening. In fact, if he paid attention, nearly all weapon-based attacks are life-threatening in FATAL. However, a belly button is listed as less crucial regarding hacking a torso than, say, hacking a lumbar vertebrae. Again, Jason failed to represent FATAL.

Further, role-playing situations that accurately represent mythology are likely at some point to include rape, molestation, encounters in brothels or possibly situations that deviate more from social norms.

Enjoy this first mention of "Well, because it's historical, we're not in trouble." As much in life, the authors of FATAL use history and mythology as they use any other source: Go through it for the dirty parts, ignore everything else, then claim that you're entirely accurate. (And while there are myths that deal with rape - most of them Greek - molestation, brothel visits, or giving birth to a clone through your cock didn't appear in any of them. Nice try, though.)

Although Darren erroneously presumed to know anything about my life, he failed to support any argument about skipping solid content and only including dirty parts. By the way, Darren should learn that brothels existed long before, and after, Ancient Greece. In fact, brothels were the accepted norm throughout the Middle Ages. As a reference, I cited _Medieval Prostitution_. There is nothing dirty about notes on Roads, Mail, and Around Town, which are sections in Chapter 6: Sociality. Of course, I can cite numerous other examples, but Darren does not appear to support his claims, or if he does, it is with minimum effort. Finally, random magical effects have already been discussed. If a historical source exists, please let me know.

Burnout: I have to jump in here just to state how hypocritical Darren is. He accuses FATAL of only taking the dirty parts of historical texts. But does this himself when doing a review of FATAL.

Sartin: This would be a good place to rag on the "one thousand hours of research" the FATALites are ever so quick to bleat that Hall did when he shat out FATAL. While many of you have been understandably skeptical of this figure, I can easily see it. In fact, going from FATAL's end product, Hall's research probably went something like:

20 hours: Playing AD&D and thinking "I could so do better than this."

20 years, actually.

Burnout: 12 years here.

0.4 hours: Hitting head on a toilet and becoming absolutely sure of that.
2 hours: Being rejected by fuckable women. (If you're willing to expand the definition of "fuckable" to include the words "within four drinks", then the final research total can be considered well over 1,000 hours.)

Judging by the level of Jason's criticism alone, I can't help but think that Jason would surely fail a comparison between my sex life and his. Why are we even talking about sex life?

Burnout: I’m just wondering. As much as Sartin’s criticisms are based on the Fatalists having cowardice to approach women or being rejected by them. I wonder if this is projection.

25 hours: Huffing paint and listening to death metal.

I never have "huffed" paint, but I've definitely listened to death metal, classical, and neoclassical (and nothing else) for over a decade.

0.2 hours: Composing the FATAL theme while still disoriented from the paint huffing.

It's a moot point, but I don't consider the FATAL theme to be an outstanding musical work. It was not written with that intention. Instead, it was written with a commerical intent, which automatically sacrifices musicality. Just the same, it serves its purpose well, until something better comes along.

20 hours: Thumbing through every medieval history book that has the word "prostitute".

Does anyone know of any others that are written by respectable scholars?

5 hours: Accidentally flipping through Roman or Biblical history books and either a) mistaking them for medieval history books, or b) failing to realize that, as human society varied drastically over the course of history, writing FATAL in a way that portrays society being pretty much the same EVERYWHERE, ALL THE TIME and calling it "historically accurate" is a bad move.

I hope it is understood from earlier that the first fallacy made by Jason above is that in many instances, ancient literature had to be consulted to fill-in for medieval literature to be true to the premises of the game. For example, some argue that slaves did not exist in medieval Europe. However, if they considered that I have attempted to extract Christianity due to polytheism, then the prevalent slavery during the days of Rome is appropriate.

The second fallacy is that FATAL does not portray society the same "EVERYWHERE, ALL THE TIME".  What Jason fails to understand is that there are 2 books to FATAL. The first, the one he pretends to have reviewed, is the system itself. The 2nd book, entitled Neveria so far, will detail FATAL's gaming world, monsters, and gods. As the most detailed gaming world ever, you can expect cultural and temporal variance. To Jason's credit, on this last point, how could he have known better?

0.4 hours: Mistaking a policewoman for a prostitute.
10 hours: Flipping through anatomy and medical texts while drunk. "Yeah, I think you could make a Health check to survive if your sternum was driven into your heart. Way cool."

Actually, I don't get drunk (though I will have a few here and there). I am not a drinker, just so you know.

2 hours: Repairing punctures in "Sexpot Annie".

Projecting?

5 hours: Flipping through kids' mythology books and watching Hercules: the Legendary Journeys, and realizing (with the help of a large, skull-shaped bong) that Zeus and Odin must have been total ass-bandits and they just left that part out, and "mythological" just means whatever the fuck you want to make up.

But, I never inhaled! Actually, I've probably only seen one or two episodes of Hercules. I praise Bruce Campbell, but think the rest of it should rot.

Burnout: I have actually seen about 10 or 15 episodes of Hercules. For about 2 weeks I thought they were hilarious. The absolutely sad fight scenes were funny until I realized they were trying to be serious. But none of my mythological knowledge came from that sorry show.

10 hours: Reading up on non-cognitivism, ether theory, and physiognomy without realizing that they're not exactly respected ideas anymore.
900 hours: Circle jerking with Torturon, Burnout, and Psychotic Messanger [sic] of Death.

Although I included basic physiognomy and the concept of ether in FATAL, I have never respected either (obviously). Just another instance of things I put in the game that I disagree with, but see them as appropriate to FATAL. I wonder how much Jason knows about noncognitivism.

Burnout: I actually to a degree respect the idea of noncognitivism. I know most people don’t but it’s a matter of opinion, I guess.

I can't verify any of this, of course, but it's the combination of events that would most plausibly result in FATAL.

By now, everyone who has read this should be used to the fact that Jason supports or verifies little to nothing.

By the way, did I mention that this book is 900 pages long?

Redundancy.

'Cause I'm going to be bringing it up as this review progresses.

Great.

A lot.

Wonderful.

Because you bastards owe me.

Great attitude.

Sartin: Yeah, what he said. I never thought I'd see actually wanting to play Imagine or Palladium, but now that I've gone through FATAL, damned if I can even remember what sucked so much about them.

Ugh. Fuck "owing", gentle readers. I'm coming for your young.

Burnout: Hmmm.. Short term memory loss. Are we so sure it’s not Sartin who has the “large, skull shaped bong."

What makes FATAL especially fun is the droning, obsessive tone of its rules sections - for example:

Finally, observe that when these sub-abilities and abilities are determined initially for a character, the abilities are determined for young adults. After the sub-abilities are described and the tables presented, aging effects are illustrated which must be referenced throughout the character's life. The last chapter details how two abilities, Physical Fitness and Strength, may be increased through persistent exercise, and also, an alternate rolling method is presented.

Although the current version has not been made available in over a month due to numerous little changes, it will be possible (in the same # of pages) to also increase Intelligence with use (or its converse). This is cited from _The Executive Brain_ and _Owner's Manual for the Brain_.

And there's that not-English again; where, when you rewrite it for a review, you find yourself restructuring the way that you speak English. Sure, you may have been able to write and/or speak it before; but then you read something like this, and you find yourself taking sentences out into the shed at midnight, butchering them, burying parts of them in the backyard and then redistributing what's left over the original document as a warning to any other proper use of the language in the book.

That was a lengthy way for Darren to say he dislikes my prose (especially since there's little, if anything, grammatically wrong with it, while both Darren and Jason commit split infinitives, dangling prepositions, etc. throughout their review).

Burnout: I think they just have trouble understanding Byron's prose, is all. They actually have to think for a minute and I bet that hurts to know that the one who created FATAL has a better understanding of the English language than they do.

Sartin: On the "bright" side, FATAL is arguably not as mind-numbingly written as Aria or Multiverser. On the "you haven't been huffing butane" side, that's much like saying "Okay, so I slid naked down a giant greased razor blade, but at least I'm not the guy who was thrown into a vat of fire ants."

In both cases, either outcome is totally stupid and painful, and the party responsible should be gang-beaten with cattle prods until the God of Bitch-Slapping finally comes down and says "Alright, I think he's had enough..." Except that in the most obnoxious case of all these, the God would suddenly add "Oh, wait, this was for writing FATAL, wasn't it? Here, let me recharge those for you."

Yes, I'm actually saying that writing FATAL is more worthy of a cattle prod beating than throwing someone into a vat of fire ants.

Although you are entitled to your opinion, you have been unable to support it.

See, try this:

These abilities only represent your character at the start of his life, so they will change as he ages; charts for this are elsewhere. Later on, we'll detail how you can increase your Strength and Physical Fitness, as well as an alternate method of rolling dice. Also, since you're reading FATAL, you should probably be aware that this game sucks.

I'm sure it's obvious, but just to be safe, I never wrote a single sentence above.

Burnout: I think it’s quite obvious given the fact Darren states “These abilities only represent your character at the start of his life”. I could just imagine that. “This is one strong baby you’ve got here miss.” Also the fact he doesn’t state where the charts and details are for increasing sub-abilities are at. Now I don’t claim to have the greatest grasp of the English language, as far as grammar, but Byron’s writing, to me, is far easier to reference.

See? English. No Grant Morrison-esque portals opened up into a not-world in which the English language was thrown down, danced upon and then sodomized. Not yet, at least.

I wonder if Darren is aware that his English, at least as presented here, is worse than that in FATAL.

Sartin: Needless to say, there aren't any editors, copyeditors, proofreaders, or non-retards in FATAL's credits. I'm not convinced there are any human beings, either, but we won't get into that.

As stated before, credits are not listed...yet.

Burnout: Obviously not, as Sartin stated before we are demigods.

Instead, I'd rather take this moment to rant that this is a great example of why editors are really damned important if you're writing a RPG. They're not just good for correcting typos, but making sure your writing technique does not end up sucking all that is ass. If you're not the best writer in the history of the universe, don't end up like FATAL! Get those editors!

I'm sure the reader noticed that again, Jason did not support his claim that English is problematic in FATAL. How many times does this need to be said? Somebody, please count.

So check this out: There's five primary stats, right? But, in a nod towards the residents of insane asylums who smear the walls with their own feces, each stat has four sub-stats which determine vital, important information like, say, enunciation, or kinetic beauty. So, you actually have a stat that determines how well you can speak, or how pretty it looks when you move.

You should have used "that" instead of "which". Enunciation and Kinetic Charisma (not beauty -- by now the reader should not expect accuracy from Darren) are important sub-abilities (not sub-stats). For example, if a character is a spell-caster, then Enunciation is important to their spell-casting. Enunciation is also important to bards. Kinetic Charisma is important to a dancer, and probably anyone trying to seduce another character. There are well over 100 occupations, and each uses a different blend of the sub-abilities. Did Darren read the game?

Burnout: Just to elaborate once again. Imagine a mage getting charged by a hill troll. Before the troll gets there, which is determined by the sub-ability of physical fitness, the mage tries to cast Wooden Carapice, which would give himself an additional 15 to current armor. Enunciation would determine if he could speak the chant fast enough to cast the spell.

Sartin: Would this be a bad place to mention that you have to randomly roll all 20 sub-abilities? And the roll is 4d100, halve it, and subtract 1? Then you go back and calculate each primary ability by averaging all four of its sub-abilities. Which is really cool when you consider that primary abilities are rarely if ever used by the rules.

4d100 has changed to 10d100. Keep in mind that a character can be created in five minutes or less with the FATAL Character Generator, available free at fatalgames.com. Then again, the complexity of determining sub-abilities [(10d100)/5 - 1], compared to other RPG's, supports my claims that it is the most difficult, detailed, and realistic RPG available. I mentioned realism because the   curve produced by 10d100 is superior to anything else I've seen, as well as the fact that the mean is 100, which is easy to interpret. Therefore, the statistical curves produced by rolling for sub-abilities in FATAL are more realistic, and represent real distributions better than other RPG's. Although primary abilities are used less frequently than sub-abilities, I disagree with "rarely". Just the same, the focus is on sub-abilities, not abilities.

Burnout: Go ahead and make about 20 characters and see how well they fit into the Bell curve. I’ve tried and it’s much more accurate than anything I’ve seen.

So, basically, saying that this game should be burned is an insult to fire.

Saying that this game should be burned is an insult to RPG's and gamers worldwide.

The worst part of reviewing this shit is that I actually have to think about it. I actually have to read this shit, then try to explain it to you, then I have to spend half an hour with a pencil up my nose trying to fish out the piece of brain that died the minute that I tried to use it to understand FATAL. And God almighty, that's not a fun job. I'm genuinely worried that this is going to start interfering with my life, so that I start wind up adding on pointless, redundant statistics to everything that I do, like the guy who writes Hybrid.

Based on the lack of quality of Darren's comments, I doubt he thought about FATAL or read much at all.

Burnout: Come on now, giving credit where it’s due he probably read it. Just he couldn’t understand most of it. That’s why he’s thinking so hard and “fishing out his brain."

Also, for x=(c)(number of words in review)*ycc+kill me you fucks kill me.

Sartin: It's hard to believe, but even Hybrid is less of a waste of atoms than FATAL. You can catch my review of it here.

Just for example: Charisma includes Facial Charisma (how good you look), Vocal Charisma (how you sound,) Kinetic Charisma (how pretty you look when you move), and Rhetorical Charisma (how fast you CAN FUCKING SPEAK.) That's right, everybody: You can determine how fast your character can speak, in words per minute. What a statistic.

While speech rate may seem pointless to a reviewer who doesn't read closely, Rhetorical Charisma is important to some characters, just as with Enunciation and Kinetic Charisma, noted above. Above all, the information is there, if needed. If not needed, it doesn't need to be read.

Burnout: Just a side note, Facial Charisma is not how good you look. It’s how good your face looks.

Sartin: Yeah, where to begin? I mean, I can't count the number of campaigns I've seen where it matters whether your face can be THAT much prettier than your body. But don't worry. Even if you blow that 4d100/2-1 roll for it, you can beat it by wearing a bag over your head, like most FATALites probably do in real life.

It would be interesting to have a poll with hundreds of anonymous participants who rate photos of their faces and ours, just to see.

Burnout: I believe in giving details so here we go again. Imagine, if you will, fighting your way to the top of a tower where a female mage is attempting to cast the spell FATAL upon the world. Now when you get there you have the option of outright killing her. But there are so many options in FATAL one of which is trying to seduce her and make her break her concentration as a by-product. Now being a mage of high enough level to cast FATAL she obviously has high skill points in spell casting, familiarity. So in order to break her concentration you need to seduce her AND roll a high enough sexual adeptness check to be considered exceptional (80 or higher). In order to do this it would help to have high Facial Charisma and Bodily Attractiveness sub-abilities.

And while we're on the subject, it's cool that Kinetic Charisma is entirely separate from Hand-Eye Coordination and Agility. That's right! You can be the clumsiest, most spastic sack of shit who ever lived, and yet still inspire boners because the way you pick up that bottle of Jack Daniels to help you get through this game is just so Kinetically Charismatic. Meanwhile, you fans of the controversial pastime of hot, sweaty man-love will enjoy how, with Vocal Charisma, the lowest possible rating will get you a description of "gay".

Finally, Darren provides an argument. Should Kinetic Charisma be correlated with Hand-Eye Coordination and Agility? If there is a correlation, it should be weak. Consider a female in high school or college, who moves attractively. The gestures she makes with her wrist, the way she moves her head, and how she walks -- most consider her to be kinetically charismatic. However, I believe it is reasonable for a female like this to be tested by a Phys. Ed. teacher regarding either Hand-Eye or Agility, and perform poorly. The opposite also seems plausible. Therefore, if a relationship exists, it is weak. As these sub-abilities stand, orthogonal to each other, is reasonable. Just the same, I am interested in exploring this further. I thank Darren for providing one argument not devoid of all reason or support.

Burnout: Darren claims we are homophobic yet, he uses the term hot, sweaty man love.

And Rhetorical Charisma...yeah. I mean, this happens all the time in the dungeon:

The scope of FATAL is much wider than adventuring in a dungeon. In fact, if you consider the majority of occupations, the most general form of role-playing in FATAL should be gaming either as a peasant in a hamlet or a serf in a town.

Player: Okay, the dark priest HAS to be down to his last few hit points. As I take my next strike, I'm gonna shout "This is for my brother! Eat testicle pubes and die, scrotum breath!"

Gamemaster: Now, hold on! I'm not sure you could get that entire sentence out before you hit. Oh, if only there was SOMETHING we could roll to see!

Burnout: Actually I believe what Sartin is looking for is Enunciation not Rhetorical Charisma. In this case if his Enunciation were not high enough he has the option of waiting to finish the sentence before striking. Though, if he chooses that he runs the risk of the dark priest attacking first. Anyway, Rhetorical Charisma is used more in the case of Haggling for a lower price for buying equipment or a higher price for selling.

If Jason read the game, he'd know that should be MaimMaster, not Gamemaster.

I spent some time trying to scream, but nothing came out but blood.

Please try again.

Sartin: Okay, people. Remember that Darren's a professional, and we're reviewing on a closed course. Don't projectile vomit blood at home!

Darren's a professional? Professional at what? It's sure not debating or reviewing. I wonder if Darren's capable of an advanced degree? Nevermind, they're easy to get.

Burnout: Isn’t it obvious Byron. He’s a professional at projecting vomitous blood, iIn accordance to the wording used by Sartin.

I should also spend some time describing the artwork for this game. Most of it is obviously photographs run through the Graphic Pen filter in Adobe Photoshop; and most of the photographs depict two beer-swollen morons pretending to fight about as smoothly and realistically as any fight on Star Trek - which is to say that it's stiff and really, really staged. There's also startling depictions of the ARTWORK HERE monster, and crudely drawn pornographic sketches here and there. As a matter of fact, the ARTWORK HERE monster must be the most common wandering monster in FATAL, given its frequency of appearance.

There is only one "crudely drawn pornographic" sketch, and it was drawn by my wife. Actually, it was the fun of the moment, not intended as permanent artwork. She is a capable artist, though someone who sees that sketch should know that it took her less than five seconds to sketch it. As for the altered photos, they are also not intended as permanent artwork. The Artwork Here monste r(which, by the way, is not all caps, just in case Darren's interested in getting it right) is now dying a slow death, since art is being added and is one of the reasons the most recent version has not been made available for some time. A professional artist is now working on FATAL.

Burnout: To give credit where it’s due, Darren is somewhat right on one point here. Being one of the people in the photographs he’s speaking about, I can say that one other person and I were drunk when taking these pictures. And as Byron stated they were never meant to be in FATAL, even worse permanent artwork. By the way, if you’ve ever played with a bardiche while drinking you would now it’s better to look staged than to chop your buddy’s head off.

Sartin: Wait, he was trying to be intimidating? I thought he was going for a "Hi! I'm a silhouette of a bearded jackass who couldn't pass muster in the SCA!" look. Really, take a white marker and scribble on some black construction paper, and you won't be too far off from what little artwork HAS been filled in here. If Hall used Photoshop to create these images, he sucks at it.

Who was trying to be intimidating? The last potential creature Darren mentioned was the Artwork Here monster. Was the Artwork Here monster trying to be intimidating? My question is: can Jason write clearly? Who is bearded? I was definitely no good at PhotoShop when altered pictures of myself and my buddies. In the last few months, I'd say I got pretty decent at PhotoShop. For example, I thoroughly redesigned the Fatal Games Website.

Here, check it out:

Really. It's from the combat section. Actually, that one isn't so bad...the guy on the right is obviously Hall, and no illustration that depicts Hall in a state of imminent fustigation can be all bad.

The image used without permission is on the second page of Chapter 10: Combat.

Hmmm...

Oh, yeah. I'm either drunk or half-blind, or someone needs to try harder.

I'm guessing Jason's drunk.

Or check this description of an ability check:

For example, a slovenly trollop offers herself to a strapping young adventurer if and only if he can expediently say a tongue-twister of her choice. Driven by hormones, the young male agrees, and asks what is the tongue twister. The courtesan challenges "Huge hung hero hunks hastily hump horny heaving hot whores. How 'bout it, huh?"

So: Not only do we have a splendid example of the level that FATAL operates at, we also have an example of the game's utter misogyny. You will never, ever find a female character in this game who isn't a prostitute and/or proclaimed slut, because that's the only kind of women that exist in these dipshits' imagination. There's also not-English ("what is the tongue twister" instead of "what the tongue twister is"), and, for the final kick in the balls to my leathery psyche, you have to check against your Enunciation stat in order to say it.

I admit to making a mistake. However, Jason's powers of observation seem to leave much to be desired. For example, it should be, "and asks 'What is the tongue-twister?'" Did he expect the reader to overlook his misuse of the colon next to "So:", or simply not notice the dangling preposition "at", which would be better written as "the level at which FATAL operates." For that matter, FATAL does not 'operate' in the sense he meant. His poorly worded attack is actually hypocritical. By the way, Enunciation is better termed a sub-ability than a stat.

Burnout: Darren states “You will never, ever find a female character in this game who isn't a prostitute and/or proclaimed slut, because that's the only kind of women that exist in these dipshits' imagination.” I take offense to these remarks but will answer in terms of the game itself. With exception of very few, like Hierophant and Druid, a female can choose to be any occupation she so desires and there are even occupations set aside just for females, other than whore. Like baroness, chambermaid, dairymaid, delouser, duchesses, queen, laundress, lacemaker,and ladies, amongst many others. There are also many occupations where both males or females are rare or uncommon but they do exist.

Sartin: Appropriately enough, that example ends with the adventurer blowing it and losing the girl. How unintentionally autobiographical!

Is that what Jason needs to believe to feel better? His suppositions sound as unreasonable as grounds for religion.

But while we're on the subject of whores and sluts, there are also few occupations in this game that get more wordage from Hall than whoring and all things related to it (and even those only exceed the whoring volume through huge charts or long, boring ass skill lists).

Whoring doesn't get much attention at all. Would anyone like to make any comparisons? Jason refuses to support his argument.

Burnout: Sure I’ll make a quick comparison. Ok whore as an occupation gets a page and a half with no charts. I’ll check how many have that much or more. Assassin has two pages with one four line chart. Brotheler gets a page and a half no charts. Clerk gets a page and a half no charts. Doctor gets a page and a half no charts. Druid gets three and a half pages including three charts that cover about a full page. Gladiator gets a page and a half no charts. Knight gets a full page no charts. Mage gets three pages about one and a half in charts. Ranger gets a page and a half no charts. Scribe gets a page and half no charts. Sorceror gets two pages about one and three quarters pages in charts. That’s all. I count 11 occupations that get the same or more wording than whore. Seems like more than few to me. There are also a lot that get a whole page to themselves so whore doesn’t get that much more than them.

And all the whore and whore-related profession descriptions, of course, instantly footnote you to "information on whores has been obtained from Medieval Prostitution, by Jacques Rossiaud". Which, as it turns out, is a book on prostitution...in southern France...in the time period spanning the 1400s. And yet Hall is basing an entire world on it. Yes, people, this is what passes for "research" and "historical accuracy" in FATAL.

If Jason read the book, he'd  know that in numerous places, information on brothels and whoring is generalized to Europe. The arguments of Jason fail to stand here, as usual. Finally, He has no idea how the world for FATAL (Neveria) will end-up, based on the FATAL system rules alone. The reader should know that this is what he tries to call a review.

Actually, I tell a lie. One aspect of whoring you won't see FATAL spend time on is sexually transmitted disease. Yep, with the loving attention Hall pays to sex, genitalia, whoremongering, and rape, there isn't one damn word in the entire book about STDs.

So Hall's either careless beyond imagination, or didn't feel "the most difficult, detailed, and realistic game available" needed to present anything that might be a possible consequence to raping and fucking your brains out. Your call!

I searched for information on sexually transmitted diseases in the Middle Ages. Although I did not search with vigor, the few times that I have searched, I have failed to find any information. Some others have made this same argument. When I asked them to provide a source, so that I can include the information, I never heard from them again. If Jason were credible, he would provide a scholarly source.

Burnout: From what I have heard, they existed but nobody was able to diagnose STD’s. Not that I see it mattering much. Considering the fact that in FATAL you’d be lucky if a character lived long enough to be effected by the long term effects of STD’s. And in the short term most would be nothing more than minor annoyances. Every 1d4 hours you must scratch your balls due to crabs. Or due to urinary tract infection take 1d2 LP of damage during each urination over the next 1d4 weeks. Only problem is, as stated by Byron, no one has brought a scholarly text to prove they even existed let alone could be diagnosed.

Then there's the charts - pages and pages and pages of charts. I should mention that the Bodily Attractiveness stat affects your breast cup size, although, of course, only for women.

Does Darren intend to argue that Bodily Attractiveness should affect the cup size of men? I hope that Darren's lack of clarity does not frustrate the reader. By the way, multiple historical texts indicated that large, spherical breasts were desirable. This was noted in the series by Giles, in either _Life in a Medieval Village_, _Life in a Medieval City_, or _Life in a Medieval Castle_. It has been noted in other books as well, but these are sufficient to support my claim for now, especially since Darren's claim is unclear, at best.

Oh, and you can get "retard strength". Check the formula out for determining this:

(71 - retard Intelligence) x 3 = (% chance of Retard Strength).

I hate the author. I really fucking do.

Is Darren close to retardation, or is he close to those with retardation? There must be a reason he is emotional and takes this so personally. He only notes that Retard Strength exists, and that he hates me for it. By the way, I have neither searched nor found any material supporting Retard Strength. However, it is important to note that it is based on the experiences of some females I knew in college. Their jobs, about which they were obviously never overjoyed, consisted of taking care of retards. They would tell stories of how some of them would flip out, and how it would take multiple male nurses, or whatever they are, to subdue them. At any rate, the girls were impressed with each such occurence, stunned by the surprising strength of retards. In fact, if you observe the features of someone with Down's Syndrome, for instance, you will notice that their metabolism seems not quite right, and that they seem thicker than average. Another thought is that retards may not know the limits of their strength. Sometime I will focus on exploring the validity of Retard Strength, but for now, that is all the information I have on the subject.

Sartin: As bad as Darren's making this sound, he hasn't been telling you the tenth of it. These abilities - and the charts for them - could deep-throat a sperm whale.

Not counting the 4d100/2-1 roll (may it burn in hell), there are three central, massive idiocies at work here. In order:

Burnout: It’s your opinion that the roll should burn in hell. Then show any other RPG that has a roll for abilities that better emulates the Bell Curve.

Lame ass references and quotes

I love how when every sub-ability mentions skills or bodily features or combat stats, we get a big "(SEE CHAPTER [insert lame ass chapter number here])", as though we're too stupid to catch the chapter references in any of the other 19 sub-abilities that are right next to it. But then again, FATAL was written for FATALites, not you or me or anyone else whose IQ doesn't begin with a decimal point, so I guess it's necessary.

And even though I've gone to great lengths to be clear, such as with the premises of the game, Darren and Jason failed to consider them. Also, one reason for multiple references to other chapters on the same page (but not to the same chapter from the same sub-heading) is because a reader may randomly select a page and a paragraph, and be redirected appropriately. Unlike a conventional book, a gaming book is not often read in a linear, front-to-back, fashion, even if it should be (and these two provide the example).

And I have to love that "Brute force bereft of wisdom falls to ruin by its own weight" quote - yeah, it's utterly hypocritical, but it's also half-assedly ironic, given that nearly every FATALite to date has presented themselves as a total death- and rape-monger while having no clue how much their belovedly rape-enabling game sucks.

Whether you like or dislike this quote, it is from Roman times, so it supports historical accuracy. Why is it hypocritical? In fact, isn't it hypocritical for Jason to call it hypocritical (see above)? Besides, I've never presented myself as a rape-monger, though FATAL does enable rape.

General idiocy/pointlessness

Like Intelligence: Spacial. With a way cool "Unfamiliar Object Assembly (# of pieces)" column. This would be the most complex machine a character can understand or some shit. Those with 100 Spacial can only understand machines with 200 parts, but with above-average Spacial, that will quickly grow to thousands of parts. Of course, where you're going to find something with that many parts in the most realistic fantasy setting available is a mystery to us both.

By the way, it's not "Spacial," but Spatial Intelligence. Since Jason's imagination seems limited, I will offer instances of objects with numerous parts: A clockmaker qualifies as someone who needs to understand objects with numerous parts. An engineer such as an archtect needs to understand objects with numerous parts. FATAL is possibly the only fantasy medieval game that lets a player role-play diverse and accurate characters such as these.

Burnout: Actually I find Spatial Intelligence very important in my line of work even though not dealing directly with mechanical parts. Being a Quality Control Supervisor I have to look at blueprints and imagine how the part will look in a three-dimensional space by only seeing one to three views in two-dimensional space. In some instances the part can’t be made from only one piece so I have to figure out what the smallest number of pieces it would take to complete said part. Quite an intriguing concept.

Or the Math sub-ability, with a "Highest math possible" column. Huh. I had no idea Geometry is the highest math any character can understand.

A premise of the game is historical accuracy. In terms of technology, the year for the game is 1335 A.D. Calculus was not invented prior to this year, so geometry is the highest possible math that a character can understand. Again, Jason offers no support for his argument, which is obviously fallacious.

Or the Common Sense sub-ability, with a "likely to" column to explain what low Common Sense characters are likely to get caught doing. The lowest possible rating is "Get caught for greater scheme: attempt to kill a god", but "Appear at emergency room after getting dick caught in zipper" and "Write FATAL" are just as likely.

The Vocal sub-ability has that "gay" note, of course, but if you're around 88-114, your description is "ordinary". Now check out the descriptions above and below it:

84-87: "Always says 'uh' or 'uhm'"
88-114: "Ordinary"
115-120: "Avoids 'uh' or 'uhm'"

So where does this leave "ordinary" speakers? Do they avoid "uh" and "uhm" half the time, and always use them the other half? It's a mystery for the ages, or for whoever's got Hall's bong.

Yes, the ordinary person uses vocal fillers such as "uh" and "uhm".

Burnout: Let’s just say an ordinary person uses them. But not always. But, also fails to avoid them. So they sometimes use “uh” and “uhm”.

And it's cool to know that Health will help out with that Urinating skill. And it helps with your hearing, too, for some reason. Also, did you know that only people with below-average Health can have allergies? So if you have even one allergy, congratulations: you're a FATAL weenie and will have a penalty on Urinating. Disgraced, you will be hopeless until you realize that all you have to do is fucking drink a two liter already and wait a day, which will give you a high enough mod to automatically score a "flood" on the chart and (if you're average height) get it as far as 16 feet with total accuracy (naturally, being "the most realistic game available", FATAL makes no distinction between power and accuracy. Or, for that matter, the ever-increasing difficulty in "holding it").

Although I'll refuse to consider why Jason may have difficulty holding it, I'll admit that FATAL could be more realistic here, which is a core goal of the game. It seemed overly complicated to introduce hearing as a sub-ability, so realism was sacrificed in this instance. As nothing's perfect, Jason successfully attacks an element of the game. I can live with it.

But speaking of realism and Urination, what's really cool is that you can't piss unless you roll over 5...and the roll is d100 + Urination Skill Points + (average of Health and Hand-Eye Coordination skill modifiers) +/- ("Time Since Last Urination vs. Ounces Drunk" modifier).

That sounds realistic to me. Though a person can usually force a little out, it's possible to truly not have to go. And for what it's worth, Health can certainly relate to a character's bladder.

Of course, you'll have to drink at least 16 ounces if you want to urinate without a penalty or having to wait more than half an hour, but that isn't very hard. FATAL characters can practically urinate at will! I have this stupid image in my mind of them beating down their opponents, chugging down those drinks, and standing around holding their dicks (and diddling every open hole in sight) for that half an hour just waiting for that Urination roll. Hell, they probably carry huge funnels so they can be extra quick with getting in the 256 ounces (and +80 mod) that will all but guarantee a "flood". Fucking shit, they probably have greasy T-shirts over their armor that say "PENIS! CUNT! ANAL CIRCUMFERENCE! Put a condom on my head, I'm a FATALITE!" God with a flying orgasm, SenZar has never looked so mature and deep as it does this fucking moment.

Burnout: I would just like to point out the hypocritical nature of the urination statement made here. While he attacks the skill itself and finds no need he stated earlier (Glad you remembered from page one) that he wanted to  “inject kerosene into my bladder, piss on them, and then set them on fire.” So he forces me to ask if he would have a need for a urination skill check instead of injecting kerosene.

But hey. If you can get that Urination skill up to 100, that will cancel out the worst possible penalty for drinking 0 ounces. Spell your name with the realism!

Of course, what Jason fails to consider is that for a character to acquire a Urination skill with a Skill Modifier of 100, the character must, on average, have achieved 20 levels, which most never will.

Oh, and about that Retard Strength? It's only +2d10 for humans. And with abilities running from 1-199 (and occasionally beyond), that's not exactly worth bothering with. But that's what makes it so 100% FATALish - it reveals Hall's total wankerness, but adds more or less nothing to the game.

It adds realism to the game. A gain of 20 Strength sub-ability points can be considerable. For example, if an average male human has 115 Strength and bench presses 150 lbs., then an average male human with a maximized Retard Strength of 135 (115 + 20) could bench press 203 lbs. Therefore, it adds something to the game. More than anything, it (hopefully) discourages players from being so willing to play retards. In DnD, the most popular RPG, abilities are determined with 3d6, offering a range of 3-18. I think most gamers have known fighters who easily accept a character who is retarded, if Intelligence were truly considered as a normal curve.

The fact that there are fucking *20* increasingly pointless and redundant stats, and the way they interconnect or fail to is stupid

None of the sub-abilities are redundant. As usual, Jason does not support his argument.

Burnout: Actually, in contrast all the abilities and sub-abilities are very useful for at least three separate skills.

Let's go right to Bodily Attractiveness. Oh, look: "Males with high Bodily Attractiveness tend to have high Physical Fitness, Strength, and Height" - yeah, maybe if all four stats weren't totally random. Sure, high Bodily Attractiveness will boost those a little, but even if yours is the mind-blowingly maximum roll of 199, you'll only get a +18 bonus. You'll forgive me for going "Woooooo!" in the most intensely sarcastic voice I can muster. It's not enough of a "tendency" to matter much of a shit against the random element.

Bear in mind that the "random element" creates a distribution that approximates a normal curve. Jason mistakenly implies that players roll a single die that produces a range of 1-199, which is obviously false. For example, if a male has a Bodily Attractiveness sub-ability of 199, then it would increase their Physical Fitness, Strength, and Height by 18. Considering only Strength, a male character that had an average Strength of 115, would apply the + 18 modifier, and have a Strength of 133. This character's bench press would increase from 150 to 190. Of course, the ludicrous portion of this example (the Bodily Attractiveness of 199) is part of Jason's argument. In order to have this sub-ability, a player has to roll '00