The request was a guide for new players to learn D&D.
I did a file search on the subject, not just that one thread, not just minmax but every board google and other search engines had to offer.
Here.
Traps a beginner should be wary of. D&D. Your best bet is to get a job and leave this on the bookshelf. Remember that the best thing to do is work, save, invest, and ignore flash in the pan things like social activities. They will not advance your career in the slightest. Best thing is to get at least a doctorate and work 12+ hours a day. You will thank me when you retire young and with money. Thank you/
He's not the only one with this bit of advice. It comes up again and again, different reasons, different goals, but it keeps coming up.
I search the data bases, collate the data, seperate into various fields, eliminate redundancies, then rewrite and consolidate the information. When personal experiences are used, I remove those and replace with similar ones that I've had.
If you don't like what some people have to offer, what some people advise, I am sorry. As I've said, I will rewrite it to be more diplomatic. But I cannot discount the information itself. It has to go in because it IS advice to someone starting out. Unless you can state that it's wrong and prove how, the best I can offer is to allow you to write a counter argument.
In fact, I would encourage this.
You all seem to think I have some sort of emotional investment in all of this. As for my personal examples, these were horrible events, but they mean nothing to me. I have no emotional attachment to them one way or the other. If it did mean something, I would not include it. I got over the events years ago. I'm not sharing to bear my soul, but to provide factual context. Perhaps it's the fact that I'm so blunt about it that it comes across as negative. To me, mentioning getting my head smashed into a locker door until I passed out in gym class is just as important to me as the fact that I like day old bagels from Bruggers. Which is to say, not at all. It's just to prove a point.
I could just as easily include other people's personal experiances, since they were posted, but I think that's rude. If they wish to share their personal experiances as examples, I would wait until they made a request to do so and then include it in it's own entry. However, The examples I did find were... graphic. I did my level best to capture the intent of the gathered data without being too... intense.
So either you are too sensitive, or I am too insensitive. I will err on the side of caution and rewrite the offending section. Chances are It's me. I simply do not see what you are all upset about. Facts are facts, in my opinion. It wouldn't be the first time. Please do me a favor and let me know if I have not gone far enough.
As for recruiting new players, that is not the purpose of this. This is to teach new players basic concepts and to avoid mistakes. However, since it seems to be important to some of you, I shall include something positive about RPG gamers. Feel free to offer your suggestions.
And just so we are clear, I will not alter any offered entry if it is deemed relivent to the stated purpose. I make no claim to understand the wisdom of every gamer on the planet, but I can do data searches like nobody's buisness. I stand by gathered data and offer that if there seems to be a negative tone to my handbook, maybe I have found few posts on this topic that were positive.
In fact, trap number 13 warns new players not to get in arguments about Melee Styles for just that reason. For some reason, the advice on the topic seems especially... aggressive. I don't know why, but melee advice just... I dunno how anyone can get so emotionally invested in anything, to be honest.
-----Four Hours Later-------
I waited a bit before posting this. I wanted to get some advice and have recieved it. I will not change the original post, but I will add to it.
I'm looking up at my whiteboard and looking at the project parameters and seeing the list of questions and one stands out, "Y N Else?"
That's shorthand for, "Why hasn't anyone else done this before?"
I got a gift for sifting through data, but my gift does not involve judging that data. It's gotten me in trouble before. I've solved problems that should not have been solved. Those are painful memories of regret. I have shared them elsewhere and have no desire to do so again. Suffice to say, I am a poor judge of the consequences of my actions.
This is a subjective handbook, not an objective one. The data sorting is correct, but I am uncertain if I should be the one organizing this data set. If you ask for a handbook on eating babies, I can make you one and it will mean as much to me as this handbook, or any handbook. The handbook is an answer to a question to the best of my ability. It's what I do.
I ask if anyone else wishes to do this handbook, because I simply don't see things the same way as everyone else. I provide solutions to problems, I don't provide solutions to the problems caused by those solutions.
Besides, it's only been what? 17 man-hours? Pfft. I waste more time playing Borderlands 2.
If nobody wants the task, I am thinking of deleting the original handbook. You see, I think I now know why I couldn't find anyone else's beginner's handbook that was worth using as a template.
I will hold off on that deletion at this time until I receive feedback from the original individual who made the request.