Dads & Dads-to-be
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Any Geeks?
Anybody else here a member of the Geekdad movement? I am still thinking of ways to incorporate dungeons and dragons rule sets into discipline and chores.
And don't get me started on the order a child should watch the Star Wars movies.
(Episode IV V II III VI) Duh....don't even bother with episode one.
DS1 July 7, 2011 DS2 Expected November 25, 2012
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Re: Any Geeks?
True question is how can you even acknowledge the prequels? They ignore the basic principals of the originals.
OP, my husband and I are both huge geeks (he actually proposed in game at a D&D session, got the DM in on it and everything), and my dad is the same way. While I am not sure which rules you want to incorporate, I do know this. We will be starting them young and will not teach 4e. If they want to learn that crap, they can go find it on their own. I promise not to rant too much on that, but we will also require they learn to appreciate older gaming systems before their own generations.
As to Star Wars, it will be IV,V,VI and then if they feel so inclined, the prequels, and yes Episode I was terrible. As much as I love Liam Neeson, it was by far his worst role ever,
Yeah, I'm a geek dad. My wife is not, at least not that she will admit. I'm not sure how D&D rules would work with discipline actions and stuff. But I do plan on having a D&D night with the family, I think its good to build imaginations, perhaps doing classic stories like Harry Potter, or Princess Bride.
Also the final fantasy series will be a must, as will Zelda for the super Nintendo, and Shadow of the Colossus. If they want to impress me they can beat Devil may cry.
Magic the gathering is also not off the table, but we'd play "Omni" its easier for people who don't understand how to build decks.
I'd also like to say that I like D&D 3rd rules, but all my books are second addition, so that's probably what we'll use.
As far as Star wars, I'm not a huge Star Wars fan, I love the universe, the movies were really cool, but I wouldn't consider myself a "fan". I've only seen most of the prequels once.
I also think of using RP as educational tool although personally I doubt DnD will work well. DnD rules are notoriously crunchy and rigid which at some point can be great for the child?s development, but generally I would think something with greater flexibility will be better.
In fact what I have mind is closer to free-form LARP with dad been a GM and arbiter. As for using it for discipline and chores that?s easy, but depends on the particular scenario you using? Casting you kid as apprentice to a wizard/knight/kung-fu master/vampire hunter/jedi, will naturally give parent ability to assign chores, grade the results and issue rewards. By the same token the chores themselves could be transformed? watering plants ? tending witchdoctors herbal garden, cleaning room ? sweeping room for bugs planted by a super-villain, shower ? decontamination after potential exposure to Romulan developed virus, etc.
Chores and discipline are really side effects as far as I am concerned though ? primarily I plan to use RP for education. Get the kid to play Indiana Jones for instance and have him/her learn about geography, history, archeology, world cultures? throw in few useful skills such as planning a trip? add physical activities (nerf gun duels, mock sword fights and fisticuffs, climbing, bicycle, swimming, etc)? use family trips to boost immersion whenever you can?
Of course my kid has just turned 2 so this is just theorizing and planning, not entirely unfounded but not confirmed by an experiment as it were.
Seriously, IV V II III VI. It does away with all of the junk in I and keeps the better parts of the prequels (II and III) -- and it keeps the reveal re: Vader and Luke a secret until the scene in Empire.
With regard to gaming and kids, I plan to get our son hooked on games as soon as he is old enough to roll dice. I certainly want to get one of these:
https://crystalcaste.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=CC&Product_Code=10751&Category_Code=ID
You know, for him.
Well my son had his own bag of dice since he was about a year and while he had no concept of dice of course, the very process of rolling (especially on the hardwood floor) seemed to deliver no end of fun. He is two now and while he still has no idea about gaming I was happy to discover him rolls the d10 and shouting out loud the number that comes up.
My point is, if you are geek parent, find dice that is big enough not to be a hazard to the kid and buy it as soon as kid can grab and throw objects.
I'm a partial geek dad. I'm only mildly into video games, which are the only games I play, and don't even do that now that my 360 got a quarter of the red ring of death.
As far as the Star Wars thing goes, definitely original trilogy first. I will let him watch Episode 1, but it isn't one we will watch over and over again unless he really gets into it.
My question is this: At the end of Episode III, the Death Star is already under construction and Luke and Leia are just born, which means the remaining 67-75% of the Death Star construction took essentially 18-20 years. Luke obviously blows it up at the end of IV, and then by VI, they have an 80% complete Death Star that has a functional main weapon. The time lapse between IV and VI is maybe 8-10 years tops. How does the Empire get the 2nd one cranked out so quickly when the first one took the better part of what could only be assumed to be 3 decades, especially when they didn't have a clone army working on the original one?
No, child labor.
My nephew used to love to farm for us, it was the only time he got to play. This was back in Final Fantasy 11 days. He would camp Vomp hill for hours killing bees and collecting beehive chips.
That was great and all until the summer he turned 3. I was outside with my sister and my nephew ran up to us all excited. He said "Mommy! I have a present for you!" She opened up her hands and he dumped a whole double handful of dead bees into her hands. Must have been 2 dozen easy. That entire summer he spent running around what was a family housing college quad chasing, hunting, killing bees and giving them to any adults he wanted to impress. The amazing part was he never got stung, he must have killed 200 bees that summer.
Well first of all, prototype always takes longer to build then subsequent copies. But more importantly the movie never specified when second deathstar construction started and no one said that there can be only one deathstar at any given time. For all we know second one was well underway before the first one was even finished.
Lurking, but DH bought a book called Geek Dad that explains how to do this.
Ha! My DH and I read that article in Wired and had that same conversation about Star Wars. I know DH is very excited to start teaching our LO DnD. We are both gamers, and most of our friends who are gamers have kids who are just a little older than our kiddo will be. DH is already planning their first campaign. As for me, I'm a huge science geek and I have a background in Paleontology...I can't wait to teach him about dinosaurs and go on some family dino digs!
For anyone who would like advice on talking to their kids about Star Wars, the following link might be helpful.
Star Wars Talk to Your Kids PSA
I will grant you prototypes always take longer, but to cut the construction time down by 67%. Those have got to be some seriously impressive contractors the Empire has.
Secondly, judging by the design of the 2nd death star, one would have to imagine that it was built primarily after Luke blew up the first one because the one fatal design flaw in the original was corrected, there was no exhaust port to put a proton torpedo down. Plus, if you have the ultimate weapon in the universe, and the goal was essentially to use it once and then use fear to keep systems in line, why would you need to spend the money to build the 2nd one, wouldn't one be sufficient? Seems very redundant.
Well we are arguing about Star Wars so I guess that proves we are geeks.
So...
1. How do you know design flaw was fixed? I mean instead of a shaft you can shoot torpedo through 2nd one had a freaking tunnel you can fly a ship through. Yes I know it was still under construction, I am just pointing out that "fixed flaw" is merely your assumption.
2. If you build a car and then someone tells you there is a flaw in the fueling system that can cause the whole thing to blow up - do you start building a car from scratch or do you simply patch or replace faulty system? There - you can have "flaw fixed" even though the car was very nearly finished before the flaw was discovered.
3. Why build more then one death star? For the same reason you have more then one fleet for instance. However powerful it can only be in one place at once. If someone attacks Corusant and takes out Emperor while Deathstar is busy destroying Alderan the power won't matter. Also as naive as SW is concept of ULTIMATE weapon even more naive, in fact extended universe has already supplied the lore with plenty of weapons on par or even more powerful than Deathstar (starkiller ship, center-point station, mass shadow generator, star forge, shawken device, dark reaper... and literally dozens more). And that's to say nothing about the Force next to which by Vader's own admission Death Star is insignificant. Bottom line having just one death star makes about as much sense as having just one star destroyer.
4. Something I missed in my first post. Not only we don't know when the second death star construction has started, but nothing in the movies tell us when the 1st one did. Oh we've seen death star plans in episode 3, but even assuming those were finished it doesn't mean construction has started immediately. Hey I have made a tree-house plans about a decade ago - that doesn't mean I've hammered a single nail in yet.
Emperor had to finish consolidating his power, defeat whatever opposition, bring separatist worlds back into the empire, perform great jedi purge, assemble resources, etc,,, basically Palpatine had more immediate problems than construction of huge ship which primary function is fear)
Personally I am very much disappointed in the Geek Dad books.
If you are really a Geek you just don't need these books - there is little if anything useful in there for you. And if you aren't geek and wish to learn - the book lack specific instructions so while you get some cool ideas you won't actually be able to do any of the projects without more books and/or help.
Worse yet, in my opinion coming up with a geek project is not hard, getting a kid interested in it is the trick... and geek dad books contain very little advice in that respect and many projects are pretty lame and boring as far as children are concerned, and many more require hours of preparation from dad just so that a kid can get involved for few minutes.
The movies don't specify exactly when construction of the initial death star started, the plans were shown first in the tail end of episode II, but at the end of Episode III, Vader and Palpatine are shown looking at the framework of the death star under construction. This was shown at the VERY tail end of the movie, along with Padme's funeral, Yoda's exile and the twins finding their new homes.
A star destroyer is kind of like an aircraft carrier, it carries large masses of troops and equipment for planetary use. The death star is something completely different. I'm not all that familiar with the extended universe beyond one set of books I read encompassing what would have likely been a very good episodes VII-IX (Zahn's I believe), but the movies don't really touch upon those, except for the force (obviously).
I'm fairly certain that when my baby comes, regardless of the sex, he/she will most likely have a very strong influence of Star Wars, Star Trek, and superheroes (probably in the clothing department.)
I'm also contemplating buying two sets of Action Figures, one to play with, and one to keep in the box (the start of a potential college fund, lol.)
I'm a nerd and proud of it. I just hope my child will embrace their own (and their dad's) nerdiness.