Biggest Nerd?

[Dr. Sylvan]

Eastman thinks he's the bigger nerd. JP asked for a definition, which implies he can compete. But can they defeat Dr. Sylvan's Incredible Powers of Doom?

Bring it on.

Exhibit A: Over 58,000 words of a first draft of when I decided to rewrite Star Wars from the ground up in my spare time during junior high. You should note several things about this: first off, I have spent over 2200 hours watching Star Wars movies and read most of the novels as well as various other things such as the West End Games RPG and cover-to-cover consumption of Bill Slavicsek's Ultimate Guide to Star Wars. I felt that the Empire's superlative military might guaranteed victory, so I started writing it that way. It is also worth noting that I wrote this during my spare time at school by going in an hour early to use the library computers. Every day. First name basis with a bunch of middle-aged librarians.

Check that shit out. And ooohhhh yes, I've got more. So much more.

[Kowal]

Amateur.

[st00mie]

Heh.

In 9th grade (1995), I started playing both Magic and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and Magic.  I still play them both to this day, though I am using the 3.5 rules in D&D.

In 11th grade I participated in the Academic Decathlon, and spent close to 40 hours per week studying worthless subjects.  I also founded the Chess Club at my high school, and piloted our team to 2nd and 1st in the state during my Sophmore and Senior years, respectively.  I later gave the game up to play Go.

I owned (and still do) every major video game console from NES forward, plus a few Ataris.  Today, I have a Playstation 2, Xbox, and Gamecube hooked up to my living room TV.  I have a Playstation 2 and a Gamecube hooked up to a TV in my bedroom.  My dining room houses a couch and another TV with a Playstation 2.  Currently, I log around 8-10 hours of console gaming time per day (a little more with the recent addition of Final Fantasy XI to my Playstation 2).

I have 3 Computers running in my bedroom, and there are network cables running along the floor in every hallway in my house.  I cannot sleep unless I hear the sound of the fans in my machines telling me everything is running smoothly.

I play Counter-Strike in CAL.

I currently work in a game store selling CCG's, RPG's, and board games to people.  My duties include administrating and maintaining the LAN center I built as well.

I spend nearly 100% of my non-sleeping time playing games.

[Dr. Sylvan]

Amateur.

I know it's not that well written, but considering the age factor (12-13 at the time), I think I'm justified in believing it to be nerdy. :)

I await Mr. Lawrence's opening volley before presenting Exhibit B.

[jpmeyer]

I doubt I can compete, since I have probably too much hipness outweighing some of my nerdity, but I will say that up until December, I was planning to go to grad school to study computer games as narratives.

[Eastman]

An interest in fantasy? Hardly nerdy. You may have missed this year's Oscars but guess what - that's mainstream now.

I was in the A/V club from 7th grade. In hs I did academic decathlon too. OH, also 3 years as student council officer, president of National Honor Society, member of band, jazz band, and math league. I was speaker of the house in Rhode Island's 'Model Legislature'

forget organizations though, how about downtime? I fondly remember skipping classes in high school to play a korean text based massive multiplayer game called astronest. Fortunately I had a special translator installed so my acron ships truly were the best in the galaxy, despite the language gap.

D2 was a blast too, I used to set my alarm for 1am so I could sneak downstairs and play while my mom slept.

I started using ICQ at 12. I've had a computer in my house since I was 6.

I've studied piano since I was 7 - Classical music.

I'm more familar with Wagner's operas than most people with music degrees.

[Kerz]

Simply that you two are 'competing' in this way makes you both winners, and losers in the end.

[Kowal]

The only thing I've got on either of you is experience with computers.

My dad used to have this ginormous stone age laptop that at the time probably weighed nearly as much as I did.  I was quite close to three when I learned how to operate it, and pushed my way in to owning it before my third birthday.  It still resides under my control (magic joke, har har *snort*) hidden safely away with other childhood comfortings such as some variety of pillow person dubbed "popo."

Tremble in ph33r.

[Azhrei]

I think this contest can clearly only be decided by sexual inexperience. Which of you has gotten the LEAST action?

[jpmeyer]

I'm curious, because I know I'm like 5 years older than you, just how gi-normous your laptop was because when I was 3 this was what my "laptop" was:



Behold, the Compaq "Portable"

[Kowal]

That's tight.  Lemme try to find someone with a digital camera so I can take a picture of it.

>>This post to be edited in approximately one week.<<

[kirdape3]

Ever go through an entire session of listening to all 10 of Mahler's symphonies in succession?  Yeah, that's what I thought.  Probably because the Second, Third, and Eighth alone run about 100 minutes apiece.

Wagner's best operas were Gotterdammerung, Die Valkure, Tannhauser, and  The Flying Dutchman, although the prelude to Das Rheingold is still the sweetest piece of music ever written.

Physics for three years (ran out of money for the last :<).  My application to the mantra of the nerd has to be in the memorization of useless facts about military operations (the Greenboy shell for the British 15"/42 Mk I in 1918 weighed in at a hefty 1920 lbs - without looking it up), as well as the standard LARP and RPG situations and infinite Magic.

[Dr. Sylvan]

I think this contest can clearly only be decided by sexual inexperience. Which of you has gotten the LEAST action?

Me. I have female friends (though only for the last eighteen months), but I've never been on a "date" as such.

An interest in fantasy? Hardly nerdy. You may have missed this year's Oscars but guess what - that's mainstream now.

Five years ago isn't two months ago. The nerdy part isn't even liking SW (who doesn't?) it's the extremity of the time and effort committed.

I fondly remember skipping classes in high school to play a korean text based massive multiplayer game called astronest.

I will admit to being impressed by this. I can't say I skipped a single class in high school, but that's because mine sent a letter home every time you missed a class, and four absences in the same class resulted in failure. My parents get upset if they hear I'm tardy, so I never challenged the attendance policy.

For the sake of completeness, my academic nerdiness includes winning my junior high's spelling bee in 7th grade, ending tied for fourth at the regional bee (next year I came in second at the school bee). I was in the chess club in 4th grade, but I found TCGs much more interesting. For writer's workshop projects in english classes, I routinely beat the second-longest story in the class by more than triple (I have no idea about comparative quality, but I was clearly the most Xtreme about it). On one occasion I was supposed to do a book report, and instead did a report on a series of six books. My high school didn't have an academic decathalon team AFAIK (maybe state magnet schools like IMSA aren't allowed to?) but I was on the Scholastic Bowl team senior year and math team sophomore year, as well as tech crew for plays throughout junior high. I also went to math camp at the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor) two different summers.

Reading a lot isn't very impressive, but as early as third and fourth grade, I read the entire children's section of the library on World War II--twice. Much like Rian (sp?), I still know numerous arcane details to this day, such as the set of carriers that attacked Pearl Harbor: Shokaku, Zuikaku, Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, and Hiryu.

Computers? Heh. My house has more computers than people, and I've been online since age eight or nine, IIRC. As for games, I hijacked my junior high computer club into an excuse to play LAN StarCraft, and when too many n00b 6th graders were unbalancing the games, I rated the sixteen regular attendees in about twenty categories (discussing relative strengths with some of the other "good" 8th graders) so that we could play two stratified games.

In terms of the credentials shared by most here including RPGs and TCGs, I think I've got a pretty diverse set. For RPGs, I've actually played all of the following: Fading Suns, Rifts, Cyberpunk, Conspiracy X, Call of Cthulu, Star Trek, Star Wars, Werewolf, GURPS, and Deadlands. For TCGs, I've gotten serious about Overpower (the old kind, like nine years ago), Decipher Star Wars, and obviously Magic. No LARPing, though.

Exhibit B: Not only am I hardcore Star Wars, I was so hardcore I decided I needed to develop a turn-based strategy game incorporating Star Wars, BattleTech, Babylon 5, Star Trek, and speculative ship classes for each. And, so help me, despite never finishing it the starship stats table or rules, I managed to play against myself with multiple teams multiple times. If you take a look at that table and then realize that I knew what all of those numbers equated to, you can begin to see the scope of this project. Concurrent with the other mentioned activities, this should signal that I spent nearly every waking moment doing something nerdy.

[jpmeyer]

• I don't roleplay
• I don't like multiplayer computer games
• I don't like fantasy and sci-fi very much
• I have only owned four video game systems, two of which were hand-me-downs
• I was homecoming king senior year in high school
• I lettered in track every season I was in high school
• I dislike anime
• I don't read very many comic books[/list:u]
  
  That said, I got about 80% of the questions right on this test

[Mykeatog]

You re-wrote star wars?

Why would you do that?

WHY WOULD YOU ADMIT TO THAT?

This thread isn't happening... it can't be happening....

*kill's self*

[Dr. Sylvan]

You re-wrote star wars?

Yes.

Why would you do that?

WHY WOULD YOU ADMIT TO THAT?

Dave challenged me. I needed to put him in his place. :)

[Magi]

Do looks count for anything?

In highschool I was the uber-nerd:

- Really tight pants that hiked up when you sat down
- Ugly Glasses
- Braces (4 years!)
- Comb over!
- Really girly physique (I was very lite because I joined the track/cross country team every year for long distance, I was a skeleton after every season)
- 0 luck with the ladies

Other attributes:

- Library Club member (Library was like, homebase for me. The Librarian would buy fantasy books because I was actually reading them).
- Stayed in the Library to play Chess during lunch in grade 8, during grade 9 it was Pokemon with the link cables, grades 10-11 it was in the computer lab playing this really bad Scorched Earth clone. Grade 12 I actually normalized quite a bit, but still played MTG in the library.
- I cried 14 times in grade 8 (my friends kept a running score, due to various things like getting shit-kicked, made fun of etc.)
- One of only 2 people who could NOT benchpress the bar.
- Played Pokemon the card game, graduated to Magic.
- Used to play Risk and Monopoly BY MYSELF (those dark times...)
- Piano, 10 years.


To this day I display many of these qualities. Still play Magic internet addict. However, ditched the glasses, ditched the braces, been working out nearly a year solid *flex* and those ladies are just throwing themselves at me



I guess I have no shot though, since I didn't REWRITE STARWARS! Like WTF that's insane.

And at the same time, you deserve props for that

[BlkXplsn]

Lemme get this right... this is a competition to see who more nerdy?



*head explodes*

@ Sylvan: NEVER had a date?! Ever?!

[Dr. Sylvan]

@ Sylvan: NEVER had a date?! Ever?!

I am Mr. Nice Guy. I think I meet every symptom of being an Intellectual Whore. :-/

I am only 17, though, so it's not like I'm as old as Darren.

[Azhrei]

Hey, shut up! I only turn 24 next week.

And on the Intellectual Whore test, I rate as an Outlaw Biker.

[jpmeyer]

Same here.  Whatever that means.  h8 jargon that people invent.

[Ric_Flair]

I like the sexual inexperience criteria.  That is a good one.  

BTW, you don't need to go out on a date to "get some."  Who made that fallacious logical jump?

Getting "some" without dating:

1.  Prostitute
2.  Attending a World's Biggest Gang Bang Competition as a participant
3.  Beer goggles
4.  Slutty girls
5.  The "let's stay in" excuse with subterfuge that leads to nakedness

EDIT:  Changed "googles" to "goggles"  Oh the hilarity of spelling mistakes.

[rvs]

5.  The "let's stay in" excuse with subterfuge that leads to nakedness

I think it's funny how I had to look up subterfuge....

[Matt]

The fact that you guys are even debating this means that you're all winners. Or losers, depending on your point of view.

[kirdape3]

Yes, but did you know that Kaga carried 20cm/50 Type 3 cannons in casemates underneath the flight deck?  (NOT 8" until they were re-bored on the cruisers and Kaga was blown up too fast)   Only the Lexington still carried 8" guns at that point.  Or that Kaga retained most of its battleship-scale armor belt (a hefty 10" on a ship that has no business being in a battleline).  Or that all six of those ships only carried I think 3/4 of their rated capacity because the Japanese hangar and folding-wing designs were HORRIBLE.  I could really keep going for a good long while. NERD 4L

[TracerBullet]

Hey, shut up! I only turn 24 next week.

And on the Intellectual Whore test, I rate as an Outlaw Biker.

12!


And on a related note, I would like to point out that anybody who's arguing in favor of their nerdiness is, by definition, uncool.  Self-depricating humor can only be taken so far, and thanks to you brave (nay, idiotic) souls, the rest of us now see where that line is.  Bravo, young losers, bravo.

[ZoneSeek]

*insert you win the prize.gif*

I have plans for "the best game of every genre ever" in my head - but that's nothing compared to you guys.

I'm jealous.

[jpmeyer]

Dr. Sylvan says that the fact that my film profs readily defer to me on the subject of East Asian cinema counts for something.

[KandyKid]

Heh.

In 9th grade (1995), I started playing both Magic and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and Magic.  I still play them both to this day, though I am using the 3.5 rules in D&D.

In 11th grade I participated in the Academic Decathlon, and spent close to 40 hours per week studying worthless subjects.  I also founded the Chess Club at my high school, and piloted our team to 2nd and 1st in the state during my Sophmore and Senior years, respectively.  I later gave the game up to play Go.

I owned (and still do) every major video game console from NES forward, plus a few Ataris.  Today, I have a Playstation 2, Xbox, and Gamecube hooked up to my living room TV.  I have a Playstation 2 and a Gamecube hooked up to a TV in my bedroom.  My dining room houses a couch and another TV with a Playstation 2.  Currently, I log around 8-10 hours of console gaming time per day (a little more with the recent addition of Final Fantasy XI to my Playstation 2).

I have 3 Computers running in my bedroom, and there are network cables running along the floor in every hallway in my house.  I cannot sleep unless I hear the sound of the fans in my machines telling me everything is running smoothly.

I play Counter-Strike in CAL.

I currently work in a game store selling CCG's, RPG's, and board games to people.  My duties include administrating and maintaining the LAN center I built as well.

I spend nearly 100% of my non-sleeping time playing games.

Buddy, you win the prize...

Here is a little bonus too!!!

[Bram]

I'm a moderator on themanadrain.com

PWNT!