It could be the Impostor Syndrome shouting through a megaphone and shattering more glass than Stone Cold Steve Austin’s entrance music…but…if there was ever a time to lay daffodils on somebody’s grave, it would be the RPG career of Malik Pierce, a character who goofed up so many times that he became a clownish version of himself rather than a truly flawed character. But how could it be my head voices talking when I just described his character trajectory? Wouldn’t everyone be in agreement? Was the GM trying to cheer me up or did she really see potential in Malik? I sure didn’t. I wanted to toss his ass in the dumpster and set the motherfucker on fire. I wanted that fire to be seen from space, as a reminder to everyone to learn from the mistakes of others.
It was 2006 when Malik made his RPG debut. Because I was nostalgic for my high school days (NOT!), I decided to enter him into a school-themed RPG on an online forum. What kind of background did he have? What was he like? Well, for starters, he was a Filipino sophomore with the name Malik Pierce, which is obviously the most Filipino name I could come up with. He was teeny, tiny, and yet stood tall over his abusive father, for which Malik spent a hot minute in juvie. Okay, so we know he can fight. Now what? Let’s give him drawing skills and a love for A Tribe Called Quest, a rap band who was putting out music long before Malik was born. Hell, there was even a member of that band named Malik, but everyone called him Phife Dawg, may he rest in peace.
Malik was introduced to the game as being tentative around potential friends, most likely stemming from the physical abuse he suffered at home prior to his sophomore year. So instead of engaging directly with the student body, he put on his headphones and let Q-Tip, Phife Dawg, and Ali Shaheed Muhammad batter his eardrums with sick rhymes and jazzy beats. It was here that he caught the attention of a female teacher who was only a few years older than him. Did Malik have any sexual tension swirling in his brain? Maybe, but he didn’t let it show. This teacher encouraged him to make the friends he needed to, and to come to her for help if he needed it. Long story short, he did just that and made friends with the entire player-character cast of the game.
You probably saw that rushed intro and you’re thinking to yourself: “My, Garrison, aren’t you the biggest galaxy brain in the world! You’ve got show don’t tell down to a science! Why don’t you get that phrase tattooed on your balls?” To which I would respond that I spared you the details because that’s not where the juicy parts of this role-play take place. The introduction to Malik’s circle of friends was so uneventful that I forgot what the fuck happened. If you wanted to be bored to tears, you would read the phone book and not my mini-memoir. You want juice? I’ll give you juice. I’ll give you the Ocean Spray version of what happened to Malik Pierce. Kool-Aid is not real juice. It’s just powdery sugar shit that looks like it goes up your nose instead of in your mouth.
First lesson of today: if you’re in a role-playing game, do not…I repeat…DO NOT sabotage your own character for the sake of a “good story”. I absolutely hate it when players do this shit. They’ll intentionally trip over something or they’ll bonk their head on a brick wall with the idea that their injury makes for an interesting story. It doesn’t. It’s just stupid. Nobody liked it when Bella Swan did it in Twilight and they like it even less when an obscure role-player does it at the expense of the rest of the party. The reason I hate this so much is because I did it with Malik and the results were bass ackwards.
The PC’s and I were in a math class doing our assignments and Malik happened to finish his first like the good little student he was. Thirty-five brain cells minus ten equals twenty-five. If that was the case, it was a miracle he got anything done at all. In Malik’s infinite wisdom, he pulls out his portable CD player, puts his headphones on, and puts on that sweet, sweet sound of A Tribe Called Quest. And because torpedoing your own character meant good storytelling, the volume on Malik’s player was a LITTLE too loud for the teacher’s comfort.
“Malik! Do you mind?!” snapped the math teacher. No response. “Malik, put that away or else I’ll put you in detention!” Surely, I would have learned my lesson that this was going to go badly. But instead, I had Malik give her a “don’t bite my head off” kind of response. The teacher threatened to take away the CD player and Malik wouldn’t fork it over. Instead, our Filipino wrecking machine was sent to the principal’s office. Being the good little lad he was, he went there straight away to confront his own shitty behavior. Just kidding! He sat in the hallway and delayed the inevitable.
And who should run into him? The overly-friendly teacher from earlier. Malik explained what happened to her and she insisted on bringing him to the principal’s office anyways. The principal explained that he couldn’t “undermine” the math teacher’s authority and that Malik’s biggest sin in all of this was talking back to her. If a student insults a teacher, it’s worthy of punishment. But if a teacher insults a student, it’s Monday morning. While that phrase is so true they made a whole Pink Floyd-themed movie out of it, this was all Malik’s fault. Forget detention, this stupid motherfucker needed a firing squad. In that regard, he would have shown more brains in that one instance than he did in the math class. It would have been literal, but it would be true no less.
What’s that? You want more juice? Of course you do, because that’s how you make a screwdriver since alcohol is necessary in numbing your secondhand embarrassment. Very well. You get one more shot of juice and then happy hour is over. You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here. To set the scene up for this next juicy lesson, there’s an ogre on the football team who’s been bullying the shit out of everyone for far too long. Beatings, screams, gaslighting, you name it, this guy has done it. So Malik’s new circle of friends thought it would be a good idea to have him draw the football stud in an embarrassing light as a measure of revenge. Malik did just that: he drew the football stud as a hideous monster that would gag John Kricfalusi and Gerald Scarfe all in the same day. Also, the bully MAY have had a football sticking out of his ass. Or an American flag. Either way, he was not happy.
After school was officially over for the day, the football stud, dressed head to toe in his gear like a holy paladin who was anything but lawful good, confronted Malik and his circle of friends. This jock towered over Malik like Andre the Giant, but moved a lot more athletically and could no doubt kick the Filipino goofball’s ass. What does Malik do about it? What’s his massive Hail Mary? Well…he takes the role of drama prince and goes into a whole spiel about his abusive past. Malik reasoned that if he could beat his dad’s ass, he could beat the football stud’s ass. Nothing could hurt Malik anymore because he was already dead inside.
And just like that, Malik Pierce became the mayor of Cringe City. He might get a longer serving term than President Xi in China. He’d be just as hated, too. The circle of friends pulled him away from the scene and they gave him a stern talking to. They told him not to be a drama prince. They told him he went too far. They told him he fucked up the whole purpose of drawing the football stud as an ugly creature that would turn any Shrek movie into an NC-17 horror show. Malik Pierce was ashamed, but not nearly as much as I was that day. Something told me that the players weren’t just speaking through their characters. Something told me they really meant that.
These were hardly my first two blunders as a role-player during those years. I made a cyberpunk mercenary look like a whiny bastard. I made a corporate stooge look like a complete idiot. I DMed a Dungeons and Dragons game where the level 15 samurai blitzed through the whole fucking thing without breaking a sweat. My massive ego was so damaged that I thought I should take a break from role-playing. Maybe I wouldn’t ever come back. Maybe I really didn’t know anything about human behavior or good character work. Maybe I was an ineffective storyteller. So I wrote the high school RPG forum a letter telling them about my departure due to no longer having fun playing.
I was half-expecting the players and GM to do cheerleader flips over this. It was probably my Impostor Syndrome shouting from the rooftop. But then the GM responds by saying…”And just like that, I just lost my best player.” Now my Impostor Syndrome was shouting at me like a marine drill instructor. Surely, this GM was just being nice to me. Best player? I don’t think so. I goofed up twice and they were both in colossal ways. Good players don’t do that. It’s one thing to have a flawed character. It’s another thing to have one who’s so flawed that he comes off as tone-deaf and stupid. That’s what Malik Pierce was: stupid as fuck and deserving of his criticism. That’s why I don’t intend to use him again in any other role-play. I might reuse his name since I like over the top names, but the character himself is gone forever. He’s getting the Chris Benoit treatment without ever actually killing anybody.
I’ve made a lot of mistakes during my career as a role-player and GM. Malik Pierce’s story takes the cake. He is easily the most embarrassing character I’ve ever played as. I don’t believe the GM one second when she said that she lost her best player the day I resigned. Am I being too harsh on myself? Maybe. But sometimes a little tough love is warranted. It’s not ideal for self-care, but it is necessary if I want to move on from this mistake. And luckily I did. The role-playing experiences I had after 2006 fucked off forever were MUCH better by comparison. I had a barbarian who rose to the top of MMA fame. I had an art therapist who actually connected to his patient in a meaningful way. I had a socially awkward college student who wasn’t seen as a creep by his peers (which is a low bar to clear, but I’ll take it).
This story about Malik Pierce is a reminder that sometimes progress and growth aren’t linear. Sometimes you have to take one step forward and two steps back. But when you take those two steps back, you can either fold or you can get better. I’d like to think I got better since then. But I still haven’t found enough duct tape to shut up my Impostor Syndrome.
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