Granddad’s Not Role-Playing Anymore

(I’ve just joined an RPG named Pathfinder. I am at my grandparents’ home. Since they have a printer, I print off a character sheet and leave it on the side to look through since Nan calls me to help with cleaning. When I finish I come down to my granddad sitting at the dining room table, my character sheet in front of him. This sheet is a basic character sheet with stats such as strength, constitution, wisdom, and charisma, plus skills such as animal handling and healing. Very clearly not a form to join something. My granddad calls me over to the table and I sit down in confusion as he rests a hand on the paper.)

Granddad: “This… is dangerous.”

Me: “What? No, it’s a role playing game.”

Granddad: “No, it’s a cult out to separate you from everyone you know and love.”

(This goes on for a while, him insisting the Games Master is a cult leader out to brainwash me and the ‘campaign’ being an evil lie to convert me. I have absolutely no idea what he is talking about since he is still insisting fighting dragons will send my soul to Hell. I am finally freed (my sheet binned after being shredded) and I go home heartbroken. The next time I visit I have the core rulebook on me, a heavy hardback book of over 500 pages, and I call granddad over to the table, book in front of me. He flips, and starts ranting until I say:)

Me: “Look, read the first chapter and if there’s something that will sell my soul to Satan, I’ll burn it myself.”

(The first chapter was an introduction to role-playing and discussed basic dice rolls and attacks. Clearly nothing about forsaking my humanity to the forces of evil. Nowadays, whenever he hears me talking about my latest campaign he mopes and tells me to shut up. He’s still interested in my bestiaries, though, and asks about all the different monsters, so I think he’s slightly interested.)