Dealing with Deities - Building a 5E Campaign in a Believer's Worldview Pt 1.

About This Series

If you are reading this, you are either 1 of my 2 remaining readers from the early 2000's Blogger Days or you scrolled waa-aay down in the search results after searching for something about Dungeons and Dragons.  For those of you looking for a good RAW justification for stacking bonuses, know that this is not the blog you are looking for.  I'm relatively new to the game and that I found the title of this blog scrawled in the margin of my notes from my 2nd or 3rd sessions playing D&D.  It's now been a year and a half since I started playing, so I'm starting to know what I'm doing (sorta).  Enough that I trust myself to finally write about my experience so far playing Giles of Hamm and what I've been noodling on as I begin to write my own little D&D adventure.

If you found this because a Blogger bot woke up from it's semi-eternal slumber to send you an email notification for a new Dashboard Drummer post, you might not know much about D&D.  I sure didn't.  So as I work through my notes I'll define a few things, like "5E" and "Campaign" and, what that all has to do with Deities, and why there is more than ONE.

Campaigns

The games that eventually grew into Dungeons and Dragons were initially table top reenactments of Napoleonic battle maneuvers with little tin soldiers (I know, weird right?).  A series of battles was a "campaign" - and the name stuck.  

Today a campaign is a story.  D&D - especially the 5th Edition (5E) that I play, is a cooperative way to tell a story that someone has written themselves or prepared using a premade adventure.  Unlike the traditional once upon a time story, the characters (everyone else that's playing) gets to decide on the fly what they will do in a given situation based on what they know and don't know about the overall story.  Imagine if the Wizard of Oz started off in black & white with the tornado; and then the narrator described the house landing on the witch and Dorothy's spiffy new shoes … and then asked her:  What would you like to do?

World Building

Just like the Yellow Brick Road in Oz, the story has to go somewhere.  Dorothy is told that to get home, she should follow the road.  For some reason there's also dancing munchkins and a fully developed backstory about the cooperative labor guild responsible for the manufacture of lollipops that seems to have no other purpose than to provide a good musical number.

Fun Fact:  fanciful singing and choreography aren't part of my D&D experience, but ya know .. you do you.

The stuff like the lollipop guild (and what the conversion rate is for green vs. blue candy ore) is what can make for a good campaign.  Though not always fully planned and sometimes bluffed on the spot, the DM (Dungeon Master) has to know what's off the yellow brick beaten path whether its a One-Shot story that is completed in one session over pizza or a years-long ever expanding map of empires and cities

That brings me to the bit about Worldview.  If you've heard anything about D&D, it's probably something to do with the 'Satanic Panic' of the early 80s when folks in the Church were really into catching what John was saying backwards about Paul and a Walrus and also really sure that a game with monsters and devils was pretty much the worst thing imaginable.  Well, at least the panic made for good investigative news reports and sold a lot of sermon tapes.  

Following the panic, amid dropping sales, a good chunk of the "devil stuff" got pulled from the next edition (2E) but realistically, that's just window dressing.  Whoever is telling the story gets to decide what the world the players are adventuring in is like.  If you want your world to be filled with Care Bears and Rainbows and feature characters with crippling star-dust addictions, cool. if you want to turn each session into an attempt to one-up the SAW franchise, you can do that too.

So, as I create my first one-shot, even though it's incredibly unlikely that any of my characters exploring an Avenger's themed ski-lodge will interrupt a fight with the abominable snow-bunny to ask about the cosmological and theological implications of a holy hand-grenade … I still need to work out how magic works and where good and evil come from and what motivates players to take moral or amoral actions.  

I remember the moment I wrote 'Dealing with Deities' in my campaign notebook.  It was when I was leveling up Giles's character sheet.  In this case, adding a cool spell that I could use to literally 'blast' the bad guys.  I just needed to decide what magical or spiritual being was granting Giles that power.

This wasn't Satanic Panic stuff.  This was Worldview.  It wasn't my story, but I was choosing this character's attributes.  Did Giles have a Evangelical approach to magic use?  With that in mind, I made a few notes over following days on different approaches I'd seen in some of my favorite stories.

Where Does the Magic Come From?

… in no particular order:

Eru, The One 

Much of the core of D&D's setting and characters are high fantasy.  Consequently, you can choose to play the game in a very Tolkienesque way.  It's not featured much in the Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit, but Tolkien's Silmarillion goes into a lot of careful theology setting up The Elemental Powers as the angels that participated in the creation of Arda - themselves created beings made in the mind and heart of Eru, The One.  So, if a phial of shimmering light saves two hobbits trapped in a spiders cave, it's no more magical than the intervention of a saint and all part of Eru's plan.

I'm not going there.  I'm not nearly smart enough to parse out good and evil or give it that much back-story.  Still there is something there about Truth and who's it is. Evil is also there - not as a duality or opposite, but as a vain attempt to create that only succeeds in corrupting what was already sung into being.

The Deep Magic

Magic in the Chronicles of Narnia is also an extension of Creation; but Lewis takes it a step further.  The world of Narnia, Calormen, and the Lone Islands sits along-side our own world (just a jump away) and the children are told explicitly that it's the same God, just different worlds and that they must come to know Him in both.  The Deep Magic that resurrects Aslan at the Stone Table is Redemption told again for that world.

Because the world in my one-shot adventure will in many ways be our own - with some comic book style exceptions - I've got the luxury of ignoring most of the existential questions by just adding in the elements that tweak our reality on the other side of the wardrobe.

Toothy Cows

Likely the least known to my readers, Andrew Peterson's Wingfeather Saga is a great example of an author's Worldview driving a world, but not the story.  Its a great bedtime series to read to little ones and a good fantasy read for medium ones … and a fairly rough tear-jerker / knee slapper for the big ones like me.  Janner and his siblings encounter quite a bit of what we'd label magic in our own world but it's fully integrated with the same tone as the rest of the story (like the above mentioned toothy cows) never explained and perfectly wonderful.

I like this lack of explanation.  There's no danger of running into an R rating encounter in either Peterson's Aerwiar or my silly ski-lodge mystery romp but I like that the Wingfeather World manages to say something about the magic in our real lives and challenge some assumptions in a silly-toothy way.

Midichlorians

In a game that is 25% Wizards and, at a minimum, 5% Cheetos and Mountain Dew, you knew the Space Wizard magic was going to come up right?  The duality of the Force isn't my takeaway here (see my notes on Tolkien's Legendarium) but I have noted that what we learn about the Force comes out over 40 odd years, not in vast exposition dumps, charts, and FAQs.  If this story I'm working ends up having legs (and players) that it can grow into, there's no reason the mechanics all have to be known right away … and honestly, I'm likely the only one that will ever care how the secret magical item really works or where it comes from.  Also, trying to shoe-horn in a lame yet overly complicated explanation half-way through wastes time and causes arguments (see Midichlorians).

Squibs and Muggles

Who can't do magic?  This is the odd example out in my list.  Rowling's own early 2000's Satantic Panic had all the same features of its 80's counterpart (and some of the same faces and arguments).  If there is a Worldview clash with believers and the Harry Potter novels, it's not as a gateway to the occult, but its grounding in a Humanistic perspective.  Magic at Hogwarts is science and quite literally a matter of genetics.  Tapping into yourself and practicing your evolutionary attributes (in the context of struggling against what you don't agree with rather than what is evil) is the central theme.  They are fun but don't point to anywhere or anyone.

This for me would be a cop-out.  The MCU take on magic in the Avengers movies - (that Magic is Science is Magic) reflects the Rowling approach and there will be a few "Nano-Technology" spell adaptations but not everything is knowable. Just like Squibs and Muggles, there is magic in our creation and our story - but it doesn't come from inside us.

More of the 5E Campaign Worldview

My notebook had a few other topics to explore, so you're welcome / I'm sorry, this blog will continue.

Next up I'll continue Meddling with Magic and get a bit more crunchy with a discussion of the 5E Schools of Magic and Supernatural Beings:

• gods, patrons, celestials and their bad guy equivalents
• the necessity of necromancy
• the details of divination

 

Rock - Paper - Scissors - Grow

Note: If your reading this from outside Michigan, I should point out that “SHAPE” is an acrostic from a series on finding your fit in service/ministry that we've been working through the last couple of months on Sunday mornings. Tonya has posted more on this – so her blog might be a better place to start.

S.H.A.P.E
=========
Spiritual Gifts, Heart, Ability, Personality, Experience
---

Throughout the SHAPE series, I've been struck by how much my I've focused on “Ability” and “Experience” when trying to see where I fit. In fact trying to identify what my “Heart” was turned out to be easier said than done. As I've gotten older and had opportunities to see myself and others in ministry, “Personality” gaps were already on my radar … but I've nearly always clung to maxims like: [I do ‘x’ professionally, so my ministry must be ‘y’]. Worse yet – and this is what gets me to the Rock-Paper-Scissors thing – are the sorts of internal billboards that announce: [Chad is … “___”]. More on that shortly.

In my professional life, I've been having a look at ‘Mindset’ by Carol S. Dweck, Ph.D. It’s the sort of book I’m expected to read now and then to demonstrate continuing development - and I’ll be honest, is hitting the reading list in November (just before Annual Review time) for all sorts of the wrong reasons. I’m much more likely to read about Throne Wardens and secret organizations like N.I.C.E., but from a whole-life perspective this is coming along at just the right time. Dweck’s assertion is that we all interpret our own intelligence/abilities – and therefore our potential actions, success, shame, and relationships from either a FIXED mindset or a GROWTH mindset.

The differences between these two Mindsets has been summarized (much better) here; but the following is my attempt to bring it back to the SHAPE discussion:

A Fixed Mindset is one that, like those billboards I mentioned, sees intelligence/abilities as set and immovable. The classic example is the child that is told she has poor math skills and continues in that fixed perspective – never trying new techniques and / or giving up on all but compulsory math for the rest of her life. Once described or labeled, Fixed Mindsets are like Rocks … forever confident in their ability to beat Scissors but always vulnerable to the dreaded Paper.

But it’s not just the negative Fixed Mindset that leads to problems. Dweck points to several studies that show if a child is labeled “Smart”, she is less likely to take on tasks and challenges that might be risky or unsuccessful … and therefore cause her to lose her positive label. In the end, the ‘Smart’ child learns less and simply remains proficient at the basic concepts. This is exactly the sort of “Hideous Strength” that N.I.C.E. had over its victims in Lewis’ story. It’s also the sort of mindset that limits potential ministry. Objective measures of quality are a means for personal development – not its replacement.

A Growth Mindset then, sees intelligence and ability as the progress so far against experience. The same studies that caution against labeling a child as ‘Smart’, show praising kids for the work they've done towards an answer or task seems to drive accelerated success overall; even when the initial work is flawed.  Peterson’s concept of Throne Warden – a model of servant leadership that drives his “Wingfeather Saga” to a heroic ending – is the sort of mindset shift needed to reject the sometimes accurate limitations we have that hold us back from becoming. It is – after all not enough to see paper, or rocks, or even scissors as simply expressions of their abilities in a children’s game. They are so much more … the tools, and raw materials that build nations and touched other worlds through the continuing creative power of His Masterful work.

That tells me that I’m more than just one dimension of ability – or what I've been ‘good enough’ to do in the past. I’m not tied to certain destinations of ministry but free to journey – to grow, to make mistakes and become more than I can see from here.

Not Quite National BBQ Tour - Part 9: Tom Jenkin's Bar-B-Q

Sunday night, as the plane was landing in Fort Lauderdale, my seatmate asked me if I was in town for business or fun.  We had a brief conversation about the area and the joys of business travel (he was flying home).  When he suggested that I try to have some fun, I decided to ask about BBQ … and after a few moments of reflection he told me about ‘Tom Jenkins BBQ’.   It would mean a driving back to Ft Lauderdale from Miramar, but definitely worth the trip.  As we de-planed, he turned around to tell me not to try them on until Tuesday since they aren't open on Mondays.

Heads Up!  The Rating Scale Has been Revised – Again!

RATING DEFINITIONS # STAR / 10

0-1  =   Its BBQ … I’ll try just about any place once
2-3  =   HONORABLE MENTION … well executed even if not to my liking
4-7  =   GOOD BBQ … flavorful, distinct, and presented well with good sides
8-9  =   REALLY GOOD BBQ … The Whole Package + That Something Special
10   =    The Undiscovered Country … If I ever really find the best, I’d have to stop looking

Tom Jenkins Bar-B-Q

Despite the name, the restaurant was in fact founded by 2 guys (neither are named Tom) named Harry and Gary.  At first it was just a sauce, then a food trailer, and since 1996 one of the great Mom N Pop BBQ shops in the world -  just north of the Ft. Lauderdale Airport on Highway 1.  I parked next to a huge smoker and right under a sign displaying the hours of operation:  Tuesday – Saturday 11am-8pm, Closed Sunday (For Church), Closed Monday (For Fishin’)

THE PLACE

This is right in Ft. Lauderdale, so retail space is at a premium, and the whole joint parking lot included would have fit inside the Scrubbys I visited last night.  Everything is old dark wood with a big counter and 4 picnic tables crammed inside (along with some benches along the wall).  Its dark, it’s full of wood smoke … it’s wonderful.  By the way if it’s your first visit don’t just walk up to the counter thinking you can order.  That’s for picking up carry-out orders.  The dine-in  line starts to the right of the door and snakes through the tables up to the side of the counter.  One at a time please – and no pushing.


THE FOOD

2 Meat combo with 2 sides and corn bread + a drink and a dessert = under $20

* Brisket (chopped):  When I was ordering, I asked if the brisket was sliced or chopped.  Right about then …. Gary pulled out a hunk of brisket and chopped it with a huge knife.  “You want it chopped”, he said; and he was right.  So good that  I (almost) forgot to put sauce on it.  Think about everything good about brisket (color, texture, flavor, fat content etc. etc.) it was that good.

* Spare Ribs:  Literally the best ribs I've ever had … and yes, that includes Kansas City.  It took just enough effort to pull the meat off the bones and the flavor was amazing.  I was sad to only get 3 huge meaty ribs in my order.

* Baked Beans: Yummy, with brisket cooked in (excellent with a bit of cornbread added).

* Mac N Cheese:  One of the agents in my class this week suggested the mac (and the collard greens).  I wasn't brave enough for the greens, but the mac was fantastic

* Bonus Side Corn Bread:  Thick enough that I wanted some butter – but it worked great with some of the sauce (and the baked beans).

* The Sauce:  They only have one sauce at Tom Jenkins.  It’s a good right-down-the-middle sauce not necessary for the food, but a great add.

*  Sweet Potato Pie:  A few of the folks in line were ordering whole pies to take home and convinced me to try a slice (ok I wasn't that difficult to convince).  Not being very familiar with this sort of pie, I was happily surprised and even more thrilled when I got to the fabulous crust.  It was a great way to put out the gentle fire from the sauce.

THE WRAP-UP

Based on my change to the rating scales above, you've probably already guessed that this visit made me rethink my Kansas City BBQ snobbery.  I have too much love for My KC Favorites (Oklahoma Joes and Jack’s Stack) to rate them lower that what I ate here (in South Florida of all places), but Tom Jenkins is right up there.  I’m happy to award a well-deserved 8.5 Stars and will be stopping back by Friday afternoon on my way to the airport for a second go at this unexpected treasure.

Not Quite National BBQ Tour - Part 8: The Original Scruby's BBQ

Since I have to ‘suffer’ through a week in south central FL, I thought I might try a few of the local BBQ places.  The NQNBT was started on a business trip to Birmingham, so I take it as a sacred responsibility to immerse myself in local Q culture.  If you've read any of the other posts, you know I’m not an expert – but it’s fun learning.  Not sure that I can manage 4 BBQ dinners in a row, but I had to make the first night count with a visit to Scrubys.


RATING DEFINITIONS # STAR / 10

0-1  =   Its BBQ … I’ll try just about any place once
2-3  =   Honorable Mention … well executed even if not to my liking
4-7  =   Good BBQ … flavorful, distinct, and presented well with good sides
8-9  =   Good Kansas City BBQ … see above + KC Magic
10   =    The Undiscovered Country

Scrubys, Pembroke Pines FL

Scruby’s [Skrew’bees] is the 2012 winner for best Ribs in Broward county and are in their 20th year of bringing the Q to south FL.  Apart from “Tom Jenkins BBQ”, this was the most recommended place for me to try.  And since it was just short drive down a palm tree lined boulevard from the hotel I headed out right after work – windows down, a long song block of Tom Petty tunes on the Radio, dashboard drumming all the way there.

THE PLACE

The joint features an open pit smoking process in a gigantic brick oven that is visible from the dining room.  Other than the prominent oven and some rustic benches, it is pretty unremarkable – strip mall sort of family dining setup crammed between a bunch of unfortunate neighbors with signs advertising various medical procedures [ - 2 points for location/character]


THE FOOD

I will say this for Scrubys, the prices are very reasonable.  I got a Beef Ribs and Brisket Combo with 3 sides and bread + a can of diet coke for under $15

* Brisket (sliced):  Right texture, right look, …. Lacking in flavor.  Without the sauces, all would have been lost.

* Beef Ribs:  The menu said that if I liked Prime Rib, these were the ribs I should order … and that would be true if my taste in Prime Rib had been developed over years at Golden Corral.  Again, pretty dull but satisfying with the sauce (see below).

* Baked Beans: Served with all meals … and surprisingly made of Pinto beans.  I expected some chili flavor, but just got beans and a little pork.

* Cole Slaw:  Also standard and very … Long John Silver-ish.  The cabbage was very finely chopped, so it was more a pile of white mush than anything else.

* French Fries:  Ore-Ida is Alright-a.  This was my only  self-selected side (the other options being baked potato and broccoli).  As usual, I used the fries to sample all the available sauces … which leads me to the good part of the review.

* Sauces:  Scrub’s  has 4 sauces at the table and all are available at the counter to take home.  The ‘Sweet’ and ‘Original’ were good but nearly indistinguishable; the ‘Hot’ wasn't …. but the Pepper-Vinegar was fun.  Now usually, any sauce that plays up its vinegar content makes me think of the thin un-sauces of places like Birmingham.  This was different.  It was thick like a Texas sauce but  nearly clear and gave a great flavor to all the low-taste food.  If the Open Pit was the downside, this was the upside.  Even the toddler-fodder fries were fun with this stuff.

THE WRAP-UP

After doing a bit more reading up on Scrubys, I found that a big part of their famous ribs is a secret rub that is inexplicably only used on Wednesdays.  This is making me rethink my nearly wholesale “meh” opinion of the food and might be enough to try them again.  There also seems to be a lot of attention given to the pork side of the menu, so maybe there is a whole world of flavors put there and I just ordered the wrong stuff.  Taking into account the lousy location and unexpected sauce … overall, Scruby-Do gets 4 Scruby-Snacks and a possible rematch on this or another of my trips to Florida.  If I wasn't flying, I think I’d try to get some of that Pepper Sauce to take home.

The Cave, Remember Your Failure At The Cave ....

The other night, Chan and I watched The Empire Strikes back on Blue Ray.  It was fun to see a movie that I can quote nearly word for word "differently" - specifically, this was the first time I got to see it in 1080p.  If you are not familiar, that's the magic number that translates into a picture so defined, you can see all the actor's blemishes rather than looking like animated action figures and the cardboard looking props for what they are ... not actual space metal.  I was noticing parts of Boba Fet's costume that I never saw before and sat in awe of how many actual stars were on screen at the end of the title crawl ... but it was The Cave on Dagobah that struck me the most.

This wasn't a special effects thing - I actually always thought the way Vader's mask "exploded" was cheesy.  What the Cave vision meant, and how I perceived it all those years ago is what got me thinking ... and blogging.

Conventional wisdom among Star Wars fans is that Luke's failure was that he chose to take his weapons into the cave after Yoda told him that he would not need them.  Essentially, that you are unable to fight fear - but must simply face it.  Since fear leads to the "Dark Side", a Jedi should avoid letting it lead him to Anger .. Hate ... Suffering etc.

When I saw 'Empire' at the Bowman Twin theater in Tulsa Oklahoma in 1980 I had a completely different understanding of the scene..  To me, it was the lesson that Luke was essentially fighting himself.  As a kid trying to grow up (and maybe fly a space ship with a light-saber hanging from my belt), this was my fight - a fight to be more than I was.[note:  I was later convinced that Luke was somehow his own father .. or his father's twin .. but hey, I was 7].

The other night though, in full 1080p, I remembered the old me - the one fighting myself to grow up. For the most part I've been successful; I'm relatively mature when it comes to most things in life ... and I have a much more thoughtful approach to fan theories about movie plot twists.  Still, I often find myself facing off against the dark me in the cave.  "This becoming is harder than it seems."

Back in May (on Star Wars Day) I wrote a FB post that referenced 1 John 4 as what should be the rest of Yoda's teaching on Fear (the enemy that is cast out by Love).  When I've missed the mark in life it's nearly always been because of Fear - or the sort of backwards self-love (selfishness) that I should have outgrown years ago.  I'm finding it takes the sort of trust necessary to leave your light-saber and blaster outside when heading into a scary place.

Not Quite National BBQ Tour - Part 7: Union Woodshop

So the guys of the Bema Seat BBQ Association were off (in style) on another adventure this weekend. After lots of word-of-mouth advertising and TV features galore, we decided it was time to make the trek out to Clarkston to try out the Union Woodshop.  We purposefully moved the meal to Saturday and planned for an obscure 2:30pm "L-INNER" meal to avoid all the crowds we were warned about.  We got right in and had a good time talking BBQ and all things manly .... but you're here to read about the Meat! - so let's get to it.

RATING DEFINITIONS # STAR / 10

0-1  =   Its BBQ … I’ll try just about any place once,  even Dickey’s

2-3  =   Honorable Mention … well executed even if not to my liking

4-7  =   Good BBQ … flavorful, distinct, and presented well with good sides

8-9  =   Good Kansas City BBQ … see above + KC Magic

10   =    The Undiscovered Country 

... please note that the ratings have been revised to acknowledge the possibility of good BBQ outside Kansas City.

Union Woodshop, ClarkstonMI

The Woodshop is famously one of the 2 "Unions" in Clarkston MI.  The Mac & Cheese that made the Clarkston Union famous has made its way here along with some of the trappings of a failed fancy restaurant that got a bit too big for its britches. According to the menu, the website - and many of the folks that recommend it - the Woodshop also features the best Pulled Pork in SE Michigan.

THE PLACE

Grown-ups eat here ... and ... and ladies with fancy hairdos.  No seriously, the atmosphere is designer-rustic with beautiful carved wood and chandeliers competing for your attention with metal trays and plywood floors.  No gift shop in sight - but this is destination BBQ, and the surroundings are a big part of why you'd journey out this way.

THE FOOD

More than one of the Bema Seat Gang was surprised at how relatively few options there were for ordering BBQ.  Basically you got a sliced meat or ribs, and then added any other meat as a sidecar.  This made it a bit pricey to try very many of the selections, so there was a bit of sharing at the table ... but as always, I'll limit my comments to what I actually tried.

* Brisket (sliced) - Nice and thick. Good flavor, though not very much of it.  To me the brisket is the single greatest measure of the BBQ joint.  I was sad to see it go - more so because I spent so little time with it.

* Pulled Pork - heavy on the smoke flavor - so much that it was almost all you tasted.  With this being a headline item, I expected more fireworks ... but maybe that has more to do with the sauces (see my note below).

* Spare Ribs - Mr Day was kind enough to literally 'throw me a bone' in exchange for some of the highly anticipate pork.  This was by far the best meat of the meal and may just be reason enough for me to start leaning away from brisket as the go-to order in future excursions.

* Baked Beans: Tried a sample before ordering (good call Bema Seat brothers) and glad we did ... no love here, nothing to see - move a long.

* Sweet Potato Mash:  Wow this was good ... Charred Jalapenos and Michigan Maple Syrup.  Again, only a tiny portion but for my money, this was the most exciting flavor of the day.

* Union Mac & Cheese:  Tasty, stringy, and appropriately cheesy (I tasted at least 4 cheeses).  Other than the onion rings I saw around the table, this was by far the most generous serving on the table.

* Sauces:  The Woodshop features 5 sauces at the table and 2 that are available on request.  Best of the bunch was a South Carolina Mustard - worst was an incomprehensible mayo-based sauce attributed to Alabama - and honorable mention to the "Hell Michigan" request only sauce.  Hell - it turned out - wasn't all that hot after all (even with ghost chilies and capsaicin extract) - but was the best of the tomato based sauces.

THE WRAP-UP

So, the Woodshop was a fun experience with really great sides but small portions and weird sauces.  That's quite a few pluses and minuses to take into account, but if I get my slide-rule out and include the untested variables (chicken / sausage etc) it rates a respectable 5 ... a solid non-Kansas City score that's only been topped locally by Billy Sims and Bad Brads.  Wish Brad's could get the Sweet Potato mash together  .... *sigh*

Note:  I did manage to bring home 1 small piece of brisket and a bit of pulled pork to try with the KC Masterpiece sauce I had in the fridge.  It was excellent and made the pork truly wonderful.  Maybe we should really start smuggling in our own sauce.

Not Quite National BBQ Tour - Part 4: Billy Sims BBQ

Having lived in Indiana for several years, I was beginning to think that Kansas City was the furthest north a Brisket-Head like me could find decent BBQ.  That has happily been proven false ... and so I've resurrected the N.Q.N.B. Tour.  If you are date checking, you'll notice that the Michigan posts are a bit out of order since I decided to number them in order of my first visit - rather than when I got around to posting about them.

RATING DEFINITIONS # STAR / 10

0-1  =   Its BBQ … I’ll try just about any place once,  even Dickey’s

2-3  =   Honorable Mention … well executed even if not to my liking

4-5  =   Good BBQ … flavorful, distinct, and presented well with good sides

6-7  =   Good Kansas City BBQ … see above + KC Magic

8-10  = The Undiscovered Country  

Billy Sims Barbecue, Southfield MI

While working in Southfield as a consultant early last year, several of the participants in my training class recommended Billy Sims as the place to go for BBQ.  Having been sorely disappointed by my search of Indiana (hereafter to be referred to as BBQ-Mordor), I was skeptical but willing to try it.  Not being a Lion's fan .. or admittedly that much of a football history buff, the name didn't mean anything to me  - but the fact that  he was a "Sooner" meant Oklahoma ... and that meant there was hope.  Now that I've researched a bit, I know that there are Billy Sims all over, even one in my home town of Springfield MO.  My first visit however was free of the dreaded franchise label and I'll only be commenting on this specific location.

THE PLACE

Not your linen napkin BBQ, in fact I was disappointed at first with what seemed to be a converted generic fast food building (I'm betting it was a captain D's).  They have tables and booths, TV overhead, a clean bathroom and a small area of Billy Sims shirts / merchandise.

... But you don't pick a good BBQ place because they sell T-shirts or have fancy fireplaces to sit next to, it's all about ...

THE FOOD

It had been so long since my first visit that Tonya, Chandler and I stopped on Sunday on our way back from Jackson.  We shared a 4-Meat (Double serving of brisket, Polish Sausage, and Pulled Pork) with a couple extras and spent a little over $25.  Sauces were simple but good (1 hot, 1 sweet) and great mixed together.

* Brisket - very good.  Just fatty enough to be flavorful and much to my amazement, T (normally a pulled-pork-only gal) said that it was good enough that she'd order it in the future.

* Pulled Pork - again very good.  Not quite shredded.  Truly worthy of a sandwich only visit.  As mentioned above, this is what Tonya considers BBQ and she was happy.

* Polish Sausage - nothing fancy but smoked incredibly well, dare I say perfect.  Chan and I ate most of it to begin with, but nobody seemed to have enough, so we ordered a bit more by weight (see my note below on the carry out options) and everybody had a few additional smiles.

* Baked Beans: good.  I definitely noticed some of the Brisket in there and by far the best side I've tried on any of my visits to Billy Sims.

* Potato Salad:  ennnhh.  I didn't ask if it was their own - but I would not be surprised if it came in a big tub.

* (BONUS SIDE) Texas Toast:  yummy.  You can add a piece for about 50 cents and make your own sandwich from the meat on your dinner plate.

THE WRAP-UP

The big win for me was the carryout portion of the menu.  All the meats and sides are available to order by weight and reasonably priced.  All the business we saw on Sunday was carry out and it seems to be what they expect when a customer walks up.  Bad Brad's is still the family go-to for a total BBQ experience near the house, but if I'm in Southfield for work (or near the 3 other locations in the area) I'll be bringing it home.

Billy Sims gets a 5 Star rating.  Not bad for Michigan.  T and Chan said that it was still worthy of introducing other folks to ... and I have to admit that had I tried it first in one of the many Oklahoma locations, it might have even earned a Kansas City Level 6.

Speaking of Kansas City ... I've not written reviews for any of my personal favorites (or un-favs) since most of my original readers are from there.  Still, I may have to go for a visit to make sure I'm remembering correctly.  It's about time to see our Overland Park peeps right T?