>>96486188

I think if you're a high-functioning nerd, you have a mask on at work etc that's pretty exhausting to maintain. You need to pencil in a certain amount of time with other nerds because the normies will crush you with their banality. A guy at my work ribs me about using a word he didn't know months ago like it's the funniest thing he'd ever experienced. So you have a certain amount of time when you can be yourself and chat about history or Asian horror movies or whatever and while you enjoy the game, you're aware it's a vector for socializing.

And then you have low-functioning nerds who are NEETs etc but have realized they have social needs(the more hardcore autists won't get past playing vidya on their own) and want to be around the high-functioning nerds. The autism brain goes all in on Warhammer or whatever and they play extremely competitively because it's probably the one thing they're good at. I think the most successful games are the ones that have allowed these two groups to work in harmony. Like how old 40K tournaments had painting/sportsmanship prizes or how RPGs have a mix of combat and roleplaying/acting.