Using a tabletop to write a novel

[GregoryOatmeal]

So I have a DM currently that I've played one session of D&D 5E with (but this could apply to any game really). The DM claims to be writing a novel and wants to use our game in the novel. He brought a large binder that I believe he has already written a lot of ideas in.

What are your thoughts on this? Would this encourage the DM to railroad subconsciously? Is this an effective way to write a novel? I have some thoughts on this but wanted to ask the community first.

 

[Uncle_Muppet]

Depending on how you go about it is an absolutely effective way to write a novel.

The group of friends I've been gaming with since college has been running a D&D game for the past few years that we have been using to write novels about. Granted, what we are doing is a novelization of the events that happen to our characters, not a direct blow-by-blow description of everything in the game session. So, I suppose you can say our game is inspiriing a novel, rather than writing it. It's gone well. We've published three books on Lulu.com and we're working on the fourth right now.

Where we differ from your DM seems to be that we agreed that we'd play the game first, then write the books afterwards - adding narrative and allowing us to incorporate all of the "wish I'd done/said that" moments. (Meaning the books aren't quite how things happened in game.) Given that he seems to have written the book first, there might be some railroading. I'd say that if you were allowed to make any character you want, then he's just going to use how you handle situations as inspiration for how his characters will handle something and the only railroad are the things you encounter. But if you were handed pre-made characters... then you might be "stuck" playing out his book for him. Meaning all outcomes are predetermined and he just needs help in figuring out the exact path to get there.

But, if you're having fun with the characters and who you're gaming with, does it really matter if you're on plot tracks or not?

 

[FreeXenon]

Sure, of course, it all depends on how you are doing it.
You should see Shemeska's story hour. =)

 

[Janx]

it's definitely dangerous as it could lead to rail-roady GMing as he tries to make the game line up with the plot he's envisioned and already written for.

I'm all for using storytelling techniques to control pacing and advising on "what happens next".

But the danger zone is having pre-determined outcomes (aka the novel he's writing) and trying to force that into the game.

Generically, if I heard the DM was really writing a novel using the game, that'd be a red flag.

It is a completely different matter if some time later, the GM was writing a novel based on the game he ran last year.

Personally, many years ago, a small time hollywood dude contacted me to make a movie based on my campaign world that was on my website (the world coincidentally shared his last name, and he wanted to break into movie making and LotR was big news back then).

Nothing came of it, but the early discussion and exercise had me looking at the timeline of the campaign and drafting a story outline of what a movie could be based on.

From that, I could see how we'd rework the PCs in the party to "show" better and how we'd tweak what really happened in the game into what makes for a better story.

Very educational exercise, and it touches on how storytelling is not the same as playing an RPG, though they are related.

 

[GregoryOatmeal]

But the danger zone is having pre-determined outcomes (aka the novel he's writing) and trying to force that into the game.

Generically, if I heard the DM was really writing a novel using the game, that'd be a red flag.

Personally, many years ago, a small time hollywood dude contacted me to make a movie based on my campaign world that was on my website (the world coincidentally shared his last name, and he wanted to break into movie making and LotR was big news back then).

Huh...I'm surprised Hollywood would be looking at a private D&D game for inspiration. I'd think they'd start with books and comics and recognizable IPs. Those types of left-field movies are generally sort of unprofitable.

He's deep...way deep...in that railroad danger zone territory. I tried to tell him ahead of the game that the mediums don't necessarily translate directly. I tried to rehab him by explaining the issue of railroading and recommending Keep on the Borderlands or Lost Mine of Phandelver, but he seems way to attached to his novel idea.

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

Steven Erickson's Malazan Book of the Fallen stems from a D&D then GURPS game he had going on with Ian Esslemont. He said as much that a lot of scenes from the books were games that they played. He had his world and mythology ready, they played the games and he took his inspiration from the games he played.

It's a fantastic work of fiction, spans 11 books (10,000 pages+) by Erickson and 6 (IIRC) by Esslemont.

AR

 

[WayneLigon]

So I have a DM currently that I've played one session of D&D 5E with (but this could apply to any game really). The DM claims to be writing a novel and wants to use our game in the novel. He brought a large binder that I believe he has already written a lot of ideas in.

What are your thoughts on this? Would this encourage the DM to railroad subconsciously? Is this an effective way to write a novel? I have some thoughts on this but wanted to ask the community first.

You may be able to gain some inspiration for a novel from gaming, but trying any sort of direct correlation is doomed to end in utter failure unless you are specifically writing for a gaming publisher.

There's a reason why every fantasy publisher that gives advice on what not to send specifically mentions 'anything that reads like a write-up of your D&D game'. Anything that even smells of 'A dwarf, a warrior, a wizard and a thief enter a dungeon' is going to be auto-rejected, unless it's specifically what the publisher wants to go for. That said, putting a unique twist on things is always going to be possible. That said, it's a very hard nut to crack.

The structure of a novel and of most games is totally different. Novels have a certain flow to them that most games do not, following certain rules of structure. Character behave in ways that the author needs them to behave and frankly most people don't play their characters like real people (or even people in novels), but like point-a-to-point-b goal acquisition machines. Certainly you can 'pan for gold' and pull some very cool stuff out of your gaming sessions, but it's very unlikely that you'll be able to use even 50% of someone's character.

I'm sure there are exceptions out there but they are few and far between. Even authors that have directly used elements of gaming in their work say that seldom is anything based on actual sessions.

Hopefully your GM is also looking at some books on how to write novels and develop characters. Those are a great help even when doing gaming material. Robin Laws has a couple things out there where he directly cast classic works as RPG sessions - look at Hamlet's Hit Points, for example. Steve Kenson's blog has some step-by-step gaming analysis of superhero cartoons.

 

[Cherno]

Wasn't the first Dragonlance novel series adapted from actual role-playing sessions by Tracy Hickman & Co? I think I've read that they played all the Heroes of the Lance as characters and adventured through Krynn, and from their adventrues the novels were created.