D&D General Who coined the phrase "murder hobo"

[Eltab]

If my hypothesizing above was correct, the origin of 'murderhobo' pre-dates widespread accessibility of the Internet. An Internet search that fizzles out before 2000 shows the limitation of the Internet, not how widespread use of the term was. Back to old-fashioned book research !

 

[Azzy]

Well enjoy your discussion.

I'm not trying to prove anything. And yes, if it mattered (such as for a legal matter etc) then a reliable and verifiable resource would be needed. But that's not this case. And, even if in an important matter if you couldn't find a verifiable attribution yet you were told repeatedly from multiple sources that your off by multiple decades, then you should at least accept that what you have verified is probably inadequate.

You—as in you, personally—don't have to prove a thing. However, in the context of the history of TTRPGs and the terminology associated with it, determining the origins of this term is important, and in that, scholarly rigueur is required. Most of of here that think that this is a topic worthy of research agree that a wider net needs to be cast if we want to collaborate (or reject, if the evidence isn't there) hearsay.

If my hypothesizing above was correct, the origin of 'murderhobo' pre-dates widespread accessibility of the Internet. An Internet search that fizzles out before 2000 shows the limitation of the Internet, not how widespread use of the term was. Back to old-fashioned book research !

While I agree that non-internet sources need to be searched, I find that your premise that lack of pre-2009 (not, 2000, as you state) internet results doesn't discount widespread non-internet usage to not be compelling. TSR and other gaming companies already had an established footprint on the internet in the early/mid 90s. By 2000 (and the advent of 3e and Erich Noah's original website), TTRPG gamers had already created established communities beyond AOL and Usenet. If a term was widespread at that point, it beggars belief that there is no evidence of it in any TTRPG community prior to 2009. You're essentially saying that it was widespread, but no one used the term (or at least in uncontracted form) in online conversations before 2009 for reasons and that it wasn't until 2013 that, for reasons, that gamers decided that it was okay to now use.

 

[LordEntrails]

However, in the context of the history of TTRPGs and the terminology associated with it, determining the origins of this term is important, and in that, scholarly rigueur is required. Most of of here that think that this is a topic worthy of research agree that a wider net needs to be cast if we want to collaborate (or reject, if the evidence isn't there) hearsay.

I look forward the results of a thoroughly researched conclusion.

 

[der_kluge]

The problem with this phrase is that it's somewhat derogatory, and not likely to find it's way into a published source. Not finding any reference to it in Dragon magazine wasn't terribly surprising for me.

And I'm not suggesting that it doesn't go back decades, but I'd like to at least try to find the oldest reference if possible.

Although, for those of you hear who claim to have known about the phrase from decades ago, I'm curious to know where you're from? It seems highly likely to me that this could have originated at a con, or at a specific game table in some small midwestern town, and then was known locally for a long, long time, but didn't become more widespread until the Internet became more ubiquitous.

 

[der_kluge]

Searched through a few other D&D-related usenet groups. They were very small, and none had any references to "hobo" at all.

 

[not-so-newguy]

You nobos will never figure it out.

 

[Eltab]

Although, for those of you here who claim to have known about the phrase from decades ago, I'm curious to know where you're from? It seems highly likely to me that this could have originated at a con, or at a specific game table in some small midwestern town, and then was known locally for a long, long time, but didn't become more widespread until the Internet became more ubiquitous.

-grin- -raises hand- Midwest USA.

 

[Azzy]

I look forward the results of a thoroughly researched conclusion.

As do I. Fortunately, there are a few gaming histographers suchs as Jon Peterson, Shannon Appelcline, and others. It'd be interesting if one of them could be made interested in the subject.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

While I find it very likely that comparable terms have been in the common parlance since "the 80's" or whenever people remember, it seems highly dubious that the particular variant "murder hobo" which seems to use "murder" as an adjective would have become the dominant form without mass-communication helping and attesting to it. Variants such as "murderous hobo", "murdering hobo", or "murder-hobo" seem more natural, as would hoboless variants like death drifter.

The attributive use of the noun "murder" has traditionally been used for things relating to a murder that are not the murderer themself. A "murder writer" is someone who writes about murder, not a writer who murders people. A "murder squad" is the police homicide division, whereas an armed squad of people who murders is called a "death squad". "Murder weapon" comes closest, but still it lacks agency. We now have "Murder Hornets" but that is a direct translation from Japanese and a 2020 coinage at that.

I'm sure people have been joking for many years about the fact that their rpg characters are violent vagabonds, with lives in some ways closer mirroring those of both criminals and homeless people than the lives the average players lead. But the standardization of "murder hobo" as the go-to term, and the application of the term to a style of play can still be newer things. It seems more likely that people are interpolating a newer term onto older conversations they had with approximate terms than that the term was in wide usage for many years before a single stray attestation occurred on any archived and readily searchable part of the internet.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

it seems highly dubious that the particular variant "murder hobo" which seems to use "murder" as an adjective would have become the dominant form without mass-communication helping and attesting to it. Variants such as "murderous hobo", "murdering hobo", or "murder-hobo" seem more natural, as would hoboless variants like death drifter.

While "murder hobo" might be an unusual construction, the term, even if it was not used to describe a problem player but the archetype of it, is used in this 2005 post on something awful, where a contributor appears to do a playthrough of a video game . The author thought he didn't need to explain the meaning of the term to his audience at this time. Given the proximity between video and roleplaying gaming communities, it's possible the term was created before the 2007 first use postulated earlier in the thread.