D&D General D&D (and potentially other TTRPG's) is a sport

[Lanefan]

D&D is a sport! I submit the following evidence:

D&D is competitive

Though I'd appear to be in the minority here, I'll back this one.

D&D requires skill

Indeed, but this one's a double-edged sword.

If the point of D&D is to win then skill is a virtue. If the point of D&D is to entertain and-or amuse then skill can often be a liability.

D&D has rules and etiquette

For this to become an official sport there wold need to be a universal set of rules upheld by some overarching body (a la M:tG Tournament Rules) and this is I think where you'd run hard aground: D&D's long traditions of kitbashing, homebrewing, and good ol' rule 0 (or page 42 for the 4e types) would fight back and win handily. Never mind there's half a dozen or more different editions/versions of the damn game.

As for etiquette - well, good luck with that....

D&D requires physical exertion

If one counts using one's brain as physical exertion (and I believe there's a valid argument to be made there, though I've not the expertise to make it) then yes, you're onto something here.

That said, using a bigger beer mug would certainly add to the muscular exercise...

I therefore submit that based on the above considerations, D&D is a sport! And we are all athletes!

So it is high time that WotC gets the ball rolling, and apply to the International Olympic Committee to have D&D recognized as a sport!

(I'm assuming the players of the team that completes the IOC approved version of the Tomb of Horrors first would win the gold, but to each his own.)

That team might win the gold, but the platinum would go to the team that found the most creative, unexpected, and-or unusual ways for their PCs to die.

 

[DollarD]

On whether D&D requires physical exertion:

No, it cannot, and your stretch to make this point strains credulity.

WTF?

If one counts using one's brain as physical exertion (and I believe there's a valid argument to be made there, though I've not the expertise to make it) then yes, you're onto something here.

That said, using a bigger beer mug would certainly add to the muscular exercise...

The argument I've made is that mental exertion manifests physically. It's also generally accepted by the IOC, given that they accept both Chess and Bridge as sports. Peak mental acuity comes from being in peak physical condition, so top players must be in peak physical condition to compete at their best.

And hey, if Chess and Bridge can be sports, why not D&D?

At the The World Mind Sports Games, they play five different mind sports: bridge, chess, draughts (checkers), go (weiqi), and xiangqi (Chinese chess). Why not D&D?

Making D&D an official sport is going to drag it back into rules over rulings and I cant say im agreeable to that.

You... make a valid point. I withdraw my request that WotC apply to the IOC to make D&D officially a sport. It can be an unofficial sport, though!

Your argument doesn't show that everyone who plays a sport is an athlete. See golfers.

You are correct. I made an unsupported leap of logic there. Let's see...

Merriam-Webster defines an athlete as “a person who is trained or skilled in exercises, sports, or games requiring physical strength, agility, or stamina.”

If we accept the premise that D&D long D&D sessions require stamina (I mean, my one 14 hour session certainly did!), then I would submit that D&D players are athletes, whether D&D is a sport or simply a game.



Let's just say that while our group seems amenable to the idea that D&D is a sport, our wives had a massive eye-roll at the idea. Once we get a few of them playing, I'm sure they'll come around.

 

[Peter BOSCO'S]

I think you’re onto something, but I think you may have missed the mark a bit. It doesn’t help that the line between game and sport is pretty blurry. However, I would say D&D is, or at least is meant to be, a game, and games do have certain features in common.

Mark Rosewater, lead designer of Magic: the Gathering wrote an article (technically a two-part article) in 2011 called “10 things every game needs”

So, what are the 10 things every game needs?

4. A catch-up feature


A catch-up feature is also an interesting choice, as it seems even more than the other items on the list to be more indicative of what Mark Rosewater considers to make a good game, rather than an essential defining feature of game-ness.

Levels that take increasing numbers of XP's is a catch-up feature. The new player can go from L1 to L5 (6,500 XP's in 5e) while the rest of the party stays L5 (going from say 7,000 XP's to 13,500 XP's.

 

[Horwath]

Levels that take increasing numbers of XP's is a catch-up feature. The new player can go from L1 to L5 (6,500 XP's in 5e) while the rest of the party stays L5 (going from say 7,000 XP's to 13,500 XP's.

we have a great catch-up feature. We level when the story demands it. New player or character is at the start at party level.

 

[Charlaquin]

Levels that take increasing numbers of XP's is a catch-up feature. The new player can go from L1 to L5 (6,500 XP's in 5e) while the rest of the party stays L5 (going from say 7,000 XP's to 13,500 XP's.

That’s… not what he meant by catch-up feature. He expands on the idea in the article, he’s talking about something to help prevent a player from getting so far behind (either behind the other player or players in a competitive game, or behind in the sense of being unable to make progress towards your goals in a solo or cooperative game) that they become frustrated and it stops being fun. Think of like the blue shell in Mario Kart. Again, the D&D equivalent is the DM giving you a fancy magic item or just toning down the difficulty of encounters if you keep getting curb stomped.

 

[Charlaquin]

we have a great catch-up feature. We level when the story demands it. New player or character is at the start at party level.

Again, wrong kind of catch-up. The PCs in D&D aren’t typically in conflict with one another so they’re not what you need to catch up to. It’s more like, if the party is poorly optimized and get demolish by encounters that are supposed to be Medium for them, switching to mostly Easy encounters so they don’t get too discouraged and give up completely.

 

[Lanefan]

That’s… not what he meant by catch-up feature. He expands on the idea in the article, he’s talking about something to help prevent a player from getting so far behind (either behind the other player or players in a competitive game, or behind in the sense of being unable to make progress towards your goals in a solo or cooperative game) that they become frustrated and it stops being fun.

And inreasing the amount of xp required per level does just this (bolded).

If a new PC comes in at 1st level while the rest of the party is at 3rd, by the time the rest hit 4th the new one will be 3rd; and will get to 4th before the rest get to 5th. The disparity in actual xp might not change much but the disparity in level will gradually lessen to a number averaging well under 1.

The PCs in D&D aren’t typically in conflict with one another so they’re not what you need to catch up to.

Doesn't matter whether they're in conflict or not, there's still catch-up involved in terms of expected effectiveness etc.

 

[Numidius]

I agree it's a sport and doping is a thing

 

[Blue Orange]

Without getting too much into the geek-jock dichotomy of the 80s most of us remember but which is now obsolete, I'd say a sport has to involve actual physical skill--even golf would qualify there. Chess, notably, which is respected as much as any sport for its complexity and skill, is generally classed as a game, not a sport. Same for Asian games like Go.

D&D definitely was a competitive tournament game in its early years, though--if you look back through early Dragon magazines, you'll find standings for the top D&D players. (As others have said, that's why the early mods are so lethal.) I wonder, what happened to this? Was there a Last Champion of D&D? Would be an interesting thing to look into.

 

[Cadence]

I worked at a college that gave out E-Sports scholarships. Not sure if that counts, but at least there was money in it. Some people make money at D&D, congrats @Morrus again with A5E. Most people it is a game, like billiards or darts or some club activity.

TT-Sports?