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Whenever I'm running a D&D-like setting, I always have halflings as the most common (although not most powerful) race. They don't take up a lot of space. They have a near-supernatural skill with agrarian tasks. There are multiple halfling cultures, some are sedentary and some wander. They...

For sure. I doubt it was completely intentional, but it's amazing how "If it's in D&D, it's in Eberron" ended up as "If it's a recognizable fantasy trope, it fits in Eberron". It's just defined enough that most common tropes have an existing Eberron corollary, but still loose enough that's...

I guess we'll see.

I think we have very different social situations around our games. All of my games already have players; we're just rotating DM duties so everyone has a turn DMing. When one game is wrapping up, the other people who have ideas for games present their ideas, and whichever concept has the most...

Ehh. That still puts the one person not up on the concept in a pretty weird position. I don’t love putting them in a “go along to get along” position. Maybe it’s fine! It ultimately depends on the player. But it’s a red flag for me.

I think that example has some nuance to it. I generally don't like to run established IP settings (especially ones that have finicky race and class twists like Dragonlance) unless all the players are on-board with the setting. A player suggesting a half-orc sounds like a player who isn't...

Agreed. I think comparing a concept like Daggerheart's campaign frames to the "atlas and gazetteer" settings predominant in the '80s and '90s is illustrative of the difference. The Daggerheart campaign frames have a lot of setting detail baked into 10-12 pages, but don't use that space to...

The main reason I can think of is that there a lot of fantasy narratives based around a leader or mentor type (sometimes more than one) mixed with a one or a group of young "chosen ones"; a broader range of levels in the party would reflect that narrative. I also imagine that for games that...

Dwarves are kind of like old Uncle Fred; sure, you only talk to him for a few minutes during the holidays once a year, but you're used to him being around, and you'd be sad if the old guy died. Dwarves are also a mainstay in my own games, as they're the race with the strongest tendency towards...

Obviously not. If someone insults your mother, or your spouse, or your kids, or some deeply seated aspect of your appearance, then sure, you can be legitimately offended. Being offended by someone not liking your gaming tastes is like being offended that they don't like your favorite Star Wars...

“Power gaming” is another term that has also had such a reclamation. A lot of us learned to game in an era that had a pretty unified vision as to how games were “supposed” to be played, and had an awful lot of language around ways of playing games wrong. Reclaiming some of these pejoratives is...

For my D&D-like games, I generally let the players make their characters, and if they’re something slightly off-kilter, I ask them if they think their race would be relatively common or rare in the world. Some players want their character to be somewhat unique and stand out, others want their...

Speaking of unwanted (gravitational) forces. :)

Seems slightly ironic, all things considered.

I don't agree. As an example, whether or not a particular game has 3 players or 7 players is a very important, salient difference between two games, but I don't think we need to categorize games in general by exactly how many players they have. (Other than whether or not a game is designed to...

Doesn't seem like a worthwhile taxonomic classification to me, since it's a question you can levy against any game. It's a good question, just a poor classification. Why would you think the pushback and the resulting conversation isn't the point?

It's a large detail in making a normative declaration about whether that game is being conducted properly. It's not a major detail in trying to describe a game taxonomically. Sometimes friction in communication is a good thing. The provocation inherent in the repurposing is the point.

Because the only difference between those two games in their overall game trajectory and narrative arc is "whether or not the players know it's happening." Repurposing the term as a non-pejorative demonstrates our increased understanding that no playstyles are "bad" in and of themselves as long...

I don't think it's overly complicated. You're using the pretty standard usage of the term as purely pejorative, the general way it was used in the '80s and 90s to describe some fairly degenerate playstyles. I'm arguing that there are plenty of play styles where giving the players a large...

Oh no, I agree we disagree. That just seems factually accurate. My magnanimity is limited to allowing you to be wrong in your posts and not feel the need to keep correcting you. I acknowledge you are committed to your particular usage, and do not desire to change it.