Friends, Players, or Both?

[sellars]

The people I play with, initially were friends more than players. However, since we all went to college, and live in different parts of the country, we don't see eachother very opften anymore. mostly only during the gaming sessions. I don't think we would all stick together if it wasn't for the game. some of us would though.

I wouldn't have objections to playing with a group on a more buisiness-basis, in fact, I'm sort of looking for such a group, to torment

So if anyone here is from the Nijmegen area in the Netherlands drop me a line

 

[Buttercup]

Well, since one of my players is my husband, I would hope that we're friends! Two of the other players I knew before, since we work for the same organization, but we were acquaintances more than friends. That has changed, and we socialize outside of the game now. The fourth current player is really more of an acquaintance--I don't actually even know exactly what he does for a living--but we had been getting invited to the same parties for a year or so before he started playing in my game. And now he's dating one of my closest friends, so I guess I'll be getting to know him better over time.

Then there's Stone Angel from these forums, who will be coming to my next session! Right now we're only virtual acquaintances, but I'm sure we'll end up as friends. The funny thing is that we both ended up playing in Alsih2o's Tuesday night online game. Small world.

But back to the original question. When I have advised posters to find another group to play with, it's usually because the treatment they have been getting from the other people around the table clearly demonstrates that those "friends" are anything but. Friends treat each other with kindness and respect. They talk things through instead of ranting and raving. And they certainly don't act so selfishly as to ruin their friends' fun.

So the bottom line for me is, yeah, everyone I play with is a friend. 'Cause we all do those things for each other.

 

[Silver Moon]

Definately friends. We started that way, back when I was in college. I put the group together to give my high school friends who still lived locally a chance to get together on a regular basis. Over the years new players have joined, who were friends of at least one of the players, and they have become friends to the rest of us. We have one new player that I still don't know that well (I met him here through EN World) but the personality seems to be a good match and we all are enjoying his company.

One drawback to having a bunch of close friends are that occassionally somebody has something important that they want to talk about that then takes priority over the game itself, but since the group is a social group too I figure that is okay.

 

[Umbran]

How can you sit and interact closely with the same people for six or more hours at a time once a week and not become friends with them? Perhaps you can manage this in the workplace, where you have no control over who is there. But in gaming you have the choice to invite them or not. Like you're going to repeatedly invite over some goon who isn't a friend?

So, yeah, I follow the "Don't game with them if you wouldn't hang out with them" rule. I don't see how one usually has a choice. If they are cool and nice enough to game with, they're going to become friends anyway through that repeated exposure.

 

[Arnwyn]

Friends first, players second.

I will never ever play D&D, etc. with strangers.