Heroes of Battle and Defining Roleplaying

[heirodule]

The recent preview for Heroes of Battle contained the followoing quote that I found questionable and disappointing

By their very nature, wars are large affairs. Not even counting support personnel behind the lines who supply food and munitions, or medical personnel who care for the wounded after a conflict, a single battle can involve hundreds if not thousands or even tens of thousands of soldiers.

That's not roleplaying. That's wargaming.

And wars, by their nature, are political. They are fought over ideologies and resources; over religious beliefs and revenge; and, all too often, for economic expansion. But even if the masses are sold lock, stock, and smoking barrel on the reasons, wars are still political battles fought by common folk for reasons too often known only to the leaders of those countries.

That's not roleplaying either. It might make for a great game of Diplomacy or Risk, or a great Tom Clancy novel, but unless your players love political intrigue, it doesn't make for a great game of Dungeons & Dragons.

I can accept the first part claiming that massed battles aren't "roleplaying" somewhat, but the claim that the political aspects of warfare are areas that D&D shouldn't focus on, and aren't roleplaying, is rather disturbing. Atlas Games Dynasties and Demagogues has a great system presented for handling political conflicts and designing poltical campaigns, and other books have delved into it as well.

I can think of several ways to involve the political nature of a war in a campaign, and even have some combats, monsters and magic, and yet the game is still (even more, may be moreso) a roleplaying game.

I'm struck by the assumtion of WOTC that avoiding politics in favor of small unit tactical exercises realy limits the horizons of D&D. Its like the complaint that Dragon magazine isn't up to the standards of the past for diversity of articles, because D&D isn't used to handle a diversity of activities (politics, exploration, invention, realm building, mass combat, etc) any more. So the only thing a "genre" book can offer is how to fit small unit tactics into the genre.

Up next, Heroes of Romance, where you sit on the sidelines while the couple meets, and engage in small unit tactics to help get the two of them together after a spat.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

It does sound weird. At the end of the day, roleplaying is what you want. It is true that D&D has certain tendencies, but you coulc play it as a war, or as a political game. And it works quite well.

 

[Crothian]

They are sopeaking in generalities which are both right and wrong. One can set up roleplaying and wargaming at the samne time, they are not mutually exclusive.

 

[Ourph]

Hey, can you blame them. Synecdoche is a great marketing tool. Telling people "that's not roleplaying" or "you're not doing it right" then turning around and saying "Now OUR game....that's roleplaying. That's what roleplaying is all about. If you're not playing OUR game you're not REALLY roleplaying" is good, old-fashioned, dishonest, used-car-salesman-like, misleading advertisement. It works!

 

[Crothian]

Hey, can you blame them. Synecdoche is a great marketing tool. Telling people "that's not roleplaying" or "you're not doing it right" then turning around and saying "Now OUR game....that's roleplaying. That's what roleplaying is all about. If you're not playing OUR game you're not REALLY roleplaying" is good, old-fashioned, dishonest, used-car-salesman-like, misleading advertisement. It works!

Yes, it works as White Wolf did a lot of this 10 years ago and it also had a negative backlash from people as werll.

 

[Captain NeMo]

D&D is what you make of it: either a boardgame or a writing/acting excercise. Both can be fun, but ultimately hack 'n' slash is just a very, very, complex board game.

 

[Nightcloak]

D&D is what you make of it...

Amen.

It's your game. Run withit and have fun. I have ran a wartime campaign and a political campaign before and they were both a lot of fun.

Speaking of hack 'n' clash. I will note that the campaign in question started out as a political campaign and after several 'events' developed into a wartime campaign...

 

[Allandaros]

I find it terribly disheartening that WotC is tossing off political gaming. To me, political intrigue is what campaigns should actually aspire to, as the characters gain in power and status.

Oh well, I guess we'll have to cancel our war-based campaigns and political intrigue games. After all, WotC knows best.

 

[Ourph]

but ultimately hack 'n' slash is just a very, very, complex board game.

That's synecdoche as well. Hack 'n' slash is as much "roleplaying" as any other style of play. Hack 'n' slash is still about exploring a shared imagined space, it's just about exploring different aspects of a shared imagined space than deep immersion political intrigue or setting specific plots.

 

[Elf Witch]

I see so if you play say in Kingdoms of Kalamar an official product and take advantage of all the political intrigue and the chance for great battles that are just ripe for the picking in the campaign book then you are not role playing. :\

I really do get tired of people trying to label exactly what the correct way to role play is.