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Message: <blockquote data-quote="aramis erak" data-source="post: 9299766" data-attributes="member: 6779310">Thinking about the timeframe ...For RPGs to arise, they needed to arise from something. Minis Wargaming, both fantasy and historical, was present.Naval Wargaming was present, both boardgaming and table-top minis, both modern and ancient, and a few hints of Sci-Fi. Most notably, the 1975 appearance of SFB and SFBM...the 1970 Maj. Matt Mattson and the 1967 Star Trek games both have space themes, but are simple games.1973-1974 sees more trek stuff, and a couple clearly not-trek... but it's not until 1975 that we get good mins and/or tabletop board games set in space. But we also get Starfire, and a couple more pocket games in the Sci-Fi realm.So, for an SF game to have been sufficiently able to motivate players to go RP-mode with their boardgame... there's not much there. So it probably would need to have been a moderns wargame adapted to do Trek (as heritage eventually did in 1978)...So I can't see a strong enough fanbase to take us to anything recognizably TTRPG... but the rise of LARPing starts around the same time (The SCA starts in 1963; disaffected SCAers often created local LARP groups in the US... but not using the term "LARP"...Much as I'd love to have seen SF be the first inspiration, I can't; fantasy was more popular.Now, it's quite likely that many consims at various universities in the US as part of or involving members of the ROTC units got into mild in-character play... And that could be a rising point - Korean War...Wargames? Check!Tank and Patrol both are early 70's... I can see it happening, but being even more obscure than D&D wound up being.Battlestar Galactica, ST:The Motion[less] Picture, MegaForce, and Star Wars could have been a delayed start point, but I think their success is predicated upon a reaction to the prevalence of Fantasy... especially Star Wars.But that delays everything by 5-6 years, and cuts off a lot of potential audience. Fantasy, it's much easier if no one can tell you "that's not in the source!!!"</blockquote>

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