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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bastoche" data-source="post: 2645496" data-attributes="member: 306">According to that definition, someone playing "Vampire the masquerade" plays dungeons and dragons. Too vague. You could add "IMO" at the end of my "Too vague" comment if it pleases you.When the heck did I ever treated anyone as a retarded?!?!?! Nothing but a game? I think it's much more of a game. Craft art passion? I play guitar. Guitar is a craft art passion. Is playing guitar playing D&D? No! What differenciate the two? A line has to be drawn at some point. I draw one, some don't like where I drew it. I ask you (anyone) to draw it and nobody can. My definition wins by fault so far. Not that I care. "D&D" is not "anything". I can agree to some extend that is can encompass many "variations" of a game, but it's not RPG in general unlike what Aus_snow suggested. D&D is much too "narrow" to include all RPGs. And no RPG rules set/game can be general enough to include all RPGs in one category. It's impossible. The rules would not make sense.For example, in many places in the DMG, the DM is encouraged to use force on the players. When fudging rolls for example. In simulatisionist games, the DM is usually forbidden to use force. Some RPGs disallow the GM to cheat. This little detail has HUGE conscequences on the actual game play. One "D&D game without force is very different from one with it.The broadest definition of D&D I would allow myself to do is along those lines:"The players are to create fictious characters from an imagined universe in which some mystical/magical phenomenons exists. They can, for example, play an elven mage or a dwarven warrior. The DM is to provide "fair" challenges to the player-characters from which the PC will get rewards in the form of treasure or character development. The way the players play their PC in relation to how the DM acts the "rest of the universe" will unfold a story for everyone to enjoy!".I think the medieval-fantasy-like setting is mandatory to call it "D&D". Star Wars d20 or d20 modern is not dungeons & dragons. The legal definition includes beholders that are proprety of D&D. So playing the SRD version is not "D&D" with regards to the law. You could imagine a non-d20 system and play in Forgotten Realms. Assuming a "reward" system and an emphasis on "challenges" (and overcoming them) like in Iron Heroes for example, I wouldn't bother not calling it D&D. I could cross that line. But playing in Forgotten Realms with the "riddle of steel" rules is propably as far from D&D as possible.</blockquote>

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