Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Hussar" data-source="post: 9520786" data-attributes="member: 22779">TBH, I find the whole question of &quot;what is D&amp;D?&quot; in the context of trying to claim &quot;this is D&amp;D&quot; vs &quot;that is not D&amp;D&quot; to be largely nonsensical.&nbsp; It's the worst kind of genre wank.&nbsp; I do find the question of &quot;what makes an RPG and RPG&quot; to be a far more interesting one.&nbsp; At least it's one that I can see there being an actual answer to, even if that answer isn't totally satisfying.&nbsp; My own personal definition is that RPG's are game making engines, more than they are games in and of themselves.&nbsp; Which is why any discussion of &quot;Is this D&amp;D?&quot; falls flat for me.For me, we use the rules of an RPG to build a game that is idiosyncratic to that table at that time and virtually impossible to reproduce.&nbsp; Two groups running a D&amp;D module can have wildly differing experiences because each of those groups builds a different game for that table.&nbsp; Unlike a normal game, you can't just sit down, read the rules and play.&nbsp; And each instance of play will start (more or less) the same way and will play out (more or less) the same way.&nbsp; Play Risk a bunch of times and each time, it will grind out with lots of dice rolling until we get a victor.&nbsp; ((Or people give up because the game has taken WAYYYY too long <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin&nbsp; &nbsp; :D"&nbsp; data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> ))&nbsp; But, RPG's aren't like that.&nbsp; The starting points and ending points are undefined.&nbsp; The starting point is defined by the table and has so many different variables that it's nearly impossible to claim that my group, your group and their group are playing the same game.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Hussar, post: 9520786, member: 22779"] TBH, I find the whole question of "what is D&D?" in the context of trying to claim "this is D&D" vs "that is not D&D" to be largely nonsensical. It's the worst kind of genre wank. I do find the question of "what makes an RPG and RPG" to be a far more interesting one. At least it's one that I can see there being an actual answer to, even if that answer isn't totally satisfying. My own personal definition is that RPG's are game making engines, more than they are games in and of themselves. Which is why any discussion of "Is this D&D?" falls flat for me. For me, we use the rules of an RPG to build a game that is idiosyncratic to that table at that time and virtually impossible to reproduce. Two groups running a D&D module can have wildly differing experiences because each of those groups builds a different game for that table. Unlike a normal game, you can't just sit down, read the rules and play. And each instance of play will start (more or less) the same way and will play out (more or less) the same way. Play Risk a bunch of times and each time, it will grind out with lots of dice rolling until we get a victor. ((Or people give up because the game has taken WAYYYY too long :D )) But, RPG's aren't like that. The starting points and ending points are undefined. The starting point is defined by the table and has so many different variables that it's nearly impossible to claim that my group, your group and their group are playing the same game. [/QUOTE]

Verification