Play Is Paramount: Discuss

[hawkeyefan]

I’m a coach for my son’s soccer team. The season just started. Before it did, we had to go out to the fields and place the goals in their proper spots and put the nets up on them and draw the lines for the field. All necessary for play to take place. But no one would call that “playing soccer”.

When I was a kid, my grandpa had an old chess set of stone pieces that I would play with when I was at his house. I’d take the pieces and create my own stories with them and act them out like any kid playing with action figures or dolls or other toys. I was playing… but I wasn’t playing chess. Denying that the purpose of the chess pieces and board was other than playing chess just because some kid might use it to some other purpose seems rather pointless.

Calling every interaction with the hobby of RPGs “play” is just silly. Stop it.

Claiming that anything other than play is the purpose of RPG materials is similarly silly. They’re games. Games are for play. It’s not complicated.

If you enjoy engaging in RPG materials with something other than play in mind, that’s perfectly fine… enjoy yourself. But that doesn’t change anything I said above.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I’m a coach for my son’s soccer team. The season just started. Before it did, we had to go out to the fields and place the goals in their proper spots and put the nets up on them and draw the lines for the field. All necessary for play to take place. But no one would call that “playing soccer”.

When I was a kid, my grandpa had an old chess set of stone pieces that I would play with when I was at his house. I’d take the pieces and create my own stories with them and act them out like any kid playing with action figures or dolls or other toys. I was playing… but I wasn’t playing chess. Denying that the purpose of the chess pieces and board was other than playing chess just because some kid might use it to some other purpose seems rather pointless.

Calling every interaction with the hobby of RPGs “play” is just silly. Stop it.

Claiming that anything other than play is the purpose of RPG materials is similarly silly. They’re games. Games are for play. It’s not complicated.

If you enjoy engaging in RPG materials with something other than play in mind, that’s perfectly fine… enjoy yourself. But that doesn’t change anything I said above.

Well, the important thing is that you're respectful of points of view other than your own.

 

[soviet]

Well, the important thing is that you're respectful of points of view other than your own.

It's not like you to say you don't like something

 

[Reynard]

Well, the important thing is that you're respectful of points of view other than your own.

It's not like you to say you don't like something

Debate is good. Let's avoid attacks tho.

 

[Fenris-77]

Debate is good. Let's avoid attacks tho.

Some things are both unfortunate and inevitable. History is a harsh mistress.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Well, the important thing is that you're respectful of points of view other than your own.

Sure, generally. Like I said, people should enjoy what they want. I respect their taste, even if I disagree.

But the idea that play isn’t the intended focus of an RPG? That’s not a stance I can really respect because I think it’s incorrect.

 

[Lanefan]

I really disagree. The "point" of RPGs is a lot more than folks grouped around the table actively role-playing and rolling dice. That is likely the most important thing to a lot of people (particularly players), but plenty of others have different priorities and different divisions of their various methods of engagement. I don't think you can assume the OP's thesis is correct just because you happen to agree with it personally.

Meh - I think that whatever else one does around the game, it all eventually funnels through the at-table play experience.

Prep, research, reading, mini-painting, worldbuilding, char-gen - that all funnels into at-table.
Logging, recordkeeping, telling war stories at the pub - that all funnels out of at-table.

Taking away the at-table piece leaves a mighty big hole in the process.

 

[Lanefan]

Engagement is paramount doesn't make much sense as a stand-alone position -- as you point out, it just means the important thing about doing the thing is doing the thing, and then lets you define "doing the thing" any way you want.

However, it can make sense as a response to the OP:

OP -- Play is paramount.
Counterpoint -- No, however you choose to engage is what's paramount.

Except the counterpoint here applies only to the individual 'you' being referenced while the OP could be (and I read it as) in reference to the hobby as an aggregate whole.

Fairly big difference in scale, there.

 

[Lanefan]

I don't agree with that. It conflates game design with game prep.

The DM is prepping the game for group play, which is part of his job as DM and so is part of his game play. The DM making rules changes to adapt a system to the setting isn't prep for group play. It's different from creating an NPC or dungeon. Design and prep are two different things.

I disagree with this.

The DM designing rules etc. is prepping for group play at a macro level, the DM creating an NPC or dungeon is prepping for group play at a more micro level.

Same thing, different scale.

 

[soviet]

Is cooking dinner eating?

Is walking to the bedroom being asleep?

Is logging in to Netflix watching a film?