Reinventing Roleplaying Games

[mythusmage]

And those concerns are? So far it seems that people aren't "laying the smackdown".

I thought I had laid out my concern. That people are treating their particular part of the roleplaying hobby as a game, when it could be so much more.

How do get people to rethink their hobby is what I'm now working on.

 

[d4]

What do I think of when I hear the word, "game"? I think of an entertaining, competitive pastime, where the participants vie to see who wins. There are other ways of looking at games, but how many people know this?

i think i see a glimmer of your point, finally. it is true that with most people, when you say you are playing a role-playing game, they ask, "How do you win?"

but games don't have to be competitive; they can also be cooperative. i think the best RPG campaigns are ones where there is no competition between players, or between players and the GM. it's best when everyone cooperates, and the heroes win.

but that's still a game to me.

How to better express what I see as the difference between a hobby and a game. How about: A game is what you play. A hobby is what you make out of playing the game.

i don't see how that's any different from what all of us are already doing.

And to persuade folks in the industry to produce material more conducive to roleplaying as a hobby instead of as a game.

and that would be, what exactly? what kind of material? i don't understand your distinction between "hobby" and "game", so statements like this lack any sort of meaning for me at this point.

perhaps you shouldn't have started this thread until you were a bit more clear what you mean. because so far, you haven't really said anything.

 

[mythusmage]

well, he hasn't really said anything yet.

How about, "He hasn't said anything I'm ready to hear."?

And, Hong, you've stopped being funny.

 

[Crothian]

I thought I had laid out my concern. That people are treating their particular part of the roleplaying hobby as a game, when it could be so much more.

How do get people to rethink their hobby is what I'm now working on.

But you haven't explained, at least well enough for me, what that means. How will treating this as a hobby be different then treating this as a game?

 

[Crothian]

How about, "He hasn't said anything I'm ready to hear."?

I'm ready to hear it. I just don't see what the differences between game and hobby are in terms of role playing.

 

[hong]

And, Hong, you've stopped being funny.

Naturally. D00d, you have to realise that as far as manifestae* full of sound and fury signifying nothing go, this has nothing on the Turku school. Lift your game!


* The plural of manifesto, of course.

 

[Etan Moonstar]

Thanks for clarifying what game means to you, mythusmage. I'm afraid that I haven't personally experienced the problems that you seem to feel are widespread in rpgs--I haven't seen a "competitive" D&D game since I started DMing back in 3rd grade and made a point of killing players off before noon recess was over, my DMing philosophy has always been a "consistent flexibility," or extrapolating from the existing rules/guidelines how to make good player ideas possible, and I've been blessed over the years with consistently great roleplayers interested in much more than a high bodycount and phat lewt to go with it--but I do wish you luck in your own quest for the game that you would enjoy.

I do have a couple of thoughts about expanding the player base to a more general audience, however, that you may wish to consider: 1. while I personally greatly dislike competition, most "normal" people I've met over the years actually greatly enjoy competition, especially when they're the winners; and 2. there is a huge base of people who despise anything imaginary in nature and consider both fantasy and games to be childish and unworthy of anything except scorn and disdain--look at the way the "serious" literati disdain genre fiction (there were some very amusing reactions that took place when Tolkien was repeatedly voted the greatest author of the 20th century), the Academy's track record of shunning fantasy (that trend was finally broken only recently by LotR, although my mother-in-law still refuses to see anything with stuff as "silly" as magic and orcs in it), etc. I believe to expand the player base of rpgs/rphs to include more of the general population not currently participating in them, you may have to address these underlying sociological phenomena first.

 

[mythusmage]

i think i see a glimmer of your point, finally. it is true that with most people, when you say you are playing a role-playing game, they ask, "How do you win?"

but games don't have to be competitive; they can also be cooperative. i think the best RPG campaigns are ones where there is no competition between players, or between players and the GM. it's best when everyone cooperates, and the heroes win.

but that's still a game to me.

The trouble is, most folks don't know there are other types of game out there. To them a game is something you win or lose, and this includes many already a part of the hobby. What I want to do is to get people to see what we do as a hobby. That is, we make a hobby out of catching villains, beating monsters, and grabbing loot in a make-believe place. Our hobby is imaginary adventures in imaginary lands. And it's fun. What an RPG (roleplaying guide) does is give us the tools to carry this off successfully. The Mythus hobby (for example) is but one in the greater RPH.

i don't see how that's any different from what all of us are already doing.

All?

and that would be, what exactly? what kind of material? i don't understand your distinction between "hobby" and "game", so statements like this lack any sort of meaning for me at this point.

perhaps you shouldn't have started this thread until you were a bit more clear what you mean. because so far, you haven't really said anything.

How about roleplaying stuff? Here's the town, here's the people, this is what the people do in town. Here's what some people plan on doing in town. Can you spot the plothooks? How would you get the players involved?

Is that what you mean?

 

[d4]

1. while I personally greatly dislike competition, most "normal" people I've met over the years actually greatly enjoy competition, especially when they're the winners.

i think that's an excellent point, and something i'd have to agree with. most people do prefer competition to cooperation. so i think making RPGs less competitive than they already are is not going to help expand its audience.

your second point is equally relevant. most people don't like fiction, especially the really "outlandish" stuff like fantasy and science fiction.

perhaps if RPGs had started with a more modern or "realistic" genre as opposed to D&D it would be more popular?

 

[jgbrowning]

I'm not sure that "Hobbies" are inherantly any more attractive than "Games" to the vast majority of people. After all, hobby shops are where you buy model trains and balsa wood planes.

I don't think "Hobby" is any more devoid of packed connotation than the world "Game." And I don't think it's defacto better.

But last night we played a game without stats or dice. *shrug*

joe b.