Why Jargon is Bad, and Some Modern Resources for RPG Theory

[payn]

At the risk of inviting you to swat at a hornet's nest, I am curious as to why you think that is the case? Would you perhaps like to speculate on what could account for this difference between TTRPG and video game communities?

A couple theories I have. The first one is that video games enjoy a much much larger user base. With that comes a wide variety of games that go from causal all the way up to hardcore. There is plenty of room for causals and hardcore players to chat about their hobby. The second is that there is no D&D (800# gorilla) equivalent in the video game hobby. Due to D&D's crushing orbit it dominates all discussion fairly or not. TTRPGs attract intellectually and technical minded folks who enjoy comprehensive discussions and arguments. However, due to there can be only one king of TTRPGs, there is often a winner takes all stakes to how the games are described, theorized, and general attitudes towards those of its community. Its a rare combination of low community population, but highly demanding conceptualized theory.

Just my theory.

 

[kolya]

The important feature of the magic Player Psychographics, ( T(a/i)mmy, J(e/oh)nny, and Spike ) and Aesthetic types (Vorthos and Mel), are that they are tools to remind the designers to consider many types of players and make something for everyone. Not to try to make every piece appeal to every single player, but to make sure that some part of the product can appeal to any single player.
These are a tool not to divide people because of their differences, but to bring them together by acknowledging that those differences can be meshed together.

Also, it's all a spectrum.
I'm mostly a Timmy; I like big creatures and big effects, and I play largely for the social experience. But there's also a Spikey part of me that wants to come up with clever combos and revel in the joy of pulling the combo off.
So the named extremes of the "psychographic space" are just the most extreme archetypes, and almost every player will fall somewhere other than exactly on one of the archetypes.

 

[Umbran]

Jargon is a part of education and community-engagement. It can be off-putting if you have little interest in it at a certain level, but as you learn and engage these communities more and more, you learn the jargon, whether conscientiously or not.

So, you realize this puts jargon as gatekeeping? If you don't know it, you aren't part of the in-group...
Edit to add: Others have already made this observation, apologies for the duplication

 

[Bedrockgames]

Snarf's Seven Amazing Secrets to Productively Dealing With Jargon - You Won't Believe the Last One!!!!!

Like that?

So, I tend to have a particular view of jargon (technical terms, etc.), as:
1. I require jargon to accomplish my day-to-day life.
2. I am also constantly forced to translate jargon into layman terms in order to communicate concepts to people that are unfamiliar with the jargon.

So I understand both the benefits and perils of jargon. I would say that almost every approach related to jargon in TTRPG discussion is not productive, other than explaining it when asked.

I get that it's annoying, especially when there are constantly new people coming in that aren't familiar with the terms you are using. But people have a choice- either evangelize by explanation, or choose to alienate. if you are having a conversation with people familiar with, and conversant with, those terms, that's not an issue- I would even say that if a thread (or forum) is set up to discuss a specific theory, it would be rude for people unfamiliar with that jargon to keep coming in and arguing about the terms used- just like if you were joining a discussion with medical professionals, it would be weird to insist that the doctors stop using myocardial infarction because you prefer heart attack.

I find the use of jargon, even after I know what it is, even in a discipline I am familiar with, creates this additional step my brain needs to perform in order to understand what is being communicated. Eventually you do start to internalize some Jargon. There is a lot of history jargon I have internalized. There is a lot of musical jargon I have internalized. But I also have been forced by people to put such jargon into plain english, and I find there is a lot of benefit there because sometimes jargon becomes a way of thinking around ideas rather than thinking about them. For something like RPGs, I think minimal jargon is the best way to go. Obviously some might be needed, or just inescapable because its been here from the beginning and everyone is so accustomed to using it. I am not especially interested in new jargon personally.

In terms of the categorization of people I think you make a lot of good points. My father was a salesman and used a method that grouped people into different personality types. I grew up with this just part of our breakfast and dinner table discussion so it became natural for me to, the moment I met someone, identify their primary and secondary personality trait in the model he used. Such models can be broadly useful. If you are trying to get sales and you meet 100 people, if the model is even vaguely helpful in pushing up your sales numbers, it has utility. The problem is it is just a model, and it is being used for a particular purpose, and people don't often fall neatly into models. The model can become your way of looking at the world and you can miss a lot of who people really are if you are relying on a model to understand them.

 

[Bedrockgames]

The trouble with jargon, however, is that while it can help in-groups communicate more effectively, it is also incredibly off-putting to other people; in fact, it is can be considered both a feature and a bug. If you've ever spoken to a professional (a doctor, a lawyer, a banker) who can't be bothered to explain things and "dumb it down" for a "mere layman" or dealt with a close group of friends that talks entirely in "in-jokes" and doesn't explain them, you understand what this means. When you have invented terms, people will use them as a weapon to exclude others- "Oh, you don't understand what I mean by XXXXXX? Well, obviously you just don't get it."

Agree 100%. I would add it can actually be a way of trying to gain social advantage, even unconsciously. It can be away to intimidate someone being critical for instance (if you start dropping enough jargon, they can't really follow a long or refute, even if you are talking about very simple things that can be described in much simpler and more relatable language). It can also be a way to compete and make someone feel like they are your professional or social inferior. I think especially in game design, where there are many different paths to forming a design philosophy.

Where I think jargon is more benevolent is when its used to help lift people up rather than cut them down. If someone drops medical terminology just to keep me from participating in a discussion about medical ethics or something, I find that off putting. But if they help explain the jargon so that I am better able to participate (and they are good about explaining and don't have a 'keep up' mentality) I will be more appreciative.

 

[niklinna]

At the risk of inviting you to swat at a hornet's nest, I am curious as to why you think that is the case? Would you perhaps like to speculate on what could account for this difference between TTRPG and video game communities?

My speculation is that with video games, you can't disagree with the console or another player—or a spectator!—about how your action got resolved. I mean you can, you can get upset about crappy gameplay & bugs and such, but you know there's no discussion to be had to improve the situation.

Look at the Venn diagram overlap—MMOs. Those forums are full of players bitching at the devs to nerf this class, buff that class, etc. etc.

 

[Umbran]

There's an element to this that comes down to very basic principles of effective writing: Know your audience.

Who is your intended audience? Are you sure your intended audience knows the jargon? If not, why on Earth would you inject jargon without significant explanation first?

 

[soviet]

RPGs are also highly subjective. If we both play a video game we know that we are having an extremely similar experience. An RPG is filtered through our imaginations to such an extent that even the person sat next to us in the same session is likely having an appreciably different experience. Describing how we each play RPGs is like describing how we think or what different colours look like - that is to say, fraught with difficulty.

 

[Campbell]

There's an element to this that comes down to very basic principles of effective writing: Know your audience.

Who is your intended audience? Are you sure your intended audience knows the jargon? If not, why on Earth would you inject jargon without significant explanation first?

Significant explanation is often given. Extensively so. I know I have spilled a whole lot of virtual ink on this stuff in pretty much every thread I try to talk about this stuff. Others have spilled far more.

 

[Campbell]

Fundamentally there are a couple of core issues that I think feed into this :

• When it comes to other sorts of games players tend to value variety. Different sorts of play experiences. How many people do you know who have only played one sort of video game or one sort of board game?
• There's a sort of idea that acknowledging value of one game or structure of play diminishes or takes away from another.
• Like in MMOs there's this sense that other games or styles of play take away from the player pool for the game you are interested in. See comments on splitting the fanbase.
• One structure of play represents a direct and visceral rejection of another in the RPG space. Sorcerer took a look at Vampire and said definitely not that. It's always going to be contentious because the principles of play are inversions of each other.