4 ms·

While I have my issues with Jacobin, the article isn't about "RPG culture", it's specifically about Dungeons & Dragons. You say their conclusion "that capitalis

While I have my issues with Jacobin, the article isn't about "RPG culture", it's specifically about Dungeons & Dragons. You say their conclusion "that capitalism has killed the artistic and creative part of D&D" is false, yet then go on to say > That's probably largely true of 5th Edition […] and the D&D Beyond software is clearly a first attempt at an Apple App Store style walled garden from which to extract rent forever and ever. …which is absolutely supporting their argument, isn't it? "Hasbro's steadily killing the artistic and creative part of D&D" and "there is an insane amount of creativity in RPG culture" aren't mutually exclusive! One doesn't disprove the other. They can both be true.

sfRattan 5y ago
The author is very clearly making histrionic statements about the state of the entire hobby, so my use of broader terms is entirely appropriate. I'm using the term "D&D" in the same way every RPG gamer I know has ever used it: as the genericized trademark that it is, often synonymous in everyday use with some broader sense of tabletop RPGs. In some places, the author focuses narrowly in on TSR and Hasbro and D&D as a specific property. In other places, the author makes broad, sweeping, silly statements about the hobby as a whole, and implies equally silly despairing nonsense about other hobbies (which is beyond the scope of this thread to even look into). > Without the market’s demands and the accompanying dictates that stifle creativity in favor of profitability, TTRPGs could have been part of the public domain, with gamers free to build and expand on whatever ideas they wanted, either their own or ones drawn from other sources. > Game Wizards is not just a captivating story about how one man lost control of his dream. It’s also an object lesson in the way capitalism invariably strips even our leisure activities of their communal joy. The author is playing a semantic game and moving the goalposts in order to commiserate where there is no imposed misery. Just consumers who sometimes make choices that lead them into boring walled gardens, while still having the choice to walk out of those walled gardens and find the rest of the forest.
pixodaros 5y ago
No one company has owned D&D this century. Most of it is in the public domain (Open Game Content), with some fiddly details restricted. For a while Hasbro's latest D&D was selling less than Paizo's, although I think Hasbro regained the lead. And even in the 1990s, you could share your own house rules, monsters, spells, etc. as much as you liked as long as you did not try to make money from them. RPG designers have very little control over what people do when they sit down at the table. If the author thinks that the latest version of D&D published by the biggest corporation is the 'real' one, that just shows that he has adopted the corporate ideas he claims to reject.

sfRattan 5y ago

The author is very clearly making histrionic statements about the state of the entire hobby, so my use of broader terms is entirely appropriate. I'm using the term "D&D" in the same way every RPG gamer I know has ever used it: as the genericized trademark that it is, often synonymous in everyday use with some broader sense of tabletop RPGs. In some places, the author focuses narrowly in on TSR and Hasbro and D&D as a specific property. In other places, the author makes broad, sweeping, silly statements about the hobby as a whole, and implies equally silly despairing nonsense about other hobbies (which is beyond the scope of this thread to even look into). > Without the market’s demands and the accompanying dictates that stifle creativity in favor of profitability, TTRPGs could have been part of the public domain, with gamers free to build and expand on whatever ideas they wanted, either their own or ones drawn from other sources. > Game Wizards is not just a captivating story about how one man lost control of his dream. It’s also an object lesson in the way capitalism invariably strips even our leisure activities of their communal joy. The author is playing a semantic game and moving the goalposts in order to commiserate where there is no imposed misery. Just consumers who sometimes make choices that lead them into boring walled gardens, while still having the choice to walk out of those walled gardens and find the rest of the forest.

pixodaros 5y ago

No one company has owned D&D this century. Most of it is in the public domain (Open Game Content), with some fiddly details restricted. For a while Hasbro's latest D&D was selling less than Paizo's, although I think Hasbro regained the lead. And even in the 1990s, you could share your own house rules, monsters, spells, etc. as much as you liked as long as you did not try to make money from them. RPG designers have very little control over what people do when they sit down at the table. If the author thinks that the latest version of D&D published by the biggest corporation is the 'real' one, that just shows that he has adopted the corporate ideas he claims to reject.