Creation of Narrative in Tabletop Role-Playing Games - Jennifer Grouling Cover [3]
These texts can be said to be foundational; however, with games studies (not to be confused with game theory) emerging as its own discipline, more work clearly needs to be done on such a fundamental game as D&D. Some have called this new discipline ludology, but have limited it to the study of videogames rather than all games; not only has scholarship left TRPGs in the dust, but so have those seeking to define the boundaries of games studies as a discipline. Furthermore, the study of TRPGs serves an important role in the context of other scholarship as these games are highly complex, both in terms of narrative structure and their social interaction. Fine’s book focuses on sociology, and Mackay’s on performance studies. I engage with narrative, linguistic, cultural, and writing studies in this book, although, as a scholar I primarily identify with the disciplines of rhetoric and composition. The breadth of scholarly attention to the TRPG makes this project both exciting and challenging. In this book, I seek to explore multiple frameworks for the study of the TRPG rather than limit it to the purview of any one discipline. Thus, a central concern of this text is developing a way of talking about the TRPG that transcends disciplinary lines by seeing where disciplinary frameworks are useful, and where they are not.
In particular, I am concerned with the concept of genre and medium in relation to TRPGs and other games. Because so much scholarly attention has been given to videogames, I look at the differences between TRPGs and other games. Do theories about computer role-playing apply to the TRPG or should these texts be studied separately? How do we define genres for texts that function on multiple levels? What counts as a narrative when stories operate in different media? What might draw a person to a certain genre or medium over another? While my own study must be limited in scope, I suggest a possible framework for future study of TRPGs, and possibly other games, as rhetoric. Rhetorical study has so far not figured prominently in game studies; however, I believe it offers a way to meld semiotic and social issues currently being discussed in the field and thus opens the boundaries of this work in a meaningful way.
Situating the TRPG
In order to further understand the differences and connections between TRPGs and other games and also other types of texts, it is important to look in greater depth at the origins of the TRPG. It all started with the release of Dungeons and Dragons in 1974. The idea for D&D began when Dave Arneson, a fan of the Lord of the Rings fantasy novels, introduced Tolkien-like fantasy elements into his war games and shifted the focus from controlling entire armies to controlling a single character (Mackay, 2001, p. 15). Mackay’s account of D&D’s origins clearly aligns the text with two different traditions: a gaming tradition and a literary tradition. In terms of antecedent genres to the TRPG, then, we have both war-gaming and fantasy novels.
If we look at the gaming tradition, it is clear that D&D emerged from war games, which involve enacting battles between armies, usually with a large battle map and many miniature figures. According to Mackay (2001), the first war game evolved from War Chess in 1811. Herr von Reiswitz created a war-strategy game called Kriegspiel with the purpose of educating Prussian military officers. In this game, miniature battlefields showed the terrain and counters represented troops; dice rolls added a degree of random chance in determining the way in which the battle progressed (Mackay, 2001, p. 13). War games moved from military use into the popular sphere in the late–Victorian era, when H.G. Wells created a popular game called Little Wars. Little Wars replaced counters with miniature figures to represent soldiers (Mackay, 2001, p. 13). War games are still popular today, particularly Games Workshop’s Warhammer series.3 D&D did not replace war games any more than computer games have replaced TRPGs, yet we can see that the optional use of battle map,