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By Root 418 0

Some modules may be played in just one evening, but in order for a TRPG campaign to continue for several years, player interest must be maintained. To do this, TRPG campaigns must immerse their participants in more extensive worlds, such as Sorpraedor. They must have interesting and exciting stories, and they must have engaging characters. Furthermore, the gameplay itself must maintain suspense and interest. Fine (1983) states that players “must lose themselves to the game. The engrossment is not total or continuous, but it is what provides for ‘the fun’ within the game” (p. 4). This ability to sustain interest is often much less of a concern in games that are only intended to last for one session; however, even these adventures hold a great potential for immersion. To be immersed is to be interested.

In her book on virtual reality, Ryan (2003) outlines three modes of immersion—spatial, temporal, and emotional. Ryan (2003) contends that spatial immersion is a “response to setting,” temporal immersion relates to plot, and emotional immersion relates to characters (p. 121). Yet these definitions only pertain to immersion within a narrative. I take a more literal approach to these three type of immersion to explore the ways that players are immersed in terms of space, time, and emotions in the TRPG. The degree to which players are immersed in the story is directly related to the social environment in which the game takes place.

Spatial, Temporal, and Emotional Immersion in the TRPG Storyworld

Ryan (2003) states that for a text to be immersive it must create a space to which the reader can relate. This spatial setting is a place for “potential narrative action” but is not narrative because it “may lack the temporal extension [required] to develop this action into a plot” (Ryan, 2003, p. 15). As discussed in chapter 4, a storyworld does not presuppose a narrative structure. Spatial immersion is found in narratives, but also in games—even those without narrative elements.

TRPGs do involve an exploration of a world, yet the way in which this space is created and the extent to which it can be immersive, differs in face-to-face TRPGs from computer games. For example, Murray (1998) notes that “the slamming of a dungeon door behind you” is more concrete in an online visual environment than in a face-to-face D&D game (p. 82). The lack of a visual element may make spatial immersion more difficult to achieve in D&D than in more visually oriented games; however, this type of immersion is still important to the game. Without the visual component to TRPGs, players may have difficulty picturing the exact setting that the DM lays out. Wizards of the Coast’s market survey shows that in 2000, 56 percent of gaming groups used miniatures to solve this dilemma (Dancey 2000). This number has no doubt increased since Wizards of the Coast came out with their new line of D&D collectable miniatures (minis).1 Each player selects a small figure to represent his or her character.2 The DM will select additional figures to represent monsters or non-player characters (NPCs). When the game calls for exploration of space, players often use graph paper to map out the journey for future reference. Similarly, the minis are often used to show the relative position of characters to one another on their journey. These minis can also be placed on a battle map, a plastic surface with graph paper-like hexes, each representing five feet. Because D&D combat rules often offer suggestions as to what you can or cannot do at certain distances, these battle maps help players visualize the scene and decide on their actions. The Sorpraedor campaign often uses battle maps and minis during battle sequences; however, some gaming sessions that focused more on information gathering or puzzle-solving would progress completely without them. Players may change minis frequently depending on what is readily available at the time of play. An unused die or token has been known to stand in for a monster or NPC when needed. Battle maps are marked on with erasable markers to roughly mark