Creation of Narrative in Tabletop Role-Playing Games - Jennifer Grouling Cover [93]
A key difference between fan fiction writers and TRPG players, however, is the nature of the texts they create. Fan fiction writers use the original text, such as the Star Trek television series, to produce a new text—their work of fan fiction. On the website www.fanfiction.net, one can find gamers writing D&D fan fiction that is based on their own gaming sessions, much like my writeup in the appendix. As we saw in chapter 7, the lines blur between fan fiction and fiction that is simply influenced by another text within pop culture. I would not consider Mark’s use of Tolkien to ultimately be fan fiction (though his initial story might be) because he continued to develop the character in a world that was not the world of Tolkien. Likewise, some D&D fan fiction writers base their work on their own campaigns and characters. Awww.fanfic.net user, Mute Bard, explains, “I am in the process of turning game sessions into Prose narrative. D&D is perfect for telling a story, as even the author doesn’t know what is going to happen until it actually does” (www.fanfiction.net). Although this story still takes place in the setting created by the Dungeon Master (DM), this type of writing seems distinctive from fan fiction in general because the writer of the fiction is in direct contact with the DM and shapes the story and characters through game play, rather than beginning from a more static text. Whether or not D&D players choose to later write a fictional story based on their gaming encounters, they still contribute to the creation of stories during the gaming session.
However, some of the stories on www.fanfic.net are based on D&D novels and characters created by other authors rather than actual campaigns. For example, a user named Tizai explains, “I had decided to base my next few stories on the Eye of the Beholder trilogy for a couple of reasons: I thought that the stories must be told and I have found only one other story (based on Eye of the Beholder 2)” (www.fanfiction.net). This type of fan fiction works from a preexisting text and, thus, these writers seem to fit more clearly under the label of fan fiction. In addition, it is important to recognize the difference between published D&D novels and fan fiction. Jenkins (1992) explains that fans expect something different from the published texts and often complain if they find them too “fannish.” While R.A. Salvatore’s D&D novels add to a more complete textual universe, they are different than fan fiction in part because of the way they enter the economic system. Rather than being freely available and exchanged fan to fan, these books are sold by the gaming company for gamers to read and consume. As we have seen, these books are also not based directly on an already existing text; even if they make use of D&D rules, those rules do not already contain a narrative.
Furthermore, TRPGs as a genre are highly influenced by popular culture, and there are game settings and rule systems based entirely on television series. However, there is a difference between an actual role-playing game that has been based on a TV universe and fans simply acting out roles from a TV show. Both are examples of role-play, but the second case is not actually a TRPG. In the case of an informal role-playing group based on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Hammer (2007) explains that series creator Joss Whedon is the primary author and the fans are secondary authors (p. 72). However, her example is from fans participating in role-playing not a role-playing game. In an actual TRPG based on a television series, there is the author of the series but also the author of the game rules based on the series. In such games, it is rare that the players run the exact characters from the television series in a TRPG. TRPGs differ from fan fiction where the writer may add additional characters but usually centers the story around characters from the original work.