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ysabetwordsmithRoll for resistance: How a fantasy game defended the commons
In 2023, the world’s most popular role-playing game, Dungeons and Dragons (D&D), faced a rebellion. This wasn’t brought on by imaginary goblins or dragons, but by its players.
D&D is decent for imagining new and better worlds, but it's not all that well suited to such activities. Many other game systems are much more flexible and include more comprehensive rules about doing different things -- or a very limber set of minimal rules that can be used to do almost anything. For an example of a game with rules covering a great diversity of activities, see World Tree. For an example of simple rules that can do whatever you need, my favorite is the PDQ game engine.
Some games are also explicit about their activism. Take Us North is a video game with similar feel as tabletop roleplaying in some ways, about migrants and asylum seekers struggling to reach America along routes that often kill people. Underisles incorporates sign language.
In 2023, the world’s most popular role-playing game, Dungeons and Dragons (D&D), faced a rebellion. This wasn’t brought on by imaginary goblins or dragons, but by its players.
D&D is decent for imagining new and better worlds, but it's not all that well suited to such activities. Many other game systems are much more flexible and include more comprehensive rules about doing different things -- or a very limber set of minimal rules that can be used to do almost anything. For an example of a game with rules covering a great diversity of activities, see World Tree. For an example of simple rules that can do whatever you need, my favorite is the PDQ game engine.
Some games are also explicit about their activism. Take Us North is a video game with similar feel as tabletop roleplaying in some ways, about migrants and asylum seekers struggling to reach America along routes that often kill people. Underisles incorporates sign language.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-01-30 09:09 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2026-01-30 01:30 pm (UTC)Nearly every player besides me (with exception of people playing hobgoblins, because they don't rep any race but hobgoblins) make their characters white.
I hardly ever get to play, but I'm trying to stick to the flavor of the game when I do.
And it's not like he makes it hard to tell. He produces a ton of profile art for all the many, many NPCs.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-01-30 04:30 pm (UTC)Thoughts
Date: 2026-01-30 06:47 pm (UTC)I pretty much collect gaming manuals though. They're fun to read, whether or not I ever get around to playing the game.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-01-30 05:34 pm (UTC)I remember that. A lot of people were pretty pissed off.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-01-30 06:23 pm (UTC)Yes ...
Date: 2026-01-30 07:20 pm (UTC)Also, bait and switch is not legal. It would've been fine for the publisher to put a new license on new work but not to clawback things already released under a different contract so they could steal other creative people's work. Like say, if they wanted to discourage racism, hire a team of ethnic writers to create an ethnic setting with no white people; or to discourage violence, create a gentle fiction game that uses different problem-solving methods. I own examples of both.
(no subject)
Date: 2026-01-30 07:56 pm (UTC)Yes ...
Date: 2026-01-30 08:03 pm (UTC)I was an avid tabletop gamer
Date: 2026-01-30 08:42 pm (UTC)I've been out of tabletop gaming since chemo started. Just didn't have the energy, and couldn't get together with outsiders to boot.
But I am also very sorry that I missed the chance to be an activist instead of just a consumer.
The thing is, I started playing when the ink was barely dry on 2nd Edition's DM guide. HOUSE RULES were a thing from the outset, and it was one of the points of conversation when gamers met.
WotC's cash grab, frankly, would have either disallowed such things to "maintain accuracy" or other nonsense "reason," when the point was to make it easier for the company to make money off OTHER PEOPLE'S volunteer work. Their intellectual property.
That's entirely different than playing a video game; I'm not supposed to get into the files and fiddle with them. That's hacking, especially for an online game.
But THAT is another factor that makes me feel like I don't OWN the game I bought for the computer.
With AD&D, I could ditch their stupid card system and keep using the organization method that we liked. I created a world where orcs weren't big-dumb-aggressive opponents; they were the Ottomans at the height of Empire. The usual poor-isolated-outcast character types for the players meant that they had /reasons/ to step away from the usual racial lines, and the smart leaders among the Orcs plucked the best and brightest non-Orcs out of the dirt and helped them make better lives for themselves.
While the Orc was making money hand over fist, admittedly, LOL.
Picture the Elven player character playing chess with their Orc boss, and they're arguing politics and economics like they're about to draw daggers.
Why? Because WE thought that it was fun, and different than "copy Tolkein, badly" nonsense.
Re: I was an avid tabletop gamer
Date: 2026-01-30 10:31 pm (UTC)Contrast this with companies that make it easy to adapt and expand on their materials. Gamers like that; it makes a game more popular. It means you have more options for supporting materials to sell. Plus you have a bunch of folks making content, which means if you want to launch a new setting or other expansion, you have talent ready to tap for that -- who come with a built-in audience.