On D&D Vs TTRPG

On D&D vs TTRPG

I got my start in RPGs when an elementary school friend brought his older brother's 3rd edition dnd book to play pretend with when we had indoor recess. That holiday season I asked my mom & grandma to get me my own to imagine with, and began running games for friends in middle school. Since then, from 3e, 3.5, to Pathfinder, to 5e, I've enjoyed playing D&D with friends. I'm currently lucky enough to be playing in multiple D&D campaigns.

We also have played games like Mörk Borg, Death in Space, Dungeon World, Blades in the Dark, and smaller things like Lasers & Feelings, Honeyheist, Tunnel Goons, etc. And personally I've played/tested more experimental stuff with folks online, and have been floating around the indie rpg design scene for years as I tinker on my own ultralight indie rpg.. which several of my groups have offered to playtest with me.

What I mean to say is not only, for us, is there no split between d&d and other ttrpgs, but that I have never once in decades of playing encountered a d&d group that was unwilling to try other games.

People in online ttrpg spaces, including very young people, often make quite condescending posts saying all kinds of things about d&d 5e players, all of which completely disconnect with the reality i've experienced in my years of play. Some of which are self-contradictory, such as saying 5e doesn't provide mechanical scaffolding for social roleplay outside of dungeon crawls and combat (and that people who want roleplaying in their roleplaying game should play something else), while also praising quite rules-light, on-the-fly, trust-based systems, with even less structural meat for all of these, as elegant. (And personally, i think all of these game styles can be fun as hell with the right group.)

"Begging 5e players to try literally any other game" is a meme that, again, seems to me to be an entirely fictional problem (and, I would guess, based on my own past attitude, a sort of defensive dnd-is-too-mainstream posturing outsider-elitism. My head spun around the other day when I saw a 20 year-old call themself a grognard.)... But I want to grant the possibility that this is a specifically generational phenomenon for Gen Z dnd players. (The first generation to grow up with nerd culture as mainstream.) Though, honestly I find it hard to believe something so condescending about them.. I hear of "D&D" as consumer content/lifestyle brand and [bracketing out WotC entirely, all my homies hate WotC] I can't help but think... yeah I watch a lot of fun rpg&dnd content on youtube, and everyone I know loves Dimension 20. Yet somehow this doesn't stop us from enjoying indie, osr, nsr, and ultralight rpgs. And, yes, D&D is what most people play for a lot of reasons, including the social momentum and visibility factors, and the fact that its a pretty fun and flexible fantasy game that is good enough to get a group of people together to play (which, when it comes down to it, the fact that you're playing together with a fun group will always be more important than which game you decide to play.)

I've thought about writing some version of this many times over the past couple of years. I usually ignore it but these types of posts online seem to have risen to a new degree of condescension and absurdity recently (though it may simply be i've run into it more often despite my efforts to avoid it). Obviously, this is not a 'callout' post for any individual. It's a trend that you know what i'm talking about if you have been anywhere near the ttrpg scene for the past several years. Though i am absolutely sure much of this post will be actively disinterpreted, projected upon, argued with a-guy-they-made-up-to-get-mad-at instead of what I actually said, I know that I am not the only one who has been saying this for years. I also know that many D&D players who WANT to get into indie and osr rpgs are often actively turned away by the vitriol and condescension they encounter. So if you want the ttrpg space to be more ecologically diverse and creative, indeed, if you want to encourage people to try new types of games.. DON'T MAKE US ALL LOOK LIKE SNOBBISH ASSHOLES.

With Love,

Ultra