Women and Gaming

[fectin]

P.S. "I stab it" is boring as hell for me as well. It's one of those dirty little secrets of the days when combat was as boring as hell (1E AD&D) that most of the time was spent on everything else but combat. Now that particular arrangement of searching, mapping, avoiding hidden dangers, etc might not appeal to the modern gamer of whatever gender, but the point was that there was a variety of activities that was associated with gaming ... it was not just a combat game.

That's one of the things I like about optimizing: less time spent in combat.

[PoliteNewb]

I do think that male-feminist are using that to get laid. Shrug. Maybe not all but enough.

If you're talking about male feminism in general, you're simply wrong...for starters, men are more likely to be feminists if they are already involved in a relationship with a woman.

If you're talking about men trying to get more women into gaming specifically...honestly, I could see that in some cases. I have mixed feelings on that motivation, though:
1.) on the one hand, if the end result is more women playing, I see that as a generally good thing.
2.) I don't feel it is likely to yield results...because women don't feel encouraged to enter a hobby when their entrance defaults to "you're here so guys can hit on you". Short form, no one wants to be "tits at the table".

I think simply wanting to involve female friends and increase overall diversity in the gaming community are better goals than trying to bag chicks.

I wasn't sure about this until I once tried to say, well what about other minority groups. . . and was promptly told. "We don't care if any more blacks, hispanics or asians, play, that thier thing if they don't. We DO care if women don't play, cause thats unnaceeptable" I was also told something to the effect of "Don't try to make this about race! This is about WOMEN!"

What was the context of the discussion? If it was specifically about women in gaming, I can understand the responses you got, because attempting to take a conversation with a specific aim and make it about another subject (or a generality) is known as derailing...and it's a pretty common tactic people use to short-circuit feminist discussions. I'm not saying you were doing that, but that's probably how it was seen.

If you want to talk about race in gaming, or sexual orientation in gaming, I'm sure you could start a discussion on those issues.

I'm more concerned about women in gaming than racial/sexual minorities in gaming because, honestly, I know a lot of women and I don't know a lot of racial/sexual minorities. If 50% of the people I interact with were black/hispanic, you bet I would be interested in making my gaming circle more racially diverse. And I think increasing diversity in the hobby as a whole is a good goal.

There are certainly things gaming can do to make the game more appealing to non-whites, just as there are things that can make it more appealing to non-males...a good start is working against the "white as default" standard (which exists in a lot of pop culture, not just gaming). Take a look at the iconics in 3.5, and tell me how many are non-white.
Similarly, there are things I feel can be done to make the game more appealing to non-heterosexuals.

I don't feel any of these changes (to make the game more friendly to women, diverse races, or gays) necessarily have to involve making the game LESS friendly to your default white-hetero-male nerd.

Normally as a venue to bitch about male behavior and the countless injustices they've suffered real and/or imagined at the gaming table. I remember that horrible board over on Wotc was full of that: Gamers need, maturity, social skills, hygiene.

I don't wish to misinterpret your post, but...why are those "bitching"? Aren't those legitimate concerns, that should concern anyone interested in making the hobby more female-friendly?

If a there was a thread on "race and gaming", and it had several black people talking about how they had to deal with racism at the gaming table (which is entirely possible), I would take that seriously. Should I take complaints of 'countless injustices' less seriously?

It does seem rather tasteless to hear people talking about "landscape", since I never had that kind of attitude towards my female friends at the D&D table.

Same here...not least because I'm already in a stable relationship, and not looking for a hookup.

As for this new point of view...does it really matter what color skin you have when you play D&D?

It matters about as much as what sort of genitalia you have, or who you like to have sex with...which is to say, it matters as much as the people involved let it.

That said, there are things both in games and the gaming community that make the game feel less accessible/friendly to people with certain backgrounds/experiences. I think that can be improved on, and that doing so is a worthwhile goal.

And from the actual female gamer anecdotes of "what girl gamers want" the things they want, more interactive deeper stories with less math... are exactly the same things lots of male players want...

We don't need to bend over backwards and make patronizing self censored changes to our games to attract women into the hobby.

We just have to not be jerks.

+1.

I agree with PL that the biggest barrier to women (or any other minority) getting into gaming is not mechanics or play style, it is the attitudes of other (usually straight white male) gamers at the table, and how they react to the idea (or reality) of minorities being there. It is not hard at all to make a minority feel unwanted/uncomfortable in any social environment...even without trying. So if we want more women (or blacks, or gays, or whatever) at the table, we need to actually TRY to make them feel welcome. And that's really not that hard...as PL said, just don't be a jerk.

*don't make sexist/racist/homophobic jokes
*don't treat them like some kind of weird exotic creature
*don't talk over them/ignore their input
*etc etc

Demographic questions like this are just bullshit. Largely paternalistic bullshit. Otherwise you don't ask shit like "how can we get more girls to play"

I don't believe so. I think demographic questions can point toward realities in "gamer culture" that could stand to be changed...and the first step toward change is realizing something exists.

For starters, you could listen to WOMEN who are talking about this being a problem...not just women who people want to get to the table, but women who are already there, but still feel unwelcome; who enjoy gaming, but don't enjoy the atmosphere that gaming is conducted in. That's not paternalistic...it's seriously treating women as human beings.

I'm not going to bother to quote Shadzar, I'm just to say: fuck you and your "it's your problem if you don't want to game with people who treat you like crap".

[Orion]

"Trying to get laid" I think points to something accurate, but is so simplified as to be outright wrong. Is there a sexual motivation? Sure, in a sense. I'm a straight man with more female friends than male friends. That's because I find women more fun to hang around with, on average than men, and part of that is because I'm attracted to them. Seriously, being around people you find attractive is just *fun*, regardless of whether it goes anywhere.

I'm not trying to brag about how enlightened or virtuous I am, either, because it is neither. Inviting someone somewhere because you like looking at them or flirting with them or whatever is not different than doing so because you want to bang them--it can be respectful or objectifying based on how you handle yourself. So yeah, I want more women in gaming because I find life more pleasant when more women are around. In that sense it's 100% selfish. But it's not because I specifically want to sleep with any of them.

[Psychic Robot]

So yeah, I want more women in gaming because I find life more pleasant when more women are around. In that sense it's 100% selfish. But it's not because I specifically want to sleep with any of them.

CHAUVINIST

[Sarandosil]

I don't know you guys, but I totally care about the amount of gay gamers there are for entirely selfish reasons. Seriously, where are the geek lesbians? It's like a wasteland out here.

[icyshadowlord]

I don't know you guys, but I totally care about the amount of gay gamers there are for entirely selfish reasons. Seriously, where are the geek lesbians? It's like a wasteland out here.

You know...one of my DMs would have been a geek lesbian. The only problem was that she got too busy with work and studies that she could not actually arrange a game for a group. On the bright side, I'm still pals with her and such.

And I still got one group to play with, but that is a different story. And that group has no females so nobody cares either way.

[Koumei]

Seriously, where are the geek lesbians?

Right here, for one. And I can count two others nearby.

[TheWorid]

Seriously, where are the geek lesbians? It's like a wasteland out here.

I have to raise my hand again here; and I know a couple others.

[fectin]

I don't know you guys, but I totally care about the amount of gay gamers there are for entirely selfish reasons. Seriously, where are the geek lesbians? It's like a wasteland out here.

"There is a time and a place for everything, and that time is college."
That's where they are though: at engineering colleges.

[Maj]

On the details I might disagree (but then again, I've never liked padded armor) it's got to look good and look like it works at the same time. Joan of Arc wore chain (and no jokes about dressing like a guy ...) and wore it well.

I picked padded leather because it had a profound impact on how I played D&D. The description of padded armor is what made me eschew armor for all my characters ever. Yes, it may have been a bad choice mechanically, but I couldn't get past the imagery.

Padded: Padded armor features quilted layers of cloth and batting. It gets hot quickly and can become foul with sweat, grime, lice, and fleas.

That description brought the fantasy of wearing armor into direct conflict with the grossness of it. It also doesn't help that other armors also require heavy padding to wear, which seem like they would also suffer from the foulness that is padded armor. Mentions of chaffing and the discomfort of wearing stuff that heavy in other types of armor just sealed my impressions.

It has always pissed me off that a world with Fireball has so much grunge. It's disgusting.

---

I came across this quote today and I think is very a propos...

The human brain is remarkably flexible, an organ with the capacity to absorb new information in myriad different forms. But information gets into most brains more easily in some forms than others. In most cases, students process equations and graphs only with difficulty. But because our species evolved as storytellers, virtually everyone finds it easy to absorb the corresponding information in narrative form.

I'm pretty sure I've said it elsewhere before: A large portion of D&D's unapproachability is in the fact that you're welcomed by charts and math and not the story and roleplaying. So long as the game caters to those kinds of gamers, that will be the limit of the game's audience.

[Josh_Kablack]

I don't know you guys, but I totally care about the amount of gay gamers there are for entirely selfish reasons. Seriously, where are the geek lesbians? It's like a wasteland out here.

Well, of the 12 total people who have played in my current Champs game over the past few years, only 5 identify as straight. But only one was born a female.

[Midnight_v]

I'm not trying to brag about how enlightened or virtuous I am, either, because it is neither. Inviting someone somewhere because you like looking at them or flirting with them or whatever is not different than doing so because you want to bang them--

I'm not sure we have an argument if you feel that way.
Polite newb gave a whole line by line, of a bunch of shit that basically I don't care about because I've given my opnion on that shit. I think the majority have dubius morals. Like Orion here talking about how life is better with women aroun but not wanting to sleep with them "specifically". Meh whatever. I'd say the whole thing is bullshit even the part about them bitching. If you're trying to make the game "women friendly" the implication is that you can make a vast generalization about women and get them to go in the direction you want, but they're people. You'd be better of trying to make the game more mainstream in general. Also you're a dick.

removed extra close quote so the formatting doesn't pooch. --Z

[shadzar]

I came across this quote today and I think is very apropos...

The human brain is remarkably flexible, an organ with the capacity to absorb new information in myriad different forms. But information gets into most brains more easily in some forms than others. In most cases, students process equations and graphs only with difficulty. But because our species evolved as storytellers, virtually everyone finds it easy to absorb the corresponding information in narrative form.

I'm pretty sure I've said it elsewhere before: A large portion of D&D's unapproachability is in the fact that you're welcomed by charts and math and not the story and roleplaying. So long as the game caters to those kinds of gamers, that will be the limit of the game's audience.

The charts and graphs are the easiest way, and cost effective way to express many things, from Attack Matrices, to XP level values.

4th edition attempt to give access with skill challenges, and all it did was add more formulas for those that didnt even want to roleplaying because they couldn't do it, or were hung up on bemoaning DM fiat.

There is nothing in the game to tell you how to make your story. That is up to the players and will just take understanding of that. The rules say the game is a tool for making a story. Now up tot he players to make the kind they want. The roleplaying is everything done outside of the combat system, again pretty well defined and explained, and just up for the players to do it.

All that is left to have rules for is the combat, and each edition pretty much gives that, as well some sort of fair attempt at a mechanic for social interactions. The rest is up to the players.

I have heard something similar before, but those people were asking for more story form the game, and was expecting it to provide the story. It doesnt do that unless you get a premade story.

Others i speak with expected it to mean it when it said you can be Conan, but D&D isnt the Conan world, nor does it run only the Conan stories.

Vampire heavily controlled the story in which you played, and other than some people just not wanting to be vampires etc, the whole being a vampire without letting people know, didnt sound like a very fun game to people. First, it is a win condition, second it is telling you what story you must play out. You aren't playing a vampire that is just living, but a vampire that is living in a world where exposure ends the game and a random NPC can end the game through a mistake. When interacting with the rest of the world or simply dying in public can end the game, then there isnt much game to be had as the player has VERY little control over their own character without risking the game for everyone else.

What could a game offer for the story and roleplaying without trying to define and control those parts?

[Almaz]

Shadzar, stop screwing up the board formatting when we're trying to talk about lesbians! Or Midnight_v. One of you two.

Jeez. This is clearly why there aren't more women in gaming. Boys can't be bothered to fix their format tags.

[CatharzGodfoot]

On the details I might disagree (but then again, I've never liked padded armor) it's got to look good and look like it works at the same time. Joan of Arc wore chain (and no jokes about dressing like a guy ...) and wore it well.

I picked padded leather because it had a profound impact on how I played D&D. The description of padded armor is what made me eschew armor for all my characters ever. Yes, it may have been a bad choice mechanically, but I couldn't get past the imagery.

Padded: Padded armor features quilted layers of cloth and batting. It gets hot quickly and can become foul with sweat, grime, lice, and fleas.

That description brought the fantasy of wearing armor into direct conflict with the grossness of it. It also doesn't help that other armors also require heavy padding to wear, which seem like they would also suffer from the foulness that is padded armor. Mentions of chaffing and the discomfort of wearing stuff that heavy in other types of armor just sealed my impressions.

That's why I had my characters use leather armors. It's amazing what a visceral reaction 'high adventure -- with lice!' can cause.

[JigokuBosatsu]

leather armors.

You've never worn leather pants while doing strenuous activity, have you?

[Josh_Kablack]

Leather Jacket: a garment that doesn't insulate from cold, doesn't breathe in heat, and stinks like rotten cow if it ever gets rained on. Clearly the best choice in adventure wear for the person who never actually has to go outdoors.

[Maj]

Shadzar, the point of the quote isn't to say that the books should provide more advice on how to make stories. The point of the quote is that the books should present information on how to play the game in a more story-like format.

It took me two weeks of steadily reading the PHB to go from a person who had no clue what a hit point was to a person who could sort of fill out a character sheet properly. I had no help at all (I wouldn't have known where to go for help, either), and most of the concepts described were completely foreign to me.

The first thing that you see when you open the [3.0] PHB is a picture of the character sheet with little numbers and descriptions. And the descriptions are something like this:

1. ABILITY SCORES Roll your character's six ability scores. Determine each one by rolling four six-sided dice, ignoring the lowest die, and totaling the other three. Record your six results on scratch paper. If you roll really poorly, you can roll again. Your scores are considered too low if your total modifiers (before changes according to race) are 0 or less, or if your highest score is 13 or lower.

The chapter on abilities starts the same way... How to roll dice. What ability modifiers are. How the abilities are pertinent to spellcasters. Ohh! Chart (on Bonus Spells and Ability Modifiers - WTF?)!

Then the descriptions of the abilities start. And here's a sample:

STRENGTH (Str)
Strength measures your character’s muscle and physical power. This ability is especially important for fighters, barbarians, paladins, rangers, and monks because it helps them prevail in combat.
You apply your character’s Strength modifier to:
[*]Melee attack rolls.
[*]Damage rolls when using a melee weapon or a thrown weapon. (Exceptions: Off-hand attacks receive only half the Strength modifier, while two-handed attacks receive one and a half times the Strength modifier. A Strength penalty, but not a bonus, applies to attacks made with a bow or a sling.)
[*]Climb, Jump, and Swim checks. These are the skills that have Strength as their key ability.
[*]Strength checks (for breaking down doors and the like).

Oh, hey. Another chart comparing strength modifiers... With creatures on it I don't know!

The only information that means anything to a new player is "Strength measures your character’s muscle and physical power." The rest presents information in such a way that only a person already familiar with the concept would get it unless heavily motivated to understand.

If you want to explain strength, you need to start by saying that strong characters fight better in close combat, they can break down doors and do physical activities like climbing and swimming and jumping better than weak characters.

But more than that, the way things are organized, while logical, doesn't encourage a player to stop and think about what kind of character they want. Your first job is to roll dice and decide where to put the numbers based on vague ability descriptions that allude to information that you don't have yet.

If this were being taught as a class, the way the information is presented, most students new to the subject wouldn't do very well. They would hardly stay interested enough to go back for a second quarter. My personal experience with teaching this game to other people is that I close the rulebook and start translating the information into a more accessible format - charts and graphs aren't it.

[Orion]

Waittaminute, Midnight. I never said anything about ways to make the gaming in general more appealing to "women," because like you I'm skeptical of many proposals. I explained why having more women in gaming might be desirable. And as it happens there *are* effective tactics for individual DMs who want more women in their game specifically. Like... finding some women and asking them to game with you.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Leather Jacket: a garment that doesn't insulate from cold, doesn't breathe in heat, and stinks like rotten cow if it ever gets rained on. Clearly the best choice in adventure wear for the person who never actually has to go outdoors.

This is straight-up bullshit. The main downside to leather is weight. If treated properly, it's waterproof and about as breathable as anything that's waterproof. It also blocks wind just fine. Sure, I'd rather use something synthetic when backpacking, but most D&D settings don't include petroleum-based plastics. Cotton oilskin over wool would provide better weather protection for the weight, but is more likely to get nasty and won't provide as much protection against weapons.

Compare that to the weather protection provided by wearing metal.

[kzt]

Leather jackets you can buy today are like that because they are teflon coated/impregnated . Leather raincoats are a fairly modern development, as the behavior without the coatings isn't very good.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Leather jackets you can buy today are like that because they are teflon coated/impregnated . Leather raincoats are a fairly modern development, as the behavior without the coatings isn't very good.

Oil/wax-based treatments are about as old as time itself, and do a fine job. The only real advantage of teflon is it won't pick up smells.

[icyshadowlord]

So this turned from talking about women's relation to the D&D gaming environment into a debate about wax, oils and smelly padded armor? Well, I do know that this relates to some of the issues that some might have with D&D, but I myself blatantly ignored the whole entry when I first tried D&D. My female friend did the same, and so did the DM. Funny how easy things like that can be solved by simply not RPing it out.

[shadzar]

Shadzar, the point of the quote isn't to say that the books should provide more advice on how to make stories. The point of the quote is that the books should present information on how to play the game in a more story-like format.

It took me two weeks of steadily reading the PHB to go from a person who had no clue what a hit point was to a person who could sort of fill out a character sheet properly. I had no help at all (I wouldn't have known where to go for help, either), and most of the concepts described were completely foreign to me.

The first thing that you see when you open the [3.0] PHB is a picture of the character sheet with little numbers and descriptions.

Cutting to reduce length, but the rest will be addressed...but not as much as the most important part which I have boded.

3rd edition sucks. It sucks for new people trying to pick up, and when it came out, that is the majority that played. They designed, and I talked about this a decade ago when it came out, from the front of the game trying to show what was different and also to get people into looking at the new way characters work. This fails miserably. It also makes the character sheet the actor of the story, not the player.

I wont deny ANY of that. Likewise 4th sets out to do same, and just offers a dry stack of stats. While 4th TRIES its damnedest to give a little flavor, it also doesnt want to force flavor onto people. Monster ecologies as easily missed, and character races are cut down to activities the race does well, not about how it lives in the world.

Many people say that 3rd was the edition for the player, and now that 4th is the edition for the DM. This is because DMing 3rd was a nightmare with all the options given to a player, so a DM couldn't piece together a story very well. But it wasnt really designed to do so, and also was doing like each other edition and ASSUMED you had played before. The problem is many people NEVER played before, and nothing was offered to them from Basic up to 3rd.

When Mearls talks about the "expanding gamer brain", he again is assuming that people played since the beginning and it is ok to leave out steps or information that should be a given, and takes for granted that new people do NOT know what the game is since it is different.

Earlier editions than 3rd did focus time on telling how to make a story. At least in the DMG...PHB just gave ideas of things outside of combat to tell what a race might do in day to day life, as well classes.

The problem is the book cant offer how to play it in a more story-like manner, outside of telling you "it is a game where you get to make your own Conan to tell his story alongside other players telling theirs, rather than just reading the stories about Conan."

This key bit about D&D, gets lost to the masses. It is said once, read once, and forgotten. Many who remember it try to make Conan exactly to play, but miss the point that D&D isnt made to make any exact fictional character, but to make your own fictional character to tell a story with.

If being taught a class, then the rule of 3 should apply, and that would help reinforce the games purpose itself.

1. Tell then what you will tell them.
2. Tell them
3. Tell them what you told them.

Which breaks down to:

1. introduction/syllabus
2. course
3. course summary

All 3 are as important, but the intro and summary are often forgotten, and people playing D&D or learning something, usually look for the information, not back at the introduction.

The format in which 3rd was designed and presetned....well you know the saying:

Put a bunch of monkeys in a room with typewriters and eventually they will write D&D 3rd edition.

From text over backgrounds, to text wrapping around art in the middle of the pages...it was a giant joke and illegible mess.

When they went in and cleaned up AD&D with 2nd to be more readable, they only took a first step, when 2nd edition revised came out they did a much better, if not the best job of organization EVEN done to D&D from the understanding books were being presented, not a giant book-sized board game rules pamphlet.

It starts with the intro for old and new players, a glossary of terms, then explains the RPG and goal of a D&D game:

The Real Basics

This section is intended for novice role-players. If you have played role-playing games before, don't be surprised if what you read here sounds familiar.
Games come in a wide assortment of types: board games, card games, word games, picture games, miniatures games. Even within these categories are subcategories. Board games, for example, can be divided into path games, real estate games, military simulation games, abstract strategy games, mystery games, and a host of others.

Still, in all this mass of games, role-playing games are unique. They form a category all their own that doesn't overlap any other category.
For that reason, role-playing games are hard to describe. Comparisons don't work because there isn't anything similar to compare them to. At least, not without stretching your imagination well beyond its normal, everyday extension.
But then, stretching your imagination is what role-playing is all about. So let's try an analogy.

Imagine that you are playing a simple board game, called Snakes and Ladders. Your goal is to get from the bottom to the top of the board before all the other players. Along the way are traps that can send you sliding back toward your starting position. There are also ladders that can let you jump ahead, closer to the finish space. So far, it's pretty simple and pretty standard.
Now let's change a few things. Instead of a flat, featureless board with a path winding from side to side, let's have a maze. You are standing at the entrance, and you know that there's an exit somewhere, but you don't know where. You have to find it.

Instead of snakes and ladders, we'll put in hidden doors and secret passages. Don't roll a die to see how far you move; you can move as far as you want. Move down the corridor to the intersection. You can turn right, or left, or go straight ahead, or go back the way you came. Or, as long as you're here, you can look for a hidden door. If you find one, it will open into another stretch of corridor. That corridor might take you straight to the exit or lead you into a blind alley. The only way to find out is to step in and start walking.

Of course, given enough time, eventually you'll find the exit. To keep the game interesting, let's put some other things in the maze with you. Nasty things. Things like vampire bats and hobgoblins and zombies and ogres. Of course, we'll give you a sword and a shield, so if you meet one of these things you can defend yourself. You do know how to use a sword, don't you?
And there are other players in the maze as well. They have swords and shields, too. How do you suppose another player would react if you chance to meet? He might attack, but he also might offer to team up. After all, even an ogre might think twice about attacking two people carrying sharp swords and stout shields.

Finally, let's put the board somewhere you can't see it. Let's give it to one of the players and make that player the referee. Instead of looking at the board, you listen to the referee as he describes what you can see from your position on the board. You tell the referee what you want to do and he moves your piece accordingly. As the referee describes your surroundings, try to picture them mentally. Close your eyes and construct the walls of the maze around yourself. Imagine the hobgoblin as the referee describes it whooping and gamboling down the corridor toward you. Now imagine how you would react in that situation and tell the referee what you are going to do about it.

We have just constructed a simple role-playing game. It is not a sophisticated game, but it has the essential element that makes a role-playing game: The player is placed in the midst of an unknown or dangerous situation created by a referee and must work his way through it.
This is the heart of role-playing. The player adopts the role of a character and then guides that character through an adventure. The player makes decisions, interacts with other characters and players, and, essentially, "pretends" to be his character during the course of the game. That doesn't mean that the player must jump up and down, dash around, and act like his character. It means that whenever the character is called on to do something or make a decision, the player pretends that he is in that situation and chooses an appropriate course of action.

Physically, the players and referee (the DM) should be seated comfortably around a table with the referee at the head. Players need plenty of room for papers, pencils, dice, rule books, drinks, and snacks. The referee needs extra space for his maps, dice, rule books, and assorted notes.

Copyright 1999 TSR Inc.

The Goal
Another major difference between role-playing games and other games is the ultimate goal. Everyone assumes that a game must have a beginning and an end and that the end comes when someone wins. That doesn't apply to role-playing because no one "wins" in a role-playing game. The point of playing is not to win but to have fun and to socialize.
An adventure usually has a goal of some sort: protect the villagers from the monsters; rescue the lost princess; explore the ancient ruins. Typically, this goal can be attained in a reasonable playing time: four to eight hours is standard. This might require the players to get together for one, two, or even three playing sessions to reach their goal and complete the adventure.

But the game doesn't end when an adventure is finished. The same characters can go on to new adventures. Such a series of adventures is called a campaign.
Remember, the point of an adventure is not to win but to have fun while working toward a common goal. But the length of any particular adventure need not impose an artificial limit on the length of the game. The AD&D game embraces more than enough adventure to keep a group of characters occupied for years.

Copyright 1999 TSR Inc.

The bolded portions again are the keys that are often missed. While 2nd edition moves to using a board game as an example rather than a story, it DID cause a problem. It made the combat oriented gamers minds kick in and FORGET the story, but it did so BECAUSE people were complaining that they couldn't make Conan, because they still didn't understand you weren't supposed to make Conan and play through his books.

Again Zeb assumed prior play experience or at least one seasoned player to explain the story part and pass it down.

3rd edition WAS in a way AD&D, just with part of the name filed off to make it look more appealing. The problem is that many people still don't understand what AD&D is. It was a new game, and Advanced version of D&D, not made for beginners. 3rd edition had many beginners, but neglected to offer them the benefit of, or access to, Basic D&D where the real information of the sort was.

Preface
This is a game that is fun. It helps you imagine.

“As you whirl around, your sword ready, the huge, red, fire-breathing dragon swoops toward you with a ROAR!”

See? Your imagination woke up already. Now imagine: This game may be more fun than any other game you have ever played!
The DUNGEONS & DRAGONS game is a way for us to imagine together - like watching the same movie, or reading the same book. But you can write the stories, without putting a word on paper - just by playing the D&D game.
You, along with your friends, will create a great fantasy story, you will put it away after each game, and go back to school or work, but - like a book - the adventure will wait. It’s better than a book, though; it will keep going as long as you like.

Now Gary wasnt all for thespianism, but knew people were making their own stories. So too was he rushed and busy with other things to write AD&D with it in mind. 1st edition doesnt even have the word "story" in the PHB, because it too was trying to remove the Conan creators and make sure people knew it was a game.

Q1: If 3rd, or the edition you started D&D with, had the preface from Basic, do you think that would have helped amplify the importance of the story?

Q2: While answering that question, do you also realize that people take from the game what they se in it, and if you focus too much on the story, well... a lot of the more money than brains male players likely wouldnt have picked up even 3rd edition, so what is presented is open-ended so that you can add as much or as little focus and importance on the story you want, because there is not a defined level of "required" story to give access to as many players as possible?

I agree there should be something to help new players, but the word of us grognards means nothing in regards to the game being a device to tell a story, especially when the current designers tell you to just get to the combat and skip the boring story.

Fun
Fun is one element you shouldn’t vary. every encounter in an adventure should be fun. As much as possible, fast-forward through the parts of an adventure that aren’t fun. An encounter with two guards at the city gate isn’t fun. Tell the players they get through the gate without much trouble and move on to the fun. Niggling details of food supplies and encumbrance usually aren’t fun, so don’t sweat them, and let the players get to the adventure and on to the fun. Long treks through endless corridors in the ancient dwarven stronghold beneath the mountains aren’t fun. Move the PCs quickly from encounter to encounter, and on to the fun!

Sadly, for male and female gamers, the majority of gamers don't know how to make a plot arc or sub-arcs to bind together into a story to actually tell, Also the DMG is the place most often that tells how to make a story, because it is the DMs job to make sure to link all the players actions, past, present and future, into a story. Being present in the PHB would be like telling people what kind of story they should have, rather than helping tell them how to make the game into a story.

The divide in story focus, is also the divide between D&D and ST games like Vampire, as well as popularity, so what to add to help focus on the fact the game IS a story?

[tzor]

3rd edition WAS in a way AD&D, just with part of the name filed off to make it look more appealing. The problem is that many people still don't understand what AD&D is. It was a new game, and Advanced version of D&D, not made for beginners. 3rd edition had many beginners, but neglected to offer them the benefit of, or access to, Basic D&D where the real information of the sort was.

Shadzar, your knowledge (or the lack thereof) of the early editions of AD&D never cease to amaze me. D&D was not, per se "Beginner" (that only occured after AD&D and attempts to reprint the original D&D material that the word "Basic" was incorporated.

More importantly, "Advanced" was certainly not in character creation. Although alignment became a two dimensional thing instead of simply law and chaos, and races could choose their own character class (instead of a non human race being their own character class) the basic generation of a 1E AD&D character remained virtually the same. The really "advanced" parts of AD&D were always optional. You didn't need to run the game with the psionics rules, for example.

I can't really stress how easy it was for a complete newb to create a character and get into a game in 1E AD&D because I was one and I know from personal experience. (My first character was an AD&D cleric.) While Gygax's writing style left much to be desired it was generally easy to follow and the character creation rules were usefull with only minimial guidance.

The biggest reason for 2nd edition was to kick Gygax's name off of the game.

The biggest reason for 3rd edition was to kick TSR's name off of the game.

The biggest reason for 4th edition was that WoTC had been staffed by morons who couldn't manage a game to save their own jobs and 4E has proved that beyond all doubt. Therefore they made their own moron edition.

As you said 3E was a crap as far as writing goes. Many existing players could easily forgive some of the problems within the PHB as far as that goes, but it really made it hard for new players. The whole problem is so damn simple that you really want to slap editors for not having the writers do it. You need a good concise "Beginner's" section (referencing the sections in the rest of the PHB) for creating a simple character and what all the stuff means. Advanced players can easily skip that part. Allow a player to easily create a basic character in a single chapter, and then let them explore the rest of the book for more options.

That's not rules design per se; that's layout design. You can do that with any RPG system and get it accessable to the largest possible audience without alienating the current players.