Tabletop Gaming and the Internet

I recently read an article on the Escapist talking about the future of dungeons and dragons and it stirred up a few interesting ideas. One of the biggest ones actually had to do with the affect of the internet on tabletop gaming. I had thought about it before, and the more I look at it the more I have begun to wonder if the internet may actually lead to the effective end of tabletop RPGs as we know them. While that might sound somewhat alarmist I actually do have some arguments to back it up. I should also point out that an end as we know it may not mean an end to tabletop gaming in total, just more that the mediums could radically change or that the kinds of available games will alter. One of the biggest reasons is simply communication, the internet allows for groups all over the world to share stories, information on games, etc. It also means that system breaks are far more widely known, I imagine that more 3.5 players know about pun-pun than second edition players know the whole dart trick, even if the dart trick has been around longer because pun-pun was on a message board used by millions of people who in turn could tell friends about it whereas second edition D&D was on the market before the internet was widely available to everyone. In other words, system fractures are more widely known now and it's easier to find ways to build powerful characters, even sit down and work out objectively how powerful you can get. Now sometimes this is good, it can mean that a problem existing in the game is shared by many people so you can look at houserules that were used to deal with it or something similar. However it also means that a game designer when trying to make a balanced product is literally battling the collective creativity and mechanical savvy of the whole internet. It means that a game can end up producing some true monstrosities not necessarily because the designers were sloppy but simply because if enough books are produced and enough people have the patience and diligence they can produce a true monstrosity.


Another problem can be dogpile effects from this, never mention Palladium RPGs, especially RIFTS on an RPG.net thread or you are likely to get flamed into oblivion, now I am a fan of Rifts, it has a kind of earnest madness to it that I find amusing but I can understand why some people might not like it. The dogpile problem is that you can have people who only ever hear negative press about a game, a class, a book, whatever and thus decide to avoid it because of what seems like an overwhelming opposition to it. Some forums simply turn into echo chambers where a few loud voices seem to dominate everything, even if they are a minority. And if a company happens to maintain one or more of the forums they might make changes to the game based off of the vocal minority that point out these flaws or make these complaints. There are some that might argue that certain changes in errata or editions were the result of a particularly vocal group on a forum or online group. There's also the problem where people that might be more familiar with certain large forum groups, like RPG.net or ENworld might go with the communities views on a product rather than doing a test run of it themselves, and given how expensive the game books can be that's an understandable, if unfortunate side effect of the new system. There can also be advantages here too though, I will admit that plenty of times I learned about games from these forums or I would discover interesting options because of them. I will also admit that I could have been considered part of one of the dogpiles ont he wold WotC forums during 3.5.


This leads to another change the internet brought, the effective end, or at least dramatic limitation of the local gaming shop. A big part of this is from sites like Amazon.com and DrivethroughRPG, as well as companies like Pinnacle Entertainment selling PDFs of their work on their website. Now in a lot of ways this is good, the books and PDFs are much cheaper and the selection is technically wider, it can definitely help the hobby. The problem in my view is actually more where a lot of local game shops can't compete, and I won't blame those that shop on Amazon or anything like that, the games are damn expensive and you're supporting the company that makes a game you like. The problem though is that it means that a lot of gaming shops end up doing poorer business, the gaming shop was a place for people to meet as well as being able to try out or watch games, a few shops will still do organized games of different products to help showcase them but those are fairly rare. What this tends to mean is that rather than trying out different types of games people can end up rather tribal, only playing D&D or only playing Whitewolf or only playing Palladium or whatever. It also means that more obscure games are unlikely to ever fully break into the market in a meaningful way. It can mean that we might not ever see innovative new titles or systems simply because they're either too far outside what we currently have or because they can't get the exposure to people unless they are actively looking for such a product. I will also admit that online torrenting of RPGs and the like is a problem here as well, though some might argue that that actually expands the market since it can expose people to radically different and interesting games.


The last big issue, in my mind at least, is the competition factor. It isn't a matter of tabletop games versus each other, it's a matter of them having a much wider degree of media to compete with, video games, cell phone games, the internet itself, etc. they are battling much harder for the attention of their target audience, which in turn means that changes made to appeal to the audience they seek may well alienate the audience that they already have. The other problem has to do with stuff like Skyrim, various MMOs, etc in that such games essentially allow the RPG storyline experience without having to find a gaming group. Now a lot of you out there would argue that a good tabletop game is superior to any MMO or video game and I would agree, but I also remember that I literally found my current gaming groups more or less by chance. People that might be interested in D&D, Hackmaster, Gamma World, Vampire or even Rifts or Deadlands might never find a group or someone to introduce them to the hobby, instead gravitating to the more mainstream MMOs and popular games like Skyrim, Fallout, etc. Aside from that, if a gaming group is far away or there is 'drama' at the table and other things, some people would rather just play a game alone. The other thing is that in a lot of these games the player is made to feel like a badass, they're strong, fast, the chosen one, the big damn hero, that can be very appealing and make a person maybe decide that they'd rather do that than be something that they feel is less 'special' in a tabletop game. Now I will also say though that the video games can help, Skyrims success as well as the success of games like WoW show that sword and sorcery style fantasy is very popular and maybe with good marketing tabletop games could get more people.


What I have said is, again, just my opinion, but any thoughts, comments or ideas might be worth studying, I leave it to my readers.