“The Adventure Is Yours”

“Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.”

— Albert Einstein

I haven’t followed developments with Dungeons & Dragons for a while. Every so often some D&D news or controversy appears on my gaming radar; I take note but really don’t feel the need to voice my opinion (not that anyone would notice). D&D has evolved into a very different creature than what I knew growing up in the 1980s, what I turn to now in nostalgia. I dabbled with the third edition Wizards of the Coast released shortly after acquiring TSR, running a few adventures at a local game store and even writing some d20 products in the Open Game License (OGL) boom of the early 2000s. Hasbro’s acquisition of D&D caused the line to stumble a few times, usually from management prioritizing growing profits without understanding (or perhaps caring about) the game and its customers. After threatening to vanquish and reanimate the OGL as some unfriendly form of undead corporate contract, Hasbro now seems intent on turning D&D content away from physical publications to emphasize electronic materials accessible through subscription...aping the greedy corporate subscription model others use for software and media to feed an economic system based on infinite profit growth from a finite system. Yet some of D&D’s earliest advertising slogans remind us we don’t need every scenario and supplement, we don’t even need the core D&D rulebooks to enjoy the roleplaying game hobby. Because, as the old ad said, “The Adventure Is Yours.”

Roleplaying games are perhaps the most creative genre of the adventure gaming hobby. With a core set of rules and some setting guidelines, we can develop characters and run scenarios as long as our imagination holds out...and gamers find infinite sources for inspiration in media and other pursuits they enjoy. From a gamer’s perspective, a core rulebook contains everything one needs for hours, weeks, even years of roleplaying game adventures. I look back at the games that influenced my early years as an example. The Basic and Expert D&D boxed sets provided the rules framework as well as sample scenarios to help demonstrate the kinds of adventures characters might pursue; plus an outlined game world in X1 The Isle of Dread. The Star Wars Roleplaying Game (with the sourcebook) offered fans of the original trilogy a means to pursue their own adventures just off screen from the core movie action. Space 1889 and Cyberpunk 2020 each provided entire summers worth of entertainment for friends home from college during weekly games. Even the one-volume Prince Valiant: The Story-Telling Game drew on my knowledge of and interest in Arthurian legends for a series of misadventures in and around Camelot. Sure, for most of those games I purchased supplements and scenarios to provide inspiration for further adventures. But I didn’t necessarily need them to continue enjoying the hobby. Beyond the core rules to provide the game framework and some examples of stories I could tell, everything else depended on the free and plentiful resource of our imaginations.

In this day and age, when roleplaying games have become part of popular culture, we don’t even need a company’s core rulebook...we can create our own. I look back on my own experience ages ago. Having seen some neighborhood kids “playing” D&D (rifling through room descriptions with the scenario booklet open and consulting the map), I went home and tried to codify the experience as I comprehended it, resulting in my home-grown yet fairly simple Creatures & Caverns (later released in a far more polished version). My friends and I played that for months until I received the Basic D&D box set as an Easter present; after which, of course, I set aside my own game to feast on the banquet of “official” D&D publications, eventually supplemented by my own home-made morsels when I couldn’t find or afford more product from the source.

Back then companies published new game materials: updated rules, supplements, sourcebooks, adventure modules, even magazines filled with regular doses of new inspiration. Gamers could take it or leave it based on their finances and their own tastes. As the 21st century embraced the digital Internet Age, companies adapted to the new normal. Most created websites with varying degrees of utility. Some simply offered news, but others provided free supplemental game material to enhance games and forums to foster a sense of community and communication. Gamers, too, used the internet’s accessibility to broaden their reach and share their own ideas. Their forum posts, blogs, reviews, utilities, and original game material helped spread information and trends and fuel other people’s gaming activities. One can still find completely free games online, with setting source material and complete scenarios...possibly enough to never have to purchase another book again. Some (myself included) managed to make some spare change or even significant money charging for their works, unheard of in the earlier days where print publishers dominated the market. The internet opened up a vast creative reservoir, with product from hobbyists and professionals.

Roleplaying gamers have always had a choice to buy more product or create their own material. It’s not an absolute dichotomy; at times we have the financial freedom and interest in purchasing new game materials...and sometimes we immerse ourselves in those books we have and let our imaginations create adventures. Sometimes we choose to avoid a certain company’s product for some reason, other times we gladly support a designer or publisher whose material really resonates with our gaming style and interests. Sometimes we rely on our own creations or surf the internet seeking free materials to add to our treasure chest of useful game goodies. We all have our tastes and our favorites; our support — for hobbyist or professional, for free or for pay — rewards those making such useful materials and encourages them to create more.

Like many beneficial things in life, the digital Internet Age also has its drawbacks. Where it allows creators of all levels a platform to share and sell their game materials, it also allows them to restrict access at a very basic level by charging for them. Corporations (and Hasbro) have recently taken this to the next level. Where some creators charge for players to download a PDF, companies now charge subscriptions. Not to own a product, like a print magazine, but to access online material: streaming movies, songs, and now different tiers of roleplaying game supplemental material and utilities. As we’ve already scene with several media streaming services, paying to access this material does not necessarily mean one can access it indefinitely. Services have caused uproars with fandom over pulling quirky, popular titles from a lineup, often for convoluted business reasons. While people can still access a wealth of information, companies offer few guarantees specific useful or popular materials will persist. Rather than purchasing physical meda — books, CDs, DVDs — consumers pay for a service whose terms, and access, a company can revoke at any time.

I regret most newcomers to roleplaying games enter through D&D’s proprietary “Gateway to Adventure.” The corporate trademark of D&D has become synonymous with the very concept of roleplaying games, eclipsing the existence of a vast universe of so many other games offering different degrees of rules and types of play styles. I’m dismayed by the latest rumblings from Wizards of the Coast and its overlord Hasbro: that the company seeks to monetize roleplaying game materials beyond physical publications and products, to join the dubious trend of corporations charging money for access to content one cannot truly own. I’m disappointed a hobby so based on creativity is dominated by a company that demonstrates little regard for the spirit of its core product, ignoring those designers and fans who helped ensure its success by seeking to milk it for all it’s worth. It’s an overtly avaricious move that threatens to alienate the very customers upon whom they depend.

The more I live through the 21st century, the less I like it. I am admittedly a creature of the 20th century, someone blundering his way into the new one on a meandering quest to find a place where I have worth and usefulness and a sense of belonging (things I currently lack) in a rapidly evolving society. In adapting to this century’s new paradigms I increasingly seek solace in the “old ways,” my physical copies of books, games, and other comforting media. Barring any tragic circumstances, I will always have roleplaying game books that have personal significance to me. I will always have a familiarity with games so I can recall mechanics and settings or, if necessary, create my own to run adventures for friends.

The slogan “The Adventure Is Yours” reminds me how our own imaginations remain central to the concept of roleplaying games...their creation, their execution, and the enjoyment we find in them. Although we may comb the internet for free or paid inspiration, purchase supplements from fellow hobbyists or publishing companies, our active involvement in the game creates the experience we enjoy. The game is what we make of it. We may immerse ourselves in rulebooks and sourcebooks, imagining the settings we can develop and the kinds of stories we can tell, but ultimately a roleplaying game comes into its fullness with players around the gaming table.

“There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love.”

— Sophia Loren