hi I just wanted to post something that concerns me about the traditional rpg gaming industry in general,

and read any responses there might be. My statement is:

WoW is responsible for many rpg gamers to quit playing paper and pen roleplaying games

According to my friend who is the manager of a Hobby shop, -called Outland,  -there have been an increasing drop in the sales of RPG products the last years. And he blames WoW MORPG!

Would his assumptions be wrong?

I know for myself that many roleplaying groups in my community is dead (not literary, that would be just creepy), and most of them are playing WoW. And for a small country like mine (Norway), it have had a devastating effect. People attending GONs have been halved according to Board members I have spoke with. 

Let me finnish by saying I in no way Hates WoW or bear any grudges against the fine folks of Blizzard. But is there counter measurments the gaming industry (Traditional) can do to increase and recruit more people to this fine hobby? I just wonder. for now it seems like a loosing battle. 

And in the very end I salute Fantasy Flight games for making the effort of upholding and renewing this old gaming industry. I almost jumped through the roof when I read that they bought the license and rights from GW to produce. 

I simply love you guys at FFG

ehem

it seem that the end is missing.

it should read:

...produce Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader.

I actually think it is true. Many of my old gamer friends have stopped playing and when I ask why they just say "eh, why when I can play WOW whenver I want?"

I can believe it,  but I don't understand it. While I certainly understand that they both appeal to the same kinds of people, video games and tabletop games are so totally different that I can not see how one can "replace" the other. However, I suppose video games are "easier" in the same way TV/movies is "easier" than reading, and hence has a broader appeal. Perhaps this is even more so, you don't have to worry about finding players and scheduling times to play with a MMORPG. Although some people do anyway...

MMOs are hammering tabletop here in the UK too. I beleive they do this because they do two things very, very well:

1) They allow people to play a social game at any time of day with almost no preparation (guild raids and so on notwithstanding). Tabletop means having to actually meet up, spend time preparing the game and is generally more effort to organise.

2) They allow much, much more complex rules to be applied without having to stop every 30 seconds to work out what happens, the complexity of the maths calculations involved in WoW means that not even the most hard-core Rolemaster group will be able to have as much complexity in their battle tactics as a group playing WoW. As an aside they also instant gratification (*ding* "gratz!").

One thing they are not however is a replacement for ACTUAL ROLEPLAY.

For me the essence of roleplay is facing a choice. You control a character in a story (conflict being the basis of all story) and you have to make choices that are defined by what your character feels and believes, the choices they make then go on to affect the gameworld and resolve the story one way or another. This to me is the very heart of all roleplay and MMOs dont do this. None of them (yet) allow a person to play in a way which affects the overall story through character choices. So far they are utterly linear. Its true that players in WoW (or whatever) can choose weapons and abilities but this isn't a real choice, its a tactical judgment based on how to beat whatever opponent you're facing next.

From this I draw the following conclusion: If its so easy for players to drop tabletop in favour of WoW then tabletop was in a weaker position then WoW. WoW is able to replicate several elements of tabletop without all the downsides of it. Frankly its often the case that many campaigns still do not contain any real choice, all too often they are linear stories that the players have to solve that could mostly be replicated in WoW or any other MMO.

So a possible solution is this:

1) I cant think of a very convincing way to play Tabletop without all being in the same place to play and without someone writing the game before hand, so WoW has got us beat in terms of convienience. /shrug

2) Its impossible for a tabletop game to beat an MMO in terms of game-rule complexity so lets stop trying, miminalist rules or narrativist rules will move the focus away from mechanics (often the weakest part of a game) and towards the story (the reason we play). I certainly didn't buy all the Dark Heresy books so I could print off a bunch of errata and learn the combat rules or whatever (GMs do what they want anyway!!), I bought it for the background and let it inspire me to create stories and scenarios and not know what the outcome of those stories would be!

3) Lets write more grown up and complex scenarios that WoW cannot match! How many times have you faced a problem in a scenario and come up with a dozen different answers to it!! My group does all the time and I bet yours does too!! In any given quest in WoW there is only one solution per quest ("Kill 10 of these" or "Take the key to King Blagh"). Tabletop opens up possiblity and is limited only by imagination, WoW shuts down imagination and limits options down to a single none-story-affecting choice, which is no choice at all!!

Consider this example: Run a short, pre-bought scenario for your group and see what the outcome of the story is, then compare the events to those of other groups who ran it. Different solutions every time, defined by the people playing it. Now play a set of WoW quests with a group and look online to see what other outcomes people came each. Each one is identical.

Tabletop has greater potential than MMOs and anyone can access this potential. So lets get out there and show it!!

...Rant over.

Age could be another factor. I'm 33, and got into pen and paper RPGs in the late 80's. At that time, videogames were pretty rubbish, and if you had an inclination for more involved sci-fi fantasy games, your best bet was D&D, Shadowrun, WFRP etc.

If I were a 15 year old kid now, I'd regard pen and paper RPGs as a very poor cousin of today's videogames. I don't play MMORPGs, but I did play Fallout 3 recently, and that was amazing. Why would a kid WANT to read a big book full of complex and baffling tables, rules etc when he can leap straight into a ready made, visually spectacular setting and interact with people across the globe?

I'm not saying pen and paper RPGs are doomed, but I predict they'll find it harder to pull in new, younger players. I wonder how many Dark Heresy fans on this forum are under 20? Not many, I bet....

That's a series of good points by all so far - I am also a UK gamer, now at a ripe old age of 36, and like Lightbringer, got into role-play in the 1980s while still at school.  I would agree with the fact that younger gamers resist role-play for the reasons you've named - but as a teacher as well (yup, I'm one of those too!) I often overhear kids discussing wargames and even role-play from time to time, so I know that the experience isn't completely dead in the water yet.

However, sadly, for every one of these kinds of younger gamers, there are a legion who will often stay up into the early hours of the morning playing MMORPGs, and becoming quite addicted to this experience.  It's actually tremendously powerful, the 'pull' of the computer gaming industry, for the instant gratification thing that Smitt mentions, and something to which I am quite partial as well.  What I have found is that an early interest in gaming of this kind can often lead people, as young adults, into board games and possibly role-playing later on.  There is a little interest spiked in clubs and groups as well as in places like GW stores across the country for example, where people do talk more generally about games of other types.  It has always been a 'minority' interest in comparison with computer gaming, even in the early years, where more friends had clunky ZX Spectrums than copies of D&D.  On the other hand, no-one can doubt the sell-out success of 'Dark Heresy' which was able to trade in on players' love of the 40K universe as well as love of role-play.  There will always be those gamers out there (some of whom are close friends) who simply do not like role-play!

Basically, people mature into role-play now, I believe - it does indeed offer a different, and I think richer experience in the ways already spoken of than any computer game - but it is hard to resist the graphical excellence and playability of something like WoW, Killzone II, Fallout 3, Bioshock, Dawn of War II etc... and I am still very partial to those.  I suppose it is down to us old crumblies to help those using these forums to play and enjoy these games with as much aplomb, and offer the wealth of our gaming experience to make it equally as exciting as it initially was for us!

Lightbringer said:

I like the much greater freedom you get from the PnP experiance, a computer game is always going to limit your options in terms of effecting the game world especially in the area of interacting with NPC's. In most games a computer game conversation is either a predetermined or a one way dialogue with occational input from the player. I also like getting everyone together to play the game, it makes things more fun than sitting in your room and clicking buttons to kill a boss for loot, that kind of experiance is just kind of empty to me.

To each his own I suppose.

Kaihlik

Smitt said: