DFRPG momentarily on Board Game Breakfast

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by lachimba

My genuine belief is the Gloomhavens and future dungeon crawl boardgames are going to start pulling players off D&D.

The RPGs that successfully incorporate boardgame elements (Deckbuilding, hand management, jenga, whatever) are going to be disproportionately successful.

That most assuredly ends up not being DFRPG related.

The comment is certainly relevant to this thread. Here's some insight from the designer of the DFRPG (and of GURPS Fourth Edition, and of the original GURPS Lite for GURPS Third Edition):

I turned 51 last Friday. My vision of RPGs has its roots in 1979, with AD&D. It was shaped by nearly every RPG released up until I had to leave the student life, with all its free time, and start working full-time (1995). Fantasy RPGs (FRPGs) were always the most interesting RPGs for me, so those had a disproportionate influence, whether we're talking T&T and TFT or D&D 3.0/3.5 (the last version I played – and yes, I know it falls outside that date range).

My interest was never "games, especially RPGs" but rather "fantasy, especially games." I also liked fantasy movies, dressing up in fantasy costumes and whacking things with fake swords, and decorating my room – and later my apartment – with art depicting knights, magic, and monsters. Without that, I probably wouldn't have touched gaming. While I played my share of board games, card games, dice games, and war games, they collectively didn't amount to more than 10% of the time, money, and effort I invested in RPGs. And while I played non-fantasy RPGs, they collectively didn't amount to more than 20-30% of the time, money, and effort I invested in fantasy RPGs . . . and just about all the non-fantasy stuff was either zombie stories or modern-day technothrillers.

Perversely, once I started working on RPGs in 1995, I found I had less and less time for actually playing games. The first thing to go was all the non-RPG stuff; it was always peripheral, and now I had no time for it at all. I kept playing RPGs as a way to stay "fluent" in my art.

Which is a longwinded way of saying that the DFRPG was designed by a player of "traditional" FRPGs who never had much of a background in other games and who by 2016, when he was working on the game, hadn't looked at anything but a Rule Zero RPG with dice, character sheets, and a GM for . . . well, quite a few years. The results were about as "light" as a specialist such as myself was likely to manage. I imagine my bosses knew all that when they asked me to design it.

Going forward, lighter RPGs with more board-game-like or even toy-like mechanics are going to call for less-traditional designers. Not necessarily younger designers, but that's the way to bet.

That won't be the future of the DFRPG for lots of reasons. First, the DFRPG is based on a classic Rule Zero RPG with dice, character sheets, and a GM: GURPS. Second, it's fait accompli; going back and making it a different kind of game would be the retcon of all retcons. And third and most important, the designer is me. I could use my copious free time* to immerse myself in other kinds of games, but in my heart I know I won't, because my main hobby now is Argentine tango, not gaming. I'd have to give up one for the other, and all indicators are that dance is better for my body and my social wellbeing, and at least as good for my mind.

This isn't an apology or anything of the sort. It's just an explanation for why the DFRPG is what it is. I hope it helps people understand where it came from.

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* That's a joke. Events in my life since 2016, in particular, have left me with almost zero free time (and very little money or energy).