What kind of questions can I ask here?

Question

The FAQ says?

Role-playing Games - Stack Exchange is for gamemasters and players of tabletop, paper-and-pencil role-playing games.

We've had a slight bit of discussion about LARPs that seem to indicate "maybe" but no real LARP activity.

We've discussed board games and came to the conclusion of no.

So, what about the other ancillaries, typs of roleplaying?. And how should this impact the FAQ.

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Answer 1

We do include:

• traditional roleplaying games
• story games
• live-action roleplaying games (LARPs)
• experimental RPGs (which will sometimes deliberately stretch the definition of "roleplaying game" to see what happens)
• free-form roleplaying games (Norwegian style, Jeepform, and other games with socially-mediated procedures that accomplish what traditional mechanics do)
• home-brewed roleplaying games
• any of the above played through an computer, letter mail, or other medium

We do not include:

• computer roleplaying games¹ (CRPGs, i.e. Final Fantasy VII, not RPGs like above that just happen to use the computer as a medium, i.e. D&D 4e over Skype)
• board games² (i.e. Advanced HeroQuest, Castle Ravenloft)
• wargames² (i.e. Warhammer 40k, Battlesystem, Heroclix)
• Choose Your Own Adventure–type books, even if they have dice mechanics³
• MUDs, MUSHes, MOOs, MUCKs, or other multi-user text-based worlds¹
• MMORPGs (Massively-Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Games)¹
• card games, collectible or otherwise²
• dice games, collectible or otherwise²

We make exceptions for questions that are primarily about something on the do list that simply uses or refers to one of the do nots in some way. For example:

• On-topic: How can I use WH40k to play out a big battle that is the background of a Rogue Trader adventure?
• Off-topic: Are there Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim mods that add D&D equipment and magic items?

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<sup>1. May be on-topic at Arqade, depending on the question.
2. May be on-topic at Board & Card Games SE, depending on the question.
3. May be on-topic at Science-Fiction & Fantasy SE, depending on the question.</sup>

Answer 2

We do include games like Once Upon A Time or The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen, that is storytelling games where players take turns telling a story utilizing some set of mechanics.

Answer 3

We should add into this list (Unless I've missed them)

• PBEM games - traditional roleplaying games but played by email/snailmail
• PBP games - Play By Post games - roleplaying games played via a forum, IRC or similar medium.

Answer 4

We do not include computer RPGs of any type. There is another StackExchange for that.

Thus we do not include

• Single-Player Games
• Text-based
• Multi-user Games (MUDs, MUSHs, MU*)
• Graphical Online Games or MMORPGs
• Social Media Games
• Alternate Reality Games
• Or any other flavor of computer game

Answer 5

We include Shared-author fiction when they become storytelling games.

Shared-author fiction is where a story is told (or written) in successive pieces by different authors. It is distinct from other forms of collaborative writing in that each piece of text is written by a single author. Thus, a simplistic shared-author piece might be made by two people where one person writes odd-numbered pages while the other writes even-numbered pages. The story is written in order, where each author must pick up where the last one left off and continue in a coherent narrative.

This becomes role-playing when each author has associated characters which they own. Then each author may write a section about what their character does. These are role-playing games of a sort which these days are typically played online using web-based bulletin boards or other internet forums to post the story text. Unlike most computer games or tabletop games, a true shared-author game has rules structured as etiquette and style guides rather than means of resolution (i.e. "no curse words", "no sexual situations", etc.). Often the author of a given character has final word over anything that seriously impacts that character. i.e. A character can only be wounded or killed with that player's permission.

Shared-author/role-playing sites frequently are based on science fiction and fantasy television series -- evolving out of the phenomenon of "fan fiction". There are numerous Star Trek shared-author RPGs, for example, along with Xena, Buffy, and various Japanese anime series.

Really, there is no clear line between shared-author RPGs and others. The form is distinct mainly in that it creates a (hopefully) coherent text narrative as its product. However, it certainly can overlap with tabletop play and online computer games. Some tabletop games are played over email (called Play-By-Email or PBEM). I list below a few links to what I would consider shared-author roleplaying games.

Summary taken from http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/whatis/ because I'm lazy.