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LeoLionxxx
2013-12-08, 04:16 PM
For my English class research essay, I am writing about the benefits of playing role playing games such as D&D, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, etc. (explicitly ignoring video games in this case). I plan to talk about how it helps with social skills, mental development, building creativity, and the like. Thus, I thought I’d go straight to the source and ask players on these forums:

What impact has Role Playing had on your life?

What I’m looking for is firsthand experience on what changes you’ve seen in yourself since you started gaming, and how it has/does help you in everyday life (please, no hyperlinks that are not your own. I’m already doing that type of research as well (Lord Google knows all)). Bonus points (imaginary cookies) if anyone can talk about their experiences with LARP, as I’ve heard tell it’s quite the activity.

Also, my teacher thought it might be worthwhile to look into what disadvantages playing RPGs can herald; the only one I can really think of is potential cost (and even then it can be very low), but that’s why I’m doing research :D .

Elderand
2013-12-08, 04:30 PM
There are two potential disadvantages I can think off.

Cost: especially for games that requires miniatures of some kind, those things can get attrociously expensive and are required for many tournament type events (I'm thinking wargames more than rpg here though).

The second is alienation: Even though things got better being an RPG player is still poorly perceived in some situations.

As for what benefits I got from RPG, that's hard to define, I don't have access to a control group consisting of myself not having played RPGs to compare myself to.

It didn't teach me any sort of skills asside from the skill of playing RPGs itself. I got more vocabulary from reading other books, math skills I got from schools..... oh I know, it helped me grasp probabilities better by providing concrete exemples I could work on.

I suppose it also helped with creative thinking. Specificly mutants and masterminds forced me to learn how to approach a problem from a different angle to reach an unusual solution. By that I mean I have to think of how to best model some powers based on the tools given to me.

hymer
2013-12-08, 04:40 PM
I'll add a third demerit: It is prone to promote clique-forming.

Good things... Spending Friday nights playing RPGs beats spending them drinking IMO (though I'm aware that a lot of people play drunk and/or stoned). For me, it helped polish my English (I'm not a native speaker). And it prompted me, as DM, to expand my historical knowledge early on, and later many, many other subjects.
Overall, I think roleplaying is a very decent hobby, though it doesn't quite match things like social sports.
For me, it was actually very cheap. My first four years or so were done with just the Rules Cyclopedia, dice, pens and paper.

NichG
2013-12-08, 04:56 PM
The idea of 'role-playing' predates tabletop gaming. My advice would be to look at how things similar to tabletop RPGs are used in training exercises, counselling, etc, and perhaps also look at method acting. That might give you more solid things to cite than a few testimonials.

Lorsa
2013-12-08, 05:25 PM
I couldn't really imagine my life without roleplaying. It's a very important part of my creative outlet. The benefits are many; it increases your creativity, ability to visualise environments in your mind, hones your problem solving skills, ideally your social skills and empathy as well.

First and foremost though I think roleplaying, despite or maybe because you spend so much time getting into the mindset and feelings of a created character different from yourself, teaches you many things about yourself. You can learn a lot about yourself through roleplaying, and you can also grow as a person through all the make-believe experiences.

If you spend a lot of time GM (and also playing although to lesser extent) you will learn a lot about history, old and foreign cultures, weapons, economic systems, politics, science and whatnot. It has come up quite a lot in my group that someone knows some obscure knowledge because they've had to research it for a roleplaying campaign.

I can't really come up with any disadvantages though. I don't think there are any.

Raine_Sage
2013-12-08, 05:26 PM
Well first of all you should check out this video from Extra Credits, the focus is a little more on video games but the topic itself can be applied to any game or scenario that applies to tangential learning.

http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/tangential-learning

Tangential learning in a nutshell is when you're presented with an unfamiliar phrase or concept in such a way that the player desires to learn more on their own initiative. For a non-gaming example see the popular pastime of link surfing on wikipedia. "Huh I've never heard of this thing before, wonder what it's all about."

When I started gaming I found that happening a lot. The DM would toss out a thing that sounded familiar, I'd google it, boom new knowledge acquired. Especially true if you're playing games set in historic periods or locations.

So that's the thing that might be useful on your paper, I don't know how useful the rest of it will be.

Noteable improvements since gaming: Much more active social life. To the point where my parents actually asked my brother if he'd like to hold the games at our house more often because they like hearing everyone laughing and having fun. (We're normally pretty introverted and don't go out much so I guess it makes them feel better in a 'see our kids do have friends' kind of way).

Conflict resolution becomes easier, since getting 6 to 10 people to do what you want can be tricky to manage otherwise especially when disagreements pop up. Despite all the "team building" exercises in school things would always shut down completely whenever team members started to disagree with each other and no one knew how to resolve it in a way that didn't involve splitting up. At a game, splitting up means no more game so it's a very sink or swim approach to diplomacy, but everyone's motivated to at least try.

Downsides:
When diplomacy fails it's very much a thing you can lose friends over. However it's not really much different from most social activities this way. It kind of goes without saying that if something comes with a risk of conflict it comes with a risk of schisms as well.

Being a good player can become a currency, to the point where newer or less experienced players are viewed as worthless or too risky to keep on.

Brookshw
2013-12-09, 05:52 AM
The same as any other social interaction. It's something to do with friends that's more interactive than watching a movie. The rest is up to the people at the table.

BWR
2013-12-09, 07:13 AM
What I have personally experienced:
- making good friends
- finding an amazing girlfriend
- good excuse to get together and chat, apart from just playing the game
- gets me into human contact apart from professional situations
- gest the creative juices flowing, gets me involved in things the way reading a book or watching tv doesn't. I'm an active participant, not just part of the audience.

As for disadvantages, there aren't really any I can think of that are specific to RPGs or independant of outside perception.
Cost? You can say that about many hobbies.
Lack of physcial activity? Same problem as watching tv.
Clique-ism? Again, some people will be ***** no matter what. It doesn't matter what they form around.
Prejudice? Everything suffers from this to an extent. It's not exactly unique to RPGs that there are misconceptions and sometimes outright lies propagated.
Most people who have asked me about my hobbies haven't heard of RPGs before and wonder if I do amateur dramatics. Those who have heard of it are a bit more informed because they either did it at one point or know someone who did. I have yet to encounter the 'basement-dwelling Satanist' response I have heard about. I know of one person who had this response and that was due to parents whose religion was of the "thou shalt not have fun" type.

hymer
2013-12-09, 09:03 AM
@ BWR: Pardon me for pointing this out, but your post seems awfully lopsided. Defensive, even.
You praise RP for getting you friends and a girlfriend. But it's not a problem that it's sitting flat on your butt, because so is watching TV.
You can do the reverse of those arguments and they work just as well. Pretty much all that good stuff is also part of any social hobby, so it's not a good thing about RP. And just because you can do worse by watching telly doesn't mean RP is good. Bad is still bad, even of there's worse out there.

Denying the downsides to your hobby tends to let you ignore them. Dealing with them is the better option.

Brookshw
2013-12-09, 09:54 AM
/shrug, not sure really on that note. Issues of cost? My hobby backpacking has racked up a good price tag. Same with cycling. Lots of hobbies cost money. Alienation? I haven't really encountered much in my adult life related to what I enjoy doing. I have friends that like going to clubs, I personally don't so. So we have some activities we don't do together, not a big deal. Clique forming? People tend to develop circles of friends, that's not uncommon or a problem generally. The downsides don't seem to be anything unique to this one activity, simply things that happen if you have one of many hobbies or those that normally come along with any social interaction.

Lorsa
2013-12-09, 10:07 AM
Denying the downsides to your hobby tends to let you ignore them. Dealing with them is the better option.

The problem with downsides is that most of them are in relation to something else. Unless it's easy to identify objectively like for example the disadvantage to professional boxing is getting a lot of hits to the head and professional Ice Hockey playing is loss of teeth.

If your choice is between roleplaying and running then obviously the disadvantage to roleplaying is loss of fitness/stamina. If it's between roleplaying and browsing facebook on your work computer then there's the added cost disadvantage with roleplaying.

However, I don't think roleplaying has any major objective disadvantages that are worth mentioning, like for example the aforementioned professional boxing.

Mastikator
2013-12-09, 10:10 AM
Roleplaying has introduced me to a lot of new friends and often inspires me to study about relevant things pertaining to the situation of the game.

Miss communications within the game has on some occasions caused strife between players (not me personally). Especially when there's a big difference between players's level of ambition concerning the game.
For example, one player bought a diary that he used as his characters diary, another wanted to build a character kit and even start an official government sponsored club based on our group.

There's also the problem of planning, people have lives and kids and jobs, so that tends to put huge stress on the group, it's usually what tears it apart in my experience.

But overall positive experience.

hymer
2013-12-09, 10:30 AM
The problem with downsides is that most of them are in relation to something else.

Why isn't that a problem when listing upsides, then?

Partysan
2013-12-09, 10:41 AM
Most has been mentioned already, but apart from giving me a social circle and teaching me much about myself, I also found that regularly taking the perspective of other persons and analyzing their motivations has vastly improved my capacity for empathy.

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-12-09, 11:03 AM
Roleplaying lets you get personal with your creativity, and to collude with other people who are doing the same thing.

That's a tremendous potential positive. It's also a tremendous potential detriment.

There's a reason that RPGs can get particularly tribal, because a gamer forms a sort of possessiveness, often, around a particular RPG system, around their character, around their gaming group, around the specific gaming culture that they're familiar with.

TheDarkSaint
2013-12-09, 11:41 AM
I am a teacher at a middle school and I formed an after school Sci-Fi club. I've taught the kids how to do several game types and it is wildly popular with my little geeklets.

Because I have to often justifiy what I'm doing because they pay me for it, I've come up with some reasons for roleplaying.

Positive self esteem growth: Many of my students have low self esteem and often have the heavy weight of puberty on their shoulders, telling them they are fat, ugly, stupid, nerdy and no good. Yet here is a game that is pretty much designed for you to exactly what you want and have a good chance of success. For a couple of my kids, it is the only time that they feel good about something they have done and its the only time I really see them happy in a world where they struggle a great deal. (I have high school kid volunteers come in to GM for me, they are under rules to not make it too tough)

Social skills practice: Many of my students exhibit signs of low self esteem with an inability to relate to someone else, be it in a positive or negative manner. I have both bullies and pushovers in my group and I see role playing games as a perfect way to show them how to interact with other people. Note: not in the game itself, relating to people at the table. Showing signs of being willing to work together is a big push I use, but sometimes I have to get as simple as teaching kids how ask another kids his/her name and using it instead of "hey you" because they are nervous that they forgot a name.

Social bonding: When you kill your first dragon together, it's a bonding experience. My friends back from High school with still role play with me even though we are on different sides of the world. For pre-teens and young teens, gaining social value, regardless of source, is incredibly important. If all of a sudden I'm the fighter of the group and the others need me for the dungeon, it helps me to feel connected to them, like some place that I belong.

A chance to take risks: the world of the pre-teen is awful. They are like little shark with each other and a mistake can dog someone for what feels like eternity. But if I make a mistake with my wizard, my friends in the game understand it's a game. Therefore, I can start taking risks. I can be brave and feel strong when I've mostly just felt weak and helpless.


Some draw backs to roleplaying is for people with really low self esteem, its just another way of trying to fill that hole. It's not just a game to have some fun with your friends, it becomes very important, worth getting angry or hurt over. Their characters become the most important, often Mary Sue like or overpowered munchkins. Those are the students that I have to work hardest with to help over come their large egos and tiny self esteems.

Hope this helps!

Joe the Rat
2013-12-09, 11:54 AM
TTRPG gives you a sort of social currency - anywhere you go, you can make a few local contacts by finding a gaming group. A very handy card to have when heading off to college. Most of my long-term cohort was met through or shared an interest in RPGs. This can be true of many hobbies, however.

RPGs can improve your: acting, improvisation, problem solving, accounting skills, understanding of probabilities, team building and teamwork, reading comprehension, and vocabulary. It also gives you a focus for practicing your artistry - illustration, crafting, fine motor skills from miniatures painting, etc. Many other hobbies will cover much of this ground, but this is one of the few where reading and socialization coincide, barring reading groups. Also, note the 'can' improve: some of us don't worry about the math, some of us never improve our writing (If you come with a big vocabulary and a penchant for purple prose, you might not get the framework to focus on becoming a more concise writer). It may be a blessing that what passes for acting in RPGs is not inflicted upon an audience. Depending on your system writers, you may learn a whole host of new Greek and Latin cognates, exposure to new languages, or look at a whole host of wikiwords - slamming two words together for a new name.

The primary drawback is social: Like it or not, gaming carries a negative stigma, being the definitive geek hobby.

It represents a decent investment in some combination of time, money, and focus. But this is not unique to gaming - modeling, crafting, and collecting hobbyists are much the same.

The nature of the game (a practical limit on the headcount for a single game/group) can promote subgrouping - becoming insular. At the same time, this is a hobby with multiple regional and (inter)national associations and conventions - you can share your experiences and perspectives with quite a large audience. So how is that different from an internet board...?

...that's all I got for now.

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-12-09, 11:57 AM
Another thing to keep in mind: roleplaying games require a diverse group of people to come together, and they all have very different motivations. Some are in it to master the game, some are in it to play the role they always wanted to play, some are in it to tell an interesting story in the world, some of them are in it to get time in the spotlight, and many of them are in it for a combination of these reasons, or for totally different reasons.

One problem that gamers always run into, if there's a lack of trust in the group, is that these different motivations and personalities clash heavily, and gamers don't often know how to handle it. RPGs are a rather complicated social activity, and those complications are not well-understood.

Necroticplague
2013-12-09, 12:12 PM
I find that the act of reading the books, building the characters, and then playing them practices several useful skills. Figuring out the rules of the game is a good example of reading legalese (including explicitly defined terms, literal interpretation, and use of jargon). Building and advancing the character is an excercise in planning and effective resource management. Peicing together a backstory, mannerisms, and other such fluff makes crafting (and acting out) other false personas easier. Playing and trying to circumvent tasks helps promote lateral thinking.

Sebastrd
2013-12-09, 01:10 PM
TTRPGs, especially DMing, are excellent practice for public speaking. Extemporaneous speeches, for example, are generally agreed to be the most difficult type of speech, and DMing basically consists of lots and lots of extemporaneous speaking.

Fear of public speaking is nearly universal in my experience, and DMing is great practice and builds confidence. It has given me, personally, a leg up on peers in my line of work.

BWR
2013-12-09, 02:33 PM
@ BWR: Pardon me for pointing this out, but your post seems awfully lopsided. Defensive, even.
You praise RP for getting you friends and a girlfriend. But it's not a problem that it's sitting flat on your butt, because so is watching TV.
You can do the reverse of those arguments and they work just as well. Pretty much all that good stuff is also part of any social hobby, so it's not a good thing about RP. And just because you can do worse by watching telly doesn't mean RP is good. Bad is still bad, even of there's worse out there.

Denying the downsides to your hobby tends to let you ignore them. Dealing with them is the better option.

You're right, that post is lopsided. I didn't intend to say I wouldn't have friends or girlfriends etc. without RPGs, nor that there is some special quality about RPGs that grants or increases chances of a good life that other hobbies don't have. I had friends before we started gaming.
All I'm saying is that the game is the centerpiece for most of my non-familiial and non-professional relationships. If not for RPGs I may very well have found some other hobby. But the fact is this is how it turned out.

hymer
2013-12-09, 02:36 PM
Okay. I'm glad you took it in the spirit intended. :smallsmile:

Terraoblivion
2013-12-09, 02:47 PM
The biggest benefit of RP'ing for me is quite simply that it's a social hobby. I tend towards being fairly reclusive so finding something that I can share with others has helped me a great deal. Especially since I don't like competitive pursuits very much and for various reasons I haven't felt very comfortable in organized politics either.

Another benefits for me personally is that it's an outlet for creativity while also providing a way of structuring it and focusing it so I don't get paralyzed by choice or not knowing what to do or where to start. I'll admit that this has been more the case since abandoning face to face RP'ing in favor of pbp and chat games, though. Finally, it serves as a controlled environment where I can try out many different social positions, screw up in controlled ways and so on in ways that I can't really do in real life.

For disadvantages, I haven't had many that relate to RP'ing as such. People don't judge me, partly because my family isn't inclined to judge in general and certainly not over being vaguely unusual and partly because I don't really bother talking much about it to random people. Not that I talk much to random people in the first place. Probably the biggest issue I've had is that there are some less than pleasant people among RP'ers and compared to a lot of other activities, they're accepted to a larger degree which can get uncomfortable, but it's not a major thing. Really, I'm not sure there are disadvantages as such other than opportunity cost, time I spend RP'ing I don't spend learning a musical instrument, how to draw or whatever, but that's more of a matter of preference than a real disadvantage. I imagine most hobbies are ultimately similar.

veti
2013-12-09, 04:59 PM
Mental arithmetic. When I played D&D regularly, I could tot up numbers, calculate probabilities and fractions in my head pretty much instantly. I'm pretty rusty now, but can still work things out faster in my head than most people can with a calculator.

NichG
2013-12-09, 05:19 PM
Why isn't that a problem when listing upsides, then?

Well the way I read Lorsa's point is that basically you're taking one downside that all hobbies have 'opportunity cost' and spinning it out into a list of all opportunities you could be missing, rather than just leaving it as 'opportunity cost'.

That is to say, tabletop gaming is sedentary, but being a tabletop gamer does not a priori preclude you from also working out at the gym, swimming several hours a week, etc. It can discourage this, but it does so by virtue of 'taking up time'. However, any focused activity 'takes up time'.

If you compare this to something like 'there is a social stigma associated with tabletop gaming' there is a qualitative difference between the two kinds of disadvantage. The former (opportunity-cost style) is based entirely on what else I could be doing with that time - if there is some new hobby that extends your life by a century for every hour you spend doing it, the 'opportunity cost' of every other hobby becomes dominated by 'it doesn't extend your life by a century for every hour you spend doing it'.

On the other hand, a cost of the second form is a fixed consequence for doing the activity, so it doesn't change when you change the set of things you could be doing instead. In other words, its more intrinsic to the hobby (or whatever one is discussing) in question.

Most upsides (get better at mental math, exercise problem solving abilities, etc) don't have the sort of opportunity-cost structure, but I would agree that things like 'socializing' do. That's because the benefits are based on opportunities for social connections and the like rather than the specific form of socialization taking place at the gaming table.

Terraoblivion
2013-12-09, 05:38 PM
Most upsides (get better at mental math, exercise problem solving abilities, etc) don't have the sort of opportunity-cost structure, but I would agree that things like 'socializing' do. That's because the benefits are based on opportunities for social connections and the like rather than the specific form of socialization taking place at the gaming table.

However, unless socializing is specifically read as networking that doesn't really matter, if your social needs are fulfilled by RP'ing it doesn't make much sense to say that you'd get to meet more people or spend more time with others partying. It's probably true, but it's irrelevant since the goal isn't to maximize amount and simply fulfilling your needs. Same with exercising creativity, you'd probably get to do it more if you spent the time on drawing or writing novels or whatever, but if you feel that RP'ing is fulfilling and meaningful to you that doesn't really matter.

Ultimately, I'd say that most of the benefits come down to personal experience of fulfilling needs that could potentially be fulfilled in other ways too. If there is any real benefit, it's the combination of socializing and exercising creativity, though there are still other opportunities for combining them. Amateur theater for example. It's more about whether the specific community suits you, it's creativity exercised in a way you personally enjoy and so on than that it's something unique to this specific hobby. Because outside skills uniquely used in a hobby, which are by definition not useful outside them, there aren't really any skills you can't learn somewhere else. There aren't really a lot of intrinsic drawbacks to most hobbies, at least not ones that aren't heavily physical or somehow politically controversial. So, really, it's mostly about personal preference and priorities in what sides you prefer training and expressing.

NichG
2013-12-09, 06:05 PM
However, unless socializing is specifically read as networking that doesn't really matter, if your social needs are fulfilled by RP'ing it doesn't make much sense to say that you'd get to meet more people or spend more time with others partying. It's probably true, but it's irrelevant since the goal isn't to maximize amount and simply fulfilling your needs. Same with exercising creativity, you'd probably get to do it more if you spent the time on drawing or writing novels or whatever, but if you feel that RP'ing is fulfilling and meaningful to you that doesn't really matter.


This is what I mean by 'intrinsic' versus 'opportunity cost' though. What I'm saying is, its better to focus on things that are intrinsically part of an activity than to ask 'how is this activity relative to other things I could be doing' when characterizing each activity separate, because (if one is doing a cost-benefit analysis at least) the second question belongs to a later stage of the process once one has accurately categorized the various activities one could be doing.

Is anyone going to use such a method to decide whether to play tabletop RPGs? Of course not. But from the point of view of an external evaluation of the activity such as this research essay, its better to keep things separate.

(Of course the problem with the idea of such essays/analyses is the underlying assumption that a list of broad benefits and drawbacks is the right way to determine what to do with your free time, which is nonsense; but given that the OP is a student who has been assigned an essay on the topic, they don't really have much choice on the matter so I don't think thats a fight that makes sense to be fought on this thread at least)


There aren't really a lot of intrinsic drawbacks to most hobbies, at least not ones that aren't heavily physical or somehow politically controversial. So, really, it's mostly about personal preference and priorities in what sides you prefer training and expressing.

I agree with this as well - the idea of an assignment to 'consider the downsides too' is really more about getting the student to develop the ability to see both sides of a story than finding the deep dark problems underlying the RPG culture - its just sort of a bad match in this case, since its specifically a subject (hobbies) where casting things in terms of 'upsides' and 'downsides' is pretty silly. That said, the OP still has to write their essay at the end of the day.

Terraoblivion
2013-12-09, 06:33 PM
Not sure there really are any intrinsic benefits, though. Pretty much everything people has stated as benefits are found in numerous places, even things like learning about history. I learned that a lot simply from enjoying reading about it as a kid, before I started studying it in a more formal manner, for example.

Ultimately both benefits and downsides can only be seen in terms of how the specific configuration in RP'ing compares to other activities, rather than simply as a listing of intrinsic features. It's creative, social and features a lot of incidental, if scattered, learning about a wide variety of topics, but it's not going to get you in shape, teach you music or get you a scholarship at a university. Just to give some examples of benefits and drawbacks and obviously all of them can be found in other activities too. So I think that a comparative approach will be more useful than trying to look for unique features or simply listing ones.

NichG
2013-12-09, 07:09 PM
Not sure there really are any intrinsic benefits, though. Pretty much everything people has stated as benefits are found in numerous places, even things like learning about history. I learned that a lot simply from enjoying reading about it as a kid, before I started studying it in a more formal manner, for example.

Ultimately both benefits and downsides can only be seen in terms of how the specific configuration in RP'ing compares to other activities, rather than simply as a listing of intrinsic features. It's creative, social and features a lot of incidental, if scattered, learning about a wide variety of topics, but it's not going to get you in shape, teach you music or get you a scholarship at a university. Just to give some examples of benefits and drawbacks and obviously all of them can be found in other activities too. So I think that a comparative approach will be more useful than trying to look for unique features or simply listing ones.

I think you're missing my point. Intrinsic doesn't mean exclusive. What I'm saying is that if you truly want to compare things, the best bet is to first delineate how they stand on their own, and then compare those things.

For example, lifting weights has the intrinsic benefit that it can build muscle tone in the arms. Rowing a boat also has the intrinsic benefit that it can build muscle tone in the arms. Rock climbing also has the same intrinsic benefit. A quantitative analysis could then basically ask 'what is the rate of muscle tone improvement per unit time for each of these?'.

The existence of rock climbing doesn't enhance or diminish the ability of lifting weights to build muscle tone - that's what I mean by intrinsic.

Similarly, these things may have various intrinsic drawbacks. Perhaps there is a certain risk of injury when rock climbing, or rowing a boat is expensive, or whatever.

If I want to say something like 'I would like to dedicate my time to the best way to build muscle tone' I can then look at my list of things with that intrinsic benefit, and then pick the one whose benefits best match my goal and whose drawbacks are the least problematic for me.

The reason to do it this way is that you can add or remove things from the list of comparables more easily. If I only ever measure the relative rate of muscle tone increase between lifting weights and rowing a boat, and someone comes up with some new activity, I have to then do another bunch of studies to directly compare all of them. If I just do a study that measures the muscle tone improvement of each on their own merits, then I can just compare the new numbers with the old ones and I don't have to revisit things I've already analyzed.

Brookshw
2013-12-09, 09:33 PM
I agree with your point but that's a horrible example. The variety of different exercises your comparison carry very benefits and are most certainly making my arms stronger. Quibble.

Lorsa
2013-12-10, 07:46 AM
Why isn't that a problem when listing upsides, then?
'
It's true that it should be as well, something I was contemplating while writing my previous post.

However, the benefits of something is usually taken only by its own merits, things you learn or get better at while performing said activity. Same with drawbacks, if they should be mentioned it should be based on purely the activity itself, something that objectively will get worse by doing it.

For example, the drawback of playing music is that your hearing will get impaired, especially at certain frequency ranges. This impairment might still be less than if you had spent your time firing a 9mm gun without earplugs or standing next to a jet engine, but it's still a drawback.

Lack of increased fitness isn't really an objective drawback in itself, as your fitness level and health doesn't really get worse (like it does with smoking), it simply doesn't get any better. The fact that you could improve other things by engaging in another activity isn't a drawback.

hymer
2013-12-10, 08:35 AM
@ Lorsa: Well, at any one time, you fitness is either declining slowly (doing nothing), declining quickly (in exercise, sickness, etc.), or improving (in restitution). Mixing occurs. But this is mostly me being pedantic.
You’ll always have to compare an activity to something else to get a sense of its pros and cons. Otherwise every hobby is just super-plus-nice compared to lying still with your eyes closed being bored out of your skull - i.e. compared to baseline 0.
As demonstrated with my bit of pedantry, nothing is ever completely neutral (unless you’re dead). RP is a hobby, and needs to be compared to other hobbies. Compared to watching TV, it is on average far superior (because it is a social activity, and it activates and stimulates your brain rather than causing it to go into even lower activity mode than when sleeping). Compared to playing a team sport, it is arguably inferior, because the team sport has all the social advantages of RP and one or two more.
When all we are talking about is the ‘value’ (apparently beyond ‘mere’ fun) of an activity, RP really doesn’t go among the best options for most people.
But roleplaying games are fun! We don’t need excuses to play. And we should not pretend that we’re playing for other reasons. It is not any better for us than so many other activities, other than it fits our particular tastes.

Now, we can talk about taking a break every two hours and going for a walk together, and playing in ways that make us be more active than by sitting in a chair for hours on end... :smallbiggrin:

KiCowboy
2013-12-10, 09:49 AM
Well, it seems like most of the basics have been touched on so I'll focus more on personal examples.

The biggest negative: Judgement/Misunderstanding

Though not the only issue, role playing was the focal point of ending a long term relationship. We met in school and continued until a couple years after college. In fairness, I didn't bring up my hobby for the first few months we dated because I wasn't sure how well it would go over. And sure, when I did bring it up she scrunched her face up like I was trying to feed her a bowl of rotten eggs. But thanks to the miracle of young love we ignored the elephant in the room a few years. Things came to a head after our engagement. Suddenly there always seemed to be some sort of crisis on Thursdays (our game night at the time). Noticing a pattern and trying to be supportive, I stopped playing on Thursdays. When my friends were able to coordinate a different game night, somehow that would be precisely when something would come up. When I tried to ask what was up, I was caught off guard that her response was "your gamer friends aren't invited to the wedding." And then the flood gates broke. She didn't want to have to introduce this circle of friends to her family and "normal" friends. She said she had felt embarrassed of me for a long time, and had grown to resent me because every time her circle asked about me she felt the urge to lie or avoid the topic of role playing. From everything she had been taught to believe, this hobby wasn't something a "real" man would do. It didn't matter that I was loving, faithful, had a good job, and provided a nice home. "Why can't you just go to the bar, or play poker, or anything normal?" "I dunno, I thought you'd just grow up and quit it." It wasn't an immediate break after that, but new lines of communication opened up and we eventually learned we wouldn't be happy long-term. I learned plenty during the interim, and if nothing else learned plenty of skills for balancing real life with my hobby. Oh yeah, and that whole "only settle for someone who is happy with you as you, not who they want you to be" thing - that too. Hidden positive in the negative and all that. I married a wonderful woman who may not be into joining our long term campaigns, but enjoys listening in from time to time. "I love hearing the way you all laugh when you're together. You sound as happy as kids in a sandbox." Upon showing her the name of this website: "Yes. Yes, that's it exactly."

The big positive: Communication/Confidence

So, I had speech problems when I was younger. Not only was I a stutterer, but I was also prone to spoonerisms ("paper towels" might come out "taper powels") Speech therapy helped a bit, but if I got stressed (and goodness knows we never experience stress in middle school or high school, right?) old habits would resurface. Meanwhile, one of my friends had been trying to get me to try out role playing. And yes, given the above entry I know it will sound hypocritical, but I avoided at first because it sounded weird (plus a hobby that consisted of a lot if talking sounded terrifying.) But, being the devious (kind hearted?) sort that he was, a plan was formed. He told me I wouldn't have to think about how I sounded in game - that was somebody else. That was just a character. Larg the Barbarian came first. Loud, stupid, but confident. Then Colmdran the Paladin. Loud, stupid, but confident. Around this point my friend pointed out I didn't seem to trip up my speech near as much in game. I hadn't really thought about it after a while - I was just having fun. Hmm... Why not a rogue? Or a bard? Why yes, of course I could be quite eloquent in the context of the game without the normal social pressures! And then, devious (kind hearted?) sort that he was, my friend proposed another plan. I was still personally terrified of public speaking - I cringed at the thought of speeches or presentations. But, what if I pretended it was my bard giving the presentation, not me? My initial response was to say that sounded ridiculous. My friend asked if I thought actors always behaved the same way they appear in movies - or if maybe they just had a stage persona? I relented, and I tried his idea. And to be honest, it still felt forced and weird at first. But somehow, after a long enough period of pretending to be confident, pretending to be a good speaker - it grew into a real skill set. Now it seems like a lifetime ago I was scared to open up or talk in front of others. Oh, and extra bonus: that friend the best man at my wedding and I was the best man at his. I gave a damned fine speech at that wedding too :smallbiggrin:

ElenionAncalima
2013-12-10, 10:03 AM
I wouldn't exactly call it a demerit, but perhaps for the essay you could discuss the need for social contract between players and the potential pitfalls of a collaborative gaming experience.

For instance you could talk about how groups have to handle the challenges of:
1. Roleplaying mature themes/What are players comfortable roleplaying.
2. Handling character conflicts and keeping those arguments separate from real world relationships.
3. Managing the balance of power between the GM and the players.

SimonMoon6
2013-12-10, 11:14 AM
Potential drawbacks: Players may become desensitized towards matters of violence and racism.

In a setting in which most problems are solved not through talking things out but by acts of violence that typically lead to the deaths of one party or the other, players may become used to the idea that violence can solve all their problems.

Furthermore, in a setting in which one can determine whether or not someone is an enemy based solely on their appearance (such as short green guys with pointed ears... or curvaceous black-skinned beauties with white hair), one may become used to the idea that race is a useful tool for discriminating against others, that it might be "correct" to "hold one's ground" against someone with dark skin wearing a hood.

Eh, what do I know?

LeoLionxxx
2013-12-10, 03:24 PM
A warm thank you to everyone who has posted up to this point, and most of all to those who have posted their own unique experiences/stories about gaming. I've gotten some superb insight and ideas for what I can write, and quite probably a few testimonials I can quote :)

I've decided I won't talk any about the demerits of TTRPGs, due to it clashing with my thesis statement, except those I can deviously twist into benefits - such as gaming being such a foreign concept to some that they get curious, try it and love it.

Cheers
2013-12-10, 04:14 PM
I've decided I won't talk any about the demerits of TTRPGs, due to it clashing with my thesis statement, except those I can deviously twist into benefits

Now that's not very honest :) You sould never write a thesis with a conclusion in mind, the greatest discoveries are made when we least suspect them. And writing with a goal in mind will cause you to miss them (and it's not very ethic from a science point of view). But then again I do like some positive publicity for my favourite hobby so.....

As for me personally I started both LARP and DnD as a DM so my view is rather skewed as are the things I learned from them.
Above all else I learned to be more spontaneous, improvising a scene or a character background and acting to it requires to really let go of everything you know and go with the moment. Not knowing where things end up is half the fun. Especially as DM.
I'd say LARP is more difficult. As a DnD DM you can simply say; "give me a minute" or describe something in an OC way. In a LARP you're down the deep end. You can't interrupt the scene or a conversation AT ALL and breaking immersion is a big faux-pas.
Then again DnD is far more rules heavy and requires a more analytical improvisation, immediatly comming up with DC, appropiate reactions of dozens of characters and situational skill checks is very different from the deep but narrow of LARP a single character.

Anyway, just my 2c. As for social stigmatization I got lucky. I'm from Belgium and the most negative reaction I ever got was; "That's weird." :smallsmile:

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-12-10, 04:23 PM
It's not a 100% trend, but I've noticed that D&D in particular often tends to fix certain conventions in players' minds and render them inflexible and unaccepting of campaigns and/or stories that run in different styles. I'm not sure why that is, though.

Terraoblivion
2013-12-10, 04:56 PM
It's not a 100% trend, but I've noticed that D&D in particular often tends to fix certain conventions in players' minds and render them inflexible and unaccepting of campaigns and/or stories that run in different styles. I'm not sure why that is, though.

That's certainly true. To the point where some D&D players complain about magic in stories that aren't based on D&D not conforming to the standards of D&D. I remember an old discussion about the Yellow Emperor's kung-fu in Weapons of the Gods. Some people insisted that it couldn't be martial mastery that led him to it since it was clearly supernatural, so he must have engaged in scholarly research and that by extension he had to be kind of scrawny. This naturally flies in the face of both the text presented and the entire concept of the supernatural as it exists in the system and by extension the Daoist mysticism that the system is heavily based on.