Greetings All,

If you were to read a article or essay about role-playing games what would interest you the most?

What sort of information would you most definitely want to see included?

Why I ask..

In order to put the "GNS Theory" and "Threefold Models" into proper historical and relational context I have decided to expand my original effort at writing up a article/essay into a full blown regular encyclopdia article, one covering the Role-Playing Game; period. (Big period, that!) While I think I have a good start, for some of the material, it is really on a primer...

Which is where the fine, knowledgeable, and ever so ready to help others members of The Forge come into the picture.

What I am looking for is feedback with comments, suggestions, questions about what the heck I am doing, proposals, and any ideas you'd like to offer. Look over the outline. Have a chuckle, sip your soda, check the scores on the big game then let me know what you think.




• What would you like to see in a encyclopdeia article about the role-playing game?

• Do you think something important might have been left out of the outline below?

• Do you think the organisation of topics could be better, how?

• Do you consider this sort of thing a waste of time?




Going into Draft 5 the revision of the original raw entry posted here and here I have a rough outline that presently looks like this:


"Role-Playing Games"

This article (at present) will be divided into four main divisions dealing with the various aspects of role-playing, as follows:

I. The Game

?. Chief Principles of Play
?. Objective of Play
?. Method of Play
?. Social Context
?. ??

II. History

1. Origins
2. Developments of Play
?. ??


III. Theories of Play

1. "Roll vs. Role" Gaming
2. Threefold Model
3. GNS Theory
?. ??


IV. Illustrative Games

?. ??




Kind Regards,

Kester Pelagius