What if RPGs, instead of being invented by Dave Arneson in the early 1970’s, had existed throughout history?

We know that authors like Terry Pratchett, Glen Cook, David Lindsay-Abaire, and George R.R. Martin all played RPGs. What other authors might have done the same, if only they had had the opportunity?

For this social media parody project — collected here for the first time — I modified well-known literary quotes to reflect a tabletop perspective.

“Love not too well the rolls of thy hands & the devices of your character sheet.” – J.R.R. Tolkien, The Vecnallion

“Roleplay all you can; it’s a mistake not to. It doesn’t so much matter what you play in particular, so long as you have your roleplaying.” – Henry James, The Dungeon Masters

“Ever rolled. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” – Samuel Beckett, Westmarch Ho

“If you don’t try at anything you can’t fail… it takes backbone to make the rolls you want.” – Richard Yates, Revolutionary Teleportation Circle

“When we roleplay, we always strive to become better than we are. When we strive to become better than we are, the whole table becomes better, too.” – Paulo Coelho, The Magic-User

“As a Game Master, you need to learn how to select when to roll just the same way you select your clothes every day. That is a power you can cultivate.” – Elizbaeth Gilbert; Eat, Pray, Roll

“Beware; for I am possessed of Fate Points. And therefore powerful.” – Mary Shelley, Frankenstein’s Game Master

“It does not do to dwell on balance and forget to play, remember that.” – J.K. Rowling, Elminster and the Philosopher’s Stone

“If you are interested in roleplaying, go at it at full speed. Lukewarm is no good. Hot is no good either. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.” – Roald Dahl, My Uncle Arneson

“Nothing that’s worthwhile ever has a low Difficulty Class.” – Nicholas Sparks, Handout in a Bottle

“Above all, don’t fudge to yourself.” – Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Game Masters Karamazov

“It is sometimes an appropriate response to a Sanity check to go insane.” – Philip K. Dick, Azeroth

“If I got rid of my PCs, I’d lose my NPCs.” – Tennessee Williams, Conversations with a Game Master

“The GM is a cunning weaver of fantasies and fables.” – Sappho

“It is a far, far better crit I roll, than I have ever rolled before; it is a far, far better long rest I go to than I have ever known before.” – Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Modules

“I roleplay. Sometimes I think that’s the only right thing I do.” – Haruki Murakami, Spelljammer Sweetheart

“Yes: I am a roleplayer. For a roleplayer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.” – Oscar Wilde, The Critic as Game Master

“When you are GMing, you might as well imagine something worthwhile.” – Lucy Maud Montgomery, Anne of Icespire Peak

“I don’t want to die without any Twilight Scars.” – Chuck Palahniuk, Ars Magica Club

“If we wait until we’re fully prepped, we’ll be waiting for the rest of our lives.” – Lemony Snicket, The Ersatz GM

“Whenever you feel like critting anyone … just remember that all the characters of this world haven’t had the advantages you’ve had.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Volothamp

“Made weak by Fort and Ref, but strong in Will. To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” – “Arneson,” Alfred Lord Tennyson

“It is impossible to discourage the real Dungeon Masters. They don’t give a damn what you say, they’re going to run.” – Sinclair Lewis, The Innocents: A Story for NPCs

“You Game Mastered and I was longing for you. You cooled a heart that burned with desire.” – Sappho

“Whatever ability arrays our characters are made of, his and mine are the same.” – Emily Bronte, Wuthering Dungeon

“You don’t know an NPC until you’ve fought them.” – Shi Nai’an, Outlaws of the Waterdeep

“Reality exists in the players’ minds and nowhere else.” – George Orwell, 1484 DR: The Year of the Awakened Sleepers

“It was the best of campaigns, it was the worst of campaigns.” – Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Modules

“Nothing in the campaign is difficult. Only the Game Master makes it so.” – Wu Cheng’en, Journey to the Keep on the Borderlands

“The best GMs are those that tell you what you know already.” – George Orwell, 1484 DR: The Year of the Awakened Sleepers

“He knew everything about D&D except how to enjoy it.” – Joseph Heller, Roll-22

“Meeting an NPC of fame is better than just hearing his name.” – Shi Nai’an, Outlaws of the Waterdeep

“The party seeks XP entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in XP – pure XP.” – George Orwell, 1484 DR: The Year of the Awakened Sleepers

“Treasure is a handful of dirt from your home. Love not ten thousand taels of dungeon gold.” – Wu Cheng’en, Journey to the Keep on the Borderlands

“If you only run the adventures that everyone else is running, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.” – Haruki Murakami, Barovian Wood

“‘Are you ready?’ the Dungeon Master asked at last. ‘No,” the player answered. ‘Me neither,’ said another. ‘But if we wait until we’re ready we’ll be waiting for the rest of our lives. Let’s play!'” – Daniel Handler, The Ersatz Campaign

“All happy RPG groups are alike; each unhappy RPG group is unhappy in its own way.” – Leo Tolstoy, Tatyana Karenina

“Tomorrow I’ll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another session.” – Margaret Mitchell, GM With the Wind

“It is a truth universally that a single GM in possession of a good campaign must be in want of a player.” – Jane Austen, Play and Prejudice

“We need never be ashamed of our critical failures.” – Charles Dickens, Roleplaying Expectations

“Nowadays people know the DPS of everything and the value of nothing.” – Oscar Wilde, The Min-Max of Dorian Gray

“How do we know that 2 and 2 make 4? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and external world exist only in the DM’s mind, and if the DM itself is controllable – what then?” – George Orwell, 1484 DR: Year of the Awakened Sleeper

“No GM, for any considerable period, can roll one dice for himself and another for the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be true.” – Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Prep Notes

“D&D, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.” – James Joyce, Ulysses

“RPG sessions warm you up from the inside. But they also tear you apart.” – Haruki Murakami, Gygax on the Shore

“There is an idea of Elminster, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real me, only something illusory. Though you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe even sense our spells are comparable: I simply am not there.” – Bret Easton Ellis, Waterdeep Psycho

“It’s much better to fudge in a way that no one knows anything about it.” – Leo Tolstoy, Tatyana Karenina

“We were the NPCs who were not in the sourcebooks. We lived in the blank white spaces at the edges of prep. It gave us more freedom. We lived in the gaps between the sessions.” – Margaret Atwood, The Barmaid’s Tale

“He who controls the dice controls the future.” – George Orwell, 1484 DR: The Year of the Awakened Sleepers

“The only roleplayers for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to play, mad to talk, mad to fight, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous roman candles.” – Jack Kerouac, On the Battlemap

“Some players get the world, some players get a killer GM and a railroad to Arizona.” – James Ellroy, Waterdeep Confidential

“An RPG is to be lived, not controlled.” – Ralph Ellison, Invisible Game Master

“Maybe ever’body in the whole damn campaign is scared of each other.” – John Steinbeck, Of Goblins and Men

“Nothing succeeds like success.” – Alexandre Dumas, Six Years Fudging

“Come forth into the light of things, let dice be your teacher.” – William Wordsworth, The Random Tables Turned

And now, with all these fanciful quotes fresh in our minds, here is a final quote which is completely real and which I find inspirational in creating RPGs:

“Work on a good piece of writing has three steps: a musical stage where it is composed; an architectural one where it is built; and a textile one where it is woven.” – Walter Benjamin, One-Way Street

In this video, CGP Grey lays out four criteria which determines whether or not an animal can be domesticated:

• Feedable. You need a bunch of grass to feed one cow, but you’ll need a bunch of cows to feed one tiger. So you domesticate herbivores, not carnivores. (And the herbivore shouldn’t be a picky eater.)
• Friendly. Whether carnivore, herbivore, or omnivore, you need an animal that isn’t dangerous, panicky, or both.
• Fecund. You generally want animals that breed a lot, and you absolutely need animals who will breed in captivity. They also need to reproduce frequently enough that you can selectively breed them to effect over the course of a single human lifetime.
• Family Friendly. Animals that have a social hierarchy lend themselves to domestication because we can exploit those instincts in order to herd them and lead them.

You can cheat a little bit around the edges here and there, but you basically need all four of these things to be true in a single animal in order to make it a candidate for domestication, which is why — despite there being thousands and thousands of animal species on this planet — we’ve only domesticated about fifteen or so.

(We can also domesticate plants, but for the purposes of this essay I’m largely going to ignore that.)

When it comes to worldbuilding, however, something interesting happens in fantastical settings: Magic can bypass — often trivially bypass — these barriers to domestication.

For example, in the real world we could never domesticate bears: They’re feedable (in practice, up to 90% of a bear’s diet is actually planet matter). They’re fecund (having litters of two to six cubs every couple of years). They have a family hierarchy you could hypothetically take advantage of (positioning yourself as the Mama Bear).

But it’s just too easy for humans to become tasty bear snacks.

With magic, though, you could employ charm or even dominate effects to avoid becoming a bear snack while selectively breeding your captive bear population for tameness so that, eventually, you would no longer need to use the magical effects.

This is also a good time to briefly discuss the difference between taming an animal and domesticating it: An animal is tamed when it is behaviorally conditioned to safely cohabit and even work with humans. An animal is domesticated when a population becomes genetically modified to have a predisposition towards and advantage for humans.

So with some fantastical elements of magic, alchemy, or genetics, you can just bypass this entire discussion by waving your hand and saying something like, “I’ve magically altered the creatures so that they and their descendants are instantly predisposed to humans.” But, in my opinion, taking the longer path has a distinctly different feel to it — it feels more societal, rather than mad scientist. (Your mileage may vary.)

In any case, you can see how magic and megafauna can give food security that historically didn’t exist for our ancestors; mitigate the risks from otherwise dangerous animals; or, as with the bears, make them subservient in the absence of a natural hierarchy.

Magic could also speed up breeding cycles, but that’s not even necessary if your fantastical setting includes long-lived species. Elephants take too long between generations for a single individual to selectively breed them and reap the benefits? Not if the breeder is an elf.

EFFECTS ON THE CREATURE

At this point we’ve more or less given ourselves permission to take advantage of the entire animal kingdom, simply asking ourselves how a domesticated (and/or trained) version of that animal might prove useful:

• Mercenaries with war bear auxiliaries.
• River barges pulled by domesticated dolphins.
• Zebra mounts.

With a sufficiently decadent civilization, it doesn’t even have to be that useful, just aesthetically pleasing:

• Hummingbird messengers.
• Giraffes bearing noble palanquins.
• Songbirds providing orchestral performances.

As we’re considering these almost limitless possibilities, it might also be useful to keep in mind the effects that domestication can have on the animals themselves: We made pigs larger, engorged cow udders, and added almost ruinous amounts of fluff to our sheep. So you can always ask yourself, “What if this… but more?” (Or less, if that’s appropriate.) Not just zebra mounts, but zebra ponies and draft zebras, too.

It’s also notable that the mere act of domestication itself can apparently have an effect on a creature’s appearance. For example, in the mid-20^th century Soviet scientists began a multigenerational experiment (still ongoing) to domesticate wild foxes. They did this strictly by selecting the tamest foxes in each generation and breeding them.

Selecting for tameness alone, however, also resulted in the domesticated foxes gaining:

• curly fur
• multicolored coats
• floppy ears
• shortened, curly tails

So could we imagine domesticated bears with floppy ears and curly hair? Yes. Yes, we could. And absolutely should.

EFFECTS ON THE WORLD

When you introduce a fantastical domestication, deepen its connection to your setting and fully integrate it into the campaign world by coming up with at least three distinct impacts the domestication has. For example, domesticated chickens mean:

• Chicken coops exist where they’re raised.
• Eggs are served at breakfast.
• Criminals were punished by tarring and feathering them.

And that’s obviously barely even scratching the surface, but if domesticated chickens didn’t actually exist, it would give us a good start at reflecting their presence in the world (even in scenes where there are no chickens directly present).

So if we had merpeople domesticating sharks, we would want to similarly have:

• Necklaces made from shark teeth as a popular fashion item.
• A military academy where shark-riders train and bond with their mounts.
• Shark races with circuits running through underwater grottoes.

And so forth.

NON-HUMAN DOMESTICATION

On that note, let’s remember that we’ve defined a domesticated animal as one that has been genetically modified to have a predisposition towards and advantage for humans.

But in a fantasy world, humans aren’t the only species capable of domesticating animals.

Thus, for example, our merpeople domesticating sharks in ways that land-bound humans would never be motivated to do.

What would dwarves find uniquely useful? Perhaps a bioluminescent worm to serve as their light and tunnel companion?

What about a lich? What needs do the undead have that humans do not? Or vice versa?

And we’re not limited to humanoids, either. If dragons decide to start domesticating stuff, what does that look like?

And, in fact, are the sapient species just what you end up with when the gods domesticate for their needs?

“Okay, we need something that breeds like a plague and has a predilection for idolatry.”

How deep does this rabbit hole go? And if fast-breeding populations are what the gods need, how nervous should the human kingdoms be about the new lapin-folk migrating from the Great Plains? Have you noticed that Artemis isn’t answering as many prayers as she used to?

Wish you could keep roleplaying forever? The forgotten techniques of bluebooking will let you keep playing anywhere and anytime. You’ll be able to explore your character and the campaign in completely new ways, adding depth and creativity to every adventure. ENnie Award-winning RPG designer Justin Alexander gives you the simple tip and tricks you need.

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The Red Company of Goldsmiths is maintained as a small subsidiary of the Goldsmiths’ Guild (which, in turn, is largely controlled by the Ironworkers’ Guild). The Vladaams maintain it primarily to launder stolen funds and goods from their other enterprises.

Gold Strips: Suitable for crafting. Each strip is marked with the “V” sigil of the Vladaams (making them easily traceable).

Goldsmiths: Use artisan stats, Ptolus, p. 606.

• Proficiency (+2): Jeweler’s Tools
• Equipment: 1d10 x 1d10 gp, jeweler’s tools, Vladaam deot ring

Guildsman District
Gold Street – E9

AREA 1 – GOLDSMITHY

Gilted worktables with comfortable seats fill the room.

DAY: There’s roughly 8,000 gp worth of gold strips and 5,000 gp of jewelry in this room. 12 sets of jeweler’s tools.

NIGHT: The tools have been tidied away and the gold strips/jewelry moved to Area 2: Gold Safe.

SAFE DOOR (10-in. iron, to Area 2): AC 19, 300 hp, DC 24 Dexterity (Thieves’ Tools). An alarm spell is keyed to Guildmaster Telidor.

SECRET DOOR: DC 30 Intelligence (Investigation) check. The wall is hollow and this section is designed to be unscrewed.

AREA 2 – GOLD SAFE

The safe contains 25 pp, 350 gp, and 1,300 sp. It also contains large, heavy stacks of gold strips totaling 32,000 gp in value.

NIGHT: An additional 8,000 gp in gold strips and 5,000 gp of jewelry (secured from Area 1).

DC 20 Intelligence (Investigation): There is a hidden compartment in the tiled steel floor of the safe. It holds a number of small, mimatched bags containing 3,116 gp, 43,457 sp, and 103,900 cp.

DM Background: This money flows in from all the illegal operations of the Vladaams. After being held here, it’s transferred from the Goldsmiths’ Guild to legitimate banks.

AREA 3 – GUILD GATHERING HALL

A long, heavy table of polished oak runs the length of this room. A chandelier of wrought gold and rubies, lit with continual flame, hangs from the ceiling (5,000 gp value).

AREA 4 – GUILDMASTER’S OFFICE

A tidy, well-sorted desk. A gold inkwell (worth 100 gp) stands on top of the desk.

DESK: Ordinary guild correspondence is neatly stacked in one drawer; blank parchment and quills in another. A third drawer holds a black velvet pouch containing 770 gp.

• DC 14 Intelligence (Investigation): One of the drawers has a false bottom. DC 20 Dexterity (Thieves’ Tools) to open. It contains paperwork relating to the money laundering operations of the guild. There’s usually enough compromising material here to reveal 1d4+2 pieces of uncommon and 1d3 pieces of rare information from the Vladaam gather information tables.

AREA 5 – SMUGGLING HOLE

This appears to be a small, dusty, and forgotten room with a dirt floor.

DC 24 Intelligence (Investigation): Scraping away about a half inch of dirt reveals a trap door leading down to a tunnel which leads under the city wall and emerges about 500 feet away in a small copse of trees.

DM Background: This smuggling hole has not seen much use in recent years. (The Vladaams don’t want to attract unnecessary attention to a guild that’s very successfully laundering their money. But the Guildmaster and a few others in the guild are aware of its existence.)

GUILDMASTER TELIDOR

A striking woman with long black hair plaited with golden wire. She wears a beautiful golden necklace depicting a phoenix being consumed by flames formed from three large and several small red-gold tourmalines (3,000 gp). She also has a pair of matching bracelets, which are actually bracelets of friends (keyed to Navanna twice, Gattara once, Godfred once, Aliastar once, Marcus Corellius twice, and her two bodyguards).

Through her black market work and money laundering with the Vladaams, Telidor has become a very rich woman. As a result, over the past decade her social circle has rapidly escalated. And she likes it. Her ambition has led her to consider buying a familial share in House Abanar in order to raise her star even higher; the only thing holding her back is a fear of retaliation from the Vladaams.

Guildmaster Telidor: Use knight stats, MM p. 347, except she uses a cudgel (1d8+3 bludgeoning) and hand crossbow (1d6 piercing) for her attacks and she has Wisdom 15 (+2).

• Proficiency (+2): Jeweler’s Tools
• Equipment: bracelet of friends (x2), phoenix necklace (3,000 gp), diamond ring (250 gp), Vladaam deot ring
• Bracelet of Friends: This silver charm bracelet has four charms upon it when created. As a bonus action, the owner may designate one person known to them to be keyed to one charm. When a charm is grasped and the name of the keyed individual is spoken as an action, that person is called to the spot, along with their gear, as long as the owner and the called person are on the same plane. The keyed individual knows who is calling, and the bracelet functions only on willing travelers. Once a charm is activated, it disappears. Charms separated from the bracelet are worthless.

Telidor’s Bodyguards (Harla & Jarla): Female lizardfolk. Use gladiator stats, MM p. 348.

• Proficiency (+3): Perception, Stealth, Survival
• Equipment: flaming claw tips (Harla) / frost claw tips (Jarla), javelin of lightning (x2), potion of superior healing, Vladaam deot ring
• Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 7 (1d6+4) piercing damage.
• Hold Breath. Lizardfolk can hold their breath for 15 minutes.
• Flaming Claw Tips: +1 to attacks and +2d6 fire damage.
• Frost Claw Tips: +1 to attacks and +2d6 cold damage.

Go to Part 13: Red Company of Magi

Roleplay Rescue invited me onto their podcast to talk about the upcoming So You Want To Be a Game Master! Our far-ranging conversation talks a lot about RPG scenario design and the Big Secret every new GM should know.

This episode is the final one for this season – no, really – and it’s my pleasure to bring you a conversation about a significant new book for the RPG scene.

Justin Alexander is a freelance writer and the author of the grand repository of ideas that is The Alexandrian. This is an interview with Justin about his forthcoming book, released in November 2023, So You Want To Be A Game Master.

Big thanks up front to Justin for agreeing to come and talk about his new book – it truly was another joyous and interesting conversation. I hope you find it illuminating too!

Listen Now!

You can find links to my two previous appearances on Roleplay Rescue at the Alexandrian Auxiliary.