(TFT) Is TFT a role playing or board game?

["Ray Rangel" <ray.rangel@cox.net>]

The recent conversation has got me musing over what a role playing game
really is. But, before I begin, please understand that these are my own
thoughts and mental meanderings and nothing more. With that said...

I've been playing, first strategic board games, then tabletop historical
miniatures games, and in the last few years various RPGs, since I was
eighteen. That's about thirty-five years. The one universal element that
I've found in all of those years of gaming is that everyone role plays. The
miniatures gamer oversees the deployment and movement of his vast Napoleonic
army and soon take on the role of Marshall Ney, Davout, or Bonaparte
himself. Many is the miniature or paper battle that has been fought on the
border of Natal and Zululand where the players have assumed the role of the
stiff upper lipped Victorian officer or the proud brave Zulu prince fighting
for their lives at Rourke's Drift.

Yet we generally don't consider these role playing games. Why not? I think
that it is question of game design and intent rather than how is a game is
actually used. The miniatures rules or board game focus is on the mechanics
of play on the tabletop or board. The definitions and rules provided apply
to movement, combat, and morale of the playing pieces (whether cardboard
chits or miniature soldiers). Any role playing is left up to the players and
their understanding of historical (or fictional) personalities. The
objective in the miniatures or board game is to win.

Of course there are role playing games (or roleplaying, as it has become one
word in the industry and gaming community and RPG for short). These games
are specifically designed to provide the players a framework on which to
build a character or characters of which they assume the roles and act
accordingly. The objective of the RPG is to assume the guise of a character
and to play.

Of course, these descriptions represent the poles. There are an infinite
number of variation between them with many games borrowing elements from the
other in varying degrees. In my opinion, TFT is pretty darn close to the
equator. It, obviously, has strong elements of board gaming--it also has
strong elements of role playing games. I suppose this is why it is so easy
to have contention when talking about TFT. In any given situation or rules
discussion, one must first determine whether the correspondents are viewing
the topic from one pole, the other, pole or the same pole. This is can be
very difficult, in my opinion, because TFT lies on the midpoint and, thus
both points of view--while different--are valid.

Anyhow...I hope you all will excuse my ramblings on this quite Sunday
morning. My intent is not to convince anyone of anything; rather to simply
talk about my personal outlook and thoughts on TFT as happy medium between a
board game and a role playing game.

 
Ray Rangel
ray.rangel@cox.net
http://xraysvision.blogspot.com/
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