Definitions of terms

Note:  some common game-related terms are defined in the rules.

Your typical treasure-hunting, homeless ne'er-do-well that goes around and stirs up trouble for the locals.  Sometimes they accidentally do something positive and get branded “heroes.”  Of course, they let it go to their heads.

Some alternate names for adventurers are “murder hobos,” “tomb robbers” and “damned thieves.”

Basic Fantasy Roleplaying Game (or BFRPG, for short), is a fantasy roleplaying game that is reminiscent of the weird mishmash games we used to play back in the '80s, taking our B/X rules and mixing in bits from AD&D liberally.  It's the ruleset that we'll be using for this game.

I like it because it feels like old-school D&D, it's easy to run and houserule, it works pretty much seamlessly with old-school material and it doesn't hurt that it's free.  It doesn't have race-as-class, which some people like; also, it has ascending armor class, which is easier for some people to wrap their heads around.

A campaign is typically series of interrelated adventures that form the basis of a story line or story arc (intentional or not).

Since this campaign is a sandbox, the stories are interrelated in the sense that they take place in the same setting and often with some of the same characters.  While there are story lines that are happening that players may choose for their characters to become involved in there are no rails that the players must follow to continue the story.

Cat Piss Man is a gamer stereotype that is the worst specimen among gamers (or anime fans, Trekkies or any other category of fandom).  Named for the odor that surrounds him, the only thing worse than Cat Piss Man's smell is his social skills.¹⁾

Unfortunately, a lot of people picture this guy when RPGs are mentioned.

Classic D&D can encompass various games; it definitely includes the original D&D boxed set (also known as OD&D), and typically includes both the Holmes Basic D&D set and Moldvay B/X D&D.  Basically, early forms of (boxed-set) D&D.

Depending on who you talk to, it may also include the first edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (since, in many ways, it was basically OD&D with the original supplements and then some, and was published starting in the mid-to-late 1970s), and also could go so far as to include BECMI or Rules Companion D&D.  Essentially, apart from small details, they are interchangeable and are often mashed up together into a frankengame that is still recognizable D&D.

This also tends to include some retro-clone games that such as OSRIC, Basic Fantasy RPG, Labyrinth Lord and Old School Essentials that use most of the mechanics and capture the feel of Classic D&D.

The mechanical elements of a roleplaying game.  The rules, especially the ones that aren't core to the game.  Contrast with fluff.

Dissociated mechanics are the crazy-quilt, layer-upon layer of varying resolution rules for every subsystem of old-school role playing games.  One thing uses a pile of d6s, thief skill use percentile dice, saving throws and attacks use a d20, another check uses 2d6 plus modifiers… every one a little different and has different rules for modifiers.  Sometimes there's a rule for something that is well-defined, but in a given spell, monster or adventure locale description there's an entirely different mechanic specified just for that situation.

Dissociated mechanics drive some gamers mad.  I love 'em.

The thing is, each subsystem has its own flavor.  I like that.  Each one must be considered its own entity.  The chances and nuances are different; they feel different.  Not everything is boiled down to one consistent die roll that they have to conform to; players (or DMs even) know what the real chances may be.  That's a good thing; it keeps you on your toes and keeps the game from being so mechanical.

Another way of describing rule zero.

In classic D&D the player who is the referee of the game, and may be the chief narrator or storyteller of the game (in a sense).  Other games have many names for this role, the generic name being game master.

A set of observances for online roleplaying (originally described here), typically but not exclusively in D&D-like fantasy RPGs.  They allow for players to make a single character and take it between disparate campaigns (so you can always be Fred the Fighter or Marty the Magician in every game you play in, gathering experience and loot in different worlds).

The non-mechanical elements of a roleplaying game.  Typically, the setting and background material.  Compare to crunch.

The roleplaying version of “always a bridesmaid, never a bride.”  The person who is always running games for friends, rarely getting to play.

Some people prefer this (like me!).

See Dungeon Master.

Grognard is actually French for “old soldier,” but it's become a term in roleplaying by way of wargames.  Essentially, it's someone who likes to play the older games and/or been playing for a long time.

To some (like me), it's a badge of honor.  To some, it's a derisive term.

There's an endless debate about whether being a grognard means that you just prefer the older games, or more rules-lite style, or it's about nostalgia.

A hexcrawl is typically overland adventuring where encounters are defined at one or two per hex or alternately a very detailed hex may be broken down into several smaller hexes on a separate map for more detail.  They are typically (but not necessarily!) part of a sandbox campaign, although not all hexcrawls are sandboxes.

In this sense, a hexcrawl begins to resemble a dungeon crawl, and a very large (continent- or world-spanning) hexcrawl may resemble a megadungeon in that there may be tracts that are empty but there are still encounters, “factions” may be local leaders or monsters or monster groups that can control a region, etc.

A modification of rules-as-written that becomes a permanent feature of a group's playing rules.  Essentially, a modification that a group plays by that gives their game some local flavor or reflects the group's playstyle.

The kind of DM that makes players understand the character generations rules exceeding well through the sheer repetition of rolling up replacement characters.  Success is never found or fleeting at best under a killer DM, and death is frequent and arbitrary²⁾, and likely the reason many players are afraid of old-school games and DM fiat.  This is likely the result of a munchkin or other bad player becoming a DM.

A gamer stereotype that, well, knows everything… or claims he does.  He's a member of the SCA so he knows you can sleep comfortably in plate armor during the height of summer and do handstands in it as well.  He's probably also a demolitions expert so that he can speak to the sort of effects that a Fireball spell would really have.  The same guy is a co-founder of Locksport International so he knows exactly what his chances of picking that chest's lock should be and would always find the poisoned needle trap.  He has played (or implies he secretly helped design) every game in existence so he knows how these things should work better than you do.  This guy has even baked Dwarven waybread (from a recipe that he got from real Dwarves!).

While the rules lawyer sees the letter of the rules being some sort of laws of physics for the game, the know-it-all will be discontent if one thing goes against his sense of how it should be from his perfect, all-encompassing experience.  He makes others who just want to get on with playing the game want to gouge their eyes out.

There isn't a single, cut-and-dried definition of this term.  Some people claim that a megadungeon is simply a really, really, really, really large dungeon, whereas some others claim that you must meet other criteria for your dungeon to be considered a megadungeon.  An adventure locale that would be considered a megadungeon will usually meet these criteria:

1. A megadungeon is large
   1. A megadungeon will typically be at least several levels deep; some may be dozens or more deep.
   2. A megadungeon does not need to be the sole focus of the campaign, but it must be large enough to support the entirety of a campaign's play if it is the focus.  This is why some people call them “campaign dungeons,” or “tentpole dungeons” if it is the main “tentpole” of action for the campaign (but not the entire focus of the campaign).
   3. Some megadungeons have no end; as the players find the edge they are added to, becoming ever larger to expand the environment for play.  (This often goes hand-in-hand with the mythic underworld aspect.)
      
      
2. A megadungeon is a rich environment for play
   1. A megadungeon has a social aspect, because it typically has many different inhabitants and the environment is expansive enough that there are motivations, politics and power plays going on between the various factions therein.
   2. There is often a sense that the megadungeon environment is the “mythic underworld,” and as such may not follow all the rules of reality or common sense that a player may be used to.  In fact, the very environment itself may be hostile to the adventurers.
   3. Typically they are nonlinear, in that there are many paths to accomplish a goal.  Whereas some dungeons may require players to go through several specific encounters or scenes to meet a goal, there may be many physical and logical paths to accomplish something in a megadungeon.  (Also, the author of the megadungeon may have built out a potential goal without a method of resolution in mind, hoping that creative players will fill that in for him.)

Examples of well-known megadungeons would be the original Castle Greyhawk, Castles Blackmoor and El Raja Key, the Tékumel Underworld, Stonehell, Rappan Athuk and Dwimmermount.  More are being created all the time.

If you're interested in megadungeons, there's a lot of resources available.  A really good place to read up is at this forum on Knights 'n' Knaves Alehouse, or this forum on Dragonsfoot.  Also, check out the archive of megadungeons.com.

Metagaming refers to any gaps between player knowledge and character knowledge which the player acts upon.  A player is metagaming when they use knowledge that is not available to their character in order to change the way they play that character (usually to give them an advantage within the game), such as knowledge of the mathematical nature of character statistics or information about a creature or adventure module that the player is familiar with but the character has never encountered.³⁾

A gamer stereotype who is all about their character build being “optimized” and to Hell with everything else.  They like games with lots of crunch, because it gives them more options to make the statistically perfect character.  They are in the same pool as powergamers and munchkins.

These people are better off playing MMORPGs than RPGs, and definitely don't care for rules-lite, old-school games.

A gamer stereotype that is akin to the min-maxer or powergamer in exploiting loopholes to their advantage, but goes so far as to throw a fit if the DM tries to nerf the loophole or has the audacity to tell them no (they typically have a real problem with rule zero).  They can make a game miserable for everyone.

Munchkins often display maturity problems and are often the same players who will do things with the express intention to annoy other players or the DM or otherwise disrupt play.

The act of adjusting the rules, particularly those that can be (or are actively being) abused.  The term comes from the padded Nerf-brand toys, since they are considered safer due to said padding.  Nerfing things is one way to add flavor or change tone by de-emphasizing them in play, but it's also a way to deal with some stereotypical gamers without just bouncing them out of the game altogether.

Old-school gaming means different things to different people.  To some it's the crusty old rule set with its descending armor classes, cookie cutter character classes and dissociated mechanics.  To others it's the way the game is run, with rulings-not-rules, describe what you're doing and don't just use the numbers off your character sheet and the like.  To some it's about the game content:  a sandbox where you can do whatever you like, you don't ride the rails of somebody else's story.

To me, it's some of all of that; it's hard to define, but I know it when I see it, and I hope what I run could be considered “old-school,” since that's my roots.

The problem with getting an old-school game going is that a lot of gamers have trouble with old-school.  They think all their character can do is what's written on their character sheet, or that the plot will come up and bite them on the ass.  There's an old-school mindset, and you should get yourself into that mindset.

Here's a couple links of interest to help you get into it:

• Matt Finch's Quick Primer for Old School Gaming is a treasure trove of what to expect in old-school gaming.
  
• Here's a bit of a follow up to the Quick Primer for Old School Gaming.

Back-In-the-Day™ we typically used to play D&D with fixed groups who got together regularly.  However, as we have gotten older this horrible affliction called “Adulting” has gotten in the way of playing like we did as teenagers.

When one runs an open table game the game is structured so that it can be played similarly to a “pick up” game.  Whoever shows up for a given session can play their characters, or if you have a few idle hours and want to run an actual pick-up game, sure, why not?  Easy!  Want to run a couple sessions at a con, or for a couple people who have never played before?  No problem!

So, basically, anyone who can show up can play so the groups may intermix as need be to form a party at any given time.

A parody of a problem new-school gamers perceive with old-school adventures, wherein an orc patiently waits in a 10’x10’ room guarding a pie, forever ready to fight any hapless adventurer that wanders into his room.  The new-schoolers see the setup as nonsensical, since there is no logical reason for an orc to be endlessly waiting in a small room guarding anything, much less a pie, with no relation to any of the surrounding encounters, motivations of its own, etc.  Presumably, the orc is supposed to be imbued with a personality, semblance of a history, have his own motivations and the like to be realistic as possible.

Usually, people who point to something like this drag out the tired complaint about verisimilitude.  Instead, I look at it as an opportunity to do some ad-libbing or riffing on the setting and dungeon factions, making up new NPCs, story ideas, etc., on the fly.  Old-school games don't typically use reams of description and define everything possible to make the story so it becomes a co-creation with the DM and players.

(As an homage to this, I named the inn at the encampment after this.)

The OSR has been called many things:  the “old-school renaissance” for the return to the older editions, the “old-school revival” and for those who are more militant about it, the “old-school ruckus.”  Lately, I like to call it “old-school retail” because it used to be a scene where there was a lot of sharing of ideas freely, but now everybody wants money to cross their palm for their participation therein.

A gamer stereotype that will often play just about any game and may actually be a decent role player, but he will go for whatever the mechanical advantage is, but he generally has a favorite game system or five that he knows all the ins and outs of so that he can exploit them to the fullest.  You can identify them easily:  for example, consider in first edition AD&D someone who manages to build a fourth level fighter that can kill a very old or ancient dragon in a single blow thanks to rejiggered stats, multiple specializations, class and racial choices, etcetera, ad nauseum.  Akin to the min-maxer, but at least more willing to play old-school games.

In many early editions of D&D, such as Red Box D&D (but even earlier versions), if one played a demihuman character they did not play an elven mage or a dwarven fighter, they simply played an elf or dwarf, and the racial class subsumed their abilities.

Some people love it because it makes their character more “alien,” while some hate it because they reasonably claim that not all elves or dwarves are the same.

A game where you're on this nice, fixed linear trail and you can't get off it.  This is all there is to do, and much like WOPR discovered in “War Games”, the only way to win is not to play.  Compare to a sandbox.

This is typically because the DM only prepped this, so let's play this!  In one-off or convention games it works well, but for an ongoing campaign it becomes a dreary ride.

The reality is, though, that there's limited prep time and so a DM will only prepare so much material.  If the players go way off the reservation he will do his best to steer them back on track, have a sit-down and tell them this is what he had planned, use some random material he had and do off-the-cuff adventures (which can be awesome or disastrous, depending on circumstances) or just call the game.

Typically, “Red Box” is one of two similar iterations of Dungeons & Dragons:  either the Moldvay/Marsh/Cook Basic and Expert D&D version from '81-'82 (known as ”B/X” or often just as “Moldvay”), or the Mentzer edition from 1983 on (often known as BECMI, from the names of the five boxed sets:  Basic/Expert/Companion/Master/Immortal; it was also later released in a slightly abridged single volume known as the Rules Cyclopedia).

We are playing Basic Fantasy RPG, a retro-clone based on and heavily influenced by the original B/X D&D game.

See also classic D&D.

Short for “retroactive continuity,” it denotes when established game rules or events are changed after the fact.  This has been known to cause all sorts of issues, so let's avoid it if at all possible.  It's often the result of destructive metagaming seeping in and causing unrest among the natives.

A retro-clone is a restatement of an existing role-playing game, such that the spirit and even the majority of the rules are still in place.  This way, games that have long been out of print can have an effective duplicate available in the marketplace in print.

Many retro-clones are more than restatements, incorporating everything from slight rule tweaks to new systems to new concepts for gaming, while still keeping the spirit of the older system intact (to varying degrees).

(…a.k.a. “The DM is always right.”)

The unwritten rule in tabletop role-playing games which grants the DM the right to suspend or override the published game rules whenever s/he deems necessary.⁴⁾

Sometimes abbreviated RAW, it's the rules as written in the original books.  Contrast with house rules.

A gamer stereotype that sees the rules as an absolute and a tool to mercilessly beat the DM or other players into submission for the rules lawyer's advantage.  The rules lawyer can only accept what's written, word-for-word, as the absolute truth of the game, and the spirit means nothing… unless it is in his favor.  He loves to argue about the rules instead of just playing the game, and as such they usually don't want to hear anything about rule zero and should be reminded that Shakespeare wrote, “kill all the lawyers.”  Apparently, Shakespeare was a gamer!

A couple points of irony about the rules lawyer:

• While one would not expect this, often times the best friend of a rules lawyer is a know-it-all, because they can take two different viewpoints to argue towards a common reading of the rules against a DM.
• Rules lawyers want to play, but want the rules to be their own way.  Perhaps rules lawyers should consider starting their own game.
• Rules lawyers often have a peculiar tunnel vision where they only remember rules that favor them, while not bringing up rules that disfavor them.  Funny, that…

A play style where players are free to do as they like and explore the world as they see fit.  This type of game is more demanding on players to seek out hooks rather than be fed a story, but it's also more demanding on the DM because he has to come up with more on the spot to cover holes the players may find.  Contrast with railroad.

The reality is, most games are not pure sandboxes or railroads but a hybrid of the two.  There is usually an understood set of limits at the table (or there should be), and if we keep to warning ahead of time what players want to do then we can make things as sandbox-like as possible while not being completely in the vein of, “hey, guys, this is what I have prepped so this is what we're doing tonight, okay?”

In the classic game Empire of the Petal Throne the set pieces of the Tékumel Underworld are known as “Saturday Night Specials,” and were called such because players would often approach these special encounter areas during weekend play sessions when sufficient players could gather to tackle them.  Essentially, these are the interesting, static encounters to be found in the Tékumel underworld presented as a particular zone in a megadungeon.  As such, I may call the set pieces of any large dungeons (or wilderness areas, or even city encounters) this from time to time myself.

In the megadungeon this refers to a detailed, well-planned encounter area, or sometimes an entire zone or sublevel.  There is more than your typical sketch to riff off of, and often this is where the major treasures, encounters and the like in a megadungeon or other environment occur.

(Compare to setpiece; there's some definite overlap in concept here.)

There are a lot of gamer stereotypes.  Unfortunately, they're largely true, and we've all been at least one of these at one point or another.  (Have I mentioned that you can certainly be more than one of these at a time?)

Amongst them are the cat piss man, know-it-all, min-maxer, munchkin, powergamer and rules lawyer.  None are desirable or tolerable.

Playing with all the action in one's imagination.  Things are described, players visualize and react accordingly.

Varying degrees of theater of the mind exist.  It may be that you are playing without terrain or fancy VTT maps, or it may be that you play without miniatures for combat either abstract it out or just draw crib notes on paper to show positions, etc.

A Total Party Kill.  It's named for what happens when the whole party gets wiped out from an encounter or event (combat, a trap, starvation, whatever).  TPKs (and character death in general) aren't unheard of in old-school games.

The thing is, players shouldn't take them personally.  They happen.  Unfortunately, a lot of new-school players who are used to lengthy character builds and will get butthurt instead of just rolling a new character (which may take all of ten minutes in classic D&D) and getting back in the action.

Excessive TPKs may tend to point towards either very poor gameplay by players or a killer DM.

A big word that, in gaming terms, telegraphs you think that everything should have a logical explanation to meet your sense of reality or you'll never be happy with the game.  (See also user pointblank's definition of September 15, 2008 here.)

In a setting that has areas not unlike the oft-discussed “mythic underworld” then verisimilitude likely does not apply.

Images for cat piss man, the “old-school” gaming grognard and rules lawyer by Darran Sims.