Cultural influences on TTRPG citation practices

Which cultures and subcultures could have influenced the citation practices in the TTRPG hobby subculture ?

Religious authority

Religious cultures are ancient and holistic. They rely heavily on the citation of sacred or semi-sacred texts. Citing the right source can give value to an idea, making it closer to the truth. The citation has to be exact and attributed to an akckowledged authority. These citations are found in liturgy, sacred texts, song sheets, buildings, comments, etc. An acknowledged and cited idea can also create a community.

Religious song with biblical citation in epigraph, Elliott C., Woodworth LM & Bradbury WB. XIXe century.

Storytelling and authors

Most of the stories, oral or written, are attributed to an author. For oral storytelling, citing an famous author or witness means more credits to the story. Sometimes, two versions by two different authors are competing for attention or for truth [1].

A lot of written fictions or essays have explicit references to past works : in dedicace, in epigraphs, in the text, with the bibliography. Gérard Genette classifies them in paratext (epitext) and metatext (smoking literature theories).

Épigraph in Combinatorics and Graph Theory by Harris, Hirst, & Mossinghoff, 2009.

Academic tracking of citations

Mostly for the purposes of verifying and understanding, academic publications have to track back the sources of ideas, facts, theories, etc. Failing that rule is a major issue in the ethic of research : plagiarism.

In TTRPG

In 1979, Gary Gygax added his famous Appendix N to the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules in the Dungeon Masters Guide (p. 224), listing the major literature fictions that inspired the game.

All the books cited in the Appendix N. Crédits image : Goodman Games.

In the 1980 and 1990, Casus Belli magazine was the first french mainstream media of the TTRPG community. In some of its articles (eg.: daylife in the Dark Ages, heraldry, crime in the 1920s, etc.) and in somes of its scenarii, there were small bibliographiess, epigraphs, glossaries, etc.

Bibliographies, epigraphs & glossaries in articles and scenarii
by Anne Vétillard, Casus Belli, no. 37. 46 et 50, 1987-89.

The academic culture and its citation practices are the reasons why the ludographic references are extremely precise in Vade+Mecum, a TTRPG by Romaric Briand.

Sampling & Do it yourself

Music remixes [8] and sampling technique extracts a piece of music, modifies it and replays it out of its original context. Legal issues of this hip-hop technique influenced the popular culture from the 1970s to the 2000s [4].

The 1980s were also influenced by the Do it yourself (DIY) culture. For example, the punk movement claimed the values of hacking, tinkering, personal experimentation, out of the mainstream networks, low-cost resourcefulness, rough draft, non-judgemental and artistic honesty attitudes [5,6]. But the movement wasn't always clear on the original inspiration attributions.

In TTRPG

The first publications of Dungeons & Dragons were incomplete and confusing. The dungeon masters had to tinker their own rules and their own dungeons (until the popularity of Judges Guild modules).
Actually, in TTRPG, all the ludic system is calling the DIY : from the ad hoc animation of the game master to the creative answers of the players, with the collaborative worldbuilding and campaign design.

There is also a lot of self-publications and fanzines. This culture of hack is still going on as a very common practice. For example, recently a lot of games « propelled by the Apocalypse » are hacks from the original game system Apocalypse World. 

Since the 2000, the Creative Commons licences framed the reuse conditions, doing so they helped the tracking of the inspirations. The french author Thomas Munier, a follower the Do it yourself and outsider art movements, is using a lot of citations and references to games and fictions his own games.

Annotated ludography in Inflorenza 2e éd.,
a TTRPG by Thomas Munier, 2014.

Open-source programming

More recently, the culture of open-source code, through different licences, is asking to cite the authors and the institutions of the original code. This acknowledgement lists can be very long and complex.

OGL/GSL of the « d20 sytem » of D&D 3rd ed. was inspired by the open-source movement [7]. The OSR movement and a lot of publish products followed and cited the original game as requested in the OGL/GSL.

Boardgames

Between entre 1980 et 1989, the french magazine Jeux & Stratégies proposed rules variants, different game goals and mini-games to build yourself. Boardgames don't have a culture of citation.

No author for a long time

Crédit photo : Laurence Rabat, 2018.

For a long time, few game boxes or rule booklets were crediting their authors on the cover or inside the game. For example « on the 700 boardgames (from 1930 to 1999) displayed at the Expo Vieux Jeux exhibition, less than 5 % had their author on the cover » said Stéphane Quesnel, curator of the exhibition [2].
To be credited as an author and receive royalties, a person had to be the composer of a text, not the inventor of a new mechanics or a new game system. [3]

Few citations too

Thomas Vuarchex said « Bruno Faidutti was mentioning all the time and explicitly which rule and which mechanic came from where. Now, not anymore.  » [3]

Wargames

Since their Prussian origins to today, the rules of the wargames are crediting more often theirs authors. Hypothesis :

• They were published in books or manuals. So they were looking more like essays than games.
• The culture of the authority in the army.
• Citing authors can help distinguish the variants.

Special mention : sampling & board games

@Pionfesseur said Tempête sur l'Échiquier by P. Cléquin et B. Faidutti : « During the golden age of hip-hop, this game is a rare ludic example. Taking chess rules and doing whatever with it. Absolute big split to destroy the calculations of the gameplay, with kicks in the chessboard. » _{[added 2022-05-06]}

Mafia/ Werewolf

Efka from NoPunIncluded :

«(...) the Werewolf we have today is fundamentally a different game from Mafia because of the open source folk nature of how it's spread. If there was a commercial product to cement it, i wonder if we would have seen [list of games and works]. » (00:18:10)

The communities that spead the games were : university students, boardgames communities and « Tech Bros » who used it as management tool (00:30:30).
_{[added 2022-07-11]}

 

Bibliography

^{[1] Trojan wars of Homère or Hésiode.}

^{[2] Expo Vieux Jeux, at Musée Grévin of Montréal, 2018.}

^{[3] Vianney, & Manuel. « Qui possède le game ? » Ludologies, du jeu sous toutes ses formes, 2019. https://soundcloud.com/ludologies/76-qui-possede-le-game. at 00:56:01.}

^{[4] Hess, Mickey. « Was Foucault a Plagiarist? Hip-Hop Sampling and Academic Citation ». Computers and Composition 23, no 3 (janvier 2006): 280‑95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compcom.2006.05.004.}

^{[5] Torres, David G. « Punk. Its Traces in Contemporary Art ». Mexico, 2016. https://issuu.com/ca2m/docs/catalogo_punk_web.}

^{[6] Sabin, Roger, ed. Punk Rock: So What?: The Cultural Legacy of Punk. 1st ed. London: Routledge, 2002. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203448403.
[7] Lecocq, Xavier, & Benoît Demil. « Strategizing industry structure: The case of open systems in a low-tech industry ». Strategic Management Journal 27, no 9 (2006): 891‑98. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.544.
[8] Everything is a remix. https://www.openculture.com/2012/02/everything_is_a_remix_all_together_now.html}