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As promised, here is the first part in my series on role-playing. I'll be providing links to all of the series in this section in the future. I'll still write about off topic things, and you'll see the banners and title change to represent that it isn't part of the series.

I've been working hard on this for a while, so without further ado, let's commence it.



The Reality of Unreality
There are a few things that everyone should consider when they log in everyday that we often overlook.

1. We are all people.
2. We are not politicians and soldiers in this game.
3. Nothing that occurs in this game will actually affect the world around you.
4. We allow this game to affect us and how we act.

This isn't meant as a list of criticisms, it's meant to be the brutally honesty, bare-bones analysis of what we are. We are gamers, and we play a game where we pretend to be politicians. That simple idea, to pretend to be something, to feel like you can make a difference in an unreality, is the root of all role-playing.

It doesn't actually happen. Yet when we speak of our battles and wars we talk about it as if lives are on the line. We write articles about evacuating states to safety, and declaring people outcasts and terrorists. We act as if declaring ultimatums are actual threats of force, and that the groups that declare them are terrorists.

The truth of the matter is that they are not. We're all gamers, pretending to be politicians and soldiers and pretending that this game has a certain seriousness to it.

The Seriousness of Fun
People can take this game very seriously. When you engage with something you created, even if it isn't real, you treat it as if it is. By the mere act of believing in the reality of something, we are technically bringing it in to being.

While we don't have the power to truly change what date people are elected, we can change how. We can agree to primaries and blockers. We can, in essence, circumvent all game mechanics by making role-play mechanics of our own. It's this reality, this created thing, which ultimately bears most interest for people.

People who want medals want it for the pride it bears with it, even though the medal doesn't exist. Even if you think you're not role-playing, any amount of pride or emotion you show in your interactions with this digital construct is showing some amount of role-playing.

So where is this all leading to, you could be asking at this point. What's the point? If it's all made up, we can cease believing in it. That isn't possible. Humans are creatures of emotion. Despite our best efforts to separate real life from this game, it still occurs. We are people, after all, and we have needs and wants and desires.

I believe that all of us playing this game want something greater. We want to be the shakers and movers, to be the makers and the believers. We want to be the President of the United States of America, to be a Joint Chief of Staff, to be a Media Mogul, to be a Battle Hero. These things appeal to us, and in real-life we can't necessarily get them. The majority of us will spend our lives out on this earth in no significant fashion, making relatively no impact on our species at large except for production of more of us, the continued capacity of our race and life.

But that has never been good enough for people. The reality is, we want more. Humans are subject to emotion, to curiosity, to control, to manipulation. We form our environment around us, and when we can't get that directly, for whatever reason, we seek alternate means.

For us here, this is that alternate means.

So we set aside reality, and we put on the face of a politician taking a hard-line stance against immigration. We roar into battle shouting taunts at our evil invaders. We declare that freedom is dead and that the government is robbing people and subjugating their rights. We role-play to fulfill the reality we cannot obtain within reality.

It's an addiction.

Bonds Between
Within society, we have roles we play as well. The cool shop manager who wants you to buy his stuff. The loving wife who wishes for nothing more than to be a great housekeeper. The disgruntled activist, seeing the world as an injustice and desiring change. Weddings, school, families, government; they all have roles that you, as a member, must play. We could do away with it, play life as a mechanical thing, but that gets back to that whole "humans wanting more" deal.

The ability to use imagination to create reality is one of our most powerful tools as human beings, but also a great weakness. When we devote too much time to that dream, we lose sight of what is actual. If we allow our role-playing to become our real-playing, then we have allowed ourselves to be deluded, and we lose sight of what is important. It's all about that balance between enjoyment and living.

From Why to How
We know the why now: people role-play to fulfill a greater desire they cannot actualize within real life. We understand that people may take this as seriously as if it were life itself, and we can see that the boundaries between what is tangible and what is created are often blurred simply by the act of our believing in that creation.

If we want so desperately to be such politicians, then how come we don't actually do it? Some of us are trying to, and even fewer will eventually succeed at transforming our experiences here into a new reality in life. But for the rest of us, the fulfillment of our addiction is merely enough. The simple trick of thinking we're doing something important is all the satisfaction we require, and as long as it is needed, we will continue.

The human interaction in this gives us a certain bound to it as well. We know there are others, exactly like us, trying to itch the same scratch. It gives us a reason to stay. The community of this creation is as much a why as it is a how.

It's within our power to change everything in this game, and yet have nothing happen at all. And it's that paradox that ultimately keeps us all in play.

Preview
In the next installment we'll begin discussing the "how" of role-playing, focusing on the various ways people continue the trick for themselves. There will be interviews, and there may even be some role-play to read.

If you enjoyed this issue of the Halfling Times, please vote, shout, subscribe and tell your friends. You comments are also appreciated. If you have any feedback you can PM me or leave it in the comments.

Thank you for reading.





Stay frosty, role-players.