What is Roleplaying?

The information below was taken from A guide to Roleplaying – What, Who, Why & Where by Jason Anthony. It explains roleplaying in a way people, specially non-roleplayers, can easily understand.

What is Roleplaying?

When you were young one of the games you played may have been let’s pretend where you pretended to be a doctor or a character from a film or television program etc. Roleplaying (or RPG) is the natural extension of that childhood game. Each Roleplay system has a set of guidelines of what should happen in certain events. These systems explain how magic works (if applicable) and how to simulate combat, illness and other skills.

Who Roleplays?

Thousands of people around the world Roleplay, from teenage upwards. Many people get their first contact with Roleplaying at University or College where there are often groups or clubs of Roleplayers.

Why Roleplay?

Roleplay allows you to become (for a short while anyway) a fighter in a mystical land, a private investigator in search of horrible creatures or a Magic user fighting to save the world. Have you ever watched a film and said “I could do better than that..”? Chances are there is a Roleplay system that will allow you to test your skills in these situations.

Where do people Roleplay?

Normally either at social clubs or at the house of one of the players. Some Roleplayers take Roleplaying to the extreme and meet on private land and for long weekends live the parts of their characters (they also attack each other with rubber swords but we will not talk about that too much) this is called LRP (Live Roleplaying) or LARP (Live Action Roleplay).