The assumptions, intentions, and design of tabletop roleplaying games are infamously broad; seeing eye to eye on how to play is as primary a challenge as finding a time on the calendar for four to six people. Back in April of 2021, the blog The Retired Adventurer published a post called Six Cultures of Play which still sees reference as a succinct overview of distinct play traditions which have evolved over the last fifty-ish years of structured tabletop roleplaying. Between solid analysis and the author’s own admonitions not to see bright lines between the cultures where there aren’t any, I see the article as a useful model to start thinking about how people game and what they want.

Of course, the gaming world hasn’t stayed still, and from the publication of the original post to the renaming of Twitter to “X” in 2023, fragmentation was the word of the day. Since then, we’ve seen continuing fragmentation joined with an upswell in interest in fairly specific playstyle differentiation, driven by migration away from Wizards of the Coast products and strong take-up of “D&D alternative” products including not only Pathfinder but Daggerheart, Tales of the Valiant, and Draw Steel. The core ideas in the Cultures of Play post still hold true, but the consistent signpost in my mind is in the introduction, where the author describes a culture of play as equivalent to a ‘network of practice’. A community of practice is a group which forms around something they collectively do (or practice) which they have a passion for and want to do better; a network of practice is also that but doesn’t assume the same consistent strength of relationships, therefore being a more appropriate term for a larger, more nebulous group. As broad as a network of practice can be, I don’t really think it aligns with a ‘culture of play’ anymore.