Submitted by mongoose kikimora

While I took a more official tone in my previous post, explaining with verbose grandiosity the immense value of the virgin lands of the traditional gaming hobby to a rightist, I think a more conversational shall suffice here. Today I would like to write a follow up to my previous post addressing some of the concerns, questions, and ideas that were brought up to me, or I am certain many of my readers had.

I am not here to tell how to and how not to have fun, I do that on my blog and podcast. Occasionally, my esteemed co-hosts and I review things. If you aren’t willing to sit through hours of podcast audio (some of the early portions being particularly horrid, eternal thanks to our editor), I’ll hit some of the favorites and games I think you should avoid. Avoid Myfarog, anything powered by the apocalypse, and D20 derivative games like D&D and pathfinder. Myfarog is a mechanical mess unfortunately, a bit too bloated even for the old school revival crowd. Some standouts are Dark Heresy first edition, Savage Worlds Deluxe (buy the explorer’s edition if you can find it), Ryuutama, and most low complexity catch all systems. Also borrow RPG rules if you can or acquire them used, most RPG publishers shouldn’t be given money.

I suppose I should elaborate on how exactly RPGs can be made to suit our purposes. One ought to consider a two-pronged approach. The average “normie” or rando isn’t going to resonate with the previously discussed Siegemata, and if they understood it, they may be quite off put. Of course, Siegemata would exist to serve a targeted sup-group, not for mass consumption.

The ultimate goal within this metapolitical struggle for RPGs is to decide whose priors people play pretend with. You want people to think like you? Give them the ability to envision a world like yours or the one you want to create. This can be done subtly. One of the great cultural struggles of our time is between fringe hobbyists and entryists trying to make their hobby explicitly ideologically leftist. They don’t want their escapism tied to a reality that is becoming more stifling and crushing by the day. What remains to be seen is whether someone can thread the needle of taking that dissatisfaction and turning it consistently into political consciousness through providing an alternative.

What would a right-wing RPG for mass consumption look like? Well there is plenty to work with that is implicitly right-wing, mechanical enforcement of social order incumbent upon feudal society, magic based on ritual and social hierarchy a la Evola, etc. One can justify a great deal and couch things in a very right-wing sense without invoking any of the trigger words that pull up the socially inculcated firewall every person in our society possesses.

To this end, rather than disclaimers about nahtzeeism and other hysterics, one could include a short disclaimer of this sort:

“This game is about exploring the literary and storytelling traditions of the ethnic groups native to Western Europe and their understanding of reality. To gain a further understanding of their myths and cultures we recommend reading Spengler (or whomever you would prefer they read, I don’t care really)…”

Citing our own academic sources that inform our worldview and creating settings adherent to it is a good place to start. Of course, this is entirely incumbent on people playing the game actually adhering to these priors. Unlike literature and film, there is more room for audience interpretation within RPGs, but even introducing taboo philosophical priors can be a highly profitable process.

Even to this day D&D is regarded by many as a “right wing game” because it doesn’t explicitly critique feudalism (even though the only relation D&D has to feudalism is trappings of kings, lords, and knights). Why not make a pro feudal game, or make a game exploring how feudal people felt about their lives? Or build settings critical of the idea that adventuring parties would be made up of diverse groups. In fantasy there is plenty to work with. Even outside of fantasy, why should the evil empire be implicitly or explicitly xenophobic? Portray oppressive imperial powers as they are today, cosmopolitan, homosexual, and diverse, using those traits to crush recalcitrant homogeneous groups who might dare to oppose their sanctimonious morality.

These are just examples of the multitude of options facing both myself and any other aspiring TTRPG creator. I am personally convinced that we can present better alternatives to both their games and worlds. It is easy to critique our current system, even easier to note that eventually the pensions will dry up. It isn’t easy to present an alternative, but ultimately the future belongs to those of us who can present one. If not us, who else will?