Back in the old days of pencils-and-dice gaming exemplified by “Dungeons and Dragons”, “Dragon” magazine ran a comic strip by the famed Phil Foglio that covered the topic of “Sex and D&D”. Well, it actually kept threatening to but was continually prevented; Foglio knew that promising a look at sex in gaming would be far more fun than actually doing so.
After many years, I have finally had the opportunity to give a quick read to “The Book of Erotic Fantasy”, a rules supplement published in 2000 for the Third Edition of the Advanced D&D game. The book was released under AD&D’s “Open Gaming License” which allowed third-party books to use the official rules without needing to be officially approved. The Open Gaming License is no longer available; conspiratorially-minded readers may make whatever connection they wish. Anyway, I have some opinions, out-of-date though they may be; overall, I think I agree with the cartoonist.
Just to provide some context: I don’t run a game of AD&D, I run Shadowrun (which is basically an AD&D game with computers, machine pistols, and attack helicopters). Shadowrun, being based on modern American culture, acknowledges sex more than high fantasy usually did. Also, my game group runs the spectrum from vanilla to hyper-kinky, but is generally sex-positive and alt-tolerant. Continue reading