Explaining roleplaying to a non-gamer is one of the hardest things we’re asked to do. We want to share this hobby we love so much, but we often find ourselves in a catch-22 situation: it’s extremely difficult to explain roleplaying to someone who’s never done it, but once someone’s done it, they no longer need the explanation.
Below are several posts that could help when you’re called on to do the impossible:
- Advice for a First-Time Player
- Explaining Gaming to Non-Gamers (Roleplaying, that is): from xkcd forums
- Explaining Roleplaying: from rpg.net forums
- Explaining the concept of a fantasy role-playing game: from Helium.com
- Explaining What Role-Playing Games Are: from The Journeyman GM
- Newbie’s Guide to Roleplaying: from Star Wars Galaxies forums
- Pen and Paper Roleplaying Games: the hardest thing to explain ever: from Wonderbread
- Please explain the appeal of roleplaying games such as D&D to me: from The Straight Dope forums
- Role-playing: from Wikipedia
- What is roleplaying?: from Ars Imagica
- What is role-playing?: from Negative Space
- What is Roleplaying (and why on earth would I want to do it?): from NoDDSoc
[Image courtesy of pasukaru76 via Flickr Creative Commons]
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Paul on 
Great job compiling this list (and I was pleasantly surprised to find my blog on it)! I guess the multitude of explanations just goes to show how difficult it is to describe it to someone new.
JourneymanGM´s last [type] ..A Gamemaster Manifesto
@JourneymanGM- Thanks so much for posting and for the kudos (my computer access is a little irregular right now, or I’d have responded sooner). I can be really difficult to describe our hobby to someone who’s never encountered it.
I had to chuckle when I saw this. My girlfriend still doesn’t understand the concept of an RPG, even though I bought her her own copy of the Exalted core rules. When I try to explain a RPG, she keeps saying, “How can you play a game where you don’t ‘win’?”
I keep telling her she’ll have to try it firsthand to see what it’s like. Unfortunately we’re in a long-distance relationship, so I can’t just have her drop by when my group is playing.