Anti-Racism Resources for Tabletop Games
This page is currently being updated - please bear with us while we find new resources to replace the dead links!
As an organisation, NMD’s focus is on advocating for the inclusion of all tabletop gamers, regardless of gender. However, we cannot support gender diversity in the gaming community without also acknowledging the additional barriers to access many face because of the colour of their skin. We believe Black Lives Matter and that there should be no room in the RPG and wargaming community for racial discrimination.
If you’d like to learn more about how racism can impact tabletop gaming, or how to make your games more welcoming and inclusive, we’ve listed some resources below.
Why Representation is Important
If you’d like to learn more about the history of representation and racism in tabletop gaming, here are some articles that may help.
GXTalks: GX3 • Day 3 - All Your Culture Are Belong To Us: Appropriation, Erasure and RPGs.
Dragons Are for White Kids with Money: On the Friction of Geekdom and Race.
Comic-Con 2017: Black nerds, or blerds, describe the challenge of diversity in geek culture.
Asians Represent, a podcast about Asian representation in the gaming industry and in games themselves.
Asian Representation And The Martial Arts. Includes a discussion of Anti-Asian racism in a tabletop game. Content Warning: Multiple personal accounts of of racsim.
Coyote & Crow designer Connor Alexander on representation, world-building and the little details that help create immersive RPGs, an interview with Connor Alexander about Coyote and Crow, a ‘Science Fantasy Role Playing Game set in an uncolonized future’ and developed by a team of Native American creators.
General Resources on Anti-Racism
Racial discrimination in RPGs, wargames, and the nerd community as a whole is a symptom of a wider societal problem of racism. If you would like to learn more about being an anti-racist ally, these resources can help.
Remember and Resist Podcast - a recording of two panels discussing the history of Southeast and East Asian people in the UK.
Pearn-Kandola has free recordings on their seminars on racism in the worldplace, including:
A list of resources for supporting the Black Lives Matter movement.
Black Lives Matter: 10 Anti-Racism Charities in the UK you can donate to.
If you would like to do some self-reflection on you own implicit biases, you can take the Harvard Implicit Bias test online for free.
Criticism of the efficacy of the Implicit Bias Test: For years, this popular test measured anyone’s racial bias. But it might not work after all.
Tabletools
Tabletools can help games be more inclusive and welcoming. They can also allow a player to voice concern with particular subjects or scenes without needing to justify or explain themselves.
Codes of Conduct
A code of conduct, along with clear ways of reporting breaches to the code of conduct, can help make players feel more comfortable in a club or event. It will also make it easier for event and club organisers to remove people who act in racist, sexist, homophobic or transphobic ways. Our code of conduct page includes a link to the AfroTech Fest code of conduct which includes regulations specifically designed to prevent racism at their events.
Building Diverse World
Pay Attention: Black Voices in the RPG Community is a list of black RPG gamers, writers, creators and streamers.
Not Having Racism In Your Campaign, Settings, Or Table - PAX Unplugged 2018.
Ideas to Consider when Creating BIPOC Characters infographic.
FATE SRD has a page on running/playing inclusive FATE games. While it is set specifically in the context of running a game using the FATE system, it can be applied more broadly to Tabletop games.
Friends, Foes and Other Fine Folks is a manual of pre-written diverse NPCs for Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition.
Ancestry & Culture: An Alternative to Race in 5e includes character creation rules to use ancestry and culture as an alternative for race statistics in Dungeons and Dragons 5e.
We hosted a panel on ‘Representation in Fantasy Worlds’ for the Podcast Zone at Dragonmeet 2019. It covers topics around representation in fantasy settings and building diverse RPG worlds. It was recorded by ‘What Am I Rolling.’
And, if you need some inspiration for your next campaign, you can check out our list of diverse fantasy and science fiction books.
Diverse Miniatures
Everyone should be able to have miniatures that reflect themselves and the worlds they build.
If you’re looking for wargames or miniatures creators that embrace diversity in their games, check out Geek and Sundries’ article How and Why Miniature Wargames Companies are Choosing to Embrace Diversity.
Miniatures companies such as Bad Squiddo and North Star’s Frostgrave create diverse miniatures.
If you know of a company doing a particularly good job creating diverse miniatures, please contact us and we’ll update this list.
There are a number of painting guides for painting different fleshtones, including:
If there is a page or a resources that you think we should include, or if you’d like to tell us about your own work/project, please contact us.
Thank you to Mira and Ming for their help editing this page.
Page updated 02/04/2021.