Splatbook

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A splatbook is a sourcebook for a particular role-playing game (RPG) that is not needed for play, but is devoted to a particular facet, character class, or fictional faction, providing additional background details and rules options. For example, a "swords and sorcery" fantasy game might offer splatbooks for each of the races in the setting: humans, dwarves, elves, and others.

Contents

History

Origins

The term "splatbook" arose in the 1990s. It originally described the sourcebooks published in the early 1990s by White Wolf Game Studio for its World of Darkness games. [1] Many of these books were titled using similar patterns: clanbooks in Vampire: The Masquerade , tribebooks for Werewolf: The Apocalypse , traditionbooks for Mage: The Ascension , and so forth. In newsgroups, these were called *books (the asterisk on a computer keyboard being used as a wildcard character). Since the asterisk is also known as a "splat", this gave rise to the term "splatbook". [2]

Modern usage

The term "splatbook" is now used to describe a range of sourcebooks, including those which predated the term. Shannon Appelcline and Stu Horvath have cited the 1978 book Mercenary, created for the science fiction RPG Traveller , and the 1979 sourcebook Cults of Prax , created for the fantasy RPG RuneQuest , as examples of the splatbook format which preceded its definition. [2] [1] [3] Other examples include Advanced Dungeons & Dragons books such as the "Complete" series ( The Complete Book of Dwarves , Complete Arcane , etc.), [4] or the numerous codices for Warhammer Fantasy Battle and Warhammer 40,000 . By extension, the term "splat" is used for the character class described in a splatbook. [2] [1] [3]

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Appelcline, Shannon (2014). Designers & Dragons: The 90s. Silver Spring, Maryland: Evil Hat Productions. pp. 16–17. ISBN   978-1-61317-081-6.
  2. 1 2 3 Horvath, Stu (2023). Monsters, Aliens, and Holes in the Ground. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. pp. 54–55. ISBN   9780262048224.
  3. 1 2 "A Brief History of Game #11: White Wolf, Part One: 1986-1995 - RPGnet". www.rpg.net. Retrieved 2025-01-16.
  4. ↑ Fannon, Sean Patrick (1999). The Fantasy Roleplaying Gamer's Bible. Jacksonville, FL: Obsidian Studios. p. 242. ISBN   0967442907.
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