''Playing with Fire: Dungeons and Dragons, Tunnels and Trolls, Chivalry and Sorcery, and other Fantasy Games'' is a book written in 1984 by John Weldon and James Bjornstad and published by
Moody Press that tries to show that fantasy role-playing games like ''
Dungeons & Dragons'' are anti-Christian.
Contents
In the early 1980s, some religious groups accused
TSR, the publisher of ''
Dungeons & Dragons'', of encouraging sorcery and the veneration of
demon
A demon is a malevolent supernatural entity. Historically, belief in demons, or stories about demons, occurs in religion, occultism, literature, fiction, mythology, and folklore; as well as in media such as comics, video games, movies, ani ...
s. This was exacerbated in 1982, when
Patricia Pulling
Patricia A. Pulling (June 30, 1948 – September 18, 1997) was an anti-occult campaigner from Richmond, Virginia. She founded Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons (BADD), an advocacy group that was dedicated to the regulation of role-playing games s ...
's son killed himself. Pulling blamed ''D&D'' for her son's suicide, and formed an organization named B.A.D.D. (Bothered About Dungeons & Dragons) to attack the game and the company that produced it.
In 1984, the Christian publisher Moody Publishing released ''Playing with Fire'', a 91-page book by John Weldon and James Bjornstad that was critical of
tabletop role-playing games,
attempting to prove that role-playing games are morally ambiguous and dangerous for young, impressionable minds.
''Playing with Fire'' was subsequently favorably quoted by other Christian publications including ''Demon Possession and the Christian'' (C. Fred Dickason, Crossway, 1989) and ''Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs'' (John Ankerberg & John Weldon, Moody Publications, 1996).
Reception
In the May-June 1985 edition of ''
The Space Gamer'' (No. 74), Steve LaPrade commented that "Like it or not, RPGers, parents are reading this book or hearing from those who have. It has been prominently displayed in religious bookstores and in some regular bookstores. If gamers want to see the shape of a threat to their hobby, this book is it. Because of its information value – plus a good bibliography of RPG newspaper and magazine articles – gamers may find it a worthwhile investment of their time and money, especially if RPGs are under attack in their home town."
References
{{reflist
1984 non-fiction books
Books about role-playing games
Collaborative non-fiction books