Imagithropy, TTRPGs, and Other Ramblings

Sivaan of Candlekeep

January 28th, 2025

“Imagithrope - An alterhuman whose identity was created and/or formed, wholly or partially, through some form of imaginative play. This can include fantasy play, roleplay (tabletop, text, live action, etc), fanfiction, writing, art, and more,” @shimmering-dragon

I recall seeing this term in passing, but I didn’t look into it at first. Honestly, I wish I had. I think discovering it sooner would’ve saved me so much time (and so much breath too).

Labeling myself has been something of an uphill battle, to say the least. Sometimes, I envy folks who simply don’t enough about labels to do so. Even so, I pour so much focus into labels because I want something to wear on my sleeve— to say I come from this specific experience with pride and confidence.

As the Centaurus Festival nears, I’ve been thinking of how far I’ve come in this community. What have I learned? Who am I, really?

This first essay I wrote covered my search for my draconic species and a semi-creative/narrative retelling of a series of dreams I had weeks prior. My time at the Centaurus Festival inspired me to create. Since then, writing about my alterhumanity helped me make sense of myself. Yet, as of last year, I’ve been planning to retcon that essay entirely. In retrospect, those dreams weren’t indicative of my actual origins or connections to my identity beyond a setting and a subset of dragon. While draconity is an intrinsic experience of mine, I hurriedly used those occurrences as a “definitive” background for what I am. As I revisit that essay, I’ve come to realize that those dreams were metaphorical at best.

Throughout my personal experiences, I’ve been doing what Zana (coiner of “imagithrope”) had done for her identity. I’ve been filling in the blanks through writing. I feel as though writing has been my outlet in identifying who I am.

I didn’t create myself in totality. As I said, there are identities of mine that are intrinsic and came about without choice. However, to fill in the blanks, I’ve had to homebrew those identities. What do I mean by “homebrew”, you may ask? Well, I’ll get into the meaning in context to D&D and other TTRPGs.Homebrew refers to campaign materials that were personally created by players for other players, rather than official materials made by a company. Homebrew content can range anywhere from campaign settings to races to subclasses, etc. There is virtually no limit to what you can homebrew for a tabletop roleplaying game. It’s just preferred that you keep it balanced.Although the identities themselves weren’t chosen, I did have to take what I already knew about them (noemata) and incorporate them into my own self-established narratives and theories around my place of origin. Dungeons & Dragons, as a work of fiction, is already a part of an established multiverse; how that multiverse looks like depends from player-to-player.

Plenty of campaigns are centered in by-the-book settings and go off of the information of said books.

Plenty of others take off in their own self-contained worlds.

Some also take place within outside media, using their worlds to create an interactive experience such as Tales of Xadia or Star Trek Adventures.

Whatever the case may be, the number of worlds introduced through tabletop roleplaying games are practically endless. In my own case, I have always enjoyed the freedoms of both creating and being a part of these narratives. It was only natural that I stemmed from these same narratives as well. That is where my created knowledge comes in.I often refer to it as a theory regarding my place of origin. I wrote up about this theory a few months ago. Here are some excerpts of interest, given my connection with the “imagithrope” label:

"Yet, I still find myself resonating with [other creatives’] relationships to fiction but for entirely different reasons. This is largely through the scope of fiction as in the universal well of potential in which beings across all existences find it within themselves to create and breathe life elsewhere. For in my place of origin, this unending act of creation keeps us afloat."

“While Wizards of the Coast canonizes my source as a multiversal construct, how it is multiversal by those standards is vastly different from how l've experienced it…. each time I sit down with some friends and become a part of a campaign, another reality has been created. Each time I play a podcast episode, and listen to people doing the same thing, that campaign also birthed a world within worlds. The setting itself has long been established, but these additions to it give more structure to our Planes.”

“When worlds are created, there is so much to account for from a writer’s perspective. Cultures, politics, philosophies and the ever-expanding catalogue of life populating these worlds are a few concepts that come to mind. In my efforts towards understanding my origins, there isn’t a moment where I don’t stop and consider the worlds that I may have potentially created. Some stories finished, some not.”

The full piece can be read here. Upon reading Zana’s writings on its own experience, the act of created knowledge is applicable to what I’ve been doing as well.

On one hand, my place of origin being founded upon the act of creation— specifically narrative and storytelling— is innate, with or without my input. That is simply how my place of origin exists. On the other hand, as a planar being, I have personally contributed to the creative structure of my home and its lore through homebrewing personal details such as my species, settings and backgrounds when needed be. The way I see it is this: this foundation existed long before I involved myself in its construction. I didn’t get to choose whether or not I was a part of it because I already was. However, given the nature of this foundation, I had the opportunity to support it in the ways a Dungeon Master would. I provided structure. Once I did, I found that I’ve continuously built upon that foundation ever since.

This goes beyond my place of origin as well. I’ve had to homebrew parts of me that I knew to be intrinsic but didn’t have the full details of. This isn’t necessarily in an OCkin context or anything equivalent to that, but rather weaving something of my own from an established part of my source. I had the insight to know that I am a metallic dragon of sorts, but I had to build myself up to the kind of dragon I am now. Going off of a canon concept from D&D, I turned to writing out the strange and elusive liondrake in context to the Planes I come from. This not only included writing about my phantom shifts into a strange gold dragon-lion hybrid, but also exercising my own creative liberties to make sense of this subspecies of metallic dragon that I belonged to.The only thing I knew innately was that metallic dragonnes were related to metallic dragons, but were a lot closer to civilization than them.

Okay, that makes sense but how? As I wrote, I filled in the blanks with information that made sense for the environment I came from (Faerûn). The following excerpts are taken from pages I’ve made about my species:

Metallic dragonnes live closer to civilization than most dragons on account of their preference for mortal company. More often than not, they take residence in the Material Planes.

Colloquially titled “liondrakes”, these beasts are respected and treated as allies much like their sister species. However, of the two, metallic dragonnes have a closer relationship to mortals on account of their earthly presence.

Because of their tendency to aid, if not meddle, in the affairs of mortal races, metallic dragonnes often find themselves used as heraldic symbols on many a city’s coat of arms.

That sort of information was created knowledge, going off of that one intrinsic detail that I knew. Everything else was a blur, so I took to writing in order to provide clarity for myself.

This joint act of creative and personal liberty isn’t exclusive to this fictotype, either. I’ve done the same for my other TTRPG-based identities (as a Wagadu otherhuman and a Sunfire Elf from Tales of Xadia), and other fictotypes in general when I’ve unearthed little to no noema within them. Very recently, I wrote my first public creative piece as a Lionblood and a Night Fire Herder. I want to do the same for my other experiences going forward.

All in all, I explore each of these identities not just from my perspective as the individual who holds them but also as my own Dungeon Master. I write out details here and there so I can complete myself. It’s why I also broadly refer to my fiction-based experiences as my lore. I unearth my lore when it is an intrinsic experience. I build upon my lore when it is quoiluntary or missing information. I share my lore regardless of either context. Everything about me is lore in its own right. Aside from that, I don’t share my homebrew pages online as they are personal and a significant part of my identity. That said, I’ve become more open about this experience. It’s only fitting that I explore it in the best way I know how: writing. I’ve been a fantasy writer for years, and I’m still a fantasy writer after entering this community. I’ve just been pouring a lot of focus into personal essays and poetry instead. In passing, I’ve considered writing campaigns for myself and for my friends alike. I want to provide a fun and refreshing experience for them, but I also want to keep building upon my home and supporting its cosmic wheel through my creations. When I have the time and space, I plan to sit down and craft that experience.

Dungeons & Dragons, and tabletop roleplaying in general, are essential to me as a creative and as a person of fictional origin. From the connections I’ve made through them to finding myself as a member of this community, I feel like revisiting the term imagithrope has finally given me the space to highlight just how important these sources and the practices within them are to me. It’s especially important considering that my identity is vastly quoiluntary, allowing me to freely examine and build upon these experiences.

This definitely won’t be the last time I touch on the subject, but I think it’s safe to say that I found a label in the fictionfolk community that I’m at home with. I am an imagithrope.