Carter Offer: “TTRPGS LITERALLY CONTROL MY LIFE!!!”

By Xiaoying Wu Hong

Carter Offer, a sophomore interdisciplinary arts major, is wickedly obsessed with TTRPGs (tabletop role-playing games). You can tell from the way his eyes light up at the mention of D&D (Dungeons and Dragons) or Call of Cthulhu (a tabletop role-playing game released in 1981). Whether it's in his art or in the free time between classes and work, role-playing games fill his everyday life.

Offers his upcoming solo show, “TTRPGS LITERALLY CONTROL MY LIFE!!!” at The Forum Art Space, is a testament to his love and adoration for the game genre. Inspired by the fantastical storytelling and community that surround the genre, Offer pays homage to his childhood love through his work.

Carter Offer at his shift in The Forum Art Space office room (photo by Xiaoying Wu Hong) 

What is TTRPG?

TTRPG stands for tabletop role-playing game. It can pertain to several games, including, but not limited to, Dungeons and Dragons, all editions of the game. I’ve been playing Cain a lot, Cyberpunk RED, all editions of Call of Cthulhu and the Alien TTRPG, just to name a few.

Are all these games online? I know D&D is generally in person. 

Yeah, so you can play any of these in person or online. Generally, playing them in person would grant a better experience. I’d say like, six times out of 10. 

What’s the main inspiration for your exhibition?

TTRPGS, Table Top Role-Playing Games.

I’ve been playing Dungeons and Dragons for around five years with my friends. Ever since then, I’ve been playing once to three times a week, every week, for the past, like, five years.

What’s Dungeons and Dragons about?

It depends on who is hosting the game itself. Typically, it revolves around one person known as the Game Master, or Dungeon Master, and they are making a world for the players to play the characters that they create. So the Dungeon Master, DM for short, grabs the group of players. Then those players come together as a party, and they partake in several events together.

So what media are you going to use?

I’m doing a lot of posters in the form of graphic design-related prints, paintings, drawings, ink washes, photographs, some books, maybe two books, large prints, large paintings, small prints, small paintings, small photographs, small books and about three different ways that people can interact with the show itself. I’m going to have a board up where people can write down their TTRPG stories. I’m also going to have a dice that everybody can roll.

Carter Offer with his work in the visual arts building (photo by Max Valentine Mills)

Are there any inspirations beyond TTRPGs?

No. Pretty much everything revolves around tabletop role-playing games. But I am doing every facet of tabletop role-playing games. So not only the gameplay itself, but my experience with my friends as the players, my experience preparing to host these campaigns, the ideas that occur within the campaigns themselves and yeah, pretty much everything regarding the actual experience of playing the game.

Why TTRPGs? Why is this particular genre so important to you out of every other game genre out there?

TTRPGs already inspire a lot of my art. I wrote my letter to Purchase on TTRPG. It was like managing time with D&D or something like that. I learned how to code because of D&D. I learned After Effects [Adobe motion graphics software] because of D&D. Pretty much everything I do is because of D&D at this point.

Anything you wanna say to the people coming?

Ok, my message: TTRPGS have impacted every facet of my life, and I hope you make the time to come to my show and take a gander at this impact.

Offer’s solo exhibition “TTRPGS LITERALLY CONTROL MY LIFE!!!” will open with its evening reception at The Forum Art Space on April 15 at 7:30 p.m. and will be up until April 19.