OneBookShelf Community Content Programs and the Polish RPG Fandom

Marek Golonka's article asks why Polish authors are nearly absent from OneBookShelf community content programs, such as Dungeon Masters Guild, which let fans publish supplements for tabletop RPGs without a formal publisher license. As of December 2018, the author found only three Polish contributors, and only one, Jan Sielicki, had published multiple titles. The paper's central argument is that the long absence of professionally published RPGs in Poland, together with a persistently small commercial market, intensified fan prosumption while limiting the chance for fans to acquire the skills needed to publish their work professionally or semi-professionally.

The analysis weighs several contributing factors. Dungeons & Dragons holds a weaker position in Poland than in the English-speaking market, its first successful Polish release came late, and the Polish RPG community has shown limited appetite for digital materials, with a preference for printed books and a reluctance among local publishers to release PDFs. Language barriers and the flourishing of Polish-language fan websites in the early twenty-first century may also have reduced interest in English-language platforms. The author draws on a range of sources, including the history of Polish RPG magazines, competition judging experience from the Quentin scenario contest, and an interview with Sielicki, who attributes his success largely to skills gained as an English teacher and to over twenty years of RPG play outside the Polish fandom.

The study's scope is focused on Polish RPG culture and the English-language OneBookShelf programs, with a time frame running from the late 1980s through 2019. Its methodology combines literature review, participant observation, a fan-community consultation conducted in December 2018, and a single in-depth interview, so its conclusions rest on qualitative evidence rather than a systematic survey. The author concludes that small, fan-heavy markets stimulate amateur creativity while offering less practical know-how for commercial design, and suggests that the Polish situation reflects this trade-off rather than a failing of the community.