How do you fit monks into Occidental campaigns?

Since the purpose of playing D&D at this point (and since 3E's launch, when this thread started) is to play D&D, in a self-sustaining cycle of self-reference, I'd advise not worrying about it. "It's D&D."

Those of you who want to reproduce something else are advised to escape, lest the ouroboros crush you within its coils.

prosfilaes said:

I see your behavior as unproductive; you see no need to stand up for others, and you refuse to stand up for yourself, so nothing will ever change. And by requiring a person of that minority to stand up for themself, you're letting this behavior become normalized in society and making anyone who complains seem to be that over-sensitive minority.

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Let me be clearer. I can't stand up for every cause, in every country and in every group. I can only speak out against things I don't agree with either with in my group (which the Dwarf issue has never come up) or in conversation (notice when I said it wasn't okay?).

I don't need to be told how to deal with racism and I don't want to put up with the "sensitive" minority syndrome you're trying to paint.

You might disagree but come back to me when you've dealt with racism for your entire life. I know you might live in an ideal world but the issue is very complex and what you might see as "unproductive" is a learned behaviour from years of experience.

People don't want to be spoken for, hell not all Asians would not agree with me and so I respect that inter-personal line.

prosfilaes said:

Wow, you do have a skill at forming a strawman version of any argument. What he actually said was that the monk is a racist class--being debated, that people are using the monk as a racist stereotype--which nobody was arguing wasn't true, and that he didn't feel responsible for responding to racist stereotypes that weren't directed at him--which I said was very narrow sighted.

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Don't put words into my mouth. I said the class is tolerable, I never said it was racist.

Rassilon said:

And now you've offended all the British people. Because everyone knows that Dwarves are Scottish; and the Britains who aren't Scottish are offended at being confused with Scottish, and the Scots are offended at being labelled merely 'British'...

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This is a classic example of "sensitive minority" syndrome if anybody was wondering. If somebody speaks out then they have to be very, very careful what they say because people will and do use anything to try and make their point null-and-void.

This is usually done by trying to prove that the person with the complaint is racist or offensive themselves or just too sensitive when it comes to a question of racism.

You're not a nice person, good day.

Tonguez said:

The Monk class is based on the idea of the Eastern Shaolin/Zen/Taoist Monk as per all those Wuxia/Golden Harvest movies right?

yet most gamers use Westernish settings

How do you reconcile the two?

- Monks are exotic 'oriental' visitors to the campaign region
- Monks are a integral part of normal society
- Monks are changed to have a more occidental outlook whilst maintaining their core abilities

any ideas?

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I tend to disallow monks for that very reason but it sounds like you are looking for a way to incorporate this into your campaign so along those lines, I'd try to "westernize" it; more specifically, integrate it into your setting by reworking the "RP" elements of the monks into your setting.

First off, that means ditching weapons not appropriate to y our setting like bo-sticks and the like. Then it means making the 'order' or 'monastery' of your monks fit into your setting. In a classic medieval-ish setting, this might mean making your monks part of something like the Irish monasteries, perhaps a fighting-brothers sub-order meant to deal with a threat akin to the vikings.

As a practical matter, if you establish the setting, establish a religious or martial order that may have some sort of monk class and THEN associate the D&D monk class with that order, it might work better, rather than starting with the class and trying to retro-fit the setting to it.

But this reminds me of a time when I did allow a monk... more in a new thread