Another WOTC creation, another badly chosen name for a core part of the PHB.
Concept of a leader class and a fey magic elf race - great, no problem with that. The names, warlord and eladrin, don't work for me. Why can't they just use classic, generic fantasy names? Why are they getting ridiculous (warlord) and arbitrary (eladrin) with them? Why are we getting more D&Disms in the core, as if the cleric wasn't enough?
This is D&D, WOTC, and you're spiked chaining it further into D&Dism territory. It'll map even less to classic swords & sorcery fantasy tropes, because you'll have to explain to newcomers that warlords don't have armies, and what the heck an eladrin is, and so on. You're polluting the implied setting by making this stuff core.
D&D is already full of D&Disms, but generally they're optional and can be ignored, by not using that supplement. By moving them to centre stage and putting them in the PHB you don't even really give people an option to ban them, because it's a pain in the neck to state that such and such parts of the PHB don't apply to this campaign. Or have to put up with the annoyance of reading "eladrin" and "warlord" every time if you rename them.
I understand that WOTC wants to give the game a shake-up, but for something as minor as names, it's just so trivial to do a good job with something classic and generic instead of putting a sore thumb into every campaign out there.
A lot of people play D&D as a sort of Sim S&S Fantasy World game, and by pushing your brand as a specific, non-generic entity with a specific, extremely quirky implied setting you may find that aspect of D&D's ability to deliver on that suffering. Thus far it's hewed fairly closely to Tolkien, who stuck to mythology, which was okay (everyone knows what a dwarf is)...
...but now we're going all Planescape and WoW. "Fey elf" and "demonic blooded human" and "leader" have mythic resonance as tropes, but the names chosen to represent them need an overhaul IMO.
As if the implied setting wasn't already quirky and idiosyncratic enough...
Concept of a leader class and a fey magic elf race - great, no problem with that. The names, warlord and eladrin, don't work for me. Why can't they just use classic, generic fantasy names? Why are they getting ridiculous (warlord) and arbitrary (eladrin) with them? Why are we getting more D&Disms in the core, as if the cleric wasn't enough?
This is D&D, WOTC, and you're spiked chaining it further into D&Dism territory. It'll map even less to classic swords & sorcery fantasy tropes, because you'll have to explain to newcomers that warlords don't have armies, and what the heck an eladrin is, and so on. You're polluting the implied setting by making this stuff core.
D&D is already full of D&Disms, but generally they're optional and can be ignored, by not using that supplement. By moving them to centre stage and putting them in the PHB you don't even really give people an option to ban them, because it's a pain in the neck to state that such and such parts of the PHB don't apply to this campaign. Or have to put up with the annoyance of reading "eladrin" and "warlord" every time if you rename them.
I understand that WOTC wants to give the game a shake-up, but for something as minor as names, it's just so trivial to do a good job with something classic and generic instead of putting a sore thumb into every campaign out there.
A lot of people play D&D as a sort of Sim S&S Fantasy World game, and by pushing your brand as a specific, non-generic entity with a specific, extremely quirky implied setting you may find that aspect of D&D's ability to deliver on that suffering. Thus far it's hewed fairly closely to Tolkien, who stuck to mythology, which was okay (everyone knows what a dwarf is)...
...but now we're going all Planescape and WoW. "Fey elf" and "demonic blooded human" and "leader" have mythic resonance as tropes, but the names chosen to represent them need an overhaul IMO.
As if the implied setting wasn't already quirky and idiosyncratic enough...
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