D&D 5E WOTC Possibly Removing "Druids" for Religious/Cultural Sensitivity Reasons

[Paul Farquhar]

I have recently come around to seeing "selling your soul" in a more metaphoric fashion. It's not about making a specific contract in exchange for specific benefits – anyone making such a contract was probably heading for the lower planes anyway. Rather, it's a metaphor for performing evil deeds for your own benefit.

BG3 treats it very literally, with a written contract, full of subclauses, with witnesses etc.

The thing is, deals with devils have been used to parody the legal profession since long before D&D was invented.

 

[Remathilis]

I was going to note the same. While Rhaez' list is obviously silly and facetious, the points are real. 1) Made-up names avoid real-world cultural reference, and 2) they have the advantage from a corporate perspective of being copyrightable, 3) Made up names have the downside of not being immediately evocative or grounding.

Monte Cook for Arcana Unearthed/Evolved used names that were vaguely descriptive or made up rather than archetypes like D&D did. They were things like champion, green bound, unfettered and warmain. They aren't 1:1 with the PHB, but your tank, healer, caster, and skills guys are all there along with your unarmed fighter, nature caster, gish, etc.

The advantage is that each class is unburdened with specific archetype baggage. The green bound could represent any nature powered PC like a green witch, a druid, a shaman, or Captain Planet. The disadvantage is that being that unmoored from the classic archetypes doesn't evoke much information without additional explanation. You say "Barbarian" and people know you are talking about Conan, The Class. You say Unfettered and people have to ask what does that class even does!

Could D&D eventually brand it's classes with even more IP unique names that aren't based on real world archetypes? I guess it's possible. I think it's also possible they move to a more free form class structure and use the classic classes as examples/quick builds eventually too.

 

[Mannahnin]

The advantage is that each class is unburdened with specific archetype baggage. The green bound could represent any nature powered PC like a green witch, a druid, a shaman, or Captain Planet. The disadvantage is that being that unmoored from the classic archetypes doesn't evoke much information without additional explanation. You say "Barbarian" and people know you are talking about Conan, The Class. You say Unfettered and people have to ask what does that class even does!

Could D&D eventually brand it's classes with even more IP unique names that aren't based on real world archetypes? I guess it's possible. I think it's also possible they move to a more free form class structure and use the classic classes as examples/quick builds eventually too.

Exactly.

And part of D&D's market dominance and first mover advantage is the whole weight of accreted history and tropes which D&D functionally originated (like spellcasting armored Clerics, as reflected in a secondary dictionary definition someone quoted up-thread, or its vision of Druids, or its particular versions of "Vancian" magic, which are similar but not identical to how one form of magic worked in Vance's works) and which the broader fantasy market and D&D-knockoff games for decades now have imitated. Which makes it complicated to walk away from those things. The tropes and memes have momentum and longevity and would probably continue even if D&D itself didn't use those names anymore.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The names need to go. The classes can stay; each fills a niche.

"Martial artist" is a term that applies to all warriors, isn't it?

Mystic Warrior might be a better name, but still isn't brilliant.

I wish people weren’t so wrong about what is actually a problem in these classes and their names.

You could use Kensei as a class name in D&D, without uproar. You just have to write it to actually respectfully and reasonably model the Japanese Sword-Saint.

Look, we've already got one thread for T&A that is, apparently, totally fine here, we don't need a second

Do the what now to the who there!?

unpopular opinion:

I like there being an overlap between druids and nature clerics (and believe there should be nature based sorcerers an warlocks), as it allows a player to build similar concepts while using a different class.

Maybe a player just played a cleric, or doesn't enjoy cleric mechanics. But they still want a nature caster. Druid is perfect for them. And it works in reverse too.

I agree. It’s good for the game to have some degree of overlap between classes.

And are the templars going be banned from Dark Sun and other possible settings?

The Crusades are largely viewed as an immoral series of wars of European aggression and conquest, and the Templars as popular icons of those invasions and occupations, so…I doubt it.

Is offensive an evil orc wearing a turbant?, and an evil vampire wearing a morrion (the helm used by Spanish conquerors)?

The conquistadores were savage invaders and oppressors, slavers, mass rapists, and genocidal psychopaths. As a descendent of both these monsters and their victims, I will always be perfectly comfortable using them as evil villains. Because they were. Like the Nazis. It’s always okay to make them the evil monsters that have to be defeated. Neither makes the Spanish nor the Germans into evil villains as a people.

Turbans are currently worn by a Sikhs more than anyone else, who have never been an oppressing force, but have been marginalized and had to defend themselves against oppressors.

The two examples are not like cases.

 

[Gradine]

Do the what now to the who there!?

Let's just say there's an art thread that feels like a relic of an era where chainmail bikinis were still an open question. At least the last time I poked my head in there I had to close it immediately because I was at work.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

don't think this approach is a perfect fit for D&D, though, because D&D doesn't have one big all-encompassing setting.

Yeah it’s great for offshoots, like my warlock rewrite is called the Anathemir, because it is a class with a story of learning the same skill set as those who traffic in “anathema” like undead and aberrations and demons (no 3 types of fiends, demon, devil, and fiend, are all just words for the same thing), with the purpose of destroying them. Initially I called it the Binder, but over time I found that it worked better as a setting specific class, alongside the Aethernaut (arcane warrior class that binds magical energy called Aether to themselves and has ties to Alchemists and Anathemir), and Astari (monk rewrite as itinerate warrior-mystics with esoteric knowledge and abilities that defy limitations but aren’t magical).

Because those classes (and the Witch and Assassin) all have ties into the setting and its history and cosmology, it feels good to have them be unique to the setting. I have considered changing Witch to something less generic, but I won’t force it.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Let's just say there's an art thread that feels like a relic of an era where chainmail bikinis were still an open question. At least the last time I poked my head in there I had to close it immediately because I was at work.

The AI one? If so yeah internet art is very persistent in how it portrays women, and “dressed practically” isn’t really part of that equation, but the thread is 90% cleavage free for most of its pages, I’d say.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Points at warlocks.

Which doesn't really address 99% of the tropes.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I don't see that any special mechanics are needed for a character to sell their soul.

Cool, so spell out the answers to the situations I outlined above.

When a player wants to sell their soul, what's the range of stuff they can get for it? What are the consequences for selling their soul? How do they summon the devil? Do they get X more years of life before being dragged bodily to Hell or do they get to walk around indefinitely without a soul?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I have recently come around to seeing "selling your soul" in a more metaphoric fashion. It's not about making a specific contract in exchange for specific benefits – anyone making such a contract was probably heading for the lower planes anyway. Rather, it's a metaphor for performing evil deeds for your own benefit. Your soul was sold when you turned in that refugee in order to curry favor with the evil government, or when you stabbed your buddy in the back because you didn't want to share the treasure. That doesn't mean you can't have other contracts with devils, but they won't be dealing with souls directly.

Nearly everything in D&D is a metaphor or symbol for something. If we take all those out, we're left with an exciting RPG about people discussing the dissolution of their marriage.