• The VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX is LIVE! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!

D&D 5E Art in 5e...?

Thaumaturge

Wandering. Not lost. (He/they)
The "skirt" is a place with pockets for components and such. It's over pants. Skirts only sexualize because they show skin - not because they are skirts. The skirt alone isn't the thing causing the sexualization, and in this case because there are pants on under the "skirt", it's not sexualized. Indeed, it actually serves to cover her butt, rather than reveal anything. It's more de-sexualizing than it would be with no skirt.


cold1.jpg

I agree. Skirt over pants is something we see in the real world. It's something that was seen in the ancient world. It can be functional or societal to wear that type of clothing.

I got the picture at the Roman Military Research Society. They have a nice write up on what legionaries wore in cold weather.

Thaumaturge.
 

log in or register to remove this ad

Jeff Carlsen

Adventurer
What bothers me is just how much better the uncropped version is. The cropping seriously harmed the composition. This is the Player's Handbook. It deserves better.

I suspect that the piece was commissioned before the cover design was finalized.
 



But I think this twisting pinup pose is kind of a dumb cliche at this point.

I think that's just picking nits. Heroic fantasy art typically shows the heros - male or female - in poses that emphasize their physique, strength, dexterity, etc. Nobody complains about the poses and relative lack of clothing you see with male barbarian characters. Why should it be different for female ones? We're not talking about a chainmail bikini character with DDs or anything like that.
 

I just tried to get into that pose. I'm a fat, short, middle-aged guy, and I was able to do it, with a little bracing against the wall, since I'm not suspended in midair like that character.

That's all beside the point, though.

The fact is that humans - male or female - tend to respond better to people who are considered to be attractive. There is also a tendency in action-oriented art (fantasy, comics, etc.) to show heroic characters with exaggerated, idealized proportions, regardless of their gender. That goes pretty far back, and can even be found in stories without art (like in Ancient Greece). There's nothing wrong with that. I certainly don't feel a wave of insecurity wash over me every time I see a heavily-muscled barbarian character.

D&D is a product, and WotC is going to go with art that helps to sell the product. That particular picture doesn't go full-cheesecake, but it still shows heroic proportions. That seems like a good compromise.

Any ideology becomes problematic when taken to extremes. The extremist fringe factions of the various political parties, religions, social movements, etc. tend to hurt the overall message of the ideology when they start making statements that swing too far into the extreme. The Hawkeye Test and statements about any depiction of a pretty woman as a sexualized image go too far. That's straying into Dworkinite territory.
 

Any ideology becomes problematic when taken to extremes. The extremist fringe factions of the various political parties, religions, social movements, etc. tend to hurt the overall message of the ideology when they start making statements that swing too far into the extreme. The Hawkeye Test and statements about any depiction of a pretty woman as a sexualized image go too far. That's straying into Dworkinite territory.

I don't think that's fair at all.

Whilst I think this image is boring rather than sexist (the problem is that it's a dull comic-book cliche, for me), it's not right to start calling people "extremists" just because they think it is. If you honestly think they are, then frankly, you've obviously never seen genuine extremist views on this subject.
 


Blackbrrd

First Post
Pics or it didn't happen.

Thaumaturge.
Damn ninja! :D

Looking at the cover-poll, the MM is far outstripping the PHB/DMG when it comes to votes. I think part of the reason is the composition. The DMG/PHB are both about 40% of the original image, which makes the cover-image feel unbalanced. In contrast, the MM has the Beholder right in the center, pulling your eyes toward it. In addition, there isn't too much overlapping between the Beholder and the two PC's, as opposed to the PHB cover, that in my opinion is a bit of a mess in comparison. All the covers are 10x better than the 4e covers though, so I am quite satisfied. ;)
 

Callahan09

Explorer
Now I don't believe that a comic/fantasy image is bad just because it fails the Hawkeye test. The Hawkeye test is ruthless. An image doesn't have to be erotic at all to fail; there just has to be something about the pose/clothing of a female character that would make a male character look effeminate in the same pose/clothing.

Is it now considered a positive goal for society to approach a reality where men and women behave and dress in exactly the same ways such that you can't tell what sex someone is? That's not meant to be a snarky dismissal of the notion, by the way, that's actually a real question.
 

Voidrunner's Codex

Remove ads

Top