D&D (2024) Here's The New 2024 Player's Handbook Wizard Art

 

[Chaosmancer]

EDIT/TLDR - If you really want to narrow the argument down and not "brush" Isekai, perhaps the real issue isn't the genre, it's the recommendations? I'm skeptical but it's possible. What I've seen consistently since my brother got me back into watching anime a couple of years ago, is that where Isekai is recommended, it's often completely terrible, and a non-Isekai show with the same flaws wouldn't get the same kind of recommendation.

I think it is a problem with the recommendations, but more specifically you need to understand who is recommending things and why.

Another subgenre that I really, really like is LitRPG, which contains things like cultivation stories and progression fantasy. A major problem with a lot of these stories is the Overpowered Protagonist. It is REALLY prevalent, and it annoys me in a lot of cases. There was a story I read not too long ago that I thought was going to be an interesting story about a merchant, and ended up with him slaying a high-ranking angel and then that angel's god by the end of the first book. It was just too much for me.

But the story Azarinth Healer ALSO has a very overpowered protagonist in a lot of ways, who by the end of the third book has left everything she was doing in the first book far behind, and has even successfully regenerated from being beheaded. It is a trope I normally hate... but it was done well and it didn't annoy me in THAT book. Nor would I think people who hate overpowered protagonists would necessarily hate One-Punch Man, who is explicitly ludicrously overpowered. So, if I was recommending those stories, I could be rightfully accused of recommending stories with a bad and even harmful trope... but I wouldn't be recommending them FOR that trope.

Do people who recommend these bad Isekai do so because they LIKE overpowered male fantasies? Maybe. I know a lot of people recommend Konosuba, but they aren't recommending it because it has well-written plots with likable characters... they recommend it because they find it funny. If you don't like the humor of the show... you won't like the show. I like Realist Hero, an Isekai that has a harem as a core part of the plot and deals with slavery... but I like how they handled the harem, I don't see anything inherently wrong with polyamorous relationships, and the slavery issue was brief and handled fairly realistically fitting with some of the realpolitik themes of the story. I tried watching Overlord, but I found it boring and I lost interest. I know many people love it. I don't begrudge them that, but it wasn't for me.

Again, if you were simply saying "Many of the most popular Isekai I don't think are any good, and are full of nasty tropes"... I can't disagree with that. Rise of a Shield Hero is something I missed, but the more I hear about it, the more I am glad that I missed it. Maybe it would have charmed me if I saw it, maybe it would have really bothered me, I don't know. And I don't think you are talking out of ignorance, because I recognize you are correct about a large number of your points. I just think you go too far. Just like I think people go too far with Urban Fantasy, just like I think people go too far with LitRPG stories. Yes, there is a lot of garbage out there. But that garbage is not an innate feature baked into the genre and inseperable from it. The good stories are not "exceptions that prove the rule" they are... good stories in that genre. I mean heck, there are good and bad adaptations of sherlock holmes, there are good and bad comedy sitcoms, there are good and bad reality tv shows (I'm sure there is at least one good one). The message of "be careful with the genre, because it has a lot of crappy shows in it" is fair. The message of "this genre is crap and it should burn to the gorund, because it is inherently bad"... isn't. I'd lose too many shows that are exquisitely made or at least really interesting if you did that.

 

[ezo]

I keep pushing back, because I'm trying to reflect back your position, which seems to have repeatedly boiled down to "if you had the money and power not to need glasses, you would fix yourself not to need them, because glasses are at best an inconvenient and subpar tool for fixing yourself." Anyone, in your mind, who is wealthy and powerful enough would not be depicted with glasses, glasses are for the poor or the weak. Therefore a powerful character looks weird with glasses to you. The only acceptable answer you've seen for her wearing glasses, is if they are magical glasses that give her something better than normal sight. Something that makes them appropriately more wealthy and powerful.

Oh PLAH-EEASE! "Wealthy and powerful", "glasses are for the poor or the weak"... Those are some mighty big leaps you just made and you've just lost a lot of credibility you had with me.

I understand you didn't intend that message, but it is the one left when you keep insisting that it doesn't make sense to you that people wouldn't choose to fix themselves if they could.

Not at all, and if you read it that way, there's no point in any further exchange.

And FWIW, people "fix" (I abhore that word, but whatever) themselves all the time (or try to). You have poor vision? Do you wear glasses? If so, you are "fixing" yourself. I don't know many people who would choose to walk around blind if they could help it, and even if they choose to I wouldn't find any benefits worth the inconveniences, personally, so it wouldn't make sense TO ME!

I know I'm coming across strong here, but more subtle arguments don't seem to get past your confusion about why we care about this. Why we don't like this idea that glasses look weird on a powerful mage with access to plenty of gold and magic

To be clear, there is no confusion, there is only your opinion and mine. They don't agree and they obviously never will on this topic. Good day.

 

[Fifth Element]

I think that is more likely because you don't care. You (maybe unintentionally) told us your preferences. You just don't think much of artists that aren't those 3 guys or at least from that era. Which is fine. We all have preferences. But this constant attempt to suggest objective truths about D&D art outside of your preferred (and let's be honest, that means formative) era is transparent.

Absolutely. I don't recognize these artists either, because they're not to my taste and I don't spend any time at all learning about them. But if I were to take that to mean that the artists don't actually have a recognizable style - rather than me just not being able to recognize it - I would be making an unjustified assumption.

 

[Fifth Element]

#

lit-up Christmas trees offer a different experience to the nearsighted.

Yes! And traffic lights in the rain.

 

[Fifth Element]

Most people don't carry spare glasses on them IRL.

Most people also don't go exploring dungeons where they know goblins likely lurk, so IRL is irrelevant.

 

[Arilyn]

Let's assume the glasses are being worn to correct vision. How could the wizard get her eyes fixed magically? Maybe Heal but that's a 6th level divine spell, and I'm not sure blurry vision would count as a disease. Even if Heal would work, I'm not sure a deity would be willing to channel that much power through one of their clerics to fix blurry vision?

Maybe a magic item? But you'd need to find one. Glasses seem more practical at this point.

 

[Fifth Element]

If they have a preferred past edition then there is no need to complain, but as @Jaeger said, many like to play the current edition and still want it to reflect their preferences

Why would that be preferable to having other peoples' previous-unserved preferences reflected instead, given that your preferences were already served before? The art doesn't actually change the game at the table. Why wouldn't you WANT other people have a turn at having their preferences reflected?

 

[ezo]

Most people also don't go exploring dungeons where they know goblins likely lurk, so IRL is irrelevant.

Irrelevant to you, relevant to me.

 

[ezo]

Let's assume the glasses are being worn to correct vision. How could the wizard get her eyes fixed magically? Maybe Heal but that's a 6th level divine spell, and I'm not sure blurry vision would count as a disease. Even if Heal would work, I'm not sure a deity would be willing to channel that much power through one of their clerics to fix blurry vision?

I don't know if you'd had time to read through the thread, it is getting a bit long, but this has already been covered in prior posts. If someone else wants to chime in, that's cool, but I'm not going through this again personally. Sorry.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

She is probably far sighted, not near sighted. Her galsses only cover half her eyes. So one can assume she only needs them for reading. So losing them in the fight is no big deal. She probably has some spare ones. And also mending will take care of it even if they are the last ones.

Or she just wears them for style reasons or because they are a magic item.

Edit: definitely only worn for style reason. Do you notice that the lines of her face are perfectly straight. If you are short sighted and wear correction glasses, the face looks smaller behind them. If you are near sighted, the face lools wider. So no change of size = no correction factor. At least nothing to speak of.