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I'd like to know the thinking behind this....
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<blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6396512" data-attributes="member: 2067"><p>[sblock]</p><p></p><p></p><p>We're off to a bad start.</p><p></p><p>If you're one of the "orphans of the planes," you can't be "heir" to much of anything. A heritage is something the wealthy and powerful give their children, not something your bastard offspring can easily proclaim. Your bloodline might be ancient, or it might be recent, but as a proper tiefling, you have no real way of knowing for sure. And anyway, the chronology of your bloodline shouldn't matter -- being a tiefling is about REJECTING those that would define you by your bloodline. </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Nobles? There is nothing noble about the rejected Other, that inverts the "classism" angle explicitly. Bargains? There is no equity here, just complicated shame. Your ancestors might have been victims or breedthralls or sacrifices. Or just people in the wrong place at the wrong time. Subjugating empires? There's never been any claim to tiefling glory except what each individual wrings out of a reluctant society.</p><p></p><p>One True History? For a race whose history shouldn't have ever been a question worth answering because even asking the question is failing to understand the race? </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Hey, that doesn't invalidate PS Tieflings! </p><p>[/sblock]</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Having a decadent noble heritage that fell due to their own hubris reads more like tieflings as a cautionary tale: there is some specific sin that if only it were corrected or atoned for, your people wouldn't be so "flawed."</p><p></p><p>PS tieflings, as orphans and castoffs, have no such noble history, no aspirational former glory, no justification for their current misery. If you are part of a marginalized group in Real World society, it is not due to some corruption on your part, or some flaw in your ancestors, it is visited upon you at birth through no blame or fault of anyone. It is the cruelty of a capricious universe. There is no excuse for handicaps and deformities and simply being born "different," there is no possible redemption because there is no sin to be redeemed from, you have done nothing wrong, but you are still the target of hatred and ire and suspicion. It is the fundamental injustice of biological inequality, of a world that isn't perfect and can't be perfect.That narrative is about overcoming <em>society</em>, the prejudice and the injustice of a world that doesn't treat you as normal. </p><p></p><p>Which makes it perfect for Planescape -- the idea of the universe being flawed and in need of your characters' actions to make just is part of what makes belief such a powerful force in that setting. </p><p></p><p>Giving tieflings a decadent noble past nukes a lot of that possibility. It has blame, and it pins it somewhere specific, and allows for a "cure." It is like if Shrek ended with Fiona turning into a beautiful woman instead of a hideous ogre. It is exactly the wrong message for the kind of story that I found really compelling in tieflings before. </p><p></p><p>Which isn't to say that it's a bad story. It's just not what was interesting about tieflings. It didn't capture the fun of playing one for me. If they wanted a dark and brooding satan-spawn of a race to play the Grey Guys in their setting, they probably should've kept the whole thing the same and just changed the name to something else and we wouldn't even be having this convo.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="I'm A Banana, post: 6396512, member: 2067"] [sblock] We're off to a bad start. If you're one of the "orphans of the planes," you can't be "heir" to much of anything. A heritage is something the wealthy and powerful give their children, not something your bastard offspring can easily proclaim. Your bloodline might be ancient, or it might be recent, but as a proper tiefling, you have no real way of knowing for sure. And anyway, the chronology of your bloodline shouldn't matter -- being a tiefling is about REJECTING those that would define you by your bloodline. Nobles? There is nothing noble about the rejected Other, that inverts the "classism" angle explicitly. Bargains? There is no equity here, just complicated shame. Your ancestors might have been victims or breedthralls or sacrifices. Or just people in the wrong place at the wrong time. Subjugating empires? There's never been any claim to tiefling glory except what each individual wrings out of a reluctant society. One True History? For a race whose history shouldn't have ever been a question worth answering because even asking the question is failing to understand the race? Hey, that doesn't invalidate PS Tieflings! [/sblock] Having a decadent noble heritage that fell due to their own hubris reads more like tieflings as a cautionary tale: there is some specific sin that if only it were corrected or atoned for, your people wouldn't be so "flawed." PS tieflings, as orphans and castoffs, have no such noble history, no aspirational former glory, no justification for their current misery. If you are part of a marginalized group in Real World society, it is not due to some corruption on your part, or some flaw in your ancestors, it is visited upon you at birth through no blame or fault of anyone. It is the cruelty of a capricious universe. There is no excuse for handicaps and deformities and simply being born "different," there is no possible redemption because there is no sin to be redeemed from, you have done nothing wrong, but you are still the target of hatred and ire and suspicion. It is the fundamental injustice of biological inequality, of a world that isn't perfect and can't be perfect.That narrative is about overcoming [I]society[/I], the prejudice and the injustice of a world that doesn't treat you as normal. Which makes it perfect for Planescape -- the idea of the universe being flawed and in need of your characters' actions to make just is part of what makes belief such a powerful force in that setting. Giving tieflings a decadent noble past nukes a lot of that possibility. It has blame, and it pins it somewhere specific, and allows for a "cure." It is like if Shrek ended with Fiona turning into a beautiful woman instead of a hideous ogre. It is exactly the wrong message for the kind of story that I found really compelling in tieflings before. Which isn't to say that it's a bad story. It's just not what was interesting about tieflings. It didn't capture the fun of playing one for me. If they wanted a dark and brooding satan-spawn of a race to play the Grey Guys in their setting, they probably should've kept the whole thing the same and just changed the name to something else and we wouldn't even be having this convo. [/QUOTE]
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