Is it wrong for a game to have an agenda?

[scourger]

DnD has an agenda if you look closely enough - you kill things, take their stuff, and become increasingly more wealthy, powerful and important within the context of the game. Now take that model and apply it to a capitalist society...

Yes, I've often thought it the product of a capitaliat society. Not a criticism or an endorsement; just an observation.

 

[Crothian]

A bad agenda to me.

well, that game really isn't that way at all.

But please can we not go to those places as they go against the riules of discusion on these Boards.

 

[smetzger]

If I agree with the agenda, then it's ok with me.
Otherwise, I could range from tolerance to aberrate.

Gotta agree with this one. If the agenda agrees with my morals and values than thumbs up. If it goes againt them then thumbs down.

For your specific example I am all for the equal treatment of oozes, so thumbs up for me.

 

[scourger]

But please can we not go to those places as they go against the riules of discusion on these Boards.

Yes, I did a quick reply before I saw the mod's reminder.

 

[scourger]

It's not necessarily wrong for a game to have an agenda. And it's not wrong for me to not support such a game due to it's agenda, either.

This quote from #61 pretty much sums it up for me, having now read all posts to this point.

To put it in terms of hypothetical oozes, I would refuse to support the oozes game in which certain character oozes derive more magical power from the ritual sacrifice of other ooze characters, especially if certain ooze feats give oozey magical abilities that then lead all the oozes to fight over the chance to sacrifice the defeated ooze foes; as if the ooze-caster-classes weren't ooze-sacrificey enough. I might have to read the entire Oozes Handbook to understand the agenda of promoting oozanism, but I won't like it when I do--particularly if the oozenet enlightens me to the author's predelictions.

For my personal games, the agendas are usually such things as encouraging heroism, eschewing materialism, and encouraging the players to play something other than the familiar D&D-sword-&-sorcery-kill-a-monster-and-steal-its-treasure game.

Neither the publisher's or the DM's agenda is easy to pursue, and often fails, in my experience.

 

[Trickstergod]

Do you take the word of the author or insist there is some devious ploy at work here?

Insist on the devious ploy.

Of course, it may not really be a ploy because the agenda might not be intentional; if you think oozes are just dandy, think they're on equal footing with everyone else, happen to be an ooze yourself, or whatever...then it might not even enter into your head that there's an issue on the table at all.

Generally speaking, I trust to what I notice and if someone tells me otherwise, well...I usually go check on whatever information's available to support the observation and denial. Often enough, what I find corroborates with what I suspect. Not always with gaming stuff, but other stuff as well. So I trust to my observations and if what I see doesn't match up with what an author says...I suspect a ploy.

 

[Ormiss]

I'm not sure if anyone said this already (I only read the first page, sorry!) but core D&D books (as well as the various accessories) have a very clear agenda. If you subscribe to what the monster manual says, you're playing a game with an agenda.

Just read the Book of Vile Darkness and the Book of Exalted Deeds. Also, someone mentioned that most people would be averse to a campaign that limns black people as inferior to white. True, but what about a campaign that portrays orcs as inferior to humans? What about a campaign that portrays kobolds as inferior to drow? D&D is full of agendas that we'd never stomach in real life, but we take them for granted in the game. Honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way. The idea that there is something honest-to-god-evil out there makes for a great campaign, while it makes for nothing more than delusion in real life.

 

[Henry]

Interestingly, I have been previously playing in a homebrew of a friend of mine that explores that very idea that Ormiss mentioned. In fact, I'm playing a PC that is technically human, but is one-quarter Orc; Orcs in the setting are second-class citizens who worship the god Moradin (yeah, get that!!) but are looked down upon by all other races (including dwarves who can't STOMACH that the orcs co-opted their god).

 

[mmadsen]

Also, someone mentioned that most people would be averse to a campaign that limns black people as inferior to white. True, but what about a campaign that portrays orcs as inferior to humans? What about a campaign that portrays kobolds as inferior to drow? D&D is full of agendas that we'd never stomach in real life, but we take them for granted in the game.

Orcs, kobolds, and drow, of course, don't exist in the real world, so depicting orcs as strong but stupid, kobolds as small and tricky, and drow as decadent and evil isn't evidence of an agenda (unless those imaginary races are clear stand-ins for real-life groups, which they aren't).

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

The idea that there is something honest-to-god-evil out there makes for a great campaign, while it makes for nothing more than delusion in real life.

Given that we're trying to stay away from real-world political / ethical battles, you might want to avoid tossing barely hidden ethical maxims into the end of your posts.