Racially diverse artwork in D&D...does it influence you?

[ShinHakkaider]

I hope you realize how insulting that is. Playing in, say, a "white" Middle Earth is just an excuse for exclusion or minimization?

I dont know about anyone else here but I'M not talking about playing in Middle Earth OR Arthurian legend. I'm asking you why is it a problem for someone like me to play someone that looks like me in a fantasy RPG setting?

And according to you, it IS a problem.

Who are these sinister people whose primary agenda in producing an RPG setting is to exclude and minimize other races? And why do these same people often enjoy playing non-white characters in games set in non-white settings?

There's no conspiracy. It's just thoughtlessness and maybe perhaps laziness. I'm mean it's fairly obvious if you go to a con that RPG's a white man's hobby and that there are few brown faces at these things. That still doesnt mean that those of us who ARE in the hobby don't appreciate it when we see representations of ourselves in these RPG books.

And it doesn't mean that we don't get annoyed when we are told that we cant really be part of a fantasy world without justifying our existence IN that world because of our skin color.

 

[Barastrondo]

I'd like to play a character who looks like me in a D&D fantasy RPG. You've said repeatedly that my character would seem forced in anything that would resemble "Arthur's England" or "medieval Europe". So by your own admission if the world that my character is in is close to those two, his existence needs to be justified or his existence in these worlds are "forced".

I think rather it comes down to whether or not you think that D&D implies, by default, a pastiche of medieval European culture (only with pantheism and gender equity and extra cultures). Some people do, and some people don't. I'm firmly in the "don't" camp, but for people who cut their teeth on Arthur and Tolkien, they may see a much stronger connection than is necessarily present.

From what I see of 4e art, there's not too much that says "medieval Europe." The armor and weapons have been deliberately stylized to look more like D&D than history. The architecture is high fantasy, all over the place. You could build Arthur with the warlord class, but you could also build Zhuge Liang. They even use Al-Qadim-esque examples right in the DMG for sample worldbuilding and adventure design. Hence, i gotta think that the European model is a matter of personal taste, not some sort of fact about "how modern fantasy works."

 

[Wyrmshadows]

Of course religion isn't a genetic reality. You know what else isn't a genetic reality? The correspondence between plate armor and lances with caucasian skin.

Of course there isn't a genetic reality to plate mail armor but their is a climatalogical and geographic reality to clothing, armor, customs, values, etc. These climatic and geographic realities create the various differences in human types as well as strongly influences the cultures which they create.

There is a reason that historically caucasians created plate armor and there is a reason that desert peoples wouldn't wear plate mail, it would be deadly. The kinds of wepons, clothing, etc. a culture creates, as I am sure you know, is based on necessity as well.

I am all for diversity, just not a handwaved superficial diversity that goes along the lines of "Well its fantasy, so it doesn't matter." I want to see real diversity in traditional D&D were asian doesn't just mean a katana and middle eastern influence isn't just in regards to tossing some djinn around and calling it a day. What I would like to see is an asian-type warrior wearing western armor (because the climate allows it) but add some asian flair to it in regards to regalia and ornamentation and maybe think in somewhat different terms so the character isn't merely another traditional faux-european D&D character who happens to look faux-asian. Plus, in a traditional D&D setting this guy would be exotic...and what is wrong with that exactly?



Wyrmshadows

 

[eyebeams]

The Arthurian tales go from pagan tales of great warriors to Christian tales of pious knights, but, sure, you'd want a "knights in shining armor" setting to involve pious knights who fight in the name of a merciful god. That has always been the point of the D&D paladin -- although I'll agree that the polytheistic setting assumptions don't work well with it.

What could anyone conceivably provide you that would satisfy you on that point? Seriously.

Some indication that it matters to the story in the least. You can't satisfy me, because it doesn't matter.

What does matter is that amazingly, actual medieval Europeans apparently had more of a taste for diversity in their stories than people who claim they're just trying to be faithful to the "spirit of the time."

Of course the peasant demographics aren't mentioned in any story, because everyone knows the peasants are dirty, white farmers.

They weren't really that dirty, either.

If we injected some black sharecroppers into an Arthurian tale, they would be laughably out of place.

What, exactly, was the thought process that turned nonwhite peasants into "black sharecroppers?" I mean, was this an off the cuff thing to say, or did you really mean to imply that not-white=automatic analogue for a group oppressed by some disgusting history?

I hope you realize how insulting that is. Playing in, say, a "white" Middle Earth is just an excuse for exclusion or minimization?

What, we're in Middle Earth again? It seems funny to me that people really want to conceptually teleport anywhere they can to win this thing.

Who are these sinister people whose primary agenda in producing an RPG setting is exclude and minimize other races?

It's not sinister. It's a problem with cultural attitudes that is deeply ingrained and needs to be corrected with analysis. Remember: This thread is actually about commercial representation -- or was before all the conceptual teleportation that's been invoked to keep alive the limp, sputtering flame of monoethnic ideas. Careful analysis should be *expected* of WotC, and we should *demand* an ethical, inclusive position, rather than one that simply panders to bias. This bias is a problem, but it's important to remember that it is almost never the result of malice. It's a culturally ingrained reflex.

And why do these same people often enjoy playing non-white characters in games set in non-white settings?

Because the issue is not just denigration. It's assuming the power to define who other groups are in a way that denies them the same privileges (including flexibility of concept) as the assumed "default."

Too much to handle? The character just doesn't fit. If you want to create a fantasy world where sub-Saharan African blacks wear plate armor in the style of medieval French or English knights, go right ahead, but it's obviously jarring -- and it's presumably intended to be.

It's a good thing actual medieval Europeans were more openminded:

[imagel]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5f/Saint_maurice.jpg[/imagel]

[imagel]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Saint_Maurice_Magdeburg.jpg[/imagel]

That's St. Maurice, head of the Theban legion, as he was represented in the Middle Ages. They didn't have a problem with him wearing their armour.

 

[mmadsen]

I dont see how am I misunderstanding your point.

I do. You are definitely reading in a lot of things I didn't write.

I'd like to play a character who looks like me in a D&D fantasy RPG.

Then do so.

My point is that a black sub-Saharan African does not naturally fit into a quasi-European setting. A fair-haired Nordic European does not naturally fit into a quasi-African setting. Neither fits into a quasi-Japanese setting.

If you want to play a racially black sub-Saharan African without it being jarring, you want a fantasy setting without obvious racial expectations approximating Europe, the Middle East, Asia, or the Americas (before global travel).

Or you need a good story for why an exotic foreigner would be in a land so far from home.

 

[Wyrmshadows]

First Wyrmshadow, my above comment wasn't directed at you but a comment on how these types of things (like minimization) can be justified with arguments of verisimilitude even when we're talking about fantasy that isn't based in those tropes, like D&D.

But so much of the art of D&D and western fantasy is certainly of a european type that I don't know how one can claim that there isn't a link between D&D and the tropes of western ie. european fantasy. The fantasy that D&D is based on is of a european bent such as that of Tolkien, Arthur, Beowulf, folklore and various American and european fantasy authors.

I mean the hardest thing I'm having trouble grasping is those using the "it's not realistic to medieval europe" argument... especially since by the descriptions in the 4e book it isn't medieval europe and the difference in skin color is for the default (and in fact most campaign settings) of D&D very much justified. I am not talking about a person's individual homebrew...I am talking default D&D, so again I ask why would diversified art break peoples suspension of disbelief in the D&D corebooks or generic supplements

I think that you are right about 4e because the implied setting is so vague as to be nearly non-existant in regards to the distribution of human racial/ethnic groups. Cool with me and fitting for the core books. However, I still want the art to represent diversity in culture as well as skin tone. If there are to be analogues let them be believable, if analogues aren't assumed then the cultures should be different enough to see to it that human racial diversity looks like more than a marketing decision and something based on the internal consistancy of the implied setting if such a thing as internal consistancy can even be applied to something as vague as the POL "setting."


Wyrmshadows

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Nice pix there, eyebeams!

 

[Imaro]

I hope you realize how insulting that is. Playing in, say, a "white" Middle Earth is just an excuse for exclusion or minimization?

Who are these sinister people whose primary agenda in producing an RPG setting is to exclude and minimize other races? And why do these same people often enjoy playing non-white characters in games set in non-white settings?

Huh? So me saying it can be used for minimization (which in many forms of media it has been) is the same as me saying it was used that way in someone who wanted to play in an all-white Middle Earth? Remember earlier when we talked about switching goalposts and twisting words?

Well I don't know about sinister people but the original post was started because one of 3e's original artists came out and said R&D at WotC pushed for less diversity intentionally. What does playing a non-white character in a non-white setting have to do with it? if anything, It speaks to the ironic nature of people who would play one of these "non-white settings "... (your words, not mine) but then have a fit because there being mixed in a, by default, mixed setting.

 

[mmadsen]

It's a good thing actual medieval Europeans were more openminded: [...] That's St. Maurice, head of the Theban legion, as he was represented in the Middle Ages. They didn't have a problem with him wearing their armour.

You clearly haven't been reading what I've been writing. There's nothing wrong with an exotic foreigner from a faraway land in European garb -- but he's an exotic foreigner.

 

[Barastrondo]

Of course there isn't a genetic reality to plate mail armor but their is a climatalogical and geographic reality to clothing, armor, customs, values, etc. These climatic and geographic realities create the various differences in human types as well as strongly influences the cultures which they create.

There is a reason that historically caucasians created plate armor and there is a reason that desert peoples wouldn't wear plate mail, it would be deadly. The kinds of wepons, clothing, etc. a culture creates, as I am sure you know, is based on necessity as well.

On the other hand, cataphracts. Persia is a pretty warm place, and they had heavily armored cavalry. And if people are forging heavy armor for adventurers to go into the cool, shady depths of a dungeon or ruin, why wouldn't cultures closer to the equator equip their delvers in such a fashion?