Unearthed Arcana WotC Removes Latest Unearthed Arcana

WotC has removed this week's Unearthed Arcana from its website. Not only has the article's web page itself been removed, the actual PDF has been replaced with last month's "Subclasses, Part 1" PDF (although it's URL still reads... /UA2020-Subclasses02.pdf).

The article included three new subclasses, the bardic College of Creation, the cleric's Love Domain, and the sorcerer's Clockwork Soul.

[NOTE - NSFW language follows].

I don't know if it's linked, but WotC came under criticism on Twitter for its treatment of the Love Domain. The main argument isn't that mind-control magic has no place in the game, but rather that coercive powers should not be described as "love", and that the domain might be poorly named.

People like game designer Emmy Allen commented: "It seems WotC have tried to create a 'Love' domain for clerics in 5e. By some sheer coincidence they seem to have accidentally created a 'roofie' domain instead. Nothing says 'love' like overriding your target's free will to bring them under your power."


That domain was introduced as follows: "Love exists in many forms—compassion, infatuation, friendly affection, and passionate love as a few facets. Whatever form these feelings take, the gods of love deepen the bonds between individuals."

The powers were Eboldening Bond, Impulsive Infatuation ("Overwhelm a creature with a flash of short-lived by intense admiration for you, driving them to rash action in your defense”), Protective Bond, and Enduring Unity.

Whether the criticism was a factor in the article's withdrawal, I don't know. It might be that it just wasn't ready for prime-time yet. It seems the domain itself would be better named a "control" or "charm" domain than a "love" domain, which seems to be the main thrust of the criticism on Twitter.

WotC's Jeremy Crawford commented: "The official version of the Unearthed Arcana article “Subclasses, Part 2” is still ahead of us, later this week or sometime next week. Our team will hold off on answering questions until you’ve seen the real deal!"

 

[Celebrim]

Is Cupid not a god of love?

That is I think the entire crux of the entire topic in a nutshell. My answer is emphatically, "No.", but... to answer no to that question involves overturning an huge amount of unconsidered "common sense", because certainly in the larger culture, Cupid is a god of love. Certainly if you asked a high school student, "Who is Aphrodite?", on a test about Greek Mythology, you would hesitate to not give full points to the answer, "The goddess of love.", unless you had specifically overturned conventional wisdom in class.

 

[Salthorae]

My answer is emphatically, "No.", but... to answer no to that question involves overturning an huge amount of unconsidered "common sense"

I mean, I suppose you might be right. I've never heard the concept that he's NOT a god of some kind of love.

I suppose Wikipedia is a bastion of "common sense", but here is what they say:

In classical mythology, Cupid (Latin Cupīdō [kʊˈpiːdoː], meaning "desire") is the god of desire, erotic love, attraction and affection. He is often portrayed as the son of the love goddess Venus and the god of Mars. He is also known in Latin as Amor ("Love"). His Greek counterpart is Eros.

I get that "love" is a mixed bag in english with a broad array of definitions. But that's why I have no issues with this domain as presented. "Love" is mixed bag, why shouldn't the domain be?

 

[Celebrim]

I mean, I suppose you might be right. I've never heard the concept that he's NOT a god of some kind of love.

Some kind of "love" certainly, for certain values of what "love" is. But, is Eros the god of the sort of love that the twitter poster was thinking of when she condemned a Domain of Love that is, in fact, quite well suited to the clerics of Cupid?

I get that "love" is a mixed bag in english with a broad array of definitions. But that's why I have no issues with this domain as presented. "Love" is mixed bag, why shouldn't the domain be?

Boom. Exactly. That's what the whole argument is really about. We're in the midst of a cultural crisis regarding the definition of the word "love". It's apparently evolving back to a more conventional Western conception of what love is, after a couple of generations of experimenting with the idea of "Free Love" and finding it not quite as good as it was billed on the label. And the problem is that the creator of the Love domain was envisioning something like how love was imagined by people who thought up Cupid, and the complaint was raised, "I don't want people thinking about love like that!"

And hooray for that, but it's creating a big crisis of communication.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I really don't understand why we're having such a big discussion about it.

WotC chose to change something they are designing. They are allowed to do so, and it doesn't matter what prompted them to make the change.

Those of you who didn't want it changed, or wanted a chance to say your piece when the eventual survey came out... tough crap for you. You are not owed anything and they can do whatever the hell they want.

You don't like it? I'm sure they'd be happy for you to take your business elsewhere. You just have to decide what's more important... playing this game that WotC has produced, or stop playing it because you don't like the political stance you think WotC took. But I can guarantee you, they aren't going to care what your decision is either way. And thus bitching about it here is resulting in absolutely nothing other than giving you something to do for a couple hours until a more interesting thread gets created for you to post in.

 

[cbwjm]

I really don't understand why we're having such a big discussion about it.

Have you not been paying attention? Having big discussions is what people do on the internet.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

We've pretty clearly reached the sea lion stage of this debate.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

"A charmed creature can’t Attack the charmer or target the charmer with harmful Abilities or magical Effects."
but I guess the concept of agency is meaningless to you.

Ookay. I can shrug off one hostile accusation, but this is becoming a pattern. I'm walking away now.

 

[Panda-s1]

Ookay. I can shrug off one hostile accusation, but this is becoming a pattern. I'm walking away now.

which pattern, the one where I get increasingly frustrated, or the one where you ignore this key aspect of being charmed?

 

[Bohandas]

Calling it "Love" and then making it have a class feature to override free will...yeah, probably not the best thing to have released close to Valentine's Day.

I dunno, that sounds like Valentines Day to me. I mean the methods of coercion are different, this is magic - whereas Valentines day is more of an extortion racket, perpetrated against the American public by Hallmark and by jewelry companies - but ultimately they are similar.

 

[Bohandas]

Boom. Exactly. That's what the whole argument is really about. We're in the midst of a cultural crisis regarding the definition of the word "love". It's apparently evolving back to a more conventional Western conception of what love is, after a couple of generations of experimenting with the idea of "Free Love" and finding it not quite as good as it was billed on the label.