Mana, Shamans, and the Cultural Misappropriation behind Fantasy Terms

[Dannyalcatraz]

Derren has earned a vacation from the thread.

 

[aramis erak]

Current members of the holy Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and Malta would certainly disagree on your last point.

The several I've known, including two chaplains, would not use the term Paladin for themselves. All of them are at least vaguely familiar with the term in its D&D usage, (You meet some interesting folk when you work at the archdiocesan cathedral)

 

[Bagpuss]

Sorry but that's just how language works. Cultures meet they interact and they share words from each other. It's why we have terms like pyjamas, bungalows and veranda.

It is interesting to know the origins of words and how words change overtime, but we aren't about to stop using a word that we all have an understand of in game, and there is no reason we should.

 

[aramis erak]

Buddy do we really want to have the discussion where we point out that this may be true in the US under various state laws, but in the UK, and in much of the world, this absolutely would not be true and that the real problem here is that the US legal system is hopelessly legalistic (in the bad sense) and obsessed with the letter of the law rather than intent or justice?

Because why muck things up with such a culturally specific example?

In the case of a discussion which seems to center around «shaman», «druid», and «mana» being bad when used in D&D because they aren't used in their correct cultural context of origin, and are applied only to primitives in D&D, and D&D is largely written by subjects of the US, within the US, for a still largely US-dominated market, with US Law being its relevant baseline under which it works...

 

[Sadras]

I must say after all these threads about shamans and tribes, it does make me want to revisit lizard men.
Note to self: Must find a way to have the PCs return to the Mere of the Dead Men or the Malpheggi Swamp (in the other campaign).

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

@Doug McCrae

Your textual analyses are thorough.

Thinking about system and gameplay, in my view one of the problems D&D faces is ambiguity over the relationship between clerics, druids and MUs.

This post isn't going to unpack every aspect of the issue, but will try and set out what I see as the basic problem.

Clerics are, at their core, heavily armed and armoured religious warriors who work channel the power of the divine to work miracles of healing, divining, turning sticks into snakes, dispelling evil spirits, and sometimes calling down doom upon their enemies. They are not allowed to be true neutral: they are proselytising and they establish fortresses from which they rule the land, extracting taxes and tithes. We know from the paladin class entry in the AD&D PHB (p 24) that clerics can be nobles.

In summary, clerics are a mix of Biblical trope with the mediaeval military orders and warrior bishops. In terms of the divide/contrast I posited upthread, they are urban/cosmopolitan.

Druids use lighter armour (leather, wooden shields) and spears and knives and "exotic" weapons like scimitars and (in UA) the khopesh. According to the AD&D PHB (p 21) "They hold trees (particularly oak and ash), the sun, and the moon as deities." They must be true neutral, which is (per the DMG p 23) is a "naturalistic ethos" that sees each element of the world as part of the whole, provided that (per the PHB p 33) things do not" become unbalanced due to the work of unnatural forces - such as human and other intelligent creatures interfering with what is meant to be." There magic deals extensively with plants, animals, weather and the elements. They can change shape and pass without trace through the woodlands.

Druids are clearly on the rural side of my contrast. Their outlook and abilities are identifiable as broadly animistic/shamanic. They do not build great temples. They are not proselytisers.

This cleric/druid relationship starts to break down as soon as clerics - beginning in the PBH but moreso with DDG - are shoved into the polytheistic context without any mechanical or flavour change. In 5e this comes up in the question of the relationship between nature clerics and druids. In 4e it is the problem of the relationship of clerics of Melora to druids.

In AD&D, if there are clerics of Ehlonna - who are, in virtue of that, presumably bearers of truth about nature - then what is the role of druids and the "old faith"? They must be wrong!

MUs only further complicate the matter, because while their core tropes (robes, books, alembics) suggest late mediaveal/early modern alchemist types, their magic also overlaps heavily with druids, because they also play the "witch"/pagan role in the gameworld which, in part, is a way of looking at the rural aspects of religion and spirituality through the urban/cosmopolitan lens. Subsequent developments in the game take this further - eg in OA wu jen are a MU subclass but many of their spells and their focus on elements overlaps with druids; in 4e we have witch as a subclass of wizard; etc.

I think if druids had been treated as a version of MU rather than as a deviant or less form of cleric; if lizardmen and gnolls had druidic religious/cultural leaders rather than the second-tier "shamans" and "witchdoctors"; if 4e had not drawn a sharp distinction between primal and arcane power sources (eg wizards could be "primal" + literacty); then at least this aspect of D&D might have fewer problems.

It is interesting. In the previous thread I'd mentioned that, perhaps, one way to avoid these kinds of issues is to use terms that fall under a bigger umbrella.

Use terms like Holy Leader - instead of cleric or Shaman.

Then subclasses can be divided into lines such as the ones that you mention. Rural vs Metropolitan, for example. You could have animistic-type Holy Leaders, more Bureaucratic Holy Leaders from hierarchical religions. Oral tradition vs Literary traditions etc...

Gets rid of some of the overlap between Nature Clerics and Druids. Druid can just be a subclass of, what is now, cleric. Each subclass expanded upon and given special abilities based on its focus.

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day? Even a blind squirrel finds nuts once in a while? Take your pick.

There were lots of people quoted in my last post. Was your rude comment directed at all of us engaged in that conversation or just me? You don't have to answer, It was a rhetorical question.

Perhaps the issue is you aren't insightful enough to see that problems are multi-faceted? I do notice you don't engage in discussions that try to dig deeper than what's on the surface but, instead, only comment when you want to disagree with someone. It's unfortunate you see every comment that doesn't conform to your world view as a challenge rather than an opportunity to have a conversation.

I pride myself in not blocking people, regardless of how disrespectful they are. Regardless, I certainly won't engage your abusive comments anymore.

 

[Bedrockgames]

It is interesting. In the previous thread I'd mentioned that, perhaps, one way to avoid these kinds of issues is to use terms that fall under a bigger umbrella.

Use terms like Holy Leader - instead of cleric or Shaman.

Then subclasses can be divided into lines such as the ones that you mention. Rural vs Metropolitan, for example. You could have animistic-type Holy Leaders, more Bureaucratic Holy Leaders from hierarchical religions. Oral tradition vs Literary traditions etc...

Gets rid of some of the overlap between Nature Clerics and Druids. Druid can just be a subclass of, what is now, cleric. Each subclass expanded upon and given special abilities based on its focus.

To me, these all sound much less evocative than shaman, Druid or cleric. People gravitate towards real world words because they evoke certain flavors. the end result when you take this kind of microscope to the language people use, in my opinion, is a very stifling result. You just end up in a state of constant second guessing and focused on the linguistics, and you get so sidetracked from focusing on the stuff that makes games fun and interesting

 

[Aldarc]

To me, these all sound much less evocative than shaman, Druid or cleric. People gravitate towards real world words because they evoke certain flavors. the end result when you take this kind of microscope to the language people use, in my opinion, is a very stifling result. You just end up in a state of constant second guessing and focused on the linguistics, and you get so sidetracked from focusing on the stuff that makes games fun and interesting

”Priest” is commonly used outside of D&D instead of “cleric” with basically no problems or people complaining about the term. There are other terms that could work just as well. We have evocative terms like seer, oracle, augur, prophet, soothsayer, and the like.

In the case of “Druid,” we could always use evocative terms like Geomancer or even Ecomancer (to borrow from Pirates of Dark Water) to communicate what the class is about.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

To me, these all sound much less evocative than shaman, Druid or cleric. People gravitate towards real world words because they evoke certain flavors. the end result when you take this kind of microscope to the language people use, in my opinion, is a very stifling result. You just end up in a state of constant second guessing and focused on the linguistics, and you get so sidetracked from focusing on the stuff that makes games fun and interesting

I tend to agree but was just throwing around ideas. The idea is that you take the microscope off the language entirely.

The flavour comes from the sub-classes. There's nothing very evocative about the name 'Fighter'. Battlemaster is a way cooler name but it's a subclass for a Fighter. I think the idea is to give people the freedom to turn these classes into whatever they need for their campaigns. If you want a shaman, choose archetype 'x' and add all the trappings. If you want a Crusader Cleric Warrior, take archetype 'y'.

I'm still not a fan of some of the overlapping archetypes. I never saw a reason to have Nature Clerics when Druids already existed and I have, literally, never used a shaman class. If I have a 'shaman' goblin or something, I just a take a regular goblin and give it spell slots and divine spells. Which, I suppose, is the issue: people tend to only use the term Shaman when talking about 'evil' humanoid divine casters.

 

[Aldarc]

I did propose the term “mystic” earlier.