D&D General Old School DND talks if DND is racist.

[Ruin Explorer]

The narrative of savage fast-breeding barbarians descending on virtuous settled folk and menacing civilization isn't peculiar to Europeans or the 20th century. It's a human universal. Every settled corner of the earth has been threatened, raided, and conquered by nomadic people since forever. It's basically the history of the world in a nutshell. The steppes of Asia ('the navel of the world') alone have pulsed out dozens of waves of conquest into China, India, the Near East, and Europe. And the literate people who lived in those regions wrote sagas and myths and histories about the monstrous savages who lurk in the darkness beyond the lantern-light of civilization. The actors change in time and place - it might be the Scythians threatening Persia's frontiers in the 6th century B.C., Celts menacing Italy in the 2nd century B.C., the Saxons invading Britain in the 7th century AD, or the Mongols invading China in the 12th, but the story of the savage horde threatening civilization is a story told a thousand times in a hundred languages.

If some people want to excise that narrative from RPGs and drama, then okay. But it's a global human trope they'll be excising, not a recent or peculiarly Western one.

This simply isn't true.

You're confusing a peculiar racist narrative, which has been applied liberally to non-nomadic people, with the actual raids of nomadic tribes, and then conflating it with population movements in general.

No-one is talking about excising "savage hordes", they're talking about a peculiar and specific racist narrative. The "fast-breeding" part is what should clue you in to the racist aspect. No-one said that in antiquity. People complained about "endless" hordes, but they didn't say "because genetically they pump out babies faster!". But that's what the racist line is. You also carefully excise the low intelligence and so on. People like this were often characterised as uncivilized, barbaric, and so on, but the whole idea that an entire people was "genetically stupid" was not one that really appeared much before modern racism (i.e. 1500+). Accounts of the Romans negotiating with Attila certainly include some insults about the appearance of the Huns, but they're mild compared to modern stuff, and there's no idea that the huns are "genetically inferior" or "reproducing faster" and so on - that sort of talk doesn't start until much later.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So what are the alignment criteria? Lets use 5e's. From the 5E SRD

Lawful good (LG) creatures can be counted on to do the right thing as expected by society. Gold dragons, paladins, and most dwarves are lawful good.
Neutral good (NG) folk do the best they can to help others according to their needs. Many celestials, some cloud giants, and most gnomes are neutral good.
Chaotic good (CG) creatures act as their conscience directs, with little regard for what others expect. Copper dragons, many elves, and unicorns are chaotic good.
Lawful neutral (LN) individuals act in accordance with law, tradition, or personal codes. Many monks and some wizards are lawful neutral.
Neutral (N) is the alignment of those who prefer to steer clear of moral questions and don’t take sides, doing what seems best at the time. Lizardfolk, most druids, and many humans are neutral.
Chaotic neutral (CN) creatures follow their whims, holding their personal freedom above all else. Many barbarians and rogues, and some bards, are chaotic neutral.
Lawful evil (LE) creatures methodically take what they want, within the limits of a code of tradition, loyalty, or order. Devils, blue dragons, and hobgoblins are lawful evil.
Neutral evil (NE) is the alignment of those who do whatever they can get away with, without compassion or qualms. Many drow, some cloud giants, and goblins are neutral evil.
Chaotic evil (CE) creatures act with arbitrary violence, spurred by their greed, hatred, or bloodlust. Demons, red dragons, and orcs are chaotic evil.

RAW the PC described would be, most likely, Chaotic Good. A PC who acts as his conscience directs, with little regard for what people who dont know what they are talking about and just making stuff up on the internet expect.

In this case, the PCs conscience directs them to kill the prince in order to stop 10,000 deaths. They don't care that you haven't actually read the rules but are pretending to have done so. Their action they are taking is straight up murder so perhaps you may argue they are not lawful, and I will give you that. But there is NO support for your argument here in the actual text. In their hearts and their minds, this PC has decided to take an action that they believe is right. This is chaotic good. Through RAW.

Stop making stuff up.

No.

You're talking about someone ignoring their conscience - specifically you dismiss it as their "pride and morality", so they can murder a kid on the dubious belief that it'll save thousands later. Anyone whose "conscience" lets them murder innocents isn't CG.

What you're describing is clearly LE - he's following a tradition, and he's doing what he wants - murdering a kid to appease his personal belief that it will save thousands. He's methodical and by your own words "ignoring morality".

Indeed, this is the crux of the argument - if you say "Well you can be "Good" and murder kids if it's in a good cause!", you're basically opening up a situation we suddenly go from thousands to maybe two - basically anything is acceptable so long as the "murder balance" favours you.

Again, you're describing a villain.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Sometimes the villain is even right. Crappy dictator who's thing is "support me I ifffe stability he's ha ha" gets overthrown and the replacement is even worse and/or civil war breaks out/economic collapse.

Good old days looked good if you lived through the 90s in the former USSR.

Definitely, and if you want to tell stories like that in D&D you can. I was thinking about running a campaign a few years back, where the "forces of Good" had won, but created a situation that was incredibly unstable and difficult to manage. I don't think D&D is really the right game for that sort of thing though, so I didn't run it in the end.

 

[JEB]

Even the more activist-end of things stuff, where it's not entirely opposed to D&D (so already a lost cause), seems be like "Hmph well they're trying - they could try much harder, but I guess they're trying".

Out of curiosity, do you know what that particular section of D&D's critics would want D&D to look like, to satisfy all their concerns? What changes they would consider sufficient?

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So the concept, a reality across the span of recorded human history, is in and of itself, racist?

Like, lets pretend that we drop a community of Orcs into the middle of the Sword Coast, farmers, and we have Orcs just strolling down the streets of Waterdeep, no problem at all.

Can we have a predominately raiding, nomadic, destructive, region of Orcs at that point?

Like what is your end game here? What is your ideal? Is it Eberron? Is it 'there is no culture of raiding Orcs, only raiders, that are multicultural' how far does it need to go in your eyes?

You're conflating a bunch of stuff here, as I said.

Raiding nomadic orcs wouldn't be a problem if they didn't also have racist tropes like fast-breeding and low-IQ. Those are NOT part of the historical accounts until the era when more organised and increasingly science-language-oriented racism comes in, which is the 1500s and later.

What's worse, D&D made it true - it made it so it wasn't merely some lazy slur - but literally "the racists were right".

And when you have a "the racists are right" situation, not only is that extremely creepy and attracts the wrong crowd, whilst driving away anyone under about 35-40 (bad when the game is growing almost entirely in that sector, even ignoring right/wrong for pure pragmatism), you also can't have orcs who aren't fast-breeding and stupid, because you're saying it's inherent to the beings.

 

[Zardnaar]

You're conflating a bunch of stuff here, as I said.

Raiding nomadic orcs wouldn't be a problem if they didn't also have racist tropes like fast-breeding and low-IQ. Those are NOT part of the historical accounts until the era when more organised and increasingly science-language-oriented racism comes in, which is the 1500s and later.

What's worse, D&D made it true - it made it so it wasn't merely some lazy slur - but literally "the racists were right".

And when you have a "the racists are right" situation, not only is that extremely creepy and attracts the wrong crowd, whilst driving away anyone under about 35-40 (bad when the game is growing almost entirely in that sector, even ignoring right/wrong for pure pragmatism), you also can't have orcs who aren't fast-breeding and stupid, because you're saying it's inherent to the beings.

We weren't talking about Orcs but this.

Quarian

The quarians are a nomadic species of humanoid aliens known for their skills with technology and synthetic intelligence. Since their homeworld Rannoch was conquered, the quarians live aboard the Migrant Fleet, a huge collection of starships that travels as a single fleet. Approximately three...

masseffect.fandom.com

Someone said the game was a problem because they were like the Roma.

Their world was destroyed by sentient AI and they're wandering around in a migrant fleet. Kinda like Battle Star Galactica.

Any link to Roma is fairly tenuous beyond they're both nomads with similar problems. In game you can help restore the planet and make peace with the AI.

They weren't even portrayed in a negative way or anything and help save the galaxy.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Out of curiosity, do you know what that particular section of D&D's critics would want D&D to look like, to satisfy all their concerns? What changes they would consider sufficient?

Ahhh, if only there was a simple answer, but it's the same as any other group of D&D fans or haters - ask seven people, get seven different answers!

One website I read is mostly concerned about two things, which a lot of others have mentioned, which do seem valid to me:

1) D&D doesn't yet have a particularly diverse set of creatives/creators. This is something that can be fixed, and obviously people can see WotC is moving on it, but not perhaps as quickly or boldly as some people would like. It's certainly fair to say that D&D's main creatives and so on increasingly look less like the playerbase, especially the under-35 playerbase, where according to WotC's own market research/census/etc., the vast bulk of D&D players are (yes, sorry, we old fogies are a very small part of the market now, since D&D ballooned to be this massive thing, far bigger than the '80s).

2) D&D doesn't have particularly diverse locations/settings/cultures, and has made some sad and very "But how is that racist?!?!"-type unforced errors when it has gone for more diverse ones. Like the classic "the natives are just sitting around and waiting for some outsiders to come in and save them" - indeed that the PCs are assumed to be outsiders in a non-white area is extremely problematic itself. So there's a desire to see more diverse locations/cultures, and to see them covered in some depth, and for the default assumption to be with them that the PCs are from "around there" (in a broad sense), rather than outsiders from far-away lands (individual groups can always do the latter, no-one can stop them). There's also a concern that diverse locations/cultures will get pretty short shrift, and that WotC won't put the effort into promoting them.

Obviously only time will tell, and that's just one perspective. Again, ask any seven D&D players what they want to see changed/improved in D&D and you'll get seven different answers.

The change to lineages and in particular, actually implementing it in a book (Ravenloft), rather than just having it as one optional rule in a book full of optional stuff has attracted some praise, too, to be sure.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

We weren't talking about Orcs but this.

Quarian

The quarians are a nomadic species of humanoid aliens known for their skills with technology and synthetic intelligence. Since their homeworld Rannoch was conquered, the quarians live aboard the Migrant Fleet, a huge collection of starships that travels as a single fleet. Approximately three...

masseffect.fandom.com

Someone said the game was a problem because they were like the Roma.

Their world was destroyed by sentient AI and they're wandering around in a migrant fleet. Kinda like Battle Star Galactica.

Any link to Roma is fairly tenuous beyond they're both nomads with similar problems. In game you can help restore the planet and make peace with the AI.

They weren't even portrayed in a negative way or anything and help save the galaxy.

I'm looking at your post and the ones before it, and it really looks like you're talking about Orcs, not Quarians. You were responding to @Charlaquin who was apparently responding to the nonsensical claim about "it's history so it can't be racist innit!" (except, obviously, it can). Maybe you quoted the wrong post? Maybe I'm just being dumb? It wouldn't be the first time...

Also the Quarians are not "tenuously" linked to the Roma, dude. Even their manner of dress and accents evoke Roma stereotypes (not accurate ones, but movie/TV ones), as well as lifestyle/situation, the specific prejudices against them and so on (which make little sense in an ME context). That reference was immediately obvious. They are consistently relatively positively portrayed (though their situation is of their own making), it's true, but historically that's lead to some utterly insane racism in RPGs. Mass Effect doesn't quite get there, thankfully, but both Dungeons and Dragons, and World of Darkness did. Both of D&D and WoD did the same thing - they dehumanized their Roma-equivalents. Both tried to do it "positively". D&D has the Vistani as somewhat superhuman but not human. They look like humans, act like humans, conform Roma stereotypes (many positive, some negative - like being particularly drunken), but are not human. This, unfortunately, is something the Nazis would have agreed with them on. And I'm not even Godwin'ing, because that's a legitimate and historically accurate Nazi ref (which are excepted from Godwin'ing). Yeah, D&D was like "Well yeah they're not humans but they're BETTER than humans, suck it Nazis !", but like, that's still super-messed up. WoD did the same thing, except as with so many things, they took it WAY FURTHER and oh my god did it get racist up in there - they got to the point where in WoD:Gypsies, the Gypsies are wildly superhuman, and actually kinda-racist against humans(!!!). You can look into it. It ain't good. And on a certain level, Mass Effect does it again - "Look it's the Space Roma, and they're not humans!". But honestly because they're not portrayed as better or worse than humans, and they are clearly an entirely alien species with just some Roma theme-ing, it doesn't go all the way, so I think it sticks in "merely problematic" or "things that make you go hmmm" rather "Oh damn that's racist!" like D&D/WoD.

 

[Zardnaar]

I'm looking at your post and the ones before it, and it really looks like you're talking about Orcs, not Quarians. You were responding to @Charlaquin who was apparently responding to the nonsensical claim about "it's history so it can't be racist innit!" (except, obviously, it can). Maybe you quoted the wrong post? Maybe I'm just being dumb? It wouldn't be the first time...

Also the Quarians are not "tenuously" linked to the Roma, dude. Even their manner of dress and accents evoke Roma stereotypes (not accurate ones, but movie/TV ones), as well as lifestyle/situation, the specific prejudices against them and so on (which make little sense in an ME context). That reference was immediately obvious. They are consistently relatively positively portrayed (though their situation is of their own making), it's true, but historically that's lead to some utterly insane racism in RPGs. Mass Effect doesn't quite get there, thankfully, but both Dungeons and Dragons, and World of Darkness did. Both of D&D and WoD did the same thing - they dehumanized their Roma-equivalents. Both tried to do it "positively". D&D has the Vistani as somewhat superhuman but not human. They look like humans, act like humans, conform Roma stereotypes (many positive, some negative - like being particularly drunken), but are not human. This, unfortunately, is something the Nazis would have agreed with them on. And I'm not even Godwin'ing, because that's a legitimate and historically accurate Nazi ref (which are excepted from Godwin'ing). Yeah, D&D was like "Well yeah they're not humans but they're BETTER than humans !", but like, that's still super-messed up. WoD did the same thing, except as with so many things, they took it WAY FURTHER and oh my god did it get racist up in there - they got to the point where in WoD:Gypsies, the Gypsies are wildly superhuman, and actually kinda-racist against humans. You can look into it. It ain't good. And on a certain level, Mass Effect does it again - "Look it's the Space Roma, and they're not humans!". But honestly because they're not portrayed as better or worse than humans, and they are clearly an entirely alien species with just some Roma theme-ing, it doesn't go all the way, so I think it sticks in "merely problematic" or "things that make you go hmmm" rather "Oh damn that's racist!" like D&D/WoD.

Just to be clear I'm opposed to things like the Vistani.

Quarrians get a pass imho.

Conflict is good for drama and bad things happen irl conflict and if those bad things also happened to XYZ.

Since you can find those examples anywhere if you look hard enough.

I'm also fine with rascism in game as long as it's not taking the piss in RL cultures or thinly veiled caricatures of RL cultures.

Eg Dwarf doesn't like elf that's fine. ABC race doesn't like XYZ is fine or as part of back stiryg that race is extinct. Eg there's no elves they all died in ancient wars.

That's where nuance comes into it. It's also kinda fine from the DM as villains gonna villain. How the DM pulls that off is the key thing.

Vistani crap, Quarrians are fine imho draw your own lines.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Just to be clear I'm opposed to things like the Vistani.

Quarrians get a pass imho.

Conflict is good for drama and bad things happen irl conflict and if those bad things also happened to XYZ.

Since you can find those examples anywhere if you look hard enough.

I'm also fine with rascism in game as long as it's not taking the piss in RL cultures or thinly veiled caricatures of RL cultures.

Eg Dwarf doesn't like elf that's fine. ABC race doesn't like XYZ is fine or as part of back stiryg that race is extinct. Eg there's no elves they all died in ancient wars.

That's where nuance comes into it. It's also kinda fine from the DM as villains gonna villain. How the DM pulls that off is the key thing.

Vistani crap, Quarrians are fine imho draw your own lines.

I draw similar lines. I think the Quarians have so many things going on that the "Roma/Gypsy" stuff is a bit eye-roll-y, but it's not the dominating factor. They're these amazing technologists who managed to BSG themselves, as you say, and that is the dominant impression, especially in ME2/3. I'm not here to condemn you for liking the Quarians - I'd have to condemn myself too!

I think there are a lot of "fake problems" from some people (not you) in this thread, like "OH ORCS CANT BE EVIL NOW!?!??" and stuff but it's not real. No-one is saying that. They're saying "Orcs shouldn't align with a bunch of racist stereotypes" and/or "Orcs shouldn't be relentlessly depicted as evil because there are too many counterexamples in D&D". And yeah, we can all blame Drizzt if we like, but Drow are in a similar position. Personally and honestly I actually think Drizzt "held the Drow back" though, for two reasons:

1) He's SO LAME oh my god. Even when I was a kid my "Lame-dar" was pinging him hardcore. But he spawned this legion of fans with people a bit older, and countless imitators, and became a meme before we used that word. This annoyed DMs all over the world, and was unfairly transferred on the general concept of "non-evil Drow", when in fact the problem was "Drizzt-imitator".

2) The portrayal of the Drow in the '90s books got so fetish-y and ridiculous, as a result of Drizzt books that it became much harder to even conceive of a "good Drow" who wasn't a goddamn joke.

This is all Drizzt's fault!