D&D 5E [Merged] Candlekeep Mysteries Author Speaks Out On WotC's Cuts To Adventure

In an event which is being referred to as #PanzerCut, one of the Candlekeep Mysteries authors has gone public with complaints about how their adventure was edited.

Book of Cylinders is one of the adventures in the book. It was written by Graeme Barber (who goes by the usernames PanzerLion and PoCGamer on social media).

Barber was caught by surprise when he found out what the final adventure looked like. The adventure was reduced by about a third, and his playable race -- the Grippli -- was cut. Additionally, WotC inserted some terminology that he considered to be colonialist, which is one of the things they were ostensibly trying to avoid by recruiting a diverse team of authors for the book.

His complaints also reference the lack of communication during the editing process, and how he did public interviews unknowingly talking about elements of an adventure which no longer existed.

"I wrote for [Candlekeep Mysteries], the recent [D&D] release. Things went sideways. The key issues were that the bulk of the lore and a lot of the cultural information that made my adventure "mine" were stripped out. And this was done without any interaction with me, leaving me holding the bag as I misled the public on the contents and aspects of my adventure. Yes, it was work-for-hire freelance writing, but the whole purpose was to bring in fresh voices and new perspectives.

So, when I read my adventure, this happened. This was effectively the shock phase of it all.

Then I moved onto processing what had happened. ~1300 words cut, and without the cut lore, the gravity of the adventure, and its connections to things are gravely watered down. Also "primitive" was inserted.

Then the aftermath of it all. The adventure that came out was a watered down version of what went in, that didn't reflect me anymore as a writer or creator. Which flew in the face of the spirit of the project as had been explained to me.

So then I wrote. Things don't change unless people know what's up and can engage with things in a prepared way. So I broke down the process of writing for Wizards I'd experienced, and developed some rules that can be used to avoid what happened to me."

He recounts his experiences in two blog posts:

• What happened? Writing for Wizards Part 1
• What Happened? Writing for Wizards Part 2

The author later added "Wizards owns all the material sent in, and does not publish unedited adventures on the DM Guild, so there will be no "PanzerCut". I have respectfully requested that my name be removed from future printings. "

 

[Ruin Explorer]

You literally said their age was a reason they wouldn't have picked up on the issue with primitive. That's textbook definition of ageism. I mean, it's literally part of the definition:

• 1.1Distinction from other age-related bias
• 1.2Implicit ageism
• 1.3Stereotyping
• 1.4Prejudice
• 1.5Digital ageism

and rather than accept what you're doing, you're accusing me of bad faith? Do you not see the incredible irony in you accusing others of not taking responsibility for their blinders when you are doing the exact same thing?

What is it you think "bad faith" means? I didn't say that was the case, I said it was a possibility, and it is a possibility. The idea that that's dangerous ageist stereotyping is definitely in the realms of concern-trolling. I have no power of this person nor any ability to harm them. Claims of ageism need t

The fact is Mohan didn't see "primitive" as problematic. The most charitable interpretation of that is that they would be surprised to hear it was considered a bad thing.

Strongly suggest people click the link btw:

Ageism - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I notice acceptance that cultural views on certain words being different is pretty far from the stuff they list under "stereotyping".

 

[DM Magic]

This was the comment:



that is literally saying the reason they didn't see a problem is because of age. What do you think "pushing retirement age" means if not related to actual age?

That is absolutely my bad. I did not see that. I definitely wouldn't put it that way, but Ruin Explorer is their own person and it's quite clear from their comments that this is not what they intended to convey.

 

[Sacrosanct]

What is it you think "bad faith" means? I didn't say that was the case, I said it was a possibility, and it is a possibility. The idea that that's dangerous ageist stereotyping is definitely in the realms of concern-trolling.

It's not surprising you didn't understand what we're talking about, based on your youth.

What? I didn't say it was because of your age, you're arguing in bad faith!

You literally said he didn't get it because of his "retirement age". And you're insisting on blaming others for calling it out rather than taking ownership. Stop with the victim blaming or accusations of concern trolling. Do what you're demanding other do.

 

[Charlaquin]

You literally said their age was a reason they wouldn't have picked up on the issue with primitive.

They said it’s unsurprising, given his age, that he wouldn’t have thought the word primitive was problematic. That isn’t surprising. When someone grew up in a time when a word was seen as perfectly socially acceptable that is no longer seen that way, it isn’t surprising when they don’t see the issue. That doesn’t mean they are incapable of seeing the issue. It isn’t even directly about their age. People who grew up in different contexts had different formative experiences and are likely to have different views on various social issues. That’s not ageism, it’s basic psychology.

 

[TheSword]

I think it's fair to say WotC probably have some issues where their desire to engage with a more diverse community of writers is running up against old-fashioned ways of doing things which worked "just fine" with some of their older authors. I don't think it's necessarily helpful to spin it as these writers being "inexperienced" or whatever - I mean, every writer was once, but it's a lot less likely to be a bad look if the people failing to communicate properly with you and so on are the same sort of background as you in terms of race/age/gender/etc. which I think was previously the case.

I also don't think "unrestrained" is at all correct with Panzer. If you read his more recent thread, as I think you may have re: philosophical, it doesn't seem like he expected to be "unrestrained", he just expected communication. Given he was publicizing the book for free for WotC I don't feel like it's unreasonable for him to expect to have any major changes communicated to him. If you only meant Orion, well, that's arguable but the way you've written it makes it look like you believe it applies equally to Panzer.

This is a challenge a lot of organisations, including liberal-as-you-could-want ones are facing, note. I have a friend who works at a charity with a basically left-wing cause (though one so broad they have a lot of mildly right-wing supporters, mostly of a kindly religious bent) and they've seen this issue in multiple ways. Ways of doing things need to be updated, and the realization that sometimes something that would seem fine to do to another white dude might not read the same way when done to someone else, esp. if you engaged them with more diverse voices/input in mind.

I think he expected to be able to write about the days of Thunder and exposition for why Yuanti are evil and was then miffed when this wasn’t used. He was disappointed when what he wrote wasn’t used. He shared that with a fair few people on Twitter spawning this thread.

He expected adjustments but not reductions around the 20% mark that be experienced. That’s what I refer to by unrestrained. He seems to have mellowed over the last 24 hours or so.

The majority in CM are new authors. I checked out a few other peoples Twitter feeds and what I saw over and over again we’re smiling faces with CM photographed in their hands, not a slew of complaints about WOCs practices. That’s not evidence that bad stuff didn’t go down. But it should make us wary about jumping to conclusions.

 

[Sacrosanct]

They said it’s unsurprising, given his age, that he wouldn’t have thought the word primitive was problematic. That isn’t surprising. When someone grew up in a time when a word was seen as perfectly socially acceptable that is no longer seen that way, it isn’t surprising when they don’t see the issue. That doesn’t mean they are incapable of seeing the issue. It isn’t even directly about their age. People who grew up in different contexts had different formative experiences and are likely to have different views on various social issues. That’s not ageism, it’s basic psychology.

Making a stereotype about someone or their character/behavior based on their age is ageism. I literally provided the link to the definition. For one, it assumes that Kim (or anyone of his age) would not normally be able to have the ability to have modern sensibilities or viewpoints.

That's bad. No different than making the same assumptions about poor people, or POC, or gender. I gave the definition; not asking you to take my word for it. You can't just ignore it because it doesn't fit your narrative.

 

[Scribe]

We don't need to inject 'dangerous' into the discussion here. It's ageism to assign beliefs to a person or reason behind their actions based on age. Super simple.

People who grew up in different contexts had different formative experiences and are likely to have different views on various social issues. That’s not ageism, it’s basic psychology

Wow. Mind blowing to see doubling down on this.

I can't tell you all right now you would be called into HR over this position.

Replace age or era, with gender, or race, and you would simply get fired over it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It's not surprising you didn't understand what we're talking about, based on your youth.

What? I didn't say it was because of your age, you're arguing in bad faith!

You literally said he didn't get it because of his "retirement age". And you're insisting on blaming others for calling it out rather than taking ownership. Stop with the victim blaming or accusations of concern trolling. Do what you're demanding other do.

Umbran has previously said not to keep engaging with people you believe are arguing in bad faith, and to avoid us both getting red text to the face, I'm going to go ahead and do that. But @Charlaquin has explained it extremely well.

I can't tell you all right now you would be called into HR over this position.

Nice Freudian slip.

And no, I'm extremely familiar with ageism and HR and this is the equivalent of saying you're unsurprised someone hasn't heard of Roblox because they're 45, and HR would laugh in your face. People are "doubling-down" because they're right. Again I point you to:

Ageism - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Morrus]

It looks like this conversation has just turned into a handful of people yelling at each other about the definition of ageism. I'll check back in a bit. If it's still just that, I'll close it. Up to you.

 

[Scribe]

Umbran has previously said not to keep engaging with people you believe are arguing in bad faith, and to avoid us both getting red text to the face, I'm going to go ahead and do that. But @Charlaquin has explained it extremely well.

Nice Freudian slip.

And no, I'm extremely familiar with ageism and HR and this is the equivalent of saying you're unsurprised someone hasn't heard of Roblox because they're 45, and HR would laugh in your face. People are "doubling-down" because they're right. Again I point you to:

Ageism - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Auto correct sucks.

And nope, still ageism. Not shocked it isn't seen as such, but it legally protected.

Carry on, no need to continue this.