D&D 5E Are humanoid mono-cultures being replaced with the Rule of Three?

[Reynard]

In a 2 hour action flick? Rarely do you see them address the full impacts of the heroes action. In an 8 hour miniseries or TV series? You often do. Ramifications take time to explore, so in storytelling that has time, you see them explore the impacts of their actions far more often. Comics are full of villains that hate heroes because of the damage the heroes did while protecting the world. Even the MCU movies are finding time to explore fallout - Zemo in the MCU is a byproduct of the devastation in the Ultron fight, for example.

D&D is a long story game. You have time to explore. Dealing with the fallout of your decisions isn't a 'juvenile DM' approach. If handled well, it can be very moving storytelling. I tend to think of young and inexperienced DMs tending towards hack and slash with no story in mind, which would be the opposite of what you attribute to them.

That kind of exploration definitely requires player buy in from the beginning. That is not something that is okay to spring on players as a surprise. You need consent from players to ask them to grapple with the fallout from an unintentional mass murder. I am surprised it is even a discussion given how quick folks are to throw up yellow cards about other play elements.

As to "real world" good vs evil: this seems like absolutely not the place to discuss such a fraught, nuanced subject.

 

[Mercurius]

That’s because because people can’t grasp that in myths and folklore that each of these races is supposed to depict certain kinds of people with specific personalities for allegoric storytelling. They are supposed to be stereotypes of the human psyche or certain types of social behaviors so they can tell story about it as an early form of psychoanalysis.

Yes, this. Although I would make a couple of key adjustments, because I think what you say here could be used to perpetuate the cognitive error of misplaced concreteness that I believe is at the root of a lot of these issues.

"Mythic thinking" involves not allegory and stereotype, but symbol and archetype.

An allegory involves an "A = B" equation. A is a stand-in or representation of B. A symbol, on the other hand, is multi-faceted, with a variety of meanings that are contextual to the individual. Not "what does this really mean," but "what does this mean to me, in this context."

An archetype--used in the Platonic and Jungian sense--is akin to a "proto-thought," an expression of a deep pattern in the psyche, one that is universal, or at least representative of something that has wide applicability (so I would argue that there are "true" or universal archetypes, and also "lesser" or cultural ones). A stereotype, on the other hand, is a crystalized and reduced form of an archetype, a cliche, and often pejorative in nature because it often reduces a complexity to a simplified and generally negative characterization.

The error that is occurring involves reducing symbols to allegories, and archetypes to stereotypes. So people think that orcs, for instance, are meant to be allegorical for specific races or types of people, rather than representative of a universal aspect of human nature. Orcs aren't stereotypes, but archetypes of those aspects of ourselves that are bestial, self-serving, enthralled by evil and power.

What WotC is essentially doing is patching on more stereotypes, nicer ones. It is well-intended, I think, but doesn't go deep enough, and doesn't solve the problem, only bandaids it a bit.

 

[DEFCON 1]

What WotC is essentially doing is patching on more stereotypes, nicer ones. It is well-intended, I think, but doesn't go deep enough, and doesn't solve the problem, only bandaids it a bit.

But better to put on the band-aid than to not do anything and let the wound get infected. Because only by starting the healing process with the band-aid will the possibility of fuller recovery actually have a chance of happening down the line.

Small steps moving forward and all that.

 

[MGibster]

Seems to me that nobody really just wants to admit the truth of the matter... that ALL races / creatures / monsters we D&D players are playing are just "humans in masks" (as the meme goes.)

Are you kidding? All humanoid creatures just being humans with funny ears/bumps on their face has been my jam for years now. And I'm very positive about that because it's tough to tell a story about something that's totally alien to us.

 

[Mercurius]

But better to put on the band-aid than to not do anything and let the wound get infected. Because only by starting the healing process with the band-aid will the possibility of fuller recovery actually have a chance of happening down the line.

Small steps moving forward and all that.

Sure, as long as people who don't want that bandaid aren't castigated for it. Or people who take a different route to addressing the underlying "wound" (or see the wound differently).

Let's emphasize the nature of D&D as a toolbox of tropes, and empower individual DMs to make their own settings, or their own takes of pre-published settings, rather than shoehorning everyone into a "this is the new way, and only true way, to play D&D."

Now I'm not suggesting that WotC is doing that, and the vast majority of people aren't advocating for such an approach--at least explicitly. But I think it is often implicit, especially with such hot-phrases as "problematic."

 

[MGibster]

The difference is that nobody, absolutely nobody, who writes that scene in that action movie then writes their heroes confronting the grieving families of the people they killed-- which is something that a certain kind of juvenile DM absolutely gets off on-- and the audience of the action movie doesn't expect an angelic pat on the head for being objectively morally correct when cheering on the right heroes.

For me, D&D is not the right game to tell that kind of story. It's not the kind of game where the DM should introduce moral quandaries about what to do with non-combatant orcs and what to do with them knowing they'll grow up to be combatants one day. You simply kill the orc, bandit, or Illithid and move on to the next part of the adventure without dwelling on those who have died. I've explored the ramifications of violent behavior in other games, Vampire for example, but not very often in D&D.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Sure, as long as people who don't want that bandaid aren't castigated for it. Or people who take a different route to addressing the underlying "wound" (or see the wound differently).

Let's emphasize the nature of D&D as a toolbox of tropes, and empower individual DMs to make their own settings, or their own takes of pre-published settings, rather than shoehorning everyone into a "this is the new way, and only true way, to play D&D."

Now I'm not suggesting that WotC is doing that, and the vast majority of people aren't advocating for such an approach--at least explicitly. But I think it is often implicit, especially with such hot-phrases as "problematic."

I fault no one for not wanting something changed. People have their own beliefs and their own ways of doing things, and that's fine. But at some point after a book has been written and published, (general) you gotta just accept that what you want isn't what is happening. And thus all of these diggings in of your heels thinking that if (general) you just argue good enough... WotC'll change their mind and rip the pages out of the book they've just written. But that is in fact accomplishing nothing but making yourself miserable.

And that's when the rest of us always chime in with "If you don't want it as it is written in the book, then for your own sake change it in your own game."

We don't say that to anger you. We don't say that to thumb our noses at you. We say it because we know that is the only way you are actually going to get what you want and possibly be happy. The change has been made to the game at large and it's not going back... so save yourself the grief by just accepting it and moving on with your own game in whatever way you wish your own game to play.

Have you been "left behind" by the game in this instance? Yup. But people have been left behind by the changes in D&D for almost 50 years. You aren't the first, you certainly aren't the last... but if you really want to play D&D that badly, you gotta learn to accept it and make the D&D you want to play at your table (even if it's not the one that is baseline for everyone else).

 

[Kobold Avenger]

I'm reminded that there isn't much of a difference between Dwarves, beyond Hill and Mountain Dwarves do enjoy some fun, but Duergar don't enjoy any fun. Also it's sort of puzzling how the Scottish stereotype has stuck to Dwarves, even though Tolkien's Dwarves were very much based on Jewish people.

 

[Weiley31]

I think light sensitivity often gets ignored, or might be solvable with a common item like "sunglasses".

Or Drow Combat Umbrellas.

 

[Sithlord]

I'm reminded that there isn't much of a difference between Dwarves, beyond Hill and Mountain Dwarves do enjoy some fun, but Duergar don't enjoy any fun. Also it's sort of puzzling how the Scottish stereotype has stuck to Dwarves, even though Tolkien's Dwarves were very much based on Jewish people.

I think there is more of a Norse influence on the dwarves. But even Tolkien made a note of the similarities. But that similarity was there even in the Norse sagas about dwarves.