D&D 5E 50th Anniversary and beyond

[Micah Sweet]

No. I didn't speak to any proportions of content at all!

I said that, if you are in a state of inequity, if you don't get pushback, what you've done is not a significant step towards equity.

As a practical matter, and speaking as a broad generalization, folks who sit in a dominant place in culture want to remain in such a position, because that position feels good. If you treat them like equals, instead, that feels less good, and they will gripe about that. The "negative reaction" is a sign that you moved meaningfully in the right direction. And, indeed, those in a dominant place are often extremely sensitive, and will often give pushback over tiny things that question that dominance. So, you don't need much inclusive content at all - just a little bit usually does the trick to set people off. Egos... are kind of fragile, sometimes.

Also, as a tangent: "proportionally high" means little. It is language that sounds important, but does not clearly state the situation.

Let me take a stick, one meter long. I paint one quarter of it black, and three-quarters white.
I take another stick, one meter long. I paint 251 millimeters of it black, and 749 millimeters of it white.

Technically, the amount of black on the second stick is "proportionally high" compared to the first one. The language, being vague, hides the fact that it is a very small difference. By not specifying, we are left to assumptions, and to feel that it is a big deal, when it isn't.

So, I reject the "proportionally high" characterization. It wasn't what I said, and the language tends to mislead.

Fair enough, I misunderstood. I was thinking of more obvious examples, like the things Geoff Thirlwell was referencing.

 

[Micah Sweet]

To be fair, we've had a LOT more years of anti-inclusion...

Again, why do things have to see-saw?

 

[Umbran]

Fair enough, I misunderstood. I was thinking of more obvious examples, like the things Geoff Thirlwell was referencing.

So, neither you, nor Geoff, has established anything about proportion of content. From where I sit, Geoff is referencing exactly what I am talking about - small changes that those in dominant positions react to.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Again, why do things have to see-saw?

I think of it like standing in a river. If you stand still, the current will still push you back.

For centuries (at least in the US), those in charge oppressed and subverted voices and representation of those who were not considered White. Laws and mobs enforced this. Media enforced this. People literally died because of it.

So the struggle to counteract that HAS to be push-back. If we just stand still, the years and years and years of cultural norms will continue to dominate. We will just follow old patterns set by those who want their culture to dominate and oppress.

Think of this not as a seesaw, but as a revelation of how things should have been the whole time.

And until inclusion and representation really is the default, we have to keep fighting and fighting and fighting against that current.

 

[Oofta]

The only thing I dislike is the one the OP forgot to mention:
short rests to recover abilities will mostly fade out. In the last few books, abilities are either at will or proficiency bonus per long rest.

To the rest: alignment for races can be setting specific and then it is only "often" for humanoid types. Calling a race evil is usually only an excuse for adventurers to attack on sight or slaughteting the "evil" children without feeling guilty...

I get so tired of the bolded accusation. I've always had evil races, played with many DMs who did the same. I've never seen this once

I don't care what you do or what you justify or how. I'm not going to explain why I use evil races because it's a pointless rabbit hole.

But doing it so people can get their jollies murdering evil children? I can't say it never happens because I'm sure someone somewhere has. To say it's the reason to have evil races? Incredibly insulting hyperbole.

 

[Mannahnin]

So, neither you, nor Geoff, has established anything about proportion of content. From where I sit, Geoff is referencing exactly what I am talking about - small changes that those in dominant positions react to.

Geoff cited a couple of numerical examples. I was wondering how accurate they are. Sometimes something can FEEL really skewed, then when we count it, it turns out to be different than we thought. Or (deliberately or inadvertently) cherry-picked.

I enjoy the Dragon Talk podcast but it went for a very long period (possibly 20 episode) where every single guest was either black and talked about their colour or was non-heterosexual and talked about that. I have absolutely no issues with people from either of these groups and enjoyed their interviews as much as any other guest but it was an extremely disproportionate representation of the majority of the fan base.

So if you can remember roughly when this span was, we could (for example) count whether it was indeed 20 episodes, and confirm whether during that span every single guest was a POC or gay. It might turn out that the actual number was significantly shorter, but that the subjective feeling was exaggerated.

Ancillary to that, we could discuss whether "proportionate representation to the majority of the fan base" is or should be the goal! Ruth Bader Ginsberg was asked once when female inclusion on the Supreme Court would be enough. When, essentially, could we relax and stop worrying about equal representation on the court? How many female justices would that take? And she opined "When there are nine." That, given that historically the court had been all-male for most of its existence, in her estimation one couldn't really consider things balanced until and unless "just choosing the best person" had happened to line up 9 women. At that point we could reasonably say that we're past the issue.

They have a random character generator segment where probably only a quarter of the characters gender is male or female.

This one seems like another good candidate for measurement, to see what the actual percentage is, vs. what the subjective impression is.

The conversation also reminds me of those studies showing perceptions of who talks longer in meetings, which seem to consistently demonstrate that men talk much more than women, and that when the percentage shifts closer to parity, the men typically perceive this as the women dominating the conversation and doing most of the talking.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think of it like standing in a river. If you stand still, the current will still push you back.

For centuries (at least in the US), those in charge oppressed and subverted voices and representation of those who were not considered White. Laws and mobs enforced this. Media enforced this. People literally died because of it.

So the struggle to counteract that HAS to be push-back. If we just stand still, the years and years and years of cultural norms will continue to dominate. We will just follow old patterns set by those who want their culture to dominate and oppress.

Think of this not as a seesaw, but as a revelation of how things should have been the whole time.

And until inclusion and representation really is the default, we have to keep fighting and fighting and fighting against that current.

I understand the historical context, but I dont see why regularly depicting all people as equal in your media isnt good enough. Isnt that what we ultimately want to see? No group being regarded higher or lower than any other? I'm speaking in general. Any given creative work should be able to lean a bit as long as inclusivity is maintained.

 

[HammerMan]

I get so tired of the bolded accusation. I've always had evil races, played with many DMs who did the same. I've never seen this once

same.

I don't care what you do or what you justify or how. I'm not going to explain why I use evil races because it's a pointless rabbit hole.

it is black and white gaming vs shades of grey gaming

But doing it so people can get their jollies murdering evil children? I can't say it never happens because I'm sure someone somewhere has. To say it's the reason to have evil races? Incredibly insulting hyperbole.

Yeah, I don't understand why everything has to be vilified by the side that wants shades of grey IN game...

 

[Mannahnin]

To the rest: alignment for races can be setting specific and then it is only "often" for humanoid types. Calling a race evil is usually only an excuse for adventurers to attack on sight or slaughteting the "evil" children without feeling guilty...

I get so tired of the bolded accusation. I've always had evil races, played with many DMs who did the same. I've never seen this once

I don't care what you do or what you justify or how. I'm not going to explain why I use evil races because it's a pointless rabbit hole.

But doing it so people can get their jollies murdering evil children? I can't say it never happens because I'm sure someone somewhere has. To say it's the reason to have evil races? Incredibly insulting hyperbole.

Oofta, these are two different things.

He didn't say anyone's doing it to "get their jollies murdering evil children", he's saying that having an entire race be evil is a convenient justification for killing the kids without feeling guilty about it. Not that they're LOOKING FOR opportunities to kill kids. More that, if the scenario puts kids in the way, they don't want to have to wrestle with a moral dilemma and wind up feeling guilty. This is not entirely unfounded. It's exactly what Gary Gygax was saying with his 2005 "nits make lice" reference to Chivington. (link below)

In my opinion what Gary was talking about was an easy/lazy way out of dealing with situations like he presents players with in the Caves of Chaos in B2. He gives you a bunch of humanoid antagonists, and in his nod to Gygaxian Realism, the lairs include a bunch of noncombatant women and children.

In real play, groups can choose to deal with this numerous ways. DMs can choose to elide the kids. DMs can run the women also as combatants, or rule that they are peaceable and ask for truce, swear to leave the area, etc. OR, in the "nits make lice" approach, players can just exterminate the vermin and be reassured that the creatures were never capable of peaceful negotiation or growing up to be nice and non-threatening adults, so the players don't have to feel guilty or worry about their characters no longer being Lawful Good.

Q&A with Gary Gygax, Part II - Page 3 - Dragonsfoot

 

[HammerMan]

I understand the historical context, but I dont see why regularly depicting all people as equal in your media isnt good enough. Isnt that what we ultimately want to see? No group being regarded higher or lower than any other? I'm speaking in general. Any given creative work should be able to lean a bit as long as inclusivity is maintained.

yeah, I mean look at movies, or comics, or TV shows, it is still more white men then anything else, but there is no movie/show/comic in 2021 that is ONLY white men... but put a only ______ one out and it is fine because that is to help counterbalance the white men dominating the other more mixed ones...