D&D 5E Toward a new D&D aesthetics

[Fifth Element]

Take the time to look at the world from your 'opponent's' viewpoint.

Several people even explicitly asked for a clarification of what the term was supposed to mean, since it was not obvious. No clarification was forthcoming. Attempts to clarify it actually made it worse, due to the attempts being as vague as the original use of the term. Your characterizations of the discussion remain inaccurate.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Several people even explicitly asked for a clarification of what the term was supposed to mean, since it was not obvious. No clarification was forthcoming. Attempts to clarify it actually made it worse, due to the attempts being as vague as the original use of the term. Your characterizations of the discussion remain inaccurate.

It was obvious. Please. You are being intentionally obtuse. The poster meant that the art seemed cutesy/childish to them. Which you already know (or should!), but I am stating for clarity. Any responses to that initial post should have been addressing that and not adding baggage to the original statement.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

It was obvious. Please. You are being intentionally obtuse. The poster meant that the art seemed cutesy/childish to them. Which you already know (or should!), but I am stating for clarity. Any responses to that initial post should have been addressing that and not adding baggage to the original statement.

For what it's worth, you found my statements above persuasive, but I largely hold with Fifth Element here. Yes, there was some dogpiling, but a portion of that is simply because people join threads over time--especially if those threads are active. It is an unfortunate fact of internet forums: a controversial statement made 10 pages ago remains "fresh" much longer than it would in a spoken conversation, because new folks joining the thread on the regular do not always read every single post before replying. I mean, already we're over 410 posts in this thread alone; if someone joined, skimmed through some posts, and felt compelled to respond to some of those original controversial statements, I would not feel they had committed an egregious error. Yet doing that is exactly what led to the dogpile in this thread.

I would also argue that, overall, Beancounter did tend to dig themselves deeper, doing plenty of "adding baggage" all on their own. E.g., the "Disneyfied" statement is literally in the second post of the thread, Beancounter (and some others IIRC) basically said anyone who wanted clarification on that was being openly disingenuous, and fairly soon thereafter began bringing in the other, even more controversial statements like the coddling of modern children relative to past generations, and dismissing pretty clear evidence to the contrary (like the Satanic Panic). Even very early on, they were using "Disney" pretty pejoratively: "But why not just make the illustrations 'softer' instead of crossing the line into Disney? It isn't just the illustrations - the choice of race (species, really) has expanded to include anthropomorphized rabbits and turtles. How about a game of Alice in Wonderland? Anyone?"

I likely contributed to the issue of feeling dogpiled, so I apologize for doing so. My intent was to engage with ideas I found lacking in support or to draw out more nuanced discussion. I don't, however, think that the response to that was remotely justified.

 

[Morrus]

@Ulorian

It's just not worth it.

I appreciate Ulorian and a few others speaking up about the incident, the environment here, and the behavior a some others in the thread.

It's really over for me. I've become a "marked man". The Mod's bias is rather blatant. He completely ignored the behavior of others and only accused me of not giving others the benefit of the doubt. By doing so, he has given people de-facto permission to be rude, arrogant, condensing, snarky, and other such behaviors towards me without consequences.

For me, this forum has become toxic.

Every time I post, I'm going to be thinking "Am I going to invoke the wrath of the mod and his sycophants"..

And the way some people suck up and cow tow to the Mod is rather pathetic. There is one member in particular that liked every single post the mod made. If that isn't a textbook example of brown nosing, I don't know what is.

The mod likes to participate in threads as a "regular member" without his "mod voice". However, the reality is, that his status as a Mod gives his opinion a lot more weight than a non mod.

And as I mentioned above, his opinion acts as guidelines for the "right opinion" or the "party line", that other must follow, (or at least tread very carefully if they disagree). If you step out of line, it becomes "open season" on you.

It not an environment I care to be part of.

Predictably, the mod will swoop in with the dreaded red text and ban me.

He'll say I broke the rules, but that's just cover for his power hungry ego trip.

Further, I guarantee this post will disappear.

Also, predictably, the usual actors will come to his defense to show their unwavering loyalty.

Please do not discuss moderation in-thread.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

For what it's worth, you found my statements above persuasive, but I largely hold with Fifth Element here. Yes, there was some dogpiling, but a portion of that is simply because people join threads over time--especially if those threads are active. It is an unfortunate fact of internet forums: a controversial statement made 10 pages ago remains "fresh" much longer than it would in a spoken conversation, because new folks joining the thread on the regular do not always read every single post before replying. I mean, already we're over 410 posts in this thread alone; if someone joined, skimmed through some posts, and felt compelled to respond to some of those original controversial statements, I would not feel they had committed an egregious error. Yet doing that is exactly what led to the dogpile in this thread.

I would also argue that, overall, Beancounter did tend to dig themselves deeper, doing plenty of "adding baggage" all on their own. E.g., the "Disneyfied" statement is literally in the second post of the thread, Beancounter (and some others IIRC) basically said anyone who wanted clarification on that was being openly disingenuous, and fairly soon thereafter began bringing in the other, even more controversial statements like the coddling of modern children relative to past generations, and dismissing pretty clear evidence to the contrary (like the Satanic Panic). Even very early on, they were using "Disney" pretty pejoratively: "But why not just make the illustrations 'softer' instead of crossing the line into Disney? It isn't just the illustrations - the choice of race (species, really) has expanded to include anthropomorphized rabbits and turtles. How about a game of Alice in Wonderland? Anyone?"

I likely contributed to the issue of feeling dogpiled, so I apologize for doing so. My intent was to engage with ideas I found lacking in support or to draw out more nuanced discussion. I don't, however, think that the response to that was remotely justified.

I appreciate your response. Let me go over it in more depth before I reply. But thank you for being reasonable.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Speaking as a neutral third party who just read through the thread, it seems to me that there's a lot of unnecessary accusations going on. I can see why someone might see a "dogpile", but it's an illusion. Three or four posters disagreed with another. It's not like they have some kind of hive-mind. Sure, some of them didn't express their disagreement in the kindest way, but that's to be expected. Professional writers don't always express themselves well in print - and most of us are not professional writers. To expect everyone to express themselves well in a forum post is folly (not to mention it holds others to a higher standard than you yourself, whoever you are, can reach).

I'm sure I'm doing a terrible job of it, but I'm trying to voice some reason here. Can we discuss the art, and not the quality of peoples' posts? It really helps to assume that everyone means not to offend you, rather than to assume that they do. (Even if you're wrong about that.) Most of the time, it's true.

Speaking for myself on the topic of the thread, I don't like much cutesy stuff in my D&D, but I don't see a trend toward more of it, exactly. If there is any trend, it's toward a greater variety in styles, some of which includes some cutesy stuff. I understand why someone might feel there's a trend, if they look at the cute stuff without noticing all the not-cute stuff, like that bloody shark.

In fact, in my mind, the existence of this book (the "friendlier" planar hub, for those who want that), may allow them to purposefully make Sigil darker than they otherwise might have, just to keep the two of them distinct.

 

[billd91]

It was obvious. Please. You are being intentionally obtuse. The poster meant that the art seemed cutesy/childish to them. Which you already know (or should!), but I am stating for clarity. Any responses to that initial post should have been addressing that and not adding baggage to the original statement.

That's a definition you're supplying. For the rest of us, the claim of "Disneyfied" isn't necessarily an obvious definition, particularly since Disney's art styles do vary. Animated vs photorealistic? Characters have increasingly juvenile structures (like Mickey Mouse's evolution as a drawn character as pointed out by, of all people, Stephen Jay Gould)?

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

That's a definition you're supplying. For the rest of us, the claim of "Disneyfied" isn't necessarily an obvious definition, particularly since Disney's art styles do vary. Animated vs photorealistic? Characters have increasingly juvenile structures (like Mickey Mouse's evolution as a drawn character as pointed out by, of all people, Stephen Jay Gould

I see your statement as being... disingenuous. It seems obvious what the intent of the term was. Why would someone bring up this term where the intent was to compare animated vs. photorealistic? Come on...

 

[Yaarel]

I keep finding myself bringing up the word 'disingenuous'. Here it is again. This post is disingenuous.

I hope it is obvious to readers I am genuine, sincere, and honest.

Wait. Are you accusing me personally of being "disingenuous", insincere, dishonest? Such an accusation would come across as insulting.

I am sincere.

Indeed, before I wrote the post that you are responding to, I reread the posts by @beancounter, to make sure I was characterizing them fairly. Whether intentionally or not, his posts did come across as judgmental and insulting, as does the post that I am responding to now.



Additionally, the question about sarcasm is sincere. Sarcasm rarely communicates well in internet text. One post stated he conceeded he was wrong, the next post insulted other forumers as if being "pathetic", and his last post seems to clearly indicate that he thinks he is right, meanwhile insulting everyone in the forum.

It seems there could be easier posters to defend.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I see your statement as being... disingenuous.

I mean this with all friendly respect: You really need to stop accusing people of this. You've felt others are being rude in their method of arguing, but you keep making things personal. I see how it might feel that way to you, but try being a little more charitable. It's friendlier.