D&D 5E Spelljammer Errata

[Mind of tempest]

Elves got several pages in the original campaign setting. I think they were aiming for Victorian Age British Colonial Empire and not zealous Nazis, but it still wasn't a good look overall.

And there was this zinger in the original Hadozee entry from the 2E MC:

man, I hate these elves already.

 

[EpicureanDM]

Yes, exactly. The apology was necessary and prompt. Now I want to hear about them hiring an outside sensitivity consultant to review future material, and hopefully prevent this sort of thing from happening again. And maybe that's what they meant by "we’ve initiated a thorough internal review of the situation and will take the necessary actions as a result of that review."

Who's going to hire the sensitivity consultant? Jeremy Crawford and Chris Perkins, two of the three credited writers for the book including the Hadozee?

 

[Alzrius]

Elves got several pages in the original campaign setting.

That the elves in Spelljammer had a paternalistic, condescending view of other races was a running theme throughout the 2E product line.

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

You think 99% of tables are wholly rewriting the lore of races? Based on what?

Not rewritten, but ignored... Hence it taking two weeks of Spelljammer being out in the wild before anyone made much of a noise about the Hadozee lore. Most people, myself included, just glanced at the first paragraph and then rushed to read the race mechanics to try to figure out how to abuse the glide ability. Really for most races you just need to say what they are, "gliding monkey sailors" is fine, I am pretty confident in saying that the even if the backstory for the Hadozee weren't dropped, it wouldn't come up at 99% of tables, they are just going to get played as "gliding monkey sailors" without the dark backstory that no one asked for.

 

[Ixal]

Not rewritten, but ignored... Hence it taking two weeks of Spelljammer being out in the wild before anyone made much of a noise about the Hadozee lore. Most people, myself included, just glanced at the first paragraph and then rushed to read the race mechanics to try to figure out how to abuse the glide ability. Really for most races you just need to say what they are, "gliding monkey sailors" is fine, I am pretty confident in saying that the even if the backstory for the Hadozee weren't dropped, it wouldn't come up at 99% of tables, they are just going to get played as "gliding monkey sailors" without the dark backstory that no one asked for.

99% of the tables probably don't even consider "uplifted to be slaves but escaped" to be a dark backstory at all as that is pretty standard scifi themes

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

Who's going to hire the sensitivity consultant? Jeremy Crawford and Chris Perkins, two of the three credited writers for the book including the Hadozee?

I am pretty sure that the review and hiring will be done at the Hasbro corporate level. Although, in the end, they will probably hire one person as a manager and then outsource sensitivity reading to outside freelancers depending on the needs of the project because there are so many areas that can be problematic that will escape any individual reader.

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

99% of the tables probably don't even consider "uplifted to be slaves but escaped" to be a dark backstory at all as that is pretty standard scifi themes

Except the lore as presented was not at the individual level, it was more of an origin story for the species that was in the far past.
Which is another reason it was so unnecessary. The race isn't even designed with those themes in mind, it was just tacked on Planet of the Apes/Uplift lore to add a bit of a sci-fi twist.

 

[Ixal]

Except the lore as presented was not at the individual level, it was more of an origin story for the species that was in the far past.
Which is another reason it was so unnecessary. The race isn't even designed with those themes in mind, it was just tacked on Planet of the Apes/Uplift lore to add a bit of a sci-fi twist.

Which makes it even more strange that some people take so much issues with that story. Especially as being created as a servitor race is not exactly new in D&D (dragonborn and possibly kobolds to dragons, ect.)
Should a RPG company completely stop writing lore (which basically is the majority of writing they make their money with) because of the off chance someone feels offended and twitters about it?

 

[Dire Bare]

Who's going to hire the sensitivity consultant? Jeremy Crawford and Chris Perkins, two of the three credited writers for the book including the Hadozee?

No, their boss, Ray Winnegar.

 

[Alzrius]

No, their boss, Ray Winnegar.

Wouldn't that be Cynthia Williams?