Unpopular opinions go here

[Micah Sweet]

As a medium, American comic books are dying. The largest companies in the industry could learn so much from the manga industry. But they refuse to learn. They are stuck, frozen in time. And refuse to change.

What sort of changes are you advocating?

 

[pemerton]

Seems like an argument that athletes are better than other people, since they have superior bodies and superior minds.

I took it to be an argument that excelling in a particular field requires intelligence.

I don't know about footballers, but I've had the good fortune to know some very brilliant mathematicians, and many of them have also been skilled in other areas - eg one is an excellent pianist, one won a writing competition, they are often fluent in literary or cultural fields, etc. Not necessarily in every case, but sufficient to suggest that being excellent in one field is as likely to bring with it skill in others, as it is to preclude also having other talents.

 

[Scribe]

Seems like an argument that athletes are better than other people, since they have superior bodies and superior minds.

I mean...what?

A professional athlete, like an NFL player...is about as close to what an 'adventurer' would look like peak physical and mental condition, while the rest of us normal people, would be working the fields, or running the shops, or crafting things, or record keeping....which is...what most of us do now....

Wait...

 

[overgeeked]

peak physical and mental condition

You’re overestimating at least half that. You’re also ignoring the drugs, brain damage, and criminality.

Medieval adventurers would be much the same in a fantasy world as they were in the real world. Conquistadors and Crusaders are the closest thing we have that’s analogous. Conquistadors were the unemployed fighting men with nothing to do but cause trouble in newly reconquered Spain. So they were shipped off to the New World with promises of adventure, wealth, power, and land. And in pursuit of that wealth and power they raped and slaughtered their way across continents and committed several genocides and enslaved whole populations.

Crusaders were much the same.

Maybe it’s well passed time we left to archetype of the greedy, itinerant sell-sword in the dustbin of history where it belongs.

 

[Scribe]

You’re also ignoring the drugs, brain damage, and criminality.

Am I though?!

I'd also say what you describe (rightly) goes beyond 'adventuring' and is more 'semi official war's of conquest', but these are details we likely dont need to get into.

 

[Hussar]

You’re overestimating at least half that. You’re also ignoring the drugs, brain damage, and criminality.

Medieval adventurers would be much the same in a fantasy world as they were in the real world. Conquistadors and Crusaders are the closest thing we have that’s analogous. Conquistadors were the unemployed fighting men with nothing to do but cause trouble in newly reconquered Spain. So they were shipped off to the New World with promises of adventure, wealth, power, and land. And in pursuit of that wealth and power they raped and slaughtered their way across continents and committed several genocides and enslaved whole populations.

Crusaders were much the same.

Maybe it’s well passed time we left to archetype of the greedy, itinerant sell-sword in the dustbin of history where it belongs.

Heh, that's kinda where Fantasy slams right up against history. Fantasy as a genre is a romanticization of the past. The problem with that is that ... well... it's romaticizing a period which is pretty darn horrific when you start actually looking at it. Scratch below the surface and you realize just how much we have to ignore in order to have the genre at all. Return of the King is seen as a good thing after all. Nobody says, "Return of the constitutionally elected sovereign who is responsible to the people of the nation!" It really doesn't roll off the tongue too well.

It's often why I don't really get too fussed about things like the Wall of the Faithless in Forgotten Realms (as an example). I'm already ignoring the fifteen thousand other things that would make a D&D world an absolute nightmare to actually live in. One more thing just isn't much of a stretch.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

There is a difference here in possessing athleticism and being a high-level athlete as displayed through on field performance. The knowledge, discipline, processing speed and attention to detail required to perform as an athlete require a significant amount of intellect. This is particularly true for complex team sports with a lot of moving parts like football and basketball.

Will high end athletes tend to possess the level of intellect as high-end physicists? Absolutely not, but Patrick Mahomes, Jason Kelcey and Amon-Ra St. Brown are definitely a standard deviation above the baseline.

Even at the lower end, outside of freak levels of athleticism, someone who is not at least of average intelligence is unlikely to excel in athletics. Savants do exist, but they are outliers. The trope of dumb athlete is just not very reflective of any locker room I have ever been a part of.

I have no idea what athletes you are encountering. Your opinion here seems baffling to me.

 

[Maxperson]

You’re overestimating at least half that. You’re also ignoring the drugs, brain damage, and criminality.

Medieval adventurers would be much the same in a fantasy world as they were in the real world. Conquistadors and Crusaders are the closest thing we have that’s analogous. Conquistadors were the unemployed fighting men with nothing to do but cause trouble in newly reconquered Spain. So they were shipped off to the New World with promises of adventure, wealth, power, and land. And in pursuit of that wealth and power they raped and slaughtered their way across continents and committed several genocides and enslaved whole populations.

Crusaders were much the same.

Maybe it’s well passed time we left to archetype of the greedy, itinerant sell-sword in the dustbin of history where it belongs.

No. Not Conquistadors and Crusaders. Explorers would be the closest. Sure many of them were also not great, but a lot of them went places and braved danger just because they could and for the thrill of the, well..............................adventure! The Edmund Hillarys and Amelia Earharts.

 

[Reynard]

No. Not Conquistadors and Crusaders. Explorers would be the closest. Sure many of them were also not great, but a lot of them went places and braved danger just because they could and for the thrill of the, well..............................adventure! The Edmund Hillarys and Amelia Earharts.

D&D adventurers do not have much in common with modern adventurers. At best they resemble the late 19th century tomb European tomb robbers -- er, archaeologists who used colonialism as an excuse to raid the relics and treasures of other cultures.

I am running a few shadowdark sessions at Carnage in Killington VT this late October where the goal is to PUT BACK the treasures in the dungeon.

 

[Micah Sweet]

D&D adventurers do not have much in common with modern adventurers. At best they resemble the late 19th century tomb European tomb robbers -- er, archaeologists who used colonialism as an excuse to raid the relics and treasures of other cultures.

I am running a few shadowdark sessions at Carnage in Killington VT this late October where the goal is to PUT BACK the treasures in the dungeon.

Any conflict in those sessions?