D&D General Jaquaying the dungeon - a term to avoid

[DEFCON 1]

Wow... So, first, Jaquays did not request her name be taken off of the concept. That didn't happen. It's not a real thing. To be clear here: I am not accusing Alexander of making it up. You lot did. The article could not be more clear that the actual objection was not to using her name, it was to spelling it wrong. Stop using "jaquaying" and start using "jaquaysing." That is all she is requesting of you. Alexander wants to change it to "xandering" because he wants to publish a book and using someone else's name like that raised some questions with the publisher, and also, because of course he wants to name it after himself. (And possibly a bit of "I'd rather change it to an entirely word than spell it differently, because I dislike that S for aesthetic reasons.")

Second, the "harassment" being brought up here is only and entirely people saying "use jaquaysing instead of jaquaying" and maybe occasionally taking that objection too far. Again, you made this up, not Alexander. The article spells this out in plain English with no ambiguity whatsoever. Yes, Jaquays is almost certainly catching some highly unpleasant naughty word over trans issues, but that's entirely disconnected from the word "jaquaying" and is not mentioned or even hinted at in the blog post in question here.

Yes, I literally made an account just to come in here and say this, because holy crap, six freaking pages of people saying "she said to take her name off it, so just stop using her name for it" when she literally never said that is way, way too much.

Well, we don't know exactly what was said at various points. Her request adding of the 'S' to the name was something that had been brought up years ago. It's not a recent request. So when Justin said this in his blog post:

'I spoke with Jennell earlier this year. We both agreed that the name should be changed, and I said it would be a large project to do it, but I’d make sure it happened by the end of the year.'

We do not know if this recent conversation is referencing her merely original desire from years ago to add the 'S' to the term, or in fact was a new conversation where they perhaps agreed to change it altogether. The blog post does not make this clear. Maybe she did want her name kept as part of the term but just wanted the 'S' added (and Justin said no)... or perhaps if Justin brought up the fact that he was going to be writing a book and needed to finalize a term, Janelle didn't care one way or the other whether the term used her name (with the 'S' or no) and so they agreed to let Justin change it to whatever he wanted.

Now you might very well be correct... but then again there's no reason to suggest why your interpretation of the matter should mean more that what we've all gleaned from the post ourselves. I mean unless you have some personal knowledge of the situation or a connection to Janelle (which maybe you do, but you did not insinuate that to be so.) So it's fine that you finally made an account just in order to try and "correct" us on the matter... but unless you do have that connection to the people involved, there's no reason for us to take your opinion as anything more than just that-- your opinion.

 

[Mannahnin]

To be fair, in the early pages of the thread some of us clearly did read things into what Justin actually wrote that he didn't actually say.

I can't 100% agree with @Rystefn that it's perfectly clear with no ambiguity. JA's post certainly leaves out some details and implies others without being explicit.

 

[KYRON45]

This whole thing seems like a solution looking for a problem. Language is a living thing. The cat is out of the bag. The expression either will or won't stick. You can't forcefully remove language from the lexicon. I don't think the expression is as commonly used as this discussion makes it sound. I've been playing RPGs since 1986 and the only person I've ever heard us the expression was Sly Flourish.

It seems to me that if all of the "experts" simply honor this person's request; the situation will resolve itself.

 

[Mannahnin]

This whole thing seems like a solution looking for a problem. Language is a living thing. The cat is out of the bag. The expression either will or won't stick. You can't forcefully remove language from the lexicon. I don't think the expression is as commonly used as this discussion makes it sound. I've been playing RPGs since 1986 and the only person I've ever heard us the expression was Sly Flourish.

It seems to me that if all of the "experts" simply honor this person's request; the situation will resolve itself.

IME it mostly sees heavy usage in OSR and very dungeon design-focused circles.

 

[Reynard]

Wow... So, first, Jaquays did not request her name be taken off of the concept. That didn't happen. It's not a real thing. To be clear here: I am not accusing Alexander of making it up. You lot did. The article could not be more clear that the actual objection was not to using her name, it was to spelling it wrong. Stop using "jaquaying" and start using "jaquaysing." That is all she is requesting of you. Alexander wants to change it to "xandering" because he wants to publish a book and using someone else's name like that raised some questions with the publisher, and also, because of course he wants to name it after himself. (And possibly a bit of "I'd rather change it to an entirely word than spell it differently, because I dislike that S for aesthetic reasons.")

Second, the "harassment" being brought up here is only and entirely people saying "use jaquaysing instead of jaquaying" and maybe occasionally taking that objection too far. Again, you made this up, not Alexander. The article spells this out in plain English with no ambiguity whatsoever. Yes, Jaquays is almost certainly catching some highly unpleasant naughty word over trans issues, but that's entirely disconnected from the word "jaquaying" and is not mentioned or even hinted at in the blog post in question here.

Yes, I literally made an account just to come in here and say this, because holy crap, six freaking pages of people saying "she said to take her name off it, so just stop using her name for it" when she literally never said that is way, way too much.

Just to be clear, you think anonymously coming in hot, blaming everyone for not being smart enough to read between the lines like you did, and being rude will elevate or resolve this discussion?

Amazing.

 

[Lanefan]

It's three linear dungeons connected at the entrance.

A more interesting study might be The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan. Parallel paths? (Interconnecting at a couple of nodes).

UK 5 Eye of the Serpent is another interesting dungeon for path analysis.

While I have both of those here somewhere I've neither run nor played in either one and haven't read them in ages, thus I don't remember anything about their design/layout.

 

[J.Quondam]

I think the we here may refer to JA and his publisher.

I just re-read the post, and I believe you're right.
I stand corrected, thanks.

 

[delericho]

I think then discussion went further when she discovered that most of Justin's articles from the past that referenced things all still used Janelle's deadname when discussing products that Janelle had written in the years past, and when she asked him to remove her deadname as well, it took a bit of discussion for him to understand why that was important.

The comments in which this was discussed appear to have been deleted so I can't cite, but I think you have the order reversed here - I think the request to remove the deadname came first (and was actioned), and then the request to add the S made later. This latter, it seems, wasn't actioned, and it appears JJ has recently firmed up the request, prompting the complete name change.

I think it's also important to note that the original version of the article was written some years before JJ came out. That is, it wasn't a deadname at the time of writing - whatever JA's flaws, he's not guilty of that particular one.

 

[Ancalagon]

I'm going to have to think about these revelations before commenting...

I think some people are not happy with justin re-naming it after himself. I think it's kind of in bad taste. He deserves it less than Jannel... but he came up with it, he can name it.

 

[MGibster]

I'm going to make a bold assertion: Having multiple pathways through a dungeon doesn't need a special term. Just don't turn your dungeon into a tube (like the Sunless Citadel or latter day World of Warcraft dungeons) and you're good. Not everything needs to be turned into jargon.

Yeah. I'm just going to call it making a dungeon. There's no reason for this weird bit of jargon.