D&D General Drow & Orcs Removed from the Monster Manual

[MGibster]

I'm reasonably sure hardly anyone wants to replace tall, beautiful humanoids with short, wrinkly ones. That's not happening.

As I continue to age, I am learning just how true this is.

 

[Distracted DM]

And orcs have other racial abilities than drow do and vice versa. It's not just skin color.

I think the point that you're replying to is that in 5.5, they don't.

 

[delericho]

It does occur to me that the answer to getting a more nuanced take on just about any of the species may require only a single, simple change: drop alignment. Or, at the very least, drop it from the Monster Manual - individual monsters and characters appearing in adventures could still have it.

At this point it does nothing mechanically, and all it seems to add to the game is trouble when you tag something as 'evil'.

 

[TiQuinn]

Why would I do that?

As I said, if they start acting on the fantasies, they are no longer fantasies. That would include acting the macho part out.

I've seen MANY portrayals of macho mercenary/military PC groups over the decades and not once did I see a player start acting that way outside of the game, despite having a great time with the fantasy of being a military macho dude.

A fantasy has no bearing on real world morals. Stopping it from being a fantasy and acting the fantasy(or parts of it) out in the real world does, but then it's no longer a fantasy.

Hmm, can't agree with your firm distinction between fantasy and real world morality at all. IMO, there's definitely nuances. The ability to be a macho paramilitary merc type is fantasy. Acting like one in terms of talk and attitude is real, and yet I've seen it quite often in the part of the U.S. I'm from. That's to say nothing of the way someone conducts themselves in say, an online COD game with other people.

I can just think of too many examples where someone has let their media consumption go to their head, and start to dictate the way they think and talk. Again, I don't think there's a direct link from that media to the person's actions, but it does underscore the need to be able to at least discuss and be introspective about the media we consume (to bring this back around to the point.)

 

[Maxperson]

Anime is definitely less nerdspace than it used to be. For example, I was on the bus a few months ago, and two older teenage girls in front of me, dressed very fashionably, wearing a lot of make-up, were both discussing Jujustu Kaisen* and liking and reposting memes about it (particularly involving Satoru Goju** of course). And I've seen similar with a lot of anime. Admittedly none of it trad fantasy, all pretty much urban fantasy (but that does occasionally involve the tall, good-looking kind of elf).

* = An anime about high school kids fighting quite terrifying demons ("curses" as it calls them).

** = The "Giles" figure to use a Buffy analogue, though it's not very accurate.

Here in the States, anime is extremely popular among young folks(30 and under) and especially in the junior high and high school crowds. And gaining momentum.

 

[TiQuinn]

Batman went downhill when they turned him into a vigilante. The 1960s Batman will always be the true Batman.

"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!"

 

[Mistwell]

I don't see how you can interpret what I said as a strawman, I just happened to pick one feature that orcs have that pirates are not assumed to have because I couldn't remember adrenaline rush or relentless endurance off the top of my head.

Buddy, those names were right there in the quote of the post you were quoting so you didn't need to remember off the top of your head.

To clarify, about the only thing I would consider a must-have for an orcish pirate would be darkvision because that seems pretty core feature of the race

That's great for your game if you think Orc traits don't need to be on Orc NPCs. But for those of us who want Orc traits on Orc NPCs, like the game has done for a very very long time now, it would be appropriate if WOTC told us what to do with the CR of that NPC when we add those traits back in to the Orc NPC. CRs are measured to the 1/4 for low levels. Use of those traits can kill a PC if not handled well. And Orcs are extremely common for the game, particularly when using past adventures.

Not sure why you decided to respond to a simple question with a flamethrower.

Because you saying, "What, darkvision?" to a post that doesn't even mention that but that we've been discussing specifics for pages now was pretty aggressive in that context.

 

[Maxperson]

Hmm, can't agree with your firm distinction between fantasy and real world morality at all. IMO, there's definitely nuances. The ability to be a macho paramilitary merc type is fantasy. Acting like one in terms of talk and attitude is real, and yet I've seen it quite often in the part of the U.S. I'm from. That's to say nothing of the way someone conducts themselves in say, an online COD game with other people.

I've seen that a lot, too, but I think that is due to how they see the military/paramilitary groups in real life and a desire to emulate that, not from playing games where they pretended to be members of those groups.

I think it's bazillions of times more likely that someone who acts that way(or wants to) will then go on to play one of those things in D&D, than to go the other direction and play it in D&D first before going on to act that way in real life.

I'm also not sure how someone act while playing COD is the same as acting that way in real life. That seems to me to be more akin to roleplaying while playing that type of game than bringing that kind of game into real life.

I can just think of too many examples where someone has let their media consumption go to their head, and start to dictate the way they think and talk. Again, I don't think there's a direct link from that media to the person's actions, but it does underscore the need to be able to at least discuss and be introspective about the media we consume (to bring this back around to the point.)

But that's what I'm saying. There's no connection between the two. Some sort of indirect correlation could stand some discussion, but really shouldn't be acted on the way WotC did by removing orcs and drow from the MM.

 

[TwoSix]

Anime is definitely less nerdspace than it used to be. For example, I was on the bus a few months ago, and two older teenage girls in front of me, dressed very fashionably, wearing a lot of make-up, were both discussing Jujustu Kaisen* and liking and reposting memes about it (particularly involving Satoru Goju** of course). And I've seen similar with a lot of anime. Admittedly none of it trad fantasy, all pretty much urban fantasy (but that does occasionally involve the tall, good-looking kind of elf).

* = An anime about high school kids fighting quite terrifying demons ("curses" as it calls them).

** = The "Giles" figure to use a Buffy analogue, though it's not very accurate.

I just think of it more that a lot of Nerdspace is now in popular culture. It's still nerd stuff, it's just that social mores don't make that a negative to anywhere to the same degree.

 

[TheSword]

And what do we do about the other topics I mentioned, like the two other abilities for orcs or the one other 2014 ability for orcs? Does that change the CR or not? It's not like I didn't just rant about that issue for a majority of what you just quoted and then misrepresented as being about darkvision.

I just think NPCs arent necessarily a sum of all their parts. It’s acceptable for an orc (thug) to have pack tactics for instance and not an orcs relentless endurance. NPCs don’t follow the same rules as PCs.