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

[Sepulchrave II]

"Exclusively" is a bold claim, as I've pointed out I've used the word myself and never associated it with that.

If you can find me a reference to phylactery between 200 CE and 1975 (when it was incorporated into the D&D lexicon) which doesn’t apply to tefillin, I’ll be impressed. Because I can’t find one.

And I mean... how many tefillins do you think 1960s Wisconsin men encountered?

Gygax would have known them as phylacteries. Probably via Matthew 23.

I think Gygax's thought processes extended to "wow that's a cool sounding word" and not much beyond that.

I don’t deny it. I’m not suggesting that his choice to use the term was a conscious (or unconscious for that matter) anti-Semitic decision.

 

[Parmandur]

Obviously WotC isn't going to backtrack anytime soon. Why would they? Either way, it's wouldn't present sales of D&D. I still think it's a silly change even if other companies did the same.

I think they would rather have some people feel a change is "silly" than offend people.

 

[Bae'zel]

Nevermind, just making the dicussion more unpleasant.

 

[Remathilis]

Obviously WotC isn't going to backtrack anytime soon. Why would they? Either way, it's wouldn't present sales of D&D. I still think it's a silly change even if other companies did the same.

When. It's been pointed out WotC is late to this party. Paizo, EN Publishing and Bethesda all made a terminology change much earlier that Wizards.

 

[Remathilis]

Non-ironically I think it should have stayed as Girdle. (again, D&D creator's love sucking any flavour out of anything)

I know. Why did they finally settle on Wizard when "magic-user" had serviced us for years? D&D creators love sucking the flavor out of anything.

 

[TiQuinn]

I know. Why did they finally settle on Wizard when "magic-user" had serviced us for years? D&D creators love sucking the flavor out of anything.

I’m demanding that next version we go back to “fighting man” instead of “fighter”.

 

[Remathilis]

I’m demanding that next version we go back to “fighting man” instead of “fighter”.

Reject Modernity: Fighter, Cleric, Wizard, Rogue

Embrace Tradition: Fighting-Man, Cleric, Magic-User, Thief.

 

[Bedrockgames]

By my count, two Jewish posters. I'm not sure that counts as "lots".

I didn't mean in this thread alone, I meant on the issue in general

 

[Maxperson]

I refer you to my post upthread.

This one is the 7th result on my Google query: Dungeons & Dragons Has an Antisemitism Problem - Hey Alma

As I posted, I don't know how representative these views are. But I don't think it's true to say they're not there.

Yeah, I saw that one as well. I saw a hell of a lot more Jews saying it wasn't offensive.

 

[Bedrockgames]

If you can find me a reference to phylactery between 200 CE and 1975 (when it was incorporated into the D&D lexicon) which doesn’t apply to tefillin, I’ll be impressed. Because I can’t find one.

Gygax would have known them as phylacteries. Probably via Matthew 23.

I don’t deny it. I’m not suggesting that his choice to use the term was a conscious (or unconscious for that matter) anti-Semitic decision.

I'd be very curious how Gygax picked up the word. But it isn't like a lot of Christians throw the term phylactery around. He may have picked it up from Matthew, but he also might have picked it up from a thesaurus or more likely, context in a fantasy story that used them for something. Perhaps someone who knows can weigh in, but we probably shouldn't assume we know the answer to this one unless we have some kind of actual confirmation. Also it is notable that if he did get it from Matthew, he doesn't seem to have a handle on their actual function