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

[jasper]

I mean, technically we're all Barbarians. Well, maybe except for the Classics majors...

Lies. I know how to use a fork.

 

[Gradine]

Lies. I know how to use a fork.

Ah, but can you speak ancient Greek?

 

[Maxperson]

Cook did his best to write OA with respect and interest in Asian cultures, and he did his best to research the topic . . . . but society really wasn't having these types of conversations we have today, and the resources available to Cook were limited. Academics certainly were having the discussion on "orientalism" at the time, but not in the mainstream.

I don't take issue with Cook himself, his intent was certainly a positive one.

But today, we can do better. We are having these conversations, we are hearing from more diverse voices, we are aware, we do have the resources. I don't take issue with Cook in the 80s, but I most certainly do take issue with folks who would publish an "Oriental Adventures" today. Or who give pushback on publishers working to make their products more inclusive by removing terms like "race" and "phylactery". Ugh, gets under my skin.

They aren't making the game more inclusive by removing phylactery, though. The word phylactery by itself doesn't appropriate anything at all from Judaism. Not one little bit. It has a definition that simply means amulet. If they had simply removed wording about boxes with writings inside and left it as any object for the Lich's soul, there would be no connection between it and the Tefillin.

Removing the wording regarding boxes and writings would be more inclusive. Removing the word phylactery is not.

 

[jasper]

Ah, but can you speak ancient Greek?

Something Better Southern, and Cobol.

 

[Maxperson]

Lol. I've missed them. I assume they aren't in the new DMG

I expect they are, but renamed like the lich's soul jar.

 

[Maxperson]

Something Better Southern, and Cobol.

I'd be more impressed if you spoke Kobol.

 

[Gradine]

Something Better Southern, and Cobol.

You say that, but all I hear is "bar bar bar bar bar"

 

[pemerton]

The game does have specialized language

I thought that you don't approve of jargon!

This is just a semantic argument. I think you know that when I say 'taken away' I mean something that was in a previous edition I liked is not being carried over into a new edition of the game (and evaluating what they take out, keep in, change and add, is pretty fundamental to judging a new edition). So yes, they aren't going back in a time machine and taking the word out of the DMG. But clearly that isn't what I was saying. I am talking about D&D as an ongoing thing that exists across editions.

It's not "just a semantic argument". Because you're not actually identifying anything that has been "taken away". What you're saying is that you don't like a change that WotC (and Paizo before them) are trying to make in the ongoing culture of D&D.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Aw, man. Did you ever see the music video for Taco's "Puttin' on the Ritz?" I remember his cover in the 80s when I was a kid, but I was in my thirties when I first saw the European version of the video and it was like staring at the gory aftermath of an automobile accident. I simply could not believe what I was seeing yet I could not look away.

I have never seen the European version of it*, just the American edit. However, it should be noted there was also a lyrical whitewashing:

Original lyrics:

If you're blue, and you don't know where to go to
Why don't you go where Harlem flits?
Puttin' on the Ritz

and:

Have you seen the well to do
Up on Lenox Avenue
On that famous thoroughfare
With their noses in the air?

and:

Spangled gowns upon the bevy of high browns
From down the levy, all misfits
Putting' on the Ritz

vs Taco lyrics:

If you're blue, and you don't know where to go to
Why don't you go where fashion sits?
Puttin' on the Ritz

and:

Have you seen the well-to-do
Up and down Park Avenue?
On that famous thoroughfare
With their noses in the air

and no mention of the high browns at all, just repetition of prior verses.

Now, to be fair, the second edit actually originated with the song’s original writer, Irving Berlin. He wanted to make the song more about the NYC high life in general. So Lenox Avenue (in Harlem) became Park Avenue (not in Harlem).



* for those who don’t know, several of the actors were in blackface

 

[Bedrockgames]

I thought that you don't approve of jargon!

Generally I don't lol. For example I am not a huge fan of academic jargon that feels unwarranted and makes it hard for experts to communicate with regular people, and I am not a fan of theoretical jargon that interferes with having conversation about RPGs. But I am a gamer and I do like a good ten dollar word and game system terminology

It's not "just a semantic argument". Because you're not actually identifying anything that has been "taken away". What you're saying is that you don't like a change that WotC (and Paizo before them) are trying to make in the ongoing culture of D&D.

This strikes me as highly semantic lol. And the whole argument is purely semantic because the core issue is whether replacing phylactery with another term is a good or bad thing (and not about how we describe what is going on). Sure it is about change I don't think is good. But the reason I dislike the change with the lich is it removed the phylactery and replaces it with another term. Look if they removed Dragons from the game between 5E and 5.5 (not sure what the proper name for the new 'edition' is), we would say they have taken away dragons. Yes it is a change. But that change is a subtractive one. And okay, perhaps they take out Dragons and replace them with Crocodile Beasts. But the word dragon has been removed, and the concept altered even as a result. We still use language of subtraction. So they have taken out phylactery and replaced it with a less interesting term. I think describing that as a change and as something being removed are both pretty accurate.