Article on _genuine_ mature themes

[S'mon]

So, when people talk about an "article on _genuine_ mature themes" (as opposed to what they found in the BoVD, I assume), or claim to write some evil material that is "far more vile" than the BoVD, I never really know how to react, since they play off of what many thought the BoVD was about, but in my mind never was.

Hi Monte - thanks for your clarification about the intent of the BoVD. I wasn't addressing it in the thread title, I was thinking of the thread about 'should there be a separate product line for mature product', which banned discussion of what 'mature' might be, making discussion difficult. I don't think WoTC has been helpful in deliberately obfuscating 'mature themes', 'about evil NPCs' and 'depraved content' in its marketing, presumably as a device to stir up controversy and maximise sales.
Thanks for making clear that you were not responsible for this deliberate confusion.

IMO they would have been better and more truthful never to draw a distinction between the likes of BoVD and regular D&D product in the first place - I haven't read BoVD, but from what you say it's well within the D&D mainstream.

Personally I think:

1. Stuff about regular D&D-evil like BoVD should be published but does not need to be distinguished with a 'mature' label, indeed it's a misleading label.

2. More stuff dealing with mature themes in the Rilstonian sense in D&D would be welcome. The Kalamar stuff mentioned above sounds interesting, I may well check it out as a source for ideas.

3. As for depraved stuff in the hentai-tentacle or let's-play-serial-killers (eg Kult) sense, if WoTC or others want to market this it should be clearly labelled as such with an age-appropriate label like the NC-17 movie rating. Probably WotC would be better not publishing such.

 

[S'mon]

That was a great article but I feel that it gave short shrift to escapism.

(snip)

Sure, I like dealing with sophisticated themes (like rape, torture, slavery etc) in my rpgs but mostly I like it to be a little simpler than real life.

(snip)

Hi - I think Rilstone gave due weight to the value of pure escapism, 'sometimes you just want to kill some orcs', but the main point was that you can combine flash-bang action with mature themes, for a richer roleplaying experience. A film like Conan the Barbarian does this, by showing the growth of the protagonist from child to manhood both physically & mentally, and expounding a right-wing Nietszchean philosophy that gives the movie more depth than most fantasy flicks, whether the philosophy appeals or not. Star Wars' use of Campbellian 'heroes' journey' themes does this too, to some extent (contrast with eg 'Buck Rogers' or 'Battlestar Galactica'). Babylon-5's use of plausible politics, credible human motivations and the idea that actions have consequences, is also a candidate. By contrast, modern Star Trek series IMO seems to deliberately shy away from anything that could be considered 'mature themes', in the sense of dealing with identifiable human motivations, politics etc, in contrast to a lot of old series Star Trek.

Edit: I'm not sure why rape, torture and slavery are inherently more sophistiticated themes than mass murder, grave-robbing, assassination, and many other D&D-standards. Any of them can be dealt with in a sophisticated way, eg dealing with their cultural and psychological ramifications, or not. Either approach seems fine to me.

In many D&D worlds these may all be accepted parts of the campaign background, or you may have a world where mass slaughter of the enemy and the theft of their wealth is regarded as acceptable behaviour ('Good'), but enslaving them or raping their women is not. Or killing & enslaving may be ok, rape not ok, and so on. In a world modelled on the actual middle ages, pre-battle assassination of the enemy leaders would be a definite no-no ('evil'), while torture of captives might be fine.

 

[bramadan]

Thanks Monte,
I still do not like BoVD much, but now I know were you wanted to go with it.
I guess what I was hopping for was something that would change tenor of DnD, towards something more like Martin's "Song of Ice and Fire" or Moorcock's "Von Beck".
I understand that was not the book you wanted to write but I think it remains one that much needs writing...

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

I also think it's fair to point out that while the above article is correct in thinking that certain genres have certain default levels of maturity, there is also a very real possibility of stretching any genre to break out of that default mode.

Alan Moore's Watchmen comes to mind as a perfect example of how this is achieved.

While it is true that that book deals with a variety of 'real' political issues, all of those issues serve primarily to provide a new and fascinating set of contexts and twists for the same old thing. As proof of this I ask anyone to read it in light of the cold war and tell me that the book has been made obsolete in any sense.

And I am certain that that sort of genre stretching is possible within the confines of DnD, even if it is the less certain route to travel for the mature.

I might make similar arguments for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Try watching that and Ang Lee's Sense and Sensibility on consecutive evenings for a real trip in the realm of maturity and genre.

Not too mention almost any Terry Gilliam movie.

Some of this may seem sort of redundant, but I'm seeing a lot of posts that talk about adding things to a genre to get maturity, when I'm fairly certain that there is a lot of maturity there in the first place.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

I was trying to think of a comic book that went beyond the simple superheroes bashing stuff style - Watchmen is the one. It's very good indeed, extremely well written and plotted. The fact that it's drawn rather than in the form of text should have no bearing on that.

 

[Belen]

Thanks for the clarification, Monte. It really helps to know what you consider the BoVD to mean. Wizards really did market it in a different way. After thinking about your comments, I realize that they manipulated the community in order to heighten sales. I guess they wanted their own version of the 80s witchhunt.

This type of thing offends me to no end. Before seeing your response, I had always wondered why you wrote a book that seemed so far out of touch with what we had been told to expect. To find out that your intentions had been different is a relief. And the book makes much more sense to me now.

However, I think it does show what WOTC considers "mature." Mr. Valterra may talk a lot about mature-themed supplements, but their actions surrounding the BoVD show that they are not capable to creating books that will live up to the name. Their definition of "mature" is flawed. They're like the dorks who start giggling when someone says, "boobies."

Of course, now that we know what WOTC marketing is doing, can we really trust the "fluff" talk surrounding 3.5.

 

[Psion]

Originally posted by Monte at home
WotC added some stuff about torture methods and equipment, but that was it.

Interesting. Does that include the material on execution equipment? Because I found most of the book's mechanics useful (especially the possession mechanics), but found the material on execution equipment much less useful and it did not dovetail neatly with the existing rules.

 

[S'mon]

I meant to post this in my own thread - got my threads mixed up reading BelenU's post twice, sorry.


quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by BelenUmeria

However, I think it does show what WOTC considers "mature." Mr. Valterra may talk a lot about mature-themed supplements, but their actions surrounding the BoVD show that they are not capable to creating books that will live up to the name. Their definition of "mature" is flawed. They're like the dorks who start giggling when someone says, "boobies."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


I fear this may be true. My impression (and best hope) though is that they're looking at publishing a 'mildly politically incorrect' line that emphasises the kind of stuff that was standard in sword & sorcery fiction and games before the late-80s. So things like nudity in artwork, more gore, darker settings, maybe a little moral ambiguity*, seem likely. These may be combined with a tone aimed more at adult readers. I think this would be a good development. Maybe they could hire SHARK to do the product development?

*Not that Conan worries about moral ambiguity when he slaughters the city law enforcement personnel in a typical REH romp.

 

[Ysgarran]

The group that I play with agrees with you but I think that you are missing part of the point of the article or I'm misunderstanding your point.

I don't understand how rape, torture or slavery would fall under the category of 'sophisticated' themes. Everyone agrees that these actions are evil and all good characters would oppose such actions. All of these things are very black and white; there is no moral ambiguity. There is no element of moral complexity in these issues.

I think that part of the problem is the overloading of the term 'mature'. (Something WOTC's advertising BovD did not
help or clarify).
Defination One:
Material suitable for older players.
Defination Two (Henry's defination):
Material that is defined by complexity of the moral and ethical issues it deals with.

I've been reading 'The Midnight' setting book and it definately has
some good possibilities for the second defination. There is a section in the book dealing with how to get the 'feel' of Midnight that I may repost sections of when I get back home tonight.


Ysgarran.

p.s.
Excellent thread by the way. A question that has been on my
mind ever since BovD came out.

That was a great article but I feel that it gave short shrift to escapism.

<SNIP>

Sure, I like dealing with sophisticated themes (like rape, torture, slavery etc) in my rpgs but mostly I like it to be a little simpler than real life.

My wife is a rape/DV counsellor and she puts it this way - "My life is depressing enough, why would I want my liesure time to be depressing too?"

 

[S'mon]

The group that I play with agrees with you but I think that you are missing part of the point of the article or I'm misunderstanding your point.

I don't understand how rape, torture or slavery would fall under the category of 'sophisticated' themes. Everyone agrees that these actions are evil and all good characters would oppose such actions.

(Edit: I see you weren't addressing me, but the original poster, and I think we're basically agreeing.)

Everyone in the modern western world perhaps* - not everyone in the game world, necessarily. The in-game society, like many real & historical societies, may regard slavery, torture or rape, as we would understand them, as perfectly ok in some circumstances.
But my point was, agreeing with you, that these are not necessarily any more sophisticated themes than eg warfare or assassination, which commonly occur in most D&D games. It's what you do with the theme that counts.

*I read an article 'Is Torture Ever Justified?' in The Economist recently.