D&D (2024) Comeliness and Representation in Recent DnD Art

michaeljpastor

Adventurer
This is a massive misrepresentation of my words. I said that calling something like that described above "just a robot" is gross. That if you don't have a soul in a world where souls exist you're a lesser being, you're "just a robot." That idea is gross.
Then I mistook the "one who thinks that" for "I think that." For that I apologize. BUT it is a natural attitude to exist in a milieu where souls are everywhere and seem to be key in differentiating between self-awareness, or it wouldn't have been addressed with Constructs. It's great for building in conflict in a story.

And coincidentally, the Blade Runner animated prequel shorts were just released on YouTube and eight minutes in, one Replicant asks another "If we die, do we go to heaven?" and the other responds with "no Heaven or Hell for us. This world is all we've got."

And that's something I like to see, but not in an artificially created life form, but in a naturally evolved one.
 

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BUT it is a natural attitude to exist in a milieu where souls are everywhere and seem to be key in differentiating between self-awareness, or it wouldn't have been addressed with Constructs. It's great for building in conflict in a story.
If there are soulless self-aware beings, then souls are clearly not key in differentiating self-awareness. And in such a case, the attitude that they are "just robots" is gross, which was my point.
 

michaeljpastor

Adventurer
If there are soulless self-aware beings, then souls are clearly not key in differentiating self-awareness. And in such a case, the attitude that they are "just robots" is gross, which was my point.
yes, i acknowledged that. and i think having that attitude in the universe towards a soulless species is a good plot-hook, like the prejudices against mutants in comics.
 

LesserThan

Explorer
Looks like you're wrong about this one too.
From Keith's blog:

"A Warforged can be healed, and they can even be poisoned, though it’s not easy. Warforged have feelings, and while this is something that’s debated in Eberron itself, the fact is that they have souls; the real mystery is where those souls come from."

Link here
No, I am not wrong. Baker changed his mind in 2019. 15 years AFTER writing Races of Eberron (2004), which stated the GM should decide, and 2 factions freed the warforged NOT because they have souls, but because they could think.

Got a lot of people staying at Holiday Inn that like to call people wrong because they did a Google search and only get a little bit of info, like the one previously claiming WotC never owned TSR.

Baker changed his mind, fair. Now we know what he thinks, but to those who only buy the books, a blog from Gygax, Baker, Arneson, Tweet, Mearls, etc is useless because it should have been in the books to begin with. Making excuses for a poorly written book, just means a bad designer.

Sorry, I can not tell what page number in Races of Eberron says the GM should decide, but its near the front of the book, where Baker intentionally, upon release, left it ambiguos.
 
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Alzrius

The EN World kitten
Sorry, I can not tell what page number in Races of Eberron says the GM should decide, but its near the front of the book, where Baker intentionally, upon release, left it ambiguos.
It's mentioned in a sidebar on page 8, and then dealt with more directly in another sidebar on page 16.
 


Voadam

Legend
Sorry, I can not tell what page number in Races of Eberron says the GM should decide, but its near the front of the book, where Baker intentionally, upon release, left it ambiguos.

It is left undecided as an in world question, but it is not addressed from a rules perspective though. My reading of the warforged and living construct descriptions and the 3.5 RAW on souls and resurrection means they have souls.

It was left specifically ambiguous with people in world arguing both ways on whether they have no souls.

Races of Eberron page 16:

THE QUESTION OF SOULS
The Treaty of Thronehold gave warforged their freedom, but only after great debate. House Cannith and Thrane argued ardently that warforged were not living creatures because they do not possess souls. Their evidence for this was that warforged cannot become undead by any known method, not even ghosts or shadows. They are immune to energy drain, and no one knows of a warforged soul in Dolurrh, the Realm of the Dead. Breland argued that because warforged can be raised and resurrected, they must have souls. Of course, House Cannith and Thrane countered that no warforged brought back from death told tales of any kind of afterlife.
In the end, the Question of Souls, as that portion of the negotiations came to be known, was left unanswered. Warforged were freed because they could exhibit thought and free will. Today many people continue to think of warforged as creatures without souls, and citizens of Thrane often refer to warforged as “the soulless.”

Since they are specifically subject to raise dead and 3.5 raise dead requires the subject's soul to be "free and willing to return" for raising to work and 3.5 has rules specifically about how bringing things back from the dead involves bringing their soul back my interpretation is that RAW warforged have souls but in world many in Eberron feel they do not.

3.5 PH page 171 "When a living creature dies, its soul departs its body, leaves the Material Plane, travels through the Astral Plane, and goes to abide on the plane where the creature’s deity resides. If the creature did not worship a deity, its soul departs to the plane corresponding to its alignment. Bringing someone back from the dead means retrieving his or her soul and returning it to his or her body."

In the 3.5 Eberron Campaign Setting book where they were introduced they have sentience and free will and the living construct type. While immune to energy drain they are subject to "ability damage, ability drain, and death effects or necromancy effects" unlike normal constructs. They can also be raised and resurrected.
 


LesserThan

Explorer
Anti-inclusive content
Nah, it also serves the purpose of helping keep things in perspective. At the end of the day, it’s a leisure activity, and all these arguments we have about it are really not that important.
Imagine all these as quotes, and tell me why any should evey be used.

Its just elfgames.
Its just blacks.
Its just gays.
Its just cripples.

From top to bottom they dismiss as a group/label.
fantasy games
a race
LGBT
disabled

It is no different from SQW and SJW, status quo/social justice warrior.

Labels used to be dismissive and demeaing to others. Standard playground bully tactics to name call.
 


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