OK @Parmandur these are fighting words! BECMI and Deities & Demigods are the best of D&D! Even putting them in the same sentence as a "mistake" is a horrendous miscarriage of justice! This take has seriously tainted my opinion of you past and present!
I see this a lot. What I don't understand is that D&D has always had art that didn't match the medieval theme and had shiny happy people. Also, their is still art that is dark, grim, and medieval in 5e & 5e24 art. So my question to you: how much of one or the other is to much for you?
For me, modern (WoTC) D&D doesn't have someone like Jim Holloway. His art kept it real. Not heroic. Regular looking people, with at least one of them in quite the pickle. Modern D&D art is all heroic. Which is fine, but I miss the Jim Holloways of the world.
Yes. Bards and druids both got moved to simple weapons only, unless you pick a feature or subclass that gives you all martial weapons. Druid lost scimitar (which was goofy but iconic) but bards lost a lot of one handed weapons like longsword, rapiers and whips which fit the bard look so well. 2024 bards now are stuck with daggers and maces as weapons.
I guess I disagree with that statement, it is not all heroic. Is it mostly heroic, probably, but I wouldn't say all of it.
Wait, how are scimitars iconic for druids? I have never in my life pictured a druid with a scimitar. I am trying right now and I can't do it!
I'm sure it's probably not, but I can't think of any that aren't. Certainly nothing like this:
Glares at you in Tramp, Willingham, Roslof, and Otis.
i believe i read somewhere it's from a bit of a lore interpretation weirdness originating from earlier editions, how the IRL druidic traditions they were based off of there was significance in harvesting mistletoe using golden sickles, i believe sickles didn't exist in some earlier editions and so they were given scimitar proficiency for that purpose instead and it just kind of stuck.
Yea, I think we’re just diametrically opposed on this. My first RPG book was the 2e PHB; when I read the 1e PHB a few years later I found the black-and-white sketches actively offputting.
