D&D 5E Dark Sun, problematic content, and 5E…

[Micah Sweet]

Semantics

Absolutely not. WotC is one publisher of 5e, not the whole game. The OP's question didn't even mention WotC, even if the impetus for asking it relates to Dark Sun.

 

[TheSword]

Absolutely not. WotC is one publisher of 5e, not the whole game. The OP's question didn't even mention WotC, even if the impetus for asking it relates to Dark Sun.

That’s the context of the question the OP did mention Dark Sun and Kyle Brink. I made it clear that other publishers with nothing to lose can do it. WotC can’t. It’s not a simple question of yea or nay.

 

[Yaarel]

I am unfamiliar with the Magic the Gathering "Phyrexians".

But the impression is, the importation of this species into D&D is about to repeat all of the historical D&D "problematic" content all over again, and worse.

 

[CleverNickName]

The best way to "fight" problematic content is to not publish it.
(I voted no.)

 

[MGibster]

I mentioned Delta Green before as something that deals with a lot of real-world issues and can get very... well, there can be some very needed content warnings. But it also goes over that stuff and tries to deal with it in a way where it's the focus, which makes every op sort of a setting unto itself. D&D doesn't really play like that, and it really can't go into deep depth on the institutions of its worlds typically because there's a decent chance that the players won't interact with all of them. It feels like a problem with the concept of the game, not just the broadness of the audience.

Delta Green is also a straight up horror game which I think changes some of our expectations when compared to a heroic fantasy game. That said, one of the neat things about role playing games is, well, taking on a role of a person who has different beliefs, lives in a different world, and does different things than what we do in every day life. On the flip side, I think one of the reasons D&D is so successful is it doesn't require a lot of stretching to get into the heads of our characters as they tend ot hold the same western liberal values we hold.

 

[Faolyn]

And yet we have Ravenloft Where evil is permeating every pore of reality and everyone seems to be ok with it.

Supernatural evil, not real-world evil. Even those domains that are based around real-world horrors (such as pre-5e Falkovnia) are there only because of supernatural evil.

 

[Scribe]

I am unfamiliar with the Magic the Gathering "Phyrexians".

But the impression is, the importation of this species into D&D is about to repeat all of the historical D&D "problematic" content all over again, and worse.

If Wizards has literally any sense or taste, they wont put Phyrexians into D&D.

 

[Faolyn]

PC: "Oh Slaves exist? I want to buy one.
DM: side eye "Sigh. You are unable to find anyone who wants to sale you one."

Sure. And that direction would be published in the actual rules? It wouldn't lead to arguments at the table?

In my decades of play and DMing I have never had another player want to own a slave and 100% of the time fight to free them. Heck most PCs would rathe throw gold at a hireling and put that paid employee into serious danger.

As I said before (or possibly in another one of these Dark Sun threads), a quick google ("dark sun slavery legal") had the very first result being a post on reddit about a party who bought a slave, and the DM wondering if the slave should come to love the PC owner as a brother. That post was from last year.

Your experiences are, sadly, not universal. There are plenty of people who would have no problem with slavery in their game.

 

[Minigiant]

forgotten realms has slave traders, Exandria has slave traders, Greyhawk has slave traders, Al Qadim has slave traders, I think every dnd setting i've ever seen has slave traders. I've never seen anything in any of those that make me think the authors were supporting slave trading. It's just part of human history. Happened on every continent and every race has had bad actors who participated in it. Makes for great enemies your players will hate.

Those settings don't put slave traders in every city. Except the one that is ten seconds to midnight because the Demigod was killed.

 

[gorice]

Interesting thread. I've got a few disordered thoughts about this.

1. I think we can take it as given that WotC will not touch this with a 10 foot pole. I also don't think that we should be looking to WotC to provide... Well, anything, honestly.
2. Whether and how things like slavery should be included in play, and their inclusion in game publications, are two different questions, as others have made clear.
3. Slavery in particular is a troublesome issue due to the American context. On the one hand, this is another frustrating expression of American cultural imperialism; on the other, there are good reasons (given by @Imaro ) to leave it out, or at least tread carefully.
4. For me, what is most offensive is the whole idea that evil only originates in villains, and that no-one should play characters living in a society that does evil things. We live in a world in which we depend upon, and are complicit in, ecological destruction and economic exploitation, up to and including slavery. The strength of a setting like Dark Sun (with or without slavery) is that it puts these issues front and centre and asks the players 'how will your character deal with this, given the danger of resisting and the difficulty of mere survival?'.
5. Speaking of which, your're not being moral if you're doing it for a reward. D&D is still premised on a worldview in which adventurers can and should murder 'legitimate' targets, and be rewarded for it by the powers that be. A depiction of a violent and hierarchical society that is nonetheless somehow idyllic if not for external enemies who are inherently evil and must be murdered is actually 'problematic', in the way that we used to use the word.