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

[Micah Sweet]

then define them I ask for what is worthy in this object show me what matters I want you to say it.

that is not happening this is not the 90's or 00's it would get out and be used to farm clicks and of course a stock fall, hasbro would not let them.

So they can't do it because the world is awful now? I really wish I could refute that one.

 

[Mind of tempest]

So they can't do it because the world is awful now? I really wish I could refute that one.

a) you not answering my primery question.
b) the world was is and always will be horrible however the behaviour you asking for is unprofitable which is something wotc can't do and getting in hot water is bad for the brand.

 

[Micah Sweet]

a) you not answering my primery question.
b) the world was is and always will be horrible however the behaviour you asking for is unprofitable which is something wotc can't do and getting in hot water is bad for the brand.

Post-apocalyptic, broken environment, oppressive governments, mutated monsters, maybe psionics. A new setting could be created featuring those things while retaining the defense against the mob WotC so desperately needs. If they need to hire new creatives so their core design team can keep making their bland new edition, so be it.

 

[tetrasodium]

Other point, if the sorcerer-kings keeps the biotech, the life-shape craft... Shouldn't the industrial revolution started centuries ago? Then the most of the workers should have been replaced with machines. And almost all workers could work with special "exosuits".

And what about the evil genies, daos and efreeti? These would use slaves, and it is generic D&D.

It happened thousands of years ago, search for the word race or races in the darksun timeline. Halflings are very strongly implied to have created the other races while growing their empire. Going back to a utopia state that existed before those methods were used to create all the races was a big part of rhajaat's plan .

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Let's remember we may disagree about the criteria to be followed. For example I don't like the tropes showed about the Vatican church in the rpg "7th Sea". I can say those tropes are a true frivolity against the real victims of anti-Christian hate, not only in Spain for the age of convents burning, but also suffering intolerance and persecution in different places from the world, even in the last years, reaching levels of genocide.

We could need some limits (to stop the hate-speech and those things), and more when the company wishes it to be a family-friendly brand, but if we allow an imposition of certain criteria without a previous debate as civilized people, then others could arrive and reclaim their own criteria to be obeyed.

* Could any people be evacuated into other zones of the Athaspace for the cleasing war, or the Brown Tide? Or to the Astral Domains of deities or primal spirits.

* What if the giths discovered the biotech/lifeshape craft, and by means of reverse ingeneering they found the way to cause a "digievolution" of the spinewyrms toward "true dragons"?

* Not only Athasian people have got darker skin because it is a sunny weather, but also there are people with blue or green skin because they are mutants. We shouldn't worry if now the character of the Pentad Prism were "race-swapped".

Please, I don't want that type of nonense like "if you aren't from French-speaker country then you can watch movies about French-speaker characters". Please, the good stories have to be universal. Fiction set in other cultures should help to build bridges and understand other people, and this would be useful against the bigotry and those things. Japan has got more prestige thanks manganime industry in the Western market has helped to know them better.

---

This picture is a scene of slavery in a 80's children cartoon, the pilot episode (Ep1 S1), "Cobra Strikes" of G.I.Joe.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Additionally I might add that part of my point from earlier was that we can't lay all of the ownership of the discomfort at the feet of PoC. Part of that discomfort is mine and my feelings of playing the subjugator against a black player. even if they give the ok it still would feel icky doing it. I don't think I would be alone in that.

Getting you on-side isn't a golden ticket to slavetown though.

 

[Lanefan]

that is not happening this is not the 90's or 00's it would get out and be used to farm clicks and of course a stock fall, hasbro would not let them.

Well, when you get right down to it WotC really only has three options for Dark Sun, Birthright, and their other old IP:

--- update (maybe) and republish or reissue, retaining control over the IP; or
--- release the IP to the commons so others can mine it as they will; or
--- retain control of the IP but do nothing with it; in other words, bury it.

The last option seems to be what some here are advocating. And yet, burying IP is in general one of the most evil things a corporation can do, an opinion that extends far beyond the limited realm of RPGs. Let's not encourage them.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, when you get right down to it WotC really only has three options for Dark Sun, Birthright, and their other old IP:

--- update (maybe) and republish or reissue, retaining control over the IP; or
--- release the IP to the commons so others can mine it as they will; or
--- retain control of the IP but do nothing with it; in other words, bury it.

The last option seems to be what some here are advocating. And yet, burying IP is in general one of the most evil things a corporation can do, an opinion that extends far beyond the limited realm of RPGs. Let's not encourage them.

Absolutely. Option 2 all the way.

 

[pemerton]

Well, when you get right down to it WotC really only has three options for Dark Sun, Birthright, and their other old IP:

--- update (maybe) and republish or reissue, retaining control over the IP; or
--- release the IP to the commons so others can mine it as they will; or
--- retain control of the IP but do nothing with it; in other words, bury it.

The last option seems to be what some here are advocating. And yet, burying IP is in general one of the most evil things a corporation can do, an opinion that extends far beyond the limited realm of RPGs. Let's not encourage them.

WotC have done the first with Dark Sun. And with Birthright: Birthright Campaign Setting (2e) - Wizards of the Coast | AD&D 2nd Ed. | Birthright | AD&D 2nd Ed. | DriveThruRPG.com. So what are you complaining about?

 

[crazy_cat]

snip And yet, burying IP is in general one of the most evil things a corporation can do, an opinion that extends far beyond the limited realm of RPGs. Let's not encourage them.

Really? Evil?
Surely it's more annoying and or inconvenient for those that want to access the IP (which somebody else owns)?
But evil. are you sure?

 

[Lanefan]

Really? Evil?
Surely it's more annoying and or inconvenient for those that want to access the IP (which somebody else owns)?
But evil. are you sure?

Given the number of times throughout history where innovation and invention has been held back or suppressed by unwilling-to-change corporations buying the IP and-or patents and then burying the product, yes.

 

[pemerton]

Given the number of times throughout history where innovation and invention has been held back or suppressed by unwilling-to-change corporations buying the IP and-or patents and then burying the product, yes.

So just to be clear - by not publishing a revised version of a 30 year old work of fiction, and by not licensing the trademark and copyrights to other publishers, WotC is stifling innovation and invention?

That seems a far-fetched claim to me.

 

[Lanefan]

So just to be clear - by not publishing a revised version of a 30 year old work of fiction, and by not licensing the trademark and copyrights to other publishers, WotC is stifling innovation and invention?

Dircetly, no.

Indirectly, by sitting on it and not releasing it to the commons, yes.

 

[pemerton]

Dircetly, no.

Indirectly, by sitting on it and not releasing it to the commons, yes.

The work is on sale.

Why would WotC, of all the media companies in the world, be the one to release its trademarks and copyrights to the commons? When did this become the standard for judging a media corporation?

 

[Bacon Bits]

Given the number of times throughout history where innovation and invention has been held back or suppressed by unwilling-to-change corporations buying the IP and-or patents and then burying the product, yes.

What?

WotC just said Dark Sun isn't going to get an update because it has recognized that the culture has changed. They're saying it's too difficult to make it work under the guidelines they just changed to. It's literally an example of a corporation changing.

 

[Vaalingrade]

"Unwilling to change' by not making it available to people to reprint the same old thing over again.

If they were really unwilling to change, we would have had the Slaveholder's Guide to Darksun in 2016.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The work is on sale.

Why would WotC, of all the media companies in the world, be the one to release its trademarks and copyrights to the commons? When did this become the standard for judging a media corporation?

They could release their settings on the DMsGuild and make some money off them.

 

[pemerton]

They could release their settings on the DMsGuild and make some money off them.

Have WotC released Transformers on DMsGuild? Not as far as I know. I assume that there is a commercial logic to what is licensed via DMsGuild, connected to cross-promotion of particular WotC products.

I don't really see how Dark Sun is in a special category in this respect.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Have WotC released Transformers on DMsGuild? Not as far as I know. I assume that there is a commercial logic to what is licensed via DMsGuild, connected to cross-promotion of particular WotC products.

I don't really see how Dark Sun is in a special category in this respect.

Dark Sun has a lot more in common with other D&D settings like Ravenloft and Spelljammer that have been released on DMsGuild as opposed to non-D&D settings like Transformers and G.I.Joe that haven't.

 

[Zardnaar]

One could argue that the problem is with me, or with the player, but I think that would be ignoring some of the cultural complexities that we live with. D&D is not played in a platonic world of forms. It is played in the real world with real people.

If a black person asked to play in my Dark Sun game with the usual Freedom entry point and we discussed it and everyone gave the okay, then maybe, but it would still be really uncomfortable for me. I would be thinking "Are we SERIOUSLY doing this?" the whole time. This setting was not written with a diverse player base in mind.

Big Darksun fan here with most of the product line on PDF.

The Darksun adventures pretty much are utter trash. All of them.

They're tied to the events of the Prism Pentad and/or heavily railroaded, metaplot heavy or are more grand tours of Athas.

Remember the post 1985 AD&D adventures are not well regarded for a reason.

It was a thing at TSR for a while. Good 2E adventures are few and far between.