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

[Vaalingrade]

Also, there are a lot of people who would simply disagree with your first statement that "Violence, war and theft can be justified."

Ironic, considering stamping out the sludge of slavery justified all three.

 

[CleverNickName]

@Raiztt, are you suggesting there is a such thing as a "valid criticism" in defense of slavery?

I don't think you are, but wanted to ask to be sure.

 

[ReshiIRE]

Also, there are a lot of people who would simply disagree with your first statement that "Violence, war and theft can be justified."

Yes.

And they would literally be completely wrong, by any measure of evidence, history or empathy. I can go to extreme scenarios and win the argument simply by those examples.

Anyone would be familiar with the scenarios I come up with.

A defensive war against an aggressor can be easily justified completely.

Stealing bits of food can be justified when you have absolutely no resources and no recourse to other avenues (or difficulty reaching those avenues) , especially in a scenario where you wouldn't even be depriving an individual shopkeeper - just a massive multinational.

Violence against someone attacking you and planning to severely hurt you can be justified. To a point, violence against someone bullying you can be very easily justified.

Whether those justifications are moral to everyone or always valid are beyond the point. There are very simple, easy examples I can provide to each of the above, using events from history, common sense and empathy to understand.

That cannot at all be done with slavery. Never. Not at all. Not one example of slavery throughout history is ever justifiable. It's always evil. It's always something someone wants to do. It's never forced, never as a reaction, never a matter of necessity. There was always an alternative.

I am careful with the words always and never. I try my best to use them when I believe they are appropriate, to highlight the significance. Absolutes can be quite dangerous.

This is once case where I know I am right about this.

 

[Maxperson]

You ever read GURPS Technomancer? It has a fun look into what sort of spells would or would not be legal in a modern setting. A lot of divination spells were also illegal when used to spy on people.

I never have, but that makes a lot of sense. Fire spells are another no no. Lightning bolts, etc.

 

[Faolyn]

You should be careful with words like "always" and "never" because I am fairly confident that I can concoct at least one hypothetical situation which would violate that statement.

Also, there are a lot of people who would simply disagree with your first statement that "Violence, war and theft can be justified."

I guess what I am saying is that you are massively begging the question in a way that I think just ignores/dismisses other people's valid criticisms.

You can think of a way where slavery would be justifiable? Do tell.

 

[Faolyn]

I never have, but that makes a lot of sense. Fire spells are another no no. Lightning bolts, etc.

In Technomancer, a lot of those spells are treated in the way that weapons are the real world--legal, but if used in the commission of a crime, can bring extra penalties. Some are outright illegal or require licenses or even security clearances to learn.

The setting's premise is that when they exploded the atom bomb at Trinity and Oppenheimer said "I have become death, destroyer of worlds," he unknowingly completed a ritual that ripped open reality and brought magic into the world (and caused women to give birth to anthros, created various monsters, etc.). A second test by the Soviets, in Antarctica, caused an even bigger, wilder rift, and absolutely nobody wants to see what a third bomb would do. It's a cool setting, but sadly it hasn't really been touched since it came out in the 90s and could do with a huge update.

 

[Faolyn]

That cannot at all be done with slavery. Never. Not at all. Not one example of slavery throughout history is ever justifiable. It's always evil. It's always something someone wants to do. It's never forced, never as a reaction, never a matter of necessity. There was always an alternative.

Exactly. The alternatives may not have been as easy to accomplish, but they were there. In Dark Sun, where slaves are as likely to be used as a form of entertainment or in a mul breeding farm (and, presumably, as sex slaves in general) as they are to be labor, there's no justification.

(I keep bring up the mul breeding farms because people here seem to forget that--they talk about labor and gladiators but they forget that Dark Sun canonically had sex slaves and that's even less justifiable.)

 

[Staffan]

In Technomancer, a lot of those spells are treated in the way that weapons are the real world--legal, but if used in the commission of a crime, can bring extra penalties. Some are outright illegal or require licenses or even security clearances to learn.

The setting's premise is that when they exploded the atom bomb at Trinity and Oppenheimer said "I have become death, destroyer of worlds," he unknowingly completed a ritual that ripped open reality and brought magic into the world (and caused women to give birth to anthros, created various monsters, etc.). A second test by the Soviets, in Antarctica, caused an even bigger, wilder rift, and absolutely nobody wants to see what a third bomb would do. It's a cool setting, but sadly it hasn't really been touched since it came out in the 90s and could do with a huge update.

GURPS Technomancer is a really cool idea, in that it asks the question "What if magic was real and really worked in this particular fashion?" So you get things like rocketry being way behind where it is in the real world (because (a) there's no desire to use missiles to deliver nukes and (b) if you want to put things in orbit, you can teleport them there), and flying kevlar carpets being used for spec ops insertions. In a way, it reminds me of Eberron which took a similar approach.

The main problem is, well, it's GURPS...

 

[Faolyn]

GURPS Technomancer is a really cool idea, in that it asks the question "What if magic was real and really worked in this particular fashion?" So you get things like rocketry being way behind where it is in the real world (because (a) there's no desire to use missiles to deliver nukes and (b) if you want to put things in orbit, you can teleport them there), and flying kevlar carpets being used for spec ops insertions. In a way, it reminds me of Eberron which took a similar approach.

The main problem is, well, it's GURPS...

Heh, yeah. I liked GURPS for a long time (I've played both 3e and 4e, and run 4e) but I can't handle that level of complexity anymore. It got to the point where I needed the character generator program to be able to make even minor NPCs, and even with that, there were too many options and maneuvers and weird things like that. I was always terrible at combat because there were so many little maneuvers or whatever they were called that were basically required if you wanted to both be able to hit and inflict some damage.

If I were to ever run Technomancer, I'd run it in SWADE. Still very customizable but with far fewer moving parts.

 

[Mecheon]

They churned out what they thought was cool, and that people would buy. They weren't hamstrung by social media. It was a better time for creativity. Most of the things I love about D&D originated in the 2e era.

When you get to its heart, social media is just, feedback. And that's sort of one of TSR's problems in this era, they didn't really listen to feedback and, well, we know how that all went. Blaming it all to 'social media' when we're having this exact discussion on social media itself is a wide net. Its moreso 'hamstrung by widespread feedback', because in this day and age everyone has a voice to go "Yo, this is a problem" or "This doesn't sit well" or "Why on earth is THAC0 like this, just use regular numbers"

and look I'm gonna argue against that 'better time for creativity' because I will dump on maztica because like, the least creative way to do a South American setting