fusangite said:
How is this the case? Would Batman be appropriate for D&D if he had a sword?
Batman already exists in D&D. He's a fighter/rogue/couple level of monks character with the serial numbers filed off. And his pseudo-noir feel would fit perfectly in Eberron, especially in a Sharn-based game.
Besides, almost none of the magic items listed in the DMG are even useable by monks, another indicator of how out of place they are.
Just by flipping open the DMG, I see that the first 14 wondrous items are all usable by monks, and the 15th isn't only because it's a wizard exclusive item. The majority of weapon enhancements are likewise available to monks. Sure, he can't use wands or staves, but then, a good chunk of the other classes can't either.
Djinni et al are a great example of what I am talking about. D&D largely taps into crusades-era Europe, when cultural exchange with Islam was at its heaviest and most extreme. Thus, there is penetration of Persian and Arabian myth into Europe in this period, forming, for instance, our present-day ideas about faeries. By the same token, there was no equivalent penetration of Indian or Chinese mythology into European culture and again, D&D reflects this.
D&D largely taps into eras and cultures from all over, not crusader-era Europe. The barbarian is a Conan riff, the druid has nothing in common with druids save the name, and the rogue is as much James Bond as it is anything else.
D&D defaults to polytheism, it has post renaissance era weaponry, it has a spell list almost completely divorced from myth, and an "adventuring" class of citizens melded with a mercantile, metropolitan spirit that recalls modern conceits.
Is there crusades-era influence? Sure. Is it the primary influence? Not in my core books.
Of course not everything in D&D is derived from the mythological beliefs of Europeans and Middle Easterners people in the 13th century. But, of the monsters drawn from mythology, the vast vast majority are. In the Monster Manual, for instance, there is the Naga (India) and the Ogra Mage (Japan); aside from that, there are, as far as I can tell, no other references to mythology east of Persia.
The couatl and rakshasa are also monsters from outside the boundaries of European influence. And the gold dragon is kin to the eastern dragons, right down to the structure of its sinewy body and leonine face - its stylized look can be seen on banners and signs on just about any chinese restaraunt you see.
And in addition to the fact that the "European" monsters in Monster Manual 1 are equaled in number by purely D&D beasts, they're often so divorced from their historical counterparts as to be similar in name only. And when they aren't reimagined, they're inspired by far-ranging eras. The Monster Manual fey, for example, are almost pure little-people Victorian, but they exist side by side with the hydra and the minotaur - and it's doubtful you'd find many Victorians, even the ones who believed in fairies, who would have copped to thinking the hydra was real.
Now don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that D&D shouldn't have south and east asian classes and creatures in it. What I am saying is that with so little other Asian stuff, the Monk does not belong in the core rules. He belongs in a rules set that properly supports the class, with other Asian classes, an Asian physics and Asian monsters. But right now, the monk sticks out like a sore thumb and undermines what faint suspension of disbelief we manage to hold onto.
And what I'm saying is that I have a hard time reconciling the idea that the monk hurts mythic versimilitude in ways that Conan, Porthos, Richard the Lionhearted, James Bond, and Dr. Strange teleporting to a trap-filled dungeon to steal gold from a 10-eyed soccer ball does not.
