D&D 5E Don't play "stupid" characters. It is ableist.

[Crimson Longinus]

Players or characters?

Characters. I think for players it would be slightly higher.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Characters. I think for players it would be slightly higher.

Are you sure?

In my experience, most players are put on this earth to remind us that not everything has a purpose.

 

[Ragmon]

And, thirty plus pages later, we're still stuck on missing the point.

See, there's no issue playing a low intelligence character. That's never been the problem. Playing a low intelligence character as a caricature of real world mental issues, IS the problem.

So, no, "playing a character as very dumb" isn't ableist, any more than any or your other examples are problematic. If the player is being respectful, not passing it off as comedy or mocking, then there's no problem. Heck, you last line there, " Let players play their characters as they see fit, as long as noone is insulted at the table" is pretty much on point. I'd take it a step further and say as long as no one is being insulting, full stop. But, that's quibbling over verbiage and I do agree with the basic point.

Which, as it always has been, comes down to Wheaton's Law - don't be a dick. Wasting everyone's time on hypotheticals and whatabouts is pointless arguing for the sake of arguing. It resolves nothing and simply obfuscates the actual issue here.

But, hey, 30+ pages on and people are STILL making the same arguments they were making on page 3.

Its EnWorld, its Nerds debating/arguing about imaginary things. This is pretty normal.

 

[Seramus]

I would say that most tables I have played at that have been heavy into "role playing" to tend to incorporate the physical abilities into the character conception, and that we have the same divide. In other words, people who aren't taking the physical abilities into account for RPing say, "Look, we don't do this for the physical abilities, so why should we for the mental ones!" While the people who do it for the mental ones say, "Look, we do it for the physical abilities, so of course we do it for the mental ones!"

Two ships passing in the night.

There is a dark and terrible place nobody speaks about. When a player tries to portray a character with higher intelligence or charisma... and can't. By a large margin.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

There is a dark and terrible place nobody speaks about. When a player tries to portray a character with higher intelligence or charisma... and can't. By a large margin.

There is a simple and easy solution for this.

Just tell them to try as hard as they can to play like Snarf.

They will never live up to it ... but it's good to have goals, right?

 

[jgsugden]

And, thirty plus pages later, we're still stuck on missing the point.

See, there's no issue playing a low intelligence character. That's never been the problem. Playing a low intelligence character as a caricature of real world mental issues, IS the problem.

So, no, "playing a character as very dumb" isn't ableist, any more than any or your other examples are problematic. If the player is being respectful, not passing it off as comedy or mocking, then there's no problem. ....

This does not handle the entire controversy.

Consider: Today, it is considered unacceptable for an actor that can hear to play the part of a character that can't hear. It doesn't matter if the actor that can hear is being respectful or not, it is considered inappropriate, across the board, by the advocacy groups for the disabled and increasingly by Hollywood studios.

Some of the reasons why this is not acceptable do not relate, strongly, to the RPG discussion. For example, playing a character without the ability to hear would not deny someone that can't hear a paying job (although if they were a Critical Role cast member...) However, when you 'play at' having a disability that you have never experienced, there are many people that consider it to be demeaning to those that actually do have experience with the disability. Regardless of your respect, your consideration, or your attempts at authenticity, there are those out there with the disability, and their allies, that are offended by the attempt.

This is not a simple situation, and there is no universal agreement on what is appropriate. If you Google the term "cripface" you can find a lot of discussion on many, many, many different elements of the controversy as it relates to acting, and can see that some of those elements do apply to RPGs.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

This does not handle the entire controversy.

Consider: Today, it is considered unacceptable for an actor that can hear to play the part of a character that can't hear. It doesn't matter if the actor that can hear is being respectful or not, it is considered inappropriate, across the board, by the advocacy groups for the disabled and increasingly by Hollywood studios.

Some of the reasons why this is not acceptable do not relate, strongly, to the RPG discussion. For example, playing a character without the ability to hear would not deny someone that can't hear a paying job (although if they were a Critical Role cast member...) However, when you 'play at' having a disability that you have never experienced, there are many people that consider it to be demeaning to those that actually do have experience with the disability. Regardless of your respect, your consideration, or your attempts at authenticity, there are those out there with the disability, and their allies, that are offended by the attempt.

This is not a simple situation, and there is no universal agreement on what is appropriate. If you Google the term "cripface" you can find a lot of discussion on many, many, many different elements of the controversy as it relates to acting, and can see that some of those elements do apply to RPGs.

I bolded the part that is important. I have a post in the works that I may (or may not) put up regarding this issue.

But briefly-

1. The overlap between paid commercial acting gigs and what is usually private TTRPGs is, at best, inexact.

2. It is certainly true that people learn empathy by attempting to "act" as others; in addition, it is also true that TTRPGs (and other methods of roleplaying) have long been considered safer areas for people to experiment with behaviors and traits (I'm thinking of those that are of interest to the queer community) without necessarily "outing" themselves, especially when this was a much larger concern or there are safety issues or players are younger.

3. It is also true that defined traits for roleplaying is one reason that it can often be effective and helpful for many people that are neurodivergent.

4. Finally, very few people start out being good at something- I think it's important for people that are learning to roleplay to be supported positively with constructive criticism, and not shouted down with derogatory epithets (such as enabling ableism, or racism, or what have you). It can be exceptionally difficult to "put yourself out there." Concentrate on the intent, and the ways to make portrayals better-not on shaming people.

IMO.

 

[Charlaquin]

Really? Note that there is a difference between not many, than none at all.

Strength-
1. Has an effect on "to hit" and "damage" (when you don't use a finesse weapon)- sure, you can avoid it with dex, but PAM/GWM and big ol' weapons is an advantage for some.
2. Carrying capacity. I know, some people don't care about encumbrance ... but a lot do. That's a mechanical effect.
3. Grappling.
4. Heavy armor.
5. Jumping distances.

Etc. Look, I'm not here to really debate this- but ... just no. I can't agree with what you're trying to sell.

Yeah, sure, but intelligence also contributes to quite a few checks and some saves. When you hilight the mechanical effects of strength and brush over the mechanical effects of intelligence, it looks like a double-standard.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Yeah, sure, but intelligence also contributes to quite a few checks and some saves. When you hilight the mechanical effects of strength and brush over the mechanical effects of intelligence, it looks like a double-standard.

Why do I bother? I literally went through the other four abilities, explicitly refgerencing the saves for wisdom so everyone would know I was discussing two abilities that did not have those same number of saves. And then ...

That leaves only two dump stats for most players- intelligence and strength. As strength has real mechanical effects, and, for the most part, intelligence doesn't, it becomes an easy choice. In other words, unless you're a wizard, wizard-adjacent (like EK or AT), or a very niche case (Mastermind Rogue, for example), intelligence is always going to be the dump stat. (emphasis in original)

That's it. Sure, if this is the hill you need to die on, knock yourself out. You win! Of the two useless dump stats, you have conclusively proven with this statement that strength is slightly more mediocre than intelligence, as opposed to what I wrote.

Okay. I'm a double-standarder. I would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for Charlaquin and those meddling kids! Good?

 

[Charlaquin]

Why do I bother? I literally went through the other four abilities, explicitly refgerencing the saves for wisdom so everyone would know I was discussing two abilities that did not have those same number of saves. And then ...

That leaves only two dump stats for most players- intelligence and strength. As strength has real mechanical effects, and, for the most part, intelligence doesn't, it becomes an easy choice. In other words, unless you're a wizard, wizard-adjacent (like EK or AT), or a very niche case (Mastermind Rogue, for example), intelligence is always going to be the dump stat. (emphasis in original)

That's it. Sure, if this is the hill you need to die on, knock yourself out. You win! Of the two useless dump stats, you have conclusively proven with this statement that strength is slightly more mediocre than intelligence, as opposed to what I wrote.

Okay. I'm a double-standarder. I would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for Charlaquin and those meddling kids! Good?

I’m not saying strength is more mediocre than intelligence, I’m saying both abilities have mechanical uses that dumping them impacts, but in the case of strength, those mechanical effects are generally treated as sufficient to represent the low stat, while in the case of intelligence, a lot of DMs insist that players who dump it also meet some arbitrary standard of “roleplaying their intelligence” in addition to its mechanical effects.