D&D General Drow & Orcs Removed from the Monster Manual

[Remathilis]

Yes, language changes (or is very resistant to it), but pushing against 18 centuries of accepted usage - and its enshrinement in Christian scripture - is no small undertaking. There are lots of words I'd like to change which have been misappropriated or misrepresented: I'd prefer that shaman refer to an ecstatic in the Tungus-Evenk complex, but it simply doesn't anymore; hence my usage has changed accordingly.

And some words become collateral damage due to no fault of their own. Their is an old Anglo-Saxon word for miserly or stingy person that has nothing to do with the color black, but I would not suggest trying to use niggardly in any context today. The word is just too close to the infamous slur that no amount of reclaiming is going to save it. Sometimes you cut your losses and lose a word to history.

 

[Voadam]

The 2e Ravenloft Van Richten's Guide to the Lich description of phylacteries has them as usually box-shaped amulets with arcane symbols inscribed on them, then says they can actually be anything valuable with an interior for the symbols to be inscribed on.

 

[Lakesidefantasy]

And some words become collateral damage due to no fault of their own. Their is an old Anglo-Saxon word for miserly or stingy person that has nothing to do with the color black, but I would not suggest trying to use niggardly in any context today. The word is just too close to the infamous slur that no amount of reclaiming is going to save it. Sometimes you cut your losses and lose a word to history.

I still have trouble saying the word "snicker". It has a sting to it.

 

[Voadam]

I still have trouble saying the word "snicker". It has a sting to it.

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

 

[Scribe]

Shadowdark continues to knock it out of the park.

As an aside, that's not the full statblock.

 

[Umbran]

And then they talk to a member of the Jewish community who explains that that Google is wrong (shocker, I know) and helps to break that connection. In other words, talking to actual people helps more than just interacting with a screen.

Yeah.

And never mind that some of us were told about the connection by Jewish people. That inconvenient complication to our simple story can be ignored.

 

[pemerton]

I Googled "Jewish objection to lich phylactery". This was the third link that was offered up: https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/d-...e-word-phylactery-used-for-what-a-lich-has-is

I'm a Jew, and a practicing one at that, which means that every day I put on my Tefillin. For those who don't know what it is, it's a pair of leather boxes with scrolls of the Torah (Bible) inside. Everyone has their own, each was made specifically for the owner, it's a whole thing. But in short, it's a big part of Jewish culture. Its word in English is "Phylactery".

"Phylactery" is not a common word, and it sounds like a cool mystical thing. Nonetheless, D&D has taken the word for this sacred piece of Jewish culture and uses it as a Horcrux for a Lich, an evil wizard of all things. To be frank, it's a bit antisemitic to associate Jews with Liches, we aren't evil wizards, just a small ethnoreligious group. Of course, the creators of D&D, nor Wizards, may not know what a Phylactery really is, and what their decision to associate it with Lich actually means. I firmly believe that creators of D&D and Wizards are not antisemitic and that they did not mean to spite Jews by associating the Phylactery with Lich.

But now with Wizards making D&D more inclusive and modern, I believe that it would be wrong to leave the Phylactery as a word associated with Lich.​

That view may or may not be widely shared - I don't know. Given it's a post on a message board, I don't even know for sure that it's sincere. But there it is.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

Who is this "we"?

The posters on EN World are not the ones publishing the game. We are taking no significant risk - nobody is going onto twitter saying, "Warpiglet sucks because of this word choice in the DMG!" No skin in the game. No responsibility for the outcomes.

If you are suggesting more than a handful of people buying D&D know what a phylactery is, where it comes from and on top of that are offended by it to the point of hurting sales…

I am ok agreeing to disagree.

If we say the gaming Jewish population is upset by this…I will let Jewish people speak to that.

Somehow I doubt that is an issue with that community, but I don’t have the data. So far I have only heard Jewish D&D fans say they don’t think it’s an issue though not a random sample or anything. Maybe more peopme are worked up about it than I assume.

Edit: see above

 

[Alzrius]

And never mind that some of us were told about the connection by Jewish people. That inconvenient complication to our simple story can be ignored.

Sort of like how you ignored the fact that I said we (i.e. Jews) were aware of that connection, and that the salient point is that we don't actually call it that in any sort of religious or cultural context? Or how you ignored other posters saying that in this thread? Because while pointing that out might be inconvenient for you, it's in no way the complication you seem to think it is.

 

[Umbran]

If you are suggesting more than a handful of people buying D&D know what a phylactery is, where it comes from and on top of that are offended by it to the point of hurting sales…

I was saying this whole things is kind of armchair quarterbacking.