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

[Bae'zel]

I don't know that the way it was handled was much different (with exception to the usual differences between AD&D and 3.X stats), but that, out of all of the literal hundreds of official 3rd edition products, OA was the one chosen to mark the return of the stat. Why OA and not any other product*? Well... we've all heard the podcast, right?


*not even Song & Silence, which to misquote an old friend, was really a missed opportunity to name a book Lutes & Loots

Wait… they brought it back in 3e?!

Yikes

 

[billd91]

Wait . . . "Comeliness" wasn't in the 3E OA, was it?

Not that I'm aware of. And a quick search isn't finding it.

 

[billd91]

Comeliness, on its own, is a terrible rule and I'm glad it didn't survive 1E.

I can kind of see why they wanted to separate beauty from Charisma - that's a problem people have had from the beginning. But the whole fascination thing was ridiculous.

 

[pemerton]

In academia perhaps.

I was not in academia when I was a high-school student in the late 1980s.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I was not in academia when I was a high-school student in the late 1980s.

Okay, fair enough. But I saw nothing like that until I went to college

 

[pemerton]

Pemerton this is clearly just a semantic argument you are making. The fact is: Game X used to have Y, but current version of X no longer has it, so Y has been removed from the game is a perfectly reasonable useage of this language. That Y exists in earlier versions of the game in libraries or out in the world as a platonic idea, doesn't change the fact that it is not in the current edition. It isn't even an important point, but I am finding this particular argument you are making quite baffling

It's not a semantic argument. It's pointing out that nothing has been "taken away". You still have all your books that talk about liches and their phylacteries. You can talk about liches' phylacteries to your heart's content. In the games that you play in, you can describe liches as being kept "alive" by their phylacteries.

As far as I can tell, your complaint is that a book has been published that describes things in a way that differs from how you would prefer to describe it, and therefore some other people are likely to take up that different description. What is that taking away from you?

 

[pemerton]

Okay, fair enough. But I saw nothing like that until I went to college

OK. I did. I also wrote a letter to Marvel Comics after reading a racist episode of Conan the Barbarian.

Your autobiography and your perceptions don't exhaust the world's experience on these matters.

 

[Bedrockgames]

OK. I did. I also wrote a letter to Marvel Comics after reading a racist episode of Conan the Barbarian.

Your autobiography and your perceptions don't exhaust the world's experience on these matters.

Yes I recall you mentioning that.

Sure and neither do yours. But I definitely don't recall this conversation being a big thing at that time at all (certainly not in the mainstream gaming community). Not like it is now

 

[Bedrockgames]

It's not a semantic argument. It's pointing out that nothing has been "taken away". You still have all your books that talk about liches and their phylacteries. You can talk about liches' phylacteries to your heart's content. In the games that you play in, you can describe liches as being kept "alive" by their phylacteries.

As far as I can tell, your complaint is that a book has been published that describes things in a way that differs from how you would prefer to describe it, and therefore some other people are likely to take up that different description. What is that taking away from you?

This strikes me as an incredibly semantic argument. Perhaps the most semantic argument you and I have had here. But I think we've reached the end of the road on this part of the discussion. For whatever reason you think taking a word out and replacing it without another is not taking something out of the game. I definitely consider this removal of something. But I feel like debating this is kind of pointless because we are literally just arguing about the words I chose to express my complaint (and we have gone back and forth, both essentially saying the same thing) enough times that it doesn't seem either of us will make much headway with the other.

 

[pemerton]

Can't we decide for ourselfs whether something has been taken away from the game and whether we are poorer for it or not.

I never said I was owed anything or that my opinion had more weight.

You did imply that some - many? - people who disagree with you are simply following a fashion. You also suggested that there concerns are merely "academic".

Frankly, to me your talk of things being "taken away" - as opposed to the more accurate they published a book that I don't care for - does make it sound like you think you are owed something. To me, it sounds like you think that WotC owes you books that conform to your preferences.