Heroes of Battle and Defining Roleplaying

[Corinth]

The D&D community, on the whole, doesn't want to deal with politics, romance, real fear (i.e. effective horror) or large-scale warfare. It wants to explore places, fight skirmish scale battles, haul off the loot and level up; what role-playing there's to be had therein is to be confined to parley situations, (de)briefings at the start (end) of the adventure, and occassional Q&A sessions. In other words, a fantasy-themed action/adventure wargame--an unabashed power fantasy--and that's what D&D is at its heart.

 

[Mouseferatu]

The D&D community, on the whole, doesn't want to deal with... [snip]real fear (i.e. effective horror)...

No? I guess WotC made a mistake in having several of us write Hereos of Horror, the next in the series.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

No? I guess WotC made a mistake in having several of us write Hereos of Horror, the next in the series.

Of course they did! Don't you know by now that WotC can do nothing right?! And you're in league with them now!! You've gone...um...hmmm...more evil!

 

[heirodule]

No? I guess WotC made a mistake in having several of us write Hereos of Horror, the next in the series.

Bully for you. (i mean it) But we'll never see Heroes of State, since that "isn't roleplaying"

 

[buzz]

I think they mean that D&D isn't built to handle political stuff. At least, not that much. It's combat-heavy system, a quick browse through our Rules forum makes that clear. This isn't true with some other systems.

Yes. It may have been more accurate for the blurb to say "That isn't D&D" rather than "That isn't roleplaying." D&D, as written, is not about mass combat nor global politics. It's about events on the level of a party of 4+ characters.

I tihnk you're all reading WAY too much into this. This is no signal of a change in WotC's attitude about D&D. WotC has been pretty clear about what D&D is and isn't in thier eyes from the get-go: dungeons, dragins, wilderness adventures, thieves' guilds, elven forests... same as what it's been about since 1974.

They cater to the mainstream. That's ther job. Plenty of other d20 publishers explore other arenas; look to them rather than lambast WotC.

 

[buzz]

Bully for you. (i mean it) But we'll never see Heroes of State, since that "isn't roleplaying"

Never say never. This is one blurb written by one marketing staff members about one product. Ease down, you're just grinding metal.

 

[Nathal]

The quote solely serves to define the focus of the book, i.e., war from a grunt's-eye view, not from those who are leading nations and commanding armies..

I agree. I think that the preview was simply saying that this is not a "battle system" treatment of warefare in RPGs.

 

[Nathal]

When the author of that preview wrote, "...wars are still political battles fought by common folk for reasons too often known only to the leaders of those countries" I think he was using the word "political" in the most cynical sense. That D&D heroes fight for the real causes, while the masses fight for whatever reasons their leaders tell them to. When he speaks of politcal war in this context I think he speaks of an objective and maybe even a tad coldhearted perspective on warfare. The message seems to be to prevent the PCs from getting caught up in the vicsssitudes of the mundane world, becoming mere cogs in the machine. I've heard people use the word "politcal" as the antithesis of the personal and heroic in the past, and I wonder if that is what the author was driving at. Whoever wrote that blurb was obvioulsy no jingoist.

 

[Flyspeck23]

When the author of that preview wrote, "...wars are still political battles fought by common folk for reasons too often known only to the leaders of those countries" I think he was using the word "political" in the most cynical sense. That D&D heroes fight for the real causes, while the masses fight for whatever reasons their leaders tell them to. When he speaks of politcal war in this context I think he speaks of an objective and maybe even a tad coldhearted perspective on warfare. The message seems to be to prevent the PCs from getting caught up in the vicsssitudes of the mundane world, becoming mere cogs in the machine. I've heard people use the word "politcal" as the anthitus of personal and heroic in the past, and I wonder if that is what the author was driving at. Whoever wrote that blurb was obvioulsy no jingoist.

"War is merely the continuation of policy by other means." - Karl von Clausewitz, On War

 

[Kae'Yoss]

"War is merely the continuation of policy by other means." - Karl von Clausewitz, On War

So a warmage is merely an evolved diplomancer?