D&D (2024) How did I miss this about the Half races/ancestries

[Frozen_Heart]

Gnolls were playable in 3.5 and 4e. They don’t even need a rewrite, just a little added lore from a couple old sources.

Any clue why they changed the lore to make them not playable? Their current lore definitely excludes it. Being literally demons spawned from their kills which are eaten by hyenas.

But yeah, if you want a tool using smart enemy which doesn't have a moral dilemma to fight and kill, it can't be a player species option. As if it's a player species option it's not always evil by definition.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Wandering offtopic...

But seriously why don't we have a playable plant species? Pathfinder has Leshys and they're such a meme. I love them so much.

4e kinda had one but they were more spirit of nature made manifest.

And hamadryads

 

[Chaosmancer]

Characters often take stuff off of dead people - ones they've just killed, one they just found or when tomb raiding. They can be any sapient you wish for them to look like. One of the iconic classes in previous editions and a subclasses in 5e is called the Thief.
Do you think the multitude of designers in all those editions and D&D heart-breakers were basing this class off colonisers?

Right, but lets say the party is attacked by bandits, kill them, and strip the bodies.

Did the party specifically go out into the wilderness to hunt bandits? Maybe yes, maybe no. But funny thing here, I've used the term "bandits" which implies they are stealing. They are acting. Those bandits could be any species. You could have an Angel bandit who is pulling a robin hood, or modron bandits, or undead bandits. Bandits is a job.

What people often are saying "hey, this doesn't pass the sniff test" is when the job is replaced with a species. It becomes really uncomfortable when the entire reason you are going out into the wilderness is to find some sentient beings to kill and steal from. Because, you know.... that is what bandits do. Those are the bad people. So, the only thing that I have ever seen asked form is that instead of "but they were ORCS! They deserved to be murdered" is that we keep it to the job. And maybe not exclusively depict specific species as having that job. Because, again, my groups have slaughtered human bandits without a second thought. But we've rarely tracked them back to their village, killed the village chief, then celebrated while we practically enslaved one of them to be our bag boy. But that does seem to happen a distressing amount to goblins.

 

[Guest 85555]

Would have adding more racism into the movies made them better? Is racism the secret sauce to interesting stories like keeps getting claimed?

I don’t think the point isn’t that it is the secret sauce if anything, it is just sometimes that Igor creative choice (for a whole host of reasons). Going through art and saying let’s strip out all the bits I find gross, because it can technically function without them just seems like a bad way to approach creative endeavors

 

[Justice and Rule]

Again that also describes war in general. It describes a lot of conflicts and many genres of adventure and legend. The idea of killing monsters who don’t look human exists in all kinds of lore. But it also isn’t as simple as you are describing. They aren’t killed because of how they look, in campaigns where orcs are the bad guys, they are either killed because they are evil or because it is convenient and essentially a team blue versus red situation for gameability purposes. The appearance is more for stuff like coolness, making them more scary and tapping into human fears of predatory creatures and as a way of reflecting their inner evil

It doesn't describe war in general, but it definitely can describe a specific kind of war, especially when it's people going into a wilderness and killing people they find to "not resemble humans". You say it's not because of how they look, but you are the one who brought up their looks in the first place as a reason. Also talking about how they are "monsters" misses that they can be mated with and can even be part of a player's parentage.

Again this argument that it is colonialist just doesn’t feel like a solid one to me. And I’ve read plenty on the history of it. I even get that one can make an argument about the history of the literature and genre going back and connecting to it. But I don’t think that is what is being re-enacted at the table when a party goes into a dungeon and kills some goblins

Your version of colonialism is so focused on the top-end of things that it misses what happens below it. You're abstracting it so deeply that it loses the actual meaning of what's happening. It's not just that you are killing goblins, but you are going into their lands, killing them, and taking their stuff. That they are the "enemy" or "evil" misses that plenty of victims of colonialism were branded similarly.

Again you are just taking a lens that is preconfigured to read colonialism into it and that is what is being seen

No, I'm just taking a critical lens to something, rather than ignoring it. Your lens of colonialism is writ so large that it would be useless in examining individual events.

I understand my own reaction. You can keep saying this, it doesn’t make it more true

You just literally ascribed to me having a "lens that is preconfigured to read colonialism into it", so please don't try to say that you are putting down your own reaction when you are telling me my own.

I am offering the standard definition of colonialism. You don’t have to agree with my arguments. People in debates are often not persuaded by one another. But I also think you are underestimating the strength of the points I am making here.

It's not the standard definition of colonialism. The standard definition of colonialism doesn't require all those things and recognizes that those things individually can be recognized as having colonial aspects. You are trying to generalize and put too many preconditions on to what colonialism is when certain acts absolutely mimic colonialist actions.

Again killing people and taking their stuff because they look different also describes tribal conflict, gang warfare, violent robberies, etc. abd again you are simplifying because this isn’t happening due to appearance. The appearance is just a convenience and flavor in those instances, the reason is usually either the evil nature of the creatures and/or the greed of the adventurers

You are generalizing the context from what it was: going into the wilderness, finding sapient creatures, killing them and taking their stuff. That absolutely has colonialist overtones, especially in more modern times. The

Again the default isn’t setting up colonies, taking control of the territory (it often remains an open dungeon or untamed wilderness), while some campaigns go the mercantile route most aren’t doing things like exploiting the local resources, imposing their culture in the orcs, or doing this do a colonial power can become more powerful (they could be in service to a power but often if they are they are just retrieving an object that was lost long ago or saving a princess)

Again, just because all these things aren't present doesn't mean that something isn't colonialism. Many colonialist expeditions weren't built on settling land at all, just finding treasure. Going to someone else's home, killing them and taking their stuff absolutely hits those points, and it's absolutely something that gets discussed a bunch. Given that Gary himself talked about killing off children with the phrase "Nits make lice", it's not hard to see where this idea comes from. It's always been there, it's just been a matter of reconciling with it.

Again you are claiming to read peoples minds here. I can tell you you are 100% wrong about my reaction. I am sure others can weigh in on their’s

I'm not reading minds, I'm reading the room. Why do you think many people have moved on from this style? People have become less and less comfortable with it for exactly these sorts of reasons: they are killing things that feel like people rather than monsters. When you have a heritage that is half-Orc, how do you expect people to dissociate them with sapient beings? The whole point is that as time has gone on, these "evil creatures" and how you go to their homes, kill them, and take their stuff has started to feel bad as people start to really look at it. That's not a stretch, that's just people doing basic critical examination of gameplay.

 

[Chaosmancer]

because humans are trespassers there, and Dryads, Fey and Elves are in their right to deal with trespassers as they see fit.

And so when you enter orc or goblin lands, or a dungeon where they are living, why is okay to murder them? They don't get the right to deal with trespassers as they see fit?

 

[Chaosmancer]

EDIT: We accept strong religious ideologies and their zealots for storylines (cultists), racism is just another form of fanatical ideology. I'm not sure why people here seem to struggle to incorporate that specific ideology within a storyline creatively.

You chopped a lot of that section, but I'll address your question here, because you aren't asking the right question.

Yes, I could have an underground railroad, or a third group causing racial tensions to flare between elves and dwarves... but I've seen that. I've seen that dozens upon dozens of times. I literally don't have to be "creative" because its all been done before. And so... why bake it into the game? It can be done to be interesting, but it is not, as per itself, interesting. It is no more interesting than any of a dozen other plots. And by baking it in... we don't go further.

Take Tieflings for example. They are "hated and feared" and... that's it. That is their entire role in the narrative of the story. But... why can't we push past that and say "okay, but what would they look like in a society?" Because, sure, the first time a fiendishly blooded person showed up, it would cause a freak out. But, five hundred years later, with multiple species who live for hundreds of years seeing many of these people being born... we'd figure out pretty quick they aren't a threat. Just like we no longer consider people born left-handed as agents of the Devil. IT would just be a thing. And since I know what racism looks like, I know the first half of the story, but it could be far more interesting to see that second half. To see what the world looks like WITHOUT racism.

And if I want the elves and the dwarves to be racists and someone else stirring the pot, while a fourth group tries to act as a mediator... I can make that. I can make that without someone having to write into the PHB "all elves are racist to dwarves"

 

[Chaosmancer]

Artists? I don't know about you, but I don't stick my books on a shelf or frame them up on the wall and just look at them. D&D is a product, not art.

SO, you aren't actually following the conversation wit Bedrock, or you simply don't agree with them? Because the entire discussion has been about artists for like... a dozen pages.

And this very VISIBLE group has been pushing back against WotC's lame announcement since it happened. Where have you been that you have only seen me do this?

I never even saw the announcement. I've been dealing with my own life. But still, the point stands. I can't advocate for things to change, but you can advocate for them to stay the same, because you get to determine what reasons are "good enough"?

Nobody is demanding anything. At least not in this thread. There's a rather huge gulf between calling out a dumb decision as dumb and demanding that they make the setting.

So, you don't want Dark Sun? Why even bring it up then?

That's cool. I have no problem with people doing this. Corporations don't have personal issues, though. As much as the law treats them as people, they aren't people and don't have feelings or problems with anything.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by that. It was written pretty vaguely.

Probably because there has been this entire massive conversation dominating the thread that you seem to be completely unaware of.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Any clue why they changed the lore to make them not playable? Their current lore definitely excludes it. Being literally demons spawned from their kills which are eaten by hyenas.

Yeah they were a normal race with a contested origin in 4e, IIRC. Like a demon lord kinda took over a bunch of them, and the others reject the madness of what’s his face.

Eberron has always had playable Gnolls in the Znir Pact, and 4e had several articles I think about the Gnolls and thier inner struggle with the Demon Within.

 

[Maxperson]

SO, you aren't actually following the conversation wit Bedrock, or you simply don't agree with them? Because the entire discussion has been about artists for like... a dozen pages.

I've skimmed it and missed a lot. Let's call it quarter following that conversation.

I never even saw the announcement. I've been dealing with my own life. But still, the point stands. I can't advocate for things to change, but you can advocate for them to stay the same, because you get to determine what reasons are "good enough"?

Who said you can't advocate for change? You can, but you should have a reason that stands up. Slavery, especially since it exists and continues to exist in 5e, is not a good reason in my opinion.

So, you don't want Dark Sun? Why even bring it up then?

Do you not understand the difference between "want them to make it" and "demand that they make it?"

Probably because there has been this entire massive conversation dominating the thread that you seem to be completely unaware of.

No. It's because that sentence was written vaguely, but if you don't want to clarify there's nothing that I can comment on.