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

[Faolyn]

How much more would they need to add to meet your requirement of, "showed the impacts of slavery"? Your complaint was that the slaves had no identities. If they had the same degree and proportion of identity as the other NPCs in the module, would that work for you?

It would be better.

Again, I bring up Spire, a game that shows how much slavery messes people up, in comparison to D&D, where you could literally replace the slaves with cheeseburgers for all that the slavery actually matters for the worldbuilding. So why even have the slavery in the first place? It can't be because it makes the game more interesting because it doesn't. It does nothing more than say "those guys over there are the bad guys." It doesn't make the game more mature because it doesn't do anything with the slavery that's mature. It doesn't show realism because the hopefully-soon-to-be-ex-slaves aren't treated as people, just goals. Slave Lords apparently didn't even assume the PCs would care enough about the slaves to ask them their names. The slaves were nothing more than MacGuffins.

This is a major reason why many of us are against including slavery and bigotry in the games. D&D, and indeed many other games, doesn't treat it as any more than a plot hook.

You and others have said that bigotry is great in the games because it brings up conflict. OK, like what? Do you actually make sure to have people discriminate against those PCs who chose the wrong race/sex/skin color/whatever at game start? Do you throw them out of taverns: "we don't serve your kind here"? Do you have the watch just automatically assume that the half-whatever or full orc or whomever is guilty because of course half-whatevers and orcs are the bad guys and go out of their way to hassle them? Do the other players treat those characters poorly and say things like "you may be a half-orc, but you're OK"? Do you go out of your way to make sure that PCs who are playing an oppressed minority feel every minute of that oppression, the way actual people are discriminated against?

Because I'm going to guess that for most tables that assume bigotry is great for games, nothing like this happens, or is used specifically by jerks to harass a particular player, or is simply used as an excuse: you can kill those orcs; they're evil.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Which is stupid for other reasons, not the least of it being that not everyone uses Corellon and Gruumsh, or uses them in the way that the books say. The world I made has those two gods but neither of them are creators of the elves or orcs. There's no such thing as a "mark of Gruumsh" in my world because I loathe racial alignments plus, as I said in an earlier post, that phrase has connotations in it that make me not want to use it.


How? How is that cool.


What if most orcs and elves were pretty neutral with each other, and some were even allied or at least traded with each other, except for that one group of orcs and that one group of elves who are warring over land or religious issues or an ancient insult?

Because what you're proposing isn't a flipped script. It's just an exception to the "cool" hatred.

I believe I have clarified my position adequately in the last couple of posts. At this point if you don't agree or cannot understand we are like going to have just agree to disagree.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Because we already have playable races with a complex society. All you want to do is add orcs into that mix to become just another skin. Right now, they're unique.

No, they aren't unique. And no, I don't want them as a "skin" . And wow, your argument is basically "we have complex societies, we don't need these people to have a complex society".

Well those are the ones you presented to me.

Yeah, one from the playtest (meaning incomplete) and the other from my personal blurb I use for all my games, which often take place in very different settings. I didn't think I needed to explain why those aren't going to be the same as the multi-page entries in published books.

Yeah, we are never going to get past this point as I find this reasoning hogwash.
There are games from Final Fantasy books to PC Games that deal with racism and we are active participants in those yet somehow we become emotionally brittle when we pick up a pair of die. It is so much easier being passive, unable to do anything about the injustice, unable to be a hero, unable to make your voice known.

"Movies are different"

"Well what about these games huh!"

... Yeah, it is a little hard to get past a point you completely ignore. Sure, there are other games that include racism. How many of those have you fully embody the character? I know when I played Final Fantasy, I didn't get to write the dialogue. I didn't get to decide what happened either. A lot of times the characters would find a thing, then attack it, and I was just along for the ride.

Do you pick up your dice from your pre-written script for the game? Do you just sit and wait for the DM to say "generate a random number!" as they weave a tale of what your character does?

Yes, Final Fantasy is more interactive than a movie, but Dnd is more interactive still. It is almost like different forms of media are different...

I provided you a list of examples of the conflicts that exist for a number of races.
So yes, I think each having their own unique struggles provides hopefully a different experience of play at the table. Mechanical effects or Traits, Ideals, Bonds and Flaws would assist that - so that they are not all same-y, but some rather loud voices are not fans of that.

No you didn't. You just said "Orcs have these conflicts!" and left it at that.

Now, if you are referring to a post to a different person, I do remember you mentioning something like elves long lives being unique in how they express themselves... which is, to quote you, hogwash. How do I know?

Because Dwarves, Gnomes, Firbolgs and even halflings and Genasi have long lifespans too. Then you have races like Warforged, Autognomes and Fairies whose lifespans are big question marks. Gith have lifespans that can be as long as you want, since they often live in the Astral where time has no meaning. And then you have the semi-undead Dhampir and Reborn. So this "utterly unique" conflict is shared by what? Twelve other races?

So, kind of weird to have this concept of "unique conflicts" that are shared across multiple different races. Almost seems like having different races sharing different traits is... normal and okay.

Yes, because orcs moved from being antagonists to playable races, so the weight of their racial history came with. I do not want anymore skins.

Well they aren't going to be "skins" they are going to be a playable race. And since their racial history is horrible and badly written even from a technical viewpoint, it isn't going to be a problem to get rid of it. Especially since, to remind you, you never even read it before this week.

Tieflings have the general distrust by others, Dragonborn are looked as strangely alien.

No they aren't, at least not for the Dragonborn. I've never seen anything about Dragonborn being "strangely alien".

As we move more and more of the Monster Manual into the PHB we will have more of these issues since many of them have slavery, cannibalism, racism in their history. Why? Because they were originally monsters. As you bring more and more of them across you are going to be stripping them of any uniqueness and making them skins with....complex societies.

Personally, I think there should be a humanoids book with a whole range of ideas (like the ones I posted) and script swaps. That would be far more useful than sanitsing the PHB.

They aren't getting stripped of uniqueness. They aren't "skins". We just decided it was okay to be racist to the things we planned to kill in game, and now are realizing how messed up that is.

 

[Guest 85555]

So if it isn't preventing difficult things from being depicted in movies, Television, books, or video games, where is this chilling effect? How can you continue to claim that we are on the path to go "too far" when you can't point to a single industry that has actually not produced content like what you are talking about over the past 10 years?

I think it is very obvious media has grown more full and predictable in the past five to ten years. That doesn’t mean there aren’t some subjects that media has expanded its views on in a good way. But even then the prioritization if wholesomeness and radiating a message, I think has just made that content boring too.

Yeah, as a writer I AM in the business of saying what art should and should not be using. And as a human being with empathy towards others. Sure, maybe a game specifically marketed as a power fantasy where a man assaults women for fun is somehow giving some sort of artistic merit... but I doubt it. And while you want to talk about violence, violence, and let's focus on the violence, that wasn't what I was pointing out.

Again I can’t comment on a medium I have zero experience with since the early 2000s (and even then I didn’t play much). But my view as a writer and as an appreciator if media, is let creatives explore topics, don’t leap to conclusions because it sounds awful, and if it is awful avoid it. I am not interested in deciding what should and should not be considered valid art or valid subject matter

There can be a discussion on violence. But interestingly, neither this thread nor my point focus on violence or killing. But, again, going out there and saying "But, it is ART and you can't say anything negative that might prevent ART" just leads to people with hate in their hearts to decide to lie and claim artistic protections that aren't deserved.

First line never said you can’t say anything. I have been very clear I value free expression and that includes the right to critique. But I also don’t think we should set the bar inwhat is culturally permissible around preventing bad people from claiming artistic protection.

Maybe if we lived in a society where people had their rights, I'd be more sympathetic to the idea. But since we live in a society where every day I see news feeds telling me that such and such state has passed a law taking away more rights from people, I'm not exactly thinking we are in a healthy place where we can just "live and let live" because one side will end up dead.

I think human rights are very important. And so think free expression is central to protecting the rights we have and expanding rights. And that’s why you should value artistic free expression because the tools (whether they be law or simple online trends) we establish for restriction art, will eventually be used by the people you don’t want using them to silence the people you want to protect.

We already weren't allowed to show LGBTQ+ things. We already live in a world where a trans-person appearing in a commercial gets people pulling out semi-automatic guns and "protesting". We lived in that world, for decades. And it was this very movement of saying enough is enough, we need to be better, that started making it even slightly more acceptable.

I think the whole culture war is sad. I don’t drink so I don’t care if the bud light spokesman is a trans person or Kid rock (personally I wish people drank less beer), but I think the culture war is out of control if people are firing guns to protest a beer commercial. Also free expression needs to go both ways. People calling for a beer commercial to be taken down are being censorious (and that is the thing since have been speaking against the whole thread). People shouldn’t be afraid of a beer commercial

You talk about how things have gotten worse and worse in the last few years? Do you realize that in the last 5 to 10 years I have seen more same-sex couples and inter-racial couples on shows and commercials than I have seen in my entire life? Those happened because the people in power heard us saying that enough is enough, and we need to do better. And stopping that progress because you fear it will somehow reverse course? That doesn't make sense.

I am in an interracial marriage. It isn’t new to include interracial couples in media (I remember the Jefferson’s having such a couple gif example) but I am glad it is more common, however it is more complicated than you are saying. Like I said there have always been the right wing reactions to us, but more recently we’ve encountered more negative reactions from the left too. So I don’t think if you ask all interracial couples they are optimistic just because we appear in more commercials. Also look at things like Star Wars. They clearly intended Finn and Rose to be a couple. But they threw that story arc in the trash can (I assumed for fear of the global market but that was just my guess)

I don’t understand why you think I’d want to reverse course on this. My complaint isn’t about more interracial couples appearing in commercials

You can have progress in these areas and still have an issue because you aren’t allowing other things now deemed bad (even if they aren’t bad but just sometimes get mistaken for bad). And you can have a good message but a singular focus on that message can interfere with making work compelling. It can lead to things like putting your subject matter in a pedestal or making characters that are overly idealized. This happened to me with a game dealing in Christian themes. I tried too hard to maintain a message in keeping with the the theme and ended up with something vanilla and too message oriented. So took a break and returned to strip a lot of that out and restore rough edges to it.

My main complaint here has been about putting parameters on what is acceptable. It hasn’t been that so think there are too many diverse characters or something like that. Again, that stuff should be acceptable. Like I said before, if someone wants to make something like coyote and crow, great, I think that is cool. But I also think dark sun with slavery in it and half elves of evil orcs are also okay.

Edits for typos

 

[AnotherGuy]

Oh, wow. Do you not realize how that makes everything worse? You are literally making the bigotry against a person their entire personality and turning them into a professional victim. Wow. Also, a lot of those are incredibly bigoted. "Inherent nature"? "Built in alignment"? "Tainted blood betrayed in their appearance"? "Decide who they are"? Except for the alignment, since those don't exist in real life, each of those are things that have been used by real-life bigots against other real-life people.

No I don't realise how I've made things worse. These are fantastical creatures in a fantastical setting - now you're allowed to lean into these flaws or ignore them completely.

I also view these character options in the same way vampire clans have their flaws and perceptions of other vampire clans in VtM.

And not just racists, either. As an example, many people expect bisexuals to decide if they're gay or straight, because bi-erasure is a thing and so, apparently, is being of mixed heritage. I can point out how your orcs above are also insulting to people who, like me, are neurodivergent and have to "struggle to fight off their inherent nature." I spent a lifetime wondering what was wrong with me and desperately trying to be normal, whatever that was, before I got my autism and ADHD diagnoses at the age of 38, because girls didn't get these types of diagnoses when I was a kid in the 80s and 90s.

If you feel insulted because the orcs carry the Mark of Gruumsh, that's on you in the same way someone who wishes to view He-Man as insulting to anyone who is not muscular and strong so they cannot be a hero.

But hey, it's cool because it makes for a fun character for you to play, right?

I enjoy the races as they were designed. If you wish to draw parallels from reality to a fantasy race that's not on me.

There is nothing wonderful about any of these. They're just crass stereotypes.
Oh, but the elves are blessed and only may have a skewed perspective on life. I'm sure they wipe their tears away with hundred dollar bills.

Sounds like you dislike the elves. May I suggest playing a half-orc?

 

[Vaalingrade]

I enjoy the races as they were designed. If you wish to draw parallels from reality to a fantasy race that's not on me.

It is on the designers. Who made those parallels.

That is the point: calling that out and holding them responsible.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I am not sure anyone has said they need to see racism in their fantasy game.

People have literally said that taking racism out takes every single conflict out of the game. How else are we supposed to interpret that.

Personally, I like unique half-elves. I am not a fan of them now being a cosmetic skin.

I dislike the new rules allowing any possible species union. I just know I will see someone argue for a Warforged Kobold at some point.

Why is that a problem? Cyborg Kobold sounds like it could be a lot of fun.

 

[AnotherGuy]

No, they aren't unique. And no, I don't want them as a "skin" . And wow, your argument is basically "we have complex societies, we don't need these people to have a complex society".



Yeah, one from the playtest (meaning incomplete) and the other from my personal blurb I use for all my games, which often take place in very different settings. I didn't think I needed to explain why those aren't going to be the same as the multi-page entries in published books.



"Movies are different"

"Well what about these games huh!"

... Yeah, it is a little hard to get past a point you completely ignore. Sure, there are other games that include racism. How many of those have you fully embody the character? I know when I played Final Fantasy, I didn't get to write the dialogue. I didn't get to decide what happened either. A lot of times the characters would find a thing, then attack it, and I was just along for the ride.

Do you pick up your dice from your pre-written script for the game? Do you just sit and wait for the DM to say "generate a random number!" as they weave a tale of what your character does?

Yes, Final Fantasy is more interactive than a movie, but Dnd is more interactive still. It is almost like different forms of media are different...



No you didn't. You just said "Orcs have these conflicts!" and left it at that.

Now, if you are referring to a post to a different person, I do remember you mentioning something like elves long lives being unique in how they express themselves... which is, to quote you, hogwash. How do I know?

Because Dwarves, Gnomes, Firbolgs and even halflings and Genasi have long lifespans too. Then you have races like Warforged, Autognomes and Fairies whose lifespans are big question marks. Gith have lifespans that can be as long as you want, since they often live in the Astral where time has no meaning. And then you have the semi-undead Dhampir and Reborn. So this "utterly unique" conflict is shared by what? Twelve other races?

So, kind of weird to have this concept of "unique conflicts" that are shared across multiple different races. Almost seems like having different races sharing different traits is... normal and okay.



Well they aren't going to be "skins" they are going to be a playable race. And since their racial history is horrible and badly written even from a technical viewpoint, it isn't going to be a problem to get rid of it. Especially since, to remind you, you never even read it before this week.

No they aren't, at least not for the Dragonborn. I've never seen anything about Dragonborn being "strangely alien".

They aren't getting stripped of uniqueness. They aren't "skins". We just decided it was okay to be racist to the things we planned to kill in game, and now are realizing how messed up that is.

You're telling me they are not skins without telling me why they are not skins is unhelpful for this conversation. I look forward to your unique orcs.

 

[Incenjucar]

You telling me they are not skins without telling me why they are not skins is unhelpful for this conversation. I look forward to your unique orcs.

They have different abilities which lead to different experiences. Are trees just a reskin of flowers?

 

[AnotherGuy]

It is on the designers. Who made those parallels.

That is the point: calling that out and holding them responsible.

So please by all means create something without drawing any parallels (for offense) and it must be more than just a skin.