D&D 5E How do you hope WotC treats the upcoming classic settings?

[Azuresun]

Not if they're actually written well.

Take the defining kender trait of stealing everything in sight. First off, why? Mostly for comedy reasons, because they're so "innocent" that they don't know that they're doing bad things--but honestly, that's neither funny nor a show of innocence (especially since they lie about stealing). Give them a legitimate reason for stealing stuff. Say that they have a philosophy--or even a non-theistic religious belief--that says it's OK to have personal property, but it's always wrong to hold on to it selfishly if someone else needs or wants the thing. Say that kender either don't care that other cultures think differently or that kender actively believe that other cultures are wrong when they hold onto things.

So what this means is that you will have kender who accept this philosophy blindly and "handle" things whenever they want to; those who accept the philosophy but also realize that they shouldn't inflict their beliefs on other people; those who reject the philosophy; and those who come up with variants on that philosophy. More importantly, this prevents the kender from being a one-note annoyance because it is literally a choice as to how the player wants to deal with the handling, not just how much of a jerk the player wants to be.

This is just one way to "handle" kender (hur hur) without turning them into "just halflings."

The well is probably poisoned by now, but if I was running Dragonlance, I'd play up the kender lack of awareness of personal property as going both ways--if they have a pouch of gold, they'll hand it over to a beggar who clearly has more use for it than they do, or they'll happily lend their magic sword to someone else and forget to ask for it back.

 

[pming]

If someone who is actually from a group that I'm not part of says "this thing portrays my group in a hurtful or tone-deaf way", than that opinion has more weight than mine. I can still like whatever I like in the privacy of my own mind, but I'm not going to demand the wider world continue to support that.

...and if the solution to that ends up "portraying the group YOU are in, in a hurtful or tone-deaf way"... who wins? There is such a thing as "I don't like this because it makes me feel uncomfortable. I'm not going to buy/play/endorse that thing and I'll go elsewhere". What happened to that?

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Azuresun]

...and if the solution to that ends up "portraying the group YOU are in, in a hurtful or tone-deaf way"... who wins? There is such a thing as "I don't like this because it makes me feel uncomfortable. I'm not going to buy/play/endorse that thing and I'll go elsewhere". What happened to that?

Easy. The excluded groups gained more visibility (and purchasing power), and many producers realised that hey, we don't actually need to lose what made our things fun to make them more accessible (and expand the market).

 

[Nefermandias]

To be honest, it's really easy for any DM to just use things from AD&D. It's mostly plug and play, believe me.

I've run quite a few modules and used a lot of old setting book info on the fly, without any need for conversion. Because it's so simple, 5e is weirdly compatible with 1e and 2e.

That's why I'd be okay if they never touched old settings anymore. There's no reason to. They would only make everything generic and try to cram an ungodly amount of player options in the books anyway.

 

[Hussar]

Why? Even real world mythology has the greek gods and norse gods etc involving themselves directly with humans. Why cant fantasy gods in a fantasy world?

Future Modern D&D in the way you describe seems bland AF, IMO. Every culture needs to be the same, every god needs to not exist etc.

Again, you're trying to justify events in the fiction using the Thermian Argument.

Here's the link for a very good watch:


Basically, at it's heart, you're saying that no matter how egregious the text is, how racist, bigoted, misogynistic, whatever, doesn't matter so long as you can justify it in universe. The problem is, those gods DON'T EXIST. They are just fictional constructs of the author. The AUTHOR is the one writing these dehumanizing things. Now, do we accept that our fiction is racist, bigotted, hateful, or do we step up and say, "No!" There is no actual justification for glorifying mental illness. There just isn't.

So, yes, you can have kender who are mentally ill. That's fine. But, you can't, or at least shouldn't anyway, write them in such a way that this mental illness is a good thing. Oh, it's just because a random magical effect (note, Kender in universe were NOT created by a god, but rather by the accidental release of Chaos by the Greygem of Gargath - they are the gnomish victims of radiation exposure who have been horribly mutated to the point where they aren't even gnomes anymore) so, it's okay? No. It really, really isn't.

Either write kender so that their curse is an actual affliction, or don't write it at all. Celebrating mental illness and pretending that mental illness is a good thing is just not acceptable anymore.

 

[Nefermandias]

Yeah, Wizards of the Coast should really leave the old settings alone. Probably for the best.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Yeah, Wizards of the Coast should really leave the old settings alone. Probably for the best.

But I love what they did with Ravenloft. I want more please!

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

But I love what they did with Ravenloft. I want more please!

Yeah. There are certain older settings that I would love to play in 5e. Spelljammer, Planescape (okay, I hate the Great Wheel, but I love the idea of Planescape), Council of Wyrms, PoLand, and possibly a few others. The answer isn't "leave all previous editions' settings alone!", it's more "be careful with how you translate previous editions' settings to 5e, and some may be better left behind".

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Yeah. There are certain older settings that I would love to play in 5e. Spelljammer, Planescape (okay, I hate the Great Wheel, but I love the idea of Planescape), Council of Wyrms, PoLand, and possibly a few others. The answer isn't "leave all previous editions' settings alone!", it's more "be careful with how you translate previous editions' settings to 5e, and some may be better left behind".

You want Poland to become a setting book? I think you can book a flight there if you like.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

You want Poland to become a setting book? I think you can book a flight there if you like.

Nentir Vale. Nerath. "Points of Light" land. PoLand.