D&D 4E In terms of theme, tone, and spirit, I hope 4e . . .

[danzig138]

But most of it doesn't inspire wonder.

I'll happily admit that I have seen any art from 3E that has inspired any wonder yet. But with that, I have to point out that, unlike with 1E, I also haven't seen any that made me wonder why the people running the company were putting their little kids' pre-nap time drawings in their books. And really, that's what I thought about a whole ship load of 1st edition art. None of it inspired wonder either. It really kind of sucked (blah insert standard disclaimers blah).

The first (and last) time I saw D&D art that made me go "Whoa, now that's cool. I want to play that." was Brom's Dark Sun work. And there was some funny art I guess maybe from the basic game? I think the same guy some art for Paranoia? Some of that was just hilarious.

 

[danzig138]

dream

Is that what the kids are calling LSD these days? I always thought Otus had to be trippin' a little bit.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Technically, that druid illustration is the same as all the other class pictures, she just has a wolf with her. How does that make it any different than, say, the fighter? He has his axe and there's a shadow behind him to hint at a wall. I do see context in the druid image, but its still just a druid and a wolf.

Sure, it may just be that I can see how her outfit was made. It may just be that there is an implication of Stag God in the twiggy antlers, implying some tie with druidic religions as they appeared in earlier editions/mythology. It may be the feathers used to ground the character in something resembling an understandable (Native American) culture. It may even be that the presence of the wolf itself ties her into at least one aspect of the world apart from herself.

Like I said, it does it for me.

YMMV.

 

[Wolfspider]

Dictionary.com defines "context" as:

3. Mycology. the fleshy fibrous body of the pileus in mushrooms.​

Now, I know that we are not talking about mycology....

Awww. Why not?

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Sure, it may just be that I can see how her outfit was made. It may just be that there is an implication of Stag God in the twiggy antlers, implying some tie with druidic religions as they appeared in earlier editions/mythology. It may be the feathers used to ground the character in something resembling an understandable (Native American) culture. It may even be that the presence of the wolf itself ties her into at least one aspect of the world apart from herself.

Like I said, it does it for me.

YMMV.

Makes sense to me.

Thing is, I can see all those kinds of things in that Warlock image, too. In fact, in almost all the static images of single characters, there are hints and references to what they are that provide context. Course, some do it better than others, and I do love that Druid image and agree its one of them, but I don't think I've seen one that doesn't at least have some context relating to what its supposed to be.

 

[Raven Crowking]

He's playing air guitar because he's a fun guy......


BTW, what was Lidda doing here? Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar indeed......

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

I'm confused.

Are folks saying that the above are not conventions in anime, or that they don't appear in D&D 3.X art, or both?

I think they are disagreeing with the qualifier of "Every".

It would be like if I said every piece of 1st edition art was pure garbage that looked like a bad superhero comic drawn by someone on acid.

When I'm just talking about Erol Otus.

I mean, some of it looked like it was drawn by a 5th grader while bored in math class. No LSD required.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

as does the large, curved sword which looks more like a scimitar than a katana.

It's supposed to be a scimitar.

 

[Xyxox]

There has been a definite shift in art style with 3e. There are certainly distinctive features to what is called 'dungeonpunk' - less realism in armour and weapons, contemporary features such as tats, piercings and fetishwear. But dungeonpunk <> anime. It doesn't even look influenced by anime imo.

As an aside would anyone say Dark Sun's art was early dungeonpunk? Brom's work is, if anything, more fetishistic than the 3e stuff.

I have to agree with the equation of Dungeonpunk does not equal anime.

For the record, I despise both art forms.

That's not to say that Dungeonpunk and Anime are not good and valid art forms, only that my tastes run to different styles.

One final word on the whole thing. I'd take Dungeonpunk or Anime any day of the week before I'd take Erol Otus.

 

[HeinorNY]

Can anyone post an image from any D&D book that barely looks like anime?