I've reversed my stance on dragonborn and tieflings

[The Little Raven]

It's almost always a red flag, and after being 'open minded' and suffering for it dozens of times, yes, sorry, eventually people go 'oh god no' when some prospective player starts talking about the Quiet Man in Black who happens to own a motorcycle which shoots smaller motorcycles with ninjas on them. Carrying smaller ninjas.

So, you don't like anti-heroes because you have had idiot players that don't understand what an anti-hero is?

 

[The Ubbergeek]

It's almost always a red flag, and after being 'open minded' and suffering for it dozens of times, yes, sorry, eventually people go 'oh god no' when some prospective player starts talking about the Quiet Man in Black who happens to own a motorcycle which shoots smaller motorcycles with ninjas on them. Carrying smaller ninjas.

I agree with mourn... albeit... this bit made me laugh out loud.

 

[Celebrim]

The darker and edgier edition. It seems to me that they are about 10 years to late getting in on this.

 

[Imaro]

The darker and edgier edition. It seems to me that they are about 10 years to late getting in on this.

... ... ... ..."Wait a minute, it'd be so much funnier if it wasn't so true."

 

[rounser]

And this leads to the argument of what is generic and what is not.

And that's easy to answer, because you just look to mythology. Elves? Dwarves? Check. Hobbits? Erm, not really. Blame Tolkien. Cambions? Check, but not by the empire. Strong presence in every world? Hell no. Dragondudes? Nup. Getting pretty specific there. "Eladrin"? What the heck is that? Sounds like something plucked from a specific world.

It's shades of grey. But that doesn't mean "anything goes", IMO. The core does a lot of worldbuilding for you, and so needs to be treated carefully. WOTC are getting pretty cavalier with it at the moment, which may see harm to D&D's IP in the long term as it becomes "D&Dism world construction kit" rather than "fantasy world construction kit" even more than it already is.

 

[Hussar]

And that's easy to answer, because you just look to mythology. Elves? Dwarves? Check. Hobbits? Erm, not really. Blame Tolkien. Cambions? Check, but not by the empire. Strong presence in every world? Hell no. Dragondudes? Nup. Getting pretty specific there. "Eladrin"? What the heck is that? Sounds like something plucked from a specific world.

It's shades of grey. But that doesn't mean "anything goes", IMO. The core does a lot of worldbuilding for you, and so needs to be treated carefully. WOTC are getting pretty cavalier with it at the moment, which may see harm to D&D's IP in the long term as it becomes "D&Dism world construction kit" rather than "fantasy world construction kit" even more than it already is.

But, from what we've seen, the "fantasty world construction kit" is NOT what 4e is going to be about. They're giving you a complete town and starter adventure in the DMG. They're giving you a fair bit of racial backstory and pantheon work in the PHB. Core D&D is apparently meant to be played out of the box.

Unlike previous editions where DM's were expected to spend dozens, if not hundreds of hours detailing a campaign world before you could start to play. The only problem was, so very few DM's actually did this. Most simply started playing and ignored the whole world building schtick as much as possible.

The problem with that was, there was so little actual campaign material in core that campaigns were pretty flat and boring. The adventures might be fun, but, the setting was tissue paper thin.

Now, those of us who have zero interest in spending a bazillion hours writing fanfic get to play in a set world with enough backstory to make it hang together. Fantastic. Even better, it's not yet another Tolkien rip-off wannabe Middle Earth.

For you homebrewers out there, it's a bit more work. Too bad. I have no sympathy anymore. I used to, until I realized that homebrewers would much rather make it much harder for everyone else to play the game so they could do less work stripping out flavor text.

This is finally the edition that plays out of the box. We haven't had that since Basic/Expert D&D in the 80's, and I, for one, welcome it.

 

[Hussar]

Who only became cool when a certain unnamed duel weilding scimitar GOOD drow showed up and then everyone wanted to play drow. Kinda defeats your arguement, when folks want to play angst ridden good guys who suffer for what their evil race does.....

Not really. Drow were included in the Unearthed Arcana (1985) and our Good Drow didn't make an appearance until 1988. People tend to forget that. Drow were popular as PC's because of the GDQ series, well before R. A. Salvatore.

 

[The Little Raven]

And that's easy to answer, because you just look to mythology. Elves?

If we're going by mythology, then D&D elves are the first thing that need to go, since they are significantly different from mythological elves.

Dragondudes? Nup. Getting pretty specific there.

In a game called Dungeons & Dragons... not really a surprise.

WOTC are getting pretty cavalier with it at the moment, which may see harm to D&D's IP in the long term as it becomes "D&Dism world construction kit" rather than "fantasy world construction kit" even more than it already is.

Well, considering WotC has made D&D more successful and popular than it has ever been under TSR's watch, I think TSR did more damage to D&D's IP.

 

[rounser]

But, from what we've seen, the "fantasty world construction kit" is NOT what 4e is going to be about. They're giving you a complete town and starter adventure in the DMG. They're giving you a fair bit of racial backstory and pantheon work in the PHB. Core D&D is apparently meant to be played out of the box.

A town and a starter adventure, and you believe that no worldbuilding is required??? Nevermind that the whole worldbuilding thing is perhaps D&D's main draw for a large part of it's audience? An audience that isn't going to expand....except to more worldbuilders, because without hundreds of pages of "adventure path", that's all the game will support?

As Terry Pratchett says, pull the other one, for it has bells on it. If they've worked a miracle and taken the worldbuilding and adventurebuilding out of D&D (almost an oxymoron unless it's been turned into Talisman overnight and no-one's noticed), then you'll be right. I hope you're right. I just don't believe that you are.

 

[rounser]

If we're going by mythology, then D&D elves are the first thing that need to go, since they are significantly different from mythological elves.

In a game called Dungeons & Dragons... not really a surprise.

Well, considering WotC has made D&D more successful and popular than it has ever been under TSR's watch, I think TSR did more damage to D&D's IP.

Mourn, can you at least be a bit discriminating? I know you have a vested interest in seeing 4E succeed because your job depends on it, but it's getting old.

I'm not all anti-4E, I think a lot of what I've heard is excellent changes that I can fully get behind and look forward to, but you're not putting out any such mixed signal. I know that it's hard to get someone to believe something that their salary depends on them not believing, but please tell me just one thing you don't like about 4E instead of waving the flag and splitting hairs like you've done there.

I mean, what does follow mythology 100%? Not much. Not even other mythology, but there are close analogues in celtic legend for D&D elves (guys on boats from memory). And Dungeons & Dragons implies there are dragons in the game somewhere, no more than that. If PCs, why weak sauce dragonborn, why not actual, honest-to-goodness PC dragons? OH, BECAUSE WOTC DIDN'T DECIDE TO PUT THEM IN THERE. As arbitrary as that. As for TSR and D&D's IP, FR is being resurrected for a reason, and Eberron is no FR. And they were apparently trying to replace or equal FR's role as CRPG and novel golden goose with Eberron, remember?