D&D General Old School DND talks if DND is racist.

[Zardnaar]

Games Workshop definitely has a certain toxic wing to its fandom.

There's a certain part of society that basically idolizes the Imperium of Mankind. . .they look at them and think THAT's what they want things to be like.

Vehemently anti-science, xenophobic, authoritarian, religiously fundamentalist, absurdly militaristic, lead by a cult of personality. . .they're a fascist's dream.

I do wonder how many people get involved with WH40K because the Imperium and its mindset has become something of a memetic thing in some corners of the internet.

It was satire once upon a time. It's also an improvement over the other options.

I find Warhammer stupid over all ymmv.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

No. OSR/Old D&D isn't racist.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[ccs]

I feel deja vu lol. Originally, yes, orcs were inherently evil. They were literally described that way in the MM from 1979. Not until years later, in dragon articles, and 2e, and other books did that change. But originally? They were very much inherently evil. There was no other information at the time (late 70s) to remotely tell you otherwise.

Edit and for the pedantic folks out there, when this same topic came up not long ago, the 1e MM says the alignment is the characteristic of the creature. The definition of inherent is "in a... characteristic way". And orcs are lawful evil. There is no other conflicting information for anyone picking up the MM in 1979 and not assuming orcs are evil, inherently.

Yeah, except for those sections in the intros of the various books that explicitly tell you that in this game you should feel free to change anything you please.
I, a decently intelligent 11/12 year old, read those pages in Basic & 1e and understood perfectly well that I could (for example) change an monsters alignment if I pleased.
I feel like I'm in the minority in having read those pages (or at least understanding them).

 

[Mind of tempest]

Yeah, except for those sections in the intros of the various books that explicitly tell you that in this game you should feel free to change anything you please.
I, a decently intelligent 11/12 year old, read those pages in Basic & 1e and understood perfectly well that I could (for example) change an monsters alignment if I pleased.
I feel like I'm in the minority in having read those pages (or at least understanding them).

given the existents of people who are super rules lawyers who get angry if you change anything about the game, lots of people just default as it is easier for them.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Satanic panic brought us 2nd edition. The edition I started with and which I forever hold in my heart.
I am sure (deducing from the last playtest), that this discussion will bring us 6th edition (or 5.5) and it will be a great one.
Due to time restraints, the difference will be small, but we will get an overhaul to base classes and races and backgrounds.
This will generate very positive feedback and due to the compatibility will not face big backlash from the fans, who after 10 years of 5e dearly want base classes to be better balanced.

And truth be told. DnD of old was racist*. It is 50 years old and world has changed a lot since then.

edit: * in hindsight.

 

[ccs]

I'm not sure Games Workshop has ever been politically conscious. I grew up near GW HQ, so I've been there more than once. They used to have a bunch of dioramas in the back. I think it's now been turned into a proper museum that you pay to enter nowadays, but when I was a kid it was more a place that the guy running the shop would take you to see when it wasn't busy.

One of the biggest (and best) dioramas they had was the one showing the Praetorian Guard's defense of some outpost against a horde of Orks. Praetorian guards were just Mordians with the head of a Cadian painted differently, but the diorama was popular enough that they released a line of Praetorian models.

Thing is, this whole scene was based on the film Zulu. That's not interpretation, that's what the creators said. And they chose to represent the British soldiers by human Imperial guardsmen, and the Zulus by Orks.

Those were the Mordian Iron Guard:

sporting re-sculpted heads with pith helmets instead of the caps in the first pic (some included beards as well)"

The Warhammer World is full of real world cultures represented by monsters. But even to the people who created that the idea that evil elves had black skin seemed problematic.

LOL. REALLY? The company that made & sold these guys (pygmies, from WHFB 3rd ed):



and later used orks to stand in for the Zulus vs those pith helmeted Praetorian Guardsmen, feared social blowback if they painted their Dark Elves up as D&D Drow?
Yeah, I don't think so..... Maybe they just didn't want a legal issue with TSR. Or, more likely, they were aiming for their own IP take on the Dark Elves.

It's been one DnDism that I have refused to accept in my games. If drow have been condemned to live beneath the surface and suffer in the sun, then they must have pale, almost translucent skin. Anything else offends reason.

Well, the Drow didn't evolve you know They were marked with black skin to match their eeevil black souls & driven from the light of the sun via divine retribution (you know, for being eeevil.).
Stuff like that's not uncommon throughout RL myth, folklore & religion. So no reason it shouldn't be present in a fantasy game inspired by such sources where the gods and Good & Evil are actual things.

But hey, change anything you like. You're TOLD to do that in the intro pages of the game.

 

[Minigiant]

Old school Roleplaying and Wargamining was very jokey,with forced tropes, and meant to not seriously.

The issue is that that if the whole climate s jokey and not serious, you breed stupid ideas. Or breed ideas that break the second to change something. And it is easy for problematic stuff to get in and move around unnoticed. Especially when you try to sell inside jokes.

A lot of inside jokes are terrible.

 

[TheSword]

Grogs haven't actually had much impact on 5E's success. I forget the percentage, but the percentage of players over 35 is pretty surprisingly small compared to the rest.

In fact, I'd say it's wrong to say that "being in touch with it's roots" made 5E particularly successful, given the age of people playing. I think 5E's success comes from it being an accessible and pretty playable game, combined with streaming/YouTube and particularly Critical Role introducing it to a mass audience at exactly the same time a ton of '80s nostalgia was around (none of which requires 5E to be in any way like '80s D&D, indeed, it basically isn't), and also hitting at a time when a lot of 20-somethings were looking for stuff that was social but fun and yet also not necessarily super-drunken (board games got a huge boost from this at the same time - indeed at board game cafes in London, the "grog" percentage, i.e. people my age and above, was like 10-15% tops - most people were clearly in their 20s and highly diverse in terms of both gender and race (which was delightful to witness - seeing two Middle-Eastern girls in their 20s playing some serious LCG deckbuilder for example!). Accessibility and hitting at the right time are key to 5E.

As for racism, I do think there is a bit more in older D&D fans than I'd like, though, honestly, I'm skeptical about how it compare to the general population. Older RPG fans skew white and male, but they also skew liberal/leftist/open-minded - D&D fans less so because you get more people who like the black-and-white worldviews they see alignment as endorsing, and like to romanticize the past more - but still I suspect compared to the population in general it's not bad.

I meant more that D&D has made a successful franchise of refreshing and updating previous editions IP. Created in those earlier editions.

Do we honestly think Curse of Strahd didn’t benefit from Tracey Hickman’s consulting?

Developing D&D shouldn’t be a zero sum game, where attracting diversity comes at the cost of our long time loyal fan base. As has been said, the bigots are a small proportion mostly born out of ignorance. Their voice is amplified by the medium of the internet but I think we’re doing a pretty good job of drowning them out.

Look at this thread. Aside from a very small number of exceptions no one is debating whether we progress, just how to do it and how fast.

...that’s progress.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Hiya!

No. OSR/Old D&D isn't racist.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

Or more to the point... the game and most of the players weren't intending to be racist.

But because cultural mores change over time... parts of the game and some of the attitudes of the OSR/Old D&D might now be considered racist at this point in time.

So if you are a part of the OSR/Old D&D and that matters to you... that parts of the game you enjoy have undertones of racism... all you need to do is to see what people are talking about when it comes to racism in OSR/Old D&D and choose to change the bits in your game and your attitudes towards them that could be considered racist without getting bent out of shape over it.

Of course we know that's hard... heck, people here on the boards get bent out of shape by rules changes or additions all the time even without ones with any racial undertones. And our defense mechanisms and hackles immediately jump up when any potential racism is implied. But really, what's worse? Pretending that the rest of society just doesn't "get it" and going about your business the same as you ever did... or acknowledging the potential and making small changes along the way just to keep yourself in check?

I know for me personally... I'm always seeing things in media that someone is decrying as -ist or an -ism and I sigh heavily and think "Really? You're getting upset about that, now?!?" But then I take a moment to just think whether whatever that is is actually any kind of a big deal that impacts my life in any way shape or form and I realize that no it doesn't. So going along with the idea is no skin off my back if others believe it to be important in making more people happy.

And while I know there's a lot of folks desperately afraid of the whole "slippery slope" argument where they think society's going to break off and sink into the ocean if we "allow" this change to our mores to occur... trying to bring it to a screeching halt is rather pointless. Because the people pushing for these changes to our societal mores are usually younger than you and will outlive you. So you can try and fight the changes all you want, but eventually you're gonna die and the younger people will be able to keep those changes in place without you there to cockblock them anymore. So why make yourself miserable for the few years remaining in your life by trying to swim against the current and trying to prove to the young folks that this thing they believe is all wrong and they're going to hell if they continue it?

 

[DEFCON 1]

Case in point... giving your pronouns to people.

Now, I don't do it personally... because I'm old and I don't have that habit established in my brain in any way, shape, or form. But I'm not going to get bent out of shape that the people younger than me are beginning to do it and think it would be much better if all people did. Especially since no one is "forcing" me to do it. So why should I care that this is now a thing? I can certainly understand why it's a thing, and why other people go along with it... so what is the point in arguing with them that it's a stupid thing to do or a waste of everyone's time? That's just making myself miserable shouting at the clouds.