Rashomon and Palace of the Silver Princess

[ninjayeti]

Its also noteworthy that the re-issue of "D3 - Vault of the Drow" which came out about the same time had TWO pictures of a fully nude succubus - including one on the back cover. Hard to believe that this was fine as back cover art but "The Illusion of the Decapus" was so crazy they had to pull the module because it might give ammo to the "Satanic Panic" folks.

Vault of the Drow also contains this description of the sex dungeon the Drow High Priestess keeps behind a secret door in her bedchamber:
Behind the secret door is a cell wherein is chained an insane human of great strength (9th level fighter; H.P.: 73; 18/81 strength, 11 intelligence, 9 wisdom, 16 dexterity, 18 constitution; 17 charisma) kept here by Charinida for whatever purposes please her at the time. There are several whips and torture instruments on one wall, and near them is a gag and a ring of invisibility. Note that the prisoner is bound to the east wall where the secret entrance to room 4) is.

I don't know if Wells was a talented author who was unfairly maligned because of sexism - but if anyone wrote S&M fantasies disguised as a module it was totally Gygax with Vault of the Drow.

 

[Tony Vargas]

….she is demoted to secretarial tasks while people talk about her "S&M Fantasies" when she wasn't even aware of what "S&M" meant according to her.
...
We can do better.

I was going to point something else out...

S&M*




*Not that there would have been anything wrong with that.

...but you got there yourself, right away.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Alzrius]

The account in Art & Arcana is more complex than that presented in the Wired article, too: it's a pretty shabby article, really.

I agree. For a better take on the situation, I recommend this article:

The Day the Old School Died

The story has become a legend in the roleplaying industry.In 1981, TSR was preparing to release module B3 Palace of the Silver Princess. Written by Jean Wells, it would have been the next module

thealexandrian.net

Also, since it's good to look for information from a wide variety of sources, consider the module's Wikipedia page, its Acaeum page, and Shannon Appelcline's history of it.

 

[jayoungr]

I agree. For a better take on the situation, I recommend this article:

The Day the Old School Died

The story has become a legend in the roleplaying industry.In 1981, TSR was preparing to release module B3 Palace of the Silver Princess. Written by Jean Wells, it would have been the next module

thealexandrian.net

Note that this article contains a link to the archived WotC page with a free download of the "scandalous" original version.

 

[darjr]

Thanks for that!

I think I’m going to run it!

 

[Zardnaar]

It's understandable why the art was cut, and if she ignored a directive in order to do it it's not sexist.

1981 Satanic panic in a product aimed at kids I think it's understandable why the art was cut.

This doesn't excuse any other sexism that existed at the time but it was also 1981 it would be sexist by modern standards pretty much anywhere.

News report 1981 is sexist. Well duh.

In this case I don't think it is. If she wasn't given any direction if what they wanted yeah severe overreaction.
But if they were told to clean it up and she handed in that recalling the product is understandable. That would have cost money and would likely get you fired at a lot of places.

 

[dave2008]

It's understandable why the art was cut, and if she ignored a directive in order to do it it's not sexist.

1981 Satanic panic in a product aimed at kids I think it's understandable why the art was cut.

This doesn't excuse any other sexism that existed at the time but it was also 1981 it would be sexist by modern standards pretty much anywhere.

News report 1981 is sexist. Well duh.

In this case I don't think it is. If she wasn't given any direction if what they wanted yeah severe overreaction.
But if they were told to clean it up and she handed in that recalling the product is understandable. That would have cost money and would likely get you fired at a lot of places.

According to all the reports she asked for the art to be changed and was told no. So I think you have misunderstood something. That being said, the module was substantially rewritten too, so I think the whole story is a bit more complex.

 

[Zardnaar]

According to all the reports she asked for the art to be changed and was told no. So I think you have misunderstood something. That being said, the module was substantially rewritten too, so I think the whole story is a bit more complex.

I downloaded way back when WotC put it up for free.

It's not that good compared to the green cover the filkbin the blanks thing never caught on.

I may have wires crossed, others were saying she did it defying the directive from high.

 

[dave2008]

I downloaded way back when WotC put it up for free.

It's not that good compared to the green cover the filkbin the blanks thing never caught on.

I may have wires crossed, others were saying she did it defying the directive from high.

No worries. I just read the Alexandrian article (linked in another post above) about this module that was quite interesting. He makes a good argument that no one really knows exactly why it was recalled. However, the more interesting part he discusses is the non-art changes to the module and how the change it from a more sand-box adventure to train DMs to a linear one-shot adventure. I suggest taking a look.