TSR Running list of potential problematic issues in TSR era DnD

[Sacrosanct]

Pantheons of gods and priests who only worship one deity.

Oh! That’s a good one. It certainly seems that all references to a clerics deity infers or outright states they worship only one deity whom they get their powers from. Never really caught that before, but it seems so obvious now that you mention it

 

[teitan]

Oh! That’s a good one. It certainly seems that all references to a clerics deity infers or outright states they worship only one deity whom they get their powers from. Never really caught that before, but it seems so obvious now that you mention it

There is an issue with this? really? I mean Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Atenism, even some "pagan" religions are monotheistic. Is it no longer acceptable to be a monotheistic?

 

[ccs]

There is an issue with this? really? I mean Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Atenism, even some "pagan" religions are monotheistic. Is it no longer acceptable to be a monotheistic?

Additionally the character could just have attracted the notice/patronage of one of the gods of a pantheon.....
That doesn't seem at all out of character for many of the Greek gods. There's all sorts of stories where they picked sides, favorites, etc.

 

[Zardnaar]

Additionally the character could just have attracted the notice/patronage of one of the gods of a pantheon.....
That doesn't seem at all out of character for many of the Greek gods. There's all sorts of stories where they picked sides, favorites, etc.

They also had temples and oracles dedicated to specific deities. Hell (hades) some places were famous for it such as Delphi.

 

[ccs]

They also had temples and oracles dedicated to specific deities. Hell (hades) some places were famous for it such as Delphi.

Exactly.
And I presume other polytheistic cultures had similar for their deities. Greek is just the one that comes to mind 1st.

 

[Zardnaar]

Exactly.
And I presume other polytheistic cultures had similar for their deities. Greek is just the one that comes to mind 1st.

Yeah Delphi probably the most famous but each major deity and a few minor ones had specific sites.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

Nothing is wrong with it per se. I was actually quite impressed by it. But if I were a little more aware at the time, I would have had it as an African warrior in traditional dress. To show more diversity not just with the ethnicity of the character, but in the culture as well.

I see your point, but... if you depict a XYZ warrior wearing XYZ traditional dress... while fighting an undead monstrosity, you'd need to make sure that mechanically, the XYZ dress has the same mechanical protection than the full plate. Because if there is a difference, wearing anything except than the best available armor in the picture makes the XYZ warrior look less advanced, which is also something you'd want to avoid.

When I look at the second picture, I see people who lack any metalworking technology to make armor, fighting with an obsidian-incrusted wooden club instead of more modern weapons... It evokes stone age fighters. So unless the macuahuitl has the same stats as a greatsword and the traditional dress is worth a steel armor, beware of unwantingly reinforcing stereotype of "meso-americans = less advanced".


BTW, both pictures are great art.

 

[Mecheon]

Let's just dive right into to the real problems.

The Wallara. Called "Chameleon men", you'd think, hey, might be like, a chameleon lizard-man, right? Nah. Artwork just, had them as Aboriginal Australians. Like, I think even TSR realised these ones were bad as they came back as lizardmen later and haven't been seen since.
There was also another group of blatently Aboriginal Australian derived people in Ravenloft in the Nightmare Lands or wherever it was and I recall them being pretty "Okay, that's dumb"

Oh, and don't forget the old mainstay of Drums on Fire Mountain which I will just put the name down and back away very swiftly from because oh BOY is that one A Problematic Thing.

 

[Zardnaar]

I see your point, but... if you depict a XYZ warrior wearing XYZ traditional dress... while fighting an undead monstrosity, you'd need to make sure that mechanically, the XYZ dress has the same mechanical protection than the full plate. Because if there is a difference, wearing anything except than the best available armor in the picture makes the XYZ warrior look less advanced, which is also something you'd want to avoid.

When I look at the second picture, I see people who lack any metalworking technology to make armor, fighting with an obsidian-incrusted wooden club instead of more modern weapons... It evokes stone age fighters. So unless the macuahuitl has the same stats as a greatsword and the traditional dress is worth a steel armor, beware of unwantingly reinforcing stereotype of "meso-americans = less advanced".


BTW, both pictures are great art.

In 5E light armor is just as good as heavy for the most part. Slight difference in AC has other advantages.

There's no rules for stone material.

 

[Lanefan]

Pantheons of gods and priests who only worship one deity.

Nothing wrong with that - the modern analogy is there being a whole league of teams and yet you only cheer for one.

EDIT to add: and the reason a cleric only worships one deity is because that's the deity who provides her with her spells every day!