D&D 5E (+)What Ubiquitous DnD Tropes Get It Totally Wrong?

[Son of the Serpent]

@Hussar Imo, due to an unhealthy level of obsession you are at this point assigning motives and biases to oofta to suit your needs and seeing things that just arent there. Imo, at this point you are mostly just self righteously bullying the dude. Clearly none of his intent is racist. But you gotta keep beating that dead horse. You dont want to see it that way though. You refuse to see it that way. Oh well. Im gonna move on to a different thread.

P.s. he is no where near the only one. In my estimation he is the worst offender at the time of this post but he is not the only signifficant example of this.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

As noted before, "free will" is a meaningless weasel word

But, it isn't. You can note it all you want, but it's false.

 

[Charlaquin]

Clearly none of his intent is racist.

How many times must it be said that intent has nothing to do with it? Intent is irrelevant.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

Despite the fact that the conversation went way off the reins, the talk of shamanistic cultures for orcs reminded me that Tolkien's orcs weren't representative of primitive humans or tribal cultures. They were inventors and builders, with a talent for industry and a penchant for environmental destruction, part of Tolkien's hate-boner for the industrialists who he believed had despoiled England and led to first World War I.

Now, why this got squeezed through a D&D lens to 'stupid, rampaging barbarians'? Well I don't think "hated Industralist" was a big thing in 1970s USA (In fact I think its a much more celebrated thing in American culture than elsewhere). But I do think orc pretty much got applied to the "Indian" template in "Cowboys and Indians"....

 

[Charlaquin]

Despite the fact that the conversation went way off the reins, the talk of shamanistic cultures for orcs reminded me that Tolkien's orcs weren't representative of primitive humans or tribal cultures. They were inventors and builders, with a talent for industry and a penchant for environmental destruction, part of Tolkien's hate-boner for the industrialists who he believed had despoiled England and led to first World War I.

Now, why this got squeezed through a D&D lens to 'stupid, rampaging barbarians'? Well I don't think "hated Industralist" was a big thing in 1970s USA (In fact I think its a much more celebrated thing in American culture than elsewhere). But I do think orc pretty much got applied to the "Indian" template in "Cowboys and Indians"....

Tolkien’s orcs were certainly not “primitive” or tribal, no. But they were an inherently evil ”race,” which is a bunk concept rooted in institutionalized racism, and he also described their appearance as “degraded and repulsive versions of the (to Europeans) least lovely Mongol-types”

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

Every keep or big city always has military around as if in war times.
The numbers of professional soldiers are far to high, in reality a knights castle would have half a dozen professional fighters at most during peace times. The other personnel would be recruited from the local farmers.
Same in cities, during peace times they would have two dozen or so watchmen, militia would be formed by arming the citizens if needed.
The way it is done would be far to expensive, since soldiers in peace times would cost much gold without being productive.

Which makes me think of a misconception of a different kind: D&D campaigns and other heroic fantasy adventures do not take place in the European Middle Ages and do not have to use history as a blueprint.

 

[Lanefan]

Depends on the setting, really. At any rate, all humanoids have something in common that human-looking outsiders do not: they are all native to the material plane.

This is where definitions get messy, as D&D uses 'humanoid' as something of a keyword to represent a particular subset of monsters.

Meanwhile there's various other monsters which meet the real-world definition of humanoid (which is to say, roughly human-shaped with the right number of legs and arms and so forth, and no obvious extra bits such as wings or tails) but which aren't counted as humanoid by the game. The Gith would be one such. Medusa would be another, in some versions.

 

[FlyingChihuahua]

Which makes me think of a misconception of a different kind: D&D campaigns and other heroic fantasy adventures do not take place in the European Middle Ages and do not have to use history as a blueprint.

And thus, they have problems that medieval societies didn't have to deal with, like manticores.

 

[Hussar]

And, that, boys and girls, is why it has taken the better part of half a century for fantasy as a genre to catch up to the rest of the world. Oh, it's not such a big deal. We shouldn't worry about it too much. So what if we are perpetuating stereotypes that led to some of the most horrid episodes in history. It's all just part of the fun right?

For a hobby that prides itself on imagination and being aware of aliens and "others", sometimes I really despair over how conservative and stuck in a rut fantasy fans really are.

 

[Hussar]

This is where definitions get messy, as D&D uses 'humanoid' as something of a keyword to represent a particular subset of monsters.

Meanwhile there's various other monsters which meet the real-world definition of humanoid (which is to say, roughly human-shaped with the right number of legs and arms and so forth, and no obvious extra bits such as wings or tails) but which aren't counted as humanoid by the game. The Gith would be one such. Medusa would be another, in some versions.

In 5e D&D, Gith are humanoids. Medusa are not, but, that's largely because of the gaze attack and the fact, in 5e anyway, they are the results of a curse, not an actual created race. They sold their souls to powerful outsiders for beauty and were eventually transformed into medusa. At least, that's the 5e interpretation.

Note, in 3e, medusa were considered "monstrous humanoids", so, it does depend on which edition you want to look at.