D&D Movie/TV Why is the media overstating how controversial the Druid's Owlbear shape is?

[Henadic Theologian]

Can you point to any sites? I thought that had died down right after the initial trailer came out. I'm not even seeing the clickbaity headlines.

But also I have a whole lot of sites blocked on Google News because they're just content mills grinding out clickbait headlines and cranked out text to try to get ad clicks. So I might not be seeing a lot of them now.

Though if this story is coming back up again on legit geek news sites then it's probably a sign that Paramount's marketing folks are trying to do whatever they can to get people talking about the movie. Getting folks to argue on twitter about a movie is actually considered to be a good thing by movie marketers - it's much better than people not talking about it at all.

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Directors Address Owlbear Controversy

The directors of Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves have explained why their movie's druid [...]

www.google.com

1 Detail Fixes Honor Among Thieves' Biggest D&D Complaint

The owlbear isn't actually a problem.

screenrant.com

Part of this might be the fault of the directors bringing it up in their Director Commentary Breakdown of the second trailer not realizing this had resolved itself months.

 

[Maxperson]

Lke seriously when the first trailer came out folks pointed out that with PHB rules Druids can't wildshape into Owlbears, others pointed out that WotC will likely solve this by making Owbears beasts in the future and/or an Owlbear subclass for Druids or even just point to the optional Druid rules in Tasha's, and then no one was bothered (even saying bothered is an overstatement, it was more like it was noticed then anyone really got angry about it).

Yet we are still getting articles on this as if fans really care that much about it.

The media has a deep seated need to exaggerate or outright lie(via headlines) about what articles are about in order to make money.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Lke seriously when the first trailer came out folks pointed out that with PHB rules Druids can't wildshape into Owlbears, others pointed out that WotC will likely solve this by making Owbears beasts in the future and/or an Owlbear subclass for Druids or even just point to the optional Druid rules in Tasha's, and then no one was bothered (even saying bothered is an overstatement, it was more like it was noticed then anyone really got angry about it).

Yet we are still getting articles on this as if fans really care that much about it.

Who is "the media" in this case? Is this on the front page of the New York Times? Does it lead Fox News?

EDIT: Oh, Screenrant and Comicbook.com. This feels like a self-inflicted wound, @Henadic Theologian. Don't read garbage websites.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The media has a deep seated need to exaggerate or outright lie(via headlines) about what articles are about in order to make money.

Outright lies lead to lawsuits that the media loses. You are listening to someone else who is, in fact, exaggerating or lying to you about this.

 

[Jer]

Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Directors Address Owlbear Controversy

The directors of Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves have explained why their movie's druid [...]

www.google.com

1 Detail Fixes Honor Among Thieves' Biggest D&D Complaint

The owlbear isn't actually a problem.

screenrant.com

Ok, yeah, both of those fit my criteria of clickbait. ComicBook I blocked ages ago because there was a week where literally nothing that was showing up in my feed was anything but headlines looking to generate hateclicks so I blocked them. The only reason I don't have Screen Rant blocked is because I like the Pitch Meetings skits

Part of this might be the fault of the directors bringing it up in their Director Commentary Breakdown of the second trailer not realizing this had resolved itself months.

Ah - no that's likely on purpose. The directors all know that getting geeks to argue about "controversial" fan stuff like this gets them free publicity without really any downside. It's much better than folks talking about the movie for actual controversial reasons that could lead to real repercussions.

 

[Maxperson]

Outright lies lead to lawsuits that the media loses. You are listening to someone else who is, in fact, exaggerating or lying to you about this.

Ohio man shot dead by police while cleaning out late grandmother’s home

Joe Frasure, 28, was fatally shot by officers in the city of Wyoming on 30 January

www.independent.co.uk

That headline is a lie. This is a pet peeve of mine. Often I read an article only to find out while reading it that the headline is just plain deceptive.

 

[CleverNickName]

Here's my house-rule for druids who can wildshape into owlbears.

Spoiler

In this campaign, druids can wildshape into owlbears. Use the stats for a brown bear, but describe it as having the head and beak of an owl.

 

[jasper]

Here my response for the owlbear thingy. DM Squeeze or DM Mom made them allow it.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Ohio man shot dead by police while cleaning out late grandmother’s home

Joe Frasure, 28, was fatally shot by officers in the city of Wyoming on 30 January

www.independent.co.uk

That headline is a lie. This is a pet peeve of mine. Often I read an article only to find out while reading it that the headline is just plain deceptive.

The Independent is a garbage website. The UK media scene is extremely weird, but the good news is that you only have to pay attention to maybe one or two outlets there as a result. The rest are worse than American supermarket tabloids (and are owned by the same people in many cases).

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The whole owlbear wildshape thing is weird on so many levels, starting with why aren't owlbears beasts to begin with? That feels like the original sin here. They don't breathe fire. They don't have some sort of specialized sonic attack. They're essentially normal animals that evolved differently in a fantasy universe or A Wizard Did It.

I'm with the movie folks on this one. It's stupid for a druid not to be able to shapeshift into an owlbear (doing so is a big part of druidic identity in World of Warcraft, for instance, which millions of more people are familiar with than D&D druid wildshaping) and it should be changed in 1D&D, either by changing the owlbear's type, loosening up the wildshaping rules, or both.