Funny Events of the "Woke" world

[Zykon TheLich]

Oh yeah, but that's what would make the topic fun, talking about weird sidequests and plotlines that involve that sort of thing.

Well, vaguely related, that somehow reminds me of one of the very few DnD sessions I played back in the early 90's. A girl in my grungey/metaller/rocker social circle, who quite frankly looking back I'm sure was one of those 30 year olds that somehow blagged their way back into secondary school, played a mage by the name of Gaginon Haucecox (spelling perhaps not 100% correct). Gaginon was an old man. He lived up to his name.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Well, vaguely related, that somehow reminds me of one of the very few DnD sessions I played back in the early 90's. A girl in my grungey/metaller/rocker social circle, who quite frankly looking back I'm sure was one of those 30 year olds that somehow blagged their way back into secondary school, played a mage by the name of Gaginon Haucecox (spelling perhaps not 100% correct). Gaginon was an old man. He lived up to his name.

I say neigh to that particular plotline.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

OK. So they posted their homebrew rules here? Or are we transplanting an RPG.net thread to R&P for some reason that I can't quite fathom?

EDIT: I guess maybe "wheelchair = disability = woke" so that's the connection?

Worse: they made a book with some redesigned dungeons and stories where guys like orcs weren't automatically the bad guys and that says something about society, you know? And nothing good

 

[Silvanus]

Outside of the initial response, how the US response terrible? The US followed the "scientific consensus".

It didn't, though. Doing what you think is right is not the same thing.

The US half-assed almost all of its responses, from testing to quarantine guidelines to lockdowns. Then it rushed to end restrictions ASAP for the sake of business income. It provided inadequate support for the effected, both people and businesses, meaning that people were pressured to go back to work when sick. And then we have the idiocy of leaving the provision of vital equipment to the goddammit inter-state free market bidding war.

You'll notice the US experienced a worse infection rate and mortality rate than most other developed countries, by far. This from the wealthiest country on earth?

Sweden's main fuckup was not protecting the vulnerable early on.

Yes, that would be the main one. Pretty fucking major fuckup. The other Scandinavian countries had a superior early response, yet you never cite them, because they don't play into your "no restrictions" narrative.

Nope, zero actual good evidence that masks work, same with lockdowns. In fact, I don't think there exists a single paper that says lockdowns provided more benefits than harms.

Blah blah blah, same old broken record.

 

[Zykon TheLich]

I say neigh to that particular plotline.

Are you saying that 15 year old girls (probably 35) pretending to be old men with a thing for sucking horse dicks aren't something you're into?

Worse: they made a book with some redesigned dungeons and stories where guys like orcs weren't automatically the bad guys and that says something about society, you know? And nothing good

Slightly relevent:

"The Orks are the pinnacle of creation. For them, the great struggle is won. They have evolved a society which knows no stress or angst. Who are we to judge them? We Eldar who have failed, or the Humans, on the road to ruin in their turn? And why? Because we sought answers to questions that an Ork wouldn't even bother to ask! We see a culture that is strong and despise it as crude. (Uthan the Perverse, controvertial Eldar philosopher)"

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Are you saying that 15 year old girls (probably 35) pretending to be old men with a thing for sucking horse dicks aren't something you're into?



Slightly relevent:

"The Orks are the pinnacle of creation. For them, the great struggle is won. They have evolved a society which knows no stress or angst. Who are we to judge them? We Eldar who have failed, or the Humans, on the road to ruin in their turn? And why? Because we sought answers to questions that an Ork wouldn't even bother to ask! We see a culture that is strong and despise it as crude. (Uthan the Perverse, controvertial Eldar philosopher)"

As a GM

- YouTube

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[Ag3ma]

You do realize when you post a paper or something, I don't just look up the person that did it and find some conflict of interest or bias and dismiss the paper. When have I ever done that? You constantly do that. You don't give any reasons why it's wrong.

Firstly, this is gross hypocrisy, because you can't even explain why they're right in the first place.

You spend a minute or two Googling to splurge something - anything - irrespective of quality and without even rudimentary checks, and expect everyone else to devote hours into debunking it. Do you not see the problem here? This is how bullshit wins arguments, because it's much easier and faster to throw misinformation than disprove. The thing about information, and even science, is that you can find someone saying pretty much anything. You can post studies showing that homeopathy or prayer cures diseases if you want, and that's an important context when you dump a paper claiming ivermectin protects you from covid, "prove me wrong". It's disrespectful to others to impose this sort of burden on them whilst only putting in a tiny fraction of that effort yourself.

I would remind you of the huge amounts of time I put into crappy sources you've presented, because honestly I looked through and analyzed quite a lot of them back in 2020/21- which you've now conveniently erased from your memory. Do you know what you've done much of the time: you have ignored that analysis and carried on misrepresenting them, based on nothing but sheer ignorance and unwillingness to admit error. I got pissed off bothering over 2 years ago. I'm not feeling well disposed to put in that kind of time in now either.

Because you don't actually understand much, really all your arguments boil down to "X said Y". That's not the end of the world, as long as you properly examine the bona fides of the people saying it and the wider context of debate - for instance why "scientific consensus" is useful. The problem is that you haven't even done that. For instance, Marty Makary is not a reliable source and patently never was: where he was right, it was pretty much more luck than insight. And where you have leaned on real experts like Paul Offitt, you've been awfully selective in what you've chosen to take from them.

There's a huge amount of data out there, and there have to be ways of filtering it. Who has written something, their reputation, their associations, and their track record is a simple "first pass" to remove likely junk. If any of it does turn out to be useful, it'll be cited in other work and you can haul it back out of the discard pile.

How don't you get this? When you doing an intervention for anything, you have to prove it works first!

Okay, thought experiment time.

A new respiratory disease emerges which has similar infectiousness to covid, no vaccine exists, and it kills 50% of those infected. Are you still going to tell me the government can't order lockdowns and mask mandates, because they aren't proven to work? (Actually, I bet at that point everyone would stay at home as much as possible and wear a mask without the government even having to tell them.)

Hey, there you are unfortunately having to do some shopping - socially distanced, naturally - and some guy is walking round maskless, potentially breathing out a 50% chance death sentence for everyone else in the store. Would you feel comfortable shopping in that store, with that guy who thinks masks aren't proven to work and no-one should be allowed to make him use one? Are you truly willing to bet your life on it?

 

[Eacaraxe]

This entire tangent about whether wheelchairs contextually make sense in these different fantasy settings is scarcely relevant, because we're talking about an IP that allows for an enormous amount of creator/DM licence and flexibility to create the scenarios they want to see. It's an IP that accommodates homebrew, even. It is not supposed to be rigidly prescriptive. Bast almighty, the whole conversation flies in the face of the spirit of the IP.

It's more "here's this whole-ass fantasy setting full of Whatever You Want to Do, and you opt for a...wheelchair?". And then proceed to act as if it's the dawn of some new golden age of inclusivity, and all before were ignorant, hateful grognards to either bring to enlightenment or leave behind, and you deserve plaudits from all corners of the internet for...doing shit that's already been done for decades.

​

Literally one of the first D&D iconic characters, and quite possibly the most famous D&D iconic ever. Dragons of Autumn Twilight came out in '84, seven months after DL1: Dragons of Despair. Oh, and he's SEVERELY physically disabled. His disability and overcoming it isn't just the centerpiece of his personal narrative as it isn't just a challenge but directly informs his ambition and love-hate relationship with his twin brother, but heavily includes two other characters (Caramon and Kitiara).

And none of it stemmed from a player wanting to be Stunning and Brave, and expecting blowjobs and birthday parties for his Stunning Bravery. Terry Phillips biffed his stat and HP rolls, and went with it.

The Johnny-come-lately evangelism and brazen revisionism of the hobby are the problem.

Is there an actual decent argument anywhere in that tedious infodump?

Already retreating to the same tired Danth's law-adjacent nonsense?

...my contention that you were underselling that item's raw utility...

Again, this is whether that your premise (flight is game-changingly powered) is sound. It is not.

I wanted to talk more about trans people in D&D though

I think a more interesting topic is whether or not trans-ness would emerge as a distinct social and political identity in the Realms, in the first place. It's a fantasy setting which lacks a patriarchy per se, and gendered prejudices and discrimination aren't terribly widespread, but at the same time biological sex-altering spells and items are comparatively common and their use isn't subject to judgment in most regions.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

I think a more interesting topic is whether or not trans-ness would emerge as a distinct social and political identity in the Realms, in the first place. It's a fantasy setting which lacks a patriarchy per se, and gendered prejudices and discrimination aren't terribly widespread, but at the same time biological sex-altering spells and items are comparatively common and their use isn't subject to judgment in most regions.

See I made this conversation pages ago, but nobody read it. Sadge.

 

[Eacaraxe]

See I made this conversation pages ago, but nobody read it. Sadge.

Hold on I got this.

Trans identity wouldn't exist in Faerun.​

Okay, now we'll get a conversation about it and someone around here will finally, suddenly, remember how common magic is on Toril.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

"The Orks are the pinnacle of creation. For them, the great struggle is won. They have evolved a society which knows no stress or angst. Who are we to judge them? We Eldar who have failed, or the Humans, on the road to ruin in their turn? And why? Because we sought answers to questions that an Ork wouldn't even bother to ask! We see a culture that is strong and despise it as crude. (Uthan the Perverse, controvertial Eldar philosopher)"

Fucken Eldar... "Oh, the humans are terrible because they're susceptible to Chaos"... and just who was it that murder-fucked a Chaos God into existence?

 

[Asita]

Again, this is whether that your premise (flight is game-changingly powered) is sound. It is not.

He says with no self awareness of the fact that his rationale for dismissing out of hand the spit-balled scenarios are that those scenarios were not redesigned to counter the advantages provided by flight, and therefore argued that failure to do so necessarily translated only to "bad campaign planning". Never mind how if we're using that kind of argument, it can be thrown back - with roughly as much validity - at the item he was objecting to in the first place.

Let me be clear on something here, Eacaraxe: I can fully respect and be on-board with crimson5phoenix's position that - and I quote - "if they showed me the specific wheelchair that this whole argument was over... I'd say they'd get something like that around level 10, not starting out with it. And probably with a couple of nerfs to it." As I've said several times now - and you have pointedly ignored every time - I agree that that specific wheelchair has too much going on under the hood. What I cannot respect is you insisting that items like the Broom of Flying are any more reasonable for low level play out of what reads to me very much like familiarity bias. I do not see the broom as a more valid low-level alternative, rather I put it in roughly the same ballpark.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

It's more "here's this whole-ass fantasy setting full of Whatever You Want to Do, and you opt for a...wheelchair?". And then proceed to act as if it's the dawn of some new golden age of inclusivity, and all before were ignorant, hateful grognards to either bring to enlightenment or leave behind, and you deserve plaudits from all corners of the internet for...doing shit that's already been done for decades.

View attachment 9308​

Literally one of the first D&D iconic characters, and quite possibly the most famous D&D iconic ever. Dragons of Autumn Twilight came out in '84, seven months after DL1: Dragons of Despair. Oh, and he's SEVERELY physically disabled. His disability and overcoming it isn't just the centerpiece of his personal narrative as it isn't just a challenge but directly informs his ambition and love-hate relationship with his twin brother, but heavily includes two other characters (Caramon and Kitiara).

And none of it stemmed from a player wanting to be Stunning and Brave, and expecting blowjobs and birthday parties for his Stunning Bravery. Terry Phillips biffed his stat and HP rolls, and went with it.

The Johnny-come-lately evangelism and brazen revisionism of the hobby are the problem.

I swear to you, the vast majority look at this book and go "oh, that's neat" and move the fuck on.

Like, aren't you standing here proving them right about the wheelchairs? Because how fucking dare some random person even *suggest* such a thing and say so publically? Who the fuck are they to even *dare*

 

[Terminal Blue]

I think a more interesting topic is whether or not trans-ness would emerge as a distinct social and political identity in the Realms, in the first place. It's a fantasy setting which lacks a patriarchy per se, and gendered prejudices and discrimination aren't terribly widespread, but at the same time biological sex-altering spells and items are comparatively common and their use isn't subject to judgment in most regions.

In 5e, they very explicitly state that you shouldn't feel constrained in any way by the gender binary when making characters, so yeah.. pretty much anything goes. There used to be a statement to the effect that some elves were born hermaphroditic in emulation of Corellon Larethian, although they seem to have dropped that from newer printings as real life intersexed people sometimes are sometimes referred to as hermaphrodites, which is incorrect and offensive.

Personally, I'd imagine gender in any given D&D setting is at least as diverse as it is in the real world. Orcs have generally been depicted as an explicitly patriarchal society, for example, while drow are explicitly matriarchal.

I don't see why there wouldn't be trans people in D&D, both in terms of people who use magic to literally change their appearance and people who just live socially as another sex to the one assigned to them at birth. Historically, it was a bit of a thing for people assigned as women to disguise themselves and live as men in order to escape the limitations placed on them within a patriarchal society, but if you dig a little deeper there's often clear evidence that they were experiencing what we would call gender dysphoria or actively saw themselves as their acquired gender. Those kinds of feelings are actually pretty ubiquitous in human societies in much the same way as same sex attraction.

 

[Satinavian]

Worse: they made a book with some redesigned dungeons and stories where guys like orcs weren't automatically the bad guys and that says something about society, you know? And nothing good

But that was utterly intentional. I mean, D&d had regularly stuff like that before and no one cared.

But this time WotC marketed this as some new direction. It was them that plastered that flimsy connection over all social media, interviews and various other outlets. They wanted to be perceived as woke. Of course only to sell a new, better edition/ or a revision.

And of course they got the same kind of backlash they got every single time when disparaging their earlier offers to sell the new one. Not quite as bad as the tiefling/gnome thing at 4E, but similar. Only this time with culture war framing. The problem was less the "the new D&D is woke" part of the statement but painting the old versions, beloved by their many fans, as the opposite.

I would guess that was actually intentional. They wanted to get the publicity and involve the D&D brand in "woke"-controversities. Because considering how much of this nonsense came over official channels and statements and how little the player community actually cared, that can't have been incidental.

Of course hardly anything actually changed. Eberron orks have not been really bad guys since Eberron was a thing. Slightly off color Drow have been common in illustrations for decades. And "Custom Lineage" is a balancing thing. Nothing of substance was modified and, at least in D&D forums, people did not care much. Not like when they did the OGL thing, that was what an angry fandom actually looks like.



As for gender and sexuality, D&D hardly talks about it at all. And even less than in the earliest versions. That is a topic they seem to deem to dangerous and don't want to be associated with at all. I mean, sure, the BoeF-controversy is some time ago but it is not as if they reversed course here. Several other big publishers are far more open to it.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

But that was utterly intentional. I mean, D&d had regularly stuff like that before and no one cared.

But this time WotC marketed this as some new direction. It was them that plastered that flimsy connection over all social media, interviews and various other outlets. They wanted to be perceived as woke. Of course only to sell a new, better edition/ or a revision.

And of course they got the same kind of backlash they got every single time when disparaging their earlier offers to sell the new one. Not quite as bad as the tiefling/gnome thing at 4E, but similar. Only this time with culture war framing. The problem was less the "the new D&D is woke" part of the statement but painting the old versions, beloved by their many fans, as the opposite.

I would guess that was actually intentional. They wanted to get the publicity and involve the D&D brand in "woke"-controversities. Because considering how much of this nonsense came over official channels and statements and how little the player community actually cared, that can't have been incidental.

And I desperately want nerds to stop fucking biting. Because that article that Ear posted way back didn't say "this is just stuff people did all the time way back when anyway" it said "and now D&D is the wokes and is destroying culture"

Let the cringy corpo-speak be cringy corpo-speak without turning it into a goddamn culture war. Stop trying to justify flame wars over fan kit

 

[Satinavian]

And I desperately want nerds to stop fucking biting.

Well, yes.

But honestly, did the nerds even bite this time ?
Disregarding all the corporate pieces and media reporting about it, was there really a huge controversity ? I am pretty sure, there was none in any of the roleplaying communities i am part of. I have seen a single guy in a forum complain, but he hardly got answers. There was some discussion about Tashas custom lineages, but that was about the mechanics, completely disregarding the culture war angle.

Sure, you can probably find some idiots on twitter being outraged (well, you always can). And culture warriors who are not involved in D&D had to say their piece about it as well. But i have not gotten the impression that this got much traction in the circles it was meant for.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Well, yes.

But honestly, did the nerds even bite this time ?
Disregarding all the corporate pieces and media reporting about it, was there really a huge controversity ? I am pretty sure, there was none in any of the roleplaying communities i am part of. I have seen a single guy in a forum complain, but he hardly got answers. There was some discussion about Tashas custom lineages, but that was about the mechanics, completely disregarding the culture war angle.

Sure, you can probably find some idiots on twitter being outraged (well, you always can). And culture warriors who are not involved in D&D had to say their piece about it as well. But i have not gotten the impression that this got much traction in the circles it was meant for.

I agree entirely. Which is why I'm pissed off that it made its way *here*. Generally speaking, I think this forum is better than that

 

[Silvanus]

It's more "here's this whole-ass fantasy setting full of Whatever You Want to Do, and you opt for a...wheelchair?". And then proceed to act as if it's the dawn of some new golden age of inclusivity, and all before were ignorant, hateful grognards to either bring to enlightenment or leave behind, and you deserve plaudits from all corners of the internet for...doing shit that's already been done for decades.

Dude, literally nobody here is acting like that. The only person who's incessantly trying to link this to culture war shit and getting super-aggressive about this is you.

 

[Baffle]

Literally one of the first D&D iconic characters, and quite possibly the most famous D&D iconic ever. Dragons of Autumn Twilight came out in '84, seven months after DL1: Dragons of Despair. Oh, and he's SEVERELY physically disabled. His disability and overcoming it isn't just the centerpiece of his personal narrative as it isn't just a challenge but directly informs his ambition and love-hate relationship with his twin brother, but heavily includes two other characters (Caramon and Kitiara).

Is Raistlin severely physically disabled? It's been a long, long time since I read these books (I was a child, which was ages ago) but I was of the impression he's just pretty weak and coughs a lot. Gives strong 'people with disabilities are jealous of you and will turn to evil' vibes, whereas Caramon is pretty inside and outside.