Quote from: deadDMwalking;1108538Greyhawk is not fantasy Europe - or at least, not exclusively.  The Book of Artifacts is not set in a specific setting so could not be a proxy for Europe.

Yes it is. Stop being retarded. "Not exclusively". You make it sound like medieval Europe equals romanticized King Arthur tales instead of literally hundreds of distinct ethnic groups who all hate each other. Have you ever actually read a history book before..?

Quote from: jhkim;1108540Yup. tenbones mentioned the lesbian couple Lady Lord Yanseldara and Vaerana Hawklyn -- who date at least back to 1996 when they were featured in one of the Forgotten Realms novels ("The Veiled Dragon"), and possibly much earlier. They might have dated back to the 1987 Campaign Set. The Realms had supposedly been Greenwood's imaginary world since before role-playing in them -- like Tekumel for M.A.R. Barker.

Fair enough, but I still maintain him saying it is purely for marketing purposes. He surely didn't promote these notions when TSR was pumping out the FR trilogies by the millions. Tekumel has never been anything but upfront about its culture, and THAT is the entire reason I think a lot of us have issues with shoehorning all this bullshit into D&D. Tekumel has weird sex cults, matriarchs, non-Western traditions, etc. Zero issue with that, it's a game about a world based on Indian-inspired mythos. Greyhawk is a pseudo-European environment that borrows heavily from pulp swords-and-sorcery, so when you try to add all this ridiculous transgender crap as being 100% normal with zero repercussions, it makes no sense whatsoever. It's pandering to a small group of insanely vocal, hyper-militant people.

Quote from: deadDMwalking;1108504It doesn't have to be about you.  

I dunno, shouldn't it be about the people who are buying the actual books and therefore helping WotC profit from creating them?

Quote from: tenbones;1108537And now you make my point for me: THE VAST MAJORITY OF US ARE NOT L-G-B-or-T. I treat them like people with special interests, nothing more. I'm not obligated to buy into those interests. I fully accept many among them have chosen to form their own in-group. That in-group DOES NOT INCLUDE ME as it is dependent on inclinations I have *zero* amounts of. It makes perfect sense for someone to create a fictional setting representing the fantasies of that in-group to roleplay in with whatever conceits emerge from that. It doesn't mean I have to accept their interests inserted into things I consume that are already established.

I'm not LGBT either -- but when I create settings, I'll often include LGBT characters. Likewise, Ed Greenwood isn't LGBT as far as I know, but he created a setting with openly LGBT characters. Conversely, it's not like LGBT players and authors are restricted to only playing Blue Rose. They can and do play in Greyhawk, Deadlands, Amber, etc.

Quote from: tenbones;1108537Unfortunately for Ed, we'll never know what his table-version of the game was *supposed* to be. Nor do I hold Ed Greenwood up as some great arbiter of culture. I'm PERFECTLY fine with the idea of playing in Ed's libertine LGBT revisionist wonderland view of his setting - but there is a good reason that never came out of editorials in the early 80's when gaming was still relatively in its infancy.

Quote from: tenbones;1108537Want two gay gnome kings? Well create an adventure path where two gay gnomes form an actual army and conquer and establish a kingdom where they do the whole LGBT rights thing.

OK, so you're claiming that homosexuality is actually suppressed in the Realms, in contradiction to what Greenwood says. So any homosexual characters should have to struggle with the social rules against them. Do I understand that correctly?

As far as I know, the editing has never contradicted Ed's views of the Realms on this point. That is, it's possible that the editors at TSR may have toned down or edited out mentions of homosexuality from Greenwood's writing during the 1980s and 1990s -- but on the other hand, they've never inserted in anything saying that homosexuality is not tolerated, or that the values are otherwise different from his vision. And there have always been a scattering of same-sex couples like Hawklyn and Yanseldara. The modules not mentioning something doesn't mean that it doesn't exist in the setting, though. If TSR edited out mentions of pregnancy in their modules (which I suspect they did), I wouldn't presume that no one gets pregnant in the setting. I'd think that pregnancy exists in the setting, and the modules just weren't talking about it.

Quote from: jhkimYup. tenbones mentioned the lesbian couple Lady Lord Yanseldara and Vaerana Hawklyn -- who date at least back to 1996 when they were featured in one of the Forgotten Realms novels ("The Veiled Dragon"), and possibly much earlier. They might have dated back to the 1987 Campaign Set. The Realms had supposedly been Greenwood's imaginary world since before role-playing in them -- like Tekumel for M.A.R. Barker.

Quote from: Brad;1108547Fair enough, but I still maintain him saying it is purely for marketing purposes. He surely didn't promote these notions when TSR was pumping out the FR trilogies by the millions. Tekumel has never been anything but upfront about its culture, and THAT is the entire reason I think a lot of us have issues with shoehorning all this bullshit into D&D. Tekumel has weird sex cults, matriarchs, non-Western traditions, etc. Zero issue with that, it's a game about a world based on Indian-inspired mythos. Greyhawk is a pseudo-European environment that borrows heavily from pulp swords-and-sorcery, so when you try to add all this ridiculous transgender crap as being 100% normal with zero repercussions, it makes no sense whatsoever. It's pandering to a small group of insanely vocal, hyper-militant people.

I'm not disagreeing about Greyhawk - I don't offhand know what attitudes towards LGBT people are in Greyhawk, but I agree that they're probably closer to historical medieval.

But for Forgotten Realms, Greenwood *did* write in these notions even when TSR was pumping out FR trilogies. Some parts may have been veiled by editors, but it's still in there. Yanseldara and Hawklyn were unquestionably a lesbian couple. Elminster was changed into a woman for years by the goddess of magic, for example. Back then, actually, a lot of LGBT material wasn't subject to as much scrutiny as today - because there wasn't a spotlight on LGBT rights. So things like Elminster turning into Elmara, or Corellon Larethian being gender-fluid were viewed as weird fantasy rather than current politics.

I think the emphasis on LGBTQ representation is going to date RPG products (probably most pop culture products) like big hair and leg warmers dates stuff from the 80's.

Quote from: tenbones;1108509That means you could self-impregnate!!! Now THAT is how you fix the dwindling Elf-population problem in the Realms.

These arent Hollywood movie hermaprodites. :mad:

But. One has to assume that of the elf gets pregnant then they cant change to male. Either that or they have the ultimate contraceptive/abortion system.That alone should have the SJW cultists flipping out with the implications.

Quote from: SHARK;1108296Greetings!

What the hell is the stupid obsession with rape, and the constant posturing of "Rape Inclusion" or whatever as some kind of moral badge? In my campaigns, *Rape* is a pretty common and ordinary activity--for conquering armies, barbarian hordes, and mass assaults and invasions by wicked, evil humanoids. Much like the news, Bards and other people in the campaign world reference rape of various individuals as appropriate, or unfortunate populations, again as appropriate to the situation and events at hand.

Villainous characters also engage in rape, brutal torture, murder and sacrifice, among other horrific atrocities.

Do so many of you actually have *player characters* that go around raping women? In my campaigns, such activity would earn most such characters a villainous reputation, with a likely judicial or communal judgement of being executed, tortured, or maimed in some compacity. Conquering armies and bands of mercenaries would otherwise benefit from a somewhat different metric, depending on the nation, people, alignment, and culture--much like we see in our own historical records.

It's almost like some kind of taboo terminology with hushed, magical properties, whenever anyone even so much as mentions *Rape*. As I noted, such sensitive sensibilities would likely be severely triggered reading any of dozens, hundredsof historical books and accounts--as well as the Bible. In a dark, brutal and violent world, women are frequently raped as a matter of course. It's a trapping of being female throughout history in virtually every culture and time. In history, women are frequently raped. In a warlike fantasy world, women are likewise often subjected to rape, just like men are often brutally tortured and killed. Children are slaughtered, or enslaved. So what? It's a historically-flavoured fantasy game. Lots of terrible things happen, like being tortured, slaughtered by weapons, roasted alive by fire, or eaten by some horrifying monster.

In such a game for exmple, a player character might learn that their home village was conquered by an army of savage beastmen. Most everyone was slaughtered and eaten, while the women were raped and enslaved. NEXT?

Perhaps the player characters can investigate and discover if some of their female relatives or friends still live, and may be rescued? Whatever. Geesus. The whole triggering angst about the term being referenced is just stupid to me.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

This reminds me of a controversy about the novel Friday. The title character was
a: an artificial person
b: trained as a spy and courier.
c: involved in a life or death struggle.

Some guys captured her. In their line of work, they could have killed her and she would not have been surprised or really all that resentful. It was the way things were in her world. But they raped her. She didn't like it but she was, herself, a hardened killer and not a normal person. Later on, she forgave one of them.

The shit really flew. A man I knew who worked for years to help get a convicted (and guilty) murderer out of prison wrote an op ed about how horrible this was and what a bad example it was to girls.

Fuck all, Friday wasn't a role model. Normal readers felt sorry for her, while admiring some of her qualities. And rape isn't worse than murder.

Quote from: tenbones;1108543Are you implying the majority of Greyhawk is not clearly informed by European folklore, history, and mythology cribbed from American and European sci-fi and fantasy?

You do realize Greyhawk is D&D right? Titles, sovereign nomenclature, flora and fauna - even the supernatural variety. Pretty much majority European OR co-opted foreign things lensed by European folklore. Thats a mighty small pinhead you're dancing on.

We went over this months ago in a thread on now "racist" D&D is by not being "inclusive" enough and when it was pointed out some Greyhawk races are dark skinned the reaponse was "they arent dark enough!" and "they are really representing spanish or mediteranian races which dont count (except when the cultists want them too)

Quote from: jhkim;1108540Yup. tenbones mentioned the lesbian couple Lady Lord Yanseldara and Vaerana Hawklyn -- who date at least back to 1996 when they were featured in one of the Forgotten Realms novels ("The Veiled Dragon"), and possibly much earlier. They might have dated back to the 1987 Campaign Set. The Realms had supposedly been Greenwood's imaginary world since before role-playing in them -- like Tekumel for M.A.R. Barker.

No, they're not in the gray box. To the best of my knowledge, their first appearance is in 1990's Forgotten Realms Adventures, though it doesn't mention their sexuality. Vaerana is just described as Yanseldara's "deeply trusted companion, strong right arm, and former adventuring comrade", and they live together in the "Ladytowers". So readers could draw that conclusion, not draw that conclusion, or just ignore it because sexuality generally isn't a factor for most NPCs.

Quote from: Antiquation!;1108529"Well guys, I'm gonna turn in. I'll be in my tent, uh... meditating..."

Short rest?

Continuing reading through Tomb of Annihilation we come to a second instance. Leader of a thieves guild and his male right hand man and consort. This is at least a little more fleshed out than the first. But it is still just... there...

Here is another bemusing thing I notice in these modules... In each case the inclusion so far has been predominantly not good people. Or at best, ambiguous as to if they are good or bad. Haven't gotten back to Curse of Strahd yet but assume the gay revnant is on the good side?

Quote from: jhkimYup. tenbones mentioned the lesbian couple Lady Lord Yanseldara and Vaerana Hawklyn -- who date at least back to 1996 when they were featured in one of the Forgotten Realms novels ("The Veiled Dragon"), and possibly much earlier. They might have dated back to the 1987 Campaign Set. The Realms had supposedly been Greenwood's imaginary world since before role-playing in them -- like Tekumel for M.A.R. Barker.

Quote from: Pat;1108580No, they're not in the gray box. To the best of my knowledge, their first appearance is in 1990's Forgotten Realms Adventures, though it doesn't mention their sexuality. Vaerana is just described as Yanseldara's "deeply trusted companion, strong right arm, and former adventuring comrade", and they live together in the "Ladytowers". So readers could draw that conclusion, not draw that conclusion, or just ignore it because sexuality generally isn't a factor for most NPCs.

Huh, that seems pretty clear to me. I don't think it's modern political revisionism to say that Vaerana and Yanseldara are lesbian. I think they were always lesbian, and the module was just circumspect in talking about it in 1990.

Quote from: jhkim;1108586Huh, that seems pretty clear to me. I don't think it's modern political revisionism to say that Vaerana and Yanseldara are lesbian. I think they were always lesbian, and the module was just circumspect in talking about it in 1990.

They may or may not be.  No idea.  But it is modern literary criticism thinking that every description of a couple of same sex friends living in the same house is always veiled something else.  Likewise the idea you expressed earlier about characters not having children.  Historically, plenty of people had no particular interest in setting up a married household, with all that implied, but for a whole host of reasons found it convenient to share a house.  Were some of them homosexual or other things? I'm sure they were.  It made a great cover for them.  But this idea that every example of that type fits the modern preconceptions just isn't logical or consistent with the full portrayal of those societies.

Now Ed Greenwood being still alive and on the record, his particular example probably does fit the pattern you've set here.  I imagine quite a few written examples do, in games or otherwise.  More so than reality.

They were always lesbians in my long-term campaign that was actually set in Elversult. The degree to which it mattered was only in context at my table. I never took them to be "normal" representations of rulers - since obviously even back then they didn't overtly say it. But that's precisely why it only matters insofar as your games delve into such matters at the table.

Simply saying it and doing nothing with it in publication today is puerile or pandering (or both) in a setting where such things aren't the norm, where in 1990 it was edgy. The quality of the modern penchant for it is condescending in most cases, as Omega pointed out above, to anyone from the LGBT group with half a brain.

Quote from: jhkim;1108586Huh, that seems pretty clear to me. I don't think it's modern political revisionism to say that Vaerana and Yanseldara are lesbian. I think they were always lesbian, and the module was just circumspect in talking about it in 1990.

Why is that clear? All it says is they work together, they live in the same mansion, and they're friends. I agree they were probably always intended to be lesbian, but the text as written merely leaves open the possibility. That you assume it means they're clearly lesbians is you reading your own prejudices and assumptions into the text.

Quote from: Omega;1108579We went over this months ago in a thread on now "racist" D&D is by not being "inclusive" enough and when it was pointed out some Greyhawk races are dark skinned the reaponse was "they arent dark enough!" and "they are really representing spanish or mediteranian races which dont count (except when the cultists want them too)

yeah... "It's never enough".  I'm feeling victimized. I need those Asian Gnomes... STAT!

/reaches for his Emotional Support Tarrasque