Quote from: Chris24601;1060064Unfortunately, it is still relevant and matters to me because there are three gamers in my area, one or more of whom always end up in games I play in, who consider Dragonlance to be awesome and who regularly want to play Kender and Tinker Gnomes (and play halflings and regular gnomes as them when they can't).

Anything I can provide that makes them feel ashamed of wanting to play such dumbass things (or make the GM come down hard on allowing them into his game out of a desire to give the players something they want) is a win in my book.

You can't make an idiot feel ashamed for liking something that sucks. For example, look how ineffective people have been at trying to shame me for liking 4e.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;1060080You can't make an idiot feel ashamed for liking something that sucks. For example, look how ineffective people have been at trying to shame me for liking 4e.

LOL. You and me both. :cool:

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4E like other editions of D&D had it merits and flaws. Why no enjoy more than one version of D&D.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;1060080You can't make an idiot feel ashamed for liking something that sucks. For example, look how ineffective people have been at trying to shame me for liking 4e.

The only problem with this statement is that 4e is an objectively good game.

Maybe not "great" "D&D". But the game itself is fantastic and WotC had to crit fail in a lot of different ways for 4e to flop like it did. (Marketing, licensing to incentives people like Paizo to keep supporting 3e, etc.)

Quote from: fearsomepirate;1060048No, I'm saying that it's absurd to examine the socio-political implications of the two-dimensional characters in a trash-tier novel by a hack author, who cranked them out like clockwork in order to harvest burger-flipping income from the pockets of teen boys. You shouldn't pretend this crap matters for any longer than it takes the self-important, Marxist dork in charge of your college lit class to give you an 'A'.

Is that what you were saying?  Why didn't you say so earlier and at least make it clear that you didn't actually bother to read the post you were responding to?

Quote from: Dracones;1060054You're making an assumption that the popularity of gaming is partly due the removal of certain content we see today as "problematic". I haven't particularly seen that, and I'm not really sure how that would even be measured. The one large event where I did personally see a massive influx of women into the hobby was Vampire the Masquerade. I don't recall the material for that game being any more inclusive than D&D 2e. If anything it touched on darker subjects. IMO, the reason why Vampire worked was it tapped into interests of women at the time(gothic punk was big, Anne Rice was cool and there was an explosion of authors like Poppy Z Brite writing that genre of material).

Absolutely TTRPG VtM brought a lot of women into the hobby, albeit I'd argue that the LARP was maybe an even bigger pull for them (i.e. via women already playing the game). But the rise in popularity of TTRPGs with women in the past few years can't easily be sourced to VtM.

And while I agree that measurement is hard, it's not impossible. At the last RolePlay Rally I attended, I was one of two guys on a table of eight including the DM, a first for me in 40 years of (convention TT D&D) gaming. We had a blast, as expected.
When we went to the bar after our one-shot I chatted briefly with a group of the ladies, asked how they got into the hobby, what made an event like this attractive to them etc. Their stories were individual, but the themes were similar, chiefly that 5e resonated with them and that they felt welcome.

Now I give more credit to the convention organizer than the WOTC Art Director, but it's not a zero-sum game. All these things add up over time. That's anecdotal, of course, but it also rings true with every online space I come across. Something is different, and it is the culture, as much as it is the game material itself.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;1060080You can't make an idiot feel ashamed for liking something that sucks. For example, look how ineffective people have been at trying to shame me for liking 4e.

Quote from: S'mon;1060082LOL. You and me both. :cool:

Quote from: Rhedyn;1060084The only problem with this statement is that 4e is an objectively good game.

Maybe not "great" "D&D". But the game itself is fantastic and WotC had to crit fail in a lot of different ways for 4e to flop like it did. (Marketing, licensing to incentives people like Paizo to keep supporting 3e, etc.)

Put me down for number four in favor of this position.

A lot of my work in creating my own system has been in taking the best parts of 4E (tactical combat, interesting martial classes, choices to make about your character every time they level up) and melding them with a more sandbox type setup (among other things... less extreme level scaling so large numbers of lower level opponents can remain a threat, replacing narrative triggers with real time ones and completely decoupling wealth/expected gear from level advancement).

Quote from: Motorskills;1060091And while I agree that measurement is hard, it's not impossible. At the last RolePlay Rally I attended, I was one of two guys on a table of eight including the DM, a first for me in 40 years of (convention TT D&D) gaming. We had a blast, as expected.
When we went to the bar after our one-shot I chatted briefly with a group of the ladies, asked how they got into the hobby, what made an event like this attractive to them etc. Their stories were individual, but the themes were similar, chiefly that 5e resonated with them and that they felt welcome.

Now I give more credit to the convention organizer than the WOTC Art Director, but it's not a zero-sum game. All these things add up over time. That's anecdotal, of course, but it also rings true with every online space I come across. Something is different, and it is the culture, as much as it is the game material itself.

I think the anecdotal is fine for a lot of this stuff. I'm not sure how you'd do a proper study on it. I'd be interested in what aspects of the culture of 5E brought them in. I don't particularly feel that the internal culture of D&D has changed all that much in 10 years. The external culture seems to have changed pretty dramatically with 5E feeling like it has more of a mainstream appeal due to marketing(youtube/twitch shows) and ease of play. I'd be curious if the vibe for them felt better due to the mainstream appeal(not just a geek thing anymore) or if the cons/gaming stores/shopping experience(Amazon vs comic store) changed how newbies interact with the experience.

I like 4E as well, and I think its failures were due to a combination of missteps on WotC's part (marketing mistakes, H1 Keep on the Shadowfell, high barriers to entry with the perceived need for minis and no cheap alternative) and outside factors (a fanbase that was primed to resent the changeover, a competitor ready to swoop in and take advantage, the world economy tanking just after you launch a high-cost line).

I think 5E has succeeded by lowering the entry barriers, pushing the nostalgia, and taking advantage of new technology that allows the game to actually be demonstrated easily.

Quote from: S'mon;1060059Yes, this is how things actually work. Something catches the current zeitgeist, and people go for it. It has nothing to do with removing Politically Incorrect elements; vampires for instance are not particularly PC.

Did you see the big Vampire 5E drama? The SJW brigade accused the V5 team of pandering to nazis because they dared to mention their existence in one sentence in the Brujah clan writeup, and when questioned about it, White Wolf's response was basically(paraphrasing here) "That kind of thing is a problem in the real world, and since the World of Darkness is supposed to be an even worse version of the real world, it's something we're not going to completely ignore. Plus vampires are in many ways horrible people, so some of them will follow horrible ideologies. We're acknowledging it, not endorsing it."

The SJWs absolutely lost their shit.

Quote from: GeekEclectic;1060104Did you see the big Vampire 5E drama? The SJW brigade accused the V5 team of pandering to nazis because they dared to mention their existence in one sentence in the Brujah clan writeup, and when questioned about it, White Wolf's response was basically(paraphrasing here) "That kind of thing is a problem in the real world, and since the World of Darkness is supposed to be an even worse version of the real world, it's something we're not going to completely ignore. Plus vampires are in many ways horrible people, so some of them will follow horrible ideologies. We're acknowledging it, not endorsing it."

The SJWs absolutely lost their shit.

Greetings!

Wow. Excellent insights there, friend. I didn't know much about that drama-fest at all, as I'm not a fan of the Vampire game. However, from a philosophical point of view, isn't it strange that within such a milieu as presented by the Vampire world--it is just fine to be a vampire, where such creatures torture and slaughter mortals *like cattle*--feeding off of them, draining their blood, and leaving their victims as drained, husk-like corpses--that is all ok and perfectly morally acceptable--but being a *NAZI* is well, that is just going too far!!! LOL. Do you see the fucked up moral reasoning there? Naturally, I don't expect most of the liberal SJW crowd to ever consider such dissonance in their philosophy.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

I did come across the recent Vampire blowup.

Re 5e DnD popularity, I do think some design choices contributed, not just a change in the zeitgeist. I think the rules are more accessible than 3e-4e. I even think the art may have been a factor though I have no evidence of this, and I see 20-22 year old female players happily playing half naked Amazon warrior PCs in my Wilderlands games. But maybe if there were half naked Amazons all over the core books it would deter some people. And even if Amazons in loincloths are fine (they are) impractical boobplate armour is a different issue. I recall a 4e-era female player who complained about the boobplate picture on her pregen Warlord PC's sheet.

I definitely don't think that fantasy versions of human cultures is a negative issue for anyone but extremists. I could imagine this happening but never seen it. Something like The Atruaghin Clans is only going to offend those looking to be offended, it is a typical fantasy mash up pastiche.

Edit: It occurs to me that if WoTC keeps doubling down on making Forgotten Realms into Jeremy Crawford's Magical Realm, it could end up having the opposite effect, and begin to deter mainstream normal people. TSR was right to tone down the more egregious sexual elements of Ed Greenwood's Magical Realm when turning Forgotten Realms into a mainstream commercial setting; WoTC could end up doing the reverse if they stay on present course. That Jeremy's interests & views are now considered Politically Correct by the West's ruling elites, and normal in Seattle Liberal circles, I don't think really changes this calculus. They need to keep it at a level where it won't deter most people.

Let me repeat myself, for those of you in the back, again.

Gaming has ALWAYS been inclusive, it's just never been socially acceptable.  Now that it is, the normies are doing what they always do when they take something over, push out the undesirables:  Most of us.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;1060131Now that it is, the normies are doing what they always do when they take something over, push out the undesirables:  Most of us.

I don't see normies doing this. I see one bunch of oddballs, the SJW freaks, attacking other groups of oddballs (the grognards, the gearheads, etc). SJW freaks are a million miles from 'normie'. It's the same type of entryism that provoked Gamergate. And that previously destroyed the science fiction & fantasy literary community.

Normies just want to try playing this odd game "Dungeons & Dragon" they've seen on TV/Youtube.

SJWs do want to identify themselves with the Normies, as part of their plan to take over the hobby, but you only have to look at them to see they're not the same. SJW "Inclusivity" is no more inclusive of Normies than it is of Grognards. Ultimately it destroys everything.

Still curious about the Crawford/FR stuff. Google has been unkind.