Quote from: Darrin Kelley on December 14, 2023, 10:52:48 PM
To answer Pundit's question. They have always been a part of D&D. They just didn't raise too much of a stink.

The problem is the corporations politicizing the issue. Trying to virtue signal with the issue.

I'm an old school D&D fan. I preferred the Elmore and Caldwell art far more than what they are putting in the D&D books today.

Of course there were gay people who were always part of D&D. One of the famous players in Arneson's group was gay, literally before the game even came into publication.
But that's not what I said, what I said isn't "now there's GLBT people playing and there wasn't before", I said "now there's ideological queer activists with a propagandistic agenda playing the game". That's the difference.

Quote from: pawsplay on December 14, 2023, 11:37:06 PM
No one's stopping you.

I already did.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 14, 2023, 11:53:44 PM
Of course there were gay people who were always part of D&D. One of the famous players in Arneson's group was gay, literally before the game even came into publication.
But that's not what I said, what I said isn't "now there's GLBT people playing and there wasn't before", I said "now there's ideological queer activists with a propagandistic agenda playing the game". That's the difference.

There were always gay people playing and making D&D.  The difference is that they didn't insist that the game be all about them and their sexuality.  There was this incessant, narcissistic insistence that the hobby revolve around them.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 14, 2023, 11:53:44 PM
Of course there were gay people who were always part of D&D. One of the famous players in Arneson's group was gay, literally before the game even came into publication.
But that's not what I said, what I said isn't "now there's GLBT people playing and there wasn't before", I said "now there's ideological queer activists with a propagandistic agenda playing the game". That's the difference.

The problem is that the virtue signalers only latch on to what they think is the hot topic of the moment. When they find something more attractive to them, they move on. And honestly, I don't believe for a second that the virtue signallers actually play the game. Or at least not seriously enough to actually be a part of the hobby.

Trans is just the hot-button topic of the moment. That's why they latched onto it. When they get bored, they will leave it in the dust. Just like they have done with every other topic they have temporarily latched onto.

Non-binary seems to be replacing trans as the flavor of the month fashionable identity.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 14, 2023, 05:26:02 AM
The difference is that the OG gamers (or indeed any gamers between then and around 2014) weren't playing these non-humans as a specific ideological act of anti-humanism or of "queering D&D".

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 15, 2023, 12:15:43 AM
There were always gay people playing and making D&D.  The difference is that they didn't insist that the game be all about them and their sexuality.  There was this incessant, narcissistic insistence that the hobby revolve around them.

I'm not clear exactly what they're doing. So it's OK to be gay. And it's OK to play a half-orc, drow, tiefling, or other monstrous PC.

But somehow playing a monstrous PC after 2014 became an ideological act of anti-humanism and queering?!?

How would I tell what is a bad, anti-humanist tiefling PC vs an acceptable one?

Monstrous PCs were around in 2nd edition AD&D. They had a whole splat book dedicated to them. They didn't make a big deal out of them.

The Tiefling arose with 4th Edition D&D. and it seemed to attract a whole new type of players. Those I don't care much to deal with.

Quote from: jhkim on December 15, 2023, 01:11:26 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 14, 2023, 05:26:02 AM
The difference is that the OG gamers (or indeed any gamers between then and around 2014) weren't playing these non-humans as a specific ideological act of anti-humanism or of "queering D&D".

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 15, 2023, 12:15:43 AM
There were always gay people playing and making D&D.  The difference is that they didn't insist that the game be all about them and their sexuality.  There was this incessant, narcissistic insistence that the hobby revolve around them.

I'm not clear exactly what they're doing. So it's OK to be gay. And it's OK to play a half-orc, drow, tiefling, or other monstrous PC.

But somehow playing a monstrous PC after 2014 became an ideological act of anti-humanism and queering?!?

How would I tell what is a bad, anti-humanist tiefling PC vs an acceptable one?

Because you either have your head firmly under the sand or because you're willingly, blind and deaf, but my bet is it's because you agree with the narcissists.

Quote from: Darrin Kelley on December 15, 2023, 01:29:59 AM
Monstrous PCs were around in 2nd edition AD&D. They had a whole splat book dedicated to them. They didn't make a big deal out of them.

The Tiefling arose with 4th Edition D&D. and it seemed to attract a whole new type of players. Those I don't care much to deal with.

Tieflings arose with Planescape in the 2e era. 4E made them a standard race because they were so popular to play in the 3e era. The only thing 4E did was standardize the look of them, which they stated in the promotional books (D&D Presents: Races & Classes) was entirely a marketing decision to provide a consistent identity for promotional purposes; outside of the Nentir Vale setting (ie. Forgotten Realms, Eberron, homebrew) they were expected to be the same Tieflings they'd been since 2e.

The new race for 4E was the Dragonborn. There was something called a Dragonborn in 3.5e, but they were humans who underwent a ritual to reborn as a dragon-man whereas 4E made them a natural (for a fantasy setting) race.

I know its convenient to just lay all the sins onto 4E which is already loathed, but this particular thing isn't even really a D&D thing; its spillover from the manga/anime cute monster girl fetish that D&D is proximally close to by dint of being fantasy with non-humanoid races. The same freaks fetishized all the WoW monster races too (and arguably moreso than D&D as WoW pretty much made every female of every species sexy even if the male was some hideous beast so it a much smaller jump).

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 15, 2023, 08:33:47 AM
I know its convenient to just lay all the sins onto 4E ...

Well yeah, there's a reason for that. 4E may not have originated all the sins, but it sure did a fine job of collecting them all into a single game.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 15, 2023, 08:33:47 AM

Quote from: Darrin Kelley on December 15, 2023, 01:29:59 AM
Monstrous PCs were around in 2nd edition AD&D. They had a whole splat book dedicated to them. They didn't make a big deal out of them.

The Tiefling arose with 4th Edition D&D. and it seemed to attract a whole new type of players. Those I don't care much to deal with.

Tieflings arose with Planescape in the 2e era. 4E made them a standard race because they were so popular to play in the 3e era. The only thing 4E did was standardize the look of them, which they stated in the promotional books (D&D Presents: Races & Classes) was entirely a marketing decision to provide a consistent identity for promotional purposes; outside of the Nentir Vale setting (ie. Forgotten Realms, Eberron, homebrew) they were expected to be the same Tieflings they'd been since 2e.

The new race for 4E was the Dragonborn. There was something called a Dragonborn in 3.5e, but they were humans who underwent a ritual to reborn as a dragon-man whereas 4E made them a natural (for a fantasy setting) race.

I know its convenient to just lay all the sins onto 4E which is already loathed, but this particular thing isn't even really a D&D thing; its spillover from the manga/anime cute monster girl fetish that D&D is proximally close to by dint of being fantasy with non-humanoid races. The same freaks fetishized all the WoW monster races too (and arguably moreso than D&D as WoW pretty much made every female of every species sexy even if the male was some hideous beast so it a much smaller jump).

To add to this, the few female races in WoW with ugly females have tiny tiny playerbases that ive heard some of the staff from WoW complain about. (Female Tauren is the big one)

When I allow non-humans I actually like tieflings as player races. They produced amazing results in my last Ravenloft campaign (which leaned hard on pseudo-Christian themes) and even outside of that context they actually match nicely with real human mythology.

There are a lot of heroes in our legends who were half god/fairy/spirit/demon/whatever, way way more than elves or dwarves as protagonists.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on December 15, 2023, 01:36:27 AM

Quote from: jhkim on December 15, 2023, 01:11:26 AM
I'm not clear exactly what they're doing. So it's OK to be gay. And it's OK to play a half-orc, drow, tiefling, or other monstrous PC.

But somehow playing a monstrous PC after 2014 became an ideological act of anti-humanism and queering?!?

How would I tell what is a bad, anti-humanist tiefling PC vs an acceptable one?

Because you either have your head firmly under the sand or because you're willingly, blind and deaf, but my bet is it's because you agree with the narcissists.

Agree with who about what?

From my view, if someone likes playing Vampire: the Masquerade, or playing a tiefling in Planescape, or a warlock in 4E, that's purely a matter of taste. I might not share their taste, but I don't think it's an immoral anti-humanist act for them to play whatever RPG they want. Though, I loved playing a warlock in 5E, and while I don't go in for grimdark, I've loved a lot of monstrous PCs in the vein of various Buffy protagonists and similar.

In general, I don't agree with anyone who wars over how other people should play RPGs. I don't have a problem with OSR fans playing RPGs in whatever way they like, and equally, I don't have a problem with people playing queer tieflings in whatever way they like.

IMHO, it's not anti-Humanist to play one of the increasingly wide range of Races.

However, the MASSIVE rise in players wanting to roleplay a Fursona, Otherkin personality, or otherwise play something non-Human, is a symptom of the rampant misanthropic trend in Millennials and Zoomers.

Quote from: Grognard GM on December 15, 2023, 02:58:12 PM
However, the MASSIVE rise in players wanting to roleplay a Fursona, Otherkin personality, or otherwise play something non-Human, is a symptom of the rampant misanthropic trend in Millennials and Zoomers.

You know, I've felt this for decades, but I haven't been able to put my finger on the 'why' of it. It seems to be something more than simple misanthropy, but what exactly is it and what are its origins?

Quote from: jhkim on December 15, 2023, 01:11:26 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 14, 2023, 05:26:02 AM
The difference is that the OG gamers (or indeed any gamers between then and around 2014) weren't playing these non-humans as a specific ideological act of anti-humanism or of "queering D&D".

Quote from: yosemitemike on December 15, 2023, 12:15:43 AM
There were always gay people playing and making D&D.  The difference is that they didn't insist that the game be all about them and their sexuality.  There was this incessant, narcissistic insistence that the hobby revolve around them.

I'm not clear exactly what they're doing. So it's OK to be gay. And it's OK to play a half-orc, drow, tiefling, or other monstrous PC.

But somehow playing a monstrous PC after 2014 became an ideological act of anti-humanism and queering?!?

How would I tell what is a bad, anti-humanist tiefling PC vs an acceptable one?

You couldn't, and that's how the crazies snuck in.

Once upon a time, the tiefling players were just edgelords trying to be edgy in front of the camera. It was obnoxious, but it was pretty low-key. Over time, tieflings became the poster child for tearing down the cisheteronormative patriarchy. The potential was always there, and every year, they became a little more queer activisty. While that was happening, tieflings became increasingly lame and edgelords stopped wanting to play them.

That brings us to today. Tieflings are too popular with the mainstream queer Tumblr crowd. They're no longer edgy, and so the traditional marginally acceptable edgelord player doesn't want to play a tiefling anymore.

To adapt a turn of phrase from the luminaries of our modern era: Put a tiefling in it, and make they/them lame and gay.