Quote from: Gagarth;1119512It also  is not the poc  or feminist utopia the SJW NPCs want and want to retcon history into.  None of the settlers of Iceland were black lesbian paraplegics like they would have us believe nor demand from an RPG set in such a a setting.

Yeah but is that what they believe or demand? Specifically the C&S developers? I can believe maybe it is, but so far I've seen no evidence for any of that. I'll ask again, please share what you got!

Quote from: Zirunel;1119511We have no idea what "they" mean, or even if they mean anything at all.

This whole thread is built on a weak foundation. We are supposed to believe that the developers of the latest edition of C&S are taking some kind of outrageous stand on "diversity, " and yet, despite multiple requests from multiple posters (beginning with post #2) to document what stand these developers are taking, we have seen nothing. Nothing at all. Absent any corroboration, it seems likely this thread is only pretending to be about RPGs, and in reality is just a political post stirring the pot about "SJWs." In which case it belongs in another subforum.

If we didn't have all these stirring the pot conservative click-bait threads in this forum we would have far fewer posts, which would underline the increasing irrelevance of this forum in regards to matters related to actual gaming. It's becoming the fun house mirror image of TBP.

Quote from: Zirunel;1119503I don't think you're just rambling. We can argue about whether, say, a black character is potentially plausible in a quasi-realistic C&S European setting (and I believe the answer is broadly yes), but at the end of the day it has to matter. Somehow. If it really doesnt matter in the setting, then insisting that your character is black is as meaningful as insisting they are blood type B-, or have a third nipple, or a certain anal circumference rating.  Who cares. It only matters if the setting (and/or the game mechanics) makes it matter.

I'm sick of arguments over whether it makes sense to have dark skinned characters in fantasy. It's fantasy! We have Nyambe Adventures! I'm sick of lazy settings written by white liberals where you have black kings of Not!Europe, while ignoring the continent of Africa exists and has numerous kingdoms with histories stretching back millennia. Seriously, the princess Andromeda was explicitly from either Africa or India according to Greek myth, but you wouldn't know it from Hollywood. Nyambe Adventures is nearly two decades old now and nobody but me seems to be singing praises for remembering the Sword & Soul genre.

So I'm writing a fantasy setting to give the middle finger to both the racists and the white liberals.

I'm writing this fantasy setting based on StarGate SG-1 of all inspirations. It has thousands of planets inhabited by humans of all world real world phenotypes and beyond. There are counterparts of real historical civilizations and more: Wakanda planets, Inuit planets, Middle Kingdom planets, Vedic planets, Norse planets, Brazilian planets, Egyptian planets, etc. These planets interact through countless portals. Socio-politics and socio-economics play key roles just as on Earth. There are societies which endorse racialized slavery and burn homosexuals at the stake, and there are societies where slavery makes no such distinctions and sexuality is fluid. There are matriarchies, patriarchies, and equalitarian societies.

The various humanoid/demihuman/halfbreed/whatever races add another complexity into this. Elves, dwarves, little people, orcs, aasimars, tieflings, forgeborn, dragonspawn, beastfolk, etc. Think racism was difficult before? Imagine how it gets when you introduce racism against fantastical beings.

Imagine, if you will, orcs that are just as intelligent and capable as humans. The difference, besides general appearance, is that all orcs (at least from planet XYZ) are hermaphrodites. Both male and female at all times and, in lean times, capable of parthenogenesis. From the human perspective, they're treated as dudes simply due to their appearance as muscular and hirsute. How would these orcs view the human preoccupation with sex and gender?

When they're not, you know, killing ankhegs that are harassing farming village #3648217. This is probably a better discussion for general fantasy fiction than RPGs. That other thread where the adventurers defeat the army of man-eating Christmas trees by singing carols at them is probably a good indicator that RPGs aren't the greatest tool for dark and serious philosophical exploration. Surrealism, certainly! I would love to see more surreal fantasy in that vein.

Quote from: Bren;1119519If we didn't have all these stirring the pot conservative click-bait threads in this forum we would have far fewer posts, which would underline the increasing irrelevance of this forum in regards to matters related to actual gaming. It's becoming the fun house mirror image of TBP.

Yup it's hit the point where I rarely post here anymore.

Quote from: Bren;1119519If we didn't have all these stirring the pot conservative click-bait threads in this forum we would have far fewer posts, which would underline the increasing irrelevance of this forum in regards to matters related to actual gaming. It's becoming the fun house mirror image of TBP.

With one important difference. This thread wasn't closed and the participants banned for "Not being a good fit for the forums."

For myself, I've not had much to contribute because it does seem like a tempest in a teapot over a game I'm not interested in. So like an adult, I mostly ignore it. There's plenty of other threads about gaming.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1119522I'm sick of arguments over whether it makes sense to have dark skinned characters in fantasy. It's fantasy! We have Nyambe Adventures! I'm sick of lazy settings written by white liberals where you have black kings of Not!Europe, while ignoring the continent of Africa exists and has numerous kingdoms with histories stretching back millennia. Seriously, the princess Andromeda was explicitly from either Africa or India according to Greek myth, but you wouldn't know it from Hollywood. Nyambe Adventures is nearly two decades old now and nobody but me seems to be singing praises for remembering the Sword & Soul genre.

So I'm writing a fantasy setting to give the middle finger to both the racists and the white liberals.

Assuming those are two different and distinct categories.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1119391Ignoring the controversy for a moment...

What do they mean exactly by "diversity"? Ethnic diversity, sexual diversity, neurodiversity?

Going by the standard of 'diversity' as represented by other woke rpg companies and MSM this means that 55%+ plus of major NPCS  should be female and 75% should be  POC no matter the setting.  Every settlement detailed, and all illustrations,  should also have similar ratios along with the fact that Asian (of both varieties),Black and Latinos should all be represented.  So the inhabitants of your a 9th century settlement in Iceland should look something like this.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]4084[/ATTACH]

Quote from: S'mon;1118971It's really not preachy in the Core AFAICS. Nor in Xanathar's. The 5e adventures start to get icky once Darth Crawford takes full control and abolishes the Imperial Senate ....or puts Mearls in the shed out back.

Which adventures have been Rainbow Connection-ed?

Does Mearls have any involvement with the adventures? I thought he was basically just thinking up any old crap that other people, such as the Rainbow Connection, try to spin into what passes for gold at WotC (ie, he writes bad rules and other people fix them).

Quote from: Zirunel;1119503I don't think you're just rambling. We can argue about whether, say, a black character is potentially plausible in a quasi-realistic C&S European setting (and I believe the answer is broadly yes), but at the end of the day it has to matter. Somehow. If it really doesnt matter in the setting, then insisting that your character is black is as meaningful as insisting they are blood type B-, or have a third nipple, or a certain anal circumference rating.  Who cares. It only matters if the setting (and/or the game mechanics) makes it matter.

It absolutely matters to players that they can set the physical characteristics of their character, even when those characteristics don't matter in any mechanical way.  I don't think I can count the number of players that have wanted an unusual physical characteristic like 'lavender eyes' or 'blue hair' or 'iridescent skin'.  The idea of playing a character that is a form of wish fulfillment is hardly controversial.  Having characters that are impossibly strong by mundane standards is well supported; having characters with a non-standard appearance is certainly worth considering. It's a minor concession to a player about something that has a major impact on how much they enjoy and invest in the game.  

Quote from: Gagarth;1119546So the inhabitants of your a 9th century settlement in Iceland should look something like this.

I don't think your costuming is at all right.  

In any case, there are shows that are pseudo-historical that don't 'force diversity' if it wouldn't make sense.  I think the closest chow to what you're describing might be Outlander.  It is set in 18th century Scotland (not 9th century Ireland) and I don't think they have a character 'of color' until the show moves to the United States.  

Do you have an counterexample of where a historical show was completely 'brown-washed' and white characters were changed to people of color?  I can provide a few dozen examples of historical shows and movies where 'the good guys' were changed to be Americans when they were supposed to be British/Canadian/Australian, or where a real-life person of color was recast as a white person, or where a white person was cast as a PoC using makeup.  I like Breakfast at Tiffany's, but Mickey Rooney's role is cringe-inducing.

Quote from: deadDMwalking;1119559It absolutely matters to players that they can set the physical characteristics of their character, even when those characteristics don't matter in any mechanical way.  I don't think I can count the number of players that have wanted an unusual physical characteristic like 'lavender eyes' or 'blue hair' or 'iridescent skin'.  The idea of playing a character that is a form of wish fulfillment is hardly controversial.  Having characters that are impossibly strong by mundane standards is well supported; having characters with a non-standard appearance is certainly worth considering. It's a minor concession to a player about something that has a major impact on how much they enjoy and invest in the game.  

I take your point about wish fulfillment. It is kind of baked into the whole rpg concept, so there's nothing wrong with helping players achieve that. In fact, it is the whole point.

However, my point (and I think BoxCrayonTales') is that if the setting completely normalizes, say, blue hair, lavender eyes, and iridescent skin, and those things are no longer unusual physical characteristics , then they will likely not offer the same satisfaction as forms of wish fulfillment for players who want a  "non-standard appearance."

Quote from: deadDMwalking;1119559In any case, there are shows that are pseudo-historical that don't 'force diversity' if it wouldn't make sense.  I think the closest chow to what you're describing might be Outlander.  It is set in 18th century Scotland (not 9th century Ireland) and I don't think they have a character 'of color' until the show moves to the United States.  

Do you have an counterexample of where a historical show was completely 'brown-washed' and white characters were changed to people of color?  I can provide a few dozen examples of historical shows and movies where 'the good guys' were changed to be Americans when they were supposed to be British/Canadian/Australian, or where a real-life person of color was recast as a white person, or where a white person was cast as a PoC using makeup.  I like Breakfast at Tiffany's, but Mickey Rooney's role is cringe-inducing.

Certainly, we haven't been given any examples of C&S doing that. I agree, if there are examples, someone should share them

Quote from: Zirunel;1119563However, my point (and I think BoxCrayonTales') is that if the setting completely normalizes, say, blue hair, lavender eyes, and iridescent skin, and those things are no longer unusual physical characteristics , then they will likely not offer the same satisfaction as forms of wish fulfillment for players who want a  "non-standard appearance."

I think a lot of people want to have a particular unusual characteristic without making it the major feature of the game.  More importantly, if one player wants to have an unusual characteristic, that doesn't mean every OTHER player wants to make the game all about that.  

I just watched Magnificent Seven and Return of the (Magnificent) Seven - Yul Brynner does a bang-up job in his role as a hard-boiled cowboy living on the fringes of society but still willing to do the right thing.  It's an unusual casting choice - Yul Brynner was born in (what later became) the Soviet Union and is a mix of German/Swiss/Mongolian/Slavic peoples - not exactly what you first imagine when you think of 'Cowboys and Indians'.  Thankfully, the movie doesn't focus on every passerby inquiring about his heritage and parentage.  In the second movie there is a scene about heritage, but it's someone else bringing up the fact that he's half Irish and half Mexican and not fitting in is part of why he's there to begin with.  In fact, questions of identity and 'who you choose to be' are relatively central to the themes of the sequel.  I think a D&D game does well to follow the pattern - we don't have any control of the circumstances of our birth but we forge our own destiny - and the world accepts that. The idea of a peasant rising to become a hero and become king is at least as ridiculous as a person in a historically racist period being judged by their deeds rather than their ancestry.  

But isn't that always the way?  People, even RACIST PEOPLE recognize and make exceptions for....exceptional...people.  A D&D adventurer, by dint of willing to take on danger that others won't always proves that they're exceptional.  You volunteer to save someone's life I doubt they'll insist on waiting until someone else more to their liking comes along - they may not let you marry their daughter in their gratitude but they'll probably at least treat you like a human being.

Quote from: Zirunel;1119511We have no idea what "they" mean, or even if they mean anything at all.

This whole thread is built on a weak foundation. We are supposed to believe that the developers of the latest edition of C&S are taking some kind of outrageous stand on "diversity, " and yet, despite multiple requests from multiple posters (beginning with post #2) to document what stand these developers are taking, we have seen nothing. Nothing at all. Absent any corroboration, it seems likely this thread is only pretending to be about RPGs, and in reality is just a political post stirring the pot about "SJWs." In which case it belongs in another subforum.

I am genuinely interested in seeing and discussing what outrages the developers of C&S are promoting about their game, but so far, ain't no there there.

It's already been pointed out they're pushing this stuff on their Facebook page. I made a comment directly about the issue before the KS closed and got a lot of push back, so I no longer bother to check out the C&S page or the Britannia Games one.

Quote from: Bren;1119519If we didn't have all these stirring the pot conservative click-bait threads in this forum we would have far fewer posts, which would underline the increasing irrelevance of this forum in regards to matters related to actual gaming. It's becoming the fun house mirror image of TBP.

And yet you replied to this thread...and no one was banned. Exactly how is this some sort of Bizzaro TBP when no one is hardly banned? Also, this thread is absolutely about actual gaming; an RPG I have played and still play is being morphed into something I don't particularly care for in the latest addition simply to appease a group of people who really don't give a fuck about it in the first place. It's just activism for the sake of appearances and has no functional relevance to the game whatsoever. Are we just supposed to ignore people taking a property we enjoy and turning it into their warped vision of reality?

I think, all in all, I'd be worried if C&S had as large a fanbase as D&D. But AFAICT, there's a lot less than 100k people playing it globally. Let them have it.

Quote from: Brad;1119567It's already been pointed out they're pushing this stuff on their Facebook page. I made a comment directly about the issue before the KS closed and got a lot of push back, so I no longer bother to check out the C&S page or the Britannia Games one.



And yet you replied to this thread...and no one was banned. Exactly how is this some sort of Bizzaro TBP when no one is hardly banned? Also, this thread is absolutely about actual gaming; an RPG I have played and still play is being morphed into something I don't particularly care for in the latest addition simply to appease a group of people who really don't give a fuck about it in the first place. It's just activism for the sake of appearances and has no functional relevance to the game whatsoever. Are we just supposed to ignore people taking a property we enjoy and turning it into their warped vision of reality?

Greetings!

Excellent, Brad. You know, your commentary made me think of something else, too. Why do some people here get all twisted because other people here discuss the Liberal tyranny? It shouldn't be a surprise. If you don't like Conservative politics, attitudes, and discussion--there are many places full of liberals that welcome other liberals. Try having the discussions we have here *anywhere* else, and see what happens, you know? TBP, EN-World, and many, many other sites.

In so many such places, liberal attitudes are considered normal, and liberal's bloviating about their beliefs is acceptable and applauded.

Here though is one island where Conservatives and others can feel free to think, and speak, and talk, and yet, even here we have some people that want us to shut the fuck up.

That pisses me off, you know, my friend? Keep up the good fight, Brad!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Quote from: SHARK;1119576Here though is one island where Conservatives and others can feel free to think, and speak, and talk, and yet, even here we have some people that want us to shut the fuck up.

Anyone can post whatever they want here, as long as it's about gaming. That's the entire point of this site per Pundit. It isn't my fault that SJWs have infiltrated so many areas of culture that it is literally impossible to talk about as something as insignificant as gaming without at least being forced to mention this sort of crap from time to time. Plus, there are a bunch of SJWs that post on this site, IN THIS VERY THREAD, so WTF are you supposed to do? If everyone who posted here completely avoided anything remotely resembling politics, the SJWs would overrun the board in a couple weeks. At least here they get some push-back, but somehow being able to express alternative opinions equates to "white nationalist echo chamber" to people on TBP. Posters like Bren want to seem themselves as morally superior for not wanting to engage in addressing these issues, but still be able to complain in the very threads they don't want to exist. You can't have it both ways; either don't post in the threads or accept the fact all this crap is due to a bunch of fascist leftists masquerading as freedom fighters dictating how games must be written and played, NOT some conservative, libertarian, or classical liberals bitching about a-historical nonsense cluttering up their pseudo-medieval RPG.