Quote from: rytrasmi on April 03, 2024, 09:56:31 AM

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 01:30:01 AM
Regarding Saunders, he could be accused of tokenism because he explicitly wrote a black fantasy protagonist because of his frustration with white-authored fantasy. Here's him talking about starting his writing career:

QuoteIt was when I discovered fantasy that I also discovered that I wanted to be a storyteller - a griot, although I hadn't yet discovered that term. I soon would, though. I spent my university days at a historically black college in Pennsylvania, Lincoln. I started in 1964 and graduated in 1968. Seldom has so much changed during a four-year period. So much was going on, from three-piece suits and processed hair to Afros and dashikis. From integration to Black Power... From non-violent demonstrations to riots in the streets... From punching somebody for calling you black to shouting 'Black is beautiful!' Lincoln had a lot of students from Africa at the time, and I learned a great deal from them. I started reading more about the history and culture of Africa. And I began to realise that in the SF and fantasy genre, blacks were, with only few exceptions, either left out or depicted in racist and stereotypic ways. I had a choice: I could either stop reading SF and fantasy, or try to do something about my dissatisfaction with it by writing my own stories and trying to get them published. I chose the latter course. I was crazy enough to think I could break into what was essentially a white genre - at the time, I didn't know Chip Delany was black, even though I'd read, and enjoyed, his work. That fact wasn't exactly advertised back then.

https://web.archive.org/web/20110607105724/http:/www.zone-sf.com/crsaunders.html

"He could be accused..." - I'm not going to argue against speculation in passive voice. You raised Saunders and now seem to be arguing with someone else, maybe a ghost or maybe yourself. Sort out whether you think Imaro is tokenism and get back to us.

OK, that's fair. I felt like diving into "tokenism" was a new can of worms, but I've already done so anyway.

I would say that tokenism is disinterested checking of boxes. The classic being a film producer who says "We need one Latino, one black, and one wheelchair-using character" - and doesn't give a damn otherwise as long as the token role is filled. For example, including a token black character in a horror film, only to have that character be the first one killed off. A film like The Wiz is not tokenism. The creators clearly cared a lot about it and weren't just checking off boxes, and it wasn't just a single token character or inclusion.

Saunders writing about a black protagonist in fantasy Africa, and Kretchmer writing about dungeons with ramps aren't tokenism. As authors, they are writing about what they are interested in, not just checking off boxes to be inclusive.

---

There is a parallel to tokenism in audiences as well -- where someone declares that they love a work simply because they heard the author was some minority, and not because they actually read and liked the work. I see this in many liberals. Someone might say how much they love Thompson's combat wheelchair just because of the representation, and not because they have actually played with it and enjoyed gaming with it. Or they say they love Imaro without even having read it.

The converse is hating something simply because of the representation. I'm pretty sure that if Kretchmer's adventure had appeared in some third-party OSR-compatible collection without mentioning that she uses a wheelchair, that it would have raised no comment. It's an adventure in an Egyptian-style tomb with a mummy lord and a mystery about the canopic process.

I think both of these are similarly dumb.

Quote from: blackstone on April 03, 2024, 10:41:19 AM

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 01:30:01 AM
In general, what I care about in an adventure is the game content. For the vast majority of RPG adventures, I don't know the author and don't care enough to examine their motivations for writing the adventure.

That's the whole point of this thread: intent. IF the intent of the author to include wheelchair access to a dungeon because they're wheelchair bound in real life, it is a bit narcissistic and potentially anachronistic depending on the campaign.

Intent is different than results. As I noted, the particular dungeon by Kretchmer is not at all anachronistic. It has ramps in the same style as real Egyptian tombs do, and there are no wheelchairs of any sort in the adventure. (The dungeon also isn't wheelchair-accessible as a whole, since it is entered via a ladder and has pits.)

I have no idea about what Kretchmer is like as a person -- but it isn't inherently narcissistic for an author to write about their personal interests. Hell, even writing an autobiography isn't inherently narcissistic. It's writing what you know. The author might be a narcissist, but it isn't proven just by writing about themselves.

Quote from: SHARK on April 03, 2024, 01:49:20 PM
Jhkim loves to shriek about Pundit claiming the wheelchairs were in the WOTC adventure, and somehow, they weren't there, so Pundit was wrong, supposedly.

And yet, I have often reminded Jhkim that Pundit did not make it up, or lie at all. Where did he get this idea from? I saw the whole wheelchair BS talked about by Clownfish, The Quartering, and more--in addition to WOTC talking about how important wheelchairs and inclusivity was in their adventures, on their website. There was some official article of WOTC that talked about it, and then I think some twitter posts or something by WOTC developers themselves. So, Pundit did not lie about anything. Pundit did not distort anything, or misrepresent anything. If the actual published adventure was somehow cleansed of the fucking wheelchair in the last minute before publication, that isn't Pundit's fault.

Put up or shut up, SHARK. Give a link (or archive) where anyone other than Pundit claims that the combat wheelchair was in Candlekeep Mysteries.

I read a bunch of the articles cited at the time three years ago, and none of them - other than Pundit - made this claim. There were articles that discussed both Kretchmer's adventure in Candlekeep Mysteries and Thompson's combat wheelchair, but no one claimed that the latter was part of the former.

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 02:20:53 PM

Quote from: SHARK on April 03, 2024, 01:49:20 PM
Jhkim loves to shriek about Pundit claiming the wheelchairs were in the WOTC adventure, and somehow, they weren't there, so Pundit was wrong, supposedly.

And yet, I have often reminded Jhkim that Pundit did not make it up, or lie at all. Where did he get this idea from? I saw the whole wheelchair BS talked about by Clownfish, The Quartering, and more--in addition to WOTC talking about how important wheelchairs and inclusivity was in their adventures, on their website. There was some official article of WOTC that talked about it, and then I think some twitter posts or something by WOTC developers themselves. So, Pundit did not lie about anything. Pundit did not distort anything, or misrepresent anything. If the actual published adventure was somehow cleansed of the fucking wheelchair in the last minute before publication, that isn't Pundit's fault.

Put up or shut up, SHARK. Give a link (or archive) where anyone other than Pundit claims that the combat wheelchair was in Candlekeep Mysteries.

I read a bunch of the articles cited at the time three years ago, and none of them - other than Pundit - made this claim. There were articles that discussed both Kretchmer's adventure in Candlekeep Mysteries and Thompson's combat wheelchair, but no one claimed that the latter was part of the former.

Greetings!

Ahh, no, Jhkim. I don't keep the links from this BS from years ago. Sorry. I don't care that a wheelchair, specifically, can't be found statted out in Candlekeep. The larger point being is that WOTC promoted this BS, and you know they did. They wrote about it, in some online article, and or twitter comments. As you acknowledge--and I pointed out--The Quartering, Clownfish, and others, also talked about this Woke BS before Pundit did, in his video. Pundit does not even have the Candlekeep book, so, *shrugg*--some of his predictions are sometimes off. So what? Pundit's video was however, very relevant to WOTC intentions and program. I remember reading WOTC people crowing about this BS, Jhkim.

Another member here said that you always see the trees, but always miss the forest. I think that is accurate. You have this weird, pedantic obsession with minutia, while completely missing the larger point or meaning. And you do shriek about this, concerning Pundit's video. *Shruggs* It makes me wonder, simply, what is your fucking point? A member here--OMEGA--often talks about how WOTC markets books and modules--proclaiming it is about A, B, and C. Then, somehow, when it is actually published, the book only has "A" in it, and doesn't have "B" or "C" in it. Again, so what? We all know that WOTC embraces the Woke agenda. They push and promote this agenda to varying degrees in every product--some more, and some less. Omega says it is marketing, aimed at harvesting publicity and outrage. I can definitely see that as an additional element. WOTC is also committed to the Woke agenda. WOTC can easily embrace two different goals at the same time--Woke agenda, and marketing. I think Omega is correct about that reality, to a large extent.

So, we can easily see a scenario where WOTC markets one thing, Pundit makes a video talking about it, then the book is published, and there are differences between what was marketed and what is actually published. Pundit has not always been entirely accurate with his predictions concerning several WOTC products--some predictions or assessments have been exaggerated. I have also talked about those instances. I own the books, so I often know very well what is in them and what isn't.

The larger point being though, Pundit is usually very accurate in his predictions and assessments of WOTC and game products in general. Sometimes he misses the mark, or exaggerates a point of argument or assessment. Again, though, so what? How long have you watched Pundit's videos? This isn't a new revelation.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

  Maybe all the leftist hijackers can go out and be like Saunders and create their own thing and their own original stories and freaking STOP hijacking established intellectual properties if they are so frustrated with the IPs as they exist. 

Quote from: jhkim on April 02, 2024, 10:05:17 PM
If the problem isn't with wheelchairs in general but with only the specific cases (like Thompson's homebrew rules), then the discussion should be "these wheelchairs suck - here's the right way to have wheelchair-using PCs in a game".

But that isn't what most posters have been saying. There's been tons of venting about how any wheelchair-using PC is completely ridiculous and unworkable.

If you want to talk about what are good ways to have a wheelchair-using PC, then I'd be open to that. All this talking about it has poked at my imagination some about what I might like in one of my fantasy games.

1+2: Thats what some of is were doing in another thread. But it got derailed by the usual "no it cant be used anywhere" screeching.

=3: Been there, done that. Aint gonna happen in this thread though where it will just get lost again. But my personal take is that a real non-magic wheelchair is going to be a huge hindrance  unless you have party members willing and able to haul the PC around wen needed.

And what happens when that handler gets taken out in a delve? What happened in a morally challenged group when you become dead weight and the party really wants to haul back all that gold and you are impeding that?

Quote from: yosemitemike on April 02, 2024, 10:20:45 PM

fantasy elevators (whether they functioned by pulley or by magic, she didn't say),

Sidenote here. Used to be you could actually find elevators in some dungeons. And ramps. But the moral guardians conveniently forget all that and pretend they are so brave and bold as to invent this thing thats been a thing since probably the get-go.

Quick example was the idea that beholder and mind flayer lairs had no stairs as neither race had never had need. Examples of making something that would be validly wheelchair accessible. But no. They cant do something reasonable like that anymore.

Beholders and mind flayers are the opposite of wheelchair-accessible, unless you've got one of the new models that flies.

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 02:11:05 PM

Quote from: rytrasmi on April 03, 2024, 09:56:31 AM

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 01:30:01 AM
Regarding Saunders, he could be accused of tokenism because he explicitly wrote a black fantasy protagonist because of his frustration with white-authored fantasy. Here's him talking about starting his writing career:

QuoteIt was when I discovered fantasy that I also discovered that I wanted to be a storyteller - a griot, although I hadn't yet discovered that term. I soon would, though. I spent my university days at a historically black college in Pennsylvania, Lincoln. I started in 1964 and graduated in 1968. Seldom has so much changed during a four-year period. So much was going on, from three-piece suits and processed hair to Afros and dashikis. From integration to Black Power... From non-violent demonstrations to riots in the streets... From punching somebody for calling you black to shouting 'Black is beautiful!' Lincoln had a lot of students from Africa at the time, and I learned a great deal from them. I started reading more about the history and culture of Africa. And I began to realise that in the SF and fantasy genre, blacks were, with only few exceptions, either left out or depicted in racist and stereotypic ways. I had a choice: I could either stop reading SF and fantasy, or try to do something about my dissatisfaction with it by writing my own stories and trying to get them published. I chose the latter course. I was crazy enough to think I could break into what was essentially a white genre - at the time, I didn't know Chip Delany was black, even though I'd read, and enjoyed, his work. That fact wasn't exactly advertised back then.

https://web.archive.org/web/20110607105724/http:/www.zone-sf.com/crsaunders.html

"He could be accused..." - I'm not going to argue against speculation in passive voice. You raised Saunders and now seem to be arguing with someone else, maybe a ghost or maybe yourself. Sort out whether you think Imaro is tokenism and get back to us.

OK, that's fair. I felt like diving into "tokenism" was a new can of worms, but I've already done so anyway.

I would say that tokenism is disinterested checking of boxes. The classic being a film producer who says "We need one Latino, one black, and one wheelchair-using character" - and doesn't give a damn otherwise as long as the token role is filled. For example, including a token black character in a horror film, only to have that character be the first one killed off. A film like The Wiz is not tokenism. The creators clearly cared a lot about it and weren't just checking off boxes, and it wasn't just a single token character or inclusion.

Saunders writing about a black protagonist in fantasy Africa, and Kretchmer writing about dungeons with ramps aren't tokenism. As authors, they are writing about what they are interested in, not just checking off boxes to be inclusive.

---

There is a parallel to tokenism in audiences as well -- where someone declares that they love a work simply because they heard the author was some minority, and not because they actually read and liked the work. I see this in many liberals. Someone might say how much they love Thompson's combat wheelchair just because of the representation, and not because they have actually played with it and enjoyed gaming with it. Or they say they love Imaro without even having read it.

The converse is hating something simply because of the representation. I'm pretty sure that if Kretchmer's adventure had appeared in some third-party OSR-compatible collection without mentioning that she uses a wheelchair, that it would have raised no comment. It's an adventure in an Egyptian-style tomb with a mummy lord and a mystery about the canopic process.

I think both of these are similarly dumb.

Quote from: blackstone on April 03, 2024, 10:41:19 AM

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 01:30:01 AM
In general, what I care about in an adventure is the game content. For the vast majority of RPG adventures, I don't know the author and don't care enough to examine their motivations for writing the adventure.

That's the whole point of this thread: intent. IF the intent of the author to include wheelchair access to a dungeon because they're wheelchair bound in real life, it is a bit narcissistic and potentially anachronistic depending on the campaign.

Intent is different than results. As I noted, the particular dungeon by Kretchmer is not at all anachronistic. It has ramps in the same style as real Egyptian tombs do, and there are no wheelchairs of any sort in the adventure. (The dungeon also isn't wheelchair-accessible as a whole, since it is entered via a ladder and has pits.)

I have no idea about what Kretchmer is like as a person -- but it isn't inherently narcissistic for an author to write about their personal interests. Hell, even writing an autobiography isn't inherently narcissistic. It's writing what you know. The author might be a narcissist, but it isn't proven just by writing about themselves.

You missed the whole point of the argument AGAIN: intent. Somebody already pointed out earlier the author's intent when creating the adventure. I don't give two fucks if there were ramps in Egyptian tombs. So fucking what? There are ramps used in other Bronze Age cultures.

The designer said they wanted to make a dungeon to where "They can go exploring in".

Coupled with WoTC'S DEI protocols WHICH YOU ARE CONSTANTLY IGNORING AND THEY HAVE STATED...

Fuck it. I'm done.



I should have know better to have a discussion with someone who thinks RPG.net is a good RPG resource. https://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/links.html

Good day Sir!

Quote from: jhkim on April 03, 2024, 02:11:05 PM

OK, that's fair. I felt like diving into "tokenism" was a new can of worms, but I've already done so anyway.

I would say that tokenism is disinterested checking of boxes. The classic being a film producer who says "We need one Latino, one black, and one wheelchair-using character" - and doesn't give a damn otherwise as long as the token role is filled. For example, including a token black character in a horror film, only to have that character be the first one killed off. A film like The Wiz is not tokenism. The creators clearly cared a lot about it and weren't just checking off boxes, and it wasn't just a single token character or inclusion.

Saunders writing about a black protagonist in fantasy Africa, and Kretchmer writing about dungeons with ramps aren't tokenism. As authors, they are writing about what they are interested in, not just checking off boxes to be inclusive.

---

There is a parallel to tokenism in audiences as well -- where someone declares that they love a work simply because they heard the author was some minority, and not because they actually read and liked the work. I see this in many liberals. Someone might say how much they love Thompson's combat wheelchair just because of the representation, and not because they have actually played with it and enjoyed gaming with it. Or they say they love Imaro without even having read it.

The converse is hating something simply because of the representation. I'm pretty sure that if Kretchmer's adventure had appeared in some third-party OSR-compatible collection without mentioning that she uses a wheelchair, that it would have raised no comment. It's an adventure in an Egyptian-style tomb with a mummy lord and a mystery about the canopic process.

I think both of these are similarly dumb.

D&D has been around for 50 years and the combat wheelchair only came to us in the last few of years. Some new entrants showed up and, quite literally, declared that because of their new creations disabled people will finally feel welcome in the game. As if disabled people haven't been welcome and playing D&D perfectly fine for 50 years! Aside from missing the mark of what an RPG is supposed to be (hint: you play a hero, not yourself), it comes across as new entrant over-enthusiasm. That over-powered broken-homebrew combat wheelchair in particular reads like it was written by someone who does not understand the game or maybe does not even play the game at all.

It would be like me going over to the Story Game world (which I only barely know) and publishing a homebrew for, I dunno, randomly generated ethnic hairstyles. Finally, thanks to me, all you troglodyte story gamers can finally welcome diverse hair-play into your games! Representation! The story gamers would be rightly pissed and answer that nobody fucking asked for this and, if there was a genuine need, it would have been solved years ago.

So the combination of new entrant-ism, anachronism, and crap design-ism (the -ism trifecta) rightly pisses a lot of people off. People who defend this, as if there is some kernel of value buried in the heap of crap (who knows?), well you specifically, are stretching trying to analogize the combat wheelchair to other accepted game content. You may ultimately be correct in that a well-designed, verisimilitude-respecting combat wheelchair is possible. However, the retard new entrants have burned through the patience of regular gamers with their idiotic intent and design. This kind of thing happens all the time and it's human nature. Idiot #1 poses some stupid idea, normal guy argues that there's a kernel of truth to the idea, and nobody cares because idiot #1 already torched all possible goodwill. Only time fixes that.

Continuing this conversation is probably not going to change anyone's mind. So, you should just publish a good homebrew D&D wheelchair and let people use or dismiss it as they wish.

Edit:

Presentation matters. It speaks to intent. The loud idiots squawk about representation and give us broken homebrew as if they are some savior of the hobby. Had some regular gamer just published a thoughtfully designed wheelchair and said "One of our characters lost his legs last session, so the party hired a gnome tinkerer to build this..." it would have received the reception it deserved, muted "Looks cool, thanks," just like all other homebrew magic items. Instead we get a 68-page mess of I don't know what the fuck.

Quote from: Omega on April 03, 2024, 03:32:58 PM
Sidenote here. Used to be you could actually find elevators in some dungeons. And ramps. But the moral guardians conveniently forget all that and pretend they are so brave and bold as to invent this thing thats been a thing since probably the get-go.

Indeed, I remember seeing elevators in mega-dungeons going back to the late 70s.

Quote from: rytrasmi on April 04, 2024, 02:25:46 PM
You may ultimately be correct in that a well-designed, verisimilitude-respecting combat wheelchair is possible. However, the retard new entrants have burned through the patience of regular gamers with their idiotic intent and design. This kind of thing happens all the time and it's human nature. Idiot #1 poses some stupid idea, normal guy argues that there's a kernel of truth to the idea, and nobody cares because idiot #1 already torched all possible goodwill. Only time fixes that.

Continuing this conversation is probably not going to change anyone's mind. So, you should just publish a good homebrew D&D wheelchair and let people use or dismiss it as they wish.

OK, that's fair. The discussion has been jostling my creative thoughts, so I'll post about that on another thread.

Quote from: rytrasmi on April 04, 2024, 02:25:46 PM
D&D has been around for 50 years and the combat wheelchair only came to us in the last few of years. Some new entrants showed up and, quite literally, declared that because of their new creations disabled people will finally feel welcome in the game.
...
So the combination of new entrant-ism, anachronism, and crap design-ism (the -ism trifecta) rightly pisses a lot of people off.

When you say "new entrants" - you're talking about Thompson's homebrew combat wheelchair from 2020, right? Is there anyone else other than Thompson who is doing what you're saying? There's also Lord Weathermay in Ravenloft II, but I don't think any of this applies to him. Ravenloft is explicitly based in Gothic Horror like Dracula and Frankenstein, which includes technology like wheelchairs. Several posters here have referred to Kretchmer's adventure, but it has no wheelchairs and no anachronism.

So people are exploding in outrage over a four-year-old homebrew that as far as I know has never been adapted or included in any published product.

I don't mean to be defending Thompson's homebrew. It's non-setting-specific, so anachronism didn't bother me, but I was bugged that it can hover, but only over stairs. That seemed particularly illogical, and also non-functional, as there is a lot of terrain other than stairs that can foul a wheelchair.

Player asked me if he could make a Ranger in a wheelchair. I said sure. It worked out well. Here's a clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGQevaXj3tQ

Quote from: Corolinth on April 03, 2024, 03:39:47 PM
Beholders and mind flayers are the opposite of wheelchair-accessible, unless you've got one of the new models that flies.

Lots of ramps. Why would a beholder especially ever make stairs? And Illithids do not due to the whole organic architecture thing.

Quote from: Aglondir on April 04, 2024, 10:15:43 PM
Player asked me if he could make a Ranger in a wheelchair. I said sure. It worked out well. Here's a clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGQevaXj3tQ

I KNEW that's what it was before I even clicked on that link...

Quote from: oggsmash on April 03, 2024, 03:25:22 PM
  Maybe all the leftist hijackers can go out and be like Saunders and create their own thing and their own original stories and freaking STOP hijacking established intellectual properties if they are so frustrated with the IPs as they exist.

Even if they had the talent, which they usually don't, the point is to tear down existing media and replace it with their "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" versions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony