Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 26, 2023, 02:09:37 PM
Try not to give yourself an aneurysm there, cowboy. You're getting way too worked up over this triviality.

When wokies try to depict non-white religions, they can't tell the difference between Voodoo and Santeria even after reading Wikipedia. I'd say that's far more important than some jargon disputes.

Not a Cowboy, a Charro, please report yourself for re-education 

Not worked up, as for it being a triviality that's how the woketards got so much power being a tiny minority, we give way because it's such a small thing, time and time again, until we realize they're running X to the ground.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Like it or not D&D is the 500 Tones Gorilla in the room, it has shaped the culture and not only in RPGs.

The ONE real problem I see is that people tend to just use the exact same class with a different name when developing something like Maztica, Al-Quadim, etc. If you're going to do so why not just call it Witch? And if you're going to give it a different name (A single word for the love of God) then do the work and make it really different, give it spells that fit the setting, give it limitations that fit YOUR setting.

Take the White Witch, I haven't seen one that's really different from the Standard Witch, it's just a LG Witch.

But, if you're doing a vanilla fantasy heartbreaker then keep the useful shorthand, it saves you work, it gives the potential buyers a useful shorthand that helps them grok what you mean faster.

I don't technically disagree with this. For example, I don't see the point of fighting the D&D meaning of "druid" in D&D.

However, I question the value of doing a "vanilla fantasy heartbreaker" which is just a D&D variant keeping stuff like druid the same. Nothing wrong with D&D, but we already have a massive glut of D&D variants.

I'd be far more interested in a Gaulish-inspired RPG that has Celtic priesthood than in yet another vanilla fantasy heartbreaker.

Quote from: jhkim on October 26, 2023, 06:05:19 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Like it or not D&D is the 500 Tones Gorilla in the room, it has shaped the culture and not only in RPGs.

The ONE real problem I see is that people tend to just use the exact same class with a different name when developing something like Maztica, Al-Quadim, etc. If you're going to do so why not just call it Witch? And if you're going to give it a different name (A single word for the love of God) then do the work and make it really different, give it spells that fit the setting, give it limitations that fit YOUR setting.

Take the White Witch, I haven't seen one that's really different from the Standard Witch, it's just a LG Witch.

But, if you're doing a vanilla fantasy heartbreaker then keep the useful shorthand, it saves you work, it gives the potential buyers a useful shorthand that helps them grok what you mean faster.

I don't technically disagree with this. For example, I don't see the point of fighting the D&D meaning of "druid" in D&D.

However, I question the value of doing a "vanilla fantasy heartbreaker" which is just a D&D variant keeping stuff like druid the same. Nothing wrong with D&D, but we already have a massive glut of D&D variants.

I'd be far more interested in a Gaulish-inspired RPG that has Celtic priesthood than in yet another vanilla fantasy heartbreaker.

That's fine, each has his interests, I'm just saying that in a vanilla heartbreaker or in vanilla D&D the words have a weight and meaning and shouldn't be changed just because.

Like you say if you're doing a Fantasy RPG based of off different mythos then by all means, but do the work, not just change the name and keep everything else the same.

I was thinking of an Arthurian mythos setting which used some D&D class concepts as appropriate. Clerics and Paladins are associated with Christianity, Warlocks and Sorcerers with Satan, Druids with "the old religion". Merlin is a Sorcerer, but because he was baptized he can use his powers without going to Hell.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 26, 2023, 07:15:04 PM
I was thinking of an Arthurian mythos setting which used some D&D class concepts as appropriate. Clerics and Paladins are associated with Christianity, Warlocks and Sorcerers with Satan, Druids with "the old religion". Merlin is a Sorcerer, but because he was baptized he can use his powers without going to Hell.

I like it, now, IIRC Merlin descends from an inccubus, small difference but he inherits his powers doesn't make a pact for them.

So, Merlin is a cambion, or a tiefling if you preffer.

This is just a gut feeling, but I think neodruids are more likely to be offended by the removal of the name.
In AD&D druids are clearly based on what little information we knew about them plus Victorian(?) Neodruids tropes.

Shaman is originally a Eurasian Steppe term innit? That's actually what they were in Oriental Adventures. Funny how the game's "racist past" seems to use terminology more properly than WOTC ever did in the information age.

I think our society is fast approaching peak stupidity where witches and whatnot are a problem in fantasy. It's not like witches are a faerie tale trope or anything...

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Given WotKKK recent decision to change (in MtG) the Witch to something else there's been a bit (a huge one imho) of a discussion about if it's appropriate or not to use such terms to define the classes:

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 18, 2023, 12:38:53 PM

I prefer to use succinct phrases: e.g. ecoterrorist magic-user instead of druid, sexy female magic-user instead of witch, elderly male magic-user instead of wizard, demon-worshiping magic-user instead of warlock, religious healer magic-user instead of cleric, etc. But YMMV.

&

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 18, 2023, 08:17:53 AM
Troubadour is probably the most accurate term for what D&D bards actually look like and do.

For example.

Now, at your table or while designing your game you do you boo.

That being said I feel there's something missing from the discussion:

Like it or not American (USA for the more pedantic) culture has permeated the world's, part of it IS D&D, and D&D used those names for those classes (even if you believe they were wrong from the start in doing so), and so those names have become ingrained in the popular imaginary world wide as representing something.

For that part, don't worry, South Korea, Japan and India's culture are replacing the West.  The US puts out content with zero emotional content, meanwhile Japan puts out content that gives you an emotional reaction.  Look at the irrelevance of American comic books compared to Manga?  Go to your FLHS, they typically had current comic books - what they are pulled and have replaced with Manga + old comics, but nothing new?  American cultural influence is dead, dying and gone.  Disney can't put out a movie that makes a sale.  Paramount just announced they are going full DEI after all their Star Wars content flops more than the Incredible Mr Limpet does outside of water.  Get ready for an Asian centered cultural world a lot faster than people believe and you can thank the wokesters for putting themselves completely out of jobs.  By the time the wokersters are done, we'll be watching films celebrating Pearl Harbor for the brave Japanese airmen.

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 30, 2023, 01:42:54 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Given WotKKK recent decision to change (in MtG) the Witch to something else there's been a bit (a huge one imho) of a discussion about if it's appropriate or not to use such terms to define the classes:

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 18, 2023, 12:38:53 PM

I prefer to use succinct phrases: e.g. ecoterrorist magic-user instead of druid, sexy female magic-user instead of witch, elderly male magic-user instead of wizard, demon-worshiping magic-user instead of warlock, religious healer magic-user instead of cleric, etc. But YMMV.

&

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 18, 2023, 08:17:53 AM
Troubadour is probably the most accurate term for what D&D bards actually look like and do.

For example.

Now, at your table or while designing your game you do you boo.

That being said I feel there's something missing from the discussion:

Like it or not American (USA for the more pedantic) culture has permeated the world's, part of it IS D&D, and D&D used those names for those classes (even if you believe they were wrong from the start in doing so), and so those names have become ingrained in the popular imaginary world wide as representing something.

For that part, don't worry, South Korea, Japan and India's culture are replacing the West.  The US puts out content with zero emotional content, meanwhile Japan puts out content that gives you an emotional reaction.  Look at the irrelevance of American comic books compared to Manga?  Go to your FLHS, they typically had current comic books - what they are pulled and have replaced with Manga + old comics, but nothing new?  American cultural influence is dead, dying and gone.  Disney can't put out a movie that makes a sale.  Paramount just announced they are going full DEI after all their Star Wars content flops more than the Incredible Mr Limpet does outside of water.  Get ready for an Asian centered cultural world a lot faster than people believe and you can thank the wokesters for putting themselves completely out of jobs.  By the time the wokersters are done, we'll be watching films celebrating Pearl Harbor for the brave Japanese airmen.

"America commits to cultural seppuku, Japan capitalizes," but in all seriousness Japan is in America's sphere of influence. It's not impossible Japan gets dragged into the same bullshit state of affairs.

Quote from: WERDNA on October 30, 2023, 01:48:24 PM

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 30, 2023, 01:42:54 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Given WotKKK recent decision to change (in MtG) the Witch to something else there's been a bit (a huge one imho) of a discussion about if it's appropriate or not to use such terms to define the classes:

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 18, 2023, 12:38:53 PM

I prefer to use succinct phrases: e.g. ecoterrorist magic-user instead of druid, sexy female magic-user instead of witch, elderly male magic-user instead of wizard, demon-worshiping magic-user instead of warlock, religious healer magic-user instead of cleric, etc. But YMMV.

&

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 18, 2023, 08:17:53 AM
Troubadour is probably the most accurate term for what D&D bards actually look like and do.

For example.

Now, at your table or while designing your game you do you boo.

That being said I feel there's something missing from the discussion:

Like it or not American (USA for the more pedantic) culture has permeated the world's, part of it IS D&D, and D&D used those names for those classes (even if you believe they were wrong from the start in doing so), and so those names have become ingrained in the popular imaginary world wide as representing something.

For that part, don't worry, South Korea, Japan and India's culture are replacing the West.  The US puts out content with zero emotional content, meanwhile Japan puts out content that gives you an emotional reaction.  Look at the irrelevance of American comic books compared to Manga?  Go to your FLHS, they typically had current comic books - what they are pulled and have replaced with Manga + old comics, but nothing new?  American cultural influence is dead, dying and gone.  Disney can't put out a movie that makes a sale.  Paramount just announced they are going full DEI after all their Star Wars content flops more than the Incredible Mr Limpet does outside of water.  Get ready for an Asian centered cultural world a lot faster than people believe and you can thank the wokesters for putting themselves completely out of jobs.  By the time the wokersters are done, we'll be watching films celebrating Pearl Harbor for the brave Japanese airmen.

"America commits to cultural seppuku, Japan capitalizes," but in all seriousness Japan is in America's sphere of influence. It's not impossible Japan gets dragged into the same bullshit state of affairs.

Those Japense firms that get americanized, gets called out by the public and they back down due to societal norms there.  Look at Sony, its sales are toilet water now because they went woke.  Sony had to move its video game division to Los Angeles because Japanese workers would not support it.

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 30, 2023, 04:16:33 PM

Quote from: WERDNA on October 30, 2023, 01:48:24 PM

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 30, 2023, 01:42:54 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Given WotKKK recent decision to change (in MtG) the Witch to something else there's been a bit (a huge one imho) of a discussion about if it's appropriate or not to use such terms to define the classes:

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 18, 2023, 12:38:53 PM

I prefer to use succinct phrases: e.g. ecoterrorist magic-user instead of druid, sexy female magic-user instead of witch, elderly male magic-user instead of wizard, demon-worshiping magic-user instead of warlock, religious healer magic-user instead of cleric, etc. But YMMV.

&

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 18, 2023, 08:17:53 AM
Troubadour is probably the most accurate term for what D&D bards actually look like and do.

For example.

Now, at your table or while designing your game you do you boo.

That being said I feel there's something missing from the discussion:

Like it or not American (USA for the more pedantic) culture has permeated the world's, part of it IS D&D, and D&D used those names for those classes (even if you believe they were wrong from the start in doing so), and so those names have become ingrained in the popular imaginary world wide as representing something.

For that part, don't worry, South Korea, Japan and India's culture are replacing the West.  The US puts out content with zero emotional content, meanwhile Japan puts out content that gives you an emotional reaction.  Look at the irrelevance of American comic books compared to Manga?  Go to your FLHS, they typically had current comic books - what they are pulled and have replaced with Manga + old comics, but nothing new?  American cultural influence is dead, dying and gone.  Disney can't put out a movie that makes a sale.  Paramount just announced they are going full DEI after all their Star Wars content flops more than the Incredible Mr Limpet does outside of water.  Get ready for an Asian centered cultural world a lot faster than people believe and you can thank the wokesters for putting themselves completely out of jobs.  By the time the wokersters are done, we'll be watching films celebrating Pearl Harbor for the brave Japanese airmen.

"America commits to cultural seppuku, Japan capitalizes," but in all seriousness Japan is in America's sphere of influence. It's not impossible Japan gets dragged into the same bullshit state of affairs.

Those Japense firms that get americanized, gets called out by the public and they back down due to societal norms there.  Look at Sony, its sales are toilet water now because they went woke.  Sony had to move its video game division to Los Angeles because Japanese workers would not support it.

Not sure if it was the Prime Minister but some big wig in Japan's government is courting ESG investment.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 31, 2023, 01:17:00 AM

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 30, 2023, 04:16:33 PM

Quote from: WERDNA on October 30, 2023, 01:48:24 PM

Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 30, 2023, 01:42:54 PM

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 18, 2023, 01:20:26 PM
Given WotKKK recent decision to change (in MtG) the Witch to something else there's been a bit (a huge one imho) of a discussion about if it's appropriate or not to use such terms to define the classes:

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 18, 2023, 12:38:53 PM

I prefer to use succinct phrases: e.g. ecoterrorist magic-user instead of druid, sexy female magic-user instead of witch, elderly male magic-user instead of wizard, demon-worshiping magic-user instead of warlock, religious healer magic-user instead of cleric, etc. But YMMV.

&

Quote from: RPGPundit on October 18, 2023, 08:17:53 AM
Troubadour is probably the most accurate term for what D&D bards actually look like and do.

For example.

Now, at your table or while designing your game you do you boo.

That being said I feel there's something missing from the discussion:

Like it or not American (USA for the more pedantic) culture has permeated the world's, part of it IS D&D, and D&D used those names for those classes (even if you believe they were wrong from the start in doing so), and so those names have become ingrained in the popular imaginary world wide as representing something.

For that part, don't worry, South Korea, Japan and India's culture are replacing the West.  The US puts out content with zero emotional content, meanwhile Japan puts out content that gives you an emotional reaction.  Look at the irrelevance of American comic books compared to Manga?  Go to your FLHS, they typically had current comic books - what they are pulled and have replaced with Manga + old comics, but nothing new?  American cultural influence is dead, dying and gone.  Disney can't put out a movie that makes a sale.  Paramount just announced they are going full DEI after all their Star Wars content flops more than the Incredible Mr Limpet does outside of water.  Get ready for an Asian centered cultural world a lot faster than people believe and you can thank the wokesters for putting themselves completely out of jobs.  By the time the wokersters are done, we'll be watching films celebrating Pearl Harbor for the brave Japanese airmen.

"America commits to cultural seppuku, Japan capitalizes," but in all seriousness Japan is in America's sphere of influence. It's not impossible Japan gets dragged into the same bullshit state of affairs.

Those Japense firms that get americanized, gets called out by the public and they back down due to societal norms there.  Look at Sony, its sales are toilet water now because they went woke.  Sony had to move its video game division to Los Angeles because Japanese workers would not support it.

Not sure if it was the Prime Minister but some big wig in Japan's government is courting ESG investment.

Yup global asshats are doing everything they can to shove a dick up Japan's ass and the citizens are telling them very politely "no thank you" as the Japanese tend to do.  Sony went woke and it hurt their console sales in Japan.  The PS5 is the lowest selling Sony counsel in Sony's history.  Kadokawa president apologized for publicly supporting censorship.  His customers told him to get bent.  The president took a pay cut for it.

https://japantoday.com/category/features/lifestyle/kadokawa-president-apologizes-and-takes-pay-cut-for-his-comments-about-censoring-manga

Say what you want about the Japanese, they are a culturally homogenous society with strong societal ties.  They are very good at resisting woke attacks on their culture and people.

Quote from: WERDNA on October 30, 2023, 01:29:16 PM
This is just a gut feeling, but I think neodruids are more likely to be offended by the removal of the name.
In AD&D druids are clearly based on what little information we knew about them plus Victorian(?) Neodruids tropes.

Shaman is originally a Eurasian Steppe term innit? That's actually what they were in Oriental Adventures. Funny how the game's "racist past" seems to use terminology more properly than WOTC ever did in the information age.

I think our society is fast approaching peak stupidity where witches and whatnot are a problem in fantasy. It's not like witches are a faerie tale trope or anything...

Yes, "shaman" originally comes from northern Asia. But it's since been used by pop culture and incompetent anthropologists as a generic term for indigenous belief systems around the globe regardless of how different those beliefs actually are. In OGL books, I've seen it used a broad shorthand for not!druids with a generic indigenous aesthetic (Native American? Afro-Caribbean? Australian Aboriginal? Who knows!) and a theology that doesn't match any real theology that ever existed and doesn't mesh with the already convoluted D&D cosmology.

The problem is that, once you actually start studying world religions, you begin to notice there are more similarities than there are differences. While there are obvious differences between cultures, all religions serve similar roles in giving people a sense of purpose and providing various remedies for social, physical and environmental ills in a time before we had evidence-based medicine, economists, and the weather channel.

The beliefs of Proto-Indo-Europeans, pre-colonial North Americans and pre-colonial Sub-Saharan Africans are probably more similar than they are different. But in pop culture and fantasy fiction, an artificial line is drawn between... well, euro paganism and non-euro paganism. Non-euro paganism is treated as a homogenous mass whose tenets are horribly misconstrued by writers, whereas even the most inaccurate depictions of euro paganism are vastly closer to the mark by comparison. Even the woke do this by, for example, conflating Haitian Voodoo with Cuban Santeria in Castlevania: Nocturne while simultaneously scrubbing all elements of Folk Catholicism. This is probably because euro paganism is vastly more accessible to the people writing this stuff, whereas non-euro religion... isn't.

I'm sure we can all name underworld rulers like Hel, Hades and Anubis. (Ancient Egyptian religion isn't actually European, but it's the most accessible African religion to Europeans due to the Egyptology craze and the fact that Ancient Egypt heavily influenced European cultures via trade.) How many of us can name many American, Australian, Sub-Saharan African mythological characters other than Coyote, Anansi and Quetzalcoatl?

Also, Proto-Indo-European descended religion has tons of elements that would seem "shamanic." For example, Greek religion posits that natural features have their own gods (nymphs, satyrs, river gods, mountain gods, etc) and that even abstract concepts like justice and vengeance have personifications. Then there's fairies, personifications of the seemingly capricious natural world that must be placated and avoided, who are a Christianization of the rustic deities of pagan religions. Nymphs, fairies, jinn, yokai, etc. are all different cultures' versions of the same thing: personifications of natural forces that must be placated and avoided.

Compare the cosmologies for Mayan religion, Chinese folk religion, and Greco-Roman religion. Notice anything? All three have an identical three-tiered model where Sky/Heaven sits at the top, Earth in the middle, and the Underworld/Hell at the bottom. These cultures didn't have contact with each other, yet they independently came up with the same basic cosmology. What do they have in common? Agriculture, cities, writing, and elaborate funerals. This suggests to me that these religions are reflective of universal aspects of human heuristics: the Sky/Heavens are above us, we live on Earth, and we inter our dead in (or mark their passing with) the grave.

I don't think it makes sense to exoticize these things, especially when you have a poor grasp of their workings anyway. A cleric, druid, and shaman, or whatever you want to call them, are the same thing.

Exotic only means different, not from here (wherever here is).

You  don't need to "exoticize" different cultures/religions from your own, they ALREADY are exotic to you, just like they would see you as exotic even if they don't have a word for it. Plus "exoticize" is just SJW gobbledygook.

Exotic
1 of 2
adjective
ex·​ot·​ic ig-ˈzä-tik
Synonyms of exotic https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/exotic
1: introduced from another country : not native to the place where found
exotic plants
... exotic species creating havoc when introduced into new environments.—
Chemical & Engineering News
2: strikingly, excitingly, or mysteriously different or unusual
exotic flavors
Until very recently the alpaca was an exotic sight at county fairs and petting zoos in the metropolitan region.—
Glenn Collins
3 : of or relating to striptease : involving or featuring exotic dancers
exotic dancing
an exotic nightclub
4 archaic : foreign, alien

Can anyone point to why is it now "problematic" to find something exotic?

I've already proven that in the only games where Shaman could be used for the medicine man from the "first nations" it's very rare to find it at all.

That you or other people see the class and think amerindians speaks about you a lot more than about the class itself.

Nothing about D&D cosmology (and 99.99% of RPGs) makes a lick of sense, it's not a 1:1 equivalent to any IRL cosmology present or past. But that's only a problem if you want to model reality. MY complaint it's that it doesn't make sense internally, in the game world.

As for Shaman being an amalgamation of different IRL cultures... Well duh! it's shorthand, do you also complain that The Cleric is an amalgamation of Christianity with other religions including polytheism? No, nobody complaints because fuck the Christians that's why.

Well fuck the pagans, polytheists, witches, druids, shamans etc too! Seriously, IT'S A GAME, it's not meant to model IRL things.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 31, 2023, 12:36:52 PM
Exotic only means different, not from here (wherever here is).

You  don't need to "exoticize" different cultures/religions from your own, they ALREADY are exotic to you, just like they would see you as exotic even if they don't have a word for it. Plus "exoticize" is just SJW gobbledygook.

Exotic
1 of 2
adjective
ex·​ot·​ic ig-ˈzä-tik
Synonyms of exotic https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/exotic
1: introduced from another country : not native to the place where found
exotic plants
... exotic species creating havoc when introduced into new environments.—
Chemical & Engineering News
2: strikingly, excitingly, or mysteriously different or unusual
exotic flavors
Until very recently the alpaca was an exotic sight at county fairs and petting zoos in the metropolitan region.—
Glenn Collins
3 : of or relating to striptease : involving or featuring exotic dancers
exotic dancing
an exotic nightclub
4 archaic : foreign, alien

Can anyone point to why is it now "problematic" to find something exotic?

I've already proven that in the only games where Shaman could be used for the medicine man from the "first nations" it's very rare to find it at all.

That you or other people see the class and think amerindians speaks about you a lot more than about the class itself.

Nothing about D&D cosmology (and 99.99% of RPGs) makes a lick of sense, it's not a 1:1 equivalent to any IRL cosmology present or past. But that's only a problem if you want to model reality. MY complaint it's that it doesn't make sense internally, in the game world.

As for Shaman being an amalgamation of different IRL cultures... Well duh! it's shorthand, do you also complain that The Cleric is an amalgamation of Christianity with other religions including polytheism? No, nobody complaints because fuck the Christians that's why.

Well fuck the pagans, polytheists, witches, druids, shamans etc too! Seriously, IT'S A GAME, it's not meant to model IRL things.

Woke = Globalism.  Everything has to be the same and equal, there can be no other or different we are all the same and borders are racist etc.  Its why they tend to go against the term exotic or other.  It's fairly sad, but the powerful are trying to force one culture on the planet as much as they can.  It's like we are watching the deliberate destruction of cultures right now.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 31, 2023, 12:36:52 PM
Nothing about D&D cosmology (and 99.99% of RPGs) makes a lick of sense, it's not a 1:1 equivalent to any IRL cosmology present or past. But that's only a problem if you want to model reality. MY complaint it's that it doesn't make sense internally, in the game world.

As for Shaman being an amalgamation of different IRL cultures... Well duh! it's shorthand, do you also complain that The Cleric is an amalgamation of Christianity with other religions including polytheism? No, nobody complaints because fuck the Christians that's why.

These are all things that I have complained about before.