I remember reading through the 5e core books upon release in 2014 and thinking they were pretty good. What was the turning point where wokeness started to ruin the game?

Easy, the paragraph in chapter 4 that says, "You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender."

This set the precedent that the DM cannot veto a player's character concept no matter how much that concept doesn't fit into the game's setting. It was all downhill from there.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on January 07, 2023, 09:23:16 PM
Easy, the paragraph in chapter 4 that says, "You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender."

This set the precedent that the DM cannot veto a player's character concept no matter how much that concept doesn't fit into the game's setting. It was all downhill from there.

Yep.  As a result that was the last D&D book I ever bought.  Kinda saw where things were headed.

Was that the only offending part of the core rulebooks?

As with a lot of such ideological takeovers, it happens quietly at first, then slowly, then seemingly all at once.  That's because all the people involved, and their fellow travelers, will habitually pretend they aren't doing what they are doing until they get control, then it accelerates. 

A great deal of change, took place in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything.  The change there, was much greater than that witnessed in the previous core books and splat books.  After the core 3 books, you saw splat books go off into 2 primary directions. 

Volo's Guide to Monsters, expanded upon the previous Monster Manual offerings; and it also included additional playable races to those found in the PHB.  Then Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, followed in the footsteps of Volo's.

The other type of splat, came in the form of Xanathar's Guide to Everything; and then later, Tasha's Guide to Everything.  These books were an expansion of content found in the PHB and the DMG.

*More recently; Mordenkainen's Monsters of the Multiverse, is a replacement for both Volo's and the previous Mordenkainen's volume.  This was a do-over, which allowed WOTC to continue to go woke; by re-releasing previously released material.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on January 07, 2023, 09:23:16 PM
Easy, the paragraph in chapter 4 that says, "You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender."

This set the precedent that the DM cannot veto a player's character concept no matter how much that concept doesn't fit into the game's setting. It was all downhill from there.

^^THIS^^

DnD5e has always been woke.

Quote from: RabidWookie on January 07, 2023, 09:52:28 PM
Was that the only offending part of the core rulebooks?

Important Note here -

Yes, it was offensive. The important reason is WHY. The statement was offensive because that has always been how the game was played since its inception without some ham-fisted author's note saying so. You could play anything you wanted as a character and nobody cared. The only exception to that were people who used it to be an asshole at the table hiding behind the excuse of, "My character was created that way and so must be shitty to everyone!"

In the hail of screams about how "stunning and brave" that statement was, people forgot that it had always been that way, just unstated because it was obvious.

Quote from: RabidWookie on January 07, 2023, 09:52:28 PM
Was that the only offending part of the core rulebooks?

AFAICR yes, though I can only speak to the PH because I didn't buy the other books.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on January 07, 2023, 09:23:16 PM
Easy, the paragraph in chapter 4 that says, "You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender."

This set the precedent that the DM cannot veto a player's character concept no matter how much that concept doesn't fit into the game's setting. It was all downhill from there.

I'd agree that it's woke, but I don't think it undermines DM authority any more than any other statement in the rulebook saying "You can do X". There are a lot of parts of the rules - like equipment, language, and backgrounds - that depend on setting, and need to be altered if different from the default setting. In 5E, the default setting is the Forgotten Realms, which were established back in the 1980s by their original author, Ed Greenwood, as being typically inclusive of LGBT identities.

So, I'd agree that it's a marker for "woke" - but it isn't opposed to DM authority and it fits with the original vision of the Forgotten Realms.

Also, that paragraph at least partly due to Pundit's influence, according to him. As he put it,

QuoteI was completely and explicitly in favor of Wizards including that, just as they did.  Contrary to what you have implied I have never  and would never be opposed to inclusion on the basis of gender or sexual orientation.  I have always been firmly in support of gay rights; I have had gay and bisexual players in my gaming groups, my wife (The Wench) and I lived for many years with a gay couple renting our spare bedroom, I have been a supporter of LGBT rights in Uruguay (which is one of the most progressive countries in South America on that note, where not only has gay marriage and adoption been legalized but anyone from the age of 12 onwards has a right to choose the gender stated on their identity card), and to my knowledge (maybe someone can point me to a pre-existing work that proves otherwise, but if so I did not hear of it) my Arrows of Indra is the first RPG to feature a transgendered character on the cover.

Source: http://therpgpundit.blogspot.com/2014/07/if-youre-going-to-hate-me-at-least-do.html

Quote from: jhkim on January 08, 2023, 12:01:24 AM

Quote from: hedgehobbit on January 07, 2023, 09:23:16 PM
Easy, the paragraph in chapter 4 that says, "You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex and gender."

This set the precedent that the DM cannot veto a player's character concept no matter how much that concept doesn't fit into the game's setting. It was all downhill from there.

I'd agree that it's woke, but I don't think it undermines DM authority any more than any other statement in the rulebook saying "You can do X". There are a lot of parts of the rules - like equipment, language, and backgrounds - that depend on setting, and need to be altered if different from the default setting. In 5E, the default setting is the Forgotten Realms, which were established back in the 1980s by their original author, Ed Greenwood, as being typically inclusive of LGBT identities.

So, I'd agree that it's a marker for "woke" - but it isn't opposed to DM authority and it fits with the original vision of the Forgotten Realms.

Also, that paragraph at least partly due to Pundit's influence, according to him. As he put it,

QuoteI was completely and explicitly in favor of Wizards including that, just as they did.  Contrary to what you have implied I have never  and would never be opposed to inclusion on the basis of gender or sexual orientation.  I have always been firmly in support of gay rights; I have had gay and bisexual players in my gaming groups, my wife (The Wench) and I lived for many years with a gay couple renting our spare bedroom, I have been a supporter of LGBT rights in Uruguay (which is one of the most progressive countries in South America on that note, where not only has gay marriage and adoption been legalized but anyone from the age of 12 onwards has a right to choose the gender stated on their identity card), and to my knowledge (maybe someone can point me to a pre-existing work that proves otherwise, but if so I did not hear of it) my Arrows of Indra is the first RPG to feature a transgendered character on the cover.

Source: http://therpgpundit.blogspot.com/2014/07/if-youre-going-to-hate-me-at-least-do.html

That bolded part will be the end of the LGBT movement. That's not something I'm too happy about in the slightest.

Throwaway lines about trans characters being allowed don't ruin the game IMO, I'm thinking more about stuff like eliminating bonuses/differentiating features for PC species or no longer portraying monsters as inherently evil. Things that change the way the game is played.

Quote from: RabidWookie on January 08, 2023, 12:20:42 AM
Throwaway lines about trans characters being allowed don't ruin the game IMO, I'm thinking more about stuff like eliminating bonuses/differentiating features for PC species or no longer portraying monsters as inherently evil. Things that change the way the game is played.

There are a handful books where WotC didn't include alignment info, as they were moving away from alignment - notably Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft. However, I don't think that affects game play much. There are still evil monsters in Richten's, they just don't have "alignment: lawful evil" in their stat block. WotC later reversed that policy, and began including alignment stats again, with slightly changed verbiage.

They have stuck with removing race-specific stat modifiers, which lessens optimized race/class combos. That has some effect compared to original 5E, but it's pretty marginal. It's a shift of 1 or 2 attribute points around. It mostly influences those players really trying to maximize optimization.

I think 2015 was the year wokeness hit critical mass in our culture, I guess it's a blessing that 5e core hit in 2014. I can only imagine what OneD&D will bring...

Let's be honest here: that line about not sticking to a gender binary was pure virtue signalling. It has zero impact on the rules and almost no effect on the setting unless a player/GM wants to draw attention to it. As Jeff pointed out, you have ALWAYS been able to describe your character however you wanted. The book did not need to give players explicit permission. What that sentence DOES do, however, is alienate players that aren't comfortable with having gender-non-conforming character (either out of a bias or perhaps simply because the setting doesn't allow it).

The biggest misconception people have with "fantasy" is they think it means "anything goes," when what it actually means is that the fantasy world does not necessarily comport to our reality. It is entirely within the realm of "fantasy" to have a world where genders exist on a strict binary (not only physically/biologically, but socially as well). Sure, one can make the argument that the core D&D books default to Forgotten Realms, which was allegedly design purposely to be inclusive to other lifestyles, but the core books are also intended to be toolkit. You don't NEED to include halflings or dragonborn or druids or certain Feats, etc. And, yes, that also means you can ignore that sentence about gender identity too. But here's the test... try writing a setting for D&D that explicitly sets down a gender binary, then count the seconds before you get called an istophobe and have your licensing rights revoked.