Quote from: Slambo on June 26, 2023, 08:29:50 PM
Judging by it being mark rosewater i think its for Magic

Definitely.  In Magic the Gathering, permanents can have types, and the most common one was a creature type, such as Llanowar Elf being an Elf.  Many cards care about this sort of thing, granting abilities to creatures that share a type, counting the types to create an effect, etc.  At some point this was both generalized and extended past creatures to become tribal, which they actually decided to stop printing more of years ago because of woke reasons. 
https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Tribal

So this is a way for them to go back to print new tribal cards again, just with a nonsense name.

We shall see if this affects D&D in any way.  At the moment it doesn't seem like it, but, you know how that goes.

Quote from: Venka on June 27, 2023, 12:59:30 AM

Quote from: Slambo on June 26, 2023, 08:29:50 PM
Judging by it being mark rosewater i think its for Magic

Definitely.  In Magic the Gathering, permanents can have types, and the most common one was a creature type, such as Llanowar Elf being an Elf.  Many cards care about this sort of thing, granting abilities to creatures that share a type, counting the types to create an effect, etc.  At some point this was both generalized and extended past creatures to become tribal, which they actually decided to stop printing more of years ago because of woke reasons. 
https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Tribal

Wait. So from reading the link, the MtG "tribal" keyword is used to describe mechanical sharing of card type. It doesn't have anything to do with groups of American Indians or other historical/barbaric/primitive peoples. Is that right?

So "merfolk" is a type that a tribal card refers to - as in "Tribal Enchantment - Merfolk" means that in some circumstances that card is treated like an "enchantment" card, but also sometimes as a "Merfolk" card. But in ordinary English, "merfolk" aren't a tribe. They're a type of creature.

It sounds like "tribal" was a weird name in the first place to use for this, and "typal" actually seems to fit better. I'll buy that fixing it was for woke reasons too, though.

Quote from: Grognard GM on June 27, 2023, 12:15:20 AM
American Indians, who these fools GUSH over, have Tribal Councils, call themselves tribes, and use the word tribal to describe matters internal or affecting them.

And some resent the term "native american" because they're tired of the white man giving them something and then taking it away again. IE they got used to the term Indian, and then some whitey got offended for them.

Just like this situation.

Quote from: jhkim on June 27, 2023, 01:15:32 AM
Wait. So from reading the link, the MtG "tribal" keyword is used to describe mechanical sharing of card type. It doesn't have anything to do with groups of American Indians or other historical/barbaric/primitive peoples. Is that right?

Completely.

QuoteSo "merfolk" is a type that a tribal card refers to - as in "Tribal Enchantment - Merfolk" means that in some circumstances that card is treated like an "enchantment" card, but also sometimes as a "Merfolk" card. But in ordinary English, "merfolk" aren't a tribe. They're a type of creature.

Correct.  "Typal" isn't actually a good word here either, because of how you use "typal" in English.  But assuredly they should have originally chosen a word or phrase that implies that the enchantment is type-limited or type-specific.  The fact that this word doesn't exist, and their desire for a single-world descriptor, is likely why they went to the closest-fit "tribal".  But it wasn't the right word either.

QuoteI'll buy that fixing it was for woke reasons too, though.

Yea they've basically said as much.  Because "tribal" was never a great fit and isn't relevant to the lore or story, I think they felt it was glib towards actual tribes, and that's their reason.  It's not as preachy as many of their other changes, such as banning "crusade" as offensive, or pretending that card number 1488 no longer exists, and other such nonsense, though.  Basically this change is arguably meant to take away something that was arguably slightly insensitive for no actual thematic gain or verisimilitude, but not meant as a cultural attack or virtue signal.

  So wait, why not just use the word 'Type'? This reminds me of the never ending contortions of the 'Foo' Rule in L5R. And in retrospect these rules were habitually shrugged away in CCGer circles; we understood what was meant for the most part until someone wanted to find the bleeding edge of pedantic rule exploitations. 

Refusing to use "tribal" because of perceived negative linguistic baggage is stupid. What we should be doing is reclaiming the word and using it in its psychological meaning. Chaosium's Nephilim game did that. It literally called the playable secret societies "tribes" to distinguish them from the non-playable secret societies, using the word explicitly in its psychological meaning. (Although in this case the tribes are all close allies and work like invisible colleges. Player groups are expected to make their PCs different tribes to round them out.)

Quote from: David Johansen on June 26, 2023, 10:41:52 PM

They're actually managing to be more racist than they previously were.

I agree, but these are the same people who, concerning the origins of Covid 19, thought that "the Chinese eat dirty bat soup" was somehow not racist while speculating that "it might have been a lab leak from a coronavirus research center" made you a Nazi.

Isn't that a bit on par with "Americans eat cheeseburgers"?

Quote from: David Johansen on June 27, 2023, 10:06:42 AM
Isn't that a bit on par with "Americans eat cheeseburgers"?

Oh, I don't argue that the Chinese eat weird stuff.  I personally don't think it's "racist" to point that out either; it is what it is.  I just find it odd that the "everything is racist" crowd thought that a lab leak theory was racist while pointing out the weird stuff Chinese people eat, wasn't.  I'm pretty sure that if I stated "American Blacks love unhealthy fried foods and grape drank and that's why they were more susceptible to Covid" liberals would go apeshit.  They were happy to do that for the Chinese, though, if it meant protecting their sacred St. Fauci.

This is a good start, but let's face it: The entire English language is chock full of colonial baggage. Even the name "English language" is white supremacist.

We must decolonize our games! For the sake of humanity, truth, and justice.

I call on WotC to do what's right: STOP publishing in English and convert all game materials to Esperanto.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on June 27, 2023, 01:23:33 AM

Quote from: Grognard GM on June 27, 2023, 12:15:20 AM
American Indians, who these fools GUSH over, have Tribal Councils, call themselves tribes, and use the word tribal to describe matters internal or affecting them.

And some resent the term "native american" because they're tired of the white man giving them something and then taking it away again. IE they got used to the term Indian, and then some whitey got offended for them.

Just like this situation.

I hate it.  My grandfather grew up (after adoption) in a German community in the Midwest, where he was called "that Indian bastard."  If he could put up with and preferred Indian, why should I be a snowflake?

Quote from: Ratman_tf on June 27, 2023, 01:23:33 AM
And some resent the term "native american" because they're tired of the white man giving them something and then taking it away again. IE they got used to the term Indian, and then some whitey got offended for them.

If I remember correctly it was Jessie Jackson, trying to push his rainbow coalition, who coined the term African-American and Native American was invented at the same time. Then he added gays to the rainbow coalition and the other groups fled leaving the gay with the rainbow flag all to themselves. What I'm saying the shift pre-dated woke and whitey being offended on behalf of others.

The fact that it was "Consultants" that suggested the change speaks for itself.  I doubt they went to a grammar or game design consultant.  The word was misapplied in the first place, so it should have been changed, but only WotC could make a proper change due to grammar seem like creating an Orwellian new-word.

Quote from: rytrasmi on June 27, 2023, 10:29:41 AM
This is a good start, but let's face it: The entire English language is chock full of colonial baggage. Even the name "English language" is white supremacist.

We must decolonize our games! For the sake of humanity, truth, and justice.

I call on WotC to do what's right: STOP publishing in English and convert all game materials to Esperanto.

I call on WotC to do what's right: STOP publishing

Placing bets:

They want the outrage to result in the revival of the keyword "Banding" so that they can recycle all those older cards with updated rules text. Who doesn't like a good band? I hear that Native Americans are big fans of those too!