Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1128668You do know that I'm a minority, right?

You're white? We're 11.5% of the world, but fortunately, being an ethnic minority doesn't mean anything on free speech forum.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1128678Not even the ones that buy into SJW shit. This is something that has literally been willed into existence by pseudo academic idiots mentally masturbating while basking in their race "theory" nonsense trying to find racism in whatever they subjectively declared it to be so. None this shit grew organically without going through some pseudo academic exercise to arrive at these conclusions. This is strictly a pseudo academic phenomenon. Normal people don't think this way.

Well said.
Working in academia, I actually see them working up this SJW stuff. It can be quite eerie when eg Feminists who care about Women & hate men go from being on top the SJW totem pole to being Radical Feminists to being TERFS (Delenda Est TERFs!) within a relative blink of an eye. Or earlier when they decided Race Is A Social Construct (But the foundation of Identity), & so on.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1128649An adventure had a couple of married gay gnome kings. People here didn't like that for some reason.

As usual you didnt even read the thread did you? No? No.

What happened was some people wayyyy over-reacted until it was pointed out just how meaningless the entry is. Just like all the others squirelled away in various WOTC modules. Its all of one sentence with zero impact on the adventure and nothing to back it up. And no one at WOTC so far has been going out of their way to draw attention to these things that I have ever seen. Or even mention them at all.

About the only thing that got even a little comment was the new race boon that allows elves to change gender every morning if they take it at chargen. Which also got noted in Adventurers League chargen. Thats been pretty much it aside from that throw-away comment in the PHB.

Quote from: Mishihari;1128670I suppose it depends how tolerant you are of such nonsense.  The 5E Player's Handbook had a couple of line about how their are other options besides male and female for your characters.  At that point I decided I was done with 5E.  I'm not sending money to people who promote such baloney.

Quote from: SHARK;1128673Greetings!

The 5E Player's Handbook talks about "Other options besides male and female for your characters." WHAT? What "other options" would there be? Geesus, what fucking nonsense. If you can, perhaps you could quote it directly, with chapter and page number? I'm not being abrasive--it is like the statement is so absurd, I want to read it for myself, kind of like the desire to rubberneck and see horrible car accidents on the freeway with blood and fore everywhere.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

M'thinks you two are over-reacting a bit.

From the Basic Rulebook

QuoteSex
You can play a male or female character without gaining
any special benefits or hindrances. Think about how
your character does or does not conform to the broader
culture's expectations of sex, gender, and sexual
behavior. For example, a male drow cleric defies the
traditional gender divisions of drow society, which could
be a reason for your character to leave that society and
come to the surface.

You don't need to be confined to binary notions of sex
and gender. The elf god Corellon Larethian is often seen
as androgynous, for example, and some elves in the
multiverse are made in Corellon's image. You could also
play a female character who presents herself as a man,
a man who feels trapped in a female body, or a bearded
female dwarf who hates being mistaken for a male.
Likewise, your character's sexual orientation is for you
to decide.

TLDR: You can play what you want.

As for what other options besides male and female? If referring to gender, there is also hermaphrodite. These actually occur to various degrees in humans. Apparently about 1 in 2000 have some form of mutation. But there are less than 1000 worldwide with the more extensive combination. Much like alot of other biological quirks. There are degrees of impact.

Well, thanks to everyone for al the advice and catching up with recent gaming history over the past couple of weeks, but I'm pretty sure now this forum isn't really for me. I now get the feeling that most of you would probably hate me and my politics. Best of luck to you all, and keep on enjoying gaming, whatever and however you choose to play.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1128649I haven't seen anyone literally arguing that to be the case. Only the antis have ever said that phrase. Rather, the actual argument is that depictions of humanoids draws heavily from historical racist propaganda that leaves a legacy to this day. This can make some players of minority status uncomfortable because they experience systemic racism in their daily life, and thus the depiction ruins their escapism at their particular tables. It's apparently quite common a problem but few of those affected are comfortable with talking about it (especially with players of majority status) and considering the #orcgate controversy I'm not surprised.

Of course this could all just be SJW gaslighting. It's not like we have any archives where players of minority status can share horror stories to verify this. I used to worry about this for a few hours every week like I do every social media fad because I'm a dirty gossip who craves online social interaction because I have no real life friends, but I recently realized that I don't really care.

An adventure had a couple of married gay gnome kings. People here didn't like that for some reason.

Box CrayonTales: I don't know too much about what's gone on over the last decade, but I think I'd be with you on this one (and I'd think that class representations could be a big issue here - Warhammer orcs as illiterate football hooligans? Now that was a bit on the nose!). Best of luck. I feel like eventually I'll say something that will start a fight here and, TBH, I can't be doing with that.

Cheers,
Franko

Kickstarter has gone big since 2012, even if it did exist before. And that has led to even more games beeing created by small time writers, always a win in my book. I agree on SJW beeing a real pain these days, am happy it hasnt yet gone that far in my country but im afraid it probably will.

Quote from: Franko77;11281431) What have been the main developments in games design over the last decade? I know that D&D5E came out since I knocked off gaming.

Aside from D&D5:

- Apocalypse World kicked off a mold of games ( PbtA - Powered by the Apocalypse) characterized by highly thematic and pickup and play gaming. Playbooks being it's biggest contribution IMO: having everything for your character, including future advancement options, in a single sheet that's easy to fill and use.

- OSR gaming bringing back 70s/80s sensibilities in modern presentation. Again, easy to pickup and play and heavily thematic with lots of tables to generate cool stuff on the fly.

- Remakes and re-releases of old games of all sorts, eras and playsyles. From new Runequests to Travellers to old D&D boxes. Even A|State!

Really we're living a golden age of rpgs now.

Franko77, afraid of the fight? You can exist among us and still hold your perceived opposite opinion.

I promise.

 It's diverse opinions like yours that maybe keeps this cast of characters honest.

Biggest changes since 2010? The "Permission Slip" culture, where D/GMs need player permission to "deprotaganize" their PCs. Serious harm and TPKs need to be cleared prior to execution. A PC killed by a random encounter? Unthinkable! Slapping the king with no deadly consequences? Sure!

Nothing can stand in the way of "The Story™". So much so that there are established "X-Cards" to allow players to cancel aspects of a GM's game that run counter to what players want.
.
Sure. It's a group game, but making the GM's adventure a slave to player whim is .... curious. So, tread lightly.

Also, the appearance of "Meta-Currency" allowing, chiefly, bad rolls a reroll. Failure cannot be tolerated. We get this from the Millennials who've been indoctrinated that "everyone can be a winner." Even when you lose.

SJW propaganda?

Quote from: Theory of Games;1128737Also, the appearance of "Meta-Currency" allowing, chiefly, bad rolls a reroll.

I don't mind the "free reroll" metapoints.  They let you play a little harder without having to worry about accidentally killing off a PC and, really, they're not really anything more than a formalized, regulated system for fudging rolls.  Fudging has been with us forever, and there are plenty today who argue in favor of unrestricted fudging whenever the GM feels it's "appropriate", so I have a hard time arguing against reroll metapoints while the unlimited fudgers are still around.

What I object to are the more extreme variations, in which the metapoints rise to a full-on currency (e.g., Fate, an entire system which revolves around its "Fate Point economy") which is bought or sold in every game-mechanical interaction, or those where, instead of simply affecting a die roll, they're used as narrative control tokens, allowing the player to declare "It's no big deal that we're out of lockpicks *pays a Fate Point* my uncle's brother's niece's thrice-removed cousin lives a block away, and his cat brings lockpicks home all the time.  I'm sure he'll give us some!" and *poof!* it becomes true.

Quote from: nDervish;1128778I don't mind the "free reroll" metapoints.  They let you play a little harder without having to worry about accidentally killing off a PC and, really, they're not really anything more than a formalized, regulated system for fudging rolls.  Fudging has been with us forever, and there are plenty today who argue in favor of unrestricted fudging whenever the GM feels it's "appropriate", so I have a hard time arguing against reroll metapoints while the unlimited fudgers are still around.

What I object to are the more extreme variations, in which the metapoints rise to a full-on currency (e.g., Fate, an entire system which revolves around its "Fate Point economy") which is bought or sold in every game-mechanical interaction, or those where, instead of simply affecting a die roll, they're used as narrative control tokens, allowing the player to declare "It's no big deal that we're out of lockpicks *pays a Fate Point* my uncle's brother's niece's thrice-removed cousin lives a block away, and his cat brings lockpicks home all the time.  I'm sure he'll give us some!" and *poof!* it becomes true.

That's my stance as well.  If I'm going to have any reroll at all, I don't want it to be entirely GM fiat.  There's a set amount.  Everyone at the table knows what it is going in.  You do repetitive stupid stuff and use it all up fast, then you are the mercy of the dice the next stupid thing you do.  You do occasional reckless stuff that fits the theme of the game, you'll probably get away with it.  Unlimited fudge by the GM is a well that the players can go to until the GM has a mood swing.  Hero points for a reroll is a limited thematic thing that's like a set amount of water in the canteen for the trip across the desert.

Quote from: Theory of Games;1128737Biggest changes since 2010? The "Permission Slip" culture, where D/GMs need player permission to "deprotaganize" their PCs. Serious harm and TPKs need to be cleared prior to execution. A PC killed by a random encounter? Unthinkable! Slapping the king with no deadly consequences? Sure!

What game does this?

QuoteNothing can stand in the way of "The Story™". So much so that there are established "X-Cards" to allow players to cancel aspects of a GM's game that run counter to what players want.

That's not how x-cards work. X-cards are meant to be used when play goes to a topic you're uncomfortable with and wouldn't like to thread.

QuoteAlso, the appearance of "Meta-Currency" allowing, chiefly, bad rolls a reroll. Failure cannot be tolerated. We get this from the Millennials who've been indoctrinated that "everyone can be a winner." Even when you lose.

Metacurrency used for rerolls exist since ever. Shadowrun is here since 1989 and it already had karma pool.

Quote from: Omega;1128694M'thinks you two are over-reacting a bit.

From the Basic Rulebook



TLDR: You can play what you want.

As for what other options besides make and female? If referring to gender, there is also hermaphrodite. These actually occur to various degrees in humans. Apparently about 1 in 2000 have some form of mutation. But there are less than 1000 worlwide with the more extensive combination. Much like alot of other biological quirks. There are degrees of impact.

Thanks for providing the quote.  I worried that I had misremembered something, but that's exactly what I remembered.

I don't view it as saying "play what you want" (everybody already knows that anyway) but encouragement to play LBWhatever characters.  And if the game authors are pushing a political agenda I object to, they don't get my money.  No big deal, there are plenty of other good games out there and 5E didn't much appeal to me anyway.  So no, I don't think it an overreaction at all.

Quote from: Theory of Games;1128737Serious harm and TPKs need to be cleared prior to execution.

Quote from: Itachi;1128822What game does this?

Tenra Bansho Zero, for one.  Despite its heavy use of metapoints (the aiki/kiai/karma cycle), it actually still manages to play pretty trad in practice... except that PCs (and major NPCs) can't die without agreeing to it.

The way it works is that you have a certain amount of Stamina points, and you're KO'ed if they run out, but you can reduce Stamina damage received by checking off wound boxes.  You have a few Light Wounds (reduce a little damage and you get +1 on all rolls while you have a Light Wound), a couple Serious Wounds (reduce more damage and give +2), and The Dead Box (completely negates all Stamina damage from one hit and gives +3 to all rolls).  You actually die if you run out of Stamina and your Dead Box is checked.  If you don't check the Dead Box, you can't be killed in combat, period, no matter what.  The idea is that, by using it, the player is saying "this fight is over something important enough to my character that he's willing to die for it", which both allows them to die and gives them the best power-up because they care that much about it.  (TBZ is designed to emulate high-action anime, which is why they have the reverse death spiral.)

Quote from: Itachi;1128822Metacurrency used for rerolls exist since ever. Shadowrun is here since 1989 and it already had karma pool.

Ah, yes.  Another classic metapoint blunder:  Using the same pool of points both as XP and as a means to buy rerolls.

(In 1st edition Shadowrun, at least.  2nd edition split it up so that 90% of your karma went in the "this is XP" pool and 10% went into the "metapoints for dice manipulation" pool.)

Quote from: Warder;1128722Kickstarter has gone big since 2012, even if it did exist before. And that has led to even more games beeing created by small time writers, always a win in my book. I agree on SJW beeing a real pain these days, am happy it hasnt yet gone that far in my country but im afraid it probably will.

Kickstarter certainly threw wide the gates for indie publishing of all sorts.

Quote from: Theory of Games;1128737Biggest changes since 2010? The "Permission Slip" culture, where D/GMs need player permission to "deprotaganize" their PCs. Serious harm and TPKs need to be cleared prior to execution. A PC killed by a random encounter? Unthinkable! Slapping the king with no deadly consequences? Sure!

Nothing can stand in the way of "The Story™". So much so that there are established "X-Cards" to allow players to cancel aspects of a GM's game that run counter to what players want.
.
Sure. It's a group game, but making the GM's adventure a slave to player whim is .... curious. So, tread lightly.

Also, the appearance of "Meta-Currency" allowing, chiefly, bad rolls a reroll. Failure cannot be tolerated. We get this from the Millennials who've been indoctrinated that "everyone can be a winner." Even when you lose.

1: The shackaling of the DM and turning them into little more than a vend-bot. Or removing them totally is a storygamer push because "ALL DMs are the hated enemy trying to oppresseded muh fiction!". "Traps are BAD and only BAD DMs put traps in their sessions!"

Years ago we had plenty of nuts here spouting pretty much all of that and more as storygamers were on a spree trying to rewrite history. Ron Edwards cultists were freaking everywhere screeching incessantly "mother may I!" and "magic tea party!" and "Traps are a dick move by the DM!" and "everything is a storygame!" and so on ad nausium.

2: re-roll currency is nothing new. Its been around since at least the 80s and was introduced into AD&D with the Conan modules which had luck points. By the 90s a couple of games had some variation on a reroll point system. Not sure if any RPGs used it before that. And it was not used in mainstream D&D till much later.