If you designed a fantasy equiavelent of the WoD, what monster types would you use instead of vamps, werewolves, mages (hmm), Prometheans, Mummies, Gypsies, Changelines, Ghosts, even Hunters? (I think that's all of them).

I think we can all agree that making gypsies into a "supernatural race" in the oWoD was a pretty darn horrible design decision which shouldn't be repeated.

Check out Monte Cook's World of Darkness. Assuming that you like the D20 System, you can inject World of Darkness creatures into a fantasy setting.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;285390If you designed a fantasy equiavelent of the WoD, what monster types would you use instead of vamps, werewolves, mages (hmm), Prometheans, Mummies, Gypsies, Changelines, Ghosts, even Hunters? (I think that's all of them).

The original Vampire clans are mostly fantasy types, in their 'look' if not their abilities:

Gangrel: barbarians
Tremere: wizards
Toreador: decadent nobles
Settites: evil priests (specifically like Thulsa Doom in the Conan film)

and so on.

There already WAS a "Middle Age"/fantasy version of World of Darkness - anyone remember White Wolf's DARK AGES line?

 It wasn't that long ago.

 Hell, we still have a handful of those books lingering on the store's shelves.


- Ed C.

Quote from: GrimGent;285392I think we can all agree that making gypsies into a "supernatural race" in the oWoD was a pretty darn horrible design decision which shouldn't be repeated.

I may be a bit crazy, but I think I prefer the magic gypsies of both the WoD and conventional mytholigizing to the sadly mundane 'illiterate migrant workers of europe' that is the vast majority of real gypsie-dom.

Then again, I also think it would be cool to have stories grant me cool mystic powers on account of being a "special race"... so I'm not entirely certain why any Rom would bitch about the typical and WoD depiction.

Of course, I also don't see any issue with being treated like the little yellow sex-god of war that I obviously am... so I'm obviously not in the norm here.

Quote from: Spike;285503Then again, I also think it would be cool to have stories grant me cool mystic powers on account of being a "special race"... so I'm not entirely certain why any Rom would bitch about the typical and WoD depiction.

It just feels like including "Magic Negro" as a character splat, complete with every single stereotype that the writers manage to pile on the concept. Treating real-life ethnicities (or nationalities, or religions) like that simply isn't smart idea: you might as well, say, have the rules depict every PC from Canada as suave seducers because "Canadians speak French and French is the language of love." (This has nothing to do with me being part Romani, incidentally.)

Maybe so, but German is the language of porn.

I'm just sayin': Me personally? If I was a Canadian I don't think I'd object to a depiction of all Canadians being suave seducers, no matter how stupid the logic behind it.  

Hell, I'd probably support it.

I should probably let this go, as this isn't really the forum to discuss the relevance of stereotypes, the harm of prejudicial attitudes and so forth.  Undoubtedly the mystic negro, or the supernaturally sensitive gypsy, or for that matter the 'native american with a medicine man uncle' or what not are stereotypes, and as far as promoting understanding of people across cultural and racial divides they aren't particularly helpful.   Yet they aren't particularly 'racist' in traditional definitions of the term, and certainly far less than the more acceptable depiction of the Irish (for example) as belligerant drunks. Why are the 'mystic gypsies' less acceptable than the Fianna werewolves?  Or the Sons of Fenris as racist viking norsemen?

So riddle me this: Why is it acceptable to treat, in a supernaturally themed game, people from Ireland as mystically attuned bards by blood, when it is not acceptable in the same supernaturally themed game to treat gypsies as people gifted with second sight and in tune with the spiritual world?

Quote from: Spike;285523So riddle me this: Why is it acceptable to treat, in a supernaturally themed game, people from Ireland as mystically attuned bards by blood, when it is not acceptable in the same supernaturally themed game to treat gypsies as people gifted with second sight and in tune with the spiritual world?

If that same treatment is extended to all the completely ordinary people from Ireland in general, then it makes just as little sense, of course. But if we are talking about, oh, a specific group of spiritual shapeshifters from Ireland, then it's safe to say that their fictional characteristics aren't going to tar all the Irish with the same brush. (The old Werewolf was particularly bad when it came to cultural stereotyping, admittedly.) By way of comparison, there was no such thing as an "ordinary gypsy" in the oWoD: they were the mortal descendants of an ancient vampire.

Quote from: Spike;285523.....................
I should probably let this go, as this isn't really the forum to discuss the relevance of stereotypes, the harm of prejudicial attitudes and so forth.  Undoubtedly the mystic negro, or the supernaturally sensitive gypsy, or for that matter the 'native american with a medicine man uncle' or what not are stereotypes, and as far as promoting understanding of people across cultural and racial divides th.....boy Spike can type!..........

Wasn't the cover and basis for a White Wolf Splatbook for their SCION  RPG Line?

We got copies of that book in the store. Black woman, wearing a top hat with some kind of tailored outfit and voodoo- paraphernalia on her or around her.


- Ed C.

Quote from: GrimGent;285614If that same treatment is extended to all the completely ordinary people from Ireland in general, then it makes just as little sense, of course. But if we are talking about, oh, a specific group of spiritual shapeshifters from Ireland, then it's safe to say that their fictional characteristics aren't going to tar all the Irish with the same brush. (The old Werewolf was particularly bad when it came to cultural stereotyping, admittedly.) By way of comparison, there was no such thing as an "ordinary gypsy" in the oWoD: they were the mortal descendants of an ancient vampire.

And the Vampires were responsible for Rome defeating Carthage, and by extension the promulgation of Western Culture as we know it. It also explicitly established Cain and Able as fact, along with all that implies.

Aside from being a stereotype, what exactly is OFFENSIVE with the depiction of Gypsies as a supernaturally attuned people?

Note that, aside from the line specific tie in, this is a very common stereotype. If it is similarly offensive in the real world, how exactly is is more offensive than the much more permissable depiction of the Irish as belligerant drunkards?  

I don't know about you but were I given a choice I'd rather 'my people' be inaccurately depicted as inherently spiritually attuned than alcoholics who love to fight.  

Of course, were the depictions of the Rom in WW wholly accurate to the real world, undoubtedly people would be up in arms about how unflattering and even racist the WW crowd was in discussing the Gypsies... and all the idiot geekboys who are interested in mythologized gypsies would be upset that they were made 'uncool'.  

I can only conclude that the only tenable position is to utterly ignore the existance of gypsies at all, to avoid the mythologized stereotype that is somehow 'racist', despite being flattering after a fashion, or making an unsellable product because there ain't nothin' sexy about 'em in real life... and then risk being accused of racism because there aren't any mention of them even where they are prevelant, thus 'writing them out' of the fiction...

Quote from: Koltar;285617Wasn't the cover and basis for a White Wolf Splatbook for their SCION  RPG Line?

We got copies of that book in the store. Black woman, wearing a top hat with some kind of tailored outfit and voodoo- paraphernalia on her or around her.


- Ed C.

Yes. There is a voudon scion which happens to be a scantily clad black woman, and yes she gets the tophat covershot on one of the three fatsplats that make up the line.

By the standards that mystic gypsies are racist depictions.. Scion is full of fail.  Norse berserkers and japanese ninja-girls, and black voodoo chicks... not a single cultural ethnic group is depicted as anything other than the sum of commonly held stereotypes.

Quote from: Koltar;285617We got copies of that book in the store. Black woman, wearing a top hat with some kind of tailored outfit and voodoo- paraphernalia on her or around her.

You're talking about Scion: Demigod, although it's not a splatbook. That's one of the signature characters on the cover: Brigitte De La Croix, a daughter of Baron Samedi.

Quote from: Spike;285627Aside from being a stereotype, what exactly is OFFENSIVE with the depiction of Gypsies as a supernaturally attuned people?

In those terms, probably nothing; but the way in which WW went about it is roughly equal to making (for instance) all Italians demon-blooded. Besides, it's hard to romanticize in such a fashion someone that you see practically every day at the supermarket.

Oh, and the younger Roma I've known have generally been seriously pissed off by the idea that they could read anyone's palm, so I guess they'd take it more personally.