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Author Topic: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies  (Read 620305 times)

Ocule

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2235 on: January 02, 2022, 12:04:48 AM »
Jesus fucking Christ lol. Crazy how much shit comes up, can you add links or page numbers for any of this?

Particularly with wrath and glory with female space marines. That’s enough heresy to go past red and set the light on fire. What’s after red? Black? If there is anything by resembling a true blacklist it’s for female space marines
I don't have my W&G corebooks on me anymore, but I distinctly remember the concept was more or less alluded to in the original print "canonically they don't exist because the astartes aren't even human anymore, they're heavily modified, however through mutation within the chapter it is possible in your game to have female space marine chapters, our would descend from the Blood Angels".

As for what I can reference-
W&G - Dark Tides, page 26 "Magos Carborast...[has no] age or gender, to the point where it truly considers itself an 'it.'"
Mongoose Paranoia (core/PHB), Page 15 "Gender and sexual preferences in alpha complex...Heterosexual sex is treasonous... the Computer has no official stance on homosexual activity"
Hard to page reference the fact that communist was completely redacted, but even Reddit talks about "huh, weird change", instances of "terrorist" can be found on pages 5, 9, 11, 20, 23, 24, 26, 27, 30, 35, 39, 42, 45, 49, 53, 54, 58, 63, 66, and multiple times on 67.
But you'll only find communist written once and that's part of the secret societies.

I will say all the games I referenced are games I loved or played myself at one point, edition, or another.
Every report I've listed hurts me.  Things like "Thirsty Sword Lesbians" I expect to be crap and avoid.  Everything I reference is personal disappointment of seeing things seep into the games I love.  Especially sad about Green Ronin, all my favorite high school RPGs came out of them.  Then everything after M&M3e was just cringey crap.  Though I will mention that I think Blue Rose was actually "the feminist rpg' rather than 'the gay rpg'.  As I believe it was literally made by pitching a women's only writing contest to create an RPG for women by women.  (and you know how they are with their slashfiction...)

Edit: I wanted to make this reply a bit more personal since I did literally JUST create this account for posting and kinda came flying in from nowhere.

No worries, so i just did a search on my pdf of wrath and glory v2.1 on page 91 in a sidebar on Gendered Archetypes it forbids playing a female astartes and the opposite for battle sisters. I dont have any previous version but I wouldn't be surprised if GW slapped them for trying to introduce that. I looked in the Ulysses Spiel version and didn't find anything alluding to femmmarines thank god. Also looked up Magos Carborast in Dark Tides, it doesn't come off as cringe as I expected only that the author seems to misunderstand the cult mechanicus.

Most of what I gathered from wrath and glory is that it was written by people who were told what warhammer is and about the lore but who weren't really fans of warhammer prior to creating this game. Which is why the feel is all over the place.

As for savage worlds, I hear you on that. They weren't an easy placement for sure because I really do hope they turn things around. I disagreed with them on why they removed the CSA though i never actually used them in any of my games and they only caused continuity problems when we hit Deadlands Noir. If you screw with historical timeline you gotta kind of run with it. Alot of their art has been made more modest but at the same time they haven't really done anything other than increase their prices significantly.

Modiphius... i think i may have been too harsh on them as it turns out Conan the Adventurers wasn't as bad as I first thought but was mildly cringe. Im enjoying the conan 2d20 book and other than the total lack of nipples it's alright. They might be more yellow... but i havent read fallout or dune or anything so might be wrong. V5 is cringe as hell though.

As for mongoose that is depressing as fuck, they made some good games in the past. Oh well commies get free helicopter rides.
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lazergoblin

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2236 on: January 02, 2022, 12:08:45 AM »
Pinnacle Entertainment (Green) - Bent the knee much to my own disappointment, retconning "problematic" settings like Deadlands due to SJW complaints that "the civil war ending in a draw is triggering, the confederacy must lose!" Even though that removes the core of the settings existence. That said I wouldn't write them off as red as they simply say "Yes, we made this change" then refused to elaborate further.  While they may bend, they have not as of yet bowed.  Really hope they turn things around. - Yellow
How Pinnacle isn't at least Yellow is beyond me. Their website (https://peginc.com/faq/) has an inclusivity statement, as does their "World Builder and Game Master's Guide" (page 15, under "All Are Welcome").

Jodi Black (PEG's Chief Operations Officer, Managing Editor, Social Media Admin and Wife of Savage World's Co-Creator) made an "admin" post on Facebook in 2020 and told Savage Worlds fans they could no longer refer to each other as "Savages" (a term SW fans have used for many years) on social media because the term is derogatory to "indigenous cultures". Then claims it's okay that they keep the term in their game's name because they don't mean it that way. Screenshot attached.
« Last Edit: January 02, 2022, 12:40:00 AM by lazergoblin »

HMWHC

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2237 on: January 02, 2022, 01:46:11 AM »
Amarillo Design Bureu. They have the Prime Directive RPG, which also has a version for GURPS. Their products don't seem to have a political bend or messaging in them.

I think the Klingon’s would beg to differ…
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mudbanks

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2238 on: January 02, 2022, 04:48:36 AM »
Pinnacle Entertainment (Green) - Bent the knee much to my own disappointment, retconning "problematic" settings like Deadlands due to SJW complaints that "the civil war ending in a draw is triggering, the confederacy must lose!" Even though that removes the core of the settings existence. That said I wouldn't write them off as red as they simply say "Yes, we made this change" then refused to elaborate further.  While they may bend, they have not as of yet bowed.  Really hope they turn things around. - Yellow
How Pinnacle isn't at least Yellow is beyond me. Their website (https://peginc.com/faq/) has an inclusivity statement, as does their "World Builder and Game Master's Guide" (page 15, under "All Are Welcome").

Jodi Black (PEG's Chief Operations Officer, Managing Editor, Social Media Admin and Wife of Savage World's Co-Creator) made an "admin" post on Facebook in 2020 and told Savage Worlds fans they could no longer refer to each other as "Savages" (a term SW fans have used for many years) on social media because the term is derogatory to "indigenous cultures". Then claims it's okay that they keep the term in their game's name because they don't mean it that way. Screenshot attached.

Take this for what it's worth, but people have started using "Savages" again and there doesn't seem to be any backlash. Furthermore, Shane had gone on record via a Facebook post, saying that he had to deal with those who wanted the confederates back, and those who felt he didn't do enough. If you ask me, PEG is trying to appease both sides.

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2239 on: January 02, 2022, 05:54:31 AM »
the only Mongoose game mentioned is Paranoia; is there any sign that any of Mongoose's other products are "woke"?
Because I know that Paranoia's creator Allan Varney is a raging progressive liberal. It might be that he, or that some of the people working on this particular project, were the ones with creative control to make this, but that this is not a company-wide policy.
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S'mon

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2240 on: January 02, 2022, 09:42:56 AM »
Changes I'd suggest.
Mongoose Publishing (Green) completely retconned the PARANOIA universe, making Friend Computer incredibly progressive because fair treatment is oppression, so gay and trans characters are treated better but straight or normal characters are expendable.
All instances of "Communist" were replaced with "Terrorist" since calling communists the bad guys isn't acceptable. (appeasing the left)
Previously all forms of sexual activity were seen as against the computers will, going against the computer is treason, treason is punishable by death.
Now that punishment is written as "procreation implies the computers design is imperfect" and that homosexual relations are "misunderstood as enthusiastic wrestling.  Practicing fighting mutants is acceptable" (so instead of "sex is illegal" now it's "straight sex is illegal")
the release campaign has they/them and non-binary characters because friend computer believes in trans-rights I suppose.  Character sheets have a pronoun box. "Don't be an asshole"?  Yeah right... - Red

This is genuinely hilarious.

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HMWHC

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2241 on: January 02, 2022, 07:01:32 PM »
Looking over the yellow list, I'm struck by how some of the companies there are '1 minor infraction 1 time' types, others are 'highly Woke, but not as bad as those Red guys' - ie Yellow spans a huge range.  The only suggestion I'd have is that the list be kept open to amendment, since some of those Yellows are very close to Green, some are basically Reds that are maybe a bit less aggressive in attacking their own customer base.

Would it be to granular to add an ‘Orange’ category? That way you could differentiate more clearly those in the Broad Yellow grouping?
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Persimmon

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2242 on: January 02, 2022, 07:23:58 PM »
Jesus fucking Christ lol. Crazy how much shit comes up, can you add links or page numbers for any of this?

Particularly with wrath and glory with female space marines. That’s enough heresy to go past red and set the light on fire. What’s after red? Black? If there is anything by resembling a true blacklist it’s for female space marines
I don't have my W&G corebooks on me anymore, but I distinctly remember the concept was more or less alluded to in the original print "canonically they don't exist because the astartes aren't even human anymore, they're heavily modified, however through mutation within the chapter it is possible in your game to have female space marine chapters, our would descend from the Blood Angels".

As for what I can reference-
W&G - Dark Tides, page 26 "Magos Carborast...[has no] age or gender, to the point where it truly considers itself an 'it.'"
Mongoose Paranoia (core/PHB), Page 15 "Gender and sexual preferences in alpha complex...Heterosexual sex is treasonous... the Computer has no official stance on homosexual activity"
Hard to page reference the fact that communist was completely redacted, but even Reddit talks about "huh, weird change", instances of "terrorist" can be found on pages 5, 9, 11, 20, 23, 24, 26, 27, 30, 35, 39, 42, 45, 49, 53, 54, 58, 63, 66, and multiple times on 67.
But you'll only find communist written once and that's part of the secret societies.

I will say all the games I referenced are games I loved or played myself at one point, edition, or another.
Every report I've listed hurts me.  Things like "Thirsty Sword Lesbians" I expect to be crap and avoid.  Everything I reference is personal disappointment of seeing things seep into the games I love.  Especially sad about Green Ronin, all my favorite high school RPGs came out of them.  Then everything after M&M3e was just cringey crap.  Though I will mention that I think Blue Rose was actually "the feminist rpg' rather than 'the gay rpg'.  As I believe it was literally made by pitching a women's only writing contest to create an RPG for women by women.  (and you know how they are with their slashfiction...)

Edit: I wanted to make this reply a bit more personal since I did literally JUST create this account for posting and kinda came flying in from nowhere.

No worries, so i just did a search on my pdf of wrath and glory v2.1 on page 91 in a sidebar on Gendered Archetypes it forbids playing a female astartes and the opposite for battle sisters. I dont have any previous version but I wouldn't be surprised if GW slapped them for trying to introduce that. I looked in the Ulysses Spiel version and didn't find anything alluding to femmmarines thank god. Also looked up Magos Carborast in Dark Tides, it doesn't come off as cringe as I expected only that the author seems to misunderstand the cult mechanicus.

Most of what I gathered from wrath and glory is that it was written by people who were told what warhammer is and about the lore but who weren't really fans of warhammer prior to creating this game. Which is why the feel is all over the place.

As for savage worlds, I hear you on that. They weren't an easy placement for sure because I really do hope they turn things around. I disagreed with them on why they removed the CSA though i never actually used them in any of my games and they only caused continuity problems when we hit Deadlands Noir. If you screw with historical timeline you gotta kind of run with it. Alot of their art has been made more modest but at the same time they haven't really done anything other than increase their prices significantly.

Modiphius... i think i may have been too harsh on them as it turns out Conan the Adventurers wasn't as bad as I first thought but was mildly cringe. Im enjoying the conan 2d20 book and other than the total lack of nipples it's alright. They might be more yellow... but i havent read fallout or dune or anything so might be wrong. V5 is cringe as hell though.

As for mongoose that is depressing as fuck, they made some good games in the past. Oh well commies get free helicopter rides.

No; Modophius belongs there.  If you even suggest that Howard's treatment of blacks was anything other than advocating lynching every one you saw on their discussion boards, you will be flagged and/or banned.  This includes making perfectly valid points about his tropes of civilization and savagery and how the latter often came out better in his fiction.  Nope; that would be akin to defending the insufferable racist.  And multiple Conan books have cringeworthy "disclaimers."  At least one was rewritten to the extent that the original writers took their names off the project (the "Africa" one).  I know they rewrote the "Asia/Khitai" one too, but I stopped paying attention by that point.

Their faux "authentic Howard" virtue signalling is another issue, but that's not explicitly political, so whatever...

Palleon

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2243 on: January 02, 2022, 08:22:21 PM »

No; Modophius belongs there.  If you even suggest that Howard's treatment of blacks was anything other than advocating lynching every one you saw on their discussion boards, you will be flagged and/or banned.  This includes making perfectly valid points about his tropes of civilization and savagery and how the latter often came out better in his fiction.  Nope; that would be akin to defending the insufferable racist.  And multiple Conan books have cringeworthy "disclaimers."  At least one was rewritten to the extent that the original writers took their names off the project (the "Africa" one).  I know they rewrote the "Asia/Khitai" one too, but I stopped paying attention by that point.

Their faux "authentic Howard" virtue signalling is another issue, but that's not explicitly political, so whatever...

It’s Conan the Wanderer (the Eastern settings) that Durall and Lites asked to be removed from over the 140 (mostly single word) changes.  The biggest sections removed are related to a caste system and drug trade.  I have the PDF and really don’t see what the big stink is from either faction. 
« Last Edit: January 02, 2022, 08:28:00 PM by Palleon »

Wrath of God

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2244 on: January 05, 2022, 03:19:37 PM »
Quote
Mongoose Publishing (Green) completely retconned the PARANOIA universe, making Friend Computer incredibly progressive because fair treatment is oppression, so gay and trans characters are treated better but straight or normal characters are expendable.
All instances of "Communist" were replaced with "Terrorist" since calling communists the bad guys isn't acceptable. (appeasing the left)
Previously all forms of sexual activity were seen as against the computers will, going against the computer is treason, treason is punishable by death.
Now that punishment is written as "procreation implies the computers design is imperfect" and that homosexual relations are "misunderstood as enthusiastic wrestling.  Practicing fighting mutants is acceptable" (so instead of "sex is illegal" now it's "straight sex is illegal")

TBH that sounds almost like right wing parody of AI-Communism.
Like isn't Friend Computer... evil enslaving force?

Quote
created gender neutral tech-priests

Gender neutral tech-priests seems like logical result of following Omnissiah too long TBH.
However female space marines... that is truly anathema. Burn them.


Quote
It’s Conan the Wanderer (the Eastern settings) that Durall and Lites asked to be removed from over the 140 (mostly single word) changes.  The biggest sections removed are related to a caste system and drug trade.  I have the PDF and really don’t see what the big stink is from either faction.

Yeah, generally speaking I think Conan collection is very good for running setting, and you those minor blurred pieces... it's easy to spice them up again.
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TrueWOPR

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2245 on: January 05, 2022, 03:27:09 PM »
No worries, so i just did a search on my pdf of wrath and glory v2.1 on page 91 in a sidebar on Gendered Archetypes it forbids playing a female astartes and the opposite for battle sisters. I dont have any previous version but I wouldn't be surprised if GW slapped them for trying to introduce that. I looked in the Ulysses Spiel version and didn't find anything alluding to femmmarines thank god. Also looked up Magos Carborast in Dark Tides, it doesn't come off as cringe as I expected only that the author seems to misunderstand the cult mechanicus.

Most of what I gathered from wrath and glory is that it was written by people who were told what warhammer is and about the lore but who weren't really fans of warhammer prior to creating this game. Which is why the feel is all over the place.

As for savage worlds, I hear you on that. They weren't an easy placement for sure because I really do hope they turn things around. I disagreed with them on why they removed the CSA though i never actually used them in any of my games and they only caused continuity problems when we hit Deadlands Noir. If you screw with historical timeline you gotta kind of run with it. Alot of their art has been made more modest but at the same time they haven't really done anything other than increase their prices significantly.

Modiphius... i think i may have been too harsh on them as it turns out Conan the Adventurers wasn't as bad as I first thought but was mildly cringe. Im enjoying the conan 2d20 book and other than the total lack of nipples it's alright. They might be more yellow... but i havent read fallout or dune or anything so might be wrong. V5 is cringe as hell though.

As for mongoose that is depressing as fuck, they made some good games in the past. Oh well commies get free helicopter rides.
I appreciate the time, attention, and second opinion.  I didn't list details on the other ones as they were more opinions of mine rather than "hey look what I found on this page-"
Modiphius I'm still unsure on, because again, I found no such wokeness in their official Mutant Chronicles 3e book, but Fallout has a 2 page spread that's just pure cringe for lack of a better term.  At least it's just those two pages.
As for you and I on deadlands, yeah, Noir is the setting I ran the most of the set, so I'm probably more biased than most on that one.

Ocule

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2246 on: January 05, 2022, 04:13:37 PM »
I kind of read the tech priest thing as less of a "gender neutral" and more of an object. Not "non-binary" or whatever the fuck, mechanicus are anything but non binary. They speak in binary ffs. But that the priest might as well be a fucking servitor. Not a he or a she, an it.

Though i'm sure some proggie asshole wrote it. Also couldnt find any trace of female space marines. Though you can probably find all the made up genders in the emperors children or any slaaneshi cult.

Modiphius I'm still unsure on, because again, I found no such wokeness in their official Mutant Chronicles 3e book, but Fallout has a 2 page spread that's just pure cringe for lack of a better term.  At least it's just those two pages.
As for you and I on deadlands, yeah, Noir is the setting I ran the most of the set, so I'm probably more biased than most on that one.

I found the pages in the fallout book about the safety tools, i had to borrow a copy. That pissed me off, not only i roll my eyes whenever they bring up "safety tools" but they took it a step further by just about demanding you use them, tell you that you really need them and then proceeding to instruct you on how to have a social interaction with another human being like im some kind of freakin child.

The weird part though is there is no preaching anywhere else in that book that i could find, making those two pages seem so out of place. Either way i'm not going to buy a copy but I wouldnt be surprised if that started to show up more frequently.
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Redwanderer
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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2247 on: January 05, 2022, 04:23:11 PM »
Go-go Ernie Gygax. Please don't let us down, I want old TSR back SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO bad.


Jaeger

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2248 on: January 05, 2022, 05:11:48 PM »
Go-go Ernie Gygax. Please don't let us down, I want old TSR back SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO bad.

Prepare for eternal disappointment.
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Ocule

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Re: [List] TTRPG Guide to Woke Companies
« Reply #2249 on: January 05, 2022, 06:23:55 PM »
Go-go Ernie Gygax. Please don't let us down, I want old TSR back SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO bad.

Prepare for eternal disappointment.

Can't blame a man for having a dream. Though you'd think there'd be more bitterness towards the TSR that pushed Gary out
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