Quote from: jhkim on June 03, 2021, 08:59:24 PM
If there is a fantasy kingdom being invaded by dwarves, and a knight swears to his king and to his country to fight off the invaders, but isn't devoutly religious - is that character a paladin?

No

QuoteWhat if there is a chaotic knight with no king but great devotion to a trickster god? Is that character a paladin?

No

QuoteI think there's no clear single definition, given limitless ranges of fantasy worlds.

It seems like the definition is clear.

The question is why would a trickster god even want to have a heavily armpured fighter as his holy warrior?  It seems antithetical.  Why not a Cleric/Rogue combination?

Quote from: RPGPundit on June 03, 2021, 08:07:20 PM
No, again, the PART YOU SEEM TO REFUSE TO UNDERSTAND is that when the WotC people say 'we're taking away alignment', they don't mean the literal two letter abbreviations on the statblock, they mean the very IDEA of MORAL ALIGNMENT.

They don't believe there is such a thing as moral alignment. And that is ABSOLUTELY CONNECTED to their goal to make every D&D setting into an OMG-so-random version of Downtown Seattle During Pride 2021.

So I don't give a twopenny fuck at the fact that you get pissed off every time you see "LG" or "CN" on a character sheet, because that's not the issue here. The issue is fighting back against the banalification of our hobby into a propaganda-delivery-system for racial grifter degenerate marxists.
EVERYTHING they're doing has to do with everything else they're doing because they only ever do anything to the game for one reason: To push their Ideological Agenda.

No, what you fail to see is that I agree the Woke attitude is a problem... to quote myself...

Quote from: Chris24601 on June 02, 2021, 05:46:24 PM
The only thing that makes D&D Woke garbage in and of itself are the story and plot elements that reinforce Woke ideology; saying evil actions are justified because "racism/white/human supremacy", or treating moral failings as virtues and what the West traditionally considers virtues to be sins.

I understand you perfectly. I just disagree with your conclusions and think you're way too focused on unimportant side-issues that have nothing inherently (this is a key word) to do with Wokism.

I disagree with your premise that a system which doesn't use alignment and has races beyond those found in Tolkien are automatically vehicles of Woke designed to destroy the hobby; which seems to be your whole argument and is burying the real issue behind side-issues that make it easy to dismiss you.

"The people at WotC don't believe in good and evil, embrace moral relativism and are injecting it into settings where objective good and evil exist" is something I 100% agree with.

"The people at WotC are treating every race as if it were just a cosplay furry outfit for someone from 21st Century Seattle instead of something with a genuine culture which makes it feel inauthentic" is also something I'd 100% agree with.

"Not using alignment stats and allowing anything but races found in Tolkien's books is, in and of itself, going to destroy the hobby" is ridiculous and inarguably false as proven by the many RPGs out there that don't use alignment, have numerous playable monstrous races and long predate the rise of Woke.

Just because the Woke use non-Tolkien races doesn't mean non-Tolkien races are woke any more than a bike lock and chain is woke because the Woke use it as a weapon. If the Woke use a hammer to cave in some guy's head, should we declare anyone who uses a hammer in their job (say, building houses) to be Woke?

No. That's ridiculous.

So stop mistaking the tools (non-Tolkien races) for the hooligan wielding it as a weapon. The issue is the hooligan, not the tool.

Quote from: RPGPundit on June 03, 2021, 08:00:44 PM
That's not what I'm suggesting. What I'm suggesting is that most races are too alien from human, and they're supposed to be so, in order that we understand them as archetype and myth.

Do you even D&D? Joking aside, mainline D&D was never really about making demihuman races "too alien from human" and while it drew inspiration from archetype & myth, it was never trying to be those things itself.

Quote from: Shasarak on June 03, 2021, 09:23:09 PM

Quote from: jhkim on June 03, 2021, 08:59:24 PM
If there is a fantasy kingdom being invaded by dwarves, and a knight swears to his king and to his country to fight off the invaders, but isn't devoutly religious - is that character a paladin?

No

QuoteWhat if there is a chaotic knight with no king but great devotion to a trickster god? Is that character a paladin?

No

QuoteI think there's no clear single definition, given limitless ranges of fantasy worlds.

It seems like the definition is clear.

The question is why would a trickster god even want to have a heavily armpured fighter as his holy warrior?  It seems antithetical.  Why not a Cleric/Rogue combination?

Wouldn't empowering a holy warrior that seems antithetical be exactly what a trickster god might do?

Quote from: HappyDaze on June 04, 2021, 06:09:38 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on June 03, 2021, 08:00:44 PM
That's not what I'm suggesting. What I'm suggesting is that most races are too alien from human, and they're supposed to be so, in order that we understand them as archetype and myth.

Do you even D&D? Joking aside, mainline D&D was never really about making demihuman races "too alien from human" and while it drew inspiration from archetype & myth, it was never trying to be those things itself.

There's a reason why 'race' is fairly appropriate terminology for Tolkien's cultures; they're NOT entirely alien species with completely different biologies. Elves and Men could have children (though there are supernatural aspects related to retaining or surrendering immortality that go beyond just biology) and hobbits are counted among the races of Men. Depending on when you talked with Tolkien, orcs/goblins were either corrupted Elves or Men.*

There are other, more alien, creatures as well, and not all of them would make good PCs for a variety of reasons, but the playable ones were at least broadly "human" in form, biology and psyche.

I have all sorts of fantastic races beyond the D&D/Tolkien standard, but I still have certain requirements; they must be sapient and free-willed and, while not strictly a requirement, most have at least some connection to humanity. Animals lack sapience so don't qualify. Spirits like demons and astral servitors are entirely defined by their natures and so lack free will (more accurately their wills are so fully comformed to their purpose that they always choose to be true to it... but as a practical matter they don't have the freedom to choose as mortals do) and also don't qualify.

The result though is that, for the most part, the psychologies of the playable species are not so alien as to be incomprehensible to humans and because they have free will they can choose to be heroes, villains or something in between.**

* I can appreciate that this changed over time, I had to backtrack and rewrite elements of my own created world because the theology didn't hang together as I continued to refine it... but if even Tolkien had the same problem, then I am not so discouraged.

** Which is far better for giving GMs freedom to set up their own campaigns or alternate settings. "Anyone" could be a hero or a villain (which is not the same as saying "Everyone" can be... just that heroism and villainy can come from anywhere).

Quote from: Chris24601 on June 04, 2021, 09:08:54 AM

Quote from: HappyDaze on June 04, 2021, 06:09:38 AM

Quote from: RPGPundit on June 03, 2021, 08:00:44 PM
That's not what I'm suggesting. What I'm suggesting is that most races are too alien from human, and they're supposed to be so, in order that we understand them as archetype and myth.

Do you even D&D? Joking aside, mainline D&D was never really about making demihuman races "too alien from human" and while it drew inspiration from archetype & myth, it was never trying to be those things itself.

There's a reason why 'race' is fairly appropriate terminology for Tolkien's cultures; they're NOT entirely alien species with completely different biologies. Elves and Men could have children (though there are supernatural aspects related to retaining or surrendering immortality that go beyond just biology) and hobbits are counted among the races of Men. Depending on when you talked with Tolkien, orcs/goblins were either corrupted Elves or Men.*

There are other, more alien, creatures as well, and not all of them would make good PCs for a variety of reasons, but the playable ones were at least broadly "human" in form, biology and psyche.

I have all sorts of fantastic races beyond the D&D/Tolkien standard, but I still have certain requirements; they must be sapient and free-willed and, while not strictly a requirement, most have at least some connection to humanity. Animals lack sapience so don't qualify. Spirits like demons and astral servitors are entirely defined by their natures and so lack free will (more accurately their wills are so fully comformed to their purpose that they always choose to be true to it... but as a practical matter they don't have the freedom to choose as mortals do) and also don't qualify.

The result though is that, for the most part, the psychologies of the playable species are not so alien as to be incomprehensible to humans and because they have free will they can choose to be heroes, villains or something in between.**

* I can appreciate that this changed over time, I had to backtrack and rewrite elements of my own created world because the theology didn't hang together as I continued to refine it... but if even Tolkien had the same problem, then I am not so discouraged.

** Which is far better for giving GMs freedom to set up their own campaigns or alternate settings. "Anyone" could be a hero or a villain (which is not the same as saying "Everyone" can be... just that heroism and villainy can come from anywhere).

I do agree that fiends, aberrations, elementals, and some other creatures are probably best when they have alien mindsets. However,  virtually all humanoids (including giants) are very likely to be human-like in mind as well as body. Undead of such races that remember their lives likely retain elements of human-like thinking, and constructs may reflect their creators.

Quote from: HappyDaze on June 04, 2021, 06:11:39 AM
Wouldn't empowering a holy warrior that seems antithetical be exactly what a trickster god might do?

Not a Trickster God.

Maybe a Lame Edgelord God.

Quote from: HappyDaze on June 04, 2021, 11:57:12 AM
I do agree that fiends, aberrations, elementals, and some other creatures are probably best when they have alien mindsets. However,  virtually all humanoids (including giants) are very likely to be human-like in mind as well as body. Undead of such races that remember their lives likely retain elements of human-like thinking, and constructs may reflect their creators.

Add undead, astral servitors and normal animals (but not unusual animals; if you want to pull a Narnia, there's options for that) onto the fiends/demons, aberrations/horrors and elementals and you pretty much have the list of what's not playabe in my setting (and undead and astral servitors are included in the GM's Guide both for making NPCs and for GMs who want a setting with different metaphysical rules than my included setting).

Frankly, the argument about how common the species is in the world isn't material to whether it should be included as a player option or not. There's plenty of fantastic fiction where "the last X" travels with other protagonists on whatever the story's adventure is... so it's good to have mechanics for those types of things rather than just dumping that in the laps of the GMs and saying "houserule it."

This goes double if your system is focused around "big damned heroes" instead of "potential hero zeroes." If dragons* and human heroes are both one-in-a-million, then allowing a PC to be either a young human hero or an average young dragon isn't allowing one player to play something particularly rarer than the other.

Rarity only matters relative to the rarity of the other PCs, not to the NPC background population (just as you wouldn't make the number of superhero PCs in a Mutants & Masterminds game dependent on the ratio of superhumans to humans, because the game is about playing a superhuman).

* I specifically mention dragons because one of the old D&D choose your adventure books I had as a kid involved you being turned into a dragon at the start and the best ending of the many included paths ended with you choosing to remain a dragon.

Give a 12 year old that book then show them the Dragonlance module where a disguised silver dragon is one of the pre-gen PCs available, then try telling them "Nope, D&D isn't a game where you're allowed to play dragons."

I am curious what people would think about a replacement for alignment. Similar to Traits, Ideals, Bonds, and Flaws for PCs?

Or if something just said, "Aggressive/Cruel/Sneaky" next to it?

Quote from: Mistwell on June 04, 2021, 06:23:46 PM
I am curious what people would think about a replacement for alignment. Similar to Traits, Ideals, Bonds, and Flaws for PCs?

Or if something just said, "Aggressive/Cruel/Sneaky" next to it?

Something like the various behavioral Hindrances in Savage Worlds?

If you desperately feel the need to have a setting where anything goes, do Planescape. That's a pretty solid campaign world and you can run into fucking anything there.

You want to play a dragon? There are perfectly good rules for that (the Dragon Magazine 1-20 level advancement for dragon PCs is pretty balanced). Ask your GM. Hell, I did -- and we had a blast with it.

But see, this isn't about playing some weird critter as a PC. Pundit's touched on this, as have I. This is about wokeists shitting things up because they want everything THEIR way. They don't want to play a character who might draw nervous envy, or scorn, or prejudice, and use that as a springboard into awesome roleplay. No, everything must be TOLERANT and HAPPY because otherwise they get sad and that's not faaaaaaair.

And the solution is to fucking show them the door.

Quote from: HappyDaze on June 04, 2021, 06:24:48 PM

Quote from: Mistwell on June 04, 2021, 06:23:46 PM
I am curious what people would think about a replacement for alignment. Similar to Traits, Ideals, Bonds, and Flaws for PCs?

Or if something just said, "Aggressive/Cruel/Sneaky" next to it?

Something like the various behavioral Hindrances in Savage Worlds?

Yes, like that.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on June 04, 2021, 06:34:24 PM
If you desperately feel the need to have a setting where anything goes, do Planescape. That's a pretty solid campaign world and you can run into fucking anything there.

You want to play a dragon? There are perfectly good rules for that (the Dragon Magazine 1-20 level advancement for dragon PCs is pretty balanced). Ask your GM. Hell, I did -- and we had a blast with it.

But see, this isn't about playing some weird critter as a PC. Pundit's touched on this, as have I. This is about wokeists shitting things up because they want everything THEIR way. They don't want to play a character who might draw nervous envy, or scorn, or prejudice, and use that as a springboard into awesome roleplay. No, everything must be TOLERANT and HAPPY because otherwise they get sad and that's not faaaaaaair.

And the solution is to fucking show them the door.

You're too focused on the few that fit your narrow parameters. Most players that I have encountered that want to play a character of a more exotic race expect that it will matter (often negatively) and would be disappointed if their choice was simply accepted without remark.

Quote from: Mistwell on June 04, 2021, 06:23:46 PM
I am curious what people would think about a replacement for alignment. Similar to Traits, Ideals, Bonds, and Flaws for PCs?

Or if something just said, "Aggressive/Cruel/Sneaky" next to it?

Those work too.  My favorite is TMNT's system, with descriptors like "scrupulous," "anarchist," etc

And here's the replacement for alignments that I went with for the game I'm writing right now:

Precepts
While it is entirely possible to play an RPG as if one's hero is oneself transported into the game world and gifted with fantastic abilities, many players prefer to play a hero with different values and personality than their own, much as an actor in an improvisational play.  Precepts are an aid to the latter players to help remember the character's personality and make decisions according to his values.  The player simply lists up to five statements describing the hero's values, in order of priority.  Precepts have no mechanical effect.