I think the more important question is, where are my goddamn wishes?

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1066583In my research I have uncovered more passages suggesting jinn that live in elements other than smokeless fire, although I'm not sure if this means they were actually made of said element.

QuoteOne of their species is called SHAQQ.

Ok, the jokes are writing themselves now.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1066586I think the more important question is, where are my goddamn wishes?

See? You're committing the mistake. You don't ask for wishes. You ask for MORE GENIES. The Barbara Eden kind, preferably. But I'll happily take her evil brunette cousin.

What kind of genie is Shazzan? And more importantly - are the kids riding the bitchen winged camel culturally appropriating someone?

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Quote from: Ratman_tf;1066586I think the more important question is, where are my goddamn wishes?

It varies. A couple of days ago I watched a Hungarian folk tale series on Youtube. In the story of the lazy boy, he catches a talking fish that gives him wishes after he releases it. Wish granting is found in folk tales from all over the world.

Which reminds me... I think the root of my peeve is that D&D is a mishmash of myths from countless cultures with no attempt made at comparative mythology or religious syncretism. That is, all cultures display recurring archetypes in their myths that result in similar situations that led one to assume that they share a common source of inspiration.

Norse jotunn, Greek gigas, Indian rakshasa, Japanese oni, Arabic jinn, Celtic fairies, etc are all variations on the same sets of recurring archetypes. For example: they commonly live in their own country like Jotunheim, Jinnistan, Otherworld, or Tartarus; have highly variable morality ranging from man-eating monsters to converting to Islam to making dangerous bargains; vary in size and form from bottled imps to planet-sized snakes to dudes with fifty heads covered in eyes; are often empowered by the elements or tied to nature in some way.

It isn't a stretch to assume that if these monsters really existed then they would be part of the same general taxonomy that inspired the cultural myths, rather than arbitrarily segregated into distinct incompatible D&D types like fiends, fey, elementals, giants, etc.

You can actually see this happening in real world syncretism. Long before D&D wrote about five elemental genies, Malay culture was integrating Arabic beliefs in jinn with local beliefs in elemental nature spirits and the humor theory of Plato shared by Arab alchemists. There were jinn of the air, the black earth, the fiery sunset and the sea who caused sickness by making imbalance in the humors. There's no distinction between jinn and other spirits or elemental beings or fairies and so forth, they are all jinn.

I'm terribly sorry if I came off as anal-retentive obsessive-compulsive before. To be honest I think that the D&D taxonomy is needlessly complex and more trouble than it's worth to keep track of.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1066605It varies. A couple of days ago I watched a Hungarian folk tale series on Youtube. In the story of the lazy boy, he catches a talking fish that gives him wishes after he releases it. Wish granting is found in folk tales from all over the world.

I think I've seen that series! If it's the series I'm thinking of, it was animated and played on PBS in the 80's.

QuoteWhich reminds me... I think the root of my peeve is that D&D is a mishmash of myths from countless cultures with no attempt made at comparative mythology or religious syncretism.

As previously noted, you are really barking up the wrong tree. D&D's goal was never mythological accuracy, much less religious syncretism.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1066607As previously noted, you are really barking up the wrong tree. D&D's goal was never mythological accuracy, much less religious syncretism.

Religious syncretism is actually the opposite of mythological accuracy. It consists of remixing myths from other cultures in order to fit them into your own or vice versa.

The Christmas holiday is a perfect example of this, as every aspect of it was co-opted from other cultural festivals. In fact, the modern image of Santa Claus was invented by the Coca Cola company.

If D&D isn't trying to be accurate to myths, then there's no reason they can't undergo rounds of much-needed simplification like rewriting genies and giants as the same. I'm writing several blog articles which do that for a lot of monsters, because to be very honest D&D has a huge problem with filler and redundancy.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1066622If D&D isn't trying to be accurate to myths, then there's no reason they can't undergo rounds of much-needed simplification like rewriting genies and giants as the same.

There's no reason they should, either.

QuoteI'm writing several blog articles which do that for a lot of monsters, because to be very honest D&D has a huge problem with filler and redundancy.

Good for you. the RPG scene can always benefit from new ideas, and new takes on old ideas.

Am I the only one thinking that what we are seeing here (and in the other thread) are what, in my neck of the woods, we call 'a wind up'?

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1066622If D&D isn't trying to be accurate to myths, then there's no reason they can't undergo rounds of much-needed simplification like rewriting genies and giants as the same. I'm writing several blog articles which do that for a lot of monsters, because to be very honest D&D has a huge problem with filler and redundancy.

Except Genies and Giants are NOT necessarily the same. Genies could be shapeshifers while Giants are limited to a single form. Genies might be constrained to physical objects (i.e. the classic ring or lamp) while Giants roam where they will. Genies might be compelled to grant wishes for those who capture them while Giants simply stomp on you for having the temerity to try and enslave them.

I hate to say it, but this is your "one-true wayism" showing through again. If genies and giants aren't considered the same creature as you think they should be (even though they are very different beings in many myths) then D&D is doing it wrong.

Again, if you want to make a "Myth-authentic" world and try and sell that, go right ahead. But stop with the "if its not my way its wrong" crap. That wins no one over to your cause. Indeed, I'd say all your One-True-Way arguments have poisoned a lot of people here against actually listening to your good points.

Quote from: Gruntfuttock;1066631Am I the only one thinking that what we are seeing here (and in the other thread) are what, in my neck of the woods, we call 'a wind up'?

Nope. There's a lot of jargon going on that's very familiar. I'm willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt, though.

Quote from: Chris24601;1066632Except Genies and Giants are NOT necessarily the same. Genies could be shapeshifers while Giants are limited to a single form. Genies might be constrained to physical objects (i.e. the classic ring or lamp) while Giants roam where they will. Genies might be compelled to grant wishes for those who capture them while Giants simply stomp on you for having the temerity to try and enslave them.

You seem to have misunderstood my point. You listed differences between genies and giants, great. I'll just re-quote you with the names changed to illustrate what I was actually trying to say but got misinterpreted: "Except ogres and ogres are NOT necessarily the same. Ogres could be shapeshifers while ogres are limited to a single form. Ogres might be constrained to physical objects (i.e. the classic ring or lamp) while ogres roam where they will. Ogres might be compelled to grant wishes for those who capture them while ogres simply stomp on you for having the temerity to try and enslave them."

Quote from: Chris24601;1066632I hate to say it, but this is your "one-true wayism" showing through again. If genies and giants aren't considered the same creature as you think they should be (even though they are very different beings in many myths) then D&D is doing it wrong.

Genies and giants never coexisted in the same cultural myths. Your argument for keeping them separate has no basis in mythology, but in D&D-specific fluff. My argument isn't to pick and choose which of those is right and then force everything to conform. I've been researching comparative mythology and I've learned that mythology is actually vague and inconsistent. D&D is unique in that it forces everything to conform to a specific behavior.

In other words, why can't we have both?

Quote from: Chris24601;1066632Again, if you want to make a "Myth-authentic" world and try and sell that, go right ahead.

Claiming that something is "myth-authentic" sounds non-credulous because myths are hardly static, clear or consistent. Generally people who use that as an advertising point are really saying it is authentic to their personal interpretation of the myths.

I want to avoid that, so I'm working to shoehorn all myths into a shared context regardless of all the crazy contradictions that creates. Trying to resolve the contradictions, rather than pick one fact and ignore all the others, is where most of my fun comes from.

With combining giants and genies, that means I have to pick which of those facts you listed are true on an individual basis... in addition to any number of other features. As I mentioned earlier, the myths of giants and jinn are much more diverse than D&D. I specifically listed a jinn that had three heads, six arms and one leg and a giant with a lion's head, lion's paws, and live snakes for legs as eye-catching examples.

Quote from: Chris24601;1066632But stop with the "if its not my way its wrong" crap. That wins no one over to your cause. Indeed, I'd say all your One-True-Way arguments have poisoned a lot of people here against actually listening to your good points.

I'm trying to avoid this but that's difficult when I'm less than eloquent in the first place and others keep misunderstanding my points.

I've specifically been trying to avoid one-true-way by tossing myths into a blender. I dislike D&D monsters specifically because they, in my opinion, fall into a one-true-way trap. One-note-joke trap? Whatever. You may disagree with my use of that terminology but I don't know any other way to put it succinctly.

Real myths have jinn with three heads, six arms and one leg, among countless other possible manifestations. D&D never ever does and all monsters are just multiplications of a specific character with zero room for anything outside that. Thus, in my opinion the myth is superior because it is not straight-jacketed.

I don't know how else to explain my beliefs in this matter. Maybe you'll find it easier to explain in your own words.

I thought we've long established the obvious:

D&D *is* its own brand of fantasy.

Why is this even an issue?

Quote from: tenbones;1066770I thought we've long established the obvious:

D&D *is* its own brand of fantasy.

Why is this even an issue?

Because we've got an armchair expert with a stick up his ass over make believe monsters in a pop culture game.

Quote from: tenbones;1066770I thought we've long established the obvious:

D&D *is* its own brand of fantasy.

Why is this even an issue?

Is it? I thought a lot of D&Disms were needlessly confusing so I wanted to simplify things. So I decided to ask for some second opinions and advice. Somewhere along the line this became a vicious argument.