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Pen & Paper Roleplaying Central => Pen and Paper Roleplaying Games (RPGs) Discussion => Topic started by: RPGPundit on January 12, 2021, 11:57:51 PM

Title: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: RPGPundit on January 12, 2021, 11:57:51 PM
"I'm just playing my character" is a phrase often said to excuse behavior that messes up a dnd game. But how to determine if it's acceptable or not? And is this an OSR/dnd5e conflict?


Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Razor 007 on January 13, 2021, 12:15:43 AM
"I'm just playing my character."

Ok, well is your character a fruit loop?  Because, you are acting like some kind of fruit loop.

"That's not very nice.  I'm starting to feel unsafe at your gaming table."

Ok.

"Well, aren't you going to apologize and attempt to affirm me?"

No.

"That's it!!!  I'm going to ruin you all over the internet!!!"

Ok, bye.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: zircher on January 13, 2021, 01:07:58 AM
Live by the sword, die by the sword.  Hyper violent or other bad behavior begets it being returned in kind.  The GM is the karma machine after all.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 13, 2021, 02:48:22 AM
"I'm just playing my character" has been an excuse a long long time. Well before WOTC. There is I believe at least two articles in Dragon on the problem of disruptive players.

Every single account I have ever seen or herd of from others has been in use as an excuse to fuck with the players and/or DM. The earliest examples I heard of in Dragon seemed to very frequently involve Either Thieves, or Paladins. For whatever reason these two classes seem to draw out this bad behavior far more than all the others combined. Sometimes in tandem with alignment discussions as alignment seemed to be a frequent excuse for "playing my character"

The discussions though point out that this is a problem when you have one disruptive player and no one else is on board for it. If you have a whole group of backstabbing psychos or at least the other players are ok with these acts then its not a problem. 75% of the time though its a problem and often a deliberate one.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Mishihari on January 13, 2021, 04:33:45 AM
"I'm just playing my character" does not excuse bad player behavior.  The player chose the the character in the first place, so he is still responsible.  If you're in with a group of players who want to cooperate and get along, don't choose a character who's going to screw things up.  If you do, you deserve the resultant pushback. 

Definitely not a 5E or OSR issue exclusively.  I'd be willing to bet it's happened in every game ever made.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Torque2100 on January 13, 2021, 07:31:14 AM
This is one of the things that scores pretty highly on my "take a hike" list.

Using "I'm just playing my character" to excuse bad, disruptive behavior damaging to everyone else's fun is no excuse at all.  You play your character, your character doesn't play you. If there is some aspect of your character that is proving to be disruptive or just isn't working change it.  Modify how the character is played.  Modify how this aspect affects your character.

This is one reason why I have severely limited the playing of mentally ill characters at my table.  It can be done well, particularly playing an experienced warrior who struggles with Post Traumatic Stress as a result of the horrors they've seen, but all too often "my character is crazy" is an excuse for dumbass Millenials to be "LOLSORANDUMB" and it's just annoying.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: robh on January 13, 2021, 08:06:09 AM
.......You play your character, your character doesn't play you.......

Absolutely, the issue is with the player. 
As already said Thieves and Paladins seem to attract a certain disruptive element. Both classes have scope for causing friction within a party and as a GM you need to be wary of whether a given player is capable of playing the role. This friction is a necessary element of the classes but there is a fine balance between disrupting and damaging party cohesion.

But it can also arise from stat driven games; A character with a very high Charisma or very low Intelligence score can lead to problems within the group if handled badly. Roleplaying borderline stupidity without being stupid takes a very skilled actor, I have never seen a player able to pull it off. Likewise high Charisma tends to result in players seeing the character as arrogant and/or conceited, and frankly no party needs a Kardashian.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Chris24601 on January 13, 2021, 08:11:04 AM
This is why I included a whole section in both my Player and GM system books on player motivations and expressly call out that it’s a team game.

So, even if you have the actor motivation where you enjoy getting into your PC’s head, you shouldn’t pick a personality and motives designed to be disruptive. Or if you’re an instigator, you should make things happen when the game starts to drag, not when the party is already in the middle of the action.

GM side it’s mostly about how to engage these motivations in play, but I probably do need a more explicit sidebar about problem players; starting with talking to them.

My personal experience as a GM is that what motivates problem behavior is most typically a mismatch of player motivation and GM presentation. A hardline GM can certainly say take a hike, a more compromising one might try to add few elements that appeal more to that player’s motivations (ex. Include some NPCs that will allow an Actor PC’s personality and backstory matter in the outcome or including things that experimentation to solve for the instigator... make sure there are some opportunities to demonstrate their PC’s capabilities for the challenger motivation, etc.).

There are just some sociopaths out there, but they’re pretty rare. Most of the really disruptive ones from experience are just people who for one reason or another feel a need for attention they’re not getting elsewhere and will take negative attention over no attention. Some people may not want to bother with playing amateur therapist, but I’ve found a lot of these types can be redirected fairly easily with a bit of positive out-of-character attention (like just a few minutes to listen) and once they see they can get that positive attention by playing along with the group, the disruptive behavior drops off dramatically.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 13, 2021, 08:22:56 AM
"I'm just playing my character."

Ok, well is your character a fruit loop?  Because, you are acting like some kind of fruit loop.

"That's not very nice.  I'm starting to feel unsafe at your gaming table."

Ok.

"Well, aren't you going to apologize and attempt to affirm me?"

No.

"That's it!!!  I'm going to ruin you all over the internet!!!"

Ok, bye.

Sad but true

Given that the upcoming new 5E D&D book not only has the so called "Wheelchair of Representation" as well as wheelchair accessibly designed dungeon (no not kidding ) I can see this only getting worse.

To Pundit point not that does excuse bad behavior. Though it happens from many characters most run in that I have had are with players using Kender, Thieves and sigh Paladins oh the badly run Paladins. Made worse that those who do behave like that at the table tend also to expect players to do the same as DMs. 
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: HappyDaze on January 13, 2021, 08:41:42 AM
.......You play your character, your character doesn't play you.......

Absolutely, the issue is with the player. 
As already said Thieves and Paladins seem to attract a certain disruptive element. Both classes have scope for causing friction within a party and as a GM you need to be wary of whether a given player is capable of playing the role. This friction is a necessary element of the classes but there is a fine balance between disrupting and damaging party cohesion.

But it can also arise from stat driven games; A character with a very high Charisma or very low Intelligence score can lead to problems within the group if handled badly. Roleplaying borderline stupidity without being stupid takes a very skilled actor, I have never seen a player able to pull it off. Likewise high Charisma tends to result in players seeing the character as arrogant and/or conceited, and frankly no party needs a Kardashian.
For "borderline stupidity without being stupid" I use the example of Johnny Lawrence from the Cobra Kai series. He's a great character IMO.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 13, 2021, 08:48:05 AM
Not sure if using TV characters is the best example as they can get away with a lot because of both script and plot armor. I mean Cobra Kai has one shall we say evil group of martial artists casually breaking and entering into the apartment of the good group of martial artists and a brawl starts. No one not even the neighbors thinks to call the police. 
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Svenhelgrim on January 13, 2021, 08:48:59 AM
“I’m justplaying my character.”

So am I.  And my character effing hates your character.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: VisionStorm on January 13, 2021, 09:03:20 AM
I experienced this sort of thing a bunch of times back in the day. My reaction was to say that the guards were also in character when they ran the character down for being a murdering psychopath who was resisting arrest.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Stephen Tannhauser on January 13, 2021, 10:23:55 AM
It occurs to me to wonder if the rule that paladins can't associate with evil-aligned PCs -- plus giving them an ability to infallibly know if another PC is evil-aligned or not -- was meant to avoid precisely that situation. In other words, at least one situation where one PC is explicitly required to irreconcilably butt heads with others is explicitly prohibited.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Stephen Tannhauser on January 13, 2021, 10:29:34 AM
On a broader level what this really comes down to is the perennial issue of cooperative gaming: What do you do when something that's demanded for one player's fun is something virtually guaranteed to ruin another player's fun?  And the answer, of course, is really only one of two possibilities: Either find a mutually acceptable compromise, or one of the players drops out, because the alternative is ruining everyone's fun.

Much stress was relieved from my psyche when at some point in the past ten years, I finally grasped that sometimes it just isn't possible to make everyone happy.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Joey2k on January 13, 2021, 01:25:03 PM
“I’m justplaying my character.”

So am I.  And my character effing hates your character.

Exactly. My character would not partner with someone who was this much of an asshat, so...see ya.

Although...sometimes in real life we do have to work with people we despise.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Steven Mitchell on January 13, 2021, 01:57:30 PM
I expect a low-level but continuous amount of friction between PCs.  I explicitly ask players to build their characters with that in mind.  It makes the game fun for me and for most of the players that enjoy my type of games, too.  However, we also expect the player to respect the limits, which aren't embedded into any kind of process or rule but rather a little effort paying attention to knowing approximately where the lines are drawn and usually staying away from the edge.  Not every player has to do this (and certainly not every character or all the time) but every player has to be ready to at least tolerate it out of the rest of the group.

Specifically, we enjoy the kinds of events where a paladin talks a holier than thou game and the thief likes to needle him about it with comments and unimportant actions.  It doesn't escalate beyond that because the players don't allow it to escalate beyond that.  If someone else wants to play peacemaker, great.  If another wants to play the naive type unaware of the simmering conflict, great.  Sure, that's terribly unrealistic.  We don't care.  If a player can't understand that distinction, then they are unlikely to be a good fit for our group (for several reasons). 

I've had kids play that were in the age 10-13 range that could get it.  A supposed adult ought to be able to.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: jhkim on January 13, 2021, 02:12:14 PM
The label is very non-specific. There are some clear-cut cases of problem players, but there is also a wide grey area.

Exactly. My character would not partner with someone who was this much of an asshat, so...see ya.

Although...sometimes in real life we do have to work with people we despise.

Some posters are picturing a psycho asshole PC as the problem, but I've also frequently seen problems with the Paladin PC or equivalent -- where their lawful good stance clashes with how all the other players want to play things.

It's really a matter of preference. I've sometimes had games where the PCs were all nice people - clean-cut superheroes, paladins, etc. However, I've also had a lot of fun in some games where the PCs are darker - they're criminal opportunists, shadowrunners, violent wandering mercenaries, etc. Both historically and in fiction, characters considered "adventurers" are often violent assholes - and internal conflicts among them is common. It's a question of what the GM and players prefer.


I experienced this sort of thing a bunch of times back in the day. My reaction was to say that the guards were also in character when they ran the character down for being a murdering psychopath who was resisting arrest.

Sometimes that fits. But also, I've seen a lot of inconsistency from GMs in this.

Village: "Please protect us, heroes! We are defenseless against the orcs and need your help."

(PCs misbehave)

Village: "We'll send out our crack guards and track you down, outlaws!"

A central premise of a lot of RPG adventures is that there is *not* a strong lawful authority to handle problems - that's why the PCs are needed to spring into action, instead of just calling the police. I think this sort of conflict is often better handled by talking to the players out-of-game, rather than having intentionally un-fun in-game action to punish the players.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Dropbear on January 13, 2021, 05:55:53 PM

Given that the upcoming new 5E D&D book not only has the so called "Wheelchair of Representation" as well as wheelchair accessibly designed dungeon (no not kidding ) I can see this only getting worse.


Which book is this? Most of what I’ve heard conjecture-wise is that it will be a Dragonlance setting book. I find it difficult to see where that sort of nonsense will actually fit! Ugh.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Thornhammer on January 13, 2021, 07:16:33 PM
Which book is this? Most of what I’ve heard conjecture-wise is that it will be a Dragonlance setting book. I find it difficult to see where that sort of nonsense will actually fit! Ugh.

The Candlekeep Mysteries book, I think.

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Mishihari on January 13, 2021, 07:22:07 PM
Sometimes that fits. But also, I've seen a lot of inconsistency from GMs in this.

Village: "Please protect us, heroes! We are defenseless against the orcs and need your help."

(PCs misbehave)

Village: "We'll send out our crack guards and track you down, outlaws!"

A central premise of a lot of RPG adventures is that there is *not* a strong lawful authority to handle problems - that's why the PCs are needed to spring into action, instead of just calling the police. I think this sort of conflict is often better handled by talking to the players out-of-game, rather than having intentionally un-fun in-game action to punish the players.


This can be fun if done right.  A PC burns down half the town.  Then the next adventure is about trying to get away from the new adventurers hired by the town.  Alternately, the PCs could be be the ones hunting down the previous hires.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Jaeger on January 13, 2021, 07:28:27 PM
Sometimes that fits. But also, I've seen a lot of inconsistency from GMs in this.

Village: "Please protect us, heroes! We are defenseless against the orcs and need your help."

(PCs misbehave)

Village: "We'll send out our crack guards and track you down, outlaws!"

A central premise of a lot of RPG adventures is that there is *not* a strong lawful authority to handle problems - that's why the PCs are needed to spring into action, instead of just calling the police. I think this sort of conflict is often better handled by talking to the players out-of-game, rather than having intentionally un-fun in-game action to punish the players.


This can be fun if done right.  A PC burns down half the town.  Then the next adventure is about trying to get away from the new adventurers hired by the town.  Alternately, the PCs could be be the ones hunting down the previous hires.

This is why I really like a reputation mechanic of some kind.

Even if the PCs get away, word gets around...
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Chris24601 on January 13, 2021, 08:26:54 PM
This is why I really like a reputation mechanic of some kind.

Even if the PCs get away, word gets around...
I call it Renown in my system, but its one of the standard rewards for adventuring. By default it only provides bonuses (to persuade and deceit if someone values that type of renown; to intimidation if they oppose that type of renown), but it does act as a good GM guide for how NPCs will behave.

When someone who has Renown 4 with local outlaws rolls into town, people are going to be nervous (and easily intimidated), but are probably also going to covertly send someone running to fetch the guy with Renown 3 in Code of Justice who passed through town a day or two before.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: robh on January 14, 2021, 06:23:39 AM
Which book is this? Most of what I%u2019ve heard conjecture-wise is that it will be a Dragonlance setting book. I find it difficult to see where that sort of nonsense will actually fit! Ugh.

The Candlekeep Mysteries book, I think.

Sad but true:
https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2021/01/dd-candlekeep-features-wotcs-first-wheelchair-accessible-dungeon.html.

Must be great because Matt Mercer say's so........
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: SHARK on January 14, 2021, 07:14:02 AM
Which book is this? Most of what I%u2019ve heard conjecture-wise is that it will be a Dragonlance setting book. I find it difficult to see where that sort of nonsense will actually fit! Ugh.

The Candlekeep Mysteries book, I think.

Sad but true:
https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2021/01/dd-candlekeep-features-wotcs-first-wheelchair-accessible-dungeon.html.

Must be great because Matt Mercer say's so........

Greetings!

*SIGH* See, this is all such pandering nonsense. As a *person*, I like and accept disabled people just like anyone else--based on their merits and how they behave, and so on. Cool people are cool people, and are always welcome at my game table.

What does THAT have anything to do with "Wheelchair Accessible Fucking Dungeons"?????? Why does the game world, and anything and anyone IN THE GAME WORLD so much as give a fuck about disabled people? Disabled people are extremely likely to either live a quiet, uneventful life mostly impoverished and dependent upon charity--either their family or the local temple--or otherwise, they get quickly killed and eaten the fuck up by monsters.

This idea that disabled people--in the fucking game--are somehow going to be these kind of "super hero" characters...geesus. No, they're not. They are crippled, and are fortunate to just get by. They aren't going to be out "fighting" a damned thing. Lots of disabled people face challenges in performing normal, mundane, ordinary activities. Getting out of bed, going to the kitchen, going to the bathroom, showering, just preparing a meal, going to the store, all can be hugely time-consuming, frustrating things, exasperating in their pain, and difficulty in merely participating in tasks involving minimal self upkeep. Give me a fucking break. Being disabled doesn't mean your life is over, obviously, but for the vast majority it is extremel extra difficult when compared to non disabled people--and they are fortunate to just maintain themselves. The idea of them "fighting" and "going on adventures into dungeons" is just mind bogglingly stupid.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: theOutlander on January 14, 2021, 07:34:26 AM
Just you wait until "I used to be an adventurer like you, but took an arrow to the knee" is branded as ableist supremacy propaganda.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 14, 2021, 08:24:15 AM
Just you wait until "I used to be an adventurer like you, but took an arrow to the knee" is branded as ableist supremacy propaganda.

It's already begun. I lurked on the Paizo boards a couple of months back and one of the players pulled a shit fit because he expected most of the posters to agree with his point. He wanted to play a Wizard who could not use his hands due to missing one arm or both and wanted to use his feet to cast the spells. Moving them instead of his arms at NO penalty. As soon as someone said he would be at a disability "your all being Ableist!" came into play and I think he was rude and obnoxious about it that he was banned or given a warning. So beyond being a bunch of people that suffer Archnophobia we now have a bunch of mentally ill gamers with no disability wanting to play quadriplegics with no penalty. Why would anyone who actually suffers from a disability for example being in a wheelchair want to keep that same condition when magic can cure it in game. Hell the person who created the so called "wheelchair of representation" likely suffers from mental illness as she can walk and move fine except self-identifies as being wheelchair disabled. While continually going to medical providers to get certified as such and they keep kicking her out of their offices.

I need to wear glasses  the whole day except to sleep for everything else. Why the fuck would I want to play a blind or visually impaired character when I live it 24 fucking 7 365 days a year.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Charon's Little Helper on January 14, 2021, 08:59:45 AM
.......You play your character, your character doesn't play you.......

Absolutely, the issue is with the player. 
As already said Thieves and Paladins seem to attract a certain disruptive element. Both classes have scope for causing friction within a party and as a GM you need to be wary of whether a given player is capable of playing the role. This friction is a necessary element of the classes but there is a fine balance between disrupting and damaging party cohesion.

I don't think that it's so much that Thief/Paladin makes a character disruptive NEARLY as much as that players who want to be disruptive gravitate to classes such as Thief or Paladin.

It's like Chaotic Neutral. A normal player has no problem playing a Chaotic Neutral character. HOWEVER - a player choosing to play a Chaotic Neutral character is often a red flag, as they picked that so that they have an excuse to do whatever wackiness they want to.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Chris24601 on January 14, 2021, 09:37:58 AM
It's like Chaotic Neutral. A normal player has no problem playing a Chaotic Neutral character. HOWEVER - a player choosing to play a Chaotic Neutral character is often a red flag, as they picked that so that they have an excuse to do whatever wackiness they want to.
I tried playing a Chaotic Neutral warlock in 3e once because alignment requirements were either Chaotic or Evil and the rest of the party was decidedly neutral on the good/evil scale so I figured it would rock the boat too much to play a good PC.

Didn't matter... based on my actions over the first three sessions the DM ruled my alignment was Chaotic Good and the rest of the party would just have to deal with having a guy who tries to do the right thing all the time in the party. It mostly worked out, but it was very amusing having this dark broody figure wielding chaos magic as the party's morality pet.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: SHARK on January 14, 2021, 09:38:26 AM
Just you wait until "I used to be an adventurer like you, but took an arrow to the knee" is branded as ableist supremacy propaganda.

It's already begun. I lurked on the Paizo boards a couple of months back and one of the players pulled a shit fit because he expected most of the posters to agree with his point. He wanted to play a Wizard who could not use his hands due to missing one arm or both and wanted to use his feet to cast the spells. Moving them instead of his arms at NO penalty. As soon as someone said he would be at a disability "your all being Ableist!" came into play and I think he was rude and obnoxious about it that he was banned or given a warning. So beyond being a bunch of people that suffer Archnophobia we now have a bunch of mentally ill gamers with no disability wanting to play quadriplegics with no penalty. Why would anyone who actually suffers from a disability for example being in a wheelchair want to keep that same condition when magic can cure it in game. Hell the person who created the so called "wheelchair of representation" likely suffers from mental illness as she can walk and move fine except self-identifies as being wheelchair disabled. While continually going to medical providers to get certified as such and they keep kicking her out of their offices.

I need to wear glasses  the whole day except to sleep for everything else. Why the fuck would I want to play a blind or visually impaired character when I live it 24 fucking 7 365 days a year.

Greetings!

Well said, Sureshot! ;D These people that "Champion" such REEEing "inclusiveness" are mentally deranged morons. This whole ideology of victimhood and "representation" is corrosive to our hobby. It is interesting that you mention your vision limitations. I sympathize entirely. My own vision is most definitely not what it was when I was younger. I had a player in one of my groups that his character--a Fighter--lost his left eye in combat, having been chewed on by a dragon. His character lost depth perception, and suffered severe penalties to any ranged weapon use. However, he devoted himself even moreso to mastering his sword and hand to hand combat, and he adopted wearing a black eye patch, which while covering his mangled and lost eye, did not entirely cover the long, jagged scars of teeth marks down the left side of his face, which gave him a definite demeanor that was intimidating, and obviously also a bit rakish, dangerous, and heroic. I gave his character the benefit of a bonus to Charisma checks when seeking to be intimidating, and also when forming first impressions, especially with other warriors and soldiers, and also women. *Laughing* All in all, while a stroke of misfortune brought disfigurement and a disability to his character, he took it in stride and made the best of it. All in the spirit of good fun, and heroism. The whole victimhood mentality is just boggling.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Ghostmaker on January 14, 2021, 09:48:52 AM

I don't think that it's so much that Thief/Paladin makes a character disruptive NEARLY as much as that players who want to be disruptive gravitate to classes such as Thief or Paladin.

It's like Chaotic Neutral. A normal player has no problem playing a Chaotic Neutral character. HOWEVER - a player choosing to play a Chaotic Neutral character is often a red flag, as they picked that so that they have an excuse to do whatever wackiness they want to.
Agreed.

A short-lived campaign I was in had the following party spread (this was 3.5E):

Male human paladin (me), LG
Female elf rogue, CG
Female satyr bard, CG
Female pixie sorcerer, CG

I looked at the other players and the DM, mentally made some adjustments, and said, 'OK, let's do this.' Hijinks ensued.

I commented later, 'I'm not sure if I was playing in a D&D game or in a harem-genre anime'.

Mind you, though: this was with five adults, all in their right minds, and all veteran gamers.

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Stephen Tannhauser on January 14, 2021, 04:43:45 PM
Why the fuck would I want to play a blind or visually impaired character when I live it 24 fucking 7 365 days a year.

To be fair, when I play characters based on myself (and I do rather enjoy this; most of my characters are a lot like me, in the end), if the opportunity is available to get some character payback in return for taking Bad Sight as a disadvantage or the equivalent, I often will. Why not?  In GURPS, it can be an extra two levels on a psi power in return for the PC having to find his glasses once in a while. And as an experience I'm familiar with, I can play it pretty convincingly and entertainingly.

That said, if I take something as a disadvantage in return for a power boost, I expect it to be a disadvantage. I wouldn't take it solely for colour and expect it to ultimately make no difference to my in-game effectiveness -- if not by reducing it overall, then by visibly affecting how it's realized. The desire for a character to be able to roleplay the emotional elements of having a disability of some variety for personal gratification, while being hindered (or hindering the party) by the (represented) physical elements of that handicap only when one deliberately allows it, is the eat-one's-cake-and-have-it-too approach I've decried before.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 14, 2021, 05:47:24 PM
Quote
What does THAT have anything to do with "Wheelchair Accessible Fucking Dungeons"?????? Why does the game world, and anything and anyone IN THE GAME WORLD so much as give a fuck about disabled people? Disabled people are extremely likely to either live a quiet, uneventful life mostly impoverished and dependent upon charity--either their family or the local temple--or otherwise, they get quickly killed and eaten the fuck up by monsters.

This idea that disabled people--in the fucking game--are somehow going to be these kind of "super hero" characters...geesus. No, they're not. They are crippled, and are fortunate to just get by. They aren't going to be out "fighting" a damned thing.

Because fantasy world is fantasy world and you can... you know put anything there.
It's not like D&D even early on was in any way REALISTIC simulator of being brigand in medieval-magic land. It was always weird blend of opposite concepts, and unholy mix of specific and abstract.
(Not to mention there are lot of disabilities that still have disabled heroes quite easily - blind martial artists, deaf heroes, heroes without arm or leg, and so on. Trope old as world - and now taken to even more absurd levels - now TBH as we had wheelchaired psionics in superhero genre it can be easily adressed to fantasy spellcasters.).

Quote
The idea of them "fighting" and "going on adventures into dungeons" is just mind bogglingly stupid.

So is taking fireball in your face and keep running, yet 10-lvl fighter can do it ;)

Look Shark I'm not a fan of this really, but hey it's D&D - it a world where a knight have a chance in solo fight with armoured giant size of a skyscraper.

Quote
As soon as someone said he would be at a disability "your all being Ableist!" came into play and I think he was rude and obnoxious about it that he was banned or given a warning.

So even PAIZO couldn't stomach such bullshit. Good.

Quote
Why would anyone who actually suffers from a disability for example being in a wheelchair want to keep that same condition when magic can cure it in game. Hell the person who created the so called "wheelchair of representation" likely suffers from mental illness as she can walk and move fine except self-identifies as being wheelchair disabled.

Are you fucking serious?
Overall there is a lot of bullshit propaganda that it is no disability it's just another way of life, equally good - you know to up spirits of disabled people, but I doubt most of them buy such bullshit really.

Quote
It's like Chaotic Neutral. A normal player has no problem playing a Chaotic Neutral character. HOWEVER - a player choosing to play a Chaotic Neutral character is often a red flag, as they picked that so that they have an excuse to do whatever wackiness they want to.

Well that's a problem TBH with how Chaotic Neutral is described in most books.
Rather than someone commited to case of liberty and anarchy maybe even, someone promoting individualism over comformism you basically get alignment equvialent of Wisdom 2.

(And that's why I always hated this linking Barbarian to Chaos, and Monk to Order, I never treated alignment Chaos and Law as personality traits - so for me furiously disciplined Chaos worshippers, and lously Lawful characters are perfectly fine)

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: SHARK on January 14, 2021, 06:41:24 PM
Quote
What does THAT have anything to do with "Wheelchair Accessible Fucking Dungeons"?????? Why does the game world, and anything and anyone IN THE GAME WORLD so much as give a fuck about disabled people? Disabled people are extremely likely to either live a quiet, uneventful life mostly impoverished and dependent upon charity--either their family or the local temple--or otherwise, they get quickly killed and eaten the fuck up by monsters.

This idea that disabled people--in the fucking game--are somehow going to be these kind of "super hero" characters...geesus. No, they're not. They are crippled, and are fortunate to just get by. They aren't going to be out "fighting" a damned thing.

Because fantasy world is fantasy world and you can... you know put anything there.
It's not like D&D even early on was in any way REALISTIC simulator of being brigand in medieval-magic land. It was always weird blend of opposite concepts, and unholy mix of specific and abstract.
(Not to mention there are lot of disabilities that still have disabled heroes quite easily - blind martial artists, deaf heroes, heroes without arm or leg, and so on. Trope old as world - and now taken to even more absurd levels - now TBH as we had wheelchaired psionics in superhero genre it can be easily adressed to fantasy spellcasters.).

Quote
The idea of them "fighting" and "going on adventures into dungeons" is just mind bogglingly stupid.

So is taking fireball in your face and keep running, yet 10-lvl fighter can do it ;)

Look Shark I'm not a fan of this really, but hey it's D&D - it a world where a knight have a chance in solo fight with armoured giant size of a skyscraper.

Quote
As soon as someone said he would be at a disability "your all being Ableist!" came into play and I think he was rude and obnoxious about it that he was banned or given a warning.

So even PAIZO couldn't stomach such bullshit. Good.

Quote
Why would anyone who actually suffers from a disability for example being in a wheelchair want to keep that same condition when magic can cure it in game. Hell the person who created the so called "wheelchair of representation" likely suffers from mental illness as she can walk and move fine except self-identifies as being wheelchair disabled.

Are you fucking serious?
Overall there is a lot of bullshit propaganda that it is no disability it's just another way of life, equally good - you know to up spirits of disabled people, but I doubt most of them buy such bullshit really.

Quote
It's like Chaotic Neutral. A normal player has no problem playing a Chaotic Neutral character. HOWEVER - a player choosing to play a Chaotic Neutral character is often a red flag, as they picked that so that they have an excuse to do whatever wackiness they want to.

Well that's a problem TBH with how Chaotic Neutral is described in most books.
Rather than someone commited to case of liberty and anarchy maybe even, someone promoting individualism over comformism you basically get alignment equvialent of Wisdom 2.

(And that's why I always hated this linking Barbarian to Chaos, and Monk to Order, I never treated alignment Chaos and Law as personality traits - so for me furiously disciplined Chaos worshippers, and lously Lawful characters are perfectly fine)

Greetings!

Hey there, Wicked! Yeah, there are always individualized cases for a player to have a character with some kind of disability. I gave a good example of a player in one of my groups in the past. It is this whole *woke* SJW ideology though, that is the root of the deeper problem. "Disability Representation" is merely one of the menu items these morons use to politicize and divide the gaming hobby. Similar to the endless REEing about being "Inclusive" of Trans, "BIPOC", shrieks of racism, colonialism, misogyny, and on and on. It's the corporatization of intersectionality and identity politics and employing that as a cultural battering ram to destroy yet another community or hobby, much like how these cultural cockroaches approach *everything* in the culture as being "problematic" and needing to be cleansed. Movies, books, comics, Marvel, 007, it just goes on and on, with every subgroup needing to compete and be represented in the "Oppression Olympics".

I've been gaming for decades, and somehow in recent years, months even, there's this sudden awareness that disabled characters *need* to be "represented". Even back in the day, as you mention, there were occasionally encountered or developed!--a character that had some kind of disability--a missing arm or an eye, for example--and no one batted an eye about it. The whole identity politic angle is what I find most mind boggling. No one should even give this kind of nonsense the time of day from these troglodytes, you know?

*Laughing* fighting a giant the size of a skyscraper! Nice imagery there!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 14, 2021, 07:19:36 PM
Quote
*Laughing* fighting a giant the size of a skyscraper! Nice imagery there!

OK, I overdone it a bit. Nevertheless 24 feet tall Storm Giant is big enough to stomp any human

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 15, 2021, 01:20:34 AM
Which book is this? Most of what I%u2019ve heard conjecture-wise is that it will be a Dragonlance setting book. I find it difficult to see where that sort of nonsense will actually fit! Ugh.

The Candlekeep Mysteries book, I think.

That could actually work if any of the librarians are handicapped and/or the place was designed with accessibility for visitors in mind. Which, from what little I have read of the place, it is to some degree.

This being WOTC though all bets are off if they will do it right, or do it ham-handed.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 15, 2021, 01:38:09 AM
Why would anyone who actually suffers from a disability for example being in a wheelchair want to keep that same condition when magic can cure it in game. Hell the person who created the so called "wheelchair of representation" likely suffers from mental illness as she can walk and move fine except self-identifies as being wheelchair disabled. While continually going to medical providers to get certified as such and they keep kicking her out of their offices.

I need to wear glasses  the whole day except to sleep for everything else. Why the fuck would I want to play a blind or visually impaired character when I live it 24 fucking 7 365 days a year.

I've discussed this in my thread on both being and playing disabled characters.

A-lot of disabled players do indeed play normal characters. But some do not for various reasons. Sometimes its simply easier to play a similar handicap as that is what they are familiar with. It can even be a certain sense of confidence there. Stephen a few posts abone mentions pretty much exactly this element as to why they play so.

For others, myself included, it may be because they have no experience at all with some perfectly mundane action and either do not feel comfortable playing that and/or flat out lack a frame of reference to play that.

And others love to play their handicap in game and find ways through magic, science, or super powers to overcome it or work around it. This fairly common from the folks I've talked with. Essentially playing a handicapped character who is via other means able to function normally or close enough.

Lots of approaches that WOTC will continue to ignore in favour of their woke agenda.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 15, 2021, 01:41:31 AM
I tried playing a Chaotic Neutral warlock in 3e once because alignment requirements were either Chaotic or Evil and the rest of the party was decidedly neutral on the good/evil scale so I figured it would rock the boat too much to play a good PC.

Didn't matter... based on my actions over the first three sessions the DM ruled my alignment was Chaotic Good and the rest of the party would just have to deal with having a guy who tries to do the right thing all the time in the party. It mostly worked out, but it was very amusing having this dark broody figure wielding chaos magic as the party's morality pet.

That is actually rather awesome. And a great example of how to play "I am just playing my character" in a non-malicious way.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Chris24601 on January 15, 2021, 02:01:59 AM
That is actually rather awesome. And a great example of how to play "I am just playing my character" in a non-malicious way.
Yeah, so it turns out I am psychologically incapable of playing a non-good PC.

I once guilted a 2e Paladin into giving up his share of a treasure to the slaves we'd just rescued, because even though we were promised the treasure as a reward for freeing the slaves, the Paladin decided it would make his god look bad if my fighter (missed the Paladin Cha requirement by one point) was the only one sacrificing their reward to help out the free but now destitute slaves.

Least good I can reliably attain is a knight in sour armor (I'd link to tvtropes, but that would be an evil act) who is cynical about making any real difference, but keeps on helping people anyway.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 15, 2021, 07:55:16 AM
You need proper evil campaign ;)
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Ghostmaker on January 15, 2021, 08:25:39 AM
Yeah, so it turns out I am psychologically incapable of playing a non-good PC.

I once guilted a 2e Paladin into giving up his share of a treasure to the slaves we'd just rescued, because even though we were promised the treasure as a reward for freeing the slaves, the Paladin decided it would make his god look bad if my fighter (missed the Paladin Cha requirement by one point) was the only one sacrificing their reward to help out the free but now destitute slaves.

Least good I can reliably attain is a knight in sour armor (I'd link to tvtropes, but that would be an evil act) who is cynical about making any real difference, but keeps on helping people anyway.
Yeah. The evil characters I've played aren't socially unpleasant -- they just usually have a couple traits that make the others look at them funny.

One was a monk who didn't understand why you'd ever let an enemy live. Another was a warlock (3.5) with a necromancy schtick. They could both work in groups and cooperate, but their behavior got more than a few side-eyes at times.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 15, 2021, 08:31:55 AM
That could actually work if any of the librarians are handicapped and/or the place was designed with accessibility for visitors in mind. Which, from what little I have read of the place, it is to some degree.

This being WOTC though all bets are off if they will do it right, or do it ham-handed.

Sad part is one can't even mention the prevalence of healing magic or miracles because it's being ableist. That somehow someone living in that environment who can afford or knows someone to use both will simply refuse to fix their disability. "Hey buddy I have spell to cure your blindness. Nah I'm good I rather remain blind for the rest of my life thanks." Even then their must be a whole horde of npcs pr pcs in Wotc gaming worlds for the building to be wheelchair accessible that no one knew existed.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 15, 2021, 08:46:48 AM
I've discussed this in my thread on both being and playing disabled characters.

A-lot of disabled players do indeed play normal characters. But some do not for various reasons. Sometimes its simply easier to play a similar handicap as that is what they are familiar with. It can even be a certain sense of confidence there. Stephen a few posts abone mentions pretty much exactly this element as to why they play so.

For others, myself included, it may be because they have no experience at all with some perfectly mundane action and either do not feel comfortable playing that and/or flat out lack a frame of reference to play that.

And others love to play their handicap in game and find ways through magic, science, or super powers to overcome it or work around it. This fairly common from the folks I've talked with. Essentially playing a handicapped character who is via other means able to function normally or close enough.

Lots of approaches that WOTC will continue to ignore in favour of their woke agenda.

Well if the new book and so called Wheelchair of Representation is anything to by they already seem ready to focus on their woke agenda even if it harms the rpg as a whole.

It's not so much wanting to play a disability that I take issue with it's wanting to play with one while having zero negative consequences for doing so. Playing a character with a limp and somehow the chasing monster is not going to focus on the character. Or wanting to cast all spells perfectly with their feet at no penalty. If one dares to say anything about it one is called ableist.

The Wheelchair I would allow though very nerfed. If allowed as is and upgraded it gives perfect fly and maneuverability speeds, extra attacks, AC and speed. With the DM and the rest of the group not allowed to say anything because we are engaging in Ableist behavior. My adventuring areas may have areas that maybe wheelchair accessible for the most part no. Sorry but the lost temple deep in the darkness is not going to have modern smooth asphalt road leading to and from it. Nor the majority of it be wheelchair accessible. That Wheelchair at least from NPCs or Monster with the right resources or abilities will be prime targets in an encounter. Want to fly up in the dragon face roll save vs Dragon Breath or what's your AC it attacks the character.

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Chris24601 on January 15, 2021, 08:59:18 AM
You need proper evil campaign ;)
You wouldn’t want me in a “proper” evil campaign. Most people have zero concept of what actual evil looks like. They think is something edgy or cool. It’s not. It’s cruel, vindictive and ultimately nihilistic.

I have no problems running evil NPCs; in large part because they’re intended to ultimately fail by the PCs efforts. They’re designed to be undone. But that’s not a proper evil campaign because the point of an evil PCs is to not be undone and that’s a problem.

Case in point, thd last time I was ever asked to actually play an evil character I was tasked by the GM with playing an evil mirror version of my PC (I had a lot of spells, the GM trusted me and was already running several other PCs as evil mirror copies) with the specific goal of “you know what your good self knows and want to hurt your good self as much as possible.”

The GM was thinking “let’s have a good matched fight”, but instead I had to pull them aside and make sure he knew just what my interpretation of his directions were.

See, the thing about playing a “goody-two-shoes” is that you care about a lot of people and help alot of people. So I told the DM that if my goal is “hurt my good self as much as possible” they wouldn’t stay and fight... they’d immediately teleport away, leaving their mirror allies in the lurch and start systematically murdering everyone my PC had ever loved or helped (which included a lot of the DMs favorite non-combat NPCs), get a copy of the animate dead spell to turn everyone killed into skeletons (because in 3e your soul can’t move on to the afterlife or be resurrected while it is undead) and then scatter them with commands to lay buried and motionless for eternity so their souls would be trapped forever and denied the afterlife. Then I’d send my PC a message via spell of what I’d done and that if they ever helped another soul I’d do the same to them.

The GM decided he should run my evil twin after all and never asked me to play anything evil ever again. Also, no one from that group ever complained that I only played good PCs after that.

I play only good PCs not because I don’t know HOW to play evil, but because I cannot understand why anyone would ever WANT to.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 15, 2021, 09:11:58 AM
Even then their must be a whole horde of npcs pr pcs in Wotc gaming worlds for the building to be wheelchair accessible that no one knew existed.

All you need are one of two factors.

Either the owners who had the building designed were handicapped and built accordingly.

Or a patron funded that feature. (Or they were planning on at least one wealthy patron who was.)

quick RL example: I think I have the only apartment in the complex with a handrail. Why? The prior owner needed one.

Though there is a 3rd possible reason. The place is not really handicapped designed. It is actually designed to accomodate certain non-human visitors or are accessways for wagons or something else that just happens to also be useful for non-related use.

Least those are the sane reasons I can come up with right off the bat that odds are WOTC will never think of because all they want is to virtue signal.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 15, 2021, 09:33:14 AM
It's not so much wanting to play a disability that I take issue with it's wanting to play with one while having zero negative consequences for doing so. Playing a character with a limp and somehow the chasing monster is not going to focus on the character. Or wanting to cast all spells perfectly with their feet at no penalty. If one dares to say anything about it one is called ableist.

Same here. A handicap should never just be something you can jot down on your character sheet and go "ha-ha! No penalties!" Even Daredevil still had to deal with various problems of being blind.

As for being able to cast spells with their feet. That would work if either the character was born without arms, or had been without long enough that they have adapted. If it is a relatively recent loss then I'd impose a penalty till it felt like enough time had passed to fully adapt.

And obviously they can not move while casting so that is a potential built in problem.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: robertliguori on January 15, 2021, 09:54:10 AM
Yeah, as said, the onus on the player is to both choose actions, in the moment, which don't ruin the other players' fun, and to bring a character to the table which makes that simple. 

But it's important to remember that people are people, and tend to rely on other people for many things, and as long as you can work out-of-game with other players around potential problem areas, and work in-game with the understanding of where the Line is that other people stop having fun, it's not super-difficult to make even black-hearted knaves play smoothly with others.

Also, it's important to remember that at the same time mirror-evil-you is deciding to teleport out because you don't value your mirror-evil party, mirror-evil-rogue is taking that AoO and shanking you because you have loot he needs to hurt good-rogue, while mirror-evil-bard is attacking both of you to set up his "I actually have free will and am choosing goodness" justification for betrayal down the line, and mirror-evil-cleric just pledged herself to the demon lord Pazuzu and committed suicide to work to dethrone Cleric's god in a few centuries.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: jhkim on January 15, 2021, 11:15:23 AM
Well if the new book and so called Wheelchair of Representation is anything to by they already seem ready to focus on their woke agenda even if it harms the rpg as a whole.

First of all, there are lots of liberal gamers as well as lots of conservative gamers. I think to match the market, there should be some liberal-themed RPG books, as well as some conservative themed, and some neutral or other. I think matching the market is good for RPGs as a whole.

Also, the Candlekeep Mysteries book isn't out yet, and I can't tell that the wokeness in it amounts to much. The woke agenda could be comparable having to two gay NPCs out of dozens in an adventure book, where if you just replaced one "M" to "F" it would be gone. In this case, it could be that someone who is reading the module might not notice at all how a given dungeon is wheelchair accessible -- it could just be all one level.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: HappyDaze on January 15, 2021, 12:31:01 PM
Though there is a 3rd possible reason. The place is not really handicapped designed. It is actually designed to accomodate certain non-human visitors or are accessways for wagons or something else that just happens to also be useful for non-related use.
This is why "wheelchair ramps" show up so often in Hutt Space. The Hutts are all into making sure beings without working legs can get around them--so long as they're Hutts. For everyone else that it might benefit, the Hutts care not at all.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: zircher on January 15, 2021, 03:15:59 PM
Yep, Lamias and other snake-kin I can totally see have a 'ramp culture'.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 15, 2021, 09:15:21 PM
Quote
You wouldn’t want me in a “proper” evil campaign. Most people have zero concept of what actual evil looks like. They think is something edgy or cool. It’s not. It’s cruel, vindictive and ultimately nihilistic.

Well as a Catholic I have to disagree - while yes that's probably fine Evil Outsider - aka demon description, I think most of human evil is very... banal, almost boring, not really even criminal.
Of course in D&D it's all much more murky - but I prefer a way when you have a lot of perfectly socially adjustable people whose current karmic-sheet says EVIL (as usually I like to treat D&D alignment in a karmic way more than = oh look there is only 9 personalities).

In 3,5 Ultimate Scoundrel there was good example of it - and I love it - they counted Jack Black's character from "King Kong" the fat director who wanted to film King Kong - as Chaotic Evil, and I was like - excellent! He is no mad cultist, he is no mass murderer, he is not cruel or vindictive - he is just sort of uncaring about consequences in a massive way as long as his purpose if fullfilled.
In other way - you do not need to play Evil Incarnated to play character with evil alignment in evil campaign.

But I agree it's usually not cool or edgy.

Quote
See, the thing about playing a “goody-two-shoes” is that you care about a lot of people and help alot of people. So I told the DM that if my goal is “hurt my good self as much as possible” they wouldn’t stay and fight... they’d immediately teleport away, leaving their mirror allies in the lurch and start systematically murdering everyone my PC had ever loved or helped (which included a lot of the DMs favorite non-combat NPCs), get a copy of the animate dead spell to turn everyone killed into skeletons (because in 3e your soul can’t move on to the afterlife or be resurrected while it is undead) and then scatter them with commands to lay buried and motionless for eternity so their souls would be trapped forever and denied the afterlife. Then I’d send my PC a message via spell of what I’d done and that if they ever helped another soul I’d do the same to them.

That's absolutely wonderful idea - but then you were playing very malicious mirror clone, not just evil dude like dunno Edwin or Eldoth from Baldur's Gate.

Quote
I play only good PCs not because I don’t know HOW to play evil, but because I cannot understand why anyone would ever WANT to.

Simply because well dependent on how your team understand alignment because I'm sure some would count what I'm gonna to say as barely Neutrals - there are multiple characters in stories I count as Evil - that are no looney, vindictive, mass murderers. Outsiders are literally made from Good and Evil. Mortal beings are not.
Walter White was evil, yet he still risked his life and fortune for his wacky sidekick (to some point at least), Darth Vader was quite way gone, but still cared about his family.
Precise interesting point about Evil-Doers is that they are not evil to everybody. And many are perfectly suitable to teamwork - still Evil in Alignment Chart.

And why would you want to play it? To explore such uncertainities. Duality of man. Unfairness of judgement. To explore how in many ways evil, sin, corruption is not this blatant Satanic choice to become bloodthirsty monster but slow, slow, slow corruption and even in corrupted man some aspects corode fast, while others can survive.

And I mean even in most blatant way you can make LE mercenary that always hold his end of deal.

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: oggsmash on January 16, 2021, 12:26:56 AM
.......You play your character, your character doesn't play you.......

Absolutely, the issue is with the player. 
As already said Thieves and Paladins seem to attract a certain disruptive element. Both classes have scope for causing friction within a party and as a GM you need to be wary of whether a given player is capable of playing the role. This friction is a necessary element of the classes but there is a fine balance between disrupting and damaging party cohesion.

But it can also arise from stat driven games; A character with a very high Charisma or very low Intelligence score can lead to problems within the group if handled badly. Roleplaying borderline stupidity without being stupid takes a very skilled actor, I have never seen a player able to pull it off. Likewise high Charisma tends to result in players seeing the character as arrogant and/or conceited, and frankly no party needs a Kardashian.
For "borderline stupidity without being stupid" I use the example of Johnny Lawrence from the Cobra Kai series. He's a great character IMO.

  And a great example of having a high charisma coupled with borderline stupid and what havoc it can birth.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: oggsmash on January 16, 2021, 12:29:26 AM
Well if the new book and so called Wheelchair of Representation is anything to by they already seem ready to focus on their woke agenda even if it harms the rpg as a whole.

First of all, there are lots of liberal gamers as well as lots of conservative gamers. I think to match the market, there should be some liberal-themed RPG books, as well as some conservative themed, and some neutral or other. I think matching the market is good for RPGs as a whole.

Also, the Candlekeep Mysteries book isn't out yet, and I can't tell that the wokeness in it amounts to much. The woke agenda could be comparable having to two gay NPCs out of dozens in an adventure book, where if you just replaced one "M" to "F" it would be gone. In this case, it could be that someone who is reading the module might not notice at all how a given dungeon is wheelchair accessible -- it could just be all one level.

  I think theming games liberal or conservative is a big fucking NO.   
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 16, 2021, 09:52:46 AM
Well one major sign that the player will be disruptive and use alignment as an excuse to myself at least, is the player demanding to play a Chaotic Neutral Barbarian. Everytime I allow one they end up just being fucking annoying and claiming that if they cannot play anything, else the DM is restricting their "creative" freedom. Yeah no nice try it's almost as bad as the time I had the real life atheist who played one in character in a Pathfinder campaign set in Golarion. While the play kept wondering why none of the religious npcs wanted to heal, help or even sell items. How about not insulting every religious npc by claiming that religion is useless and for sucker then asking for negative levels to be removed.

It's what my character wants to do is code for what I want to do and then blame the "character" when it annoys the players and or/DM.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 16, 2021, 11:04:44 AM
Quote
  I think theming games liberal or conservative is a big fucking NO.   

Disagree. There are games with politics within - both intrigue or revolutionary method, so in such game it's on place.

Quote
Yeah no nice try it's almost as bad as the time I had the real life atheist who played one in character in a Pathfinder campaign set in Golarion. While the play kept wondering why none of the religious npcs wanted to heal, help or even sell items. How about not insulting every religious npc by claiming that religion is useless and for sucker then asking for negative levels to be removed.

Then you have whole atheist regime in Northern Garund.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Abraxus on January 16, 2021, 01:53:41 PM
Then you have whole atheist regime in Northern Garund.

His whole outlook might have made sense if the character was from that area. Instead the character was the player. While also ignoring the subtle and not so subtle hints from both the DM (me) and the rest of the players to knock it off.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: RPGPundit on January 16, 2021, 07:45:31 PM
Well if the new book and so called Wheelchair of Representation is anything to by they already seem ready to focus on their woke agenda even if it harms the rpg as a whole.

First of all, there are lots of liberal gamers as well as lots of conservative gamers. I think to match the market, there should be some liberal-themed RPG books, as well as some conservative themed, and some neutral or other. I think matching the market is good for RPGs as a whole.

Also, the Candlekeep Mysteries book isn't out yet, and I can't tell that the wokeness in it amounts to much. The woke agenda could be comparable having to two gay NPCs out of dozens in an adventure book, where if you just replaced one "M" to "F" it would be gone. In this case, it could be that someone who is reading the module might not notice at all how a given dungeon is wheelchair accessible -- it could just be all one level.

  I think theming games liberal or conservative is a big fucking NO.

Absolutely agreed. There shouldn't be either of those types of games in the hobby. There should just be games.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 17, 2021, 06:44:29 AM
Also, the Candlekeep Mysteries book isn't out yet, and I can't tell that the wokeness in it amounts to much. The woke agenda could be comparable having to two gay NPCs out of dozens in an adventure book, where if you just replaced one "M" to "F" it would be gone. In this case, it could be that someone who is reading the module might not notice at all how a given dungeon is wheelchair accessible -- it could just be all one level.

This was my point with Essentials, Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annhialation, etc. The inclusions are meaningless as they have nothing to back them up. You can literally change the genders or even race and have no impact at all.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 17, 2021, 07:02:27 AM
Speaking of our old friend Wheelchair of Representation.

There it is ridden by a new character in Idle Champions of the Forgotton Realms. A evil drow or tiefling thief in a wheelchair. Backstabbing people. And detaching rings on the back wheels and throwing them as chakrams. Its both jaw-droppingly blatant and yet kinda cool at the same time.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Spinachcat on January 17, 2021, 11:38:29 PM
I want players to play their characters as they designed and envisioned their character.

However, the setting might push back on certain behaviors.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Jaeger on January 18, 2021, 06:23:50 PM
....
This was my point with Essentials, Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annhialation, etc. The inclusions are meaningless as they have nothing to back them up. You can literally change the genders or even race and have no impact at all.


The fact that I would have to consciously change them, means that they are not meaningless.

This is how entryism starts. Small inclusions.

When people dismiss them as meaningless, without pushing back, it shows that these inclusions are having the intended impact:

They are slowly normalizing the woke.

Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 18, 2021, 10:43:41 PM
I am not sure on that.

These things are usually so small that they lack impact. Hence why they are meaningless. Tomb of Annihilation for example. The shopkeeper who is worried about his husband. Its a single throwaway sentence with nothing to back it up or give meaning or even acnowlege that this is a gay relationship. Much the same with the gnomes in Essentials. Or Strahd, you know, that guy who got turned into a vamp because of his obsession with a woman? Oh now hes Bi. Meaningless throwaway sentenceces with jack all nothing to back them up. Or actually contradicted by other material.

It would be the same as say having a Call of Cthulhu module set in the deep south in a bigoted town and there is one sentence saying "Joe is black" but nothing else to back that up.

Looking back at some of the incidents in the books I have it almost feels like someone after the fact edited this stuff in due to how nothing they all are.

Contrast this with say Idle Champions of the FR where we have a Tiefling thief party member in a wheelchair, and a Tabaxi bard member in a lesbian relationship with a human NPC right front and center. Small to be sure. But these have background and impact the story.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: SHARK on January 19, 2021, 06:08:09 AM
....
This was my point with Essentials, Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annhialation, etc. The inclusions are meaningless as they have nothing to back them up. You can literally change the genders or even race and have no impact at all.


The fact that I would have to consciously change them, means that they are not meaningless.

This is how entryism starts. Small inclusions.

When people dismiss them as meaningless, without pushing back, it shows that these inclusions are having the intended impact:

They are slowly normalizing the woke.

Greetings!

Exactly, Jaeger. It's the whole "Boiling the Frog" approach. Always pushing here, pushing there, including ths stupid meaningless thing, always a little more.

Until it isn't so meaningless and it isn't so harmless, now, isn't it?

This is how we have gotten to where we are at, and with more to come. This stupid ideological BS has to be resisted loudly, and constantly. No matter how seemingly small or "meaningless" it might appear to be, because ultimately, it isn't.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 20, 2021, 12:54:31 PM
Except its not.

Every one of the examples other than the Strahd intro are meaningless because there is nothing to back it up. None of it comes across as woke agenda indoctrination. SJWs are never subtle. And a good portion of these entries are just a single sentence, if even that, in the whole book. Nor any crowing that its there as is usual for the woke need to virtue signal at any opportunity.

Candlekeep is to date the first one where WOTC has actually gotten more aggressive in pushing and advertising their agenda.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: yabaziou on January 20, 2021, 04:19:53 PM
To an intelligent person, the answer is oblivious no. To a child or an idiot, the answer is yes and that is why the concept of total party kill has been invented, to prove that violence begets more violence and as a referee I have access to many, many violent NPCs and monsters that will kill the violent PC, except if the others PCs kill them first.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 20, 2021, 04:49:25 PM
Quote
Except its not.

Every one of the examples other than the Strahd intro are meaningless because there is nothing to back it up. None of it comes across as woke agenda indoctrination. SJWs are never subtle. And a good portion of these entries are just a single sentence, if even that, in the whole book. Nor any crowing that its there as is usual for the woke need to virtue signal at any opportunity.

Candlekeep is to date the first one where WOTC has actually gotten more aggressive in pushing and advertising their agenda.

Well it's bit dualistic - one of aspects of diverisity and queernormativism SJW pushes and praises is... well normativism - ergo you just put alphabet people randomly without much story or importance even - they're just there in the world, like each time developer rolls 19 on minor NPC table.


Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Omega on January 21, 2021, 05:58:35 AM
Well it's bit dualistic - one of aspects of diverisity and queernormativism SJW pushes and praises is... well normativism - ergo you just put alphabet people randomly without much story or importance even - they're just there in the world, like each time developer rolls 19 on minor NPC table.

It doesnt work that way though. If you just have X in somewhere at random and it does nothing it is not going to register usually and not further the cause thusly.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 21, 2021, 06:09:12 AM
Well sure SJWs would prefer proper rep both in main NPCs and among random city crowd, that's true.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Jaeger on January 23, 2021, 10:02:53 PM
Well it's bit dualistic - one of aspects of diverisity and queernormativism SJW pushes and praises is... well normativism - ergo you just put alphabet people randomly without much story or importance even - they're just there in the world, like each time developer rolls 19 on minor NPC table.

It doesnt work that way though. If you just have X in somewhere at random and it does nothing it is not going to register usually and not further the cause thusly.

Except it did.

They got you to say that it's no big deal.

And not only are you not objecting to the SJW normativism, you are pushing back against people who don't like it.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Samsquantch on January 26, 2021, 10:58:20 PM

 Hell the person who created the so called "wheelchair of representation" likely suffers from mental illness as she can walk and move fine except self-identifies as being wheelchair disabled. While continually going to medical providers to get certified as such and they keep kicking her out of their offices.


Is this actually true? The creator of this abomination is actually larping as a disabled person? And no one sees anything wrong with that?
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Samsquantch on January 26, 2021, 11:30:22 PM
You need proper evil campaign ;)
You wouldn’t want me in a “proper” evil campaign. Most people have zero concept of what actual evil looks like. They think is something edgy or cool. It’s not. It’s cruel, vindictive and ultimately nihilistic.

I have no problems running evil NPCs; in large part because they’re intended to ultimately fail by the PCs efforts. They’re designed to be undone. But that’s not a proper evil campaign because the point of an evil PCs is to not be undone and that’s a problem.

Case in point, thd last time I was ever asked to actually play an evil character I was tasked by the GM with playing an evil mirror version of my PC (I had a lot of spells, the GM trusted me and was already running several other PCs as evil mirror copies) with the specific goal of “you know what your good self knows and want to hurt your good self as much as possible.”

The GM was thinking “let’s have a good matched fight”, but instead I had to pull them aside and make sure he knew just what my interpretation of his directions were.

See, the thing about playing a “goody-two-shoes” is that you care about a lot of people and help alot of people. So I told the DM that if my goal is “hurt my good self as much as possible” they wouldn’t stay and fight... they’d immediately teleport away, leaving their mirror allies in the lurch and start systematically murdering everyone my PC had ever loved or helped (which included a lot of the DMs favorite non-combat NPCs), get a copy of the animate dead spell to turn everyone killed into skeletons (because in 3e your soul can’t move on to the afterlife or be resurrected while it is undead) and then scatter them with commands to lay buried and motionless for eternity so their souls would be trapped forever and denied the afterlife. Then I’d send my PC a message via spell of what I’d done and that if they ever helped another soul I’d do the same to them.

The GM decided he should run my evil twin after all and never asked me to play anything evil ever again. Also, no one from that group ever complained that I only played good PCs after that.

I play only good PCs not because I don’t know HOW to play evil, but because I cannot understand why anyone would ever WANT to.

Very well said. I have seen firsthand what evil is and most gamers don't come close in their interpretation of evil, much like you described as expected from your gm. I don't play evil characters for the same reason and as a GM I tone my bad guys down to a more PG level as some of my players are rather squeamish... which actually ties into the wheelchair angle. My most squeamish player is disabled and needs crutches to walk and even then not at all quickly. He is perfectly ok with his limitations in life and we don't coddle him. We also do geocaching for fun and I have more than once extricated home from situations he couldn't get out of and I had no complaints in the process. In gaming, none of his characters have ever had the need to be representative of his disability and he laughs at this concept. He knows he will never be able to do the things his characters can do or even the things I did as a soldier in the military and he doesn't whine about it. He also hates people pitying him as he's very capable though limited. I have nothing but respect for him and love him like a brother because of who he is as a person.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Samsquantch on January 26, 2021, 11:36:14 PM
Well if the new book and so called Wheelchair of Representation is anything to by they already seem ready to focus on their woke agenda even if it harms the rpg as a whole.

First of all, there are lots of liberal gamers as well as lots of conservative gamers. I think to match the market, there should be some liberal-themed RPG books, as well as some conservative themed, and some neutral or other. I think matching the market is good for RPGs as a whole.

Also, the Candlekeep Mysteries book isn't out yet, and I can't tell that the wokeness in it amounts to much. The woke agenda could be comparable having to two gay NPCs out of dozens in an adventure book, where if you just replaced one "M" to "F" it would be gone. In this case, it could be that someone who is reading the module might not notice at all how a given dungeon is wheelchair accessible -- it could just be all one level.

Wouldn't it be better if we just left the politics out of gaming and just gamed for fun?
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 27, 2021, 03:55:13 PM
Quote
Very well said. I have seen firsthand what evil is and most gamers don't come close in their interpretation of evil, much like you described as expected from your gm.

Evil is a spectrum.
It's not like you move from CN one step too far and suddenly you are Demogorgon.
Playing CE character does not mean playing PURE EVIL, just like playing LG does not mean playing Jesus Christ.

I play with CE rogue in my team and NG archer, and it's working, because archer girl is not self-righteous, and rogue is not murdering psychopath, just you know amoral thief.

Quote
Wouldn't it be better if we just left the politics out of gaming and just gamed for fun?

No. Gaming is cultural activity and culture is and always was inevitably tied to politics and vice versa.
Also being conservative and liberal is not just political stance, but also philosophical, ethical and so on.
You can pretend you ignore it - but even then unconcioussly you're taking some stances.

Problem is SJWs are insufferably nagging about it
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: zircher on January 27, 2021, 04:45:04 PM
Quote from: Wicked Woodpecker of West
Problem is SJWs are insufferably nagging about it
Yeah, if you don't push back then you will be pushed over.  Safe to say, the SJWs made it an issue rather than keeping it to their own table/house rules.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: jhkim on January 27, 2021, 05:34:46 PM
First of all, there are lots of liberal gamers as well as lots of conservative gamers. I think to match the market, there should be some liberal-themed RPG books, as well as some conservative themed, and some neutral or other. I think matching the market is good for RPGs as a whole.
Wouldn't it be better if we just left the politics out of gaming and just gamed for fun?
No. Gaming is cultural activity and culture is and always was inevitably tied to politics and vice versa.
Also being conservative and liberal is not just political stance, but also philosophical, ethical and so on.
You can pretend you ignore it - but even then unconcioussly you're taking some stances.

Problem is SJWs are insufferably nagging about it

The issue is that I can play a game and have fun with it - but someone else might try the exact same game and be put off by what they perceive as the politics of it. For example, I joined this board 15 years ago, and I had fun playing the Blue Rose RPG -- but RPGPundit had tons of complaints around the politics of it while liking the True20. Nowadays, Pundit's more into OSR.

Different people enjoy different things.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 28, 2021, 09:30:52 AM
Quote
The issue is that I can play a game and have fun with it - but someone else might try the exact same game and be put off by what they perceive as the politics of it. For example, I joined this board 15 years ago, and I had fun playing the Blue Rose RPG -- but RPGPundit had tons of complaints around the politics of it while liking the True20. Nowadays, Pundit's more into OSR.

Well yes. I cannot say I like politics of Blue Rose but it does not pretend to be something else that it is.
Generally as far-right winger I curse how population - in my home Poland, but evidently in US as well, tend to see "politics" and "political" almost as curses or vulgar words, not as basic for large part if no most of human activity in history, as Greeks saw it.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Armchair Gamer on January 28, 2021, 10:19:43 AM
Quote
The issue is that I can play a game and have fun with it - but someone else might try the exact same game and be put off by what they perceive as the politics of it. For example, I joined this board 15 years ago, and I had fun playing the Blue Rose RPG -- but RPGPundit had tons of complaints around the politics of it while liking the True20. Nowadays, Pundit's more into OSR.

Well yes. I cannot say I like politics of Blue Rose but it does not pretend to be something else that it is.
Generally as far-right winger I curse how population - in my home Poland, but evidently in US as well, tend to see "politics" and "political" almost as curses or vulgar words, not as basic for large part if no most of human activity in history, as Greeks saw it.

  One of the reasons this whole argument is so fraught is the very ambiguity of the term 'political', ranging from 'grounded in a general worldview and philosophy' to 'providing lectures and harangues about contemporary figures and issues.'

  Back on the original topic, things like https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/ (https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/) are pushing me towards the idea that gaming, like discussing politics and religion, needs to return to being done in private among small circles of friends.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Chris24601 on January 28, 2021, 11:12:55 AM
Well yes. I cannot say I like politics of Blue Rose but it does not pretend to be something else that it is.

Generally as far-right winger I curse how population - in my home Poland, but evidently in US as well, tend to see "politics" and "political" almost as curses or vulgar words, not as basic for large part if no most of human activity in history, as Greeks saw it.
The thing about politics is that for 80% of the population the politics they embrace are a policy of “leave me alone to make a living and raise my family and I’ll do the same.” They engage in Greek-style politics by doing just that. It’s so basic and agreed upon you don’t even think of it as politics any more than you think about breathing.

The problem is the other 20% or so whose politics are “I know better than you how to run your life.” This position is antithetical to the 80% and so is noticed as political in the same way that your breathing is disrupted by smoke. This gets the label politics and is treated like a dirty word because it’s so contrary.

Now, to bring this back to RPGs. If the leftist (or far right for that matter) elements were just releasing their own games and treated things like the 80% treat life (you play your game, I’ll play mine, all is well) then we wouldn’t have a problem.

The problem is the group (SJWs currently, the “moral majority” in the 80s) that says “you’re playing wrong and need to change or we’ll punish you.” They proceed to try and co-opt or drive out of business anyone who refuses to bend to their desires.

The reason ordinary people hate “politics” so much is that the positions of the 20% force them to change their lives in order to resist having their lives interfered with. They’re already losing something just because the moral busybodies have turned their way.

Heck, just the time I spent explaining this was time I could have spent working on something more productive, but the need to play defense just to keep from being completely swept away means part of my day has to be paying attention to this crap and not to my own interests.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Eirikrautha on January 28, 2021, 11:21:23 AM
  Back on the original topic, things like https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/ (https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/) are pushing me towards the idea that gaming, like discussing politics and religion, needs to return to being done in private among small circles of friends.
JFC, that link!  I don't know who is more pathetic, the sniveling worm who is so afraid of offending someone that they have to get permission to discuss the topic first, or the mod team that needs to discuss and triangulate their answer to avoid poking the howling mob.  A pox on both their houses...
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Eirikrautha on January 28, 2021, 11:22:54 AM
Well yes. I cannot say I like politics of Blue Rose but it does not pretend to be something else that it is.

Generally as far-right winger I curse how population - in my home Poland, but evidently in US as well, tend to see "politics" and "political" almost as curses or vulgar words, not as basic for large part if no most of human activity in history, as Greeks saw it.
The thing about politics is that for 80% of the population the politics they embrace are a policy of “leave me alone to make a living and raise my family and I’ll do the same.” They engage in Greek-style politics by doing just that. It’s so basic and agreed upon you don’t even think of it as politics any more than you think about breathing.

The problem is the other 20% or so whose politics are “I know better than you how to run your life.” This position is antithetical to the 80% and so is noticed as political in the same way that your breathing is disrupted by smoke. This gets the label politics and is treated like a dirty word because it’s so contrary.

Now, to bring this back to RPGs. If the leftist (or far right for that matter) elements were just releasing their own games and treated things like the 80% treat life (you play your game, I’ll play mine, all is well) then we wouldn’t have a problem.

The problem is the group (SJWs currently, the “moral majority” in the 80s) that says “you’re playing wrong and need to change or we’ll punish you.” They proceed to try and co-opt or drive out of business anyone who refuses to bend to their desires.

The reason ordinary people hate “politics” so much is that the positions of the 20% force them to change their lives in order to resist having their lives interfered with. They’re already losing something just because the moral busybodies have turned their way.

Heck, just the time I spent explaining this was time I could have spent working on something more productive, but the need to play defense just to keep from being completely swept away means part of my day has to be paying attention to this crap and not to my own interests.
Dead on accurate.  The problem isn't politics.  It's proscriptive politics...
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: jhkim on January 28, 2021, 12:21:42 PM
Quote from: jhkim
The issue is that I can play a game and have fun with it - but someone else might try the exact same game and be put off by what they perceive as the politics of it. For example, I joined this board 15 years ago, and I had fun playing the Blue Rose RPG -- but RPGPundit had tons of complaints around the politics of it while liking the True20. Nowadays, Pundit's more into OSR.
The problem is the other 20% or so whose politics are “I know better than you how to run your life.” This position is antithetical to the 80% and so is noticed as political in the same way that your breathing is disrupted by smoke. This gets the label politics and is treated like a dirty word because it’s so contrary.

Now, to bring this back to RPGs. If the leftist (or far right for that matter) elements were just releasing their own games and treated things like the 80% treat life (you play your game, I’ll play mine, all is well) then we wouldn’t have a problem.

The problem is the group (SJWs currently, the “moral majority” in the 80s) that says “you’re playing wrong and need to change or we’ll punish you.” They proceed to try and co-opt or drive out of business anyone who refuses to bend to their desires.

Back 15 years ago when Blue Rose came out, I'd say the RPG scene was much less political. Despite this, Pundit and others had a ton of complaints about the publishing of Blue Rose. And things have escalated from there, which represents to a fair degree how everything has gotten more political and partisan in society from 2005 to 2021.

In current debates, posters say that because the other side has made attacks, it justifies attacking their games. So, for example, someone publishes a "combat wheelchair" for D&D as an option. That doesn't affect any conservative players' games. But then some posters can say that this is a wedge to try to change D&D for everyone, so it's important to discuss and criticize it.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Samsquantch on January 28, 2021, 02:02:06 PM
Back on the original topic, things like https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/ (https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/) are pushing me towards the idea that gaming, like discussing politics and religion, needs to return to being done in private among small circles of friends.

I too am beginning to think this. Say the wrong thing in the wrong venue and you are cancelled and banned. Dissent is verboten. At least the chances of your gamer friends shunning you are small or your friendship wasn't that strong to begin with. My gamer friends are very left but we can actually discuss nearly anything and not have it reduced to shouting and ad hominem attacks.

I've seen people banned from my lgs for creepy behaviour, theft, even temper tantrums, but so far no one has been banned for voting the wrong way, yet.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Samsquantch on January 28, 2021, 02:04:42 PM
Quote from: Wicked Woodpecker of West
Problem is SJWs are insufferably nagging about it
Yeah, if you don't push back then you will be pushed over.  Safe to say, the SJWs made it an issue rather than keeping it to their own table/house rules.

Agreed. Both of you are correct.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Samsquantch on January 28, 2021, 02:07:50 PM
Well yes. I cannot say I like politics of Blue Rose but it does not pretend to be something else that it is.

Generally as far-right winger I curse how population - in my home Poland, but evidently in US as well, tend to see "politics" and "political" almost as curses or vulgar words, not as basic for large part if no most of human activity in history, as Greeks saw it.
The thing about politics is that for 80% of the population the politics they embrace are a policy of “leave me alone to make a living and raise my family and I’ll do the same.” They engage in Greek-style politics by doing just that. It’s so basic and agreed upon you don’t even think of it as politics any more than you think about breathing.

The problem is the other 20% or so whose politics are “I know better than you how to run your life.” This position is antithetical to the 80% and so is noticed as political in the same way that your breathing is disrupted by smoke. This gets the label politics and is treated like a dirty word because it’s so contrary.

Now, to bring this back to RPGs. If the leftist (or far right for that matter) elements were just releasing their own games and treated things like the 80% treat life (you play your game, I’ll play mine, all is well) then we wouldn’t have a problem.

The problem is the group (SJWs currently, the “moral majority” in the 80s) that says “you’re playing wrong and need to change or we’ll punish you.” They proceed to try and co-opt or drive out of business anyone who refuses to bend to their desires.

The reason ordinary people hate “politics” so much is that the positions of the 20% force them to change their lives in order to resist having their lives interfered with. They’re already losing something just because the moral busybodies have turned their way.

Heck, just the time I spent explaining this was time I could have spent working on something more productive, but the need to play defense just to keep from being completely swept away means part of my day has to be paying attention to this crap and not to my own interests.

Well said, I wholeheartedly concur.
Title: Re: Should "I'm Just Playing My Character" Incite D&D Violence?
Post by: Wicked Woodpecker of West on January 28, 2021, 06:06:05 PM
Quote
  One of the reasons this whole argument is so fraught is the very ambiguity of the term 'political', ranging from 'grounded in a general worldview and philosophy' to 'providing lectures and harangues about contemporary figures and issues.'

Well indeed, that's why scope of politics is so big and inescapable.

Quote
  Back on the original topic, things like https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/pbp-playing-characters-different-from-oneself.876341/ are pushing me towards the idea that gaming, like discussing politics and religion, needs to return to being done in private among small circles of friends.

Well it's problematic. While gaming itself is probably mostly done this way - I mean I doubt conventions and playing with strangers are large part of actual GAMES - the game publishing is inevitably PUBLIC cultural activity and as such political, as culture shapes society and vice versa.
Returning to discussing culture, politics and religion in small circles is to leave fate of countries, nations, societies, to those unafraid to fight for bigger picture.

Quote
The thing about politics is that for 80% of the population the politics they embrace are a policy of “leave me alone to make a living and raise my family and I’ll do the same.” They engage in Greek-style politics by doing just that. It’s so basic and agreed upon you don’t even think of it as politics any more than you think about breathing.

As usual with stances that are common and widely practiced. But as I said - that's my beef with this stance, because even if people say "oh it's just normal life it's not political" it irks me, as there is nothing more political than normal life. One could argue politics is mostly about - what shall be normal life.


Quote
Now, to bring this back to RPGs. If the leftist (or far right for that matter) elements were just releasing their own games and treated things like the 80% treat life (you play your game, I’ll play mine, all is well) then we wouldn’t have a problem.

The problem is the group (SJWs currently, the “moral majority” in the 80s) that says “you’re playing wrong and need to change or we’ll punish you.” They proceed to try and co-opt or drive out of business anyone who refuses to bend to their desires.

Well precisely. This is one of eternal axii of political conflict between centralisation, statism and authoritarianism vs. individualism and libertarianism. In USA especially strong I guess due to their beginnings.