Quote from: S'mon;1065411Drow are homophobic?

Not at all. They're into all kinds of things. Drizzt even had an older sister who tried to screw him during the orgy that was held during his graduation.

Homosexuality isn't really delved into deeply, but I've seen plenty of references to it as far as female drow go. For males, they'd risk the ire of whichever female(s) they have to answer to if their relationship became known... or it might be a case where said female was into that sort of thing and was fine with it or even commanded it to happen for whatever reason.

Quote from: Spike;1065410The reason there is no strong, obvious depictions of sexism against women in most forms of modern fiction is because it inevitably results in a rage-mob screaming about all the sexism, thus the only ALLOWABLE depictions of sexism are against men, which results in attack threads like this. Kafka-trap, where the only solution is to make settings that are so abysmally bland and perfect that no one would ever want to play in them.

Quote from: Spike;1065410Again, because it bears repeating: No game in at least thirty years... pretty much no form of modern media... has been allowed to depict sexism against women in any way unless it is meant to protest said sexism.   THAT, and that alone, is the reason you have this one-sided case where the only obvious sexism is against men.

But, as you say, sexism *is* portrayable if it is portrayed as a flaw. So in modern historical fiction like Deadwood or Mad Men or fantasy like Game of Thrones, sexism definitely is portrayed - but it is shown as a flaw rather than a virtue. Much like racism and slavery is these days only portrayed as a wrong in modern media. Even from the time of 1E AD&D, slavery has been portrayed as something unquestionably wrong and even evil. I don't think there's anything wrong in this. In my opinion, there's been plenty of good sci-fi and fantasy in the last 30 years, including well-handled depictions of sexism, racism, and slavery.

So why the hell shouldn't orcs have their sexism more highlighted - to be delivered righteous feminist fury from the good characters in-game? Plenty of liberal-loved fiction portrays evil sexist bad guys - or even flawed sexist good guys. Tamora Pierce's Tortall books are all about women struggling against sexism in the ostensibly good kingdom of Tortall, for example. D&D could easily include this.

It's not because of bending over solely to appease the feminists and liberals. It's because of bland political correctness of not wanting to do anything to support or antagonize either feminists or anti-feminists. You imply that this sort of blandness sucks, and I would agree.

Quote from: Brand55;1065417Not at all. They're into all kinds of things. Drizzt even had an older sister who tried to screw him during the orgy that was held during his graduation.

Homosexuality isn't really delved into deeply, but I've seen plenty of references to it as far as female drow go. For males, they'd risk the ire of whichever female(s) they have to answer to if their relationship became known... or it might be a case where said female was into that sort of thing and was fine with it or even commanded it to happen for whatever reason.

That's what I thought.

In my FR female drow often have a trusted female partner who can guard them when they are giving birth, an obvious time of vulnerability when assassination attempts are likely.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1065358Maybe the issue is that all other elf groups are considered "white" by default. Are there any D&D setting that show "non-Caucasian" members of non-Drow elf groups? Any brown-skinned wood elves or sallow-skinned high elves in the mainstream settings?

Yes. Quite a few. And that goes back quite a ways too. There have been gold skinned elves. Blue skinned elves. Pretty darn sure there are brown at least heavily tanned skinned elves. Red skinned elves. And non-evil black skinned elves. And if there is not a race of green skinned elves then there should be! (And technically there are in Gamma World so there is that. ahem.)

From the PHB. Sun elves have bronze skin, Moon elves have alabaster with a bit of blue skin, Wood elves are copper with a bit of green, and so on. In fact one of the presented ef PHB elves is actually straight up Caucasian.

But I am sure some village idiot will screech "wah wah wah copper skin is caucasian! wah wah bronze skin is caucasian! wah white skin is caucasian!" like they have before.

Quote from: jhkim;1065418It's not because of bending over solely to appease the feminists and liberals. It's because of bland political correctness of not wanting to do anything to support or antagonize either feminists or anti-feminists. You imply that this sort of blandness sucks, and I would agree.

I doubt very seriously that major publishers are worried about antagonizing anti-feminists.

Quote from: Omega;1065421Yes. Quite a few. And that goes back quite a ways too. There have been gold skinned elves. Blue skinned elves. Pretty darn sure there are brown at least heavily tanned skinned elves. Red skinned elves. And non-evil black skinned elves. And if there is not a race of green skinned elves then there should be! (And technically there are in Gamma World so there is that. ahem.)

From the PHB. Sun elves have bronze skin, Moon elves have alabaster with a bit of blue skin, Wood elves are copper with a bit of green, and so on. In fact one of the presented ef PHB elves is actually straight up Caucasian.

But I am sure some village idiot will screech "wah wah wah copper skin is caucasian! wah wah bronze skin is caucasian! wah white skin is caucasian!" like they have before.

When I hear bronze skin I tend to think tanned Latin Americans and when I hear copper skin I tend to think Native (North) Americans, neither of which are European white.

Can we please not make new racial classifications?  There are only THREE types of humans, Caucasoid, Mongoloid and Negroid, science has known this for centuries, please don't make us Hispanics into some sort of weird fetish group that the Whites have to protect, please.

A skin color alone is not a racial classification.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1065430A skin color alone is not a racial classification.

Exactly.  It's based on skeletal, muscle structure, and other physical traits.

Fantasy races should work the same way.

Quote from: jhkim;1065418But, as you say, sexism *is* portrayable if it is portrayed as a flaw. So in modern historical fiction like Deadwood or Mad Men or fantasy like Game of Thrones, sexism definitely is portrayed - but it is shown as a flaw rather than a virtue. Much like racism and slavery is these days only portrayed as a wrong in modern media. Even from the time of 1E AD&D, slavery has been portrayed as something unquestionably wrong and even evil. I don't think there's anything wrong in this. In my opinion, there's been plenty of good sci-fi and fantasy in the last 30 years, including well-handled depictions of sexism, racism, and slavery.  

I would rather like to see period pieces that simply depicted the period as it was rather than always having to either whitewash it or moralize about it.  It feels rather patronizing to always have to get sanitized versions of history.   Of course I may be asking far too much, since any piece of fiction by its very nature is far more limited than life, what to include or exclude inevitably reflects bias.   I'm not saying you can't have sanitized or moralized period pieces, just that I'd love to see the third option of 'accurate and not preachy about it', if you like.

QuoteSo why the hell shouldn't orcs have their sexism more highlighted - to be delivered righteous feminist fury from the good characters in-game? Plenty of liberal-loved fiction portrays evil sexist bad guys - or even flawed sexist good guys. Tamora Pierce's Tortall books are all about women struggling against sexism in the ostensibly good kingdom of Tortall, for example. D&D could easily include this.

On the first part, I agree that it should be allowable to showcase Orcish sexism, or rather chauvanism. Indeed, I would applaud it, but I am not part of the Outrage Brigade, nor am I involved in writing D&D settings except for the occasional thread here.    Of course, then too you have the screaming brigade of nerd-porn fans who what 'hawt muscle chicks' in orc flavor.  Not all of the pandering comes from Outrage Mobs*

As for the second part: I'd rather not 'code' that sort of story into the setting, but rather allow groups to run that sort of campaign for themselves if they like. Agreed that underwriting/blandification pandering makes that sort of story harder, maybe we should spend less energy telling everyone that its okay to play Waifu Warriors, and let them decide for themselves if thats the way they want to go?   Once you make Waifu Warriors the default of the setting it automatically excludes, or at least severely weakens, the possiblity of playing the rebel stereotype breaker.

QuoteIt's not because of bending over solely to appease the feminists and liberals. It's because of bland political correctness of not wanting to do anything to support or antagonize either feminists or anti-feminists. You imply that this sort of blandness sucks, and I would agree.

False dichotomy. Political correctness has ever been 'of the left', or if you will: Appeasing the Feminists and Liberals, though in this case I should argue against the use of liberal in favor of the more correct term 'progressive', but that would lead to a semantic argument that would be pointless.   Further, even if I accept your premise that Political Correctness is entirely a separate concept from Feminism, rather than a tool frequently used by Feminists, it doesn't change the fact that it is Feminists, or at least feminist arguments, are exactly why no one wants to depict women in any negative light in fiction.  PC may be used by non-feminists for other reasons (such as, oh, charges of racism because Drow be Black, yo...), but I'm not clever enough of a poster to put up the venn diagram I'm sure we can all imagine just fine here.

Regarding your broadside against anti-feminism: I am sure that deliberate attempts to subvert the current feminist portrayal of women in D&D would be just as obnoxious and lopsided, but I'd truly love to hear which main-stream RPGs or, for that matter, novelists are writing such anti-feminist settings?   This is a 'both sides bad, because hypothetical I just made up' argument. If that isn't a thing, it should be.




* Regarding Outrage Mobs, I feel honorbound to point out that there is no real political bent to Outrage Mobs as a thing.  Censorious people who love to bully others into submission for their own aggrandizement tend to flock to the social structures that allow them the power to act as they do. In the 80's it was still 'christian morality', since the late nineties is has been PC culture and the progressive stack.  By itself this is not a condemnation of Christian Morality or Progressive Morality, and I tend to judge the Outrage Brigades independent of the beliefs they currently profess. There are always bad people who will abuse any social capital they can beg, borrow or steal.  If there is any good in their existance it may be that they serve as a check on the monopoly of culture by tearing down the very organizations/ideologies that give them power.

But that's just my theory.

Quote from: jhkim;1065383Generally speaking, I agree here. If people want more liberal games, I would advise they spend their effort making and promoting liberal games as opposed to complaining loudly about how all the game publishers are too conservative. Conversely, if people want more conservative games, I would advise they spend their effort making and promoting conservative games. The issue I have is that when people make SJW-themed games, they are called "SJWs" just the same as if they were spending their time complaining about conservative games. For example, there's a "patronizing garbage" thread now where people here are complaining about authors making SJW-themed games. For example, in a recent post was complaining about in-game background for a Fate setting book -

https://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?39667-Angry-at-patronizing-garbage-in-my-game-books&p=1065289&viewfull=1#post1065289

My position is that there should be both conservative-themed games and liberal-themed games, as well as various other political or non-politically themed games. Also, mainstream politics in a game shouldn't warrant outrage and/or boycott.

So by corollary are you also saying that SJW's don't castigate non-SJW themed RPG's for not being SJW enough? They don't, you know, call studios.... oh I dunno... Nazis? Or Homophobic? Or Transphobic? etc.? *Which* is a more prevalent occurrence today? What is the stigma of being called an SJW vs. say - a Nazi/Sexist/Misogynist/Racist/phobe?

One is certainly not equal to the other. Furthermore... is it a healthy reaction to go into the cultural circle of a group you know fully well doesn't agree with your ideas (regardless of their value) and cast aspersions at them? Probably not. The question here is to what degree is this happening? Seems pretty obvious in online forums. In terms of game content? Well we've already agreed on that.

As it stands right now - if you try to produce an RPG without signalling your SJW bonafides, once you break a certain level of awareness (a decent kickstarter for instance) - you will be checked for your papers. It *will* happen especially if you do any promotion. And because SJW's insert that stuff into their games, it's having the usual backfire effect. Not because that stuff exists - Blue Rose as we all love to trot out is a perfect example of that. It came and went. Non-SJW's didn't attack it enmasse. It exists on its own merits (I'm a fan of the system, not particularly of the setting as I find it boring, but I certainly don't hate it). The well was poisoned by the outliers. Not the other way around. You *can't* make someone believe your beliefs by beating everyone over the head with those beliefs.

Quote from: jhkim;1065383tenbones, I've posted about this several times, so I feel like you are either failing to read me or deliberately ignoring what I say.  I don't know all of the drow societies in the Realms - but then neither do most D&D players. When I refer to the core game, I mean the Player's Handbook + Dungeon Master's Guide + Monster Manual. As of 5th edition in those books, the only explicit sexism described for any society is sexism against male drow. For a medieval-themed game, I think that's fricking weird. I would expect that there should at least be represented having historical-type sexism against women, or if they're going to edit out sexism against women, then they should also edit out sexism against men.

And you seem to be talking past my larger point: Sexism IS CONFLICT TO BE DEALT WITH IN-GAME. Like Orcs Hating Elves = Racism. Deal with it in game. It's grist for the mill. I've been saying this repeatedly - the fixation that these things are *BAD* and should be removed from the game implicitly is counter-productive to gaming. You're insinuating that because this stuff exists implicitly it has some real-world effect on people.

This has been examined repeatedly in all the moral-panics of our modern time. Does it affect people? Probably. Those people shouldn't be gaming or listening to Motley Crue albums backwards too. I'm not ignoring you. I'm not misunderstanding you. I'm saying explicitly: sexism portrayed in a work of fiction is not tacit approval of ACTUAL SEXISM. Same is true with all of these other ideas spawned from the Sacred Holy Intersectional Tautology cesspool. It wasn't true then. It's not true now. This doesn't mean shitty people don't engage in our hobby. But that doesn't mean we change the hobby or worse: our thinking, to make room for alternative shitty people on the left.

And to MY point - the presentation of Drow is largely what it is. But they wouldn't be Drow otherwise. They'd be something else. And those elements *DO* exist in these settings within the Drow, if you care to look, for the express purpose of overturning in your game this very problem you're complaining about (which is why I keep bringing it up). But then... that's not really the issue because...

Quote from: jhkim;1065383I have no problem with any of the following:

1) Having historical sexism be the rule, with women as second-class citizens in most societies. I've played plenty of historical games, and there are some potential pitfalls that can make the game not fun for female players - but they are surmountable.

2) Having sexism be mostly edited out of the fantasy world, but leaving in a few examples of it - with a mix including good patriarchy, good matriarchy, evil patriarchy, evil matriarchy. This would be what I would think normal for D&D.

3) Leave sexism out of the core books as something to be introduced by GMs as they see fit.

Any of these are fine. But featuring sexism that most prominently is a thing that men suffer from? That seems more like something for an odd fantasy world of reversals, not for core D&D.

I read all that and it sounds like you have a problem with sexism (among other things) in RPG's. Or at least more than you are willing to admit.

Who in the hell would design around such caveats outside of making a game explicitly for children? Who makes all these calls? What ARE those few examples? Even in your own explanation of how you "don't have a problem" you stipulate conditionals that clearly show there are problems.

I have *never* had a female player have a problem with my very adult game. Want to know why? I treat them like adults. I treat my game seriously. It's not that bad things don't happen, it's not that bad things - horrifying things - aren't going on. It's that they, like all my players, are empowered to deal with them. This insipid coddling you're advocating seems to be to protect people from a demon that doesn't actually exist unless it's already in their heads.

Quote from: jhkim;1065383When I say the Drizz't is an example of sexism, I mean that in the books about him, I understand that he is discriminated against by sexist drow society. This is a theme in those boosk. A parallel to this would be the Tortall books by Tamora Pierce - where a number of the series focus on women struggling against the sexism of the patriarchal fantasy society (like the Alanna books or the Protector of the Small books). I was curious if there are examples in D&D novels where sexism against women is portrayed.

Or you know... conversely, this is just the conceit of one of many conflicts the protagonist exists in the form of a heroic story to overcome. Yeah. That's probably what it is.

Quote from: tenbones;1065477This has been examined repeatedly in all the moral-panics of our modern time. Does it affect people? Probably. Those people shouldn't be gaming or listening to Motley Crue albums backwards too. I'm not ignoring you. I'm not misunderstanding you. I'm saying explicitly: sexism portrayed in a work of fiction is not tacit approval of ACTUAL SEXISM. Same is true with all of these other ideas spawned from the Sacred Holy Intersectional Tautology cesspool. It wasn't true then. It's not true now. This doesn't mean shitty people don't engage in our hobby. But that doesn't mean we change the hobby or worse: our thinking, to make room for alternative shitty people on the left.

Amen. While I'm usually not a lurid guy, I do occasionally dip into sexist tropes, especially in my Dark Sun games, where the world is harsher and people tend to be nastier. It doesn't mean I think womens should be barfoot and preggers in the kitchen making me a sammich.

I had a female player who loved playing her evil drow matriarch warlock PC... she ended the campaign ruler of Ched Nasad having overthrown the egalitarian government and restored the Matriarchy.

Quote from: S'mon;1065481I had a female player who loved playing her evil drow matriarch warlock PC... she ended the campaign ruler of Ched Nasad having overthrown the egalitarian government and restored the Matriarchy.

Ahh Ched Nasad. I miss that place. The halfling jerky there is *delicious*.

Quote from: tenbones;1065499Ahh Ched Nasad. I miss that place. The halfling jerky there is *delicious*.

Halfling? Now that's just ridiculous.

...Surely you meant svirfneblin, right?