I'm interested in hearing if this makes you more interested or less interested in playing D&D.
Screenshot 2025-04-19 103329.png
For me it's not something that would make me interested in playing.
Ok, I feel this is defensible.
If you know nothing, the juxtaposition does make you curious, right? Do they really have an established world where this could happen? (pretty much yes!) Does it make sense, is it coherent? (not exactly but I've seen way more popular fiction do much worse at that)
If you know enough to spot that there's creatures of various alignments, as part of their planar world building that mostly goes back decades, then you know you are seeing something out of Sigil, and that the central focus is there to be a little bit cringe and edgy. But hold on, there's still something for you; WotC has been trying to make everything associated with the good-aligned planes described as pretty much anything except a normal white guy plus angel iconography, and here they have that as a central feature. This one piece of art is already way better than everything in the PHB just for being willing to actually market the product instead of market an ideology.
Check the left and the right of the image and notice that they've packed two of their most Hasbro/WotC/TSR-specific monsters into the picture. They've done what they can to make this picture involve all the iconography that separates them from the competition.
I think it probably is more a net positive than a net negative overall. To the people it drives away, it's doing so by being honest; if you are telling a story that is traditional and makes sense, the rules of D&D are going to fight you a little on the edges. If you don't want angelic and demonic beings (or their mortal descendants) palling around in a bar, you're going to need to set it in your own world and probably ban two player races from the PHB; it's gonna be extra work.
Quote from: Melichor on April 19, 2025, 12:40:05 PMI'm interested in hearing if this makes you more interested or less interested in playing D&D.
Screenshot 2025-04-19 103329.png
For me it's not something that would make me interested in playing.
As Venka implied, this is really right out of 1990s Planescape's Sigil.
(https://darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/dnd/img/planescape-sigil-1.jpg)
QuoteThanks to the Lady's strict forbiddance of open large-scale conflict, Sigil was a true neutral haven to all visitors. It was a location where no wars were waged and even the fiercest opponents, such as an angel and a fiend or a devil and a demon, could be seen sharing a drink and momentarily setting their differences aside.
I think it primarily appeals to a crowd today similar to the goth crowd of the 1990s - like fans of "Good Omens" - either the 1990 book or the series started in 2019.
Personally, I've never been a fan of Planescape, but I don't mind that it exists. I think it's good for D&D to have a range of possibilities that include this.
What this says to me is that playing D&D is like watching 'Cheers'. Everyone is a frenemy and nobody really does anything.
Where's the adventure?
To me this makes D&D look bland and unexciting.
Quote from: Melichor on April 19, 2025, 02:05:05 PMWhat this says to me is that playing D&D is like watching 'Cheers'. Everyone is a frenemy and nobody really does anything.
Where's the adventure?
To me this makes D&D look bland and unexciting.
Fair enough. Were you a fan of Planescape and/or Good Omens?
I enjoyed both the novel and at least the first season of Good Omens - and I thought it had interesting action, even though the pitch and promotion were mostly about the friendship of an angel and a demon. It's not to everyone's taste, though. And I didn't care for Planescape.
Coincidentally, I just played in a larp last Sunday called "Be Not Afraid" (https://www.paracelsus-games.com/theatrical-experiences/be-not-afraid) about angels who are newly given free will. It had a lot of projects and scheming, and we ended up making a truce with Hell to forestall the End Times while not abandoning our cause.
This looks like a very popular gacha meme from about 7 years ago when one of my kids was into that. So maybe they're marketing to early teens? And no, this does not increase my interest in the game.
Was the latest vtt attempt by Wotc (not to be confused with the earlier 4e one) named after that Planescape Sigil?
As far as I can tell, WotC has spent the past decade marketing D&D to people whose primary concern is being D&D players and who are willing to sacrifice anything else for the sake of that label. :)
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on April 19, 2025, 03:22:08 PMAs far as I can tell, WotC has spent the past decade marketing D&D to people whose primary concern is being D&D players and who are willing to sacrifice anything else for the sake of that label. :)
Greetings!
*Laughing* Yes, my friend, I agree.
I never liked Planescape on the whole. Yes, I have a decent number of Planescape supplements for ideas, maps, whatever. Still, the cosmology is absolutely atrocious. Extending out, then, yeah, WOTC's whole approach to cosmology, alignment, and such is pretty silly, nonsensical, illogical, irrational, incoherent, and in the end, for myself, very disappointing.
It is why cosmology and alignment in my world of Thandor are very different from WOTC. That's always been true though, as I first started designing Thandor over 40 years ago. I have never liked WOTC's approach to cosmology and alignment. I was not thrilled about how TSR did alignment and cosmology in Forgotten Realms, either. It has been an exercise in frustration all the way around, which has fed into my own satisfaction with Thandor even more so. I just don't have to worry about or consider the "Official" approach anymore, because it is absolute rubbish.
I like my game world to be realistic; harsh, savage, brutal. Mysterious, and yet, overall, consistent. Relatively low-magic, high magic occasionally, in a more mythical and epic sense, but defaulting to a relatively normal approach. No plane hopping trips for Players. No Resurrection or Raise Dead spells. I've even strictly controlled Flying as a spell. Flying, anything like resurrection, that is all epic, unusual, and not typically available or controllable in any way by Player Characters.
Yeah. Time for some fresh coffee!
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
Quote from: jhkim on April 19, 2025, 02:03:59 PMQuote from: Melichor on April 19, 2025, 12:40:05 PMI'm interested in hearing if this makes you more interested or less interested in playing D&D.
Screenshot 2025-04-19 103329.png
For me it's not something that would make me interested in playing.
As Venka implied, this is really right out of 1990s Planescape's Sigil.
(https://darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/dnd/img/planescape-sigil-1.jpg)
QuoteThanks to the Lady's strict forbiddance of open large-scale conflict, Sigil was a true neutral haven to all visitors. It was a location where no wars were waged and even the fiercest opponents, such as an angel and a fiend or a devil and a demon, could be seen sharing a drink and momentarily setting their differences aside.
I think it primarily appeals to a crowd today similar to the goth crowd of the 1990s - like fans of "Good Omens" - either the 1990 book or the series started in 2019.
Personally, I've never been a fan of Planescape, but I don't mind that it exists. I think it's good for D&D to have a range of possibilities that include this.
I think there's a huge difference in tone and that the similarity is more superficial. In either case it's not my thing anyway.
In context, Planescape is notable in that it's the kind of campaign where diabolical and sinister forces coexist with noble and angelic forces in a kind of jaded cold war. It's an interesting idea and notable because it's out of the ordinary.
Making it ordinary is what reduces it's impact. As Syndrome said, when everyone is Super, no one will be Super. And when everyone is quirky, no one is quirky.
This image just reinforces to me that WOTC is coasting on the imagination and world building of greater developers, and have little, if anything to contribute to the hobby themselves.
I loved reading about the Planescape setting and letting my imagination loose on what could happen. Playing in it was not actually that great of an experience. It seems a better setting for books than an RPG. The problem I had with it was that so much detail of what it was like to actually live in a Planescape region was left undefined, and it's different enough from RL that it's hard to draw on actual experience for that. I think a couple of setting books covering just a region of PLanescape might have helped, like continental size regions in Avernus, Arboria, or the Outlands.
I enjoyed Good Omens. It has conflicts. I didn't much care for Planescape as it was, though it had its own kind of conflicts, rife with the brand of sophomoric pseudo philosophy so popular in the '90s.
Watered down Planescape reduced to a vibe would naturally have even less appeal.
That art doesn't do anything for me, but frankly almost no RPG art does. These days, the only new fantasy art I see that really speaks to me is on album covers.
(https://i.postimg.cc/MGk8m2M5/descend-60411adbc0f0f.jpg)
(https://i.postimg.cc/vB4fFNt4/galdrum-5fd41d3b416ea.jpg)
(https://i.postimg.cc/MTx6SMSg/times-of-obscene-evil-and-wild-daring-6098ad4abf7d1.jpg)
(https://i.postimg.cc/PqMxNz2d/the-dormant-darkness-67fc2ba5912fa.jpg)
Stick an image like that on the cover of an RPG book and I'll buy it in a heartbeat.
Quote from: SHARK on April 19, 2025, 03:39:25 PMQuote from: Armchair Gamer on April 19, 2025, 03:22:08 PMAs far as I can tell, WotC has spent the past decade marketing D&D to people whose primary concern is being D&D players and who are willing to sacrifice anything else for the sake of that label. :)
Greetings!
*Laughing* Yes, my friend, I agree.
I never liked Planescape on the whole. Yes, I have a decent number of Planescape supplements for ideas, maps, whatever. Still, the cosmology is absolutely atrocious. Extending out, then, yeah, WOTC's whole approach to cosmology, alignment, and such is pretty silly, nonsensical, illogical, irrational, incoherent, and in the end, for myself, very disappointing.
It is why cosmology and alignment in my world of Thandor are very different from WOTC. That's always been true though, as I first started designing Thandor over 40 years ago. I have never liked WOTC's approach to cosmology and alignment. I was not thrilled about how TSR did alignment and cosmology in Forgotten Realms, either. It has been an exercise in frustration all the way around, which has fed into my own satisfaction with Thandor even more so. I just don't have to worry about or consider the "Official" approach anymore, because it is absolute rubbish.
I like my game world to be realistic; harsh, savage, brutal. Mysterious, and yet, overall, consistent. Relatively low-magic, high magic occasionally, in a more mythical and epic sense, but defaulting to a relatively normal approach. No plane hopping trips for Players. No Resurrection or Raise Dead spells. I've even strictly controlled Flying as a spell. Flying, anything like resurrection, that is all epic, unusual, and not typically available or controllable in any way by Player Characters.
Yeah. Time for some fresh coffee!
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
Shark,
Excellent concepts! I also prefer low magic. I preferred the 4E cosmology to the Great Wheel (isn't that the basis for Planescape?) These days I do my own "5 plane model" but they aren't places where you want to hang out. Rather, the planes are the sources of monsters and magic.
4E's cosmology below:
Quote from: Melichor on April 19, 2025, 12:40:05 PMI'm interested in hearing if this makes you more interested or less interested in playing D&D.
Screenshot 2025-04-19 103329.png
For me it's not something that would make me interested in playing.
I was already at zero interest, so I'm going to have to go with "unchanged". Unless you'll accept numbers less than zero.
Who is D&D marketing to?
Honestly? They're marketing to third-party content creators (whom they think are mostly woke lefties because that's what Google/YouTube says they are) to try and keep the fad afloat another day.
D&D took its mortal wound with the OGL scandal. Their new edition digital initiative required trust that they absolutely squandered. So it's been bleeding out as one thing after another disappoints.
Releasing the 5.2 SRD under CC is just a desperate attempt to gain back some of the third party content creators that are moving on. Too late they now understand that the OGL and trust in it actually drove people to buy WotC core books... so are left essentially begging for third-party creators to actually use their system.
That's their present audience... bargain-tier Mercers willing to sell 5.5e to the masses for them.
Today's D&D seems to be primarily targeted at the romantasy crowd. It has nothing to offer to traditional rpg players.
Quote from: Melichor on April 19, 2025, 02:05:05 PMWhat this says to me is that playing D&D is like watching 'Cheers'. Everyone is a frenemy and nobody really does anything.
Where's the adventure?
To me this makes D&D look bland and unexciting.
Planescape was always like that. No matter where you go theres someone wanting to kill you, someone wanting to use you, and someone wanting to be your friend. Doesnt matter where. It'll eventually happen if you hang around long enough.
The art in question is in the same vein. Just wotc style.
Theres adventure in anything really. Just from that art could see factions moving to crush or support such a friendship. Or make use of, and so on. And the PCs getting dragged into it or hired to intervene. etc.
Is wotc able to come up with even that? Probably not. They'd screw it up somehow.
It's probably marketing to the same sort of people who buy those inexplicably popular Travis Baldree books like Legends and Lattes. I personally hate it, but there's an audience for that stuff.
Quote from: I on April 21, 2025, 10:39:07 PMIt's probably marketing to the same sort of people who buy those inexplicably popular Travis Baldree books like Legends and Lattes. I personally hate it, but there's an audience for that stuff.
Read that as Legends and Latinas and had a mild interest...
Quote from: Brad on April 21, 2025, 10:45:08 PMQuote from: I on April 21, 2025, 10:39:07 PMIt's probably marketing to the same sort of people who buy those inexplicably popular Travis Baldree books like Legends and Lattes. I personally hate it, but there's an audience for that stuff.
Read that as Legends and Latinas and had a mild interest...
Now I want a setting that unapologetically uses all the Mexican tropes and stereotypes. Mariachis, luchadors, speedy gonzales, I want all of it alongside hot Latinas.
Quote from: ForgottenF on April 19, 2025, 10:55:33 PMThat art doesn't do anything for me, but frankly almost no RPG art does. These days, the only new fantasy art I see that really speaks to me is on album covers.
(https://i.postimg.cc/MGk8m2M5/descend-60411adbc0f0f.jpg)
(https://i.postimg.cc/vB4fFNt4/galdrum-5fd41d3b416ea.jpg)
(https://i.postimg.cc/MTx6SMSg/times-of-obscene-evil-and-wild-daring-6098ad4abf7d1.jpg)
(https://i.postimg.cc/PqMxNz2d/the-dormant-darkness-67fc2ba5912fa.jpg)
Stick an image like that on the cover of an RPG book and I'll buy it in a heartbeat.
Since your 2nd image is from iconic Warhammer, or Oldhammmer now, illustrator Ian Miller, that style has been in a lot of rpg material.
Quote from: Aglondir on April 20, 2025, 06:01:54 PMQuote from: SHARK on April 19, 2025, 03:39:25 PMI like my game world to be realistic; harsh, savage, brutal. Mysterious, and yet, overall, consistent. Relatively low-magic, high magic occasionally, in a more mythical and epic sense, but defaulting to a relatively normal approach. No plane hopping trips for Players. No Resurrection or Raise Dead spells. I've even strictly controlled Flying as a spell. Flying, anything like resurrection, that is all epic, unusual, and not typically available or controllable in any way by Player Characters.
Excellent concepts! I also prefer low magic. I preferred the 4E cosmology to the Great Wheel (isn't that the basis for Planescape?) These days I do my own "5 plane model" but they aren't places where you want to hang out. Rather, the planes are the sources of monsters and magic.
I get that. The profusion of planes, Resurrection/Raise Dead, and other elements always made D&D seem gonzo to me - throwing in everything and the kitchen sink together. And it is deeply built in, like having Raise Dead a part of the core rules (referenced in the Constitution table).
That's why I've generally preferred RPGs like RuneQuest's Mythic Europe, Harn, Burning Wheel and similar - with a cosmology built around a specific setting. I can try to rein in D&D and take out things, but I often prefer to just start from a different base without those assumptions.
I am also OK with some high-power fantasy like Amber Diceless, but it isn't overcomplicated because the high power is built into the system. High level D&D generally ends up with dozens of spells and effects and fiddly items for each character.
It makes me angry. The Angel is clearly in the lair of Satan and has become fallen, choosing to literally embrace Satan!
So they're marketing to overweight purple haired Satanists on meds and in masks who want to corrupt good.
Quote from: Brad on April 21, 2025, 10:45:08 PMQuote from: I on April 21, 2025, 10:39:07 PMIt's probably marketing to the same sort of people who buy those inexplicably popular Travis Baldree books like Legends and Lattes. I personally hate it, but there's an audience for that stuff.
Read that as Legends and Latinas and had a mild interest...
Would be a good name for a porn channel. Hell, I'd watch it.
Specific example aside, I think they're marketing to those already invested in the hopes of not losing them. In other words they're in maintenance mode trying to cater to as many established customers as possible.
Quote from: Hzilong on April 22, 2025, 12:24:52 AMQuote from: Brad on April 21, 2025, 10:45:08 PMQuote from: I on April 21, 2025, 10:39:07 PMIt's probably marketing to the same sort of people who buy those inexplicably popular Travis Baldree books like Legends and Lattes. I personally hate it, but there's an audience for that stuff.
Read that as Legends and Latinas and had a mild interest...
Now I want a setting that unapologetically uses all the Mexican tropes and stereotypes. Mariachis, luchadors, speedy gonzales, I want all of it alongside hot Latinas.
Speedy Gonzales would make such a great little Rouge, for a high level adventuring party. Get in, and get out.
D&D will never have sexiness again
Quote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
It took me a second to think of any way you might be wrong, but I agree.
That stings a bit.
But, we have the OSR and the independent authors out there, so we're good.
Take True-D6. This is literally the first picture inside the book.
Quote from: bat on April 22, 2025, 12:37:09 AMSince your 2nd image is from iconic Warhammer, or Oldhammmer now, illustrator Ian Miller, that style has been in a lot of rpg material.
Interesting. I never would have guessed the connection. Sadly in the modern days of digital distribution and no longer having album booklets, it can be a bit difficult to find out who does cover art.
Quote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
I wonder. If Marvel comics is bringing back its swimsuit special, it's possible the tide has genuinely turned.
Quote from: Spooky on April 22, 2025, 06:17:26 AMIt makes me angry. The Angel is clearly in the lair of Satan and has become fallen, choosing to literally embrace Satan!
So they're marketing to overweight purple haired Satanists on meds and in masks who want to corrupt good.
I get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
Quote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
for those of us who remember the 80s, it was basically playing D&D, fighting demons and devils, while listening to Venom and W.A.S.P.
yeah, it was cool and dangerous back then
Quote from: MerrillWeathermay on April 22, 2025, 05:01:40 PMQuote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
for those of us who remember the 80s, it was basically playing D&D, fighting demons and devils, while listening to Venom and W.A.S.P.
yeah, it was cool and dangerous back then
Since early on, D&D has been all sorts of different things to different gamers.
In my last 1980s campaign, I played a brutal but canny half-ogre fighter along with other shady characters who were systematically looting and killing our way through a Judge's Guild mega-dungeon. Halfway through we got in over our heads and had to make a bargain with an evil deity, promising part of our kills every week as sacrifices. We would never have put up with a goody-two-shoes paladin, say.
But then, my most recent 5e campaign was much more about good-vs-evil, where the PCs were agents of a holy former emperor doing stuff for honor, good, holiness, and the sacred empire.
Quote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMI get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
Not really. This image is a blatant, in your face, FUCK YOU to Christians. I can't believe everyone here is overlooking that. Maybe you and everyone here has already given in to Satan?
Quote from: Spooky on April 22, 2025, 09:55:24 PMQuote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMI get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
Not really. This image is a blatant, in your face, FUCK YOU to Christians. I can't believe everyone here is overlooking that. Maybe you and everyone here has already given in to Satan?
As a Christian, I take more offense at
The Omen than at
Good Omens or Planescape - because the latter are clearly not intended to be taken seriously, theologically speaking.
My fictional RPG worlds don't have to conform to my Christian theology. I'm fine playing Call of Cthulhu even though it's nihilistic atheism, or D&D with angels serving pagan deities. My dislike of Planescape has more to do with its playability than its theology.
Quote from: Spooky on April 22, 2025, 09:55:24 PMQuote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMI get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
Not really. This image is a blatant, in your face, FUCK YOU to Christians. I can't believe everyone here is overlooking that. Maybe you and everyone here has already given in to Satan?
Oh, you're going to be fun.
Quote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMQuote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
I wonder. If Marvel comics is bringing back its swimsuit special, it's possible the tide has genuinely turned.
...you can think this, but don't say I didn't warn you when you notice the surgery scars and extra junk in the g-string.
Disney/Marvel, just like WotC, has an agenda to push "The Message." They won't put Peter and MJ back together in the main books despite the Ultimate line vastly outselling them. Instead they put MJ into Venom (not like a sexy female Venom costume... into the middle of hulking muscled masculine Venom).
Hasbro/WotC has the same agenda; mock traditional culture while claiming victim status by saying its because of transphobia or misogyny that no one will buy their garbage.
Who is D&D being marketed too? All the freaks surrounding the WotC offices in Seattle that WotC believes is the entire country and not the relatively small bubble of perversion it actually is.
And they're incapable of learning. After Deadpool & Wolverine's success what did Marvel do? Double down with an ugly gender-swapped Silver Surfer, making the new Johnny into someone who would appeal to 'modern audiences' and reportedly turning (Mary) Sue Richards into a 'strong wahmen' who the entire story is actually focused on.
Presuming Hasbro doesn't just shelve it, that's what WotC will do with D&D too. Expect more degenerate adventures where traditional villains are just misunderstood and it's traditional society that is actually the real monster.
Because that's who Hasbro/WotC are.
Quote from: Chris24601 on April 23, 2025, 09:12:19 AMQuote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMQuote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
I wonder. If Marvel comics is bringing back its swimsuit special, it's possible the tide has genuinely turned.
...you can think this, but don't say I didn't warn you when you notice the surgery scars and extra junk in the g-string.
Disney/Marvel, just like WotC, has an agenda to push "The Message." They won't put Peter and MJ back together in the main books despite the Ultimate line vastly outselling them. Instead they put MJ into Venom (not like a sexy female Venom costume... into the middle of hulking muscled masculine Venom).
Hasbro/WotC has the same agenda; mock traditional culture while claiming victim status by saying its because of transphobia or misogyny that no one will buy their garbage.
Johnathan Pageau made an interesting observation about how the "revolutionaries" who won their revolution have to constantly re-create their oppressors in order to justify the continued existence of the revolution.
So it's not backing away from "The message" so much as constructing some new or recycled bogeymen for them to "fix".
Quote from: HappyDaze on April 22, 2025, 11:59:05 PMQuote from: Spooky on April 22, 2025, 09:55:24 PMQuote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMI get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
Not really. This image is a blatant, in your face, FUCK YOU to Christians. I can't believe everyone here is overlooking that. Maybe you and everyone here has already given in to Satan?
Oh, you're going to be fun.
EDIT: at almost 100 posts, I'm pretty sure he's trying to be funny.
Quote from: Rhymer88 on April 21, 2025, 05:35:19 AMToday's D&D seems to be primarily targeted at the romantasy crowd. It has nothing to offer to traditional rpg players.
Honestly, I agree with the first part and disagree with the second.
If we just go by the art, D&D has been feeling for some time now like the emphasis is less on traditional dungeon crawling and monster slaying, and more on fantasy people (and creatures) just standing around. From a technical stance it's oftentimes better, but from a "what is a game of D&D like" the emphasis is less on adventurers fighting monsters or solving puzzles and more of them just kind of hanging out. Which isn't to say older D&D didn't have art of people and creatures hanging out, but you also had pictures where you freaking knew someone (or something) was about to get killed horribly. The famous picture of a paladin in Hell, the guy in a trap room filling with water as a skeleton with a dagger snuck up behind him, the naked succubus just hanging out (but she gets a pass, because you'll never see a healthy looking naked woman in a D&D book again). D&D was violent, cruel, and could even be titillating (pardon the pun). Now it's "play this game and laugh with your friends, in character!" which is one marketing step worse somehow than pictures of families laughing together as the play a late-stage game of Monopoly (only one person might be laughing at that point), in that both promise a fun time but D&D doesn't even show you the committee approved group of people pretending to play the game of pretend.
As for the second part though, that D&D offers nothing to traditional gamers, I disagree.
I'm not saying it's a perfect game, because it isn't (there's several things I'd change). But almost every gripe I've seen lobbed at it could be applied to one or more earlier editions of the game as well. D&D has never been "perfect" because no TTRPG is. But you could whip out an old set of campaign modules and (with some stat updating) run it just fine. And in that regard I'd say it has plenty to offer traditional gamers.
It does indeed seem like modern D&D, is mostly about fantasy characters hanging out, and "doing stuff".
If they do go on an adventure, it's like the LotR; but the good guys are all tieflings with complicated relationships.
Quote from: Habitual Gamer on April 23, 2025, 12:35:32 PMthe naked succubus just hanging out (but she gets a pass, because you'll never see a healthy looking naked woman in a D&D book again).
(https://townsquare.media/site/33/files/2020/04/Keep-America-Beautiful-Crying-Indian.jpg?w=980&q=75)
Quote from: Habitual Gamer on April 23, 2025, 12:35:32 PMthe naked succubus just hanging out (but she gets a pass, because you'll never see a healthy looking naked woman in a D&D book again).
I'm pretty sure that TSR put an end to naked illustrations early in the 1980s, probably from conservative pressure. The first run of B3 Palace of the Silver Princess in 1980 was recalled and destroyed over a non-naked racy drawing. The B series was more for kids, so it had extra pressure, but even in AD&D books, I think nudity disappeared after the 1970s.
Quote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMI get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
D&D didn't have angels until 3.5. Gygax was quite clear that devas were
not angels in the pages in DRAGON Magazine, and the game didn't call them by that name until that revision. By that point, you could have full-fledged demon and devil worshippers as PCs. :)
Quote from: Rhymer88 on April 21, 2025, 05:35:19 AMToday's D&D seems to be primarily targeted at the romantasy crowd. It has nothing to offer to traditional rpg players.
That might actually be an accurate read of their target audience. Romantasy and LitRPG/Isekai are the big trends in fantasy fiction at the moment.
Quote from: Chris24601 on April 23, 2025, 09:12:19 AMQuote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMQuote from: D-ko on April 22, 2025, 02:19:37 PMD&D will never have sexiness again
I wonder. If Marvel comics is bringing back its swimsuit special, it's possible the tide has genuinely turned.
...you can think this, but don't say I didn't warn you when you notice the surgery scars and extra junk in the g-string.
Disney/Marvel, just like WotC, has an agenda to push "The Message." They won't put Peter and MJ back together in the main books despite the Ultimate line vastly outselling them. Instead they put MJ into Venom (not like a sexy female Venom costume... into the middle of hulking muscled masculine Venom).
Hasbro/WotC has the same agenda; mock traditional culture while claiming victim status by saying its because of transphobia or misogyny that no one will buy their garbage...
I've been seeing more and more rumors lately that the money-men in the entertainment industry are starting to come around to the "get woke, go broke" maxim, and that the ESG money which previously insulated them from their failures is drying up (we know the ESG money from the US government will be at least), enough rumors that I'm starting to credit them. Corporations tend to be moral cowards, so I don't think it's impossible that they will sniff the wind and try to alter course.
Are we going to get based right-wing media? Probably not in our lifetime. The entertainment establishment has been left wing since at least the 60s. If anything I think we'll see a retreat back to the milquetoast center-leftism of the early 2010s, with maybe some extra fan-service here and there to quietly try and keep the normies on side. At any rate, any kind of sea-change will probably hit D&D long after it hits movies and videogames, just because it's economic small-potatoes by comparison.
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on April 23, 2025, 08:09:18 PMQuote from: ForgottenF on April 22, 2025, 04:57:08 PMI get where you're coming from, but from a Christian perspective, shouldn't you be more upset that D&D co-opted the imagery of angels into a pagan cosmology to begin with?
D&D didn't have angels until 3.5. Gygax was quite clear that devas were not angels in the pages in DRAGON Magazine, and the game didn't call them by that name until that revision. By that point, you could have full-fledged demon and devil worshippers as PCs. :)
Isn't that just hiding behind a name change to be polite though?
(https://i.postimg.cc/FKWZXPXL/Capture.jpg)(https://i.postimg.cc/8PmLVyhz/Planetar.jpg)(https://i.postimg.cc/PJ8vcydT/Deva.jpg)
I mean, come on. Those are angels. :P
Yet are angels first found in Christianity or Zoroastrianism which predates Judaism?
Quote from: bat on April 24, 2025, 10:37:38 AMYet are angels first found in Christianity or Zoroastrianism which predates Judaism?
The D&D entries aren't even real angels anyway.
Biblically accurate angels are either completely human-looking -or- they're eye-covered wheels of fire and forms so disturbing they have to shield their true form behind four of their six wings so you don't die from just looking at them while telling those they appear to essentially "don't panic!!!"
Whenever I run something Fantasy, I always go for Biblically accurate angels that don't even bother with things like stat blocks. Man may call corporeal entities native to a hostile dimension demons, but even the lowest angel will just say "that's cute" and blorp it back where it belongs as an irresistible free action. You don't want to deal with real fallen angels... at all.
So by the same token any sort of non-beyond all stats being is basically just an alien from another dimension (D&D "gods" are too; something I borrowed from Palladium and have never regretted) and I actually prefer terms like Deva or Guardinal or Eladrin for those for that reason.
I'm not going to argue about what is and is not an angel according to the Bible, because in the actual book angels are some weird shit that looks like Hellraiser with white feathers.
However, let's not pretend that Christianity hasn't been all-in on beautiful people with white feathered wings since the Renaissance. It totally has, and those early D&D depictions of angels are how Christians think of angels. In fact, I'd put up $100 that a random atheist is more likely to know that angels are actually spheres made up of 7000 eyeballs than a random Christian who reads the Bible and prays regularly.
Quote from: Corolinth on April 24, 2025, 05:13:49 PMI'm not going to argue about what is and is not an angel according to the Bible, because in the actual book angels are some weird shit that looks like Hellraiser with white feathers.
However, let's not pretend that Christianity hasn't been all-in on beautiful people with white feathered wings since the Renaissance. It totally has, and those early D&D depictions of angels are how Christians think of angels. In fact, I'd put up $100 that a random atheist is more likely to know that angels are actually spheres made up of 7000 eyeballs than a random Christian who reads the Bible and prays regularly.
Agreed. To the point -- D&D devas and planars are clearly intended to be angels, as is the figure from the image in the OP, like how devas/planars are picture in the original 1990s Planescape.
Again, though, D&D clearly has never been intended to be real theology. It's only the Satanic Panic and B.A.D.D. who tried to cast D&D players as being real-life evil because of in-game paganism and spells.
----
As an aside, like almost everything else, the descriptions of angels varies widely in the Bible. It's not correct to say that angels are really spheres. For example, in Ezekiel 1 that describes the thrones (wheels), it also describes winged angels now identified as cherubim.
QuoteThe center of the fire looked like glowing metal, and in the fire was what looked like four living creatures. In appearance their form was human, but each of them had four faces and four wings. Their legs were straight; their feet were like those of a calf and gleamed like burnished bronze. Under their wings on their four sides they had human hands. All four of them had faces and wings, and the wings of one touched the wings of another. Each one went straight ahead; they did not turn as they moved.
Their faces looked like this: Each of the four had the face of a human being, and on the right side each had the face of a lion, and on the left the face of an ox; each also had the face of an eagle. Such were their faces. They each had two wings spreading out upward, each wing touching that of the creature on either side; and each had two other wings covering its body.
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DuN26PuXgAI0BQl?format=jpg&name=medium)
From DRAGON #67: "The deva
So how about the official new creature, the deva? (It is pronounced with a long "e" — deevah, with the accent on the first syllable.) Some oddly oriented chap accused me of plagiarism because the religion and myth of India mentions devas. (Good gracious! I do hope that when this fellow checks out the Monster Manual he will forgive me. . . . And what will he think of Tolkien, I wonder, who took virtually everything he wrote about from a background of Norse mythology and English folklore? And R. E. Howard! Why, almost all of his names are taken directly from actual history! Mercy! Such high-handed theft!) Those Enlightened Readers familiar with theosophy will immediately be able to recognize from whence I got inspiration for the three races of devas, and their more powerful associates the planetars and solars. Because the races of devas are native to the Upper Outer Planes, their frequency is given for such areas. As is stated, they travel about in service to the deities of these planes and do not generally ramble about on persona! pleasure jaunts. If fans of demons and devils find them too strong, I can hardly wait until they get a look at what planetars and solars are able to do! (Editor's note: This essay was composed before the issue of DRAGON Magazine containing the planetar and solar had been released.) Although there are fewer of these servants of Good, they are far and away stronger than the minions of Evil. A strong character can handle the typical demon or devil. With aid from a deva or two, any party of Good alignment can hope to survive the dire machinations of morally and ethically aligned foes with the forces of Darkness to call upon. While they should be seldom met, the potential is always there.
Although illustrated as male, the races of devas are similar to humans in that they have male and female sexes. They are bipedal and somewhat resemble humans, but they are in no sense human. In fact, they are nothing like the angels of Judeo-Christian teaching, or Moslem,for that matter, as they are a race, have no direct descent due to creation by a supreme being, and have corporal forms everywhere, save the Prime Material Plane where they have material forms but immortality. Devas have wings in order to fly — just as giant eagles and rocs do. For much the same reason, quite a number of the monstrous inhabitants of the Lower Outer Planes have wings. After all, AD&D gaming is postulated on medieval fantasy and mythology. Because there are hordes of nasty critters at work to promote Evil (and provide fodder for swordplay), it is necessary to have some reasonable' minions serving the opposing planes in the mythical multiverse of the game. To state that devas are patterned after angels is preposterous. They are patterned after mythological and fabled concepts of what sort of creatures serve the forces of Good. They are written so as to make their alignment absolutely clear. To think otherwise is to fly in the face of reason and against the entire gamut of creatures patterned in the AD&D game system. Much of the inspiration for it all is borrowed from folklore, myth, and legend. To claim that some demon names match those found in the Bible makes as much sense as asserting that devas are from Indian myth or that they are angels. Devils and demons were either taken from common lists of secular writings on the topic, or made up on the spot as the need arose. Some are obviously based on the gods of ancient cultures — Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, etc. Some are of medieval origin. Who borrows from whom becomes quite muddled in the span of history. Frankly, what difference does it make when we are talking about a time separation of centuries?"
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on April 24, 2025, 06:30:48 PMBecause there are hordes of nasty critters at work to promote Evil (and provide fodder for swordplay), it is necessary to have some reasonable' minions serving the opposing planes in the mythical multiverse of the game. To state that devas are patterned after angels is preposterous. They are patterned after mythological and fabled concepts of what sort of creatures serve the forces of Good. They are written so as to make their alignment absolutely clear.
OK, so the image from the original post isn't an angel - it's just a winged servant of the forces of Good, so there's no controversy here. :)
And the red figure with horns isn't a demon - it's clearly a Baatezu which isn't related to Judeo-Christian demons.
Quote from: Chris24601 on April 24, 2025, 04:56:47 PMThe D&D entries aren't even real angels anyway.
Biblically accurate angels are either completely human-looking -or- they're eye-covered wheels of fire and forms so disturbing they have to shield their true form behind four of their six wings so you don't die from just looking at them while telling those they appear to essentially "don't panic!!!"
According to https://dungeonsdragons.fandom.com/wiki/Angel:
QuoteA set of angels appeared in Dragon #35 (March 1980), including the angels of the ninth order, the archangels, the cherubim, the dominions, the powers, the principalities, the seraphim, the thrones, and the virtues.
I don't have the ability to track down Dragon #35 right now, but it'd be interesting to see what descriptions were used.
Quote from: jhkim on April 24, 2025, 07:00:44 PMQuote from: Armchair Gamer on April 24, 2025, 06:30:48 PMBecause there are hordes of nasty critters at work to promote Evil (and provide fodder for swordplay), it is necessary to have some reasonable' minions serving the opposing planes in the mythical multiverse of the game. To state that devas are patterned after angels is preposterous. They are patterned after mythological and fabled concepts of what sort of creatures serve the forces of Good. They are written so as to make their alignment absolutely clear.
OK, so the image from the original post isn't an angel - it's just a winged servant of the forces of Good, so there's no controversy here. :)
And the red figure with horns isn't a demon - it's clearly a Baatezu which isn't related to Judeo-Christian demons.
yeah eye roll at Armchair General lol