Grain of salt here because I can't find any official info on the net so far, but WoTC thinks, or so the rumours go, of removing the word Witch from their products (presumably Magic: the Gathering but maybe D&D as well). Same rumours say they may retire Druid and Shaman as well. They do so because of religious connotations, it seems.
Anybody have the real, official, story on that?
I guess you could make the argument a druid is just a subclass of cleric; it's been treated like that before. But it was still a *distinct* subclass.
At that point you might as well just go with with something like Warrior, Rogue and Mage or something, where there are no real classes. Or hell, what was it T20 used... Warrior, Expert and Adept?
Quote from: Kerstmanneke82 on October 09, 2023, 11:02:27 AM
Grain of salt here because I can't find any official info on the net so far, but WoTC thinks, or so the rumours go, of removing the word Witch from their products (presumably Magic: the Gathering but maybe D&D as well). Same rumours say they may retire Druid and Shaman as well. They do so because of religious connotations, it seems.
Anybody have the real, official, story on that?
According to Mark Rosewater's blog https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/ (https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/), "witch" is not being removed, but they don't use it as a 'type' for "real-world religious considerations," and are considering the same for "druid" and "shaman."
My response is what it's been for years: Don't talk to me about sensitivity to real-world religion until you stop glamourizing and overhyping Asmodeus. :)
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 09, 2023, 11:40:15 AM
According to Mark Rosewater's blog https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/ (https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/), "witch" is not being removed, but they don't use it as a 'type' for "real-world religious considerations," and are considering the same for "druid" and "shaman."
Once again their "RPGs" get hollower and more generic, evermore incapable of birthing games with narratives where anything matters at all. These are the people that say/think orcs and drow are black because theyre barbarians or occultist thieves (projecting their implicit beliefs), so it's fitting.
Quote from: Yitzhak Marxx on October 09, 2023, 11:53:40 AM
Once again their "RPGs" get hollower and more generic, evermore incapable of birthing games with narratives where anything matters at all. These are the people that say/think orcs and drow are black because theyre barbarians or occultist thieves (projecting their implicit beliefs), so it's fitting.
Pretty soon you'll be able to play a wide variety of characters in D&D, just as long as they're non-binary, of indeterminate race, vaguely have some sort of a job that defies categorization, and don't really do anything except protest "The Man," whoever that might be this week.
Quote from: Brad on October 09, 2023, 11:57:40 AM
Pretty soon you'll be able to play a wide variety of characters in D&D, just as long as they're non-binary, of indeterminate race, vaguely have some sort of a job that defies categorization, and don't really do anything except protest "The Man," whoever that might be this week.
Evil blonde elves being the men seems the current one. The untold truth is that elves are the true latinos.
Quote from: Brad on October 09, 2023, 11:57:40 AM
Quote from: Yitzhak Marxx on October 09, 2023, 11:53:40 AM
Once again their "RPGs" get hollower and more generic, evermore incapable of birthing games with narratives where anything matters at all. These are the people that say/think orcs and drow are black because theyre barbarians or occultist thieves (projecting their implicit beliefs), so it's fitting.
Pretty soon you'll be able to play a wide variety of characters in D&D, just as long as they're non-binary, of indeterminate race, vaguely have some sort of a job that defies categorization, and don't really do anything except protest "The Man," whoever that might be this week.
As official D&D gets blander and less appealing to the majority who are not fucked in the head. the ranks of the OSR will swell.
Because obviously it's more important to be respectful of neo-pagans who never complained about this rather than inventing a coherent theology in which these words are actually meaningful and actually relate to the real world words.
What's next, retiring "wight" or "phylactery" because they're used in Asatru and Judaism? Oh wait, the latter actually happened.
I can't really bring myself to care. When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about classes like the witch, druid or shaman?
Quote from: Exploderwizard on October 09, 2023, 12:18:38 PM
As official D&D gets blander and less appealing to the majority who are not fucked in the head. the ranks of the OSR will swell.
That is what I most desire regarding the situation. If OSR which is not infected by the same type, and thus its philosophy of play (which is a philosophy in itself, really) became widely popular or even predominant, society will be way less fucked by the modern influences that led to WoTC and etc.
I just pray that WotC makes up more new words that mean nothing to replace them. Maybe like "Melanated Magicians" or MelMags for short or "Natural Naturists" or NatNur's for short. Just keep putting out nonsense speak. Please WotC make your products so screwed up language wise that people will have no understanding what you are talking about.
It seems to me, if you don't want to be biased you'd make sure they weren't inferior options rather than erasing them.
I'd call it virtue signaling, but it's not: cowardice is not a virtue.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PMWhat's next, retiring "wight" or "phylactery" because they're used in Asatru and Judaism? Oh wait, the latter actually happened.
I wouldn't really describe Wight as being some term of art in reconstruction heathenism, but they'll never throw a bone to Asatru and company anyway. They're in the doghouse because too many people associate them with nazis.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PMI can't really bring myself to care. When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about classes like the witch, druid or shaman?
I like druids.
Quote from: Bruwulf on October 09, 2023, 11:20:44 AM
I guess you could make the argument a druid is just a subclass of cleric; it's been treated like that before. But it was still a *distinct* subclass.
At that point you might as well just go with with something like Warrior, Rogue and Mage or something, where there are no real classes. Or hell, what was it T20 used... Warrior, Expert and Adept?
I think I must have been a bit clearer on this, I do mean the names, not the classes in and of themselves.
Quote from: Bruwulf on October 09, 2023, 12:49:23 PM
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PMWhat's next, retiring "wight" or "phylactery" because they're used in Asatru and Judaism? Oh wait, the latter actually happened.
I wouldn't really describe Wight as being some term of art in reconstruction heathenism, but they'll never throw a bone to Asatru and company anyway. They're in the doghouse because too many people associate them with nazis.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PMI can't really bring myself to care. When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about classes like the witch, druid or shaman?
I like druids.
There was a quest to help Wang Ni Wong and Rashi So Wong help gather necromancy ingredients. As the party progresses through the quest chain, the find they are helping the necromances create a Wight. However the quest always ends in failure. At the end a wise sage hears about the party failure and tells them "Two wongs can't make a wight".
This reminds me of the episode of Fairly Odd Parents when Timmy wished everyone was the same and everyone was turned into a gray blob.
Quote from: Exploderwizard on October 09, 2023, 12:18:38 PM
Quote from: Brad on October 09, 2023, 11:57:40 AM
Quote from: Yitzhak Marxx on October 09, 2023, 11:53:40 AM
Once again their "RPGs" get hollower and more generic, evermore incapable of birthing games with narratives where anything matters at all. These are the people that say/think orcs and drow are black because theyre barbarians or occultist thieves (projecting their implicit beliefs), so it's fitting.
Pretty soon you'll be able to play a wide variety of characters in D&D, just as long as they're non-binary, of indeterminate race, vaguely have some sort of a job that defies categorization, and don't really do anything except protest "The Man," whoever that might be this week.
As official D&D gets blander and less appealing to the majority who are not fucked in the head. the ranks of the OSR every other RPG that's not WotC-developed will swell.
I like my edit better. Regardless, watching WotC fuck themselves in the ass over and over is fascinating in a kind of train-wreck way.
The only issue with WotC burning D&D down to the ground is they can cause permanent damage to the brand. Try forming up a game of D&D, but when people hear that name they think "social justice, whackadoo" and they pass. That is what I see coming our way possibly.
For some reason (Vanguard has over 12% stock in Hasbro), Hasbro is going heavy into left wing content when there is strong proof the public despises it. Look at what Disney did to its brands in two years of unrestrained leftism to Marvel and Star Wars. Star Wars has permanent brand damage and is unlikely to recover. No one is buying comics, Marvel is lame. Mind you comics started back in 2010's going toxic, but they are ignored now.
As a brand, D&D and MTG are being mismanaged.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 09, 2023, 03:10:08 PM
The only issue with WotC burning D&D down to the ground is they can cause permanent damage to the brand. Try forming up a game of D&D, but when people hear that name they think "social justice, whackadoo" and they pass. That is what I see coming our way possibly.
We can only hope that the VTT pushes WoTC's stuff into non-RPG, electronic gaming territory. Microsoft can't monetize the brand as it wishes if it remains much like a RPG because only GMs buy stuff and 5e gifted us with horrible preconceptions on GMing and game preparation (I almost gave up trying because my head was full of 5e trash), hence fewer 5e GMs. They will continue to tread on digital gaming territory. Could this detach the WoTC DnD brand from RPGs?
Greetings!
Ahhh, yeah! The fucking "Stupid Train" just doesn't stop with WOTC. And the "Stupid Train" will not stop. Why? Because the people driving the "Stupid Train" are retarded, Woke morons. They RUN EVERYTHING INTO THE GROUND. The OGL fiasco, The Happy Citadel, the trainwreck of continuous changes to the game within the books, removing "Race"--crying about Drow and Orcs, it is a cascade of absolute stupidity. Not merely stupidity, but a corrosive, corrupt ideology. So, none of this stupidity will change. It will only get worse, more extreme, more absurd.
Like Ghostmaker said, enjoy watching WOTC fuck themselves in the ass and burn the game to the ground. Absolutely destroy the brand. YES! Like watching a trainwreck in slow motion. Fascinating! Still, though, as I mentioned previously, none of this is a surprise. From the very beginning when WOTC really embraced being Woke, I knew they were DONE. So, fuck them. Let them burn. Let the NAPALM come down to cleanse them all.
The OSR will grow and gain new strength and prosperity as WOTC fucks themselves.
Semper Fidelis,
SHARK
This has nothing to do with D&D, for now.
Wizards of the Coast hinted that the Druid and Shaman creature types could be removed from Magic: The Gathering due to real religions which practice druidism and shamanism.
Mark Rosewater, the head designer of Magic: The Gathering since 2003 regularly answers questions about the game on his Tumblr blog. One question about how the Witch creature type was removed due to its association to a real religion led to an answer hinting at more removals in the future.
In reference to the question about using witch as a creature type: "if 'witch' is excluded bc of its significance as a real world religious identifier, why are 'shaman' and 'druid' creature types?" His response was "We are currently examining that exact topic."
Quote from: rgalex on October 09, 2023, 04:25:27 PM
This has nothing to do with D&D, for now.
Wizards of the Coast hinted that the Druid and Shaman creature types could be removed from Magic: The Gathering due to real religions which practice druidism and shamanism.
Mark Rosewater, the head designer of Magic: The Gathering since 2003 regularly answers questions about the game on his Tumblr blog. One question about how the Witch creature type was removed due to its association to a real religion led to an answer hinting at more removals in the future.
In reference to the question about using witch as a creature type: "if 'witch' is excluded bc of its significance as a real world religious identifier, why are 'shaman' and 'druid' creature types?" His response was "We are currently examining that exact topic."
The same people at WotC do the "sensitivity reader" job for all of their content. Druid is one of the core character classes of the game going back to 1E. Witch and Shaman are used for a large number of monsters. We'll be getting it next.
I for one welcome it because I can't wait for the nonsense word the smartest guys in the room come up with, that will make no sense and will be cringe.
Trivia: BECMI humanoid users of magic-user spells were called 'wicca' for a while before being changed to 'wokani.'
I've always wondered whether the change was made to avoid offending Gardnerians or to avoid being associated with them. :)
No actual neo-Pagan or shaman would ever feel offended that ANY these words (including Druid) exist in a fantasy game. If anything they'd feel elated about being included and represented. And would only feel offended about them being removed from the game rather than by their inclusion.
This is all part of an endless quest to feel offended on behalf of hypothetical hypersensitive people who don't exist, and are only there to ruin it for the rest in the rare instance that a tiny insignificant portion of them do exist. These are mindless people tirelessly walking up their own asshole like an ass Ouroboros.
WotC has had a lot of problems with their "creature type" logic, entirely self-inflicted. They likely wish they had a "magic-user" type instead of say, wizard, and druid. If they want to print Deathdark Witches Of Zoogmoogfoog, should they be "Human Wizard", "Human Cleric", or something else?
http://www.smileylich.com/mtg/magocracy/Magocracy_C1.html
Here's all the types as of a year ago.
Some of these mean "from a place". Some mean "this race or species of creature". Some mean "an entity with these abilities", or "a person with this job", or "a person with this social class". It's a pretty wild set of things. Want to be a rebel ninja horse? It's probably possible somehow, with the correct combination of cards.
So if they unified clerics, wizards, and druids under a new type "spellcaster" or whatever, that wouldn't be really a thing done for politics. Necessarily, at least, who knows.
Whenever card types come up in conversation, they usually don't impact the way other magic cards are made, or how things happen in D&D.
Quote from: rgalex on October 09, 2023, 04:25:27 PM
This has nothing to do with D&D, for now.
Wizards of the Coast hinted that the Druid and Shaman creature types could be removed from Magic: The Gathering due to real religions which practice druidism and shamanism.
Mark Rosewater, the head designer of Magic: The Gathering since 2003 regularly answers questions about the game on his Tumblr blog. One question about how the Witch creature type was removed due to its association to a real religion led to an answer hinting at more removals in the future.
In reference to the question about using witch as a creature type: "if 'witch' is excluded bc of its significance as a real world religious identifier, why are 'shaman' and 'druid' creature types?" His response was "We are currently examining that exact topic."
What bugs me is that the neo-pagan religions basically just appropriate the terms witch and druid. Wiccan witches have nothing to do with historical witchcraft, ditto for modern druids and actual druids. It's just LARPing/play acting guised as religion
At least shamanism, albeit not the stuff practiced in the West by hippies, has real roots.
Quote from: JeremyR on October 09, 2023, 07:41:31 PM
What bugs me is that the neo-pagan religions basically just appropriate the terms witch and druid.
I mean, the terms weren't being used contemporaneously when those religions started, so it seems like they are fair game. It's not like you're going to be like, wait, this guy is a druid, is he from a reconstructed faith or is he 1500 years old?
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 09, 2023, 12:44:31 PM
I just pray that WotC makes up more new words that mean nothing to replace them. Maybe like "Melanated Magicians" or MelMags for short or "Natural Naturists" or NatNur's for short. Just keep putting out nonsense speak. Please WotC make your products so screwed up language wise that people will have no understanding what you are talking about.
Yes. Why should they stop at being a little bit ridiculous? Go all the way, WOTC!!!
Quote from: Bruwulf on October 09, 2023, 12:49:23 PM
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PMWhat's next, retiring "wight" or "phylactery" because they're used in Asatru and Judaism? Oh wait, the latter actually happened.
I wouldn't really describe Wight as being some term of art in reconstruction heathenism, but they'll never throw a bone to Asatru and company anyway. They're in the doghouse because too many people associate them with nazis.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PMI can't really bring myself to care. When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about classes like the witch, druid or shaman?
I like druids.
I like the neo-pagan usage of "wight" as an Anglo-Saxon equivalent of genius loci. I find it really inspirational because English doesn't really have its own word for that sort of thing and I want my fantasy worldbuilding to feel uniquely Anglo-Saxon. House-wight, forge-wight, land-wight, forest-wight, etc. By playing with morphemes you can create distinct compounds for the different meanings of wight (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wight): man-wight, wight-folk, wraith-wight, etc.
Quote from: Venka on October 09, 2023, 08:08:09 PM
Quote from: JeremyR on October 09, 2023, 07:41:31 PM
What bugs me is that the neo-pagan religions basically just appropriate the terms witch and druid.
I mean, the terms weren't being used contemporaneously when those religions started, so it seems like they are fair game. It's not like you're going to be like, wait, this guy is a druid, is he from a reconstructed faith or is he 1500 years old?
At least neo-pagans use it as part of a coherent theology rather than whatever the hell WotC has been using all these years.
Honestly, when I saw this rumour I'm like hooray. WotC, please do this. It will just kick the corpse further into the grave.
Quote from: Thorn Drumheller on October 10, 2023, 11:40:27 AM
Honestly, when I saw this rumour I'm like hooray. WotC, please do this. It will just kick the corpse further into the grave.
The sad thing is, they used the old guys who know game theory as consultants because they can't have moderate or conservatives working at WotC's offices spreading their ideology of loving America and being thankful for what we have. And then after they got success on the game system they ejected everyone they could who was center left and to the right to allow only ideologically pure leftist nut jobs remain.
Current game theory at WotC is to give the player everything and remove all challenges, because that is how leftists want to live. Human beings do not want to live like that let alone play a game that simulates that. 6E is adding significantly more to player character abilities over balance. Then toss in leftwing racist views and newspeak and you have an ideological mess of a game that no one will buy let alone play.
We already had this at Disney destroying Star Wars and Marvel, but the corpse of Disney is still kicking. Disney is selling ESPN but won't let Star Wars go because they spent too much and they don't want to lose it even though its a dog now. Hasbro will do the same thing with D&D. Because WotC got Larian to make their next game based on non-woke 5E and Larian is a competent game studio, Baldur's Gate 4 is a success, Hasbro sees dollar signs now and won't let the corpse of D&D go to someone who can resurrect the brand on hopes of more video game success on D&D IP. Its not D&D IP, its game company skill. Look at all the other D&D games, they are purified shit because the game studios are shit.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 10, 2023, 10:22:05 AM
At least neo-pagans use it as part of a coherent theology rather than whatever the hell WotC has been using all these years.
D&D hasn't been theologically coherent since Supplement IV, AFAIK. :D And even Gygaxian druids were able to do human sacrifice while only landing on the 'evil edge of neutral.' (Although in fairness, that was back in the days when Law and Chaos were primary and Good and Evil afterthoughts, in that liminal period between the 3-alignment and 9-alignment systems.) :)
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 10, 2023, 12:47:22 PM
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 10, 2023, 10:22:05 AM
At least neo-pagans use it as part of a coherent theology rather than whatever the hell WotC has been using all these years.
D&D hasn't been theologically coherent since Supplement IV, AFAIK. :D And even Gygaxian druids were able to do human sacrifice while only landing on the 'evil edge of neutral.' (Although in fairness, that was back in the days when Law and Chaos were primary and Good and Evil afterthoughts, in that liminal period between the 3-alignment and 9-alignment systems.) :)
Indeed.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 10, 2023, 11:58:13 AM
Quote from: Thorn Drumheller on October 10, 2023, 11:40:27 AM
Honestly, when I saw this rumour I'm like hooray. WotC, please do this. It will just kick the corpse further into the grave.
The sad thing is, they used the old guys who know game theory as consultants because they can't have moderate or conservatives working at WotC's offices spreading their ideology of loving America and being thankful for what we have. And then after they got success on the game system they ejected everyone they could who was center left and to the right to allow only ideologically pure leftist nut jobs remain.
Current game theory at WotC is to give the player everything and remove all challenges, because that is how leftists want to live. Human beings do not want to live like that let alone play a game that simulates that. 6E is adding significantly more to player character abilities over balance. Then toss in leftwing racist views and newspeak and you have an ideological mess of a game that no one will buy let alone play.
We already had this at Disney destroying Star Wars and Marvel, but the corpse of Disney is still kicking. Disney is selling ESPN but won't let Star Wars go because they spent too much and they don't want to lose it even though its a dog now. Hasbro will do the same thing with D&D. Because WotC got Larian to make their next game based on non-woke 5E and Larian is a competent game studio, Baldur's Gate 4 is a success, Hasbro sees dollar signs now and won't let the corpse of D&D go to someone who can resurrect the brand on hopes of more video game success on D&D IP. Its not D&D IP, its game company skill. Look at all the other D&D games, they are purified shit because the game studios are shit.
Same thing for Paradox. They bought that proto-woke mall goth ttrpg that very briefly outsold D&D in the early/mid 1990s, doubled down on the woke stuff, approved a ton of crappy licensed games, and are now acting surprised when the whole house of cards is collapsing. They hired Chinese Room to make their flagship crpg, rather than Obsidian.
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 09, 2023, 03:10:08 PM
The only issue with WotC burning D&D down to the ground is they can cause permanent damage to the brand. Try forming up a game of D&D, but when people hear that name they think "social justice, whackadoo" and they pass. That is what I see coming our way possibly.
This is not an invalid concern either. Look at the damage done to Gamma World as example where its just a ha-ha funnnnny! game now.
As for the witch, druid, shaman thing.
Called it a few years ago.
Who here is even surprised they finally got around to it? If wotc were not so infatuated with demons theyd be changing those to something stupider than Tanrii and Baatazu and whatever.
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PM
I can't really bring myself to care. When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about classes like the witch, druid or shaman?
When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about WotC D&D?
Quote from: crkrueger on October 10, 2023, 11:26:25 PM
Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on October 09, 2023, 12:31:53 PM
I can't really bring myself to care. When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about classes like the witch, druid or shaman?
When was the last time anyone gave a fuck about WotC D&D?
Good question. I just checked my purchases on DND Beyond. The last time I bought a product from them was Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden in August 2020. I have a soft spot for anything Norse inspired, even remotely. And I do think it was very well done, we had a lot of fun playing through it.
But if I had any interest in buying anything else they killed it with their rainbow hued woke dreck.
Quote from: Omega on October 10, 2023, 09:08:12 PM
If wotc were not so infatuated with demons theyd be changing those to something stupider than Tanrii and Baatazu and whatever.
Nah, these shows of religious sensitivity are performative and one-sided. "Misunderstood" demons are the perfect symbol for anyone and anything ever oppressed by Christianity, and I can easily imagine pseudo-Christianity is going to be one of the main "approved" bad guy factions in mainstream D&D going forward.
Hey, somebody's got to take the cannon fodder role from the now-protected orcs, and who better than thinly-veiled references to the modern player's family back in Wyoming?
Quote from: Omega on October 10, 2023, 09:03:49 PM
Quote from: honeydipperdavid on October 09, 2023, 03:10:08 PM
The only issue with WotC burning D&D down to the ground is they can cause permanent damage to the brand. Try forming up a game of D&D, but when people hear that name they think "social justice, whackadoo" and they pass. That is what I see coming our way possibly.
This is not an invalid concern either. Look at the damage done to Gamma World as example where its just a ha-ha funnnnny! game now.
What I'm more concerned about it how it might tarnish the OSR by association. There are numerous fantasy ttrpgs (e.g. Castles & Crusades, Swords & Wizardry, Basic Fantasy) and some post-apocalypse ttrpgs (e.g. Mutant Future) to serve as alternatives, but that won't matter if nobody wants to touch them.
What we really need is a decentralized ttrpg market where you aren't held hostage by big publishers' IPs that inevitably get run into the ground like we saw with Hollyweird. Long-running IPs like Star Trek, Star Wars, Marvel, DC, Aliens vs Predator, Terminator, etc. are all poison now. Potentially good IPs like TSR's Dark Matter, Star Drive, Gamma World, etc are dead and forgotten because they're locked in copyright jail. This is why I've opted to spend effort on writing ttrpg settings recycling ideas I liked and releasing my work into public domain so that nobody has control over it. It's worked out great for the Cthulhu mythos, so why not use it everywhere?
Quote from: Shipyard Locked on October 11, 2023, 06:43:29 AM
Nah, these shows of religious sensitivity are performative and one-sided. "Misunderstood" demons are the perfect symbol for anyone and anything ever oppressed by Christianity, and I can easily imagine pseudo-Christianity is going to be one of the main "approved" bad guy factions in mainstream D&D going forward.
Hey, somebody's got to take the cannon fodder role from the now-protected orcs, and who better than thinly-veiled references to the modern player's family back in Wyoming?
My only question is if WotC or Paizo gets to this first in the main market (although one could argue that Green Ronin beat them to it with Jarzon in Blue Rose :) ), but on a related note, someone on EN World just claimed: "WotC has been working to separate the Cleric from religion for a while now." Being 7-10 years out of date on D&D, is this true?
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 11, 2023, 01:39:18 PM
but on a related note, someone on EN World just claimed: "WotC has been working to separate the Cleric from religion for a while now." Being 7-10 years out of date on D&D, is this true?
To some extent. In their efforts to make the healer role more appealing they've disseminated more and more flavor text indicating that clerics can draw their power from almost anything, including abstract concepts that have no doctrines or practices associated with them.
Honestly, disregarding any ideological motives, I think it's a good move. In a generic fantasy setting, the role of 'healer' should have as little mandatory setting baggage as 'warrior', and its up to each individual healer or warrior to decide how pious he is or if he is part of a clergy.
Quote from: Shipyard Locked on October 11, 2023, 01:54:34 PM
Honestly, disregarding any ideological motives, I think it's a good move. In a generic fantasy setting, the role of 'healer' should have as little mandatory setting baggage as 'warrior', and its up to each individual healer or warrior to decide how pious he is or if he is part of a clergy.
I agree, for various reasons, although I think it does have the unpleasant side effect of making it easier for WotC to paint all religion as evil. But abusus non tollit usum, and clerics have been a poor match for priests since the beginning--2nd Edition was the only edition that even came close to squaring that circle.
Third edition contained language separating the cleric from the need to worship a deity.
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 11, 2023, 01:39:18 PMbut on a related note, someone on EN World just claimed: "WotC has been working to separate the Cleric from religion for a while now." Being 7-10 years out of date on D&D, is this true?
In bits and pieces. 5e and possibly before that has been gradually distancing the religious classes from religion.
Paladins are the big one right out the gate. They get their power from oaths now.
Think Clerics got some sentence saying they can gain power from belief in an ideal rather than a god.
I don't understand why they can't just adopt a pagan Indo-European religion for this? Or replace Christian references with Ancient Egyptian paganism, Zoroastrianism, and/or Afro-Caribbean syncretism, and/or folk Catholicism? If they hate Christianity, then there are other options to preserve the structure derived from medieval Christianity.
D&D theology right now is a nonsense hodgepodge that doesn't map to any real theology that has ever existed. The closest is probably the collective Arthurian mythos, but that's a stretch.
The combination of class bloat and niche protection has resulted in increasingly nonsensical distinctions and worldbuilding. I'm sick of it.
Pick a coherent theology and interpret everything in terms of that. Don't half-ass it you hacks!
Quote from: Corolinth on October 11, 2023, 03:14:18 PM
Third edition contained language separating the cleric from the need to worship a deity.
It did, but it contained a lot more language talking about how they worship a deity.
Quote from: 3.5 PHBSome clerics devote themselves not to a god but to a cause or a source of divine power. These characters wield magic the way clerics devoted to individual gods do, but they are not associated with any religious institution or any particular practice of worship.
It then goes on to discuss a cleric dedicated to "good and law".
In practice this is setting dependent. Forgotten Realms, for instance, separates magic into "the art" and "the power", and it's pretty clear that clerics can't go worshiping goodness itself in that setting. But in Greyhawk you can. What happens if your cleric from Greyhawk ends up in the Realms? I've no idea, but generally clerics can get screwed from being too far from their home plane, so who knows. Obviously, in any custom game, the DM decides whether this works.
It's not an idea that easily spread out from there though, and 5e doesn't have this text.
The two main approaches are to remove the need to worship a god from the cleric (a class otherwise totally built around the concept), or to create a different class completely. So far they haven't really gone for either of these.
FYI, the idea of Clerics who get their power from an abstract philosophy has been around since at least 2e. Don't recall if they mentioned it in the PHB, but at the very least they covered it in the Complete Priests Handbook. So this predates Woke D&D by decades.
Quote from: VisionStorm on October 11, 2023, 10:51:30 PM
FYI, the idea of Clerics who get their power from an abstract philosophy has been around since at least 2e. Don't recall if they mentioned it in the PHB, but at the very least they covered it in the Complete Priests Handbook. So this predates Woke D&D by decades.
Good to note, but I think there's more verbiage to that effect in mainline products now. Which again, I think is fine.
Quote from: VisionStorm on October 11, 2023, 10:51:30 PM
FYI, the idea of Clerics who get their power from an abstract philosophy has been around since at least 2e. Don't recall if they mentioned it in the PHB, but at the very least they covered it in the Complete Priests Handbook. So this predates Woke D&D by decades.
This is true, although I think we can locate a dividing point in 3E, which moved it from a DM's world-building tool in the CPrH to a default player option in the PHB.
Quote from: Yitzhak Marxx on October 09, 2023, 11:53:40 AM
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 09, 2023, 11:40:15 AM
According to Mark Rosewater's blog https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/ (https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/), "witch" is not being removed, but they don't use it as a 'type' for "real-world religious considerations," and are considering the same for "druid" and "shaman."
Once again their "RPGs" get hollower and more generic, evermore incapable of birthing games with narratives where anything matters at all. These are the people that say/think orcs and drow are black because theyre barbarians or occultist thieves (projecting their implicit beliefs), so it's fitting.
This is what I mean by "vanilll". D&D is so generic anymore. And what's the harm in religious inspiration for anything in RPGs? You know, secular humanism is a modern-day religion, just not an organized one. remove all that, Wizards. That includes all wokeness.
I'm guessing the writers just don't understand any religion period besides fundamentalist Christianity?
WotC should just slowly remove everything from DnD until eventually they just sell a Blank book, thus offending nobody.
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 12, 2023, 07:46:43 AM
This is true, although I think we can locate a dividing point in 3E, which moved it from a DM's world-building tool in the CPrH to a default player option in the PHB.
It's never been a default player option (as in, an option a player can
expect to choose if playing by core rules). It's mentioned in the 3.X PHBs, certainly, but it's never assumed to be true. There are settings that WotC themselves shipped that allow it, and others that ban it. The same is true of any homebrew setting- the DM has to figure it out for themselves, to decide whether it's available to players or not.
Ahh, MTG. We will cause Christians headaches, but as soon as Twitter Slactivism reared it's ugly head we gladly offered our company's testicles to be crushed on the altar of wokeness.
I have returned to Magic: The Gathering. This is totally for personal enjoyment and definitely not opposition research to make a competing product. Let me lay it thick with the stupidity I've seen since I returned.
- WotC has now made "Universes Beyond" cards which are for every TV show and movie they can get the rights to. This is grotesquely unpopular among the core fanbase, but apparently Magic is the only thing working for Hasbro, and WotC has promised to roughly quadruple revenues over about a 10 year period, which has lead to aggressive marketing. My understanding is that almost none of the fans of other franchises who bought Universes Beyond sets for things like The Walking Dead and Jurrasic Park did not remain with the game long term.
- WotC has no clue what to make of their most popular format, Commander. Tolarian Community College's last video was a guide to Commander deck mana bases which was almost certainly assisted by someone at WotC, and he recommended a breathtaking 8 fetch lands for a dual color deck. This is probably so that they can make money selling lands; mana bases using fetch lands basically need to pair with shock lands. Coincidentally, the upcoming Ravnica Remastered set will feature shock lands. The problem with fetch lands is Commander is an infamously slow format and fetches will worsen the sensation of slow gameplay. It takes a lot of time to shuffle a 100 card deck, which you do every time you crack a Fetch land. Even as the metrics say that WotC is making Commander into a faster format by turn count, in terms of interactivity, this is going to make Commander feel even slower. The tables which feel the best to play at use dirt-cheap ETB tapped lands which get you into the heart of an EDH midrange game quickly and painlessly. Unfortunately, because this is one turn slower than the competitive decks and WotC has a massive hard on for their World Championships, they are going to push deck construction paradigms which are actively less pleasant to play.
- The finance people seem to think that Ravnica is going to be left abandoned on shelves because there isn't enough card value in the chase rares to give MTG nerds their gambling fix. Card prices are starting to fall, which means sales struggles for new sets.
- Apparently Elspeth is alive again. The story behind that is shockingly half-assed. It's hard to even call this a Christ parody because the execution is downright pitiable. I am 1000% hoping that WotC goes bankrupt from their stupid Universes Beyond nonsense and the finance trap they're in before they get back to Innistrad again and bring Avacyn back in an equally pathetically bland manner.
So yeah...Magic's a mess. The least of their problems is whether or not they use Shaman as a card type.
I'm considering making a collectible card game for this generation. Anything and everything that might be offensive will be removed.
(https://i.imgur.com/b0ajq1r.jpg)
And also a companion roleplaying game.
(https://i.imgur.com/WwtcBH2.jpg)
Here is a sneak preview:
(https://i.imgur.com/mJuOhF8.jpg)
(edit: made the post more relevant to this thread)
Quote from: Cathode Ray on October 12, 2023, 08:07:59 AM
Quote from: Yitzhak Marxx on October 09, 2023, 11:53:40 AM
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 09, 2023, 11:40:15 AM
According to Mark Rosewater's blog https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/ (https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/), "witch" is not being removed, but they don't use it as a 'type' for "real-world religious considerations," and are considering the same for "druid" and "shaman."
Once again their "RPGs" get hollower and more generic, evermore incapable of birthing games with narratives where anything matters at all. These are the people that say/think orcs and drow are black because theyre barbarians or occultist thieves (projecting their implicit beliefs), so it's fitting.
This is what I mean by "vanilll". D&D is so generic anymore. And what's the harm in religious inspiration for anything in RPGs? You know, secular humanism is a modern-day religion, just not an organized one. remove all that, Wizards. That includes all wokeness.
All of this is about Magic: The Gathering. Not D&D. D&D confirmed to not be ditching any of these words. They're all in the current playtest even. This is purely a MTG thing.
Quote from: Mistwell on October 12, 2023, 11:11:20 PM
All of this is about Magic: The Gathering. Not D&D. D&D confirmed to not be ditching any of these words.
Yet. They will do so when they feel they can. How dense do you have to be to not see the patterns?
You know, this is about as ignorant a take as being someone who has downplayed media distortion and censorship, and then being upset when the media bias is turned against you. It's always no big deal... then suddenly it's a crisis when it's done to you...
Quote from: Venka on October 12, 2023, 07:05:31 PM
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on October 12, 2023, 07:46:43 AM
This is true, although I think we can locate a dividing point in 3E, which moved it from a DM's world-building tool in the CPrH to a default player option in the PHB.
It's never been a default player option (as in, an option a player can expect to choose if playing by core rules). It's mentioned in the 3.X PHBs, certainly, but it's never assumed to be true. There are settings that WotC themselves shipped that allow it, and others that ban it. The same is true of any homebrew setting- the DM has to figure it out for themselves, to decide whether it's available to players or not.
If they wanted to, either the GM or the worldbuilder (who may or may not be the same person) could decide that martial schools are a thing, and that fighters only get to pick their bonus feats from combat feats associated with their school. That doesn't suddenly make all combat feats stop being a default player option. Likewise, atheist clerics are right there in the book as a thing the player can do.
But this conversational thread isn't about what is or isn't a default player option, it's about when the separation started to occur. It has been confirmed in this thread that clerics and deities were separated at least as far as the Complete Handbooks from 2nd edition, and it appears to have been introduced as a world-building tool. This decision appears to have been made to facilitate modeling something like animism using the cleric class, rather than having to create a new "kind of like a cleric, but without a god" class.
The irony of WotC potentially removing these elements from the game is that the stories that inspired D&D and continue to emanate from it in good company, are inspired by the hero cycles and mythology of human societies and civilizations, which themselves echo primordial mystical elements present in our cosmology and psyches.
Continuing to sanitize and secularize the game by removing these mystical components which resonate with our mythological instincts just destroys most of the fun. Imagine getting stuck with some sort of deracinated fantasy world whose inspirations stem from a modern day Californian interpretation of medieval society, Afrocentrism forefronted.
And yeah, as a neopagan LARPer, I would prefer these titles stay in-tact, even if they really don't accurately represent the historical realities of something like Druidism, which is completely fine.