RPGnet's decay (TBP madness)

[Stephen Tannhauser]

What if you were in a game where Orcs are born genetically, inherently, and irredeemably FASCIST (with white skin, blonde hair and blue eyes). They all grow up to be anti-revolutionaries who hate the goodness of Communism and want to put elves in gas ovens for fun. ...Would you say violence against the orcs is justified?

If that is how the rules of reality work in the setting created by that game, then yes: in that fictional context, it'd be justified. It wouldn't be a game I personally would ever play (being, ironically, myself blond and blue-eyed, though to the best of my recollection the closest I've ever gotten to fascism is unironically thinking the Knights Templar were cool), but if somebody really wants to write and play the reverse of RaHoWa, be my guest.

Besides, it's not like pale, blue-eyed, unreasoningly malevolent and totalitarianly united foes haven't been used in fantasy before -- check out the White Walkers in Game of Thrones, or the Kargads in Earthsea. If somebody wants to tell me that I should dislike those works as slams against my race because of that, they're free to do so, and I'm free to laugh at them.

[Ghostmaker]

I've commented before on what Dyvers Hands (the owners of TBP) might be up to, as they went utterly silent and didn't seem to have anything on tap. Well, lo and behold, they've pushed through a Kickstarter for their storygame card games. Very curious.

[wmarshal]

I've commented before on what Dyvers Hands (the owners of TBP) might be up to, as they went utterly silent and didn't seem to have anything on tap. Well, lo and behold, they've pushed through a Kickstarter for their storygame card games. Very curious.

Their website looks like it'd be created for a low-key new age cult. It looks like they found success by raising $707. Small companies have to start somewhere, but that seems to be an amount for a random guy starting brand new, not a company running a significant rpg forum.

[Grognard GM]

Small companies have to start somewhere, but that seems to be an amount for a random guy starting brand new, not a company running a significant rpg forum.

I knew they run TBP, they run an RPG forum too? They should probably advertise their products there.

[Armchair Gamer]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou hast conquered, Big Brother.

[Ghostmaker]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou has conquered, Big Brother.

You mean remake them so that instead of being blockbusters, they tank harder than Ishtar?

Well, that's certainly a... bold idea on this gimp's part.

[wmarshal]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou has conquered, Big Brother.

I had those thoughts (the droids are enslaved, not reworking the films to be ideologically correct) as a kid more than 35 years ago, and these geniuses are just now struggling with this is worth mocking. If they want the SW universe to deal with droid slavery, have a droid revolt be the way the galactic civilization and the SW fictional universe ends, and thus becomes a matter of legend from a long, long time ago.

[rytrasmi]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou has conquered, Big Brother.

You mean remake them so that instead of being blockbusters, they tank harder than Ishtar?

Well, that's certainly a... bold idea on this gimp's part.

What a drab boring world these people seek: Cleanse all entertainment to conform to "today's standards." Imagine not being able to enjoy a work of fiction on its own terms. Sad sacks the lot of em.

[Ratman_tf]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou hast conquered, Big Brother.

*hrngh*

For those who haven't heard my rant. The issue is Star Wars vaciliates between droids as things, and droids as indistinguishable from flesh and blood creatures.

You can flippin torture droids, for god's sake!

This makes absolutley no sense. Are droids "programmed to feel pain"? How do they "feel"? Are common Gonk droids designed with elaborate pain receptors and artifical brains so that Jabba can have them tortured? How the fuck does that make a Gonk droid any better at doing it's menial task of being a walking power generator?

There is just as much reason to argue that appliances from Brave Little Toaster should be freed and given rights, or that toys from Toy Story should be given rights.

It misses the forest for the trees. Droids are things, anthropomorphized for storytelling purposes.

Making a "droid rights" story in Star Wars will immediatley fall apart because it will call scrutiny to the issue that droids act like people because story, and there's nothing deeper to the topic.

This gets extra murky due to the fact that droids also fall into the Disney tendency to make mascot animals as smart as humans, while keeping normal animals at animal levels of intelligence, and refusing to acknowledge the difference.

There we go. Discussing Star Wars droids as people, you're knocking on the door of trying to rationalize why Mickey Mouse has a pet dog. 
u're

[BoxCrayonTales]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou hast conquered, Big Brother.

*hrngh*

For those who haven't heard my rant. The issue is Star Wars vaciliates between droids as things, and droids as indistinguishable from flesh and blood creatures.

You can flippin torture droids, for god's sake!

This makes absolutley no sense. Are droids "programmed to feel pain"? How do they "feel"? Are common Gonk droids designed with elaborate pain receptors and artifical brains so that Jabba can have them tortured? How the fuck does that make a Gonk droid any better at doing it's menial task of being a walking power generator?

There is just as much reason to argue that appliances from Brave Little Toaster should be freed and given rights, or that toys from Toy Story should be given rights.

It misses the forest for the trees. Droids are things, anthropomorphized for storytelling purposes.

Making a "droid rights" story in Star Wars will immediatley fall apart because it will call scrutiny to the issue that droids act like people because story, and there's nothing deeper to the topic.

This is why I found Janet from The Good Place so refreshing. She says at one point "Chidi, I can see that you're worried, and I just want to assure you, I am not human, and I cannot feel pain."

[Armchair Gamer]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou has conquered, Big Brother.

You mean remake them so that instead of being blockbusters, they tank harder than Ishtar?

Well, that's certainly a... bold idea on this gimp's part.

What a drab boring world these people seek: Cleanse all entertainment to conform to "today's standards." Imagine not being able to enjoy a work of fiction on its own terms. Sad sacks the lot of em.

  "Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right."--1984

[jhkim]

Making a "droid rights" story in Star Wars will immediatley fall apart because it will call scrutiny to the issue that droids act like people because story, and there's nothing deeper to the topic.

This is why I found Janet from The Good Place so refreshing. She says at one point "Chidi, I can see that you're worried, and I just want to assure you, I am not human, and I cannot feel pain."

But...  Even though she isn't human, the characters grow from treating Janet as a servant that they take for granted to a friend (or even spouse) whom they love and respect.

The droids in Star Trek show all signs of full human sentience and emotion, at least as much so as, say, Commander Data in Star Trek.

[Ratman_tf]

Spotted on a thread concerned over the treatment of droids in Star Wars:

It wouldn't happen, but I have this idea in my head that the major movies/shows of say the last 50 years should be redone with today's standards. Star Wars, Raiders,etc. A monolithic undertaking but wouldn't it be worth it?

   Thou hast conquered, Big Brother.

Having already derailed the thread over a pet peeve of mine...

Lucas already broke that barrier when he went back and tinkered with the films, several times. Why not redo them to appeal to modern, "progressive" ideas, and trash the old films?

And when the current "progressive" attitudes come to be seen as Nazi fascism, then can do it again.

Yeah, it's a terrible idea, and the sad part is they don't understand why.

[Grognard GM]

But...  Even though she isn't human, the characters grow from treating Janet as a servant that they take for granted to a friend (or even spouse) whom they love and respect.

Yes but humans anthropomorphize animals and objects all the time, so that says more about us than the robot.

[Orphan81]

But...  Even though she isn't human, the characters grow from treating Janet as a servant that they take for granted to a friend (or even spouse) whom they love and respect.

Yes but humans anthropomorphize animals and objects all the time, so that says more about us than the robot.

This right here.

It's enough to where Soldiers cry over the loss of their bomb detecting robots they get so attached to them... And it's just a machine, it has no sentience what so ever.

This whole talk over whether droids are enslaved or not is asinine in the end, for what amounts to a fairy tale universe where you're not supposed to look to closely or it falls apart. The people who think droids are enslaved are the same people who think Jedi are the "Real bad guys" because they employ 'Child soldiers.'

You're not supposed to employ real world ethics and logic in what is a fairy tale universe where Good and Evil are tangible magical forces that can effect things.

Jhkim trying to compare C-3P0 and R2-D2 to Data is more evidence of his usual Sophistry.