@Rao There's a long history of anti-semetism in the church, especially around the time of the renaissance. Revoking the rights of Jews, expelling them from Spain, etc. Its around this time depictions of Christ as anything but white became more and more rare. Check out Pope Alexander the VI sometime if you want to do some research. Notice that around his time, Jesus started to look a LOT like Cesare Borgia, his son.
That example is deeply problematic - Vampires predate the modern fantasy genre by quite a bit, and vampires in modern fantasy are absolutely pulled in from preexisting sources (Vampyre, etc) - which themselves were pulled in from folklore in Central and Eastern Europe well before that.
By the same logic, using any of the classic fantasy races as an example (such as elves) is deeply and inherintly problematic as well. Such fictional races all predate modern fantasy after all and are part of real world mythologies and folklore. And not just inside Europe either, but globally present. The Penanggalan vampire inside Malaysian folklore being a point in case.
As such I cannot help but disagree with your chosen differentiation here. And more importantly I see it as problematic when projecting an existing species (human) inside the role of a fictional (elf) one. It may be one thing to seek connections between real enthnic groups and fictional ethnic groups of humans inside an fantasy worldsetting. That, I could understand.
But a fictional race with a different physiology and psychology, completely different from humans? No, I fail to see the point there. Humans aint elves/orcs/angels/demons/ect. after all and should be regarded as such. It is not too much to ask for a reader or gamer to tell fiction from reality after all.
We're talking apples and oranges. Vampires do not represent a society of individuals with characteristics associated to the society. More to the point, their general origin story provides for the means to establish them as being of any ilk and in any manner, negating their usefulness in this conversation completely.
Contrasting this against something like elves in icelandic folklore, which bear little in common with the modern archetype of fantasy elves, making that point less suitable. (Mind you, that little in common includes physical but also cultural and conceptual differences)
Lastly - I dont really know what to do with your insistence that you cannot project the sensibilities of the author or creator into the works he has created. That's just completely false. When a fantasy author creates something (anything) - it is through their own lens and with their own biases/prejudices/values/virtues. So of course the creation of a fictional race in a fictional world can still relate to real concepts found in our real world - they are the constructs of real people, and that cannot be hidden.
Said simply, one cannot divorce themselves from the art they make. The nature of who you are influences what you make, and is reflected in that piece of art.
Again, you seek making a differentiation where there is none. Any kind of modern fantasy race can be traced back to real life mythology and folklore. This is true whenever we are talking about the Irelandic fae and Norse dökkalfar/ljosalfar/svartalfar (in case of 'modern' elves), any undead, or [enter iconic fantasy race here]. At the same time it is up to the authors whenever a fantasy race they choose for their world setting has a certain degree of appearance, mentality, presence inside their world, society, or level of civilization. For instance, many opt for the concept of a Necropolis where sapient undead are its only citizen. Or have otherwise well fleshed out, giant underground societies rivaling that of Vampire: The Masquarade. In such cases the walking dead indeed possess a society rivaling that of any other non-human race inside the Fantasy genre.
As a side note: it is not the involvement of the author's experience mirroring in their work I take issue with. Far from it, that's a matter of course as far as I am concerned. This is for instance also why H.P. Lovecraft's works became cult classics despite his extreme political point of view, mental breakdowns and numerous other character flaws. One could even say those characteristics helped to enhance his bleak, alien and hostile setting about eldritch beings of madness.
However: what I, to this day, still cannot comprehend is the needless drive of 'fans' to fully humanize non-humans in contrast of what the author intented them to be. If a non-human thinks like a human, feels like a human and acts like a human, then... you may just as well get rid of that race and replace them with humans instead. Less hassle that way, given that they already are humans in anything but appearance. That's what I meant to not see the point of projecting humans inside non-humans. While some folks may think that this would make a fictional race more believeable (or rather, more relatable)... I cannot help but to feel the complete opposite. For me personally, that would make as little sense as dwarfinize non-dwarves, elfinize non-elves and goblinize non-goblins. To put it plainly: bad and lazy world building. I could give it some slack if such special individuals were orphans who were raised by foster parents of a different race and learnt their way of life/mentality. But even then it's a stretch. A dog raised by a cat still acts like a dog and all.
The skin/hair/eye/ect. tone discussion is similarly an enigma for me. Fictional races with certain colourful tones not found in humans are widely used precisely to differentiate them from humans. Whenever green, blue, obsidian, transparent, purple, metallic, furred, scaled, feathered, or any other outlandish pigmentation is used for them simply bears little to no revelance to actual human ethnics. That much should be obvious. On the other hand, I would be greatly bored if sentient non-human races could only muster natural skin tones of real life humans. But then again, others are free to disagree with anything above. *shrugs*
However: what I, to this day, still cannot comprehend is the needless drive of 'fans' to fully humanize non-humans in contrast of what the author intented them to be. If a non-human thinks like a human, feels like a human and acts like a human, then... you may just as well get rid of that race and replace them with humans instead. Less hassle that way, given that they already are humans in anything but appearance. That's what I meant to not see the point of projecting humans inside non-humans. While some folks may think that this would make a fictional race more believeable (or rather, more relatable)... I cannot help but to feel the complete opposite. For me personally, that would make as little sense as dwarfinize non-dwarves, elfinize non-elves and goblinize non-goblins. To put it plainly: bad and lazy world building. I could give it some slack if such special individuals were orphans who were raised by foster patents of a different race and learnt their way of life mentality. But even then it's a stretch. A dog raised by a cat still acts like a dog and all.
The reason for this is because the art is generated by a human and consumed by a human. It's literally impossible not to consume that art through the frame of human perception. The writing, consumption and perception all bring their inherent biases. I am not "humanizing" elves. I am evaluating them from a human perspective, because as a human - I am incapable of perceiving them from an elven perspective.
To use your own words: The only way we can understand how an elf thinks to by comparing it against the only quantity we know: How a human thinks. The relation is built in, because you have only your frame of reference to comprehend it. You didnt "humanize" the elf, you framed it. Gave it context.
Humans work the same way in fiction. You relate to the fictitious human race in novel x by framing them against the real human race here. I wouldnt say you've "humanized" humans in that case either.
I'd also argue this concept continues further and further down the line. Your perception is as human, but also of a particular ethnicity, nationality, etc, etc - down to the literal you, who perceives the world uniquely as a circumstance of every part of your life.
It works in reverse too - so that the art reflects their perception of what they want to create, including biases.
Edit - I'll leave my part of the conversation there. I'll read your reply @Kamigoroshi - but I suspect we're at a philosophical impasse on the nature of art and perception.
Hence why a talented author learns to build entirely new civilizations, customs and traditions for their fictional races and leads their readers into their backstory setting. That way the consumer slowly but surely “learns“ of that particular race's mindset that differs from their own. The drow were for instance sufficiently fleshed out in that regard with their rather exotic, matriarchic underground civilization. Same also goes for the enigmatic and cruel dwemer inside TES lore. Or the once space-faring lizardfolk of Warhammer fame.
In a sense that's pretty much what roleplaying is all about for many. To become a different person, with different values and, in the case of non-human races, a different way of being. Nothing too difficult if one flexes their imagination muscles from time to time.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts @BallpointMan. They were interesting. Although my stand on this matter remains unchanged.
@ThacoBell (and anyone else who might be interested), my last reply on the matter:
There is much that could be said, but I think we can both agree that serious, thoughtful discussion of Church history and theology is not well-suited to this forum or method of exchange. Therefore, I am posting a brief reply below, but will not be returning for any further follow-ups in this thread. I am happy to let you have the final word, and only hope that what I have written thus far will serve as adequate witness of my views.
I appreciate your suggestion that I do some research on Pope Alexander VI. I am, however, already aware of the basics of his papacy, enough to have a high degree of confidence that he did not issue a "mandate" matching the description you provided in your original post. Again, if you are yourself aware of the text, or know the title, I really think you ought to have named it.
You say that depictions of "Jesus started to look a LOT like Cesare Borgia" during the papacy of Alexander VI. I don't think the balance of rigorous, peer-reviewed historical research on Renaissance art supports this claim - or at least any version of it that would be meaningful to a broader debate about art historical trends in the Church.
I don't mean to seem overly exacting here. But I think that the topic is important enough to merit as much precision as we can reasonably bring to it, and that we owe it to those who may not have time to engage in research of their own not to present incautious claims as certain truth.
As for claims about anti-semitism in the Church, phew...haha...if this is a forum non conveniens for a debate about iconography, it is definitely not the place to take on a topic like that. So, just a brief few words: the history of the Church is full of Catholics - some lay, some ordained; some weak, some powerful - who have sinned gravely, and whose sins have brought grave scandal on the Church (don't forget: Peter, the first pope, denied Jesus three times! - hardly an auspicious beginning); but to know the Church fully is to know (even in her darkest hours) that she is worthy of reverence and love.
And that is it for me. This is a *gaming* forum, and so I don't really seek out these sorts of conversations here. But I hope you can understand why your comments may have left me feeling compelled to raise a reply. That having been said, I am happy to follow up with you (or any other forum member), through private messages, if anyone is genuinely interested in further dialogue on these topics.
Not to go too off topic, but people would hear stories about earlier peoples and depict them as the people writing them were. Case in point, medieval depictions of Alexander the Great. Here's a depiction of him in a submarine from medieval Europe
Here's a 16th century Islamic depiction of Alexander The Great.
Note in the European depiction he's a bearded king with a crown and in the Islamic depiction he's a bearded guy with a turban. First of all Alexander was clean shaven (He made all his men shave too, since it gave the enemy something to grab on to), and he wouldn't have looked like either depiction.
So funny white Jesus story. I've also had to explain to people that Buddha was Indian. I'm an Asian guy with a shaved head, so I've been called Buddha before and turned around explained to people that Buddha was Indian and the statues of him as a fat Chinese guy are like white Jesus.
The cover of my old-school copy of "The Crystal Shard" absolutely has Drizzt portrayed as being brown-skinned.
Yup! It's quite amusing to see all the different artists put their own spin on Drizzt's skin colour, in fact. As you mentioned, the Larry Elmore cover for "The Crystal Shard" has Drizzt with brown/black skin. Next trilogy, the "Homeland" cover depicts him with pale, almost white skin (and hilariously, the next two novels in the same series, Exile and Sojourn has him going back to black skin. And in the NEXT series, Legacy and Starless Night show Drizzt once again with fair skin (he's actually shown right next to Catti-Brie, and they both have the same white skin!), but on the next two books, Passage to Dawn and Siege of Darkness, he's back to having black skin again. XD However, I think after this point the artists finally got the message because all subsequent depictions of Drizzt have him with black skin.
So funny white Jesus story. I've also had to explain to people that Buddha was Indian. I'm an Asian guy with a shaved head, so I've been called Buddha before and turned around explained to people that Buddha was Indian and the statues of him as a fat Chinese guy are like white Jesus.
Not to mention that most statues depicting that obese, laughing "Buddha" with what could be described as "Asian features" that people tend to think of as Buddha is NOT Siddhartha Gautama Buddha (an Indian prince who was the founder of Buddhism). Instead, it actually depicts Budai, another historical figure associated with Buddhism from China. The confusion arises from the fact that Buddha (or Bodhisattva) is an honorary term given to one who has achieved "enlightenment", and is not the actual name of a specific person. However, for simplicity's sake, when most practitioners of Buddhism refer to Buddha (or "the Buddha"), they are specifically referring to Gautama, who holds a special place of respect among Buddhists. (Even though ironically the real Gautama would have chided anyone who venerated him specifically, because that actually goes against the primary teachings of Buddhism.)
It depends on which version you buy. I have pretty much all of them because my wife read them and on all the book covers Drizzt has dark coloured skin.
- Homeland has him next to his guenhwyvar in the underdark
- Legacy shows him fighting a drider (his brother I guess)
- On Starless night on which he fights with Artemis (I think)
@Rao I wasn't making judgements on the "worthiness" of the church. But relating its relevant history to the subject at hand.
@lroumen Yeah, by the newer editions, they corrected it. In the first (and second) releases, Drizzt's skin color was incredibly inconsistent. I've got the shiny collections, so he's blue, green, and purple for me
To get a bit back on topic: Shoutout to Tolkien's Dark Elves (Elf?) being super pale, like what would actually happen if you avoided sunlight all the time. I haven't read the Silmarillion in years, so I don't remember if it was a small community of outcasts, or just one dude that got an unfortunate nickname.
To get a bit back on topic: Shoutout to Tolkien's Dark Elves (Elf?) being super pale, like what would actually happen if you avoided sunlight all the time. I haven't read the Silmarillion in years, so I don't remember if it was a small community of outcasts, or just one dude that got an unfortunate nickname.
Tolkien's "dark" elves were not a different race per se. And more like a splitted subculture of those who did not underwent the Great Journey towards Valinor. In that sense they are just like Tolkien's wood and grey elves. So it makes sense for them to have the same appearance as others of their race.
Later on the term "dark elf" also was used by him for those elves which were captured, tortured and then let loose to bring chaos to their fellow kin. Pretty much all elves Tolkien created were either white, or with a tinge of pale olive if memories serve right. Warhammer did pretty much go the same route with their pale dark elves which are basically rebel light elves with a nasty attitude.
I think my favourite depiction of dark elves was made by Markus Heitz in his novel trilogy Legends of the Älfar. They are paler than elves, unnaturally so even. But what makes them truly unique are their other features: eyeballs that turn pitch black when in sunlight, their blood a shade of black-red and black, pulsing veins become visible when they are angered. Their whole race is pretty much the antagonistic faction of his other fantasy books like The Dwarves and The Elves. I still remember them having lovely civilized hobbies like crafting scrimshaws out of elven bones or using human skins to furnish their furnitures.
This whole "the good sentient races are light skinned!" is a lie. Read the source books. There are dark skinned dwarves, halflings, humans, etc. Just like in real life, geography plays a role here, and most of the time of any realms fan, unfortunately, has been spent on the Sword Coast.
This whole "the good sentient races are light skinned!" is a lie. Read the source books. There are dark skinned dwarves, halflings, humans, etc. Just like in real life, geography plays a role here, and most of the time of any realms fan, unfortunately, has been spent on the Sword Coast.
People looking to find something to be offended about will find it. The same people who find Christianity so offensive are strangely silent when confronted with the sins of the other religions (Islam, Buddhism, Paganism, etc...). It's as if they have an agenda... ?
This whole "the good sentient races are light skinned!" is a lie. Read the source books. There are dark skinned dwarves, halflings, humans, etc. Just like in real life, geography plays a role here, and most of the time of any realms fan, unfortunately, has been spent on the Sword Coast.
It’s not all light skin are good. It’s all ‘coloured’ sentient races are evil. There is a difference.
All drow are ebony.
All duergar are grey.
All Orcs are green.
All Gnolls have light green skin and light or dark brown fur.
All evil dragons can be described with a colour, while all good dragons can be described with a metal.
It’s a coincidence, but one that needs to be addressed.
It’s not all light skin are good. It’s all ‘coloured’ sentient races are evil. There is a difference.
All drow are ebony.
All duergar are grey.
All Orcs are green.
All Gnolls have light green skin and light or dark brown fur.
All evil dragons can be described with a colour, while all good dragons can be described with a metal.
It’s a coincidence, but one that needs to be addressed.
The same however can also be said in reverse.
All planetars are green. While other celestials are either red, golden or blue.
All treants and dryads are brown with green or red hair.
All grigs are blue.
All centaurs are either bronze tanned or black.
All flumphs shift colors from blue, to green, to red and pink.
All sun elves are bronze.
All wild elves are brown.
All gold dwarves are bronze tanned as well.
All storm giants are either blue or violet.
All qouatles are rainbow colored.
You get the idea. It's hardly the case that being colorful equals evil. I've also yet to hear any outcry for making the aforementioned good races less, well... 'good'. Which I find most curious.
At the end of the day: fantasy races have fantasy colors simply because it makes them more 'fantastical' and wonderous in the eyes of fantasy fans. A monochrome world where no colors exist except for white and black wouldn't exactly be popular by the masses, I reckon.
It’s not all light skin are good. It’s all ‘coloured’ sentient races are evil. There is a difference.
All drow are ebony.
All duergar are grey.
All Orcs are green.
All Gnolls have light green skin and light or dark brown fur.
All evil dragons can be described with a colour, while all good dragons can be described with a metal.
It’s a coincidence, but one that needs to be addressed.
The same however can also be said in reverse.
All planetars are green. While other celestials are either red, golden or blue.
All treants and dryads are brown with green or red hair.
All grigs are blue.
All centaurs are either bronze tanned or black.
All flumphs shift colors from blue, to green, to red and pink.
All sun elves are bronze.
All wild elves are brown.
All gold dwarves are bronze tanned as well.
All storm giants are either blue or violet.
All qouatles are rainbow colored.
You get the idea. It's hardly the case that being colorful equals evil. I've also yet to hear any outcry for making the aforementioned good races less, well... 'good'. Which I find most curious.
At the end of the day: fantasy races have fantasy colors simply because it makes them more 'fantastical' and wonderous in the eyes of fantasy fans. A monochrome world where no colors exist except for white and black wouldn't exactly be popular by the masses, I reckon.
This whole "the good sentient races are light skinned!" is a lie. Read the source books. There are dark skinned dwarves, halflings, humans, etc. Just like in real life, geography plays a role here, and most of the time of any realms fan, unfortunately, has been spent on the Sword Coast.
Ah yes, the well known geographical logic that living underground for generations leads to black skin. Wait, what?
If I summarise, thus some people are extrapolating commonality of one feature to a commonality in also other features?
I fail to see why the lore of DnD needs to change because of those misgivings. Does DnD really fuel racism in its players?
You get the idea. It's hardly the case that being colorful equals evil. I've also yet to hear any outcry for making the aforementioned good races less, well... 'good'. Which I find most curious.
Because, according to D&D canon, ‘good’ races have freewill and can choose to be good or evil, where evil races were created and are enslaved by evil gods. That makes sense to me really, as I said, I am a fanatic for deep world building.
So the same can be applied to woodland creatures (dryad’s, treants and wild elves) being the colour of the woods. It makes sense, evolution gave them that colour to survive, to blend in with their surroundings.
Now go through your list and take out all the metallic colours as it isn’t surprising good creatures are described in wealth, IMO.
When the question was asked, why is there no ‘good dragons’ the answer wasn’t to say, “ya I guess a blue dragon could be good,” it was “you’re right, lets create more versions but let’s correlate their power with the wealth of their metallic scales.”
Now take out Grigs because those little crickets main point of existence it’s to annoy the hell out the players with pranks, so even though they are “unaligned” they still take pleasure out of other people’s misfortunes and you are left with horse people the colour of horses (and steeped in mythology) and alien beings from another dimension.
Now I get the colourful fantasy setting argument. When the game was first created and players were taken into dark dungeons to slay the fire breathing dragons, giving descriptive words help with the immersion of the storytelling. But as the game evolved, the descriptiveness of its creatures should have evolved with it but it stuck with metallic is good. Colour is bad.
You shouldn’t be able to look at something and know it is good. It breaks the free will statement. You also shouldn’t be able to look at a colour and say it’s evil (green) because that is subconscious stereotyping and if we practise that in our games, we will be subconsciously practicing it in real life. It’s why broccoli lost the vegetable war.
I also said it before. We as the players and the dungeon masters are the curators of this game, not some corporate entity. Our actions at the table and in online persistent worlds (shout out to NWN) are what really matters. The rules are just guidelines in how we should tell our stories. Don’t fall back on lazy tropes, surprise your players with the M’Khiin’s or a backstabbing gold dragon. Take the lore and canon that is there and create from it, don’t let it box you in.
To get back to the original point of this thread for a minute, it is quite clear that many aspects of corporate America are just engaging in performative bullshit like removing episodes of this and Golden Girls that don't have any real racist undertones at all. I understand Aunt Jemima being axed. That's a caricature of the happy house slave that I've found problematic 20 years prior to it being brought up. But this does absolutely nothing to address the very real issue of systemic racism. It's a lazy way out for corporations who don't want to do the very real work necessary to remedy actual issues.
Focus needs to be on historic issues like the tougher job market for African-Americans, the historic practice of red lining in housing, and the plain as day issues with policing. The cast of Community dressing up as Drow is about number 100,000 on the list. No liberal black activist I know of called for people to pull episodes of old TV shows in the last month. This is the kind of thing a clueless rich, white liberal thinks is making some profound statement. There are honest to god problems to deal with in this regard, and this is just inventing cosmetic ones. And as someone of the left it's becoming increasingly tactically stupid to choose these hills to fight on. This isn't even in the same ballpark as statues of Confederate generals. Someone had to go out of their way to do this, because I guarantee you no one asked for it. If people want to make a statement, they can do better than this.
In somewhat related news, in a very predictable move Dungeons and Dragons is doing away with negative racial modifiers, presumably to do away with any "racist" undertones.
Now halflings are as strong as dwarves and humans, nearly as strong as half orcs! Dwarves have the charming charisma of your greatest bards. Everyone is a grey blob of sameness with almost nothing in the way of customization, especially in 5e where you are restricted to a set of class templates with little deviation. Fun!
The diversity of playstyle has been leeched from DnD. Races have less impact. Attack bonus differences barely exist. Everyone is quasi-magical. As far as i'm concerned DnD stopped existing with the end of 3.5.
@WarChiefZeke Yeah! We all know dwarves are too ugly be decent leaders! Wait...
Honestly, some, at lot, of the negative race modifiers don't make much sense. There's zero reason a half-orc must be dumber than a human. It also gets rid of weird instances where some races are just better than others. Having the same pluses of another race, but not as many stat penalties.
If you REALLY want to make a stupid orc, or a fragile elf, you still can.
Charisma is not a stat that measures your personal attractiveness. Sorcerers don't gain their magic from their handsome features. In previous editions, it was but one of many features that Charisma measured. In 5e, all mention of physical attractiveness has been taken out.
"There is zero reason a half orc must be dumber than a human"
Under the rules as they have always existed before today, half orcs could be smarter than humans. Much smarter, in fact. Humans could be stronger than half orcs. Much stronger. But the average human with no training would not, generally, be stronger than the average half orc. Neither would a halfling. That's what those modifiers represented, and they made perfect sense. They were minor barriers that were easy to overcome, and more importantly, added diversity of playstyle. What *doesn't* make sense is how a halfling who is 3-4 feet tall, and doesn't have increased density or muscle mass like a dwarf, is on average, as strong as a 5-6 foot tall human.
I am of the opinion that making things less diverse hurts the game. This is also why I hate that melee classes are now chock-full of spell-like abilities, and that the AB system has been more or less gutted to make everyone "more even". I liked to make characters that defied expectations for their race, culturally and class wise. Now there are no expectations to defy, because expectations are controversial and must be eliminated, even though they serve a great narrative and character building purpose.
I made a halfling in NWN2, focused on nothing but weapon damage. It was something crazy like Bard/Swashbuckler/RDD/Duelist, making the most out of Dex, Str, and Int to increase all aspects of combat via the abilities Swash and Duelist get, and the stats RDD give you. A robed halfling with a short sword cutting down all in his path with speed and raw power. It was great, but now I can't help but feel that all characters like that are diminished because they don't have any barriers or setbacks to overcome.
@WarChiefZeke "Under the rules as they have always existed before today, half orcs could be smarter than humans. Much smarter, in fact. Humans could be stronger than half orcs. Much stronger."
What? Half-orcs have always taken a penalty to int. Before today, they COULDN'T be as smart as a human can be. Same for humans who don't get the strength bonus that Half-orcs do.
"I am of the opinion that making things less diverse hurts the game. "
And taking away stat penalties increases the options players have to create more diverse builds. Less restrictions = more potential diversity.
For my part... I *like* disadvantages that balance out advantages. Not for balancing sake, per say. But for their additional flavour. Daggerfall in its day has done it beautifully with its character creation "slider", I feel. The Oracle class curses from Pathfinder are another example I adore above anything for the very same reason.
As far as I am concerned the lack of penalities hurts more than it helps. That also is one of the major reasons as to why I never liked to play humans in (A)D&D: they're good at everything, without having a single downside to them. To me that's both bland and boring at the same time. Ultimately finding playing as one as not fun.
To be completely honest however: there are far more interesting ways to implement racial disadvantages than mere stat penalities. Be it a inherited racial arcane spell failure for dwarves (say 5%). Or a weakness to sound-based spells/attacks for elves due to their sensitive hearing. Or half-orcs having a small chance of going into a weak rage/tantrum if they fail a Concentration skill check. Things like that make races more diverese from each other in a fascinating way. Well, to me at the very least. But the way WotC is heading is to make all races the same, reskinned humans instead. So, yeah. Not a fan of their newest move.
Remember when females had a -1 penalty to their strength in D&D? I do. It was more realistic, but it did make a Brienn of Tarth type character virtually impossible. I don't recall if females got a bonus point in something else to make up for it or not. Dexterity comes to mind as something a female might be more gifted at than strength, but I don't think that was the stat. Maybe intelligence or charisma?
Edit: Damn, now that I think about it, it might not have been a penalty of -1, it may have been implemented as a lower max than a male (18:50 instead of 18:00?). That sounds more like what I remember...
Comments
We're talking apples and oranges. Vampires do not represent a society of individuals with characteristics associated to the society. More to the point, their general origin story provides for the means to establish them as being of any ilk and in any manner, negating their usefulness in this conversation completely.
Contrasting this against something like elves in icelandic folklore, which bear little in common with the modern archetype of fantasy elves, making that point less suitable. (Mind you, that little in common includes physical but also cultural and conceptual differences)
Lastly - I dont really know what to do with your insistence that you cannot project the sensibilities of the author or creator into the works he has created. That's just completely false. When a fantasy author creates something (anything) - it is through their own lens and with their own biases/prejudices/values/virtues. So of course the creation of a fictional race in a fictional world can still relate to real concepts found in our real world - they are the constructs of real people, and that cannot be hidden.
Said simply, one cannot divorce themselves from the art they make. The nature of who you are influences what you make, and is reflected in that piece of art.
As a side note: it is not the involvement of the author's experience mirroring in their work I take issue with. Far from it, that's a matter of course as far as I am concerned. This is for instance also why H.P. Lovecraft's works became cult classics despite his extreme political point of view, mental breakdowns and numerous other character flaws. One could even say those characteristics helped to enhance his bleak, alien and hostile setting about eldritch beings of madness.
However: what I, to this day, still cannot comprehend is the needless drive of 'fans' to fully humanize non-humans in contrast of what the author intented them to be. If a non-human thinks like a human, feels like a human and acts like a human, then... you may just as well get rid of that race and replace them with humans instead. Less hassle that way, given that they already are humans in anything but appearance. That's what I meant to not see the point of projecting humans inside non-humans. While some folks may think that this would make a fictional race more believeable (or rather, more relatable)... I cannot help but to feel the complete opposite. For me personally, that would make as little sense as dwarfinize non-dwarves, elfinize non-elves and goblinize non-goblins. To put it plainly: bad and lazy world building. I could give it some slack if such special individuals were orphans who were raised by foster parents of a different race and learnt their way of life/mentality. But even then it's a stretch. A dog raised by a cat still acts like a dog and all.
The skin/hair/eye/ect. tone discussion is similarly an enigma for me. Fictional races with certain colourful tones not found in humans are widely used precisely to differentiate them from humans. Whenever green, blue, obsidian, transparent, purple, metallic, furred, scaled, feathered, or any other outlandish pigmentation is used for them simply bears little to no revelance to actual human ethnics. That much should be obvious. On the other hand, I would be greatly bored if sentient non-human races could only muster natural skin tones of real life humans. But then again, others are free to disagree with anything above. *shrugs*
The reason for this is because the art is generated by a human and consumed by a human. It's literally impossible not to consume that art through the frame of human perception. The writing, consumption and perception all bring their inherent biases. I am not "humanizing" elves. I am evaluating them from a human perspective, because as a human - I am incapable of perceiving them from an elven perspective.
To use your own words: The only way we can understand how an elf thinks to by comparing it against the only quantity we know: How a human thinks. The relation is built in, because you have only your frame of reference to comprehend it. You didnt "humanize" the elf, you framed it. Gave it context.
Humans work the same way in fiction. You relate to the fictitious human race in novel x by framing them against the real human race here. I wouldnt say you've "humanized" humans in that case either.
I'd also argue this concept continues further and further down the line. Your perception is as human, but also of a particular ethnicity, nationality, etc, etc - down to the literal you, who perceives the world uniquely as a circumstance of every part of your life.
It works in reverse too - so that the art reflects their perception of what they want to create, including biases.
Edit - I'll leave my part of the conversation there. I'll read your reply @Kamigoroshi - but I suspect we're at a philosophical impasse on the nature of art and perception.
In a sense that's pretty much what roleplaying is all about for many. To become a different person, with different values and, in the case of non-human races, a different way of being. Nothing too difficult if one flexes their imagination muscles from time to time.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts @BallpointMan. They were interesting. Although my stand on this matter remains unchanged.
https://www.somethingawful.com/news/president-maverick-racist/1/
Is Faerun Ready for Its First Orc President?
There is much that could be said, but I think we can both agree that serious, thoughtful discussion of Church history and theology is not well-suited to this forum or method of exchange. Therefore, I am posting a brief reply below, but will not be returning for any further follow-ups in this thread. I am happy to let you have the final word, and only hope that what I have written thus far will serve as adequate witness of my views.
I appreciate your suggestion that I do some research on Pope Alexander VI. I am, however, already aware of the basics of his papacy, enough to have a high degree of confidence that he did not issue a "mandate" matching the description you provided in your original post. Again, if you are yourself aware of the text, or know the title, I really think you ought to have named it.
You say that depictions of "Jesus started to look a LOT like Cesare Borgia" during the papacy of Alexander VI. I don't think the balance of rigorous, peer-reviewed historical research on Renaissance art supports this claim - or at least any version of it that would be meaningful to a broader debate about art historical trends in the Church.
I don't mean to seem overly exacting here. But I think that the topic is important enough to merit as much precision as we can reasonably bring to it, and that we owe it to those who may not have time to engage in research of their own not to present incautious claims as certain truth.
As for claims about anti-semitism in the Church, phew...haha...if this is a forum non conveniens for a debate about iconography, it is definitely not the place to take on a topic like that. So, just a brief few words: the history of the Church is full of Catholics - some lay, some ordained; some weak, some powerful - who have sinned gravely, and whose sins have brought grave scandal on the Church (don't forget: Peter, the first pope, denied Jesus three times! - hardly an auspicious beginning); but to know the Church fully is to know (even in her darkest hours) that she is worthy of reverence and love.
And that is it for me. This is a *gaming* forum, and so I don't really seek out these sorts of conversations here. But I hope you can understand why your comments may have left me feeling compelled to raise a reply. That having been said, I am happy to follow up with you (or any other forum member), through private messages, if anyone is genuinely interested in further dialogue on these topics.
Here's a 16th century Islamic depiction of Alexander The Great.
Note in the European depiction he's a bearded king with a crown and in the Islamic depiction he's a bearded guy with a turban. First of all Alexander was clean shaven (He made all his men shave too, since it gave the enemy something to grab on to), and he wouldn't have looked like either depiction.
So funny white Jesus story. I've also had to explain to people that Buddha was Indian. I'm an Asian guy with a shaved head, so I've been called Buddha before and turned around explained to people that Buddha was Indian and the statues of him as a fat Chinese guy are like white Jesus.
Yup! It's quite amusing to see all the different artists put their own spin on Drizzt's skin colour, in fact. As you mentioned, the Larry Elmore cover for "The Crystal Shard" has Drizzt with brown/black skin. Next trilogy, the "Homeland" cover depicts him with pale, almost white skin (and hilariously, the next two novels in the same series, Exile and Sojourn has him going back to black skin. And in the NEXT series, Legacy and Starless Night show Drizzt once again with fair skin (he's actually shown right next to Catti-Brie, and they both have the same white skin!), but on the next two books, Passage to Dawn and Siege of Darkness, he's back to having black skin again. XD However, I think after this point the artists finally got the message because all subsequent depictions of Drizzt have him with black skin.
Not to mention that most statues depicting that obese, laughing "Buddha" with what could be described as "Asian features" that people tend to think of as Buddha is NOT Siddhartha Gautama Buddha (an Indian prince who was the founder of Buddhism). Instead, it actually depicts Budai, another historical figure associated with Buddhism from China. The confusion arises from the fact that Buddha (or Bodhisattva) is an honorary term given to one who has achieved "enlightenment", and is not the actual name of a specific person. However, for simplicity's sake, when most practitioners of Buddhism refer to Buddha (or "the Buddha"), they are specifically referring to Gautama, who holds a special place of respect among Buddhists. (Even though ironically the real Gautama would have chided anyone who venerated him specifically, because that actually goes against the primary teachings of Buddhism.)
- Homeland has him next to his guenhwyvar in the underdark
- Legacy shows him fighting a drider (his brother I guess)
- On Starless night on which he fights with Artemis (I think)
@lroumen Yeah, by the newer editions, they corrected it. In the first (and second) releases, Drizzt's skin color was incredibly inconsistent. I've got the shiny collections, so he's blue, green, and purple for me
To get a bit back on topic: Shoutout to Tolkien's Dark Elves (Elf?) being super pale, like what would actually happen if you avoided sunlight all the time. I haven't read the Silmarillion in years, so I don't remember if it was a small community of outcasts, or just one dude that got an unfortunate nickname.
Later on the term "dark elf" also was used by him for those elves which were captured, tortured and then let loose to bring chaos to their fellow kin. Pretty much all elves Tolkien created were either white, or with a tinge of pale olive if memories serve right. Warhammer did pretty much go the same route with their pale dark elves which are basically rebel light elves with a nasty attitude.
I think my favourite depiction of dark elves was made by Markus Heitz in his novel trilogy Legends of the Älfar. They are paler than elves, unnaturally so even. But what makes them truly unique are their other features: eyeballs that turn pitch black when in sunlight, their blood a shade of black-red and black, pulsing veins become visible when they are angered. Their whole race is pretty much the antagonistic faction of his other fantasy books like The Dwarves and The Elves. I still remember them having lovely civilized hobbies like crafting scrimshaws out of elven bones or using human skins to furnish their furnitures.
People looking to find something to be offended about will find it. The same people who find Christianity so offensive are strangely silent when confronted with the sins of the other religions (Islam, Buddhism, Paganism, etc...). It's as if they have an agenda... ?
It’s not all light skin are good. It’s all ‘coloured’ sentient races are evil. There is a difference.
All drow are ebony.
All duergar are grey.
All Orcs are green.
All Gnolls have light green skin and light or dark brown fur.
All evil dragons can be described with a colour, while all good dragons can be described with a metal.
It’s a coincidence, but one that needs to be addressed.
All planetars are green. While other celestials are either red, golden or blue.
All treants and dryads are brown with green or red hair.
All grigs are blue.
All centaurs are either bronze tanned or black.
All flumphs shift colors from blue, to green, to red and pink.
All sun elves are bronze.
All wild elves are brown.
All gold dwarves are bronze tanned as well.
All storm giants are either blue or violet.
All qouatles are rainbow colored.
You get the idea. It's hardly the case that being colorful equals evil. I've also yet to hear any outcry for making the aforementioned good races less, well... 'good'. Which I find most curious.
At the end of the day: fantasy races have fantasy colors simply because it makes them more 'fantastical' and wonderous in the eyes of fantasy fans. A monochrome world where no colors exist except for white and black wouldn't exactly be popular by the masses, I reckon.
You're using logic. Good luck with that...
Ah yes, the well known geographical logic that living underground for generations leads to black skin. Wait, what?
I fail to see why the lore of DnD needs to change because of those misgivings. Does DnD really fuel racism in its players?
Because, according to D&D canon, ‘good’ races have freewill and can choose to be good or evil, where evil races were created and are enslaved by evil gods. That makes sense to me really, as I said, I am a fanatic for deep world building.
So the same can be applied to woodland creatures (dryad’s, treants and wild elves) being the colour of the woods. It makes sense, evolution gave them that colour to survive, to blend in with their surroundings.
Now go through your list and take out all the metallic colours as it isn’t surprising good creatures are described in wealth, IMO.
When the question was asked, why is there no ‘good dragons’ the answer wasn’t to say, “ya I guess a blue dragon could be good,” it was “you’re right, lets create more versions but let’s correlate their power with the wealth of their metallic scales.”
Now take out Grigs because those little crickets main point of existence it’s to annoy the hell out the players with pranks, so even though they are “unaligned” they still take pleasure out of other people’s misfortunes and you are left with horse people the colour of horses (and steeped in mythology) and alien beings from another dimension.
Now I get the colourful fantasy setting argument. When the game was first created and players were taken into dark dungeons to slay the fire breathing dragons, giving descriptive words help with the immersion of the storytelling. But as the game evolved, the descriptiveness of its creatures should have evolved with it but it stuck with metallic is good. Colour is bad.
You shouldn’t be able to look at something and know it is good. It breaks the free will statement. You also shouldn’t be able to look at a colour and say it’s evil (green) because that is subconscious stereotyping and if we practise that in our games, we will be subconsciously practicing it in real life. It’s why broccoli lost the vegetable war.
I also said it before. We as the players and the dungeon masters are the curators of this game, not some corporate entity. Our actions at the table and in online persistent worlds (shout out to NWN) are what really matters. The rules are just guidelines in how we should tell our stories. Don’t fall back on lazy tropes, surprise your players with the M’Khiin’s or a backstabbing gold dragon. Take the lore and canon that is there and create from it, don’t let it box you in.
Focus needs to be on historic issues like the tougher job market for African-Americans, the historic practice of red lining in housing, and the plain as day issues with policing. The cast of Community dressing up as Drow is about number 100,000 on the list. No liberal black activist I know of called for people to pull episodes of old TV shows in the last month. This is the kind of thing a clueless rich, white liberal thinks is making some profound statement. There are honest to god problems to deal with in this regard, and this is just inventing cosmetic ones. And as someone of the left it's becoming increasingly tactically stupid to choose these hills to fight on. This isn't even in the same ballpark as statues of Confederate generals. Someone had to go out of their way to do this, because I guarantee you no one asked for it. If people want to make a statement, they can do better than this.
Now halflings are as strong as dwarves and humans, nearly as strong as half orcs! Dwarves have the charming charisma of your greatest bards. Everyone is a grey blob of sameness with almost nothing in the way of customization, especially in 5e where you are restricted to a set of class templates with little deviation. Fun!
The diversity of playstyle has been leeched from DnD. Races have less impact. Attack bonus differences barely exist. Everyone is quasi-magical. As far as i'm concerned DnD stopped existing with the end of 3.5.
Honestly, some, at lot, of the negative race modifiers don't make much sense. There's zero reason a half-orc must be dumber than a human. It also gets rid of weird instances where some races are just better than others. Having the same pluses of another race, but not as many stat penalties.
If you REALLY want to make a stupid orc, or a fragile elf, you still can.
"There is zero reason a half orc must be dumber than a human"
Under the rules as they have always existed before today, half orcs could be smarter than humans. Much smarter, in fact. Humans could be stronger than half orcs. Much stronger. But the average human with no training would not, generally, be stronger than the average half orc. Neither would a halfling. That's what those modifiers represented, and they made perfect sense. They were minor barriers that were easy to overcome, and more importantly, added diversity of playstyle. What *doesn't* make sense is how a halfling who is 3-4 feet tall, and doesn't have increased density or muscle mass like a dwarf, is on average, as strong as a 5-6 foot tall human.
I made a halfling in NWN2, focused on nothing but weapon damage. It was something crazy like Bard/Swashbuckler/RDD/Duelist, making the most out of Dex, Str, and Int to increase all aspects of combat via the abilities Swash and Duelist get, and the stats RDD give you. A robed halfling with a short sword cutting down all in his path with speed and raw power. It was great, but now I can't help but feel that all characters like that are diminished because they don't have any barriers or setbacks to overcome.
What? Half-orcs have always taken a penalty to int. Before today, they COULDN'T be as smart as a human can be. Same for humans who don't get the strength bonus that Half-orcs do.
"I am of the opinion that making things less diverse hurts the game. "
And taking away stat penalties increases the options players have to create more diverse builds. Less restrictions = more potential diversity.
As far as I am concerned the lack of penalities hurts more than it helps. That also is one of the major reasons as to why I never liked to play humans in (A)D&D: they're good at everything, without having a single downside to them. To me that's both bland and boring at the same time. Ultimately finding playing as one as not fun.
To be completely honest however: there are far more interesting ways to implement racial disadvantages than mere stat penalities. Be it a inherited racial arcane spell failure for dwarves (say 5%). Or a weakness to sound-based spells/attacks for elves due to their sensitive hearing. Or half-orcs having a small chance of going into a weak rage/tantrum if they fail a Concentration skill check. Things like that make races more diverese from each other in a fascinating way. Well, to me at the very least. But the way WotC is heading is to make all races the same, reskinned humans instead. So, yeah. Not a fan of their newest move.
Edit: Damn, now that I think about it, it might not have been a penalty of -1, it may have been implemented as a lower max than a male (18:50 instead of 18:00?). That sounds more like what I remember...