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Author Topic: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O  (Read 12995340 times)

Putnam

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86370 on: September 23, 2015, 06:01:06 pm »

Because it's a fantasy game. You don't expect a fantasy game to depict real-world racism, do you?

every orc being a conduit for the divine will of an actually evil god

no

and by that i mean... hell no???

malacath is not even remotely one of the more evil daedra

Rolan7

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86371 on: September 23, 2015, 06:05:32 pm »

Yeah he just likes fighting.  You got a problem with fighters?  As if wizards are any better.

I'd rate Molag Bal as the evilest (domination ain't so bad, but his brand in the games certainly is).  Followed by Mehrunes Dagon, who's... complicated.
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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86372 on: September 23, 2015, 06:06:38 pm »

Because it's a fantasy game. You don't expect a fantasy game to depict real-world racism, do you?

every orc being a conduit for the divine will of an actually evil god

no

and by that i mean... hell no???

malacath is not even remotely one of the more evil daedra

It's a reference to Gruumsh, god of the Orcs in d&d. As of 5th edition, possibly 4th as well, all d&d orcs are conduits of Gruumsh's divine hatred of all other races, basically to make it easier to kill them without moral dilemmas.
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Frumple

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86373 on: September 23, 2015, 06:08:44 pm »

Bloody hell. I'm not sure exactly what my cousin and his wife are smoking, but it's quite possibly the worst smelling cigarette stench I have ever encountered. You can tell they've visited because literally every room in the house -- and this is not a particularly small house -- that's not closed off, even the ones they haven't been in, smells more or less like shit. And not metaphorical shit. It's like an incontinent cow dragged its ass across every floor in the building. It's fucking vile, to the point of incomprehension. At this point I'm just wondering what the zog it is, because I've been around smokers off all stripes over the course of my life, and I've never encountered something this bad.

Not going to ask, though. That would mean being within talking distance, and the lingering malodorous shitestench is bad enough. They didn't smell like this even a year or two ago. What have they done? They're not even smoking inside the house, they just smell so bad I can actually pick up wiffs of it through closed goddamn door.
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SOLDIER First

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86374 on: September 23, 2015, 06:11:00 pm »

Cremation
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Harry Baldman

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86375 on: September 23, 2015, 06:14:16 pm »

It seems... odd? To want real-world racism in there. Sure, fantasy can use other species as metaphors for racism... ok? What's the problem? Metaphors are indeed a thing.

Quote from: Witches Abroad, by, of course, Terry Pratchett
Racism was not a problem on the Discworld, because — what with trolls and dwarfs and so on — speciesism was more interesting. Black and white lived in perfect harmony and ganged up on green.

I suppose you could have a game where there's active racism between blacks and whites, etc, but if you could join the KKK the game would probably just get banned. If you just want a game where you fight against racists, I dunno, go play one of the billion WW2 shooters where you fight Nazis or something.

Three problems that I can think of.

Firstly, the underlying context is usually different. Compare, say, Arcanum - there is a whole lot of racism against orcs and half-orcs, but the issue gets muddled by the fact that they're almost universally born of rape and also that they're not just ethnically and physically different, they also represent the common working underclass in an industrial revolution, and thus get shat on on two different levels. This is interesting and fun, but ultimately unhelpful in understanding and addressing the troubles of real-world racism - not that it absolutely has to be.

Secondly, in fantasy the world itself, background and all, is arrayed in a way that makes sense to the author - this is not necessarily reflective of the real world. In fact, it very often is not, since the author dictates the very foundations of the world according to their whim. This would mean that the world itself is tilted according to the author's own viewpoints fundamentally rather than superficially as in most works of non-speculative fiction. For instance, Discworld is fundamentally a product of Terry Pratchett, and reflects him in a great many ways in a way that the real world presumably does not (though it would be cool if it would, I think).

Thirdly, with Arcanum once again as the example, the racism is greatly prevalent, but everybody involved is pretty much a white person. Even the half-orcs. Looking at this, you go "well, it's just white people fighting each other, that's that problem solved right there emotionally and ethically". It takes the concept of racism without taking any of its real-world sting, because white people fighting each other isn't actually anything much to talk about whether some of them are pointy-eared or tusked or what have you. It lacks that visceral touch, I would say, doesn't touch upon anything real - it's sort of the theoretical approach, where you look at the issue and go "well, there's no problem here, is there" and pat yourself on the back for a job well done in exploring the concept of racism. It doesn't matter if that same train of logic is technically correct in the real world, because people are genuinely the same the world over. The fact is the issue has been defanged in a big way, and you haven't actually confronted the real world issue in the process. Not that this is a bad thing, necessarily, since it lets you play with racial hatred in a fashion you probably couldn't get away with in, say, To Kill A Mockingbird or something. It just means that fantasy's not terribly socially relevant overall. And from there, fantasy games are not socially relevant, or progressive, either.

no

and by that i mean... hell no???

malacath is not even remotely one of the more evil daedra

I meant D&D 5e orcs and Gruumsh in that example. Malacath is a pretty nice fellow overall, all things considered.

Anyway, that's enough derailing from me. Posting in emotion threads is a weakness I must purge from myself.
« Last Edit: September 23, 2015, 06:16:32 pm by Harry Baldman »
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Rolan7

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86376 on: September 23, 2015, 06:16:17 pm »

It's a reference to Gruumsh, god of the Orcs in d&d. As of 5th edition, possibly 4th as well, all d&d orcs are conduits of Gruumsh's divine hatred of all other races, basically to make it easier to kill them without moral dilemmas.
I've never heard of that in 3.5e DND.  Most cosmology stuff is fairly up in the air anyway, unless you happen to be using the Greyhawk setting.  I've certainly never heard that all orcs are conduits of a particular deity out of the hundred or so.

Yeah, he's the orc deity who opposes Corellon, but it's not like orcs or elves have to worship either.  Wouldn't surprise me if the new editions simplified that though, ironically bringing things back to the old days where "elf" was a class.

4th edition took some disgusting liberties with the default cosmology.  I like everything else about it, but not that.
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Sergarr

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86377 on: September 23, 2015, 06:21:14 pm »

There are still people who like D&D 4e. Even after the Wizards of the Coast has all but admitted that it tanked completely and none of its ideas were salvageable for future editions, something which I don't think has ever happened before with a major RPG.
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Grim Portent

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86378 on: September 23, 2015, 06:22:10 pm »

It's a reference to Gruumsh, god of the Orcs in d&d. As of 5th edition, possibly 4th as well, all d&d orcs are conduits of Gruumsh's divine hatred of all other races, basically to make it easier to kill them without moral dilemmas.
I've never heard of that in 3.5e DND.  Most cosmology stuff is fairly up in the air anyway, unless you happen to be using the Greyhawk setting.  I've certainly never heard that all orcs are conduits of a particular deity out of the hundred or so.

Yeah, he's the orc deity who opposes Corellon, but it's not like orcs or elves have to worship either.  Wouldn't surprise me if the new editions simplified that though, ironically bringing things back to the old days where "elf" was a class.

4th edition took some disgusting liberties with the default cosmology.  I like everything else about it, but not that.

In 3.5 and before they weren't associated with Gruumsh any more than Elves were with Correllon, which is to say that a decent chunk of them would do the spiritual equivalent of telling him to bugger off and then worship something else, but in 5th ed basically all the evil races that were made by gods were refluffed to have no real free will and to basically serve as walking bags of evil.
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Rolan7

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86379 on: September 23, 2015, 06:25:19 pm »

The concepts were good, it emphasized playability and fun.  That's a good thing for a game.  I just don't like what they did to the cosmology, basically.

People were invested in the mechanics of course, but I think screwing over the cosmology at the same time was a mistake.  Simplifying gameplay: Good idea.  Simplifying cosmology at the same time: Just a justification to hate it.

I actually assume 5th edition is pretty good, I hope to play it sometime.  Too bad my DND group split...  Arguably due to failings in 3.5e.
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Quote from: Fallen London, one Unthinkable Hope
This one didn't want to be who they was. On the Surface – it was a dull, unconsidered sadness. But everything changed. Which implied everything could change.

Rolan7

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86380 on: September 23, 2015, 06:40:52 pm »

Aw WHAT, Netflix said there was a whole season of Gotham, but it was just two episodes.
It's really good though, surprisingly.
Kinda like Arrow.  "Haha this'll be comic book tie-in nonsense" "...Huh!"

Starting to think that movie tie-ins for comic books are inherently better, compared to video-game tie-ins.

Though, I'm serious, Halo: Forward Unto Dawn was far better than I expected.  Any Halo or Marathon fan should give that film a shot.  On Netflix, no less.
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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86381 on: September 23, 2015, 06:46:17 pm »

Huh, wikipedia says there's two seasons and 23 episodes. Weird! Netflix has been acting screwy with me too. It had Father Ted for the longest time and when I want to go watch that, it disappears on me. Then I go to watch Misfits and now that's impossible to view for some other reason. The hell?

Rolan7

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86382 on: September 23, 2015, 06:50:28 pm »

Father Ted, hell yeah!  Great series, watched it with my father when we were [speaking]
Netflix tends to be a season behind, if Breaking Bad is an indication.  And sometimes it loses the lease on shows.  Your fault for not watching enough :P  But no really that's life, they have to lease.

Postedit: Me too vvv
« Last Edit: September 23, 2015, 06:53:43 pm by Rolan7 »
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This one didn't want to be who they was. On the Surface – it was a dull, unconsidered sadness. But everything changed. Which implied everything could change.

SOLDIER First

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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86383 on: September 23, 2015, 06:52:58 pm »

Arrow is extremely good and I eagerly await Season 3 on Netflix.
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Re: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O
« Reply #86384 on: September 23, 2015, 06:53:26 pm »

Father Ted, hell yeah!  Great series, watched it with my father when we were [speaking]
Netflix tends to be a season behind, if Breaking Bad is an indication.  And sometimes it loses the lease on shows.  Your fault for not watching enough :P  But no really that's life, they have to lease.
Oh well. I'll just download the Channel 4 app. A shame, though.

Also, Father Ted is definitely great.
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