If You Don’t Have Anything Nice to Say…

 …don’t say anything at all.  Or so the saying goes.  We interrupt our normal content to talk about this video highlighting the upcoming book, The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons: 1970-1976.  It is a history about the making of the Original game, with scans of the Original books, documents, letters, commentary, and input from game historian Jon Peterson.  I was highly anticipating this book, but that’s not what I wanted to talk about.

The video features one Jason Tondro, Senior Game designer at Wizards of the Coast (WotC) for D&D, who apparently has been playing since the Original game was around (so you know that he has old school chops, of course.)

Towards the end of the video (around the 38:30 mark,) Mr. Tondro and interviewer Todd Kenreck go into a smug diatribe about how Original D&D wouldn’t pass their “inclusivity reviews” today, and as a bonus, throw a racist, sexist comment about white males from the Midwest, since it is apparently socially acceptable to do so nowadays.  (Calling it like it is.  Political extremists don’t get to redefine these terms to suit their ideology.)

No shi*t!  The criticism was obvious, unwarranted, and ignorant to boot.  The example they use is the fighter class previously being called “fighting-man,” as if it was some deliberate attempt by some insidious, so-called Patriarchy to enforce their sinister will via an obscure, small press wargame in 1974.

Thing is, five seconds on the interwebz can tell you that the term “fighting-man” originates from “Appendix N” authors like Robert E. Howard (of Conan fame,) and Edgar Rice Burroughs (of Tarzan and John Carter of Mars fame,) whose writings inspired the creators of the game (emphasis mine):

“It was Mars, the god of war, and for me, the fighting man, it had always held the power of irresistible enchantment. As I gazed at it on that far-gone night it seemed to call across the unthinkable void, to lure me to it, to draw me as the lodestone attracts a particle of iron.”

 - Edgar Rice Burroughs, A Princess of Mars

“When I was a fighting-man, the kettle-drums they beat,
The people scattered gold-dust before my horses feet;
But now I am a great king, the people hound my track
With poison in my wine-cup, and daggers at my back.”

- Robert E. Howard, The Phoenix on the Sword

 I find this is a common occurrence with moralist critics.  They don’t seem to “do the work” (the research work, that is) before vomiting subjective nonsense.  Don’t get me started on those dark elves…

Spoiler alert: they're aliens from a (very good) sci-fi novel, written by a female author.

As far as I know, this did not stop female players from playing female "fighting-men" in Original D&D.  If I was to be cynical, which I’m entitled to be at my advancing age, having this guy on almost seems like an attempt to show a sympathetic character so that OG grogs can find their way to the light and repent for their sin of appreciating or even (*gasp*) loving the older games.  It's weird how WotC talks out of both sides of their mouth on classic D&D.  On one hand, they crap all over its legacy, and on the other, they still want your money for this stuff.  Regardless, this kind of commentary from the current faces of D&D seem to lend credence to the idea that new D&D is for people who never really liked old D&D.  Sad.

Original D&D is, like most things, a product of its time; this we know.  Heck!  It didn’t even pass the moralist Christian purity test back then, either (funny how history repeats itself!)  We don't need to be beat over the head with this information again and again.  Fortunately, the game survived the moralists then, and I believe it will survive the moralists now (and tomorrow.)

Old D&D turned me into a newt!  Burn it!

The new (likely sanitized) D&D books will be releasing sometime later in the year (with at least one delayed for the next.)  This will mark the first time in thirty or so years that I do not want buy the next edition of the game (I even have the 5e books.)  I’m just not interested.  I used to think it was a good thing at least, to support the mainstream game even if you don’t play it much (or at all.)  Now I’m not so sure.  In fact, I’m not sure I even want to purchase The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons: 1970-1974, but I do have a lot of respect for Jon Peterson, and I’d really like to read what he wrote (which I suspect is good.)

WotC may own the trademark of D&D (and associated IP,) and is fully entitled to call the shots about the direction in which it goes, but it has increasingly shown itself to be a poor custodian of the game and its history.  The silver lining is the Original game, its spirit, and classic ways of play can at least continue to live on in some form, warts-and-all, regardless of what happens with the official one, thanks largely to the Open Game Licenses (OGLs) and independent publishers with the wherewithal to use them.   To paraphrase something once said about Gary Gygax:
 

D&D is too important to leave to WotC.

Xi & Xi

BREAKING NEWS

Doot, doo-doot, doot, doot, doo-doot…

It looks like Wizards of the Coast (WotC) might be peddling the D&D intellectual property (IP) to potential buyers like Tencent, a company owned by an authoritarian country that happens to rhyme with the intimate parts of the female anatomy.

I couldn't resist!

This is bad enough, but it’s par for the course in our modern, global economy.  These IPs are valuable assets and companies are hungry for them or eager to offload them when they need cash.  Case closed.

*nom...nom...nom* (AI Image courtesy of Bing Image Creator)

What I’m most worried about though, is what will happen to not so much whatever the current version of D&D is (or will be,) but D&D Classics.  

If you have any classic, D&D print-on-demand or PDFs titles on your wish list, you might want to grab those ASAP, and place them in your (real or digital) vault of treasures, because regardless of how this sale goes (or not.)  It’s clear that major changes are coming to D&D.  

I experienced this circa 2008 when WotC pulled their classic PDFs from RPGNow.  While DrivethruRPG (to their credit) honored most of these when they came back online years later, not everything has been offered, and not in the same format.  For example, my PDF of the Mentzer Expert Set no longer includes the Isle of Dread adventure (which it should!)  The lesson: be proactive when change is in the air.  Don’t be caught with your studded leather breeches down!

What a way to celebrate D&D’s 50th anniversary huh?

 

Update: It seems the issue may be more complicated, where the sale IP in question might just be the rights to video game versions (could it include the upcoming virtual table as well?)  That's what I get for getting into the "news" game.  Anyway, my point still applies.  It's best to be prudent about these things.

On Censorship

Coming soon to a politically correct table near you! (AI image courtesy of Bing Image Creator)

I was thinking whether I should post about this at all.  Not in a fit of self-censorship, mind you, but if you follow the same blogs and/or RPG video channels I do (and you probably do,) you’ve about heard enough concerning this subject: that Wizards of the Coast (WotC) has been retroactively editing their 5e books to replace words which have become (quite suddenly) politically incorrect with less “problematic” vernacular.

Still, this is my joint to speak out, and so I will, but instead of sitting here and pontificating, I’ll take the Socratic route and ask some hypothetical questions of WotC:

• Why are you doing this?  (Yes, I know they have their sanitized, corporate reasons, but I want to know the actual “why?”)
• How many complaints did you get from actual customers regarding the language in your books?  Was there a survey I missed?
• Do you expect sales of your products to increase in or at least maintain their sales volume after this decision?
• Will you be retroactively editing your entire catalog?  What about classic (previous edition) books?
• If this is truly an organic change in language over time (as your defenders claim,) why do your books need to be edited at all?  Wouldn’t they already be compliant with current, socially-acceptable language?
• How will future potential customers view your decisions?  What about your current ones?  Do you want to keep me as a customer?
• Extra Credit: how much money would you save by foregoing the use of commissars sensitivity readers?

I began my D&D journey in the AD&D 2nd Edition era, long after Gary Gygax had left TSR and their products had lost some of their edginess to appease concerned moms, the infamous Patricia Pulling, and other hysterical and deceptive proponents of the Satanic Panic of the 80s (which I am old enough to remember.  Did you know The Smurfs were satanic?)  On the subject, here’s TSR’s 1995 Code of Ethics, courtesy of Grognardia.  It makes for fun reading with a slight hint of déjà vu.

Now, I happily bought TSR’s products with my meager paper route money, completely oblivious to their self-censorship.  It was only in later years that I discovered what I had missed out on in their earlier products.  I wonder if it will be the same for future D&D generations if WotC continues in this trajectory.  More’s the pity, because I can't think of any time in which past censorship has been looked at favorably by future generations.

Don't forget your three S's: (Satanic) Sacrifice, Sex, and Slavery!