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Conspiratiorist posted:So now that we've settled savage/primitive humanoid monsters can't be darkskinned, how about we determine what colors we can use? Are they allowed to be redskinned or is that offensive to indians (feather)? Yellow, maybe? Don't cut yourself.
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Oct 19, 2017 00:55
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Splicer posted:Long story short: why doesn't not-Africa have even one not-Benin. Assuming you mean thriving, not "savage" cultures with black people, there's plenty of those in the area. 5e WotC just didn't want to focus on say Tashluta or Lapaliiya and instead did "darkest heart of Faerun" poo poo instead. RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Greenwood could have researched African civilizations or he could have written extensively about the sexual activities of Alustriel Silverhand. As you can see, it was a tough choice. Chult as we know it was not created by Ed Greenwood. It was originally written by James Lowder and Jean Rabe for 2e, along with Lowder's novel The Ring of Winter. Tomb of Annihilation draws primarily from those sources. Greenwood was involved in Serpent Kingdoms for 3e, which focused on expanding the region (including more details on the Tashalar and Lapaliiya, as above) and making it not so stereotypically awful.
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Oct 19, 2017 00:55
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AlphaDog posted:Yeah, that's how I want to read it. Reading the PHB section on spellcasting again, I could see how "requires an attack roll" could mean "spell that uses a spell attack" because it's kind of written such that the latter is defining the former. That said, Crawford said Spell Sniper covers Green Flame Blade (and by extension BB) on Sage Advice so it works either way! Nickoten fucked around with this message at 01:09 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 01:00
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Arivia posted:Chult as we know it was not created by Ed Greenwood. It was originally written by James Lowder and Jean Rabe for 2e, along with Lowder's novel The Ring of Winter. Tomb of Annihilation draws primarily from those sources. Greenwood was involved in Serpent Kingdoms for 3e, which focused on expanding the region (including more details on the Tashalar and Lapaliiya, as above) and making it not so stereotypically awful.  I knew it probably wasn't him but I also knew you'd jump in with the correct info.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:00
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Nickoten posted:Spell Sniper by itself should work. It gives a cantrip that requires an attack roll, which includes Booming Blade because it requires a weapon attack roll. Weapon attack rolls are a subset of attack rolls, so the feat covers it RAW. Yeah, that's how I want to read it.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:03
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Conspiratiorist posted:So now that we've settled savage/primitive humanoid monsters can't be darkskinned, how about we determine what colors we can use? Are they allowed to be redskinned or is that offensive to indians (feather)? Yellow, maybe? Monocultures are a sign of a feeble mind.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:08
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Welp I deleted my original post instead of quoting Alpha Dog. The gist was that Tempest Clerics with a whip are fun because you can make your whip crack with literal thunder and then add extra thunder damage with Booming Blade for ~14-16 damage a turn, plus a better chance at proccing Booming Blade for an extra ~9. Rogues are still better because their free disengage means it's a lot easier to force the movement for BB's extra damage.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:12
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Lurdiak posted:Arguing in bad faith sure is fun. It's the new newbie avatar, it does things to you man. That said, it's Chult. Like, sure, the "dark, savage africa" concept was a product of its time: a wild misrepresentation of the environment and incredibly demeaning to the natives but... well, the concept exists, and it works. Even in settings where you have an incredibly dangerous wilderness filled with monsters, you can still argue a case for landmasses where poo poo is somehow worse and large civilizations just weren't allowed to flourish, or at least there are no current ones and just their ruins. So, what do you do about it? How do you sanitize it? If we want to depict primitive human or proto-human societies, we have only actual societies to draw something recognizable from. And if you want them scary, you add bones and skulls and scarification/mutilation because, poo poo, by and large people find that uncomfortable. So what do you do? The end result of combining these elements is caricatures of cannibal bushmen for the same reason those caricatures popped up two centuries ago. We know better now, kind of, that it's not about them negroes, but... we maintain much in the way of the cultural sensitivities of Europe of that time, which transferred to global society, so almost the entire world simply finds this poo poo disturbing. So, again, what do you do? Do you just trash the concept of scary primitives entirely? Maybe it's okay when it's white people, Mad Max style? What is it?
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Oct 19, 2017 01:14
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If you want savage and primitive, you could base your concepts on something from prehistory. There's a qualitative difference between making use of 18th century interpretations of african culture and something like neanderthals, about which plenty is written.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:17
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Yes, you scrap the idea of the scary, primitive lesser. Like, how is this a question we spend more than two seconds on.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:17
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Nickoten posted:Reading the PHB section on spellcasting again, I could see how "requires an attack roll" could mean "spell that uses a spell attack" because it's kind of written such that the latter is defining the former. That's kinda what I was getting at, but more that "You must make a melee attack with a weapon as part of the casting action" could be read as not being the same thing as "cast spell, make attack roll" since the weapon attack is not an attack "from" the spell. Glad the sage advice went in the right direction on this one. Also see that according to SA the opposite applies to Shocking Grasp since "you're not using a weapon with that and it doesn't magically extend your arms". Seems like a lovely thing to do, probably be better if the lightning acted as a reach weapon if you had Spell Sniper. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 01:22 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 01:19
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Conspiratiorist posted:I guess we should simply trash the entire concept of humanoid monsters as they are clearly cultural appropriation/caricatures of actual human societies that exist or existed. Well, a lot of them are. Conspiratiorist posted:It's the new newbie avatar, it does things to you man. It's not disturbing because bones and cannibals are disturbing. It's disturbing because the premise is that heroes that normally exist in a generally European fantasy setting go to stereotypical fantasy Africa to loot ancient ruins and defeat indigenous people. Do you not think that's maybe going to hit a bit close to home for a lot of people for something that's sold as escapist fiction? Do you not see how this specific combination of concepts could be uncomfortable to be presented with as a power fantasy? Nickoten fucked around with this message at 01:24 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 01:21
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Mr. Maltose posted:Yes, you scrap the idea of the scary, primitive lesser. Like, how is this a question we spend more than two seconds on. The whole thing is even dumber in the first place because Medieval/Renaissance Africa wasn't even primitive compared to Europe. The Industrial Revolution was really the point where Europe starts outpacing Africa. The whole concept of darkest, primitive Africa is a product of European colonialism and a fictional narrative created to excuse colonialism and rationalize why it came about in Africa much later than elsewhere.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:26
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Mr. Maltose posted:Yes, you scrap the idea of the scary, primitive lesser. Like, how is this a question we spend more than two seconds on. I approve of this but good luck getting people to give up their goblinoids and kobolds and trolls and ogres and giants and evil elves. Nickoten posted:It's not disturbing because bones and cannibals are disturbing. It's disturbing because the premise is that heroes that normally exist in a generally European fantasy setting go to stereotypical fantasy Africa to loot ancient ruins and defeat indigenous people. No, no, the 'disturbing' in things I mentioned are about highlighting the elements that make the concept scary and suitable for villains. Not about why people would find offense; in this you're completely right. But rectifying this requires shifting around the core of what DnD is. The standard adventurer is not an archeologist, they're a murderhobo. Under some pretense or sometimes no pretense at all, they go kill often intelligent beings, genocide them in fact, and loot their belongings and desecrate tombs and ruins of civilizations past. Using your arguments, focusing on Chult is being incredibly myopic and ethnocentric.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:30
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Conspiratiorist posted:I approve of this but good luck getting people to give up their goblinoids and kobolds and trolls and ogres and giants and evil elves. Don't describe your black people as primitive and 'noble savages' and establish them as less than the white people showing up to take their poo poo jesus loving christ how hard is this to understand.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:38
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Mr. Maltose posted:Yes, you scrap the idea of the scary, primitive lesser. Like, how is this a question we spend more than two seconds on. At the very least, there is a considerable distance between a Grimlock/Orc/Hill Giant and a black cannibal pygmy wielding a spear and wearing a grass skirt and a bone through their nose. It really isn't much to ask to not do the latter.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:42
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They need to make all tribal, isolated, primitive, savage, and low technology civilizations look like slick, white, suit wearing accountants from the 80's.  Just so everyone can shut the gently caress up.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:43
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Can I shove at the range of my reach weapon?
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Oct 19, 2017 01:47
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D&D's (Tolkien-rooted) storytelling assumption that whole categories of people, easily identifiable by sight, are always evil, always stupid, and perfectly okay to murder and rob on a whim is bad enough without drawing explicit artistic inspiration from real-life societies that not too long ago had their entire continent oppressed, exploited, and enslaved using very similar modes of thought. Like yeah, the primitive, savage being that looks like a person but in reality is a monster is around for a reason but too many people believe that about actual real life people for it to be a good idea to encourage it in our media.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:50
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User0015 posted:They need to make all tribal, isolated, primitive, savage, and low technology civilizations look like slick, white, suit wearing accountants from the 80's. +1. Waffles Inc. posted:Can I shove at the range of my reach weapon? The creature must be within you reach. I dunno, it seems reasonable to be able to do so, but I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of the rules.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:51
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Basically, if you want to do Africa D&D, the way to do it is to make the heroes be from the human societies of Africa, and the monsters be from the folklore and mythology of Africa, just like is done with the default setting and Europe.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:52
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Look, I get all your arguments, but if I don't stand up for the people who like their spear-wielding black cannibals, who will stand up for me when they come for my inbred rural america cannibals? At some point you gotta draw the line.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:53
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Conspiratiorist posted:I approve of this but good luck getting people to give up their goblinoids and kobolds and trolls and ogres and giants and evil elves. In every game I've run since I started, the "monster" species were never monsters. They were just regular people trying to get by like everybody else. It takes a little getting used to, but its way more interesting than the standard ethnic cleansing fever dream that most games endorse.
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Oct 19, 2017 01:53
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Nickoten posted:Welp I deleted my original post instead of quoting Alpha Dog. Hmm Interesting. Maybe start as a human variant paladin sentinal and get 3 levels into that for the smite, dueling fighting style, and oath of vengeance then the rest into tempest cleric? Smite continues to scale as you get higher spell slots, they don't have to specifically be paladin spell slots thanks to the errata. Plus you can get divine strike on top of that which replicates your improved smite anyway so you're only missing out on the extra attack which would chew through your spell slots too fast anyway with smite to be very useful. Nitrousoxide fucked around with this message at 01:57 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 01:54
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Serf posted:In every game I've run since I started, the "monster" species were never monsters. They were just regular people trying to get by like everybody else. It takes a little getting used to, but its way more interesting than the standard ethnic cleansing fever dream that most games endorse. Yep... and if a bunch of orcs has turned into a rampaging horde bent only on destruction, there'd better be a good reason why that's happened. "Orcs are all just like that" is a dumbshit "explanation" which requires a whole lot of handwaving about how an entire species of intelligent beings that's literally always a rampaging horde would even work. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 02:10 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 02:06
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AlphaDog posted:Yep. If a bunch of orcs has turned into a rampaging horde bent only on destruction, there'd better be a good reason why that's happened. "Orcs are all just like that" is a dumbshit "explanation" which requires a whole lot of handwaving about how an entire species of intelligent beings that's literally always a rampaging horde would even work. That was humans until we discovered agriculture, though.
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Oct 19, 2017 02:10
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Conspiratiorist posted:That was humans until we discovered agriculture, though. You sure about that?
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Oct 19, 2017 02:12
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Conspiratiorist posted:That was humans until we discovered agriculture, though. Here is an example of the handwaving I was talking about.
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Oct 19, 2017 02:12
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Conspiratiorist posted:That was humans until we discovered agriculture, though. We didn't have the population density to support hordes, rampaging or no, before agriculture A closer analogy would be nomadic steppe peoples (huns, scythians, mongols, xiongnu) who often decided the easiest way to get the cool stuff city people made was with an army, and on whom the trope is mostly based
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Oct 19, 2017 02:13
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Conspiratiorist posted:That was humans until we discovered agriculture, though. uhhhhh what could you give literally any example of 'rampaging horde for reason' ? cheetah7071 posted:We didn't have the population density to support hordes, rampaging or no, before agriculture Actually the iconic example of 'rampaging horde with no clear motive' trope comes from the Sea Peoples during the Bronze Age collapse. Its important to note that 'no clear motive' is not 'no motive'. There was likely very good reasons, be it due to food shortages as a result of the lack of good farming techniques (pre-crop rotation would lead to desolate lands that were dependent on for farming) combined with the famine, plague and natural disasters driving a large group of people into raiding lands that still had resources(the Myceneans, Hittite and Egypte being the top dogs of the region). This lead to a long cascading effect of every major bronze age civilisation collapsing in on itself and to this day we're not 100% sure on who the 'Sea People' were or what drove them into the eastern Mediterranean. I would point out this is very much after the development of agriculture as setting up those three big kingdoms of the region depended on the population growth that farming provided. kingcom fucked around with this message at 02:23 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 02:16
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There is no reason why goblins, kobolds, trolls, and ogres can't have material reasons for coming into conflict with the player. Like, "uh oh we can't have primitivist depictions of monster societies anymore!" is absolutely spot-on because the native societies that this conflates them with weren't "primitive" either!
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Oct 19, 2017 02:22
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gradenko_2000 posted:There is no reason why goblins, kobolds, trolls, and ogres can't have material reasons for coming into conflict with the player. It's particularly annoying because there are some great points of inspiration from human history that can be used here. Warrior people who cause conflict is a thing that happened. The Hittites as I mentioned early are one of the oldest examples but the Honourable Warrior Klingon archetype is actually drawn from the Roman Republic (the Punic Wars are really good for a quick point of reference). Its a period where only the rich were able to fight as you had to buy your own equipment in Rome and as a result it was seen as a real honour and aspiration to do so. Plus you couldn't serve in an political office without military service, so you ended up with Great Houses who had long histories of military successes and as a result were given real political influence. If you want to do your primitive warrior society, the realistic thing you want to model it on is actually ancient Rome.
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Oct 19, 2017 02:28
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Serf posted:You sure about that? Ask the megafauna.
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Oct 19, 2017 02:29
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gradenko_2000 posted:There is no reason why goblins, kobolds, trolls, and ogres can't have material reasons for coming into conflict with the player. one of the many reasons eberron is the best d&d setting (just uh, ignore eberron drows)
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Oct 19, 2017 02:30
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Brother Entropy posted:one of the many reasons eberron is the best d&d setting Eberrowns. Eberron drow at least have Scorrows who have a pretty long history of being amazing hero characters so they get a bit of a pass from me though yeah they are another good example of loving up with your black people being primitives.
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Oct 19, 2017 02:31
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Conspiratiorist posted:Ask the megafauna. I don't have access to an elephant at the moment. gradenko_2000 posted:There is no reason why goblins, kobolds, trolls, and ogres can't have material reasons for coming into conflict with the player. It's not hard to come up with reasons why people would fight each other, and I don't know why people need to come up with bullshit like "always chaotic evil" or whatever. Of course if you follow the line of material justifications for conflict, you always arrive back at the root cause and only 100% guilt-free acceptable cannon fodder: the bourgeoisie.
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Oct 19, 2017 02:33
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kingcom posted:Eberrowns. Eberron drow at least have Scorrows who have a pretty long history of being amazing hero characters so they get a bit of a pass from me. tbf i never really looked at eberron drow because basically everything not on the main continent in that setting felt very 'oh right i also need to put in these guys because the contest needs everything from the monster manual' so we get the main setting which has all these diverse nations and factions and twists on standard d&d races and then you have 'all the dragons' continent and 'all the psionic poo poo' continent 
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Oct 19, 2017 02:34
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You could probably do a pretty cool campaign which starts off with a "rampaging orc horde" and then slowly reveals "there's an extinciton level threat unfolding, they were escaping from it which is why they brought all their stuff and the kids too and also why they look all raggedy and poo poo" and then humans and elves and orcs and other PCs can all go back down the exodus trail and sword fight whatever weird alien/extraplanar thing/s caused the problem. Serf posted:Of course if you follow the line of material justifications for conflict, you always arrive back at the root cause and only 100% guilt-free acceptable cannon fodder: the bourgeoisie. Countdown to "why did you have to make this discussion all political?" and/or "now you're talking about people like me being the bad guys this is not ok". Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 02:45 on Oct 19, 2017 |
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Oct 19, 2017 02:40
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play as the rampaging orc horde yourself; destroy the terrible elf supremacist empire encroaching on your lands, kill their slavers and looters and child laborers enact full orc communism over the ashes
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Oct 19, 2017 02:46
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AlphaDog posted:Yep... and if a bunch of orcs has turned into a rampaging horde bent only on destruction, there'd better be a good reason why that's happened. "Orcs are all just like that" is a dumbshit "explanation" which requires a whole lot of handwaving about how an entire species of intelligent beings that's literally always a rampaging horde would even work. Been doing a bit of looking at evolutionary psych and life history strategies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_history_theory and depending on the lifecycle of the Orc, there might be some great explanations. According to the evolutionary psych, organisms that live faster lifes: - mature rapidly and have an early age of first reproduction - have a relatively short lifespan - have a large number of offspring at a time, and few reproductive events, or are semelparous - have a high mortality rate and a low offspring survival rate - have minimal parental care/investment The combination of minimal parental care, combined early maturation often leads to aggressive and impulsive decision making. Adding in the fact that they're a bunch of 13 y/o's with probably minimal schooling and ripped muscles probably leads to lots of rampaging hordes purely because their society most likely rewards risk taking and physical prowess. (evolutionary psych is a load of rubbish but kinda works here)
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Oct 19, 2017 02:56
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