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Volcott posted:Aren't there, like, a bunch of beholders down there too? This is analogous to not wearing kevlar in a war zone because the other side has nuclear capability.
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Dec 5, 2021 12:38
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the_steve posted:If anything, shouldn't Drow be white? And I mean white. Printer paper white. Another reason FFXIV's drow-equivalent are good; their skin tones are generally really pale or grey, the kind of colors you'd actually expect the skin of sun-starved creatures to get. The surface-dwelling elves instead get sweet tans. And an... I'm not even sure 'honorable' mention to the Elder Scrolls dark elves. Who don't live underground, they live on a volcanic island, and have ashen skin because the volcano erupted and stained them. Which sounds better at first, but then you realize that's the sort of ancient legend that you got about why black people existed, and they're just saying that actually did happen in that world.
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Dec 5, 2021 14:05
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Antifa Turkeesian posted:Drow Piet is a beloved Christmas tradition! On this note: Black Peter didn't age well thanks to Swart Piet.
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Dec 5, 2021 14:09
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Yeah... good old Zwarte Piet I was astonished to hear that my mom protested against it back in her time. And yet we stuck with it for so long.
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Dec 5, 2021 17:47
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Cleretic posted:Another reason FFXIV's drow-equivalent are good; their skin tones are generally really pale or grey, the kind of colors you'd actually expect the skin of sun-starved creatures to get. The surface-dwelling elves instead get sweet tans. Nah, it wasn't the volcano, or at least under normal circumstances the volcano wouldn't have changed them so much. Azura was mad at Almalexia, Sotha Sil and Vivec for killing Nerevar, so she cursed all Dark Elves. It was explicitly a curse, and the Dunmer explicitly didn't deserve it. It was an rear end in a top hat god being an rear end in a top hat. I'm not sure whether that makes it better or not honestly.
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Dec 5, 2021 17:52
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the_steve posted:If anything, shouldn't Drow be white? And I mean white. Printer paper white. Drow 
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Dec 5, 2021 17:53
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In the Elder Scrolls Orcs are a result of their god being eaten by another god and shat out. Before that they were just a type of High Elf.sweet geek swag posted:Nah, it wasn't the volcano, or at least under normal circumstances the volcano wouldn't have changed them so much. Azura was mad at Almalexia, Sotha Sil and Vivec for killing Nerevar, so she cursed all Dark Elves. It was explicitly a curse, and the Dunmer explicitly didn't deserve it. It was an rear end in a top hat god being an rear end in a top hat. I'm not sure whether that makes it better or not honestly. Them using the heart of a dead god to become knockoff half gods was probably also a sore point. FreudianSlippers has a new favorite as of 18:05 on Dec 5, 2021 |
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Dec 5, 2021 18:03
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Elder Scrolls also has two kinds of underground elves, one of which are albino and iirc eyeless, the Falmer.
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Dec 5, 2021 23:56
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Muscle Tracer posted:Elder Scrolls also has two kinds of underground elves, one of which are albino and iirc eyeless, the Falmer. Weren't they horribly mutated into that state by the Dwarves, who are the other kind of underground elf? (so many kinds of goddamn elves and they're ALL assholes in subtly different ways...)
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Dec 6, 2021 00:02
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Asterite34 posted:Weren't they horribly mutated into that state by the Dwarves, who are the other kind of underground elf? yes, the falmer are just slaves, but like bred to be in a weakened state and its pretty hosed up, dwarves suck im glad they all disappeared into a black hole or whatever
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Dec 6, 2021 01:21
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sweet geek swag posted:Nah, it wasn't the volcano, or at least under normal circumstances the volcano wouldn't have changed them so much. Azura was mad at Almalexia, Sotha Sil and Vivec for killing Nerevar, so she cursed all Dark Elves. It was explicitly a curse, and the Dunmer explicitly didn't deserve it. It was an rear end in a top hat god being an rear end in a top hat. I'm not sure whether that makes it better or not honestly. It's not a curse for the dunmer, but just for the tribunal themselves. Azura herself takes on a form with dark grey skin and red eyes pretty often and she changed the Dunmer to look like herself, which the Dunmer only see as a positive thing. To the Dunmer their change is seen as a vindication of their beliefs/veloths exodus ("hell yeah I get to look like our beloved maternal goddess). It's a blessing not a curse for most of the people. It's a curse for the tribunal cause they can't look at their people without seeing Azura and being reminded of their betrayal and their inevitable defeat via her prophecy. Also a sign of Azura's posessiveness ("the Dunmer are still mine") Is it still racist? I dunno, but it's not "dark skin is a curse" but rather "we worship the Daedra and now we look like the most beautiful/maternal one and that's dope" with a side of freaking out 3 specific assholes.
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Dec 6, 2021 01:44
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Is there fantasy from that formative 70s-80s era that has good politics? I know almost nothing about it, but I’d like a nice unselfconscious anarchist Conan or something. Sincerity is key.
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Dec 6, 2021 03:51
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Antifa Turkeesian posted:Is there fantasy from that formative 70s-80s era that has good politics? I know almost nothing about it, but I’d like a nice unselfconscious anarchist Conan or something. Sincerity is key. Does Discworld count?
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Dec 6, 2021 04:08
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seconding Discworld.
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Dec 6, 2021 07:49
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Thirded.
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Dec 6, 2021 08:12
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Only potentially problematic book from the series was Interesting Times. Discworld was otherwise sublime.
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Dec 6, 2021 08:16
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Discworld is so goddamned good.quote:IT IS … UNFAIR. [said Death, the Grim Reaper] Ragnar34 has a new favorite as of 08:49 on Dec 6, 2021 |
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Dec 6, 2021 08:47
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I always loved the irony that Death has the best bedside manner and the most empathy for others because he works with literally every living creature and remembers them on a personal level. He can't feel the way they can because he lacks the glands, but he understands well enough how they feel despite that. As Susan puts it he can't feel sorry for others, but he THINKS sorry for them.
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Dec 6, 2021 09:02
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BioEnchanted posted:I always loved the irony that Death has the best bedside manner and the most empathy for others because he works with literally every living creature and remembers them on a personal level. He can't feel the way they can because he lacks the glands, but he understands well enough how they feel despite that. As Susan puts it he can't feel sorry for others, but he THINKS sorry for them. What can the harvest hope for, if not for the care of the reaper man?
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Dec 6, 2021 09:16
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I also like that the kind of call out the old trope of the tough guy making tough decisions in Vetinari - he is under no illusions of the kind of person he is, and that while he has stabilised Ankh Morpork for now as soon as he dies everything will fall apart, so he tasks Moist Von Lipwig with reviving long dead infrastructure so that the city can actually function. I also like his decision making in Raising Steam, he hears about the new train and is just like "Moist. I WANT a train station. Go see what's up, and make that train come here." Partially because the train is just cool, but also so that the city can be connected to the rest of the disc properly.
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Dec 6, 2021 09:48
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Yeah, there's some scenes, especially in Making Money, that could be read as Moist being tested as a potential next Patrician or being tasked to set up the city in a way that it wouldn't need a next Patrician. Raising Steam is primarily a farewell to the Disc, with drat near every still living character getting a cameo if not their own scene, the rest of it is about how cool trains are, and if you squint there's even a story about Moist in there.
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Dec 6, 2021 10:20
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I've read somewhere between half to 2/3 of discworld books. I slowly dole out the rest because I'll be real sad when I'm out of them.
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Dec 6, 2021 12:14
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Strom Cuzewon posted:I'm not doubting these historians, but I do wonder how you conclusively prove that something is nonsense, and not just some incredibly obscure dialect you've never heard of. Depends what it is, but sometimes it's super obvious. As long as there have been desirable goods, there have been bootlegs; I've handled imitation Samian ware that was made contemporarily to the real stuff where they just banged on a crappy horse & some psuedo roman decoration, and then some nonsense Latin letters/words. It's pretty obvious in those cases that they were made by a local craftsman to sell to people who almost certainly couldn't read Latin but wanted some of that slick Roman tableware to show off to other chieftains or whatever. Like the ancient equivalent of a knock off Louis Vuitton purse.
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Dec 6, 2021 12:40
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Acute Grill posted:Yeah, there's some scenes, especially in Making Money, that could be read as Moist being tested as a potential next Patrician or being tasked to set up the city in a way that it wouldn't need a next Patrician. Raising Steam was the last completed Discworld novel, but it wasn't meant to be the last Discworld novel. When Pterry realised in December 2014 that he could no longer write he was well into the first draft of Twilight Canyons, a murder mystery set in a retirement home for the undead. He also had rough outlines for sequels to Snuff and The Amazing Maurice, and notes for two more novels - one set in Howondaland and another centring on the Disc's invention of crystal radio.
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Dec 6, 2021 14:33
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Samovar posted:Only potentially problematic book from the series was Interesting Times. Discworld was otherwise sublime. Color of Magic isn't great with Twoflower being an 80s stereotype of a Japanese tourist.
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Dec 6, 2021 14:43
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I could never bring myself to read the last couple Discworld books. You could already see his decline slowly creeping into his work and, if I never read those final books, they will sit there, perfect, forever, in my imagination.
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Dec 6, 2021 14:51
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Jedit posted:Raising Steam was the last completed Discworld novel, but it wasn't meant to be the last Discworld novel. When Pterry realised in December 2014 that he could no longer write he was well into the first draft of Twilight Canyons, a murder mystery set in a retirement home for the undead. He also had rough outlines for sequels to Snuff and The Amazing Maurice, and notes for two more novels - one set in Howondaland and another centring on the Disc's invention of crystal radio. There was also Scouting for Trolls, and a few others mentioned in the appendix of The Shepherd's Crown.
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Dec 6, 2021 14:52
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Macdeo Lurjtux posted:Color of Magic isn't great with Twoflower being an 80s stereotype of a Japanese tourist. Twoflower was as a stereotypical american tourist.
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Dec 6, 2021 15:26
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lemonadesweetheart posted:Twoflower was as a stereotypical american tourist. Twoflower was a manic pixie dream girl.
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Dec 6, 2021 15:39
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He's called out as being 'Auriental' and shows up there in Interesting Times as his homeland. Vvvvv It's all good, it's probably a time where whitewashing a character was probably for the best. Macdeo Lurjtux has a new favorite as of 16:07 on Dec 6, 2021 |
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Dec 6, 2021 15:53
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Macdeo Lurjtux posted:He's called out as being 'Auriental' and shows up there in Interesting Times as his homeland. I stand corrected. I blame Sean Astin.
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Dec 6, 2021 16:02
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Samovar posted:Only potentially problematic book from the series was Interesting Times. Discworld was otherwise sublime. A few of the books, mostly the Rincewind books, have some somewhat problematic depictions of women. They're a lot better than the sword-and-sorcery books they're parodying (a low bar for sure), but it does get a bit awkward when character after character is described as big-breasted and blonde and you can really feel Pratchett's horniness coming through. Fortunately, that almost entirely goes away after the first five books or so, with the exception of the character Angua. But yeah, on the other hand, most of Discworld is quite excellent with regard to politics. A lot of the books are quite explicitly feminist without being horny at all.
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Dec 6, 2021 16:55
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DontMockMySmock posted:A few of the books, mostly the Rincewind books, have some somewhat problematic depictions of women. They're a lot better than the sword-and-sorcery books they're parodying (a low bar for sure), but it does get a bit awkward when character after character is described as big-breasted and blonde and you can really feel Pratchett's horniness coming through. Fortunately, that almost entirely goes away after the first five books or so, with the exception of the character Angua. Wonder if it's because Rhianna got older and he realised oh gently caress.
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Dec 6, 2021 16:59
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Macdeo Lurjtux posted:He's called out as being 'Auriental' and shows up there in Interesting Times as his homeland. Unless I’m very much mistaken, the original cover art has him looking like Mickey Rooney in Breakfast At Tiffanys complete with yellow skin, buck teeth and coke-bottle glasses. And maybe a camera or two around his neck. e: lmao at googling Twoflower, it’s the most racist poo poo imaginable. Torquemada has a new favorite as of 17:32 on Dec 6, 2021 |
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Dec 6, 2021 17:30
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Torquemada posted:Unless I’m very much mistaken, the original cover art has him looking like Mickey Rooney in Breakfast At Tiffanys complete with yellow skin, buck teeth and coke-bottle glasses. And maybe a camera or two around his neck.   EDIT: same thing in The Light Fantastic. So it wasn't an isolated incident 
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Dec 6, 2021 17:49
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Torquemada posted:Unless I’m very much mistaken, the original cover art has him looking like Mickey Rooney in Breakfast At Tiffanys complete with yellow skin, buck teeth and coke-bottle glasses. And maybe a camera or two around his neck. Depending on the publisher and whatnot, does the author get a lot of say-so in the cover art or the illustrator? I thought it was usually more a case of "Illustrator is given a quick rundown of the book and they design the cover based on that." Could've sworn I remembered reading something like that in the "Let's Read The Sword of Truth books" thread, when Goodkind threw a fit over there being dragons on the cover of his "Totally not fantasy" fantasy novel.
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Dec 6, 2021 17:57
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Dec 6, 2021 17:58
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the_steve posted:Could've sworn I remembered reading something like that in the "Let's Read The Sword of Truth books" thread, when Goodkind threw a fit over there being dragons on the cover of his "Totally not fantasy" fantasy novel.
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Dec 6, 2021 18:00
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Getting mad that your series that is named after a magic sword and has the word "Wizard" in the title of the first book got classed as fantasy sure is pretty, uh, narcissistic I guess?
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Dec 6, 2021 18:05
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Khizan posted:Note, the book he was throwing that fit about actually had a dragon as a major plot point, it was not a case of ‘gently caress it, people like dragons, add one to the cover’. Absolutely. My point was just that I didn't think authors typically got any say-so in the artwork for their book covers.
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Dec 6, 2021 18:05
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