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D&D Looks To Cut Down On Racial Differences Going Forward
Races and classes have been the central aspects of character creation since the beginning of Dungeons & Dragons – well, not quite the beginning, since Elf used to be a class in original D&D. However, based on a twitter thread by D&D's Jeremy Crawford, it looks like Wizards of the Coast will be moving toward less drastic racial mechanics, especially in regard to races traditionally considered "monster races."
Crawford pointed out the differences between the orcs found in Volo's Guide to Monsters and those found in the Exandria and Eberron settings, saying that the latter reflects the direction that the D&D team is headed in regard to monsters. The Exandria and Eberron orcs lack the -2 penalty to Intelligence and the required evil alignment. This reflects the fact that in these settings orcs are mostly considered another type of people – with all the varieties in personality and temperament that come with that – rather than fodder for player characters to fight.
[...] It is worth noting that this comes on the heels of a Twitter discussion on the racist history of orcs, initially spawned by a screenshot of the description of orcs in Volo's Guide to Monsters. Tolkien initially portrayed orcs as caricatures of Mongolians, and orcs have been racial stereotypes of other races over and over (see World of Warcraft or Bright). Dungeons & Dragons is not immune to this – even outside of the orc issue, races like the Vistani appear as Romani stereotypes.
Diversity and Dungeons & Dragons
Throughout the 50-year history of D&D, some of the peoples in the game—orcs and drow being two of the prime examples—have been characterized as monstrous and evil, using descriptions that are painfully reminiscent of how real-world ethnic groups have been and continue to be denigrated. That's just not right, and it's not something we believe in. Despite our conscious efforts to the contrary, we have allowed some of those old descriptions to reappear in the game. We recognize that to live our values, we have to do an even better job in handling these issues. If we make mistakes, our priority is to make things right.
See also: Dungeons & Dragons Designers Clarify How Gnolls Differ From Other D&D Creatures
Related: Gender and Appearance Stereotypes Travel to World of Warcraft
(Score: 5, Insightful) by krishnoid on Saturday June 20 2020, @11:52PM (4 children)
Sounds like the Klingons. Or maybe the Romulans?
How about if a huge part of income taxes are applied to the military, the military is sent out on excursions rather than defending existing borders, and you cage trespassers at the border instead?
That's probably less evil, but now that you mention it, the alignment system vectors only have orientation, but no magnitude.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Username on Sunday June 21 2020, @06:23PM
I can see Romulans being Drow and Vulcans being other Elves. Klingons, idk, I see them more like Dwarves. They seems to have more dimension to them than just fighting. Clans and honor and whatnot. I see Orcs more like that one Dominion race that was genetically modified to fight and obey the founders. They always need some other race to lead them.
Hum. That does describe the federation. The do like their occasional excursions into the Romulan DMZ, and the unofficial sponsorship of the Maquis violence against Cardassia.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Mykl on Sunday June 21 2020, @10:25PM (2 children)
This raises a really interesting question for me.
A strong case can be made for several countries IRL to be considered "Evil" (e.g. North Korea, Ceaucescu's Romania, Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, the USA as it pertains to their foreign policy in South America, Asia and the Middle East), however what we're really talking about there is the leadership. The individuals living in those countries are often good and can be just as much a victim of the leadership.
in D&D terms, if a society is evil, but most of the individuals within that society are not, is it OK to attack them on sight?
(Score: 4, Touché) by takyon on Sunday June 21 2020, @11:04PM
Ask your party's cleric about jihad.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2020, @02:45AM
Evil is just a matter of perspective. It's all subjective, so arguing as if these are concrete terms is unproductive. I've met people who think owning animals is evil, so are Greenpeace terrorists or freedom fighters?
Why did Afghanis keep joining Al Qaeda until we finally gave up and surrendered the country to them last week? I'm sure plenty of people on this site would consider then evil terrorists, but they view Americans the same way, I'd bet.