In light of all the recent MYFAROG threads

And guess which of those the narrative presents as enlightened and which as a bunch of designated bad guys

>mythical Europe
there's your problem

Why would mythical Europe have black people?

It's mythical. Teleportation gone awry. Kunta Kente and his buddies have been chasing this one fucking vampire for gods knows how long.

And his point is that D&D was never supposed to be mythical Europe.

Ambassadors from the kingdom of Prester John

>And his point is that D&D was never supposed to be mythical Europe.

And that just loops back to the user's original argument that D&D is now just modern day America fantasy.

>After seeing it week after week and how much people dislike it

People don't dislike MYFAROG (because the creator won't ever post a scan of the rules, so no one on Veeky Forums will ever read the rules). People dislike the weekly spam threads that are obviously created by the same OP, or someone aping the OP.

The game itself seems to be a lackluster retroclone with an extra layer of "muh nordic heritage" rules on top.

There's a difference between "you meet one or two ambassadors from the Kingdom of Nubia" and numerous black people popping up everywhere as bakers, soldiers or farmers.

>user's original argument that D&D is now just modern day America fantasy.

I don't see how acknowledging that brown people exist and occasionally having them appear suddenly makes it American. Or why that's even a bad thing.

Moors

Yeah, but it always was. It's not something that just happened. user was complaining like D&D's gotten worse because of it whereas if that was his measurement, it was always just as bad. (of course, user could always admit that he never cared about historical accuracy and is just triggered by black people, but that's less socially acceptable and he has no balls)

>and numerous black people popping up everywhere as bakers, soldiers or farmers.
What settings actually have this happen? At most you'll see a black dude whose an adventurer or a trader.

What, no Racial Holy War? I'm surprised, Veeky Forums.

Acknowledging that brown people exist? Sure, I'm all for that. Would be great to have brown people kingdoms and regions to visit.

It's when you have a significant percentage of your human population in what is clearly inspired by Europe has dark skin for absolutely no reason does it get a little wonky.

Moors were unique to North Africa, Spain and bits of South Italy, they wouldn't be showing up in any significant numbers in Germany or France post-1066.

In a world where 20% of people have access to teleportation magic and heroes routinely fly around the globe on adventures, it's unrealistic to imagine black people ever leaving the Africa-analog continent or settling elsewhere.

>What, no Racial Holy War? I'm surprised, Veeky Forums.
OP doesn't want any competition with his game

>In a world where 20% of people have access to teleportation magic and heroes routinely fly around the globe on adventures, it's unrealistic to imagine black people ever leaving the Africa-analog continent or settling elsewhere.

Which is why you always see a significant amount of white people in the Africa-analog, right?

>Which is why you always see a significant amount of white people in the Africa-analog, right?
Most settings don't really go into that much detail but that is true for Golarion at least. The Wizards of the Expanse and the rest of the Inner Sea regularly send students too and fro to learn magic from around the world.

RaHoWa is too silly to be taken seriously.

A student is not equivalent to a common farmer.

>1. What do you think is the most /pol/itically charged of tabletop games?
The most popular. It's probably D&D, currently. Morons who look for trouble often flock to what is popular.
>2. What would you do to make it less so?
Alienate the entire playerbase so that no one is playing it. No /pol/ shit if there's no one looking for it.
>3. What would you to make it more so?
Find a way to attract in wave after wave of new players. It started in the 80s when D&D was popular enough to warrant Christian anti-D&D propaganda. The modern equivalent is some overweight university student wearing thick-rimmed glasses with enough dye in their hair to count as aposematism vaping on their blog about how some nerds sitting away from the public eye using dice to partially randomise a game of pretend with set rules is "problematic"

>D&D was never supposed to emulate historical Europe. You had wild tribesman, cave people, dinosaurs, and robots shooting laser guns from day fucking 1.
i am aware of this. D&D was pastiche from day 1. but at the core resides tolkien-esque fantasy, aka mythical medieval europe. see Dragonlance, see Forgotten Realm. it takes this tokien-esque fantasy and puts in additional elements as spices. however, if FR becomes more filled with people of color now (as the demographics of the US changes), it is abandoning its european roots.

you cannot have classical fantasy (which is based on mythical medieval europe) and substantial amounts of people of color in not-europe at the same time.

well, mythical europe means "a variant of the europe in King Arthur, Nibelungs, Beowulf, Robin Hood, etc"
if you put too many black people in (as in the new beowulf show), it stops being that

>D&D was never supposed to be mythical Europe.
the moment it abandons the core being mythical europe, it opens up a flank for other companies because ultimately people want to relive the above stories or LOTR or GoT or Conan. at the heart of all these tales is mythical medieval europe.

>People dislike the weekly spam threads that are obviously created by the same OP, or someone aping the OP.
untrue. i am not the OP here but i made a MYFAROG thread last week and promptly was accused (to my silent amusement) of continually creating the same spam threads

I'm still waiting on the D&D setting with loads of blacks as common farmers.

maybe but it's definitely on the rise and the question is how far it goes as the US demographics shifts. and the new beowulf is indication that it will travel in this direction.

>at the core resides tolkien-esque fantasy
You mean Dying Earth and Conan.

>In a world where 20% of people have access to teleportation magic and heroes routinely fly around the globe
wait a sec, i thought 5E toned down on magic items and shit? secondly, heroes and villains play by different rules than commoners/mooks.

>the moment it abandons the core being mythical europe, it opens up a flank for other companies because ultimately people want to relive the above stories or LOTR or GoT or Conan.
This is literally an opinion. D&D never abandoned being mythical Europe because it was never supposed to be Europe.
>it opens up a flank for other companies because ultimately people want to relive the above stories or LOTR or GoT or Conan. at the heart of all these tales is mythical medieval europe.
And many of these people want to do something different or not exactly like your ideal version of mythical Europe.

huh. halflings aren't not!hobbits after all, i guess.

>but at the core resides tolkien-esque fantasy, aka mythical medieval Europe.
D&D begins and stops being tolkein-esque with Elves, Dwarvevs, Halflings, and Balors.
>maybe but it's definitely on the rise
Examples mother fucker
>beowulf shows
People have been acting as people not of their race and gender for centuries.

Lancelot was, canonically, a black man. Beowulf has numerous references to the dark skin of their compatriots. Robin Hood's partner was a black Saracen, for god's sake! Are you telling me representing these people is wrong? Give me a break.

Now, time to bitch and moan about white people in Asian settings...

Tolkien was always less of an influence than Vance, Howard, Anderson, etc. OD&D had hobbits, balrogs, and the like (mostly as holdovers from the Chainmail Fantasy Supplement), but the tone was always more pulp than LotR.

>Lancelot was, canonically, a black man.
> Beowulf has numerous references to the dark skinf their compatriots
I'm not /pol/ but this is some legit "WEWUZ" shit. Stop giving them ammo, pls.'

>This is literally an opinion. D&D never abandoned being mythical Europe because it was never supposed to be Europe.
huh. i guess there has never been a controvery about monks being too controversial.

does FR have knights, btw? should we run down the list?

>And many of these people want to do something different or not exactly like your ideal version of mythical Europe.
fine with me. just as long as you understand that introducing PoC to a substantial degree means turning your back on LOTR, GoT, King Arthur, even Conan (where races are geographically divided).

>does FR have knights, btw?
You are aware that FR and its satellite settings cover most of a planet, right?

In medieval European terms, "black" could describe anything from "dark hair and eyes" to "swarthy complexion" or even "perpetually unhappy-looking"

How the hell is it WE WUZ shit?

Really, because I play DnD to be amoral adventurers chasing profit.

Clearly because it's okay for black people to be in a fictional rendition of Europe, but it's totally not okay to make characters whose skin color or gender never mattered black or women.

Does Beowulf lose anything by being a woman? Does Lancelot cease to be a character if he's black?

Offending /pol/ would be a plus.

The most politically charged game by far is Eclipse Phase. Other games have more political content, but no game and no fan base is so obsessively, self-consciously political.

Even W:tA, which was written by a very political person (Andrew Greenberg) and was openly admitted to be a political activism in art, doesn't reach EP's level because the FANS aren't all that political.

>beowolf becomes a cute girl
FORCE OF WILLLLLL

See

If you seriously think that D&Ds having the occasional art piece featuring a black dude makes it THE MOST POLITICALLY CHARGED TABLETOP GAME, your knowledge of tabletop games is really, really, really, really, REAAAALY lacking.

>well, mythical europe means "a variant of the europe in King Arthur, Nibelungs, Beowulf, Robin Hood, etc"
How about the variant that also has minotaurs, mind flayers, beholders, alien robots, vampires and pirates? Because that's the one D&D's always assumed. Your individual game may've been an autistic rendition of Arthurian mythology, but that's not what the developers ever had in mind

>you cannot have classical fantasy (which is based on mythical medieval europe) and substantial amounts of people of color in not-europe at the same time.
I don't even know how to start breaking down this sentence into its component stupidities. Any combination of words in any order is equally stupid, help

yes. which is why I said above
>at the CORE resides tolkien-esque fantasy, aka mythical medieval europe.
the core! conan was adventuring through all kinds of african/asian cultures too. this is fine for a campaign. the bread & butter of classical fantasy remains not!europe though.

>Lancelot was, canonically, a black man.
citation needed. anyway, there's a difference between having a single outsider of different color to having large parts of not!europe's opulation black or asian or arab. the former is good, established tradition in mythical europe's tales. the latter is a more recent phenomenon. i suspect it is driven by changing demographics, mainly in the USA.

Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance we're both heavily influenced by Glorantha, which is famous for being a non-Tolkeinesque fantasy setting. FR and Dragonlance has more European areas, but the Sword Coast was always a big trade route and is the big focus in 5e.

Greyhawk is based on a lot of things, but Gygax was not a Tolkien fan and only let some of it in because his players.

i don't but it has started the kind of debate that i wanted to start.

i reread the sentence. i stand to it. but go ahead, give us your argument against it. we're waiting.

anyway:
>Set on the planet Abeir-Toril, most of the Forgotten Realms source material focuses on the continent Faerûn. Faerûn is pretty similar to pre-industrial Europe, with the exceptions of all of that crazy fantasy stuff.
>source: 1d4chan
>inb4 id4chan, lel
we can look at more sources, if you want to. but you should realize that you are under suspicion of
a) being a troll
b) being a SJW who is going to deny what has been common wisdom all along: FR is based on mythical, medieval/renaissance europe.

the 1d4chan author at least had no reason to lie about the europe connection, unlike a SJW who doesnt want anyone to shit on WOTC's diversity strategy.

so, go ahead, make your play. i dare ya to.

That doesn't answer anything.

>i don't but it has started the kind of debate that i wanted to start.
Ah! So you're literally trolling! Phew, I thought there for a moment you were serious. Could you please put on trips so I can hide your posts?

shall we have a look at the architecture of Faerun? the clothing of commoners? the most common arms? do i need to post baldur's gate and neverwinter nights screenshots?

or maybe wikipedia?
>The theme of D&D was influenced by mythology, pulp fiction, and contemporary fantasy authors of the 1960s and 1970s. The presence of halflings, elves, dwarves, half-elves, orcs, rangers and the like often draw comparisons to the work of J. R. R. Tolkien. The resemblance was even closer before the threat of copyright action from Tolkien Enterprises prompted the name changes of hobbit to 'halfling', ent to 'treant', and balrog to 'balor'. Gygax maintained that he was influenced very little by The Lord of the Rings, stating that he included these elements as a marketing move to draw on the popularity of the work[7][8] However, in an interview in 2000, he acknowledged that Tolkien had a "strong impact".[9]

Question!

Is it okay to play a mighty white hero in Not!Africa or Not!Asia?

>hurt dur I'm a retarded celt whose never heard of the Italian or Iberian peninsulas

How does it feel to be retarded?

>Ah! So you're literally trolling!
>literally trolling
not really

>Phew, I thought there for a moment you were serious. Could you please put on trips so I can hide your posts?
why, yes, of course. there you go.

>black people in spain or italy
please give me a percentage of the overall populace

So European!

In a particular kind of game, certainly. In most fantasy settings, it would be okay to play A white hero in Africa or Asia. One among many, not more or less inherently capable. You know, like the black heroes in the vast majority of fantasy RPGs, if you'd ever actually bothered to check them rather than spazzing out and closing the book the moment you saw melanin.

Oh sure, because Pedro the Moorish Castilian is going to pick up his things and move to Lübeck.

Enclaves existed yes, but they weren't inexplicably dispersed throughout the countryside.

(me)
Even in it's roots you see how much the art was influenced by Tolkien!

Is it also good to have significant numbers of white people in your Not!Africa or Not!Asia?

Why not?

well, yes.

not him but... i have no problems with occasional black heroes in not!europe. i have a problem if significant percentages of the genpop turn non-white. also, i have to wonder how you'd feel about the above scenario if about 40% of heroes in not!africa were white. just showing those southerners how it's properly done, ey?

they existed at border regions. and to a lesser degree probably in trade centers. again, no problem with occasional exotic black man in not!europe.

I want you to show me where in the Forgotten Realms guide they give you a percentage based ethnic breakdown of waterdeep that says it's 20% latinos. Because otherwise, you're basing it on the art, which by definition only shows you interesting snapshots of the setting (assuming it doesn't just show you individual characters, in which case all supposed "claims" of representation go out the window since these people are exceptional by definition), meaning they're inordinately likely to include eyecatching characters.

nice anecdotal evidence. how is that going to disprove my above claim that D&D always was pastiche with tolkienesque not!europe at its core though? good luck trying that.

don't bother, he's an SJW trying to protect muh diversity in gaming. they're even claiming that Faerun isnt based on europe now. i mean, how desperate can one get?

that brings up another conundrum for WOTC though. if they want to appeal to PoC gamers... how long will they be satisfied with just being outliers?

>It's the individual NPC backstories that are.
Yeah this, I have made it sound less /pol/itically charged, but I think using Taldor and Alkenstar, the two countries Paizo gives little shits about doesn't count. Given that the major NPC's of the former have all of about a paragraph of information on each and nothing on the latter other than a name or two. Portraying the Grand Prince Stavian III as an armchair detective made it a lot more fun desu senpai

Man who the fuck cares what color the people are. It's fantasy. There are literal green skins running about next to scaly dragon people, and niggers being about your pseudo-europe hurts believably? This shit is just depressing.

I just don't fucking get it. Having robots and shit is okay, that doesnt break from your meme vision of pure north Western European mythological setting. But having a couple black dudes does. It's such an arbitrary line to draw in the sand.

>the architecture of Faerun
Why certainly! Do you want to look at Mulhorand? Turmish? Amn? Tethyr? Calimshan? Chult? Chondath? Sespech? Unther? The Shaar? Ulgarth? Halruaa?

You're calling people sjws for being content with the status quo. What.

Diversity has a weird ring to it when you see the NBA is labeled the "most diverse organization in America" and it's basically all black guys. Same with many schools that proudly claim how they don't have a single white student and, as they're all Asian or African, they're beaming examples of diversity.

and again, the roots of Forgotten Realms are indirectly (via the above mentioned authors, including Tolkien) King Arthur, Siegfried, Robin Hood, Beowulf, Dietrich von Bern, etc.

are you trying to tell me that abandoning these roots doesn't change the atmosphere? it is these above stories that have captured the imagination of people and driven people like JRR or Howard. even today, looking at Westeros, this is what drives the genre.

but perhaps you think GoT would be equally popular if the cast was 80% black actors.

fucking SJWs

I forgot how much I hated Forgotten Realms until you reminded me how nonsensical their naming system was.

You're basically throwing letters at me right now. That shit's babble.

>Having robots and shit is okay,
what, no! i dont robots or lasers in my fantasy, unless i am explicitly aiming at crossover campaign.

Calishites and Rashemi aren't from the Forgotten Realms now? What about the Bedines?

Also, of course, a setting without black people really can't be considered tolkienesque at all, considering there's a fucking army of them in the most well-known work.

>what, no! i dont robots or lasers in my fantasy, unless i am explicitly aiming at crossover campaign.

You mean like, "crossing over with D&D"?

Because old-school D&D has robots and lasers and shit.

This just proves how garbage your taste is. Gonzo is the finest fantasy.

Those are the original FR AD&D 1e products you moron.

The fucking stories aren't even visual in the first place, it'd change jack shit to have different skin colors on the characters.

And the continent of Westeros itself has a fucking country of desert-dwelling brown people, not to mention random not!blacks and not!arabs popping up all over the place because they or their ancestors wandered in sometime.

Yes, how long will it be before the Jewish lizardmen unveil their master plan and the Knights Templar defeat the Illuminati? Is your bunker ready for the reckoning?

Do you realize how retarded you're sounding right now?

I don't give a shit about your stupid American race politics. The rest of the civilized civilized world has figured out that there's a middle ground between alt right and sjw

EVERYONE WHO DISAGREES WITH ME IS AN SJW REEEEEEEEE

BUT IF YOU TRY TO CLAIM THAT I'M FROM /POL/ JUST BECAUSE MY VIEWPOINTS REFLECT /POL/s THAT MAKES YOU ANTI-INTELLECTUAL REEEEREEEE

>but perhaps you think GoT would be equally popular if the cast was 80% black actors
>what is half the series being set in Essos

Enter 21st century two party politics, where discussion is impossible, a middle ground doesn't exist and you're either for or against.

Only in America. There's a whole wide world out there, if you only dare peek outside whatever Kansas town you grew up in and are statistically as likely to leave as a Middle Ages peasant their own home village.

i didnt claim anything else, asshat. i also take note that the most pooular D&D setting by far has disposed of the science-fiction elements. apparently gamers prefer mythical not!europe without lasers and robots.

but nice cherry-picking there. same goes for

I'm from Canada... My point is that this whole argument has nothing to do with pseudo european mythology. There are swashbuckling pirates for Christ sake.

I hate that /pol/'s been getting it's bullshit everywhere lately. I can't escape retarded-ass identity politics or ideological dick-measuring or offline.

Yet you're still bitching about how it's filled with black people. So, by your own definition, it still isn't mythological not-Europe.

which brings us again to the point where occasional non-whites are just fine.

>Do you realize how retarded you're sounding right now?
nope. i realize you claiming that i do so after delivering a strawman though. good going.

>The rest of the civilized civilized world has figured out that there's a middle ground between alt right and sjw
go and tell that Angela Merkel.

you should browse /pol/ more before calling anyone else /pol/. /pol/ would have a problem with having non-white hero PCs.

>the game of thrones is all about who will be king or queen of essos
>who cares about the seven kingdoms
okay

b-b-but... I thought does apply
bwahahaha, no I didnt

>the game of thrones is all about who will be king or queen of essos
>who cares about the seven kingdoms

So, by extension, you're saying that all the characters in D&D books are black now? No white person in sight? Interesting, been a while since I've read those, then.

Or are you just using a stupid, inappropriate metaphor because you're foaming at the mouth with rage at the thought of darkies?

The answer to 1 is, always has been and always will be, RaHoWa. This may be obvious, but it's still worth saying.