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> Dwarves are good at building things not because of some essential genetic racial qualities, but because they are raised in a culture that values building and
by jxcl 12y ago
> Dwarves are good at building things not because of some essential genetic racial qualities, but because they are raised in a culture that values building and passes on a certain set of traditional practices around it.
Really? Let's say that the DM chose to run a game with mermaids in it. Would anyone question the (theoretically) superior swimming ability of mermaids? Let's see how a similar statement reads:
Mermaids are good at swimming not because of some essential genetic racial qualities, but because they are raised in a culture that values swimming and passes on a certain set of traditional practices around it.
It sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?
Edit: And if you're going to deride D&D for that, why not praise it for its lack of sexism (I'm talking about the stats system, not the art here)? The higher amount of testosterone in a man's body makes it much easier for him to gain muscle, but the D&D stat system allows both male and female characters "equal opportunity", so to speak, by not adding or subtracting stats based on gender choice.
- mesozoic 12y agoAnd dragonborn are good at breathing fire not because of their genetic racial qualities but because their culture values such things.
- Steko 12y agoCongratulations you removed all the context and qualifiers ("if you approach it from a very generous mindset,... You can soften the racism of deriving personality traits directly from a character’s race") in his statement and made an absurd analogy.
- jxcl 12y agoIf you apply the same qualifiers to a mermaid race it sounds just as ridiculous.
- bobcostas55 12y agoHow does the context make it better?
- Steko 12y agoA mermaids ability to swim is not a personality trait. That's why context matters.
- jxcl 12y agoNeither is a dwarf's ability to build things. They're both abilities and not personality traits.
- guyzero 12y agoThis being fiction and not reality, the dwarfish ability to build underground structures is actually literally innate. Not genetic perhaps, but somehow bound to dwarves racially. Remember this is the same game that prohibited halflings from being magic-users (well, it used to. I haven't read 5th ed). Whatever the reason, the game presents certain abilities as actually being racially innate. It's not reality. It's a fantasy world. Additionally, it's a literary fantasy world. Real-world concepts of race don't apply. If you think it's a terrible concept, by all means play a different game, build your own world, whatever. But just because the author doesn't like D&D doesn't mean it's wrong.
- bgilroy26 12y agoLet's say a merperson was raised in the absence of adult merpeople. Is there any way they could learn in one lifetime all of the different ways that a mer-society can take advantage of the sea? Genetic and cultural inheritance are both really important. In all seriousness though, Tolkien's worldview was more medieval than colonial. The north/south, high/low dynamic is a different dimension than the relationship between Europe and North Africa. It's altitude rather than longitude. Putting everything in relationship to the heavens is a touchstone of medieval culture. Twisted (cf the article's 'ugly') things were considered a visual metaphor for evil by Dante. Dante imagined that beings who were living out their function/purpose with excellence were rooted in the ground but pointed at the stars [ie 'straight]. Men and women who succumbed to temptation were pointed at the stars by design but through concupiscence [getting caught up/busy; becoming obsessed/addicted], such 'crooked' people were turned inward on themselves and could no longer appreciate the things above them.
- joeframbach 12y agoParagraphs are written about "race" being racist, but Occam's Razor can apply to make it very simple. Replace "race" with "species" and all is solved.
- IvyMike 12y agoNote that women characters in D&D did, at certain points in the evolution of the rules, did have modifications so that their stats differed from male characters. https://medium.com/@increment/the-first-female-gamers-c784fbe3ff37 https://medium.com/@increment/the-first-female-gamers-c784fb... (this is a long but fascinating article)
- skywhopper 12y agoWell, mermaids do have obvious genetic differences (the fish tail and ability to breathe in water) that would make them better swimmers than humans and humanoids. But I'm struggling to come up with what genetic characteristics about D&D dwarves you assume would make them inherently good at building things. There's nothing obvious that I'm aware of.
- mesozoic 12y agoOne would be the dwarves directional sense which is a genetic ability of dwarves to tell cardinal direction just like we can see or smell things.