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Recent release of a new entry in the hit crpg series Baldurs Gate, has prompted me to look into the history of the parent franchise, Dungeons and Dragons. It's influence is immense1, crossing borders2.
But like any cultural product, it is itself a product of its surroundings. It's a game that exalts the American values of self-reliance, ability, and the ruthless accumulation of money.
It is not only non-medieval, it is anti-feudalistic and anti-aristocratic. Creatures with more XP and hit dice rule lower-level ones, from settled barons and goblin kings to wandering bandits and nomads. Level requirements for baronies are at odds with the hereditary gloss added to D&D in nearly every subsequent setting.
Obsession with money-gathering for its own sake that is suggestive of mercantilism or capitalism.
Gygax original pre-publication Greyhawk campaign drew heavily from his own American experience. It took place on a United States map, with Greyhawk at Chicago, and Dyvers at Milwaukee. His buddy Don Kaye’s Greyhawk character, Murlynd, was a gunslinger from Boot Hill.
Most of D&D’s thousands of imitators, in game and fiction, preserve the game’s democratic bones (cash economy, guns for hire, rags to riches stories) while overlaying a medieval-European skin.
Gygaxian levelocracy, where a villager can rise to become a baron or a “Conan type”, is fundamentally incompatible with the European fantasy typified by Lord of the Rings, in which no fellowship can alter the fact that Sam is by birth a servant, Frodo a gentleman, Strider a king, and Gandalf a wizard.
1:D&D invented "leather armor" and those "leather bracers" we see in so much historical fiction today. Even in documentaries!
Also D&D started the myth of bows being a "dexterity weapon". In reality, the sword is a much more suitable weapon for weaker people (blades require so little strength, we hide knives from children, and cut ourselves unintentionally while cooking), while a bow requires strength to operate. A war bow requires bodybuilder tier strength to use, and its shoulder and back muscles, the hardest ones for a woman to pack.
I'll also blame D&D for popularizing dumb weapons, like flails, which probably never saw battlefield use and were just dumb ornaments. I've tried to play with one, its more dangerous to the wielder than to his opponent. And, of course, the overall size of weapons is exaggerated in official art, but that was already bad and only got worse in other media.
2: Record of Lodoss War, Porcine appearance of orcs in Japanese media
Edit: Restoring this post, warts and all, because when I deleted it I didn't see the notification count increase. If I had, I would have left it up. Now that they did and a discussion has started (and accusations of trolling), deleting it is pointless.
Please explain this. Posting a pastiche of 4chan threads without attribution has a strong trolling vibe.
As the person who pointed this out, I don't think being inspired by a 4chan thread and even reposting stuff verbatim should in and of itself be considered trolling. There is upon occasion good points made on that website (I wouldn't spend so much time there if there weren't) and I'd rather not start a trend of sourcing from 4chan to be inherently suspect.
No, being inspired by, or reposting from 4chan is not in itself trolling. But taking 4chan posts and stitching them together to make a post which you present as if it's something you wrote yourself, with no indicator of the source, does look like trolling. Anyone who does that sort of unattributed copypasta, from anywhere, is almost always up to something and not engaging in good faith. Just saying "Here is something I saw on 4chan" would be fine.
I sincerely doubt this would be fine. It would probably be dinged for low effort, at least, if not antagonistic just for the fact that it came from 4chan.
No, it wouldn't, at least not just because it came from 4chan.
If it's just a link drop or copypasta, then probably yes.
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