Jump to content

redmoongoddess

Member
  • Posts

    91
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Retained

  • redmoongoddess

Converted

  • RPG Biography
    Been role-playing for 6+ years!
  • Current games
    COC, Werewolf The Forsaken, Pendragon.
  • Location
    void
  • Blurb
    AUTO CORRECT TURNED ELRIC INTO CELTIC!

Recent Profile Visitors

The recent visitors block is disabled and is not being shown to other users.

redmoongoddess's Achievements

Newbie

Newbie (1/4)

71

Reputation

  1. Technically the table just said "he doesn't even really like ladies, anyways" or something to that effect. BUT now looking at it I feel stupid for not reading into the obvious implications there. I thought it just meant he was sexist. Frankly the gay option makes more sense. RE: What cultures are progressive or not - a dumb question considering how "progressive" someone is isn't a trait that you can define with numbers like the norm in Pendragon. If you really had to, it would be more like determining the Chivalry or Romantic trait bonuses. And even then that's oversimplifying it. Pendragon has mentioned the existence of Irish, Pict, and even Saxon cultures having warrior women, not necessarily as an common thing, but still a thing that occurs enough for them to not be in disguise. Now, I don't know if any of that was true in the real world, but in Pendragon, most of these cultures are also at least partial feudal (The Irish has strong tribal roots, and most of The Picts are still non-feudal), which implies inherent classism, frequent usage of violence, torture, and imperialism, and ALL have probably used slavery at one point or another with almost no one criticizing or protesting it. (Arthur's Britain is an Outlier in that no is a slave legally there.) A lady knight/warrior can be just as racist, classist, violent, and totalitarian as any dude can. I mean, ancient Chinese dynasties were usually more open to Gay people than MODERN China is, but they still had slaves and the Coup Encouraging Mandate Of Heaven. Like, Arthurian Britain is arguably more progressive in it's opinion on slavery than the british empire (which wouldn't exist for centuries) was! Even after they made slavery illegal, they paid the former slave owners money as an apology for taking away their slaves. Meanwhile, the former slaves got nothing. Arthur would've just killed or exiled the slavers on the spot. In many ways Britain's empire is closer to the Saxon's empire than Arthur's.
  2. RE:Asians. The GPC has the Twilight era suddenly see flintlock rifles invented, which is something I've always wondered why Greg put in. Chinese gunsmiths coming across the (now ruined) silk road would help explain why they suddenly showed up. Only issue, why did they go to Britain and not any of the many other countries along the way, namely, the entirety of the Sassanian and Byzantine Empires? However, an Wuxia warrior in Arthur's court is an interesting idea for weirder campaigns, and I wouldn't mind seeing mentions of Asian cultures in future Pendragon supplements (likely through the Huns, or, rarely, Asian Merchants and Adventurers, most likely from South Asia considering geography), as long as it's as well researched as it's depiction of European cultures! Expansion on North African cultures would be interesting as well, considering Zazamancs. I would like to see a combo of the fictional kingdoms mentioned in Pendragon already with the actual cultures that existed at the time. Disregards the anachronistic implications of Allah in the literary text, yes. But when history is more interesting than the fiction, I think we should go with the former.
  3. @Luca CherstichIMHO, calling lady knights "she-knights" is insulting and borderline sexist. You've already complained and moaned about women being able to be knights somehow meaning that magically everyone has modern morality in Pendragon. So give it a break. Woman Knights are knights. Anyways, I personally hope we see new regional setting books later down the line, since those were my favorites of the older supplements. IIRC Larkins is doing an Cornwall campaign as a podcast ATM. Does that mean anything? I say yes. But we'll just have to wait and see.
  4. Who worded it this way? I can't recall anyone who ever said that Pendragon should have more opportunities/focus on lady knights by saying "as if they were equal". I sure as hell didn't, so there's no reason for you to constantly say "you" in that sentence. If someone DID say it that way, that either means: 1. They meant "as if FEUDAL SOCIETY treated them as equal" not "as if THEY were equal". 2. Their understanding of English is as an second language to them. or 3. They just didn't proof read the post before hitting the submit button. And either way it's extremely dickish behavior to use what is most probably an honest mistake to win an argument about Pendragon's depiction of women. It's nit picky at best -and- deliberately misleading at worse. And nether read well on your position in this thread.
  5. Didn't stop Christians from adding theme of their religion to the inherently pagan Celtic tales, romanticists from adding Lancelot as a major character to the Arthurian Mythos when he was inherently absent from the start, scribes during the crusades from adding in "Saracens" who worship "Allah" and "Mahouri" when that's an inherently false oversimplification of North African cultures that includes Islam decades before it was invented (likely because they wanted to use it as an excuse to have vaguely "Islamic" villains), Greg from including options for Pagan, Wotanic, Jewish, and Saracen characters who don't have to convert to Christianity by the end of the story... ...Oh gods, we'll be here FOREVER if I have to explain how the entire history of the Arthurian legend is it being changed to fit the writers and readers needs...
  6. Anyways, I listened to the podcast posted earlier, and I felt like writing a run down of announcements made regarding new books there. Note that there's also a lot of interesting things announced about the new edition in general that I've not mentioned here, as I'm away from my computer atm and can't access my full notes. I'll do another post about those things later. (Some interesting changes! Like that your spouse dying can cause you to suffer from grief!) -Kickstarter for 1st edition Pendragon classic reprint coming soon, may include 1st supplements as well. -6th Edition is almost done, as it had a DECADE of development already done on it, coming out in 2021. -The Book Of Magic (that's not it's name but I can't remember what it's really called) has been pushed back in favor of 6th edition, but is almost done, they just didn't think it would make sense to publish it before starting up interest in the line again with the 6th edition. Most of the art is done and the artists are also doing the art for 6th edition. -There will be a GM's screen with an included adventure and a short guidebook about Salisbury. -Starter set, includes basic rules, but also an mini-campaign set during the Boy King era that has the PCs deal with an local problem. Starts at the year Arthur pulls the sword and climaxes at the Battle of Badon Hill. -GPC 2nd edition will be published in 3(?) volumes, each covering a different group of eras, but will also come out in a full sized single volume that covers everything. -An book focusing on Courtiers has been mentioned as an idea, but it probably won't be out for a while. (My assumption, considering he didn't go into detail about it.) -Books covering the Uther era, as well as ones for the rulers before that are coming later down the line. -Samurai rpg using the same system is still a go. -So is an rpg set in mythical ancient Greece. I imagine that neither will come out for a while, tho.
  7. 1. The idea that it was "Greg's vision" for Pendragon to be completely morally at odds with our modern view points is only partially, vaguely, true. Greg deliberately based Pendragon on not what actually happened in that time period, but what people who lived in the 14th century thought happened, and thus he opened up the idea of historically inaccurate stuff happening from the start. Saying it's now D&D because women knights are now accepted is ignoring what makes D&D D&D, as said Lady Knights will most probably start off with an HATE SAXONS passion just like any male knight, and be just as likely to be Cruel, Vengeful, Arbitrary, and Greedy as the guys are. If this was D&D, the possibility of them being racist towards Vikings or scoundrels isn't something that is mechanically presented in D&D, aside from alignment. And the option to be a Fae knight or Wizard would be an part of the core rules (which it will likely not be). Not to mention D&D's own history of struggling with sexism, largely due to one of the authors being an ACTUAL sexist who was baffled to find out that women actually played and enjoyed the game. 2. The idea that blue bloods are better people because they're blue bloods, is contradicted in Pendragon (despite the Knights, who are supposed to protect the land, all being presumably nobles) by the existence of evil Knights (Including possibly the PCs! It's mentioned in the core rules as something that might happen, if discouraged), knights who become poor, non-nobles who become knights (a possibility in book of Lady and Knights), foreigner's becoming knights, and King Mark Of Cornwall being an piece of shit. 3. Women Knights being more of an thing doesn't automatically mean that the ENTIRETY of Logres is now a non-patriarchal land, since as mentioned, it's only a thing in some areas of the land in-lore, and just because women can be knighted (which presumably requires a lot of hoops to jump through, as with any other non-Cymric Male Noble Knights who exist in the setting) doesn't mean it's common for most areas or that most NPCs aren't bigoted in some fashion. 4. Pendragon is a game, meant to be fun, and how alien and immoral the culture of Pendragon that the Players defend should be is ultimately up to the people playing it. And frankly, an 100% accurate simulation of actual knight morality would be extremely unfun to RP, as it would no doubt up play their racism and paranoia towards Saxons, their willingness to perform war crimes to keep their land, the fact that "honor" is an ideal that is frequently never upheld, not to mention rape, plagues, and torture. Themes that could show up in Pendragon but are wisely usually not, at least not as major ones, since such a game relaying around them would be nothing but extremely depressing and irritating to play through and run, at least for more people. 5. If Pict Knights are allowed, I don't see why Jewish knights are something to laugh at. 1. Doctor Who, SW and ST STILL have fan bases that are going strong to this day, Terminator went downhill as a franchise because T3 and Salvation were terrible movies, not because of wokeness, and FYI T2 was and still is praised for being one of the few 80's action movies to have a strong lady protagonist. So why would that be what killed it? (Not to mention Star Trek's relationship with communist themes and social justice.) 2. Why would you EVER want to play as a game where you played as nazis? Playing as villains, sure, but playing as one of THE WORSE AND MOST HORRIFIC armies in history who's entire idology was based around killing people simply for their skin color who killed MANY real people? No. Such a game would be maddeningly unfun and painful to play for just about anyone with a love for basic human rights. 3. Most people play RPGs to be escapism from the real world. Presumably most "minorities" have to already deal with racism, sexism, and other bigotries in their lives more than someone should experience, why would you play a game where the players are charged with protecting a land that ENDORSES these sins in order to escape that shit they already deal with often? And presumably the game is going to retain the need for conflict as it did in earlier editions, so why would all bigotry just suddenly disappear when it could easily be used as an obstacle for the players to deal with? 4. https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/slippery-slope
  8. Honestly, the fact a single image is enough for people to cry heresy and come up with (often wrong) reasons why women knights should barely be a thing (if at all), is more reasons why there should be broader depictions of them in the game. One of the difficulties of introducing Pendragon to other people is the inherent moral relativism of the setting, and how much of it is endorsed by in-universe forces vs the game itself. The nobility of actual Dark Age Britain was often very corrupt and cruel to the lower class, something that is suggested in Pendragon and the literature of Athuria with the prescience of "evil" knights (who presumably were also legally knighted, just like your player knights!), castles with awful customs, and the great flaws of "heroic" knights (Arthur...literally drowned a bunch of babies??????? Or at least attempted to.), but it rarely discusses if the system of Fedualism itself is ultimately good or evil for humanity, and usually leans to the former as an result of the players all being Knights (as supposed to revolting Peasants). That alone can turn off a lot of people, but what keeps it from going over the edge of feeling like (unintentional) Federalist Propaganda is that it directly avoids encouraging or rewarding the "bad" sides of Feudalism, whilst not directly ignoring them either. The PK's are usually rewarded for being virtuous, and the property sub-systems usually punish the player for treating their peasants like shit. It's still an more positive version of feudalism than accurate to reality, but it's no an direct endorsement of the system by any means. The decision to depict women as knight should be welcomed, it shouldn't be an thing that is "common" only as an reminder that Mythical Britain is not an perfect society, but one that still suffers from sexism and it's horrid consequences. What matters is if the game (meaning, rules, art, scenarios, ect.) sides with sexism or not. For the most part, no, it's not as sexist as the myths it was based on. But, the game material is usually written with the assumption that the Knights are men, most of the NPCs that the PCs meet, even weird fae beings, are men, and the women are usually traditionally "feminine" roles, even if they're from the other side. (The only exception is magicians like the Ladies Of The Lake, which is not what the game focuses on for obvious reasons, as playing as a magician isn't very fun in Pendragon-at least with the 4th edition rules.) And The Book Of Lady And Knights has the chance for all women characters (ALL, not just damsels!) to have an lower Valor trait than the men. Some of this is a side effect of the source material (most of the characters in La Morte De' Arthur are men), and was most likely not due to the creators having an disdain for women, but, in effect, which matters more, it comes off as the game discouraging women from being playable characters (helped by the fact that there's rules for making "ladies" that seems to only be for traditional damsel type characters, but doesn't mention if this rule should be for Lady Knights or not), which is IMHO not too different from what a game made by actual sexists would do. Stuff like THIS causes people to not be interested in Pendragon, because they get the impression that it's for not just people with degrees in Medieval history, but also old grognardy neckbeards who hate women and think feminists are the actual oppressors or some bullshit like that. In the interview that was posted by MOB, Sir Larkins said he was consulting with women players to get feedback on how the new edition handles the issue, and IMHO this is a great idea that should be done for any game dealing with these sort of themes. If the sexism is kept as views from people in-universe and not endorsed by the game (willfully or not), I think a lot more people will be willing to get into the game. But I feel the new edition should also discuss other potential social issues that come up in the game, and how one can differentiate characters in-setting portraying bigotry as good VS the game endorsing those views through mechanics. Knights should rarely have 100% modern morals, as it's an inherent aspect of the setting, but there is a line between how bigoted an Knight should be without it potentially punishing them and them being bigoted to the point of feeling too close to actual racism that people might experience in the real world. I honestly think that Pendragon's depiction of racism, nationalism, and colonialism are all topics that need to be discussed if the game is to move forward, as there has been previous Pendragon books that honestly feel pro-racist due to the depiction of "foreign" invaders and Arthur's "conquering" of them. The issue is in the original writers of these tales, not the game's developers. But their decision to follow the source materials to even this part of them was IMHO an mistake, even more considering the allowance for Pagan, Pict, Jewish*, "Sarcren", Saxon and Irish Knights who can keep their original religions without being converted to Christianity by the end of the story. And can even be REWARDED for staying close to their "pagan" virtues! (*Sadly Judaism isn't in the Book Of Lady And Knights IIRC, I hope it gets added back in at some point.) I think Pendragon needs to disengage from the source material at times, or at least allow and encourage players who want to disengage from it, in order to get better as a game. We don't need an entire novel length of material about how to depict bigotry in a Pendragon game, but more on it than previous editions have done is nothing but a good thing, IMHO. Stuff like the lady knight image and other attempts at gender/racial diversity do nothing but bring more people to the game, (which considering it's an CRIMINALLY underrated game, is a BOON) and discourage the sort of people shouldn't want to play with from this community. Frankly, I would never play with someone who would disallow ladies to be knights. Those are the type of people who I avoid like the plague. (I don't mean to imply that anyone here is one of those people, by the way. I don't know any of you personally. I do however wish that people would be more considerate in how they sound when criticizing the single image of a lady knight. "She-knight" sounds like something someone from the actual time period would say, which is not a good thing to be saying it unironically in the 21st century! So can we agree as an community to stop that nonsense? Now?) (Also I love that the Knight lady isn't wearing boob armor. Thank goodness.)
  9. Awesome! So, who wrote this new adventure? Is this another unpublished Greg outing, or is it Larkin's project?
  10. You're all right about the idea that Uther wouldn't care. I think that should be the point of the session, that despite being the king who your lord is loyal to, he doesn't give a shit, and is in general an total asshole. In regards to my original question, I should take this as an excuse to pull out original NPCs who I have no plans for, but will use later, to make it seem like I have a plan, because honestly, a lot of my GMing is just improv (and I'm not interested in running an direct copy of the GPC, because there are too many damned battles in it).
  11. This is circa 490-492. The context is that Uther is visiting Salisbury as part of his Royal Progress, and also to discuss plans to rescue the babies of a village, that was kidnapped by Saxons. Assuming everyone can make it, who would be at the meeting? So far my list is: Uther, Rodreck, Madoc, Ellen, Elad (from the introduction scenario), obviously the PKs (Just one in my campaign, doing a solo game), and the villagers who had their babies taken away. Anyone else? And, general pointers for running a court scene would be helpful!
  12. OMFG. You NEED to have an adventure where his slam poetry style goes up against the satirist poets of Ireland, you NEED to.
  13. I realized that Dorest would work more after I wrote my last post. The PK's manor is closer to there and I find the idea of being right by an strongly Roman descended territory to be an interesting one. So yeah, Dorest it is. @Voord 99, TY for mentioning the smuggler caves in Dorest, that will be a MAJOR plot thread in the future, no doubt about it.
  14. In this case, I'm considering having it be the county of Southports instead that's accused, unless there's a port/Beach in Dorset that works better for an secret Saxon spy raid.
×
×
  • Create New...