# D & D got woke and that's good because you should have all been playing that way (or not if you didn't prefer)) **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** rpg-dnd-wargames\ **Created:** [February 17, 2021, 10:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114 "2021-02-17T10:36:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 51
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Bravo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_bravo/32/493_2.png) [@Johnny\_Bravo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Bravo)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1001 "2023-01-26T16:01:10Z")
> [@nicky](#): > > “I climb into the devil-face mouth” I actually did that in 5e’s _Tomb of Annihilation_! Thankfully, it’s not an instant-kill deathtrap as it was in the original _Tomb of Horrors._ ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1002 "2023-01-26T16:15:25Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > No, because probably 95% of people in general are basically good aligned. Ha, ha, ha. No. > [@Alessan](#): > > Don’ get @MrDibble started… Aah, you’ve read the uncomfortable truths thread… ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1003 "2023-01-26T16:17:26Z")
> [@vislor](#): > > OTOH, the reason I like Alternity so much is that your roll was against your ability score + skill rank. A person with a high agility is someone who is naturally good at a task. What they did was put rank benefits on the skills, allowing for high skill people to be better at things than high ability score, even if they had the same chances to succeed. > > Sadly the game was dropped with the WotC merger so that system never got developed much. Well, that particular aspect of how skills work carried over to, at least, 3rd edition, if not further. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1004 "2023-01-26T17:19:22Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > No, because probably 95% of people in general are basically good aligned. Maybe 95% of people are NEUTRAL, but being good aligned means making personal sacrifices to aid others (just because it’s the right thing to do, not because of social pressure or family ties or w/e). I think very few people are actually Good, and there are definitely more people who are Evil than Good, but the vast majority of people are Neutral. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1005 "2023-01-26T17:28:17Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Maybe 95% of people are NEUTRAL, but being good aligned means making personal sacrifices to aid others (just because it’s the right thing to do, not because of social pressure or family ties or w/e). I think very few people are actually Good, and there are definitely more people who are Evil than Good, but the vast majority of people are Neutral. My headcanon is that alignment is altruistic vs. predatory, and spontaneous vs. planned. The good/evil axis describes how willing you are to give up benefits to yourself on behalf of other people. If you dedicate your life to making other lives better, that’s altruistic. If you constantly make other folks’ lives worse to make your own life better, that’s predatory. If you’re like most folks–not spending much time helping others out, but shying away from preying on other folks–that’s neutral. The law/chaos axis describes how much your actions are dictated by a plan. If you have a pretty set code that dictates how you act at most times, that’s planned/lawful. If you tend to make decisions based on what’s currently going on rather than on your code of behavior, that’s spontaneous/chaotic. This means an anarchist who reads lots of Kropotkin and practices mutual aid is lawful good, whereas a judge who sentences defendants according to her momentary whims or beliefs as to what will advance her career is chaotic evil. ---
**Author:** ![vislor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/vislor/32/5933_2.png) [@vislor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vislor)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1006 "2023-01-26T19:56:46Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Well, that particular aspect of how skills work carried over to, at least, 3rd edition, if not further. At first I was confused by what you meant by this. I think you mean that there are skill ranks in 3E and you add your relevant ability modifier. From that standpoint, yes, I suppose it’s true. My quibble with this involves a deeper dive into Alternity, which I won’t do. Suffice it to say, I think Alternity did more to show the differences between naturally talented (high ability score) and skilled than what 3E does but it’s nit picking so I won’t go into it. Thanks for the discussion! ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1007 "2023-01-26T20:42:01Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > If you constantly make other folks’ lives worse to make your own life better, that’s predatory. That’s what most folks do on the daily, just by existing as they do, with the consumption and the environmental degradation and the unthinking breeding and the consumption and the sprawl and the monkeysphere thinking and the consumption and … ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1008 "2023-01-26T20:48:33Z")
Okay The Good Place. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2023, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1009 "2023-01-26T22:22:29Z")
It would be racist to say that 95% of halflings are good, but I don’t think that the rulebooks have ever said that. Some of the “main” races are said to have overall good tendencies, but the books are always clear to point out that members of those races who defy those tendencies are far from rare. And humans are explicitly said to not even have tendencies towards any alignment. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1010 "2023-01-27T05:01:50Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Table 2: The game has us going up against goblins in a dungeon, and at some point we encounter a bunch of baby goblins, and the other PCs start slaughtering goblin babies because they’ll just grow up to be goblins. I’m either going to leave that table, or see if there’s a way we can pause the game and talk about how we can all have fun there, because that kind of essentialism sure as shit isn’t fun for me. That one is a tough call and I knew of one DM using that as a Paladin trap- if he killed the babies, that was evil, and he lost his Paladinhood, but if he let them live he was committing a chaotic act, so fell anyway. Bullshit. Of course if you don’t kill the babies but kill all the adults, the babies will die horribly of neglect and starvation. The only way to avoid this dilemma is to not have Goblin babies in the dungeon. It’s bad choices all the way around. We had some young (say teen?) goblin kids and one pulled a knife and critted my character, whereupon my PC killed him. The DM said that was an evil act. Fuck that shit. > [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Table 3: The game has us going up against goblins in a dungeon, and the DM is giving them all stereotypical Black accents and making jokes about crackheads and welfare queens. I’m calling that shit out as racist and disrupting that game and talking to the con managers. I have never seen that in all my 30+ years of playing, but one DM did play some elves as flamboyant gays. However, since the DM was gay, I just shrugged and let it go. He id it fairly well to give him credit. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1011 "2023-01-27T12:10:50Z")
If ridiculous notions like “95% of people are good” are even considered, in a world where just as one input, somewhere between 10-25% of men are rapists, you can bet your ash this is definitely the forking Bad Place. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1012 "2023-01-27T12:24:33Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > If ridiculous notions like “95% of people are good” are even considered, Well, you have to agree on what “good” means and how it fits into the context of your game. There are people who generally believe something like “most people are basically good.” That’s not a ridiculous starting point for a fantasy world. You could also say that “most people are basically neutral.” Either one is a fine starting point, so long as you are defining your terms. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1013 "2023-01-27T12:29:50Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > There are people who generally believe something like “most people are basically good.” That’s not a ridiculous starting point for a fantasy world. You can make a fantasy world like that, but it read to me like a reference to the real world, where that is distinctly not the case… ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1014 "2023-01-27T13:36:36Z")
People, right? Fuck ‘em. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1015 "2023-01-27T15:38:16Z")
Well, most of them. I don’t think I’m a misanthrope, far from it. I like the _idea_ of humanity a lot, and am quite social, with lots of time and love for what I consider good people. If I am a misanthrope, it’s a tender one. I’m just way more a realist about the size of that set than a 95%-er naïf. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1016 "2023-01-27T19:28:03Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > That one is a tough call and I knew of one DM using that as a Paladin trap- if he killed the babies, that was evil, and he lost his Paladinhood, but if he let them live he was committing a chaotic act, so fell anyway. Bullshit. Of course if you don’t kill the babies but kill all the adults, the babies will die horribly of neglect and starvation. The whole paladins killing baby whatever thing was always a trap stemming from an asshole DM. I’ve heard about such situations my entire gaming life, but I’ve never actually encountered it in the wild. I’ve played other games where I’ve put characters in morally difficult situations, but not D&D, because to me D&D is about heroic actions. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1017 "2023-01-27T19:52:20Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > The whole paladins killing baby whatever thing was always a trap stemming from an asshole DM. Yep. This one time I heard about it from a player in my game who was in another game, but I read about it several times on the Paizo boards. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2023, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1018 "2023-01-27T20:07:05Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > The whole paladins killing baby whatever thing was always a trap stemming from an asshole DM. I’ve heard about such situations my entire gaming life, but I’ve never actually encountered it in the wild. I’ve played other games where I’ve put characters in morally difficult situations, but not D&D, because to me D&D is about heroic actions. Many years ago I was at DragonCon in the main gaming room. I saw a table and thought it was a drop-in game and asked them if I could join. They were nonplussed, and I realized that it wasn’t a drop-in table at all, but then they said sure and I awkwardly joined what turned out to be a group of buddies just playing in the public game room. Then the “kill the goblin babies” situation came up, and I noped out of that table and left. > [@DrDeth](#): > > I have never seen that in all my 30+ years of playing Me either–I was intentionally exaggerating to show what the other end of the spectrum might look like. I have sat at tables with folks doing things almost as offensive, though, and I’ve left those tables because life’s too short. Overt misogyny is more common in pickup games than overt racism, in my experience. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2023, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1019 "2023-01-29T18:24:32Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > People, right? Fuck ‘em. Well since the alternatives are either celibacy or bestiality… yeah. > [@MrDibble](#): > > I’m just way more a realist about the size of that set than a 95%-er naïf. Just be sure you’re not one of those people saying, “I just tell it like it is,” while in reality they’re meaning, “I’m an asshole.” ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2023, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114/1020 "2023-01-30T09:32:44Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > > [@Odesio](#): > > > > Dark Sun in 1991 which had a Sumerian type setting with cannibal halflings > > IIRC from my reading of the DS boxed set, it wasn’t so much Sumerian as Dune. Everything is more hostile and lethal and magic is shunned in favor of psionics. when I bought the short-lived dark sun online game the girl at the counter said "they made a Conan/Gor D&d game? game [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114.md?page=50) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/d-d-got-woke-and-thats-good-because-you-should-have-all-been-playing-that-way-or-not-if-you-didnt-prefer/933114.md?page=52)