#they're not playing 'discuss our traumas and and try to help strangers grow: the game' | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

pagesofkenna · 6 months ago

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i wanted to make a post about a thing but the more i think about it the more i want to say and it's just going to end up being a big ramble essay, so instead i'll just give the thesis statement, thusly:

as the #1 Ratgrinders Apologist (self-appointed), of course they're the final boss fight to the death. i expected nothing less and the people trying to make discourse about it are ignoring the entire context of this being a Dungeons and Dragons game

#they're not playing 'discuss our traumas and and try to help strangers grow: the game'#they're playing 'murder people for getting in our way: the game'#which i know is now me being snubbing about D&D as a game but like. siobhan said it: theyve committed SO much murder #did the lunch lady in episode 2 deserve to be murdered? did the skater dwarves deserved to be murdered?#did the monsters the school sicced on the kids in their Last Stand deserve to be slaughtered like that??#its literally the name of the game!#the two things that are turning this into a bigger essay are 1) me being actually very disappointed in Burrow's End with how the players #just did not want at all to engage with the moral greyness aabria was trying to bring into the story #it was clear that was a direction she wanted to explore and i wanted to see it explored #but even OUT of characters the cast just would NOT engage or acknowledge the validity of that direction #and there was only so much aabria could do without being labeled a killjoy... because D&D often ISN'T a game for reckoning with #the justification of your character's actions! its a game for killing giant bears and saving the town from cultists!!#baked into the foundation of the game conceit is 'you are the hero and you are saving the day ergo your actions are Right and Just'#thing 2) i just listened to that WWW fireside the other day where brennan goes on about how combat does not get in the way #of story in dnd. that whole stove metaphor? and it rankled me so much lol because like aabria finally says after that:#yeah you bring your own food to the stove but when what you've got is a stove. the food you make is GOING to get cooked #combat and fighting and killing is baked into the system from its foundation. acting like D&D or even just d20 (the system)#is a resolution engine that also allows fighting and not a fighting engine that also allows other skills is. wishful thinking i think #and to bring this back to the POINT: of COURSE they're going to kill the rat grinders! because it's fun!#because thats how you resolve conflict in a combat game! straight up i honestly believe a lengthy conversation trying to win the kids over #would have been a weird energy to end the season on! it would have been a let down!#it would have been a huge tonal shift. because the tone you bring to a D&D game is 'killing this is fine actually'#and if you dont like that you /dont/ play D&D. its not a value judgment #i LOVE getting into moral implications and justifications and ive gotta tone it down when i run D&D games because it can kill the vibe #anyway. i said i wasnt going to write the whole essay and im not. but i did write most of the rant oops

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