Basements & Beards- Analogue Gaming Thread

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Don't forget their stupid Mario Kart ride.


And here's how the fanbase fixed both it and the toddler carrier mech:

SpoilerShow

[Kugelfisch]

Heresy, the lot of it!

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Remember Catalyst Game Lab?
Their higher-ups are still in command despite being caught embezzling money.
They've doomed Shadowrun to be an unsalvagable mess by pissing off all the old writers and designers (see embezzlement case).
They fired a BattleTech author because some SJW bitched about his non-BT fiction being too conservative.

Now this:

>no derogatory comments about religion
I'm sure it's fine when it's about Christianity

>protect the IP
Looking forward to various fan works getting shut down.

>participation is a privilege, not a right
Gatekeeping for me, but not for thee...

Looking forward to the Clans abolishing their Trueborn program, and the Inner Sphere getting their first autistic MechWarriors.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Tencent is in talks with Hasbro over D&D

Afaik this is solely about exclusive video game rights, but I'd laugh my ass off if they buy the entire IP.
Curious how this would affect WotC's grand virtual tabletop plan...

[Kugelfisch]

As soon as you sell to the chink a part of an IP, you effectively sell all of it.
It's like sucking dick. Doesn't matter if it wasn't to completion or if you swallowed. You're a cocksucker now.

[wulfenlord]

But the bro code clearly states that balls have to touch to be gay!

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Currently not too much interesting going on besides WotC potentially stopping physical releases entirely to retread into their walled virtual tabletop garden, so here are some random thoughts & opinions

The Autism of SJWs writing about Glorious Nippon

SJWs can get a bit weird when it comes to the land of catgirls and tentacle monsters, mostly 'cause you can't put (Feudal) Japan in a RPG without getting dangerously close to the dreaded orientalism.
I probably mentioned at least one of these at least once, but idgaf.

Tetsubo

Tetsubo is a bit of a holy grail among Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay grognards. Announced all the way in 1st edition, it promised to cover Warhammer's Japan equivalent (creatively called Nippon), which was so obscure that Warhammer Fantay Battles only covered it in its first 3 editions (and the large-scale spin-off Warmaster). Unfortunately, it never developed beyond a rough prototype stage.

When Daniel Fox (who is infamous for shutting down The Trove and getting banned from multiple forums for autistically shilling his products) announced his WFR clone Zweihander he also promised that his clone would feature the fabled Tetsubo.

Then everyone realized they shouldn't write about Fantasy Japan because they were too white, so the idea got dropped with little fanfare
Now this is gonna be supposedly gonna be written with a different system and setting, but nothing much has been announced for the last 2 or so years.

Advanced Lovers & Lesbians

The only supplement for everyone's favorite RPG Thirsty Sword Lesbians, it mainly existed to get the various Kickstarter goals over and done with (mostly new Playbooks and example settings).
Now the book itself is a bit weird, what with the title and cover being a parody of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (which probably would've worked better if the core book was called Lovers & Lesbians), or the batshit insanity of a "setting" where the players are just supposed to be playing actual IRL hyenas (and the writer's potentialy fetish centering around female hyena's supersized futa clit dicks).

And then there's the setting about the early days of the samurai, which for some reason westernizes the fuck out of everything. For some reason the writer was deadly afraid of using actual Japanese terminology, so instead he defaults to Western Medieval Europe analogues for some ungodly reason.
I get that samurai are more or less an aquivalent to a knight, but just refering to samurai as "knight" is bit too simplified - especially if you also port over knight-specific shit. I mean WTF is a "squire" supposed to be here? Did samurai even have squires?

Adventures in Rokugan

Aka the sloppy and sad D&D 5e version for Legend of the Five Rings. It's like the original OGL era all over again, when every other system and their mother shat out a soulless d20 version.

What is Legend of the Five Rings? Well, it's your typical Fantasy Far East / Orientalism setting. Aka a mix between China and Feudal Japan, with maybe Korea and other lesser countries thrown in for good measure.
In L5R's case, it's Fantasy Japan, except the map looks more like Fantasy China. Also they're for some reason still isolationist af despite having a fuckhuge land border, go figure.

The original L5R is already a bit weird, mostly thanks to the influence of John Wick (no relation to the movies). Dude is a total asshat of a GM who hates it if you don't play the game the way he wants - and he wants you to be part of one of the many samurai clans of the setting (which have some similarities to World of Darkness vampire clans, including having snarky opinions about each other). He does not want you to play as Ronin aka samurai murder hobos, and the game will actively punish you for doing so.
Nevermind that some of the most famous samurai of both history and fiction where literal samurai murder hobos, including Myamoto Musashi whose famous book this shi is named after.

So what about the 5e version? Well for starters is westernizes a lot of terms, almost everything that might sound to "oriental". Mages aka shugenja are now just "ritualists", because we don't want to offend religious minorities (if they still exist). Also they replace "bushido" with "chivalry" or something.

Also the game has a 2 page manifesto about the ethical correct way to play the game, which is thankfully included in the free sample PDF, because I gotta share this weird-ass infantilization.

Humanize your Asian characters

It's important to recognize the stereotypes of Asian
people that exist, and avoid them in your game. Portraying characters who are unfeeling, consistently stoic, or motivated only by the idea of honor is not a fair representation, limits opportunities in gameplay, and perpetuates harmful stereotypes set by western media.

But what if I want to play an honorable stoic guy without feelings?

Don’t speak "Asian-sounding" gibberish as a way of pretending to speak a language you do not

This is extremely harmful. Please don't do it.

Confucius says: Ching-chong, Ching-chon, Mitsubishi sushi.

Do not include ritual suicide in your games

We firmly believe the glorification of suicide as a method for redemption is wrong and can be harmful to players. Rokugan may share many cultural aspects of ancient Japan and other Asian cultures, but it does not mean harmful elements need to be included in this fantasy world.

>We want to represent this exotic foreign culture, but we only want to cherrypick the parts that don't trigger us

Be respectful of religious elements

But what if suicide is part of my religion?

Be mindful

Think before you speak. Try to be aware of what others find hurtful. We recommend having a group discussion on mindfulness before the game begins.

You know the writers have a high opinion about you when they include a "Don't be a dick" paragraph.
Though I must give them props for mentioning that you should find out about triggers before the game even starts, instead of jumping on this gay X-Card bandwagon where the triggertards never spill the beans about what hurts their precious feelings.

Don't try to explain someone else's culture to them

If you are not of a background or identity being marginalized/misrepresented at your table, do not argue with players of those backgrounds/identities you have offended. No one is sensitive for no reason. Pain from racism is real and valid. Drop your armor class and seek to understand before causing further damage with your words.

Do not argue with the third generation Japano-American who can't even speak Japanese. He has ancestral memories about the entire history of Glorious Nihon.
Also lol @ "drop your armor class".

Understand that you may mess up

Racism in all its ugly forms has run rampant in western society for generations. Much of what we understand to be facts are actually falsehoods concocted with a particular agenda in mind. War-era propaganda and tasteless media continue to impact how Asians are viewed. You may occasionally perpetuate a stereotype without meaning to.

So the game expects your baka gaijin ass to be racist without even knowing it. Good to know.

Commit to growth

It's easy to feel embarrassed or even angry about being called out for hurting someone. If you have reflected, understood, apologized, and been forgiven, don't let feelings of guilt drive you away from the game table.

WTF is this? A game about slaying oni, or an episode of Steven Universe?

[ebin namefag]

>War-era propaganda and tasteless media continue to impact how Asians are viewed.
They do realize that in the current year most of the tasteless media that impacts how we view Asians is made my Asians right?

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

You don't understand. Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips is deeply ingrained in White Man's DNA.

[Kugelfisch]

>stoic, honour-bound nobles that kill themselves to safe face after dishonourable failure to clear their family name
So, 18th century Europe?
It's annoying when hipster faggots that don't know shit about the history of the continent of their own fucking bloodline pretend to be experts of cultures they know even less off.