I welcome this kind of changes. D&D was always way too stereotypical. Dark Elf => Bastard. Orc => Brute. Elf => Wise. Even the alignment system used to be quite strictly interpret, leaving little room for interpretation in many cases.
Most famous dark elf? Drizzt Do'Urden anyone? The game itself wasn't "stereotypical". It was a set of rules by which you could tell stories. If they came out stereotypical, then that's the problem of the GM and/or the players. Rolemaster said it best when it said "If a rule doesn't fit with the story, the rule can be ignored.".
In my experience everyone wanted to be true neutral. Alignment kind of made sense as quick way to decide what an NPC would do but was too restrictive for players.
I've spent a lot of time trying to think of what an evil character would look like, but I haven't been able to. Every bad person I can think of thought of themselves as good.
Fantasy-evil is actually pretty well defined. It's basically being something between a dick and an asshole. And if feel that's a bit too much taint for you, just ponder being the average middle manager trying to meet his quarter year goals, with the rest of the party being something you'd consider "assets". Something to be used to achieve your goals, but not really something to rely on because they may have the same idea.
D&D was always to stereotypical (Score:3, Insightful)
I welcome this kind of changes. D&D was always way too stereotypical. Dark Elf => Bastard. Orc => Brute. Elf => Wise.
Even the alignment system used to be quite strictly interpret, leaving little room for interpretation in many cases.
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Most famous dark elf? Drizzt Do'Urden anyone? The game itself wasn't "stereotypical". It was a set of rules by which you could tell stories.
If they came out stereotypical, then that's the problem of the GM and/or the players. Rolemaster said it best when it said "If a rule doesn't fit with the story, the rule can be ignored.".
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Yeah, let's make it like in those anime series, where a woman-looking emaciated dude holds a 400 pound sword on his shoulder with ease. Perfection!
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In my experience everyone wanted to be true neutral. Alignment kind of made sense as quick way to decide what an NPC would do but was too restrictive for players.
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I've yet to meet someone who can actually pull off true neutral.
Most players want to play a chaotic good character. Or rather, most players play their character that way.
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Fantasy-evil is actually pretty well defined. It's basically being something between a dick and an asshole. And if feel that's a bit too much taint for you, just ponder being the average middle manager trying to meet his quarter year goals, with the rest of the party being something you'd consider "assets". Something to be used to achieve your goals, but not really something to rely on because they may have the same idea.
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