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D&D (2024) Do you plan to adopt D&D5.5One2024Redux?

Plan to adopt the new core rules?

  • Yep

    Votes: 258 53.5%
  • Nope

    Votes: 224 46.5%


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FitzTheRuke

Legend
Sure, but at the same time, the Monster Manual defines everything as a monster.
View attachment 362125
This is the kind of thing that I was talking about earlier in the thread when I said that Words in D&D (in particular, named game elements) are "Best-Fit" and not literally all the time true. Unfortunately, I did a poor job of wording the theory and ruffled some feathers. It was something that I didn't think was a controversial statement, but I did something terribly wrong in my description that must have made it sound like I was being instructive instead of collusive (in a positive way) as I intended.

At any rate, I still hold the theory: Keywords don't always mean what they say. Usually they do, but the above is a case-in-point.
 

Faolyn

(she/her)
I literally have no clue where you're going with this. One of the most famous medieval noble houses is not a valid inspiration for a D&D noble house? What?
OK, so the idea was, you have two humans: a Renaissance-era, foppish-looking aristocrat and a barbarian chief (son of barbarian chief, grandson of barbarian chief, etc.). Both would be considered nobility from a noble lineage in their own culture. The noble background feature says that a noble can get an audience with another noble. But this is ridiculous, because the two cultures are as as different as possible; there's no way that your noble feature would get you an audience with the nobles of such a vastly different culture, right?

There are a couple of ways of thinking about this.

One is that D&D has typically has a rather narrow idea of what a noble actually is. In art, flavor text, and even statblocks throughout the editions, the concept of nobility has been reserved for a very Medieval-to-Enlightenment-era Europoean style of nobility (lives in something like a palace, has a complex title and coat of arms, has at least a small army, probably employs a trusted advisor who wears a Van Dyke and is just looking for the opportunity to betray them, etc.).

So no, the noble feature wouldn't work because because D&D never expected that the barbarian chief would be considered to be a noble in the first place.

The disconnect is that we players often do consider the chief to be a noble, but of a vastly different culture, and so on the face of it, the feature doesn't make sense.

On the flip side, D&D is multiracial, with hundreds of different sentient species and sub-species, of which a sizable fraction have some sort of social hierarchy of a type that would lead to a noble class. In a setting like this, the nobility would almost certainly be taught the basics of how to deal with nobles of a different culture, if not in an etiquette class then at least by parents and those trusted advisors.

Thus, a noble of one culture should be willing to meet with a noble of another culture--maybe from a true willingness to meet with other nobles, maybe out of politeness, maybe out of curiosity, maybe because you don't want to start a war just because you refused to meet with the hoboblin warlord who has a hundred thousand troops at his disposal and doesn't like being snubbed. And note the feature says "You can secure an audience with a local noble if you need to," not "you can get the noble to actually listen to you and do what you ask of them."

(Which is another reason I honestly don't really care that much about pointing to a real-world example of something, because no real-world example is going to involve multiple different intelligent species, magic, active gods, and all the other things that D&D has.)
 

tetrasodium

Legend
Supporter
Epic
I'd look more to discussing how, given that they're in the Monster Manual, all Nobles must by definition be monsters... :)
Well the PHB says they can effectively cast a slightly modified version of the most well known spell in 3.5's book of vile darkness on commoners, that's pretty monstrous
 

Oofta

Legend
OK, so the idea was, you have two humans: a Renaissance-era, foppish-looking aristocrat and a barbarian chief (son of barbarian chief, grandson of barbarian chief, etc.). Both would be considered nobility from a noble lineage in their own culture. The noble background feature says that a noble can get an audience with another noble. But this is ridiculous, because the two cultures are as as different as possible; there's no way that your noble feature would get you an audience with the nobles of such a vastly different culture, right?

There are a couple of ways of thinking about this.

One is that D&D has typically has a rather narrow idea of what a noble actually is. In art, flavor text, and even statblocks throughout the editions, the concept of nobility has been reserved for a very Medieval-to-Enlightenment-era Europoean style of nobility (lives in something like a palace, has a complex title and coat of arms, has at least a small army, probably employs a trusted advisor who wears a Van Dyke and is just looking for the opportunity to betray them, etc.).

So no, the noble feature wouldn't work because because D&D never expected that the barbarian chief would be considered to be a noble in the first place.

The disconnect is that we players often do consider the chief to be a noble, but of a vastly different culture, and so on the face of it, the feature doesn't make sense.

On the flip side, D&D is multiracial, with hundreds of different sentient species and sub-species, of which a sizable fraction have some sort of social hierarchy of a type that would lead to a noble class. In a setting like this, the nobility would almost certainly be taught the basics of how to deal with nobles of a different culture, if not in an etiquette class then at least by parents and those trusted advisors.

Thus, a noble of one culture should be willing to meet with a noble of another culture--maybe from a true willingness to meet with other nobles, maybe out of politeness, maybe out of curiosity, maybe because you don't want to start a war just because you refused to meet with the hoboblin warlord who has a hundred thousand troops at his disposal and doesn't like being snubbed. And note the feature says "You can secure an audience with a local noble if you need to," not "you can get the noble to actually listen to you and do what you ask of them."

(Which is another reason I honestly don't really care that much about pointing to a real-world example of something, because no real-world example is going to involve multiple different intelligent species, magic, active gods, and all the other things that D&D has.)

We happen to have one statblock for a noble. That's it. Just like we have one statblock for every soldier which does not mean every soldier in existence is the same nor do they have the same gear. We have an example of what a noble might look like. I see no reason to believe there is only 1 type of noble in the entire campaign world.

D&D simplifies a lot of things, it's up to DMs and designers to turn those defaults into believable worlds.
 

Faolyn

(she/her)
We happen to have one statblock for a noble. That's it. Just like we have one statblock for every soldier which does not mean every soldier in existence is the same nor do they have the same gear. We have an example of what a noble might look like. I see no reason to believe there is only 1 type of noble in the entire campaign world.

D&D simplifies a lot of things, it's up to DMs and designers to turn those defaults into believable worlds.
I did say in art and flavor text throughout multiple editions, you know.
 

Oofta

Legend
I did say in art and flavor text throughout multiple editions, you know.

And? There are also plenty of depictions of nobles as incompetent or evil. The fact that nobles tend to be depicted in finery is pretty meaningless.

There is no "standard" noble that must be used in every campaign. Other than a single default statblock they are as varied in real life and fiction as everyone else.
 

Faolyn

(she/her)
And? There are also plenty of depictions of nobles as incompetent or evil. The fact that nobles tend to be depicted in finery is pretty meaningless.
I didn't say anything about competency or morality. You're bringing in completely unrelated aspects.
 


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