Had this conversation with someone who chose to no longer be at my table after meeting a blind NPC ( files.catbox.moe )

Another player who was at the table during the incident sent me this meme after the problem player in question (they had a history) left the group chat.

Felt like sharing it here because I’m sure more people should keep this kind of thing in mind.

Tattorack ,
@Tattorack@lemmy.world avatar

But… That depends on the magic, doesn’t it? I’d argue you could easily use magic to fix disabilities. Or do healers not exist in your world?

Gormadt OP ,
@Gormadt@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

The exist, they’re not everywhere though. And are typically very cagey about teaching others.

And often times their prices for using their services is pretty bad for the typical person.

One of the PCs though (who joined after the other guy left) is an artificer who was born without legs (currently has prosthetics they made) and the reason he’s out adventuring is to bring legs to those who lack them. Like his mentor did for him.

The next town they’re getting too will have an NPC without a leg and the artificer should have the components to make a magical prosthetic for them if they want to.

nickwitha_k ,

One of the PCs though (who joined after the other guy left) is an artificer who was born without legs (currently has prosthetics they made) and the reason he’s out adventuring is to bring legs to those who lack them. Like his mentor did for him.

That’s my kind of power fantasy right there.

Lag_Incarnate ,
@Lag_Incarnate@ttrpg.network avatar

It depends on the tone of the setting. Someone who gets their leg broken in a Forgotten Realms game can usually find a small-time priest to cast Cure Wounds on them, preventing most disabilities that aren’t from birth. Someone who gets their leg broken in Warhammer Fantasy has to hope within their gimped traveling distance that there’s a priest of the correct faith capable of appeasing the gods for the healing to happen, before their detriments become permanent. As such, having a disabled character in a game with more accessible healthcare requires an extra degree of explanation, on top of the PCs’ and players’ emotional response to someone being so downtrodden. The circumstances of their ailment, who or what was responsible, how they see their ailment and work around it, all are weights on the players’ suspension of disbelief that a GM has to take into account that they generally otherwise wouldn’t with John Miller, the able-bodied dude who runs the mill with a wife, three kids, and a problem with rats stealing the grain that he mills. It’s like a Chekov’s Gun in that sort of way, the GM as a storyteller surely wouldn’t spend the effort to decide that an NPC has a trait that is notably separate from the default without it being somehow relevant to the plot. The mage asks the party to do a quest for their magical research, a general asks the party to do a quest for national security, and a person in a wheelchair… what desire do you give them that wouldn’t be misconstrued as able-ist or a waste of that character trait? It’s very difficult, often comes with an air of making some kind of a statement, either that they’re a writer capable enough to wear disabled-face without it being offensive, or taking a preachy high-ground telling people a message about human sympathy, determination, and adaptability that they’ve already been made well aware of by the existence of popular culture.

reverendsteveii ,

It’s like a Chekov’s Gun

this is the root of your misunderstanding. diversity doesn’t require a plot hook, let people just be different and let people who are different in real life be represented in the media they consume.

Lag_Incarnate ,
@Lag_Incarnate@ttrpg.network avatar

Nice job assuming that I as a person am bigoted just because I prefer details that contribute to the story. I’m fine with people being different, that’s a fact of life, and any self-respecting person should figure out how to accept that as soon as possible. What I look for in a roleplaying game, however, is narrative cohesion, where the characters are characters instead of tokens, and their actions have consequences that make sense. Mechanically, this means that I would prefer to not be held back by my fellows, be it the guy playing a Wild Magic Sorcerer who insists on triggering a Surge via Feywild shard whenever possible and gets sad when it doesn’t go off, or the guy playing a Wizard that insists on hobbling up the stairs on their crutch instead of letting the Barbarian carry them. This doesn’t mean it can’t be done well ever, I’ve had an old man NPC with a halved movement speed use that as a way to get the party to pay attention to their surroundings instead of rushing headlong into a hallway just because it’s empty. It should be in a way that doesn’t impact gameplay; a one-armed Fighter wouldn’t insist on one-handing a Halberd under normal circumstances and would usually go for a one-handed weapon, nor would a character that’s been mute their whole life have a very good way to cast spells with verbal components without a kind DM or an addiction to Subtle Spell. Narratively, it means that things feel strange when someone opts to “have a disability” but then avoids playing into that angle at all by having a proverbial “all-terrain wheelchair” work-around with few downsides, possibly some benefits. Again, not that they can’t ever be well-represented. The trick is that you need to make up for the character’s weaknesses in a way that doesn’t make them “speshul” by being the only one allowed to have that thing.

“Why would you guys want a cane-sword that doubles your movement speed? You don’t have gammy legs halving your movement speed!” A cane-sword that doubles movement speed is still a weapon that doubles your god-damn movement speed. Don’t “gatekeep” my characters from your cool idea without at least giving me a story as to why I can’t have it (my character didn’t make it and I don’t know where the creator went) and how I could get to the point where I can if I wanted it (have to find the creator and convince them to make one for me even though I don’t really need it like the first character does). Now, if they play a disabled character straight, taking efforts to minimize the mechanical detriments through tactical assessment of one’s abilities and rely on the party to help make up for their weaknesses, congratulations! A character was made and I have no beef, you’ve won me over. If they miss some points, either expecting people to play around the character detriments they chose or playing Oppression Olympics™ as to why their character needs something your character can’t have, because they decided the character would suck otherwise, that’s just disingenuous to the multiplayer experience, and frankly kind of fucked up to hold one’s own character hostage with disability to get preferential treatment. If your character is a Polearm Master Fighter that lost his arm in the war and is questing for a Regenerate spell as he goes through life with a spear and a dream, maybe even giving up on it as he realizes he can adapt to a different style of fighting bit by bit as he levels up, I welcome and endorse it.

Now, the character can hiss and spit about the unfairness of their situation until they’re blue in the face, that’s roleplay and I wholly support that in a roleplaying game. What’s bad is, in the scenario the (N)PCs wise up to an item’s necessity, any item, and in some way negate it, putting the player in a position where they need to play the character they made in a weaker position (in this case the weakness they built into it), the player shouldn’t get upset over it. When the player insists that “their character’s agency” shouldn’t be lost because of losing one item, or “why did you approve it just to take it away?”, broseph, you made the character. Did they genuinely think the party would thank them for being graced with the blast radius of a Wild Magic Surge, or are they just a gambling addict that couldn’t foresee other people not wanting to be hit by the rebounding Chaos Bolt when there’s only one enemy target? Is that sort of player incapable of realizing that the game system with mechanics to ensure it’s not a make-pretend battle of “nuh-uh, I have [excuse] to protect me” could possibly allow for the other side to have counterplay in the same way they can make a magic chair that can climb a wall?

As for NPCs. Man, if these guys can’t handle a one-eyed veteran in a fictional country, I fear for them ever seeing a homeless shelter. They need to sort their shit out. You can have a beggar in a D&D game, they might even be a good source of information or a powerful NPC that has problems, same with a person with a crutch or a leper on a wheeled board. Sorry we forgot to put “trigger warning: semi-accurate depictions of squalor” in Session 0’s notes, if the existence in fantasy is what sets them off, I’d hate to see how they react to reality.

TL;DR: sometimes you can hate the player instead of the game. My beef is not with the existence of the differently abled, but with people that use them as a shield for their lack of originality, thought, or care for their fellow players.

Cowbee ,

This would be cool to see! Lots of ways to represent historically unrepresented people in alternative settings.

Hexer ,

Well it is quite strange to be so offended of disabled people that you would leave the game But as a devil’s advocate what the problem is actually a world building one. If you establish that the world has magic, magic is widespread and powerful then the fact that there are disabled people could be slightly immersion breaking. For example in DnD lesser restoration a 2nd lvl spell would cure most blindnesses (well except if the person has actually lost their eyes). Hard to say anything more because you gave so little details. Ultimately that person had a disproportionate response but I find your meme both pointless what aboutism and generalization. Hope you have a good day.

Promethiel ,
@Promethiel@lemmy.world avatar

I thought you were gonna make some cool points about world building but then the ending came. To address your DnD example; that’s already covered by canon. Adventurers and what they earn (monetarily, influence, and good old finders keeper’s wise) is at minimum a whole order of magnitude above what the level 0s that make up the world’s backdrop have access to.

A blind adventurer who is destitute could find a scroll of lesser restoration (not arguing it would work here or not, that’s DM fiat) or otherwise get access to restoration of some sort if sought.

The blind after mining accident level 0 beggar is screwed, but the blinded by hunting accident noble could see by the end of the day.

The blind from birth halfling who can not miss what they’ve never had before and who gets around just fine with blind sight, wouldn’t necessarily feel that there is anything to be fixed; use that wish people for legendary loot.

That’s the bleakest and reality is stranger than fiction angle tho.

They’re fictional worlds, it’s perfectly okay to make one in which differently abled people can feel represented without reality being a dick to them if you know, not being a dick is something that matters to you.

Edit: Some typos.

ThunderclapSasquatch ,

Exactly, lesser restoration is a spell 5th level clerics can cast, it won’t be super common but every temple should have someone in charge at that level at least. I’m not saying it’s impossible for people to be blind or otherwise have physical dysfunctions but magic on the scale dnd assumes means there will be lower rates of it. Did the player overreact? Yes, but he wasn’t 100% wrong

ParsnipWitch ,
@ParsnipWitch@feddit.de avatar

Why are people in the comments arguing about what is or isn’t possible in D&S or Star Trek or whatever? As far as I can see it, there is no description about what kind of universe this plays in.

It doesn’t make sense to argue whether or not a wheelchair like that “makes sense” in a D&D universe?!

EunieIsTheBus ,

Well yes, but if there is powerful magic in a world, aren’t all disabilities healable?

lightnsfw ,

Our world has powerful medicine that can heal a lot of people who aren’t getting it.

Kyoyeou ,
@Kyoyeou@slrpnk.net avatar

Had a session last night, where my player where asking this question, and posted this post as a response on the screen, and it started in, how could we do a magic chair into, let’s make an exo-squeleton. I come there to say,

That as a DM I have stollen your stuff and added it to my campaign

Duamerthrax , (edited )

Disabilities are fine, but wheelchair accessible dungeons and forests are a bit much. Yuki Yuna is a magical girl anime with a parallelized character. The ribbons on her outfit are prehensile and let her more around Doc Oct while in combat.

quindraco ,

It’s fine, provided it’s not a plot hole - i.e. your fantasy setting needs to not have abolished blindness as a realistic malady, which some settings do. E.g. LOTR 100% has blind people, while the Harry Potter universe only has very poor blind people, since solving blindness is as trivial as a polyjuice potion, even if nothing else works (and something more effective is bound to work).

norgur ,
@norgur@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

Or you’re a muggle because fuck you we ain’t helpin’ ya!

thesilverpig ,

The Harry potter world is so dystopian and broken. And after years of being fucked by them Harry just want to become a cop. 🙄

The_Dessarin_River ,

If characters in a story have a disability the question should be “What is the DM/Author trying to say, and how does this character add to the world they are portraying?” The plague of diegetic essentialism etc.

overjustic ,

That just enforces the idea that people with disabilities are not a normal part of the society. It’s like asking to justify why a character is tall, blonde, old, a woman. People are just people and there’s a huge variation on their shapes, sizes, colors and disability status.

neptune ,

I’m not sure the commenter disagrees with you. If a player wants their character to have a wheelchair, they are simply “saying” that some people have wheel chairs.

I had to go look up diegetic essential ism and basically the idea is that people get too hung up on the literalness of a character in a wheelchair.

What does it say about the universe that elephants can jump ten feet vertically? What does it say about the DM if they rule against this “fact” of DND?

The_Dessarin_River ,

Yeah, sorry, I should have linked diegetic essentialism.

The easy example I’ve seen used is Vampires and Werewolves.

How do you kill a vampire?Vampires are not real.

Within the fantasy world vampires can be understood in their relation to their ‘in universe’ opposite: werewolves. They are essentially the same creature: ‘monster that bites you and you turn into one’. Vampires tend to be rich or aristocrats with massive amounts of control over other creatures, environment, etc. Werewolves are poor, often homeless, and lose control over themselves in a bestial form.

How do you kill a vampire, a monster representing wealth, greed, etc.A simple wooden stake, the tool of peasant farmers.

How do you kill a werewolf, a monster representing poverty, desperation, etcA silver bullet, a weapon literally made of money.

The_Dessarin_River ,

I don’t think it does unless you reach some odd answers. The answer could be “to create a world that feels real and inclusive.” A big part of world building is describing places and characters so those descriptions do matter and are not just made for no reason. I don’t need to justify some convoluted way that a healing spell doesn’t work.

I think we agree though (?), because if a player asked me so bluntly it would probably require a pause to talk it out at the least, and tbh that’s on me for trying to be pithy rather than adding a sentence to clarify.

radiosimian ,

Let’s just pretend that Zatoichi wasn’t a thing. NB he might be fiction but the blind swordsman kicked serious ass.

dynamo ,

Couldn’t a cleric heal partial paralysis tho?

narcissist ,

You’ll get so much hate for stating the obvious

dynamo ,

Perhaps. Ain’t the first time, ain’t the last time.

chumbalumber ,

There are plenty of reasons a disabled person could exist in a fantasy setting. A transaction, giving something up for power (e.g. Odin). A curse from an enchanter, that they do not have the power to remove. A religious superstition around those that have had accidents befall them (that it is the will of their god). Or even simply the fact that a number of common people may not be able to afford the services of a cleric (for a villager in the mountains, a journey to the city to have their paralysis cured may be beyond what they can manage).

TheFriendlyArtificer ,

Hell. After reading this I feel like permanent effects from magical damage resulting in physical disabilities should be a trope!

I can think of a few examples: The Magicians, Game of Thrones, etc. But as a gameplay mechanic it feels like it would have some seriously cool possibilities.

dynamo ,

I don’t find a disabilty appearing in fantasy surprising, but the uncured ones do surprise me. Or remedied ig. Prettu sure that if your setting can have a wheelchair, then theoretically you could stick Warforged legs onto that someone. Obviously not ideal, but it’d probably be an improvent for the person (in universe ofc)

malle_yeno ,
@malle_yeno@pawb.social avatar

In addition to the list of explanations for why disabled people can exist in a fantasy setting that chumbalumber@lemmy.blahaj.zone provided, I’ll also just say:

Using diegetic explanations for why a problematic aspect exists in a piece of fictional media does not address the substance of the problem. The problem is that disability is often not represented in fantasy stories. Pointing out that there’s an in-universe explanation for why this may be the case doesn’t solve the lack of representation. These stories are fiction, and you can add any explanation for why disabled people exist as easily as you can erase disability completely.

This video does a good job of explaining this some more: youtu.be/AxV8gAGmbtk?si=YRvXjpZv_YP9Z5sC

grandkaiser ,

Compared to a high fantasy setting, everyone is disabled. I cannot fight a dragon any more than a blind man can be magically cured of blindness.

dynamo ,

I’m not arguing the representation angle, i just wouldn’t expect to see many disable people in fantasy, because of magic and the other weird stuff that happens in there. Same with cuberpunk literature tbh

ICastFist ,
@ICastFist@programming.dev avatar

In cyberpunk and most futuristic settings, the only real disability is being poor

chumbalumber ,

Dan Olsen, my beloved.

Absolutely a good point, answering the question ‘why is it a problem?’, to go alongside ‘how can it be fixed?’. Thanks for the thought provocation

njm1314 ,

What if the cleric isn’t around when it happens? I mean if you take an ax to the spine and don’t run into a cleric for 3 years can they do anything? I would probably say no.

Nalivai ,

There is nothing in the rules as written that prevents it
Edit: forgot i am not in the dnd community

dynamo ,

Well, i’d say that it probably depends on the kind of damage, and how well it has healed. I could see a method similar to rebreaking bones that haven’t healed correctly (IRL), where a group of medical professsionals, magical and not, just hit you with an axe in the same spot, to try and get the spine to to heal before the surrounding tissue. Maybe.

Wogi ,

What if they’re born with it?

dynamo ,

Healing magic limitations differ from medium to medium. Maybe the only thing that matters in this case is the damage being still there. Depends on the setting ofc, and if you want to be represented then go ahead, just don’t get angry at me for being surprised

ParsnipWitch ,
@ParsnipWitch@feddit.de avatar

How do you know clerics exists in that world?

spudwart ,

If you don’t treat people as people because of a disability, you have both violated the social contract.

Skkorm ,

I mean, dwarves in wheelchairs is already a thing in 5e. https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Banak_Brawnanvil

Conservative old men are so sensitive.

Gormadt OP ,
@Gormadt@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Fun fact the player in question was 21, the rest of the table is 30 - 40

Skkorm ,

Ahhh shoot. Looks like the kid got pipelined.

Blue_Morpho ,

Maybe he really didn’t like Hawk the Slayer.

theguardian.com/…/hawk-the-slayer-film-sequel-ter…

AnthropomorphicCat ,
@AnthropomorphicCat@lemmy.world avatar

This wheel chair looks out of place for the setting. I love what Psychonauts 2 did: there is a disabled character that uses psychic levitation for his “wheel” chair.

PM_Your_Nudes_Please , (edited )

The issue is that this toes the line on erasure. If a character is disabled but offsetting all of their disabilities with magic, they’re not disabled. The disability is just flavor text at that point, which feels a little bit like wearing an offensive caricature of a race as a Halloween costume.

If you want to include a disabled character in the party, that’s great. But disabilities come with drawbacks that real people with disabilities struggle with every day. If a person with a disability wants to erase their disability in a fantasy setting, that’s cool. At that point, it could simply be a power fantasy, the same way people want to play super powerful wizards and super strong barbarians.

But if an otherwise able bodied person wants to play a caricature of a disabled person without actually role playing the disabled part, it could become downright offensive to the people who actually struggle with those disabilities. Because at that point it’s not roleplaying a disabled person; It’s just leaning on stereotypes when it’s convenient, without actually roleplaying the real life struggles that accompany the disability.

Look at Toph from Avatar as a good example. She was blind and used her abilities to offset that when possible. But the important part is that she was still blind, and still regularly dealt with the drawbacks from being blind. She couldn’t read or write, because braille hadn’t been invented. And if she was ever away from solid ground, (like when flying or on sand) she wasn’t able to see anything. Because her sense of “sight” relied on her physical connection to the solid ground. So when she wasn’t touching solid earth, she was completely blind. And she also couldn’t see anything that was airborne, like when they were attacked by giant flying insects. She was blindly throwing rocks into the air, because she couldn’t see where the enemies were.

Dutczar ,
@Dutczar@sopuli.xyz avatar

“If you have an amputated leg but offset it with a prosthetic leg, you are not disabled”

What if the magic is still not as good as a fully functioning body, for one reason or another?

PM_Your_Nudes_Please ,

I think you may have missed my point. Finding creative ways to offset a disability with magic is great. But even that magic would have limitations.

Maybe you have a flying carpet instead of a wheelchair. But even the best magical items have a limited number of daily uses, because magic power isn’t unlimited.

Maybe you have blindsight instead of regular sight, like giant spiders who can see even in magical darkness. But then you’re completely blind outside of the 30’ range, because blindsight only applies to the specified range.

Maybe you’re missing an arm and have compensated with an artificer’s prosthetic that has some built in features/tools. But you don’t have any sense of touch or proprioception (so you tend to bump into things and knock it against things when you aren’t consciously paying attention to where it is,) and have disadvantage on strength or dexterity checks/saves that involve gripping/climbing/etc.

My point isn’t simply that using magic to counteract a disability is wrong. In a world where magic permeates everything, it would be expected. My point is that you can’t simply erase the disability and use it for flavor text only when it’s convenient to you. Because disability permeates the disabled person’s life and inherently shapes how they interact with the world on a day to day basis.

Dutczar ,
@Dutczar@sopuli.xyz avatar

The thing is just that this started with a Psychonauts 2 character, and I haven’t played it, so for all I know maybe it makes no difference. But I assume constant telekinesis is at least somewhat inconvenient in that world. What about someone like Toph from Avatar TLA, whose blindness is acknowledged occasionally, but most of the time functions fine?

A question might be, how do you define a sufficient amount of limitations? I’m sure there’s a point where everyone will go “yeah, you may as well be healthy”, but I assume most situations are a grey area. But I’m also neither disabled nor have experience with disabled people, so I’m probably the furthest from judging.

Also things like, how that magic carpet would be even more useful for a fully functioning person, even with a large amount of uses. Still a disadvantage on the merit of being the only option, rather than being AN option.

First ,

So what you’re saying is that if she shits her diapers in the game, it’s ok? Weird kink, but w/e floats your boat, I guess…

BigBlackCockroach ,
@BigBlackCockroach@lemmy.world avatar

This wheel chair looks out of place for the setting

dude…

It’s literally a made up world.

owen ,

There’s most definitely a better solution than a standard wheelchair in a magical world though

Nalivai ,

Floating disk

Wogi ,

I could definitely see like a gnome tinkerer coming up with something like a wheel chair that, after numerous iterations, looks pretty similar to a normal wheel chair.

Ok, start with a chair that literally just has 4 wheels on the feet. Gonna need a way to push it so put handles on the back.

Ok that’s pretty unstable and the test subject fell off repeatedly, damaging several important pieces of equipment and also themselves. Ok so what if we moved the back wheels out a bit and made them a little bigger. Ok pretty stable, gonna need arm rests though the test subject keeps falling off.

Ok now they stay in, and it doesn’t flop about, but it needs two people to move, what if… Hmmm… Ok we need some kind of drive mechanism that can be both powered AND steered with just the hands. Well this is wildly over budget with all the gears… What if we just push the wheels directly with the hands. Gotta make them a lot bigger and put a handle on…

DillyDaily ,

Another reason the chair looks out of place is because it’s a transfer chair, not a self propel chair. These chairs are designed to push someone, they aren’t designed for independent mobility.

These chairs are commonly represented in media because they are cheap and often the “first chair” a disabled person will get because of their affordability and needing something quick. But they are bog standard and you can’t really get around by yourself in one without more pain or fatigue. You’ll then start the process of getting a measured for a chair that will fit your needs.

Some people only have a transfer chair because they are semi-ambulant/part time chair user, so that’s all they need. But most people who use a wheelchair will not use a transfer chair long term. It’s temporary because it’s shit.

So it doesn’t make sense that someone with an active lifestyle, like a DnD character, would use this style chair as their main aid. Unless there’s something in the campaign, like their main chair was damaged, or the disability is recently acquired, the character is poor, etc.

Metatronz ,

They busted out of the hospital and took what wasn’t nailed down. Turns out, that was the only thing not nailed down. Twas an odd hospital

_TheThunderWolf_ ,

Possible but unlikely way around this: cast unseen servant and make it push the chair.

ParsnipWitch ,
@ParsnipWitch@feddit.de avatar

We see almost nothing about “the setting”. Not everything is LOTR, Harry Potter or D&D.

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