Latest / Stuff Mom Never Told You / Happy Hour #228: Dungeons and Dragons and Disability

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Happy Hour #228: Dungeons and Dragons and Disability · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Anny Anne Smitha and welcome to Stuff
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: I Never told you production. I heart radio, and welcome
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: to another edition of Happy Hour. As always, whatever you're
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: choosing to do, please do so responsively. Samantha, are you
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: up to anything?
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: I got my.
• 0:30
  Speaker 3: Dr pepper cherry zero. I know I was trying to
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: say it so that you didn't get too offended.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: Not a sponsor, not a sponsor.
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: No, but it does have some caffeine for me.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, nice, Nice, I have hypopison. My friends left, she
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: left a bunch of random beers, and so I'm making
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: my way through and today Hipopyson. Before we get into
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: this episode, just a reminder that we would love for
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: you to join us on a voyage. Thanks to our
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: friends at Virgin Voyages, we are going with the Stuff
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: at Sea voyage from New York to Bermuda October second
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: through seventh.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Stuff.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: You should know, fellow podcasts will be there. Stuff they
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: don't want you to know. Wills be there, and you
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: can see all of us recording live and there will
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: be events, and Samanth and I will be hanging around.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: We'll be having fun and we would love to hang
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: out with you all.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, we'll be in the middle of the sea with you,
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  Speaker 3: So of course we want to hang out.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Yes, absolutely, absolutely we do. It's gonna be fun. So
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: if you want to learn more, please go check out
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  Speaker 1: Virgin vorages dot com slash stuff.
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  Speaker 2: We would love to see you.
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  Speaker 1: And I actually think that this topic I have today,
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  Speaker 1: which is about dungeons and waggons, I bet there's some
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: dungeons and dragon we could have a little dungeons and
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  Speaker 1: dragons hang out.
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  Speaker 2: Some of us could. Who is this we could? You
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  Speaker 2: always wanted to narrate.
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  Speaker 3: I want to be in the background, not to narrate
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: while you're there. I want to see us doing a
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: production in which y'all will give me recordings or such
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  Speaker 3: and I will come by and do it a voiceover, okay,
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  Speaker 3: and commentary. I feel like if I were there in
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: the middle of it, I have talked about coming to
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  Speaker 3: watch out because I don't know what it is that
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  Speaker 3: I would be disruptive with my jokes and such while
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  Speaker 3: y'all are in character.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I think I think you could do it. I
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  Speaker 1: think you could hang out, observe, yes, maybe take some
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  Speaker 1: notes and then record your video notes.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's fair.
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  Speaker 1: Well, uh, you know, we'll see, we'll see what we
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  Speaker 1: get up to on this voyage. But yeah, today I
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  Speaker 1: did want to talk about Dungeons and Dragon for a
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  Speaker 1: couple of reasons, probably most prominent Samanthonos. I have a
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  Speaker 1: campaign that I am the leader of. I am the
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  Speaker 1: Dungeon Master, but we haven't played for two years and
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  Speaker 1: we are trying to start it back up. And I
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  Speaker 1: almost lost my seven hundred page outline. It's seven hundred pages.
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  Speaker 1: A lot of it's it's copy paste, so it's not
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  Speaker 1: as impressive as impressive as it sounds, but it's still
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  Speaker 1: pretty impressive. It's a long outline, and I almost lost it,
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  Speaker 1: and the panic was very real. But I have recovered
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  Speaker 1: it safe. But we were supposed to finally reconvene this weekend.
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  Speaker 1: Anyone who plays Dungeons and Draggons nose though the number
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  Speaker 1: one villain scheduling, so we once again have moved it
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  Speaker 1: to September.
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  Speaker 2: We'll see.
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  Speaker 1: Oh really, Yeah, yeah, it was pretty chaotic. It was
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: a pretty chaotic series of texts. But but it's been
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  Speaker 1: on my mind because I've been trying to get back
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  Speaker 1: into it, remember how to do it, like where we
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: were in the story, and all of that. But also
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  Speaker 1: we were discussing the history of queer people and dungeons
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  Speaker 1: and dragons, and so that got me thinking, what about
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  Speaker 1: the history of disability and dungeons and dragons. So for
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  Speaker 1: Disability Pride Month, this is what I looked into. It's
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  Speaker 1: similar to what we briefly touched on about when it
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  Speaker 1: comes to the history of queer and in dungeons and dragons,
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  Speaker 1: queer people in dungeons and dragons. So for a long time,
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  Speaker 1: disability equal.
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  Speaker 2: Death and duneon and dragons.
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  Speaker 1: Like he really didn't want to have a disability or
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  Speaker 1: an impairment as they're sometimes called, Like it was just
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  Speaker 1: that's usually how it was framed. There was a history
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  Speaker 1: of derogatory language. I'm not going to say it was
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  Speaker 1: like specific to dungeons and draggons, but I'm pretty sure
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  Speaker 1: one example, the writer was like, by this point, most
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  Speaker 1: people had stopped using this language, but they were still
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  Speaker 1: using it in dungeons and dragons. So you have that
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  Speaker 1: going on also, Like usually with a disability or something
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  Speaker 1: like an impairment, which is I don't know, maybe you
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  Speaker 1: get blinded or something, it reduces your points. So it's
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  Speaker 1: like it's a hindrance the bad thing. Some new games
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  Speaker 1: and different games allocate those points somewhere else. So perhaps
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  Speaker 1: your character is blind, but that means they have way
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  Speaker 1: better hearing or something like that. Those points get moved
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  Speaker 1: somewhere else, So it's not necessarily a bad thing and
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  Speaker 1: could in fact be really useful and really a really
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  Speaker 1: good thing. So I was thinking about this because the
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  Speaker 1: first time I played Dungeons and Dragons, I kind of
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: cringe to look at now I try.
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  Speaker 2: I was not a good player.
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  Speaker 1: I didn't really know what to do, but I was new,
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  Speaker 1: so I'll give myself that, but I was like the worst.
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  Speaker 1: If I had been the Dungeon Master at that time,
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  Speaker 1: I would have been like, no, not a character like this.
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  Speaker 1: But I was trying to I had read about how
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  Speaker 1: Dungeons and Dragons was useful for things like PTSD. I
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  Speaker 1: was trying to figure out what this character I was
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  Speaker 1: writing would do like in a I was just writing
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  Speaker 1: her in a novel, and so I basically made the
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  Speaker 1: poor dungeon Master Tyler my therapist. But because she had
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  Speaker 1: my character had a lot of trauma and she just
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  Speaker 1: was very She wasn't coping with it very well, and
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  Speaker 1: so in Dungeons and Dragons to fifth edition, which is
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  Speaker 1: what most people use, that would qualify as a disability
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  Speaker 1: because they are trying to include them more now. I also,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: of course had an arm like a winter soldier arm,
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: but I convinced him, well, I lost my arm, and
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: then I convinced him to let me have a Winter's alter.
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  Speaker 1: That took some negotiating. I have to say, who didn't
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  Speaker 1: go for that one immediately? Yeah, yes, yes, So I
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: didn't realize that I was kind of playing a character
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  Speaker 1: that had what would now qualify as disabilities in the manual.
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  Speaker 1: There's been a longer history of the dungeon master being
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  Speaker 1: encouraged to create non playable characters with the disability. So usually,
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: as a dungeon master, every town the players go to,
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  Speaker 1: you need to have like the innkeep, you need to
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  Speaker 1: have the the bar, the bar if you need to
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  Speaker 1: have all these characters that you are going to play,
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  Speaker 1: And a lot of times in the book it'll give
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  Speaker 1: you suggestions of how to like build a character.
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  Speaker 2: And I think in the newest edition.
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  Speaker 1: Like a quarter of them or disabilities, and they weren't
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  Speaker 1: framed as like this is bad or.
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  Speaker 2: Like this is a weakness or anything.
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  Speaker 1: I suppose that's how you play it, how the DM
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  Speaker 1: plays it. But that was I think it was a
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  Speaker 1: fourth and and things are changing once again, slowly but surely. So.
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: In twenty twenty two, a game designer and disability advocate
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  Speaker 1: named Sarah Thompson, she made up this thing called a
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: Combat Wheelchair, and so she made it as a homebrew.
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  Speaker 1: Homebrew is when you build the whole world, like because
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  Speaker 1: you can purchase books where you just kind of go
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  Speaker 1: through the book and the adventures already written and you
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  Speaker 1: just kind of have to run it. If you homebrew,
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  Speaker 1: that means you build the whole world and all the
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: characters and everything. So she introduced this combat Wheelchair and
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  Speaker 1: it's like a magical quality. It's got some magical qualities,
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  Speaker 1: and it's a free to download thing, wh should I
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  Speaker 1: appreciate And it has already kind of the rules of
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  Speaker 1: like here are the attacks you can use, here are
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  Speaker 1: the stats. It comes with all of that stuff, so
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  Speaker 1: people can incorporate that into their own home brews. And
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  Speaker 1: it was pretty popular and a lot of people got
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  Speaker 1: on board. A lot of people were like, Oh, I
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  Speaker 1: like this, let me see what version of this I
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  Speaker 1: can make, And it was also a push for people
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  Speaker 1: like you know, the Hasbro who owns Dungeons and Dragons.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe you should be offering more of this stuff right
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  Speaker 1: in your materials. So that's pretty cool. And I have
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  Speaker 1: this quote from screen rant here about it. In science
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  Speaker 1: fiction and fantasy stories with advanced technology are powerful magic.
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  Speaker 1: Writers and RPG designers who often get careless with their
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  Speaker 1: world building can thoughtlessly wind up erasing disabled people from
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  Speaker 1: their narratives. Declaring that cybernetics, genetic engineering, clerical healing, magic,
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  Speaker 1: or mystical enchantments can be used to fix disabled people.
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  Speaker 1: They are two big problems with this viewpoint. There are
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  Speaker 1: a wide range of physical and mental impairments people can have,
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  Speaker 1: not all of which can be changed. Second, many disabled
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  Speaker 1: people don't want to be fixed, seeing their impairments as
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  Speaker 1: an essential part of their lives they lead for them.
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  Speaker 1: The idea of curing all disabled people smacks of prejudice
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  Speaker 1: and eugenics, a toxic mindset, valuing people only for how strong, useful,
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  Speaker 1: or normal they.
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  Speaker 2: Are to their societies.
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  Speaker 1: But I like that quote a lot, and I think
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  Speaker 1: the other thing with Dungeons and Dragons, as we discussed,
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  Speaker 1: when we're talking about the growing popularity of it within
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  Speaker 1: the queer community. Is you want to see you want
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  Speaker 1: to play someone you resonate with usually or somebody that's
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  Speaker 1: maybe is somebody you don't resonate with, but they might
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  Speaker 1: still have whatever disability or what have you. If you
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  Speaker 1: want that option, you want to see it represented and
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  Speaker 1: to just erase it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the kind of.
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  Speaker 1: Not only is it so negative and toxic as as
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  Speaker 1: this quote says, but also it's like, what I love
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  Speaker 1: about Dungeons and Draggons is the creativity of it. You
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  Speaker 1: want a ramming wheelchair, let's talk about it.
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  Speaker 2: I love that.
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  Speaker 1: Let's be creative and collaborate together about it. I think
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  Speaker 1: that's fantastic. And as I said, yeah, a lot of
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  Speaker 1: people have started making their own versions of this wheelchair,
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  Speaker 1: the combat wheelchair, and I love to see it. I
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  Speaker 1: love to see it. There's also been a lot more
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  Speaker 1: guides being posted about hosting accessible games, which I think
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  Speaker 1: is also really really important.
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  Speaker 2: And with the.
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  Speaker 1: Growth of using the internet to play D and D
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  Speaker 1: that you've seen these communities more and more people can
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  Speaker 1: play and have access to it. But I really appreciate
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: people are writing these guides and like, here's how it
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: can be mindful about hosting accessible games.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love it. I love it.
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: It's gotta be wanting to play alas maybe on the Voyage.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: On the Voyage, yes, yes, but listeners. As always, we
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: would love to hear from you. If you've played, if
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: you have thoughts about this, tell us about your character designs,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: your character.
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: Uh, yes, we would love to hear from you.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: You can email us at Hello at Stuffnever Told You
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: dot com. You can find us at zue sky at
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: mompso podcast, or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff I've
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: Never Told You.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: We're also on YouTube.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: We have some merchandise at Compureau, and we have a
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: book you can get where you get your books. Thanks
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: as always too, our super producers Casey and Rima, and
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: our executive Bruce and Maya.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: Thank you and.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: Thanks to you for listening Stuff Never Told You pstructure
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: of I Heeart Radio. For more podcast from my Heart Radio,
• 13:51
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• 13:52
  Speaker 1: or if you listen to your favorite shows, The Angry