Chris Brady
Legendary Pubber
- Joined
- May 3, 2019
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You say that like it's a bad thing.Clyde left nothing to the imagination.
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You say that like it's a bad thing.Clyde left nothing to the imagination.
I'm not sure that it wasn't intended to invoke both, to be honest. As for the box of loot - it looks tiny, but if it's got mostly gold coins in it, it's going to weigh a shit-ton.All these comments about the slain dragon pic highlight why I have mixed feelings about it. Technically is not a badly painted pic or composition. But once you start looking at it closely and asking questions it all leads to "Did these guys just murder a baby dragon for that tiny bit of loot?" More than to "This is a young band adventurers who just got done with a day's hard work!"
I know that the pic was supposed to invoke the later, but I just can't help but think of the former.
You say that like it's a bad thing.
I'm going to need to see the birth certificate before I believe that.
It was - second printing, with the orange spine that tended to come off.Actually, I think the only core rulebooks covers in the entire history of D&D I ever liked was the Red Box, and the one DM's Guide with the wizard in the doorway. I think it was AD&D 1st edition, but like a second cover, or something.
Here's another one that isn't technically bad (though the poses have that artificial stiffness of a Vallejo), but I detest with a seething h8tred:
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Reinterpreting the Dark Elves as ethnically African is so incredibly stupid (and tonedeaf even for the time period) in multiple ways.
On the D&D art documentary, it mentioned how Clyde called yoinks on any hot women art. I love his art and have no problem with cheesecake but even he was silly at times.
Brown skin does not necessarily imply African.
Perhaps not necessarily, but that image clearly does. In general though, I can't imagine any reasonable explanation why residing in caves underground would cause an excess of melanin among a group. The original Morlocks were visually patterned on the Morlocks of HG Wells' The Time Machine, specifcally as they appeared in the 1960 George Pal film adaption, in contrast to the Eloi-adjacent Elves above ground.
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Devoid of that very specific reference, having the Dark Elves be darker-skinned makes no sense whatsoever. If anything, they'd be prone to albinoism.
It's probably covered by Gronan's quote, "We made up some shit we thought would be fun."Yeah, Gygax's relationship with mythology was....frustrating, to say the least. I don't think I've ever heard an adequate explanation for the D&D Gorgons...
It's probably covered by Gronan's quote, "We made up some shit we thought would be fun."
Nudes are porn? Gawwww so uncultured!It is if you aren't actually looking for porn
So which artist would you guy say is the king of cheesecake? Clyde Caldwell or Boris Vallejo?
Never heard of him.George Petty
I think you just answered your own question ( . . . in the affirmative).Did he do fantasy? His wheelhouse appears to be 1940s or 50s style pinups.
Did he do fantasy? His wheelhouse appears to be 1940s or 50s style pinups.
Yeah, my thoughts exactly. And those dark Elves didn't give me an African vibe, either.Nudes are porn? Gawwww so uncultured!
Hmm. I don't know. Pirate theme implies historic. And history is part of culture.That picture isn't an artistic nude, lol, it's a pirate with huge nipples poking through her shirt and the type of underwear you have to shave several times daily to pull off
Hmm. I don't know. Pirate theme implies historic. And history is part of culture.
Huge nipples is body positive and self acceptance to rock that outfit.
Shaving is hygienic. .. hard to fault her for that.
Really, I'm trying to meet you half way but I don't know how to go about it! ;)
I'm just poking fun (obvi). We're all free to like or dislike what we want!lol, I'm not saying it's bad artwork, or anyone shouldn't like it. It certainly wouldn't have been a piece that I would have submitted to this thread, unlike the weird melon-stuffed chainmail girl without internal organs in her torso pic I posted earlier in the thread. I love cheesecake art. Hence the George Pretty namedrop.
But I'm going to call a spade a spade.
Women have been removing body hair for hygiene and appearance for a long, long time. I imagine it would be de rigueur for sophisticated adventuresses. That thong she's wearing is a bit of a stretch, though.That picture isn't an artistic nude, lol, it's a pirate with huge nipples poking through her shirt and the type of underwear you have to shave several times daily to pull off
The otherwise-good Keith Parkinson’s most embarrassing offense…Here's another one that isn't technically bad (though the poses have that artificial stiffness of a Vallejo), but I detest with a seething h8tred:
View attachment 46818
Reinterpreting the Dark Elves as ethnically African is so incredibly stupid (and tonedeaf even for the time period) in multiple ways.
The otherwise-good Keith Parkinson’s most embarrassing offense…
Yeah, one of my friends always refers to that cover as “Tina Turner Lolth.”Maybe tryin' to cash in on that Tina Turner in Beyond Thunderdome craze
By accident or design TSR c. 1986 decided to interpret drow “black” skin as brown like African-Americans - it wasn’t just Parkinson, Elmore’s cover of “The Crystal Shard” from 1988 depicts Drizzt the same way. I don’t know if they thought literal black skin would be considered offensive but brown skin wouldn’t, or what. Either way, it looks in retrospect like an embarrassing misjudgment (especially on the GDQ1-7 cover in combination with the sheer spiderweb swimsuit and high-heeled fuck-me boots).
Well to be fair, this was a U.S. produced product, for a (primarily) U.S. audience. The fact that any of it might have spilled across other borders is sort of incidental in this context. The producers were intimately familiar with the market and probably should have gone a differnt way. That isn't to say that I think TSR/Parkinson were being malicious or had some hidden agenda to portray brown-skinned people as the heart of all evil in the world, but it hasn't aged well for sure (the past being a foreign country and all that, I tend not to judge these things with a modern sensibility unless there's something overt).IDK, I think that this is a very narrow, US centric way of interpreting things. Even using the term "African-Americans", like those are the primary people on Earth with this skin tone, even above Africans from Africa or other parts of the world, reveals how US-centric this is. And it takes a narrow political lens to see it that way--the kind of lens that would probably still take offense to it even if they were literal black skinned as well.
Literal black skin is also very difficult to pull off effectively in art work. It's very difficult to paint or draw anything that stands out and doesn't disappear into the background or become a black featureless blob if you go with pure black as a skin tone. Some people might be able to do it with flat inkwork, but it takes skill and sort of limits your options with presentation to make it stand out and see the features clearly.
Most of the drow color art even after this still doesn't depict them as literal black. They almost always went with purplish, blueish or grey skin. The only exception I can think of from TSR era is a couple of inkwork, like the interior art in Drow of the Underdark.
Didn't gelatinous cubes enter the game when Gary decided to use a dessert as a mini?Yeah, Gygax's relationship with mythology was....frustrating, to say the least. I don't think I've ever heard an adequate explanation for the D&D Gorgons...
I feel personally attacked.