Slime Squisher
Posts: 392
Joined: Wednesday, 7th December 2011, 20:06
Modify Djinn Description
Of the same stock as angels or demons, these spirits have been created from smokeless fire by some deranged god. Unlike regular living beings, they draw their sustenance from magic rather than eating or drinking, although for some reason they can still do the latter - probably due to being unintelligently designed by a creator with no knowledge of evolution.
I find this line to be shockingly offensive and anti-theistic while contributing little of value - and actually *misleading* me when I first started playing my now-XL27 Djinn. While I have personal reasons that I will refrain from going too much into I find that - objectively - it also clashes with the theme and tone of the rest of the game and would like to see it changed. A possible re-write:
- Code:
Legends tell that the Djinn were created from smokeless fire, having bodies made not of flesh but of a tightly bound magical essence. Unlike regular living beings, they thus must draw their sustenance from magic rather than eating or drinking, although they are still quite capable of the latter.
Or perhaps:
- Code:
Djinni are powerful magical creatures created from smokeless fire. Though they can eat and drink as they please, their arcane bodies require no sustenance to sustain themselves. ... Magic is literally their life, to the point of their health and magical powers' being one force, called "essence" (etc.)
Though honestly, this leads me to question just why such a confusing line is included in the description at all, as it leads the reader to the impression that Djinn *require* sustenance in the Crawl sense of the word. . . which they do not (they are hungerless with no alternative food-clock).
Reasons :
1.) Incongruous Tone:
-) Flipping through 10-20 other species descriptions (Minotaur, High Elf, Deep Elf, Tengu, Centaur, Naga, Troll, Human, to name justa few) reveals that the creation-myth/origin-story of these unique species is *NOT* something that is 'uniformly' discussed. Tengu are an ancient race of bird people. No mention of their creation, origin, etc.
2.) Thematically Incongruous - "God":
-) Dungeon Crawl's deities are, for the most part, within the game. The idea that there is a different creator outside of the game who has created the Djinni, Angels, and Demons is at odds with the already rich lore DCSS has developed for its pantheon. It also leads to issues (in my mind) since in-game Angels are servants of TSO. . . which befuddles matters further. So there's a seperate creator god (who is deranged?! And retarded?) that none of the other gods know about?
3.) Anti-Theistic tone:
-) Whether by accident or by intent, Crawl has not been disrespectful of cultural practices, race, sexual orientation, or religious creed thusfar. It's one thing to make up a god and then give it flaws (like, say, Beogh or Makhleb being bloodthirsty evil-doers). This is unlikely to offend anyone and anyone who *IS* offended should seek a different game to play, as this is suspension of disbelief.
But the quoted passage above seems to far more strongly insinuate *THE* god. As in, the IRL Abrahammic God (or perhaps just Islam?).
This isn't "The Binding of Isaac". There's no need to put this sort of 'humor' in the game.
4.) Confusing Wording:
-) The in-depth discussion of their need to eat/not-eat and sustenance actually proves confusing rather than helpful! I went into my first Djinn game fully expecting I had to somehow disenchant magical items in order to 'eat' to keep going. It even uses the word 'sustenance' which crawl *specifically* uses to describe hungering and the food-clock. Why not simply describe them as not needing nourishment but being magically able to eat/drink for pleasure as they desire? Simple.
5.) Trivial Effort
-) Changing the description would take literally a matter of minutes and require no actual development time. Could probably get rid of the (duh!) from later in the description while we're at it.
Now, I have personal reasons why I find this offensive as well. It feels obvious to me that my holy scriptures (The Qur'an) are being at least partially used as a significant source of the inspiration for Crawl's Djinni. As a devout Muslim and proponent of evolution I resent the implication that somehow my all-knowing creator would be ignorant of it. Or, by extension, that my God would be caricatured and mocked.
If my reasons were 100% personal, I might not have taken this step and simply opted to ignore it. But as this forum is *specifically* designed to be a place to discuss aspects of this Game's Design that we think need imroving; and as I believe this change actually lowers the quality of Crawl for all the reasons I've discussed above, this seemed worth posting.
-AHMAD
15-runer: OPWz, DECj, DEWz x2, VpWz
Other: DEWz, DrWz, DjWz, GnIE, KeCj, SpEn, SpWz, SpCj, MuWz, FeWzx2, MiBe x7.
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