Rhystic Cast #16 - The Hard Questions
Added 2024-02-14 14:39:18 +0000 UTCToday, I'm answering ten difficult questions from Patrons in the Rhystic Studies Discord. Why are your videos on Seb and Terese still up? Has Magic's worldbuilding suffered as a result of the pace of production? How can we create a productive forum for art criticism without insulting artists or damaging reputations?
Skeletal Scryings - Oblation
“A richer people could give more but they could never give as much.”
Music in this episode:
The Mars Volta - Askepios
Comments
Loved the pod, I appreciate the carefully measured responces you put forward for your audience. It's so important to model a critical voice without it degenerating into emotional, reactionary one. Re: the violence of New Capenne, I have a sense that, because the game is about conflict, one could "drill down" on any set and parse out a relationship to real world violence and conflict. I've seen people do this with MKM, maligning that it "glorifies police violence." I don't think it does, but if someone made that claim, well, they experienced MKM as glorifying police violence, so I guess it did? I could construct an argument about Ravnica glorifying tribalism, or perhaps pontificate about how Ikoria validates the use of animals in war and the violence we inflict upon them through the lop-sided power dynamics of our interspecies relationships. But I won't, because monsters are cool, and games about conflict require adversarial relationships, fights, conflict. Everyone's line of "what's too close to real world violence" is different. I learned that I can't run horror games for my dnd group, because one of my players, a close friend, has been through things that make fantasy game tension feel far too real to be entertaining. For me, I crave that kind of game, but we have wildly different backgrounds. When it comes to SNC, I personally don't feel that it glorifies the mob. All of Wizard's Market research didn't find any qualms with it that I know of, which would seem to indicate that most people didn't feel that way either. I loved your video a out SNC, and you make very real points. But I can't help but wonder if its your proximity to the subject matter that made it feel so shallow to you. The illusion was broken, Q anon started talking about your area of expertise. Everyone needs conflict to generate energy, choice, drama. Fantasy conflict is used as an escape, a way to frame our own struggles against other potential ones and feel better about the ones we have. Maybe SNC was too close to a real world source, maybe it was in bad taste. Maybe it resonated with a wide audience of Americans who liked the roaring 20's new york look, giving them a fantasy escape. Personally, SNC is so similar to Ravnica, it barely left an impression.
Spencer Leath Johnston
2024-02-15 15:06:34 +0000 UTCThank you Sam for being the voice of reason on Q1. I wish we collectively practiced more empathy, but it’s a refreshing reminder that the regular rage-bait sphere that is magic twitter does not represent us all.
Victor Chan
2024-02-15 00:42:09 +0000 UTC
