Sarah Darkmagic

Just to be clear, I'll be talking about some spoilers for the Captain Marvel movie as well as topics of dehumanization and the overemphasis on genitals.

This past Sunday, I was fortunate enough to go and see Captain Marvel in the theater. I think it's the first movie I've been able to see opening weekend since my child was born. And there was a lot that I loved about the movie.

I had tried to keep reading about spoilers to a minimum before seeing it, but there was one scene I knew was present in the movie. Because the person didn't want to get too specific about it, I knew that someone at some point "peeked" at someone's genitals. That general information and an understanding of how upsetting that can be to some, especially given the history of treatment of trans folks, was about all I knew going in.

For those who haven't seen the movie, and yes, let me remind again, spoiler alert, some folks learn for the first time about the existence of extraterrestrials, notably Fury. He learns this after a Skrull who had been impersonating his partner is killed and reverts form. We see him and his boss in the autopsy room discussing this new information and Fury at one point lifts the sheet to not only look at the alien's genital area (or at least assumed to be the genital area) but to share with his boss the looking at that area.

Most people have reported that at this point the audience laughs.

Ouch.

Part of the issue is that for many trans folks, this is pretty much a nightmare. People's emphasis and curiosity about "plumbing" cause many, many issues. And hearing people laugh at this makes it hurt even more. I want to say that the upset and pain experienced from that scene is valid and real.

I also want to talk about something I saw that I haven't heard discussed (although I admit to not looking too hard to see if anyone had.) I bring it up because I think it underscores how "dehumanizing" the lifting of the cover was. (Yes, I'm also at a loss for the correct terms to use for this since technically the Skrull aren't humans.)

At the moment Fury lifts the cover, we do not yet know that his boss is actually a Skrull in disguise. When we react to that scene the first time, we do so believing that this is about two humans checking out a dead alien's "junk."

However, it is soon revealed to us that what we thought we saw isn't reality since as soon as Fury leaves the room, we find out the boss isn't human after all. We know this because he begins to mourn the fallen alien. Not only does this rehumanize the dead Skrull but allows us to find out that the boss is an imposter as well.

This stood out to me in the theater because it undercut whatever had been built up in the "bonding" moment. It's something that happens to us any day, no? You go around with this assumption that you can guess or assume a lot about another person and then you find out that your assumptions are not only wrong but inconsiderate and callous. And it's not just the bad guys that do it but our heroes as well.

We just watched someone have to "be polite" in an incredibly traumatic and hurtful situation and the film didn't even clue us in before it happened, and thus, we have to live with our individual and collective actions to it.

At least that's what I took away from it. It clearly still centers on cis folks and it seems fundamentally unfair that a film that attempts to be conscious of the effects and history of gender didn't take more care with this. But if it's going to do that anyway, hopefully some folks can take from it an important lesson.

A vivarium is an area intended to keep and raise animals or plants in a seminatural state. A common example of a modern vivarium is an aquarium or a terrarium but there are notable examples of aquatic vivaria extending back thousands of years. A number of societies have been known for fish keeping including the Chinese, Egyptians, Hawaiians, Romans, Japanese, and medieval Europeans.

For some, the primary reason for fish keeping was to keep fish fresh for dietary consumption while also showing off one’s wealth. For others, they were able to breed and raise fish. And some kept them for ornamental reasons or for their ability to help process waste.

Most ornamental displays involved fish ponds or opaque tanks in the ground which had to be continuously supplied with fresh or running water. They didn’t know it at the time, but this addition of new water helped keep the oxygen and other gas levels in a healthy range for keeping fish and likely also helped get rid of waste products such as ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. While they didn’t understand the reasons why adding new water helped, they knew it was important.

Which brings us to an interesting discovery made at the Grado Roman shipwreck site. Researchers found a lead pipe in the shipwreck with holes in it that could have been connected to a pump. This could have brought fresh seawater via the pump into an aquarium within the vessel and keep the fish therein supplied with fresh seawater.

What’s more, contemporary writers report that live fish were in fact moved during this period including a report by Pliny the Elder of live parrotfish being moved around. Now, there is no evidence of the proposed pump or of an aquarium on board.

So, how are some ways we could use this in our games?

• During a voyage on a vessel, particularly a fishing or merchant vessel, the pump or other element breaks and the crew faces the possibility of a complete loss of inventory.
• During a voyage, the crew lose a few too many people and there aren’t enough folks to sail the ship and keep the pump going. Can an artificer or tinkerer find a way to keep the pump going without a person to hand pump?
• A rich noble, wizened wizard, or even one of the PCs wants to bring back a interesting and exotic aquatic specimen and wants a way to keep it alive in transport. Bonus points if this specimen requires a diving deep into the unknown and may be connected to the Old Ones.
• The PCs catch a ride on a ship that, unbeknownst to them, is transporting a danger creature in its onboard aquarium.

Some further reading:

• Lambousa, City site and Roman period fish tanks
• A Guide to the Antiquities of Kyrenia
• The Archaeological Evidence for Fish Processing in the Black Sea Region
• Fishing, fish farming and fish processing during the Roman age in the
  Northern Adriatic: Literary sources and archaeological data
• Sustainable Ancient Aquaculture
• Goldfish: From Tang Dynasty Ponds to 21st Century Aquariums
• Huilua Fishpond in Kahana Bay: Explore the beauty and history of ancient Hawaii fishing practices
• The First Aquatic Animals In Artificial Habitats
• Archaeological research of maritime infrastructure of Roman settlements on the Slovenian coast of Istria (1993-2007)

Image from the book Aquatic Life by Joseph E Bausman and uploaded to Flickr by Internet Archive Book Images.

One of the more obvious crossovers between fishkeeping and tabletop role playing games has to do with the death spiral. While some games embrace the death spiral, I know lots of folks try to avoid it happening.

Aquarium - Shrimp

I couldn't find an exact definition anywhere but the way I'm accustomed to the term being used is that when seemingly small events lead one towards an almost inescapable catastrophic conclusion. Small failures can compound on each other and, if not handled well, lead to game play that is unsatisfying and counter to the desires of the folks playing.

With aquariums, the death spiral is quite literal and can be difficult to overcome, especially in smaller tanks. Often, but not always, the cause is an uncontrolled ammonia spike. This could be the result of old age, a sudden removal of a large portion of either of the two beneficial bacteria pools, etc. Suddenly the system has more ammonia or nitrites than it can handle, which then causes one or more livestock to die, which in turn adds to the ammonia, and pretty soon an entire tank can be wiped out.

In other words, tanks, especially small tanks, can be swingy. :)

What's even worse is that attempting to fix the tank can also accelerate the death spiral. While many different species have different levels of various tank parameters that typically are the best for them, they value consistency even more. So if you notice that nitrite levels are higher than desired and decide to do an aggressive water change, the resulting fluctuations can cause more damage than if you had kept them at the undesired levels and worked more slowly to change them.

In thinking through this, I noticed that the suggestions for how to fix the swinginess and the death spiral in aquariums is similar to how folks limited these things in D&D, and that is by attempting to limit as much as possible the impact of any particular change. For aquariums, the suggestion is to start with a larger tank. One dead fish in a 5 gallon tank will have a different impact than a dead fish in a 55 gallon tank. Making smaller incremental changes leads to a more reliable and predictable tank and game.

That said, unlike fish, our lives aren't on the line. There are times when we can embrace the death spiral and other times when it's probably not what we want.

So I'm going to talk about some stuff and given the reaction to my attempts to convey my point of view in the past, I know this might ruffle some feathers. What I'd like to ask is that if you continue to read and find that your feathers are feeling a little ruffled, maybe take some time to think about why that is before putting me on Internet blast? And if you don't think that you are willing to do that, please feel free to enjoy some of the other absolutely wonderful content available to you on the Internet.

©Wizards of the Coast

With that out of the way, I'd like to talk about a topic that is near and dear to me, and that is female representation in game art. I know I've had a lot of discussions about that in the past but there's something different about today versus then. That difference is some changes that were made by some companies (particularly Wizards of the Coast) in terms of how they approach art in official Dungeons & Dragons publications.

My position has always been that the art of female characters has been way too restricted and lacked diversity. There was an overabundance of female characters within a narrow body type and age window, often (but not always) sexualized, often with an appearance that the references used were from lingerie or porn. While some interpreted that as an argument against any representation that fit those categories, that has never been my intent or what I argued.

As I talked to folks about this, especially folks in the industry, a few reasons for this kept coming up again and again. I'd like to talk about those because I think they amplified together to create the situation we had.

© Wizards of the Coast

One of the first was that the reason for the characters being drawn with those references is that artists prefer to work from the naked form. In some ways, this is absolutely true. We know that many of the masters have worked from nude models. Knowing the physical structure of the subject of a work helps ensure that their back doesn't look awkward or broken. I get that.

But many of the masters used both male and female models. And while they did many works that involved their particular muse and often spent time on projects that pleased them, they produced many other works with a variety of subjects. But in the art at the time, it was clear from many of the male characters that no one was looking at nude or semi-nude references for them. No ads or photo shots of men in their boxers. Not really even swimmers or male ballet dancers. There was a noticeable imbalance in how many of the artists were approaching gender.

One way to approach adjusting that would be to try to increase the diversity of the artists that were hired, finding artists who were passionate about drawing men for instance, that could not be the only solution. The other most common reason I was told for why the art was the way it was is because that's what the artists thought art directors wanted. So, basically, the art director would give out assignments. They might even be explicit about what they were and were not looking for. But artists, being concerned about having artwork rejected, would give them what they thought they wanted, what they thought "fantasy art" meant.

So, instead of taking risks, they looked at what had already been created and did more of that. This often translated to folks as cheesecake art. Do to how the art process works, it wouldn't become clear to the art director that this was going to be the case until the final work was submitted, at which point it was too late to reject the work.

Why? Because initial "drafts" of the work are like outlines. The artist provides a thumbnail of the piece, more demonstrating the overall composition, the lines of movement, etc. Clothing, especially boob windows, and the like, wouldn't necessarily show up at that level. So the thumbnail gets approved and suddenly what one person might interpret as an older woman or a full cloak turns out differently in the final piece. And by then, so much work has been put in that it's hard to change.

The sad part about this particular reason is that it was a bit of a death spiral. With more and more work being put out in this style, it worked to further establish it as the style. And without taking a step back, everyone's reactions are understandable. The problem can be understood but not addressed.

So, what changed? Well 5e came out. And with the new edition came a new approach.

© Wizards of the Coast

While I've been talking about this in terms of female representation, it wasn't just gender that was unbalanced. Skin tones were another big area as well as getting just a consistent understanding of how characters looked in a fantasy world.

With 5e, Wizards of the Coast decided not to go with a generic fantasy world for the base world. They chose the Forgotten Realms which at least had something closer to gender equality and a variety of skin tones for human characters (among others). It also had a variety of cultures within the world, with different ways of dress and speech. They could now tell artists, draw a person from this defined culture, rather than asking for a character in the fantasy style.

And that's what they did. They created world bibles and worked directly with concept arts to develop and refine what various cultures should look like on the page. They did this not just for male and female representations, but what did a family look like? What about older people in the village or city? So on and so forth.

The result was a wide range of art to choose from and the ability to "show, not tell" artists what these various groups looked like. While they still run into some issues with artists who draw boob windows on female characters from a culture that wouldn't have them (some cultures would!), those issues are far less. I haven't asked, but my guess is that they still might accept those pieces and adjust how they work with that artist in the future, but that piece that say sexualizes the character would be balanced out by the rest of them.

From my point of view, this has been a great breath of fresh air into D&D. I love seeing the greater diversity in the art. Of course there are still things to discuss and, in my opinion, improvements that can be made, but I look forward to looking at the art now. And I've seen so many positive responses from other folks out there.