dungeon-classes
Original: dungeon-classes on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Hooded Dungeon Master (gesturing): "As you noticed that, as we get deeper into any dungeon, there are fewer creatures to kill, but they're much more powerful."
Player: "Yeah. So?"
Panel 2:
Player: "I just... doesn't that suggest to you that there's a class structure at work here?"
DM: "Uh. What if the goblins down deep are easy to kill because they can't afford access to magic items, swords, etc. The threat of destruction is on you."
Panel 3:
Player: "Maybe, but like, we're planning to literally exterminate anyway."
DM: "Yeah, but not in a classist way!"
Player: "Well, if we're going in this direction, then we have built a different racial culture, probably with a unique gender notions."
Panel 4:
Player: "Okay, excuse me, there is no field of sociology in the realm of Altarian."
DM (rolling dice): "Well, I'll roll to understand the human condition..."
Panel 5:
DM (bald, eyes closed): "You may not."
Votey:
A face in profile, deadpan. Speech bubble: "I suggest the trolls form a union."
Hooded Dungeon Master (gesturing): "As you noticed that, as we get deeper into any dungeon, there are fewer creatures to kill, but they're much more powerful."
Player: "Yeah. So?"
Panel 2:
Player: "I just... doesn't that suggest to you that there's a class structure at work here?"
DM: "Uh. What if the goblins down deep are easy to kill because they can't afford access to magic items, swords, etc. The threat of destruction is on you."
Panel 3:
Player: "Maybe, but like, we're planning to literally exterminate anyway."
DM: "Yeah, but not in a classist way!"
Player: "Well, if we're going in this direction, then we have built a different racial culture, probably with a unique gender notions."
Panel 4:
Player: "Okay, excuse me, there is no field of sociology in the realm of Altarian."
DM (rolling dice): "Well, I'll roll to understand the human condition..."
Panel 5:
DM (bald, eyes closed): "You may not."
Votey:
A face in profile, deadpan. Speech bubble: "I suggest the trolls form a union."
Alt text
A five-panel SMBC comic drawn in a stylized dark-fantasy style, showing a hooded Dungeon Master and a player arguing about the politics of a Dungeons & Dragons dungeon. The player points out that deeper in the dungeon there are fewer but more powerful monsters, and reads this as evidence of a class structure: the weak goblins down low are easy to kill only because they can't afford magic items and swords. The DM grows exasperated as the player layers on social-justice analysis, insisting that exterminating monsters isn't classist, then speculating about the monsters' racial culture and gender notions. The player flatly states there is no field of sociology in this fantasy realm and rolls dice 'to understand the human condition.' In the final panel a bald, eyes-closed DM simply replies, 'You may not.' Votey (bonus panel): a deadpan face in profile says, 'I suggest the trolls form a union.'
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.