I wasn't planning to write about Deathbringer. Then I started reading the reactions to it.
I honestly couldn't believe what I was reading.
Apparently fantasy has beautiful women now, and this requires a symposium.
Several months ago I wrote a post called Frazetta Armor. It had absolutely nothing to do with Deathbringer. Truth be told, I'd been making the same joke on social media for years. While working on my Hyborian themed Shadowdark campaign, I finally turned it into a blog post.
The joke was simple. The less armor the hero wore, the harder they were to kill.
Everybody got it.
Because that's been part of fantasy for as long as I can remember.
I grew up on painted paperback covers. Every bookstore had a fantasy shelf full of warriors with impossible muscles, forgotten temples, giant snakes, skulls, sorcerers, and yes, beautiful women. Nobody stood there wondering whether the armor met OSHA PPE regulations. You picked up the book because the cover promised adventure.
That's what fantasy looked like. That's still what fantasy looks like to me.
So when I see people calling Deathbringer embarrassing because it has attractive women wearing revealing clothing, I honestly wonder where they've been. This isn't some shocking new direction. This is one of the oldest visual traditions the genre has.
I've seen people say the women are too attractive.
Too attractive? I didn't realize fantasy was supposed to stop celebrating beauty.
Then there's the clothing. Really?
We're talking about a genre where Conan wandered around in a hardly there loincloth, where Red Sonja became one of fantasy's most recognizable characters, where every other wizard somehow owns a robe with sleeves long enough to trip over. Fantasy has never dressed its characters for practicality. It dresses them to create an image you'll remember.
That's the whole point.
The criticism that really puzzles me is the claim that this somehow makes Deathbringer shallow.
Why? Because it has beautiful women?
Fantasy has always dealt in ideals. Bigger monsters. Greater heroes. Darker villains. The artwork isn't trying to convince you this is real life. It's trying to convince you this world is worth visiting.
There's a difference.
Look, you don't have to like the art. Maybe it isn't your thing. Maybe you think you've seen it all before. Fair enough.
What I don't understand is acting like this aesthetic is somehow foreign to fantasy.
It isn't.
It's one of the reasons a lot of us fell in love with fantasy in the first place.
When I look at Deathbringer, I see a game that's perfectly happy to admit where it came from.
Apparently a lot of other people were looking for exactly that.
Judging by the BackerKit numbers, I'd say they found it.