The Grimdork Aesthetic

What makes art provocative?

This post is about the Deathbringer rpg by Dan “Professor DM” DeFazio. “Grimdork” is a term taken from one of Magnolia Keep’s articles on Deathbringer. These articles gained some traction for pointing out the misogyny of Deathbringer’s art and for considering the tone of the game’s marketing. Her articles initially framed this marketing somewhat ambivalently, as a ‘thoughtless’ invocation of 80s fantasy; however by the end of the third article, she concludes that DeFazio is “selling [an] aesthetic because the product has no real ludic or narrative identity to speak of.” This is fortunate, because I did feel the initial framing was too generous on two accounts: 1), in its innocent reading of Deathbringer’s marketing, and 2) in its estimation of the effect of its aesthetic on ‘the hobby,’ such as it is.

To examine the first point, let’s take a look at the game’s initial marketing blurb as quoted by Magnolia:

Remember when D&D had balls? When dungeons were dangerous and you were lucky to make it to third level without being disemboweled? When orcs were pig-faced monsters meant to be killed? When characters looked more like Conan the Barbarian and less like Puss in Boots? More like Heidi Klum, and less like the Handmaid’s Tale? Deathbringer remembers...

This copy is written in the idiom of tongue-and-cheek grievance. Throughout its presentation, the game continually defines itself against that which it is not and as a return to some prior, less emasculated state of table top role playing games. This game clearly imagines itself, chainmail bikinis and all, as a kind of épater les (5e) bourgeois, appealing to backers out of a desire to scandalize and shock the restrained propriety of ‘mainstream’ rpg players.

To consider point (2), we can ask, was this grievance-based appeal successful? In a conventional sense, yes, as it raised over $1M, though this probably speaks more to the way that social media (in this case, youtube) can become a pathway to developing a successful brand (see also, Shadowdark, Knave, any number of 5e-adjacent products). Or, perhaps it can be argued its marketing provocation worked insofar as it generated the above-linked series of blog posts as well as discussions on various forums about the ethics of the chainmail bikini as such. Maybe, but I think in in our era of hyperpolitics, it can be easy to mistake a collective eye roll as something more intense, like ‘outrage.’

Instead, I’d like to put to one side the question of misogyny to take Deathbringer’s art on its own terms (somewhat following the example set out by these puppet art critics). Deathbringer claims as its inspiration Heavy Metal magazine, particularly from the 1980s. I must admit I was not too familiar with this particular magazine, even though I am more acquainted with its pulp fantasy forebears like Weird Tales. Heavy Metal indeed seems to present fantasy art that features scantily clad (at best) women in a transparently exploitative way. What’s notable, though, is how far Deathbringer has strayed from its avowed stylistic inspiration. Let’s take a look at some Heavy Metal covers from the 80s juxtaposed to what we get in Deathbringer. What do you see?

Well first, I know I said I was putting it to one side but yes, Heavy Metal looks like a science-fantasy Penthouse; I think hadn’t heard much of it because even as a VTM-playing teenager I knew this particular cultural niche was a bit cringe.

That said, I can appreciate many aspects of this art. First, it’s clearly in conversation with that earlier tradition of pulp fantasy art. Many of these pieces also seem to place these (naked) women in interesting, strange, appealing-yet-dangerous settings. We have here...space butterflies, surrealist unicyclists, giant insect riders, para robots, and odd science experiments. There is a campy, b-movie sexuality here, and the weird, psychedelic fantasy elements make it seem self-consciously playful.

Deathbringer, meanwhile, seems to come from an entirely different lineage of fantasy art. It is heroic, somewhat cartoonish, brightly colorful yet emotionally flat. This is ironic given that ‘Professor DM’ criticizes the vacantly heroic posture in modern fantasy art and emphasizes the supposedly grounded ‘brutality’ of his own game. There are revealing outfits for the women, sure, but aside from the Clyde Caldwell-esque “doomscribe,” nothing that seems very sexual at all. Moreover, there is absolutely nothing weird or outré about these costumes and environments; they are all bog standard vanilla fantasy, traditional heroines facing off (triumphantly) against the usual zombies and skeletons, just with less realistic armor. There is also that multi-layering affect that makes so much modern fantasy illustration congruous with its AI appropriations (gloopy green and purple mists, blurred and vague backgrounds, etc). Like the game itself, it has a lot more in common with modern fantasy art than it lets on.

In sum, while I don’t disagree in principle with Magnolia’s points on the misogyny of these pieces, their execution is so lackluster that the effect they have is negligible. If anything, I feel secondhand embarrassment for the elder Gen Xers who dropped $250+ on some Shadowdark house rules, though apparently this is a demographic with cash to spare on gaming accoutrements. It’s like watching someone buy a Harley during their midlife crisis, except instead of a motorcycle they are getting scammed on drop shipped dice.

Above I called the marketing tongue-in-cheek grievance. If the attitude towards variety in ttrpgs was just good-spirited, playful irreverence, they might have landed on something more interesting, something more fun and campy in its evocations of 80s fantasy-ploitation. But I get the sense there is real, longstanding grievance simmering among this cohort of the OSR. DeFazio has for example derisively contrasted his game with “cozy” rpgs (such as Pumpkin Spice, which recently raised a similar amount of money (though ironically I think Pumpkin Spice’s art, which could be described as Ghibli-fied suicide girl pin ups, is far more annoyingly male-gazey)). And beyond that, of course, there is the specter of corporate dnd, with its pseudo-anachronisms, bright queerness, and convivial cosmopolitanism, all of which has alienated the grimdorks.

I can’t help but feel that maybe it’s difficult to create something inspired when it comes purely from a place of ressentiment over deeply-held attachments. Deathbringer’s aesthetic attempts and fails to be an iconoclastic riposte to contemporary rpg culture. But I’m sure they will settle for being well-compensated and mildly annoying instead.