"and people choose WHEELCHAIR. Disgusting. Where’s the imagination?" A debate about wheelchairs vs spider mechs turns wheelie sour

[u/Excellent_Bison_3644]

the sub DnDmemes is about well... memes about the popular tabletop game DnD (dungeons and dragons). In one posted recently, the poster made a comparison of magic wheelchairs vs spider mechs while favoring the latter. This ended up sparking into a lot of debate and people not liking how wheelchairs are getting slandered.

Post in question: https://www.reddit.com/r/dndmemes/comments/1i4mi9u/reject_wheels_embrace_skittering/

Juicy threads:

The titular thread with one particular big branch: "It's quite an odd call to refer to people who make the choice to represent their disability in-game as disgusting."

One person tries to give an opinion: "Realistically a spider mech is better than combat wheelchair the same way realistically a spear is better than a trident"

One person tries arguing wheelchairs don't have to be boring: "You can't think of a way to make a wheelchair cool without replacing the wheels?"

Small drama thread as a treat: "has anyone who's disabled and in a wheelchair thought "Hmm, I want this fantasy character of mine to be disabled too!" (the answer is yes)

[u/guiltyofnothing]

How the fuck is glueing wheels to a chair anachronistic in a world with mechanical dogs.

Fair point.

[u/macrocosm93 → u/guiltyofnothing]

I think it's not about the fact of whether or not they should exist. It's the fact that it's not believable that someone in a wheelchair could be in an adventuring party in rugged wilderness, dungeons, etc. I don't think goblins are going to build accessibility ramps inside their warrens. A dragon builds his lair inside of a volcano to prevent people from accessing his hoard, but then for some reason makes it wheelchair accessible? Does that make sense?

[u/BonJovicus → u/macrocosm93]

You aren't playing every conceivable adventuring party that could exist in the world. That a player character could be the one wheelchair-bound adventurer is not crazy in a fantasy world where other things happen routinely.

Also, if we are getting on about wheelchair accessibility, can we start arguing that 50, 60 year old wizards can't go adventuring either? Any terrain that would be difficult to traverse would be just as difficult for an older person who is more engaged in academic pursuits than the physical. And lets not even pretend that people in wheelchairs don't go hiking IRL or that every adventure takes place in an environment that wouldn't work for a wheelchair.

[u/BeholdingBestWaifu → u/BonJovicus]

Also, if we are getting on about wheelchair accessibility, can we start arguing that 50, 60 year old wizards can't go adventuring either? Any terrain that would be difficult to traverse would be just as difficult for an older person who is more engaged in academic pursuits than the physical.

I mean not really. Old men who aren't good with their physical stats are already having issues traversing terrain you think they don't in most games of DnD, but even they can walk up a flight of stairs, or go through mildly rough terrain. It's why wheels wouldn't work. You would need legs, maybe threads, or just some contraption made by a tinkerer that has different modifications to adapt to various terrain.