Quote from: jhkim;233117Huh?  So Taran wasn't of royal blood, so he doesn't count -- and Aragorn was of royal blood, so he doesn't count.  WTF?  

It means you're looking for a connection that wasn't there, and forcing it to meet your expections. In this case, two different methods were used to determine the next King- Lineage in Middle Earth, and a vote by lesser Lords in Prydain. Magic had nothing to do with it anymore than if Aragon was wielding the ancient family weapon Browning Semi-Automatic.

Quote from: jhkim;233117Incidentally, you seem to have missed a key supernatural sign for Taran -- drawing the magical sword Dyrnwyn, which meant that he was of "royal worth".  

Did you actually read the book? You didn't even get the quote right, let alone the meaning.

It's "noble worth" first off, and is stated to be unconnected to rulership or bloodlines referencing more character and intent. It had nothing to do with being a King and only kept the sword from being used by the wrong people. Math (King for most of the book) never touched the blade. Gwydion when he was made King had already lost it in battle to the enemy, and it had lost its enchantment before Taran became King.


I find it rather amusing that not understanding the Blade's inscription was a plot point of the books, and here you fail as badly as Fflam did.

Quote from: jhkim;233117The point is that all of them were written to be the rightful rulers.

This is a joke right?

One is a fantasy book that has a character of unknown background become King by popular acclaim, and the other has a character born to be King (because he was the son of a son of... The King, i.e like most Kings.

What are you're trying to say what about them exactly? That they didn't earn it? That no King under any condition does? That magic bound to the line of Kings somehow justifies them being King? I'm not seeing anything logical here.

Let's get this straight- No magical Deer or anything like that made Taran King. The people of Prydain did. No magical Deer or anything like that made Aragon King- his birth did that.

End of story.

Quote from: jhkim;233117That they were both popularly acclaimed and supernaturally marked is convenient -- i.e. the author arranged that.  But that's what authors do.  You can ask hypotheticals like "What if the people of Gondor didn't welcome Aragorn?  Would he still be king because of his birth?"  There's no definite answer to that.

Read the history of Middle Earth, there were many Kings of Gondor and other Kings of the West not welcomed as such by the people. A little event such as the Kin Strife for but one example.

LotR just happens to be about one that people did welcome (hard not to when he shows up and saves your freakin' lives). And it seems to me that you want to throw him under the bus with the Magic Deer because of it.

The people of Gondor really wanted someone to come and be their king and fix things for them by that point in any case.

Had Denethor, Imrahil, or Boromir ascended the throne I doubt the people of Gondor would have minded much.  They were ready to grab at any straw that gave them hope.

Quote from: gleichman;233144One is a fantasy book that has a character of unknown background become King by popular acclaim, and the other has a character born to be King (because he was the son of a son of... The King, i.e like most Kings.

What are you're trying to say what about them exactly? That they didn't earn it? That no King under any condition does? That magic bound to the line of Kings somehow justifies them being King? I'm not seeing anything logical here.

I'm saying that all of them (A) were worthy of being ruler, (B) were popularly acclaimed by their people, and (C) had supernatural signs indicating that they were indeed the rightful ruler.  

It seems to me that you're trying to say that the combination of these isn't good enough.  i.e. "C.S. Lewis' books suck because Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy became rulers because the magic lion made them so -- but Aragorn is OK because he was born king, and the supernatural signs were just incidental to his royal Numenorian blood."  I'm saying that in fiction, these three are intertwined.  

Ultimately, someone is a good king because the author makes them a good king.  It doesn't make sense to say "Well, the people didn't really like Taran, the author just wrote it that way."  The people acclaim these rulers because they are good and worthy.  Similarly, there are supernatural signs indicating that they are rightful rulers because they are worthy.  Pulling the sword out of the stone was important for Arthur's legitimacy being recognized.  However, it wasn't a coincidence that he was a good person and he could pull the sword.  

Now, you can blast this as unrealistic -- "What, by coincidence the only qualified person to rule in the whole kingdom turns out to be the son of the last king?"  But it's not reality.  In fantasy, you have to accept some things.

Quote from: jhkim;233215I'm saying that all of them (A) were worthy of being ruler, (B) were popularly acclaimed by their people, and (C) had supernatural signs indicating that they were indeed the rightful ruler.  

A) is easy to agree to for the individual characters in question, but was not a condition for being King in those settings.

B) is also easy to agree to for those individual characters. In Prydain, it basically was required to be King at all. In Middle Earth, completely unimportant as to who the King was.

C) You're smoking crack. Prydain in in own written word denies your statement. And as Aragon, the supernatural signs were only those things owned by his house- a broken sword, a ring, etc- i.e what anyone born in the royal line would have had.

Quote from: jhkim;233215It seems to me that you're trying to say that the combination of these isn't good enough.  i.e. "C.S. Lewis' books suck

I've made no comment on Narnia, I don't know them well enough to.

Quote from: jhkim;233215I'm saying that in fiction, these three are intertwined.

I'm saying that you're having all too common problems telling cause from effect.

Quote from: jhkim;233215Pulling the sword out of the stone was important for Arthur's legitimacy being recognized.  However, it wasn't a coincidence that he was a good person and he could pull the sword.

You're confusing things again, like you did Drnwyn's inscription.

Arthur pulling the sword only proved that he was Uthor's son, i.e. "Whoso pulleth out this sword of this stone and anvil is rightwise king born of all England."

Worth did not enter into it. Arthur could have been a right bastard and still pulled the blade.

Taran on the other hand couldn't have used Drnwyn without being of noble character, but doing so didn't have one thing to do with him becoming King, nor did it for any previous Kings.

Quote from: gleichman;233222You're confusing things again, like you did Drnwyn's inscription.

Arthur pulling the sword only proved that he was Uthor's son, i.e. "Whoso pulleth out this sword of this stone and anvil is rightwise king born of all England." (http://www.rickwalton.com/folktale/bryant75.htm)

Worth did not enter into it. Arthur could have been a right bastard and still pulled the blade.

No, he couldn't have -- because it wasn't written that way.  You're trying to argue that it was just a pure coincidence that Arthur wasn't a right bastard, and random chance that things just happened to work out the way they did.  

But in fantasy, things like this don't happen by pure coincidence.  They happen for reasons.  The supernatural signs aren't dross that follow mechanistic rules.  There is a meaning behind them.

Quote from: jhkim;233226No, he couldn't have -- because it wasn't written that way.  You're trying to argue that it was just a pure coincidence that Arthur wasn't a right bastard, and random chance that things just happened to work out the way they did.  

No, he was the son of the King and thus the next King. You seem to being having serious problems with English John. The quote is quite explicit.

And the assumption of the story from there is that Arthur was who Arthur was- for good and ill. And there was more than enough ill to go around.



And I think with this, I'll drop out this exchange. I know you well, and you never admit a wrong (such as listing the wrong words on Drnwyn), and never alter your opinion no matter how strong and how massive the weight of opposing fact.

I leave this with my complete and utter rejection of your assertion. Taran, Arthur, and Aragon where not placed on their thrones by Magic Deer- no many how often or loadly you attempt to proclaim it.

Actually, if you read the Arthurian canon, you'll notice that Arthur is often kind of a dick, and more often than that, he's a sucker.

But that aside, where the fuck is your point here? None of these things are like the Magic Deer, the noble-vetoing sceptre, or the collectivist alignment rules of Blue Rose.

In fact, if we bring this back into the realm of RPGs, the Pendragon RPG is just about the perfect example of the antithesis of Blue Rose.

RPGPundit

Quote from: gleichman;233232I leave this with my complete and utter rejection of your assertion. Taran, Arthur, and Aragon where not placed on their thrones by Magic Deer- no many how often or loadly you attempt to proclaim it.

Not only did I not say this, I specifically started this thread to be about the fantasy trope of "rightful kings" in general, with no mention of anything from any particular game.

EDIT TO ADD: The point was to drop the particular game, and discuss instead the broader topic of rightful kings -- what people liked, what they disliked, and so forth.

Quote from: jhkim;233248Not only did I not say this, I specifically started this thread to be about the fantasy trope of "rightful kings" in general, with no mention of anything from any particular game.

EDIT TO ADD: The point was to drop the particular game, and discuss instead the broader topic of rightful kings -- what people liked, what they disliked, and so forth.

This is just too disingenuous to let pass.

You spend all that time defending Magical Deer selecting Good Kings, incorrectly attempt to link it to classical sources like Middle Earth and Prydain- and then come here to this thread attempting in effect the same thing (supernatural 'marking').

Just too disingenuous.

If you want to talk about the broader topic of Kings, talk about the boarder topic of Kings. I'm frankly not significantly aware of what you're trying to shoe-horn this thread into. It's not from Middle Earth, Prydain, Arthur's legends, or anything else I consider myself familar with.

Quote from: gleichman;233262This is just too disingenuous to let pass.

You spend all that time defending Magical Deer selecting Good Kings, incorrectly attempt to link it to classical sources like Middle Earth and Prydain- and then come here to this thread attempting in effect the same thing (supernatural 'marking').

I believe the only "classical source" I mentioned in the other thread was a joking quote from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.  

You might try discussing the topic I actually stated.  It may well turn out that we agree about the topic of this thread -- i.e. have similar opinions about good kings like Arthur and Aragorn, and that our only disagreement is in judgement about the one case.  Or it could be that we've got disagreements about them.  The way to find out would be to drop the earlier topic and instead discuss other things.

Quote from: jhkim;233273The way to find out would be to drop the earlier topic and instead discuss other things.

The earlier topic is rather damn important, magically selected versions of Taran, Aragon, or Arthur are of no interest to me. I have nothing to say about because in the first place they don't exist- and if they did exist in some alternate universe- they'd be crap and not worth talking about.

Quote from: RPGPundit;233246Actually, if you read the Arthurian canon, you'll notice that Arthur is often kind of a dick, and more often than that, he's a sucker.

Kills innocent babies too.

One of the best gaming moment I seen is when we sat down to play an arthurian one shot using GURPS. One of the guys only knows Arthur from the movies and santized stories. Basically we all played Knights of King Arthur.

It was really good group of players and soon we are really immersed in the game. So we come to this one locale where there was one of Arthur's political enemies. He started talking shit about the king. The player vigorously defended Arthur and quite eloquently (he is a preacher in real life).

Then the bad buy tells about what happened when Modred was born and Arthur had his knight go around killing all the newborns. He actually sputtered and got upset basically saying "Arthur would never do that."

Now a couple of the other players who didn't really know that much about Arthur in real life but there was two of us that knew it cold. The bad guy said "Yes it is true, go ask them. Pointing to the two of us." We confirmed the story that yes the King really did order us to go out and kill newborns.

Oh the crestfallen look on that player. For a minute I thought he was going to cry. Both in-game and out of game he didn't know about that side of Arthur and the revelation just about gives his character a heart attack.

Anyway the two of kinda got the player away from the bad guy, when we returned we really let the bad guy have it verbally because while had some telling points about our boss, we knew all the crap his boss did as well.

Well in the end that character's faith was restored when he had an epiphany at the end. Found out the true meaning of what Arthur was trying to do and that while the man was flawed the dream he represented was worth dying for.

Quote from: estar;233287One of the best gaming moment I seen is when we sat down to play an arthurian one shot using GURPS. One of the guys only knows Arthur from the movies and santized stories. Basically we all played Knights of King Arthur.

Quote from: estar;233287Now a couple of the other players who didn't really know that much about Arthur in real life but there was two of us that knew it cold. The bad guy said "Yes it is true, go ask them. Pointing to the two of us." We confirmed the story that yes the King really did order us to go out and kill newborns.

Oh the crestfallen look on that player.

Um, "Arthur in real life"??  I can understand that if there were a definitive account.  But there are dozens of mutually contradictory stories about Arthur, all made up centuries after the historical time of it.  Since it doesn't derive from one canonical source, no particular story is definitive.  

I think this is an important point if you're going to have a figure like this in your game -- i.e. make it clear about what your sources and assumptions are.  For example, I ran a Call of Cthulhu game where Arthur returned to England in the 1890s, and turned out to be horribly evil.  However, the players all knew that this was CoC -- so while their PCs were surprised, everyone really enjoyed it when Arthur's evil was revealed.

John, the problem with this thread is that you are conflating two elements, "good", and "monarchy" in a way that's really only relevant to the BR thread. You want an answer to your question:

QuoteIs this dilemma really a problem for people?  For me, I'm not concerned by it.  I can accept as a premise that a given monarchy really is good within the game, though I wouldn't want all my games to be like that.

No, it is not a dilemma, not for me or for anyone I've ever played with. I can think of perhaps one exception, a guy who in a homebrew got to have his class be "Revolutionary" and then enjoyed semi-ironically trying to stir up the peasants.

But it has fuck-all to do with "good", and the more someone or some game attempts to turn it into an issue of justifying a particular monarchy by virtue of its "goodness", with goodness defined by the game, the more puerile the whole thing seems. Or would seem, since I've never played in a game like that, and I would probably be very wary about doing so.

Since it seems no one in this thread feels they have experience with "good kings" in their RPGs, in the sense you're looking for, maybe you can give an example of how you've had "good kings" in your games, and others can then at least get a sense of what you enjoy doing with them.

The closest thing I can think of was a game where the party was all trying kick out the occupiers of a given land, and had rallied around the "rightful" lord. We were a bit like a bunch of William Wallaces to the NPC's Robert the Bruce, right up to us having to kick start him into joining "his" cause. But we weren't fighting for good.

Malory is the definitive single source for Arthur in English.

Robin Hood is a little tougher as he had no Malory and wasn't a particularly popular character with the noble class where literacy levels were higher.

But in English, Malory is the authority on Arthur.

Anyhow, as to Narnia, that's a very specific case dealing with the divine right of kings and various Christian traditions relating to man's ascendancy over the animals.  Being descended from Adam automatically makes the children royalty in Narnia, however, only Aslan / God can put them on the throne.

He also removes them when they become insufficiently innocent for his liking.