Historical pastiches in setting design.

soltakss · September 02, 2014, 11:26:55 AM

Some people sneer at the idea, but it can work and is very easy to do. It depends on how well you want the setting to fit together.

For example, if someone had a setting with Ninjas and Vikings, then they'd have to put together a rationale for why they exist, how the society works and what tensions the society has. Or, on the other hand, they could say "There are ninjas and vikings in this setting" and leave it at that.

Whatever works for the game.

jibbajibba · September 02, 2014, 11:35:53 AM

Quote from: Skyrock;784262Ripping off existing cultures, and making the references obvious, is very useful for accessibility. Just tell the players "Scuthland is Braveheart Scotland, BUT with ancestor worship instead of Christianity" or "Jipang is like old Japan with samurai and ninjas, BUT it is ruled by a Bronze Dragon emperor", and players will have an immediate idea of culture, language, clothing, food, armaments and archetypes.

I find it easier to take a cliché, and then to add to it or subtract from it or break it in a few points, then to brew a culture from whole cloth and then explain it to the players.

This.

Think about your setting add depth even create a language if you like so you can name old stuff with consistency. But a cliche is instantly grokkable and that is what you want.
I started a thread in the design section ages back (http://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?t=29150) where I stuck a few micro settings of 600 words or less that I think are all pretty much instantly grokkable full of cliche but yet feel kind of original at the the same time.

Will · September 02, 2014, 11:54:48 AM

Repeating myself, but languages and names are a biggie.

I mean, most people don't have the skills or time to come up with consistent names/language for one (let alone multiple) made up cultures.

But just making it mostly German/Norwegian/whatever? Hey, that works.

I had a lot of fun in a game online using Google Translate to come up with an ancient tablet:

Draug Vatn, vera enn.
Láttu blessaður sálmurinn halda þér.
Láttu forfeður horfa yfir þér.
Verið hljóðir, Draug Vatn.

Which works great!

Nikita · September 02, 2014, 12:31:41 PM

I use historical backgrounds extensively in my games. Having a real-life society gives excellent realistic background with highlights to pick and choose.

Main reason is that most of my games have characters in higher social status than uncouth bandit groups and freelance terrorists. Subsequently they move with better people and thus need to know how society, economy and power structures actually work.

If players actually know the setting in question (common with older payers, less common with younger players) they get verisimilitude much more easily.

RPGPundit · September 10, 2014, 10:46:39 PM

To the OP: I don't think there's any general "Getting it wrong", while you can get it wrong in terms of what you specifically want. You have to decide whether you want something stereotypical, or something historically detailed and accurate, and be careful not to do one when you intend the other (it goes in both directions).

Bedrockbrendan · September 11, 2014, 08:01:02 AM

Quote from: The Butcher;784374I've struggled with the same questions my entire gaming life.

I've read it somewhere that Robert E. Howard created the Hyborian Age as deliberate historical pastiche (famously to the annoyment of his pedantic bestie H. P. Lovecraft) so he could set a Conan story in Ancient Egypt (Stygia) this week, and in Medieval Europe (Aquilonia or Nemedia) the next.
)

He also did it so he didn't have to spend time researching details before writing. that way he wasn't chained to history, just inspired by it.

Rincewind1 · September 14, 2014, 08:49:49 AM

I admit I am trying to shy away from it nowadays (with little success to be fair, as my last setting was Vikings meet Lovecraft

- sadly that game never got far, replaced my Planescape). Not as much because I think it wrong, but because I got too used to that historical inspiration, turning my settings into nigh - copies of history, with added elves and serial numbers filed off.

One Horse Town · September 14, 2014, 09:02:41 AM

Well, my homebrew 5e setting is going to use real world locations in a fantasy way. Just to make it more complicated i'm using the Iron Gods Pathfinder adventure path with it. It's coming together nicely and i'll probably post about it down the line a little bit.

Hoorah for Norse Half-orcs fighting alongside Baltic tribal Druids against robots whilst fending off maruading Livonian Sword Brothers and Teutonic knights!

Daztur · September 16, 2014, 05:55:37 PM

Nothing wrong with using real history but please give me a reason for going through the effort of memorizing a bunch of proper nouns when just using real place names would be easier.

For example settings like the one used in Last Light of the Sun are horrible. It was so annoying to have to remember which city was not-Rome and which was not-Jerusalem etc. etc.

danbuter · September 16, 2014, 06:02:16 PM

All of my settings use stereotypical European, American Indian, Japan, and African countries. I like them, and pretty much everyone I know can immediately relate to any of them.

Tao_Alexis · September 16, 2014, 07:38:35 PM

The thing about embracing the real world - any part of it - for a campaign is how deeply it can be understood by the players. Even if they're not historians or geographers, we have inherently taken in a lot of information from the media and literature that establishes the 'reality' of things better than imagination can.

While the immortal city of Oz is known very well to many people, the 'depth' at which Oz is understood is far less than, say, Paris or London. What neighborhood is there in Oz to compare with Covent Garden or Montparnasse?

RPGPundit · September 18, 2014, 04:24:11 AM

My feeling these days is that I tend to prefer going full-on historical (or Fantasy Historical) when that's what I'm going for; and when I'm not, to avoid any direct historical analogies.

Daztur · September 18, 2014, 09:08:19 PM

Quote from: RPGPundit;787581My feeling these days is that I tend to prefer going full-on historical (or Fantasy Historical) when that's what I'm going for; and when I'm not, to avoid any direct historical analogies.

Agreed completely. If I'm going to be playing a Viking campaign I want a good reason why I can't have my PC come from Iceland and why I have to memorize a bunch of fantasy names instead.