Quote from: Premier;874311There's an important difference between your examples and "Ye Standarde D&D in Reale Medievale Worlde".

Superhero stories set in "the present day" have elements that we understand to be fictional - Superman, Batman, the cities of Metropolis and Gotham, etc. -, but the wider world still looks, sounds and feels like modern day America. It's a modern day American society inhabited by modern day American people holding modern day American culture and social mores. Yes, they meet Superman, but they's modern day Americans meeting Superman. Lovecraft's stories also involve fictuitious protagonists and the whole Mythos stuff bubbling beneath, but if the story is set in, say, early 20th century New England, the place, the people and the society feels like 20th century New England.

Putting your D&D game, impregnated as it is with its numerous social and cultural assumptions, into Medieval Europe will thoroughly fail to feel medieval or European. You might have a map of Medieval Europe on the table, and the characters might interact with historical figures, but the "world at large" will be nothing like Medieval Europe. What it will feel like is D&D Disneyland where the social structure and culture of Feudal Europe has been utterly ripped out and replaced by a 20th century libertarian fantasy through the goggles of Western stories and a fucked-up California gold rush economy turned up to 11.
In D&D, the party NEVER has to pay toll at tollhouses along the road, they NEVER have to turn in all of the loot because the dungeon was located on the King's land and therefore all its contents are the King's property, they NEVER have to face the propect that they will die in the same social class and most likely the same village they were born in, or that if a 0 level local nobleman says "jump", the only socially acceptable thing they can do is ask "how high?" There's no such thing as "D&D in the real medieval world"; there's only "bog standard D&D on a medieval map".

Superhero movies are pretty unrealistic on this front as well though. The authorities basically allow people dressed up in costumes to take the law into their own hands and commit rampant crime as they chase down one loan psycho. In the case of characters like superman, I could see there is a certain degree of being so powerful the authorities may be better off letting you do your thing, but plenty of super heroes have minor powers or just function with gadgets. Super heroes get ignore as many of our laws and social norms as D&D characters get to ignore of Medieval law and social norm. There are things they just won't get incorrect though, because the people writing them are a product of the period they are set in (so no one is going to mistake a common item like a DVD player for a computer or apply 17th century fashion to 20th century New York).

To me this is more about to what degree your campaign has historical realism in it. I think that is a spectrum that is going to vary wildly from group to group (even groups who think they are cleaving closely to the real history are often way off in many of their assumptions). I think historical realism can be really awesome, and I've certainly incorporated it into some of my own campaigns. But there is also room for using history more lightly with less fidelity to the facts and hefty anachronisms. Whether I buy into the campaign the GM presents, is going to hinge more on how it is initially sold to me. If the tone of the campaign feels like it is going for something genuinely historical, then I'll bite if the details back it up. If it is clear this is just hercules and xena in Medieval Europe, I can buy into that too. I find it is more an issue when the GM presents one visions but the campaign doesn't really match it.

Quote from: Premier;874311Putting your D&D game, impregnated as it is with its numerous social and cultural assumptions, into Medieval Europe will thoroughly fail to feel medieval or European. You might have a map of Medieval Europe on the table, and the characters might interact with historical figures, but the "world at large" will be nothing like Medieval Europe. What it will feel like is D&D Disneyland where the social structure and culture of Feudal Europe has been utterly ripped out and replaced by a 20th century libertarian fantasy through the goggles of Western stories and a fucked-up California gold rush economy turned up to 11.
In D&D, the party NEVER has to pay toll at tollhouses along the road, they NEVER have to turn in all of the loot because the dungeon was located on the King's land and therefore all its contents are the King's property, they NEVER have to face the propect that they will die in the same social class and most likely the same village they were born in, or that if a 0 level local nobleman says "jump", the only socially acceptable thing they can do is ask "how high?" There's no such thing as "D&D in the real medieval world"; there's only "bog standard D&D on a medieval map".

"NEVER" is incorrect. Taxes, wealth, title, ownership, and so on WERE talked about in AD&D. In fact, you even have a discussion insofar to the ramifications of "hiring a peasant," let alone getting them killed, because you were taking the value of labor away from a noble. Refusal, extra payment, or punishment could occur. So everything you said here does not apply.

You may play like that, but please do be aware that this is a post-WotC development if anything. Do not extrapolate it elsewhere. There is an extremely large gulf between TSR and WotC community assumptions of "what is D&D?"

Quote from: TrippyHippy;873586However, sometimes I get frustrated by fantasy settings - and seek more authentic experiences, often in time travelling campaigns. Each to their own though, of course.

Authentic experience and Time travel do not quite mix if you know what I mean.

If I want to play in fantasy europe then I'll drag out my copy of Fantasy Wargaming (The RPG. Not the Wargame) which is exactly your premise. Sadly done in such a snide and condescending way its not pleasant to read really. Some great ideas lost in the writers attitude.

TSR had a series of these. One based in Rome, one based in I believe Europe. (Charlemagne?) And of course Oriental Adventures which is fantasy mish-mash Far East. and so on.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;873763Also, mes amis, never forget the "old and tired" aspect.  After the umpteenth time of hearing that Dragonlance is a cooler setting than the real Earth, or that Dribbles the Drow or whatever the hell his name is is a cooler character than Bertrand du Gescelin (Not more powerful, COOLER) a certain number of aged grognards will simply throw up on their hands in despair and say, in the words of Master Yoda, "It, fuck."

Who the hell thinks Dragonlance is cooler? While not as soul crushingly brutal as Forgotten Realms. It is still a pretty not fun place to live. Alot like sections of Europe if you werent a noble, merchant, or safely working for said. I mean really. How many freaking times have the gods cataclysmed the planet now? three? Four? And thats just the kick-off to the grunge.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;874334Superhero movies are pretty unrealistic on this front as well though. The authorities basically allow people dressed up in costumes to take the law into their own hands and commit rampant crime as they chase down one loan psycho. In the case of characters like superman, I could see there is a certain degree of being so powerful the authorities may be better off letting you do your thing, but plenty of super heroes have minor powers or just function with gadgets. Super heroes get ignore as many of our laws and social norms as D&D characters get to ignore of Medieval law and social norm. There are things they just won't get incorrect though, because the people writing them are a product of the period they are set in (so no one is going to mistake a common item like a DVD player for a computer or apply 17th century fashion to 20th century New York).

To me this is more about to what degree your campaign has historical realism in it. I think that is a spectrum that is going to vary wildly from group to group (even groups who think they are cleaving closely to the real history are often way off in many of their assumptions). I think historical realism can be really awesome, and I've certainly incorporated it into some of my own campaigns. But there is also room for using history more lightly with less fidelity to the facts and hefty anachronisms. Whether I buy into the campaign the GM presents, is going to hinge more on how it is initially sold to me. If the tone of the campaign feels like it is going for something genuinely historical, then I'll bite if the details back it up. If it is clear this is just hercules and xena in Medieval Europe, I can buy into that too. I find it is more an issue when the GM presents one visions but the campaign doesn't really match it.

The thing is with Superheroes, it's mainly twofold.  First, there may be actual laws that allow superheroes to act the way they do, especially if they been around for a while, and it's often invisible to people reading the comics or just generally accepted.

Secondly, nothing is effectively 'set in stone'.  The leeway in changing things socially and historically is much broader because of the fact that the present isn't history.  Yet.

Whereas a historical setting, especially one where there's a clear social caste system and rules enforce by death penalties for any infraction against these laws (something else a modern setting has an advantage on. We're awfully squeamish about killing each other now.  For better or worse) the odds of being able to do anything remotely like a Fantasy Game session as per D&D is incredibly remote and implausible.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;874354The thing is with Superheroes, it's mainly twofold.  First, there may be actual laws that allow superheroes to act the way they do, especially if they been around for a while, and it's often invisible to people reading the comics or just generally accepted.

Secondly, nothing is effectively 'set in stone'.  The leeway in changing things socially and historically is much broader because of the fact that the present isn't history.  Yet.

Whereas a historical setting, especially one where there's a clear social caste system and rules enforce by death penalties for any infraction against these laws (something else a modern setting has an advantage on. We're awfully squeamish about killing each other now.  For better or worse) the odds of being able to do anything remotely like a Fantasy Game session as per D&D is incredibly remote and implausible.

But that feels like we are holding present to lower standards of plausibility than the past. If special laws can exist to accommodate superheroes, and that doesn't bother you, then special laws can exist in medieval Europe to accommodate fighters, Wizards, clerics, etc.

To me i feel it is just implausible for me to put on a cape and wreck Downtown Boston without facing jail time, as it is for adventurers to break local laws in the past.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;873550So why not cut out the middleman and play in literal fantasy Europe?

I do. In Warhammer, 7th Sea and Rifts.

Quote from: TristramEvans;874237It's the same difference between our world with its myriads of tonnes of eyewitness encounters with aliens/UFOS, and if alien being id in fact visit Earth.

Somewhere in Project Bluebook or some equivalent files should be my sketch some military investigators got after an incident way back. Pretty weird. Though I had totally no clue at the time.

Many many years later my dad recounts seeing something he, a former air combat mechanic, could not identify. From his description I'd guess it was an ARV.

Which follows through to my personal opinion that some legends are probably based on some real phenomena. Just not what might be assumed.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;874357But that feels like we are holding present to lower standards of plausibility than the past. If special laws can exist to accommodate superheroes, and that doesn't bother you, then special laws can exist in medieval Europe to accommodate fighters, Wizards, clerics, etc.

To me i feel it is just implausible for me to put on a cape and wreck Downtown Boston without facing jail time, as it is for adventurers to break local laws in the past.

The problem is that in the real world we have a communication network that's global, and enforceable in the same way.  There's also a disparity of power in a Super setting.  Whereas a medieval Europe, well, there's a lot more of the King's men and enforcers than there are of the PC's, and likely, or at least plausibly, better armed and armoured, it will not end well when the players run afoul a local lordling thinking that because the King's Law says so, he should get his way.

Now, if the campaign is mostly a sports themed one, where the players are say, Jousters running the local circuit, and deals with local intrigue and the like, then it's doable.

I also remember an idea on RPGnet where someone brought up the idea of a group of people (the PC's) being an outsider caste, and they're the ones being sent into dangerous places.  Like going into a goblin cave.  Yes, the local lord could send his army, but he has to worry about his neighbour taking advantage and having his lands invaded, so he needs to keep his army around so as to not seem weak.  Not to mention his men are soldiers, not trained monster killers.

Why not send an expendable group of mercenaries into said death trap?  I think the idea was that there were called 'Doomed Slayers' or some such.  There was even a code they followed, keeping them moving and on the road, which was based on being outsiders to the caste and wearing out their welcome sooner or later.  Was very clever, but requires some heavy bending of Medieval Europe history to make happen.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;874357But that feels like we are holding present to lower standards of plausibility than the past. If special laws can exist to accommodate superheroes, and that doesn't bother you, then special laws can exist in medieval Europe to accommodate fighters, Wizards, clerics, etc.

Yes, and that's what I already described as "bog standard D&D with a map of Europe". Which is NOT the same as "play in literal fantasy Europe" as the thread title says.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;874357To me i feel it is just implausible for me to put on a cape and wreck Downtown Boston without facing jail time, as it is for adventurers to break local laws in the past.

Bemusingly in a few cities the cops do allow people in costumes to handle situations. The trick there is that the guy in the costume is not being a nuisance and not endangering lives. Other cities. No. Not going to happen.

As for comics. The usual premise is that there are also costumed villains that ordinary police may not be able to handle. Or mobs and gangs that the police will not go after for whatever reason.

Back on topic.

People have been playing D&D with no monsters at all even right out the gate. Or even with only Fighters and Thieves as the availible classes. Or rangers and bards minus the magic. The elements are there to make about anything really and people have.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;874365The problem is that in the real world we have a communication network that's global, and enforceable in the same way.  There's also a disparity of power in a Super setting.  Whereas a medieval Europe, well, there's a lot more of the King's men and enforcers than there are of the PC's, and likely, or at least plausibly, better armed and armoured, it will not end well when the players run afoul a local lordling thinking that because the King's Law says so, he should get his way.

But again, dealing with a real police department, the feds or the army, shouldn't be the cake walk it often is in modern games. I get that there were institutions in the past that were important and difficult to manage, but we have institutions too. And our institutions are heavily regulated and centralized. Being a murder hobo in the present is probably even harder than being on in Medieval Europe. They had institutions, laws and classes, but there wasn't the all encompassing presence of video phones, satellites, the communications networks you mention, etc. All things being equal, a party in the present who run afoul of local law should end up in just as much, if not more, trouble if they try to pull it off in the modern day. Now you can explain getting away with it to a degree if the players have superpowers or something. But depending on what one means by fantasy Europe, that may be the case as well in the past (if magic is a viable option for example).

QuoteWhy not send an expendable group of mercenaries into said death trap?  I think the idea was that there were called 'Doomed Slayers' or some such.  There was even a code they followed, keeping them moving and on the road, which was based on being outsiders to the caste and wearing out their welcome sooner or later.  Was very clever, but requires some heavy bending of Medieval Europe history to make happen.

I think if the problem is working an adventuring party into the historical setting, you ether have to find the closest approximation the period offers, or take the supers route, where you create new space for them. To make it work you'll probably need to muster some flexibility on the issue of course. I mean there were people who travelled and explored in this period. It isn't so crazy to have a Marco Polo or Ibn Battuta type campaign. Granted you probably want to work within the scope of the society in question, but there are usually places you can fit things (even if it is something as artificial as the king putting together a motley crew to achieve some secret objective). When I did Servants of Gaius, we used a similar core conceit to make room for a party of adventurers. Even in most modern games, there are conceits made to make the typical adventuring party and standard adventures doable. Because even in our world, going around and stealing treasure from tombs is still frowned upon. I mean a lot of what players get away with in a modern campaign would land a normal person in jail.

When you do fantasy Europe, you can pretty much align it as much with real world history as you want. It is totally up to you and the players what assumptions you want to keep and which ones you want to ignore.

Quote from: Omega;874371Bemusingly in a few cities the cops do allow people in costumes to handle situations. The trick there is that the guy in the costume is not being a nuisance and not endangering lives. Other cities. No. Not going to happen.
.

Yeah, but my point was just that. They are not going to let me do random property damage, endanger the public, and commit violence against people I deem villainous.

Quote from: Premier;874368Yes, and that's what I already described as "bog standard D&D with a map of Europe". Which is NOT the same as "play in literal fantasy Europe" as the thread title says.

I may have missed your post on this point, so it is possible I am not clear on what you mean here. I think there is some middle ground between them though. It doesn't have to be Fighter, Thief, etc. I  am just saying, if the modern era can make room for supers and still be plausibly modern, I see no reason why the Medieval Period and Early Modern Period can't be made to accommodate adventurers and still be plausible. Whether you are doing bog standard D&D on a map of Europe, or doing literal fantasy Europe, I think the principle can still apply (depending on what the fantasy part entails).

If people want more restrictions in their campaigns that is fine. I've run pretty gritty Roman intrigue campaigns that cleaved as closely to the history as possible. And that can be great fun too. But the moment you make a player character in the setting you are likely going to start doing things that a typical person from the period wouldn't (simply because they're PCs and will likely encounter more excitement, just like a protagonist in a modern show or movie goes on an adventure every episode, whereas I've maybe had one or two quasi-adventures, that were actually pretty boring, my entire life).

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;874270Except I think we project an awful lot of our own beliefs on people here. I'm sure there were cynics who exploited things like the witch craze for personal gain (and living in the Salem area, there is plenty of evidence here that people were happy to use it for things like property grabs).

No, we have tons of evidence to this effect. The Inquisition was incredibly well documented, and the motivations of a lot of the witch trials in Europe were very clearly political.

QuoteBut for that to work, the population still has to believe this stuff is real. And I would guess that the majority of people involved thought they were waging a war against Satan's minions. So if if you make the change that witches were actually real, that doesn't stop the witch craze from happening.

No, but it takes on an incredibly different character. If witches and the magical abilities attributed to them were real, that would have drastically altered the course of human history. Curses, hexes, divinations, the ability to summon forth demons. Regardless of what folk people may have believed or wanted to believe, if any one of these things were possible, then people would have used and exploited them. Wealth would change hands, authority figures would be assassinated, famines and plagues would be spread. People who in our world were involved in the Inquisition for political reasons either wouldn't be involved or would have made completely different choices. People who weren't involved or objected to the Inquisition would have been, and vice versa. Witches would have fought back. People seeing the potential for power would have taken up witchcraft. And this is assuming just this one change, without looking back trough history in a world where witchcraft and witches were real, from the time of caveman shamans onward.

Belief is not the same as reality. The more you think about it, it becomes impossible not to see the echo effect.

QuoteEven in our own time, if you look at the whole Satanic Panic in the 80s, the people who spearheaded that were not being cynical and making power grabs, they really believed that teenagers were opening up dangerous connections with demonic forces through things like the new age movement, heavy metal and D&D. I can confirm that, because I knew people who believed it.

Just like the witch craze, like the McCarthy witch hunts, like anything of that nature, you will have the gullible people, you will have the people involved because finding a scapegoat is easier than taking personal responsibility, and you will find the people inciting it for personal gain. This is true of everything from the Satanic Panic (there were MANY people profiteering off of it) backwards.

QuoteBut the point is, you wouldn't really have to make any changes to such a setting. A show like the X Files can present our world pretty much as it is, with the added twist that alien abductions and monsters are real, because they all occur exactly as our modern myths about these phenomena say they do. People get abducted and no one believes them, but the government knows and keeps a lid on it. We don't watch a show like that and expect them to make drastic cultural changes to account for the fact that aliens are real.

Again, you're not actually accounting for the cause and effect of something actually happening. The Xfiles is not realistic, it just takes itself seriously. There is a huge difference. Yeah you can have a fantasy version of our reality where "urban legends are true", but its not our reality, it doesn't account for the manner in which our reality would be altered.