Harsh realism for languages

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by whswhs

In my current campaign, Tapestry, I've made repeated use of encounters with people who don't share a language. The PCs have dealt with them in varied ways: silent barter; finding someone who speaks a language they know; Gesture rolls; and more recently, use of spirit based magic to do an end run around language barriers (I'm not sure that allowing that was a good idea, but now it's a precedent). There is some gaming utility in nonlinguistic communication scenes. But it does limit the kinds of things that can be done in an adventure or campaign.

That is actually a good way to do it. A Hudson's Bay canoe party can come across a new tribe. They can use a few words they used a bit Eastward on the assumption that languages border. They can also take out a tomahawk (shaft pointing toward the others or other peaceful gesture) or a few matches or some beads, or wampum and lay them on a rock after satisfying that they are worth having (a Hudson's Bay Hatchet is something anyone who has little iron would want). Then they can point to the fur cap of one and make gestures that somehow indicate "More of these for more of these." They will be all day about it, but it will be worth it especially if the boss back home decides to send another expedition to this tribe.

If done in an alien world, similar things can be done. One of the problems is that you do not know what will be considered bloodworthy. For instance aforesaid hatchet is the most valuable item the canoe expedition has but the natives cannot tell whether it is intended for trade or robbery and so their reaction is tricky.

[ericthered]

In my Banestormed Romans game languages were a big deal, and one of the most common things characters spent point on. First contact was especially interesting, and we had some really fun experiences with gesturing. Including getting the character with alcohol intolerance drunk because the best way to establish "we are friends" turned out to be the exchange and communal consumption of food. I have never had a quirk turn up in play so much.

As it turned out, most sides had magic that eased the language barrier, and as the game progressed more and more people learned each other's language. The limited supply of interpreters was important though, so if you want an excuse for PC's to be important in a situation, making them rarely multilingual is probably a good way to do it. It worked for Sacajawea.

[lwcamp]

Originally Posted by ericthered

It worked for Sacajawea.

Ah, yes. A real life case where the success of the expedition depended on translation from English to French to Shoshone to Sahaptin and back.

Luke

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by ericthered

In my Banestormed Romans game languages were a big deal, and one of the most common things characters spent point on. First contact was especially interesting, and we had some really fun experiences with gesturing. Including getting the character with alcohol intolerance drunk because the best way to establish "we are friends" turned out to be the exchange and communal consumption of food. I have never had a quirk turn up in play so much.

As it turned out, most sides had magic that eased the language barrier, and as the game progressed more and more people learned each other's language. The limited supply of interpreters was important though, so if you want an excuse for PC's to be important in a situation, making them rarely multilingual is probably a good way to do it. It worked for Sacajawea.

Sacajawa was not a true first contact. Besides living as a concubine of a French trapper for months, there was a trading network set up for years.

Lewis and Clark were the first diplomatic contact with the Shoshone by the US but "reverberations" up and down the fir routes had created reasonably reliable communications.

[RyanW]

I often find imperfect/partial translations are more useful for narrative than a simple lack of common languages. Detour rather than road block.

An archaic form of a known language. Material written in an unknown language, but annotated in a known language. Having the instruction, the machine not transparently convert.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

Sacajawa was not a true first contact. Besides living as a concubine of a French trapper for months, there was a trading network set up for years.

Lewis and Clark were the first diplomatic contact with the Shoshone by the US but "reverberations" up and down the fir routes had created reasonably reliable communications.

Indeed, it wasn't an absolute first contact, and that's one reason why Sacajawa existed at all. It was still a high-stakes journey we remember to this day, and there was still a extreme scarcity of people who spoke both of the desired languages. She was thrust into the forefront of history simply by speaking multiple languages (and living in the right area). Languages are a good reason to justify using PC's in an adventure: its really hard to find someone with their language talents.

[Irish Wolf]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Indeed, it wasn't an absolute first contact, and that's one reason why Sacajawa existed at all. It was still a high-stakes journey we remember to this day, and there was still a extreme scarcity of people who spoke both of the desired languages. She was thrust into the forefront of history simply by speaking multiple languages (and living in the right area). Languages are a good reason to justify using PC's in an adventure: its really hard to find someone with their language talents.

And then if their skills aren't as high as one might wish, even more adventure can ensue. In another context, someone linked to the TVTropes article Either "World Domination" Or Something About Bananas, named for an episode of the cartoon Fairly Oddparents in which the fairies had been forced to grant wishes for a monkey, and Cosmo is trying to interpret.

"He either said 'Make humans the dominant species on Earth again', or he just wanted a banana. I dunno, I could be paraphrasing."

So, you're providing the translation for the King of Wherethehellarewe, and he asks a question of the party. From the sound of his voice, it's probably a pretty important question. But you fail your Translation roll. He either demands to know why you are here on pain of sudden and violent death, or he would like to offer you a cookie - some of the verb forms of this language are pretty tricky, after all, and "death by exsanguination" and "delicious baked goods" only differ by two vowel sounds and a tonal shift...

[YankeeGamer]

I have ALWAYS made it an absolute requirement that all the PC's share a common language, no matter the campaign. There's always an excuse that can be found. When the Pilgrims arrived, there was a local, Tisquantum ("Squanto") who spoke English--something that would be considered all but impossible if it hadn't happened.

[Joseph Paul]

Acknowledged that 'everyone has a language in common' is one of the ways to avoid dealing with the situation. But teaching Squanto English in the first place is exactly the situation I wish to explore - he has no knowledge of the language and his captors have no knowledge of his so the real world example you use actually breaks your reasoning. I would prefer to see some analysis of what Squanto and who ever taught him had to go through and how to do that by RAW.

My take is that Broken understanding of English cost Squanto 400 hours of instruction to get the two points needed. With a dedicated Teacher (skill 12+) every hour taught is an hour earned. Normally self-study is a two-for-one conversion and on the job training is at four-for-one. But the note on p25 states that language study without a teacher takes four times as long. So on-the-job learning has a 16-to-1 conversion and self-study has an 8-to-1 factor. If the student has the Linguistics skill then in any month he makes a Linguistics roll he gets the full rate (4-to-1 or 2-to-1). Just to get to Broken Squanto has to be taught by someone so 400 hours is the minimum, Accented is 800 hours, Native is 1200. If he learns it while working (he was enslaved, no idea what he did) it is 16 times that. He is illiterate so even if his native tongue had a written form and some one wrote how to speak English in it he wouldn't be able to use self-study.

So learning an alien tongue in a first contact situation would be best accomplished by characters with Linguistics skill and Teaching-12+ (for their contribution to the alien's understanding of a Terran tongue) depending on how the alien stacks up as a teacher. Run it as a long task in the background and have limited interactions that are more adventurous on outings geared toward more vocabulary building for instance. Have fun with simile and idiom and an alien race's expression of the passage of time.

I do not like that the understanding of a language isn't a skill in itself with a score. The RAW seem to lead to some dead ends. (I am aware of the article on languages as skills in Pyramid 3/44 - just don't have it yet. If you do and want to share the major changes please do so.)

Characters with Broken can understand simple sentences and important words and are penalized (-3/-6 for artsie stuff Poetry/Singing) when using a language skill like Fast Talk, Teaching, Public Speaking, etc. When is a sentence too complex to follow or an idea too hard to communicate? If the circumstances don't involve swindling someone, teaching them, or swaying opinions of the masses what is the roll supposed to be made against? If the circumstances are stressful they use the character's IQ and there are additional negative modifiers for poor connections and hurried speech. That doesn't seem to completely endorse the use of Task Difficulty modifiers though which is strange because if the communication to or from the character is complex or lengthy or technical but not in conditions of stress and doesn't rely on any of the listed language skills then it is as if the RAW say the character can't roll against anything to understand or use it.

Accented is good enough to remove any restriction on understanding or using the language even under stressful conditions. It still suffers a -1 for some uses of language skills and -2 for artistic use. Perhaps I am being a bit pedantic but if there is no need ever for an IQ roll to use or understand a language at Accented then none of the additional modifiers for poor speech or connections mentioned under Broken applies either. Which is a shame because language use is starting to look like a great poster child for the Task Difficulty modifier system.

I also don't like that failure is starkly apparent to the player of a character with limited understanding of a language. Normally the GM rolls (BS p344) when the character would not know if they were successful but the text in Broken makes it clear that the character would understand that they have not been successful in conveying information and may try again.

Other games deal with tasks that have an uncertain outcome - information transfer, diagnosis, repair, etc. I feel some of those mechanics would transfer well to GURPS. Please weigh in on them.

One uses a split dice mechanic so that a character with Accented would roll two of the three dice for comprehension of the conversation and the DM would roll the other one and keep it hidden. If the situation called for a roll of 9 or less for success and the 2D roll is a 9 failure would be apparent - 9 plus what ever is on the hidden die puts the roll over the target number of 9. Between 8 and 4 there is uncertainty about what the DM rolled with the third die. Three and less and -barring unknown modifiers - he knows he succeeded. The DM's die result is not announced. It can be assumed by the players that such a roll will average 3 and that if the 2D roll total plus 3 is in the range of success that is what they are to go with. The DM notes the actual results of the roll and acts upon those. So at both ends a player can tell if they nailed it or put their foot in it and there is a mushy middle ground where they might have gone wrong.

With Broken the player rolls one die and the DM rolls two - greater possibility of mangling the language and not knowing it.

Another has both the DM (in secret) and player roll. If both succeed the player gets the full truth of the situation. If one fails and one succeeds he gets some truth. If both fail he gets no truth. The uncertainty of attempts to use a language is preserved. Ich bin ein berliner.

I am thinking that making out some different Task Difficulty lists for certain activities would be useful.