Steve Jackson Games - Site Navigation
Home General Info Follow Us Search Illuminator Store Forums What's New Other Games Ogre GURPS Munchkin Our Games: Home

Go Back   Steve Jackson Games Forums > Roleplaying > GURPS

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 11-19-2018, 08:41 AM   #1
muduri
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Harlem, New York
Default broken-hearted barbarians

Just finished some GURPS Fantasy at a con in Scranton and the players wreaked some Machiavellian havoc - the kind you hope for, to be clear, ha. One of the feudalizing swidden chieftains has now had his heart broken twice - once led on by a courtesan, and now by the shame-suicide of his pregnant lover. Unsettling but epic!

So my question is, what do you do after two amorous tragedies? The game plays with the push-and-pull between (the rhetoric of) chivalry / high fantasy and realistic (ancient or modern) relationships and social tensions, so if examples come to mind of anything from medieval epic "cast yourself off a cliff too" to modern "focus on your political career, maybe try another marriage based on trust rather than passion" I'd be interested to hear them.

Many thanks for your thoughts!
muduri is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-19-2018, 09:44 AM   #2
jason taylor
 
jason taylor's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Portland, Oregon
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Quote:
Originally Posted by muduri View Post
Just finished some GURPS Fantasy at a con in Scranton and the players wreaked some Machiavellian havoc - the kind you hope for, to be clear, ha. One of the feudalizing swidden chieftains has now had his heart broken twice - once led on by a courtesan, and now by the shame-suicide of his pregnant lover. Unsettling but epic!

So my question is, what do you do after two amorous tragedies? The game plays with the push-and-pull between (the rhetoric of) chivalry / high fantasy and realistic (ancient or modern) relationships and social tensions, so if examples come to mind of anything from medieval epic "cast yourself off a cliff too" to modern "focus on your political career, maybe try another marriage based on trust rather than passion" I'd be interested to hear them.

Many thanks for your thoughts!
There was one McKeenit song where a Scottish knight kills his brother in law in revenge for killing his wife and then goes Crusading in atonement.

In this setting he might swear to slay a dragon, or to gain more glory then any warrior ever has, or something of the kind. Or he might take a blood-oath against whoever was responsible for his lover's suicide (taking a leaf from Lady Lucretia).
__________________
"The navy could probably win a war without coffee but would prefer not to try"-Samuel Eliot Morrison
jason taylor is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-19-2018, 10:33 AM   #3
arnej
 
arnej's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ft Collins, CO
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Work with your GM to have the perfect girl for the chieftain show up, but have him be to damaged to realize it at first. He mopes around, she is over there being perfect. He rides into battle seeking suicide, she is the shield maiden standing over him protecting him.

After a long, long, time, have him come out of his black pit of doubt and despair. But is it too late?
arnej is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-19-2018, 11:18 AM   #4
PTTG
 
PTTG's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2011
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

A political marriage for convenience does the trick. Then explore the nowadays unconventional story of a married couple that falls in love.
PTTG is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-19-2018, 07:25 PM   #5
Varyon
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Dalinar Kholin from The Stormlight Archives wouldn't be a terrible place to look. Please be advised the following contains some spoilers for book 3 (Oathbringer), but only in terms of Dalinar's past from well before the bulk of book 1.
Spoiler:  
__________________
GURPS Overhaul
Varyon is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 11-19-2018, 07:47 PM   #6
whswhs
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Quote:
Originally Posted by PTTG View Post
A political marriage for convenience does the trick. Then explore the nowadays unconventional story of a married couple that falls in love.
Note that there is about a page discussing courtship and marriage, including this specific case, in GURPS Social Engineering, if you have that.
__________________
Bill Stoddard

I don't think we're in Oz any more.
whswhs is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 11-20-2018, 07:30 AM   #7
malloyd
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Quote:
Originally Posted by PTTG View Post
A political marriage for convenience does the trick. Then explore the nowadays unconventional story of a married couple that falls in love.
An arranged marriage of some sort does seem quite reasonable (and indeed it's a little odd somebody could reach a chiefly level of rank without one having already being arranged for him).

One other complication for him, his underlings probably ought to be grumbling a bit about his obvious character flaw. In our modern culture we think of love as a good thing, but many societies see it as a sign of weakness, or type of insanity. This is actually one of the big splits you ought to be looking at for the chivalric/realistic split - love as a positive thing is something of an *invention* of southern French chivalric poetry.
__________________
--
MA Lloyd
malloyd is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-21-2018, 07:34 AM   #8
muduri
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Harlem, New York
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Many thanks for all of those - barbarian equivalent of atonement / redemption Crusade, looking up from the pit of despair before or after marriage, [spoiler alert] and Social Engineering all excellent suggestions. And Malloyd you bring up good points on both of those:

Quote:
Originally Posted by malloyd View Post
...indeed it's a little odd somebody could reach a chiefly level of rank without one having already being arranged for him...

...In our modern culture we think of love as a good thing, but many societies see it as a sign of weakness, or type of insanity. This is actually one of the big splits you ought to be looking at for the chivalric/realistic split...
There's a great Bedouin ethnography called Veiled Sentiments observing the parents doing anything to stop their children marrying for love but being obsessed with songs of amorous loss when they can hear others' on the anthropologist's tape recorder for the first time.

Our barbarian friend Cathálon himself would doubtless argue his courtship of the civilized maiden was going to be an farsighted political alliance but you're right, the elders have probably nodded knowingly at his protestations this whole time.
muduri is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 11-21-2018, 12:39 PM   #9
whswhs
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

I'm going to say that the classical formula is that a tragedy ends when the main characters are dead, a comedy when they're married.
__________________
Bill Stoddard

I don't think we're in Oz any more.
whswhs is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 11-21-2018, 07:11 PM   #10
jason taylor
 
jason taylor's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Portland, Oregon
Default Re: broken-hearted barbarians

Quote:
Originally Posted by malloyd View Post
An arranged marriage of some sort does seem quite reasonable (and indeed it's a little odd somebody could reach a chiefly level of rank without one having already being arranged for him).

One other complication for him, his underlings probably ought to be grumbling a bit about his obvious character flaw. In our modern culture we think of love as a good thing, but many societies see it as a sign of weakness, or type of insanity. This is actually one of the big splits you ought to be looking at for the chivalric/realistic split - love as a positive thing is something of an *invention* of southern French chivalric poetry.
Read Kipling's "With Scindia to Delhi". In it a Maratha warrior reproaches his lord for letting a concubine distract him.
__________________
"The navy could probably win a war without coffee but would prefer not to try"-Samuel Eliot Morrison
jason taylor is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Fnords are Off
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 05:38 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.