What is Cardiel?

[Stormcrow]

Each of the countries in Yrth represents a particular genre of fantasy. Megalos is high fantasy; Caithness is Arthurian fantasy; Al-Wazif is Arabian Nights; etc.

What is the genre for Cardiel? Its theme seems to be a live-and-let-live mixture of other cultures, but does it correspond to a particular fantasy genre?

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

What is the genre for Cardiel? Its theme seems to be a live-and-let-live mixture of other cultures, but does it correspond to a particular fantasy genre?

Whatever Lankmar is? Urban High Fantasy?

[Apache]

I thought Megalos was Evil Roman/Byzantine Fantasy.

Caithness I wouldn't call 'Arthurian'...it always struck me as more like 'Generic Fantasy Kingdom Based Off The SCA/RenFaire.'

Cardiel is what I would call 'Generic Urbanite Fantasy Close To Modern Sensibilities'. Glenn Cook's Garret Files would work in Cardiel, and in fact you could drop Garret into Tredroy and he might not even notice...:)

[Miles]

Caithness is outright described as a place for Arthurian adventures, and it does fit what with the orders of knights errant and the fact that wizards mostly stick to their towers in the pockets of normal/high mana.

Anyways, while I agree that Tredroy is supposed to be the big, cosmopolitan city where you might run across anything, I think the OP might have been referring to the rest of Cardiel, which I agree doesn't have a "theme" to it like other countries do, besides having a lot of intrigue and religious diversity. That seems to be intentional, since it gives GMs a relatively generic place to start off players new to roleplaying.

[Ed the Coastie]

Originally Posted by Miles

...Tredroy is supposed to be the big, cosmopolitan city where you might run across anything...

Inspired by Ken Hite's Suppressed Transmission "Crisis on Alternate Earths", I once tinkered with the idea of "superheroes" in Tredroy. Never did anything with it, though.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

Each of the countries in Yrth represents a particular genre of fantasy. Megalos is high fantasy; Caithness is Arthurian fantasy; Al-Wazif is Arabian Nights; etc.

What is the genre for Cardiel? Its theme seems to be a live-and-let-live mixture of other cultures, but does it correspond to a particular fantasy genre?

I don't think it's so much a question of genre. Rather, each of the cultures of Yrth reflects a particular premodern culture and religious tradition: Christianity in Megalos and Caithness, Islam in al-Wazif and al-Haz, a slurry of "eastern" religions in Sahud (united by the emperor and the bureaucracy). Each of them has an established belief system. If you want to play more "modern" characters who don't have to worry about conforming to a legally enforced established faith, Cardiel is your best bet; it serves the more "modern" players. It's sort of a Netherlands of fantasy.

Bill Stoddard

[Phil Masters]

I see Cardiel primarily as a place to play fairly generic sword-and-sorcery without having to worry much about the weather or the government. I tend to think of Fritz Leiber a lot when I'm looking at it.

In Megalos, there's always a feeling that you ought to be fighting The Man; in Caithness, you probably have ambitions to swing a knighthood and become The Man; in Sahud, The Man is part of a complicated system you probably don't understand but he'll still cause you trouble; in the Nomad Lands, it's bloody freezing; in Al-Haz and Al-Wazif, it's hot, and The Man is straight out of the Arabian Nights; but in Cardiel ... who cares? The Man locally might be a mad baron who's trying to kill you or a decent guy who's willing to pay you, but that's a strictly local issue, the weather is okay, and there are lots of monsters and bandits and stuff you can go out and deal with in the approved fashion.

[Stormcrow]

The reference to Lankhmar helps, at least for Tredroy. It's simple enough to extrapolate for Cardiel after that: generic or Leiberesque low fantasy.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

It's simple enough to extrapolate for Cardiel after that: generic or Leiberesque low fantasy.

I'm still really fuzzy on the whole low vs. high fantasy thing, but I don't see how Nehwon is possibly low fantasy. It's not Earth.

[Sunrunners_Fire]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

I'm still really fuzzy on the whole low vs. high fantasy thing, but I don't see how Nehwon is possibly low fantasy. It's not Earth.

Low Fantasy doesn't have to be Earth. Banestorm is Low Fantasy, for example.

Originally Posted by GURPS Fantasy, pg 6-7

Low fantasy, is closer to realistic fiction than to myth. Low fantasy stories focus on people’s daily lives and practical goals; magic provides a way to achieve those goals, and makes it interesting. A low fantasy campaign asks what it’s like to live in a world of monsters, magic, and demigods.

Most low fantasy magic is evenly distributed in the world, not sharply focused in certain places. Its effects are predictable and knowable. Low fantasy magic is less a source of wonder than a toolkit.

Characters in low fantasy are more concerned with practical goals, less with great passions. A high fantasy traitor might be motivated by passionate jealousy, tempted by the devil, or perversely sympathetic to the other side; a low fantasy traitor wants 30 pieces of silver. Merchants and criminals are minor figures, or entirely absent, in most high fantasy. In low fantasy, they are not only prevalent, they may be the heroes.