Steve Jackson Games Forums - I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

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Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

The whole fake Africa or fake Asia thing is exactly what I would be interested in for DF. I would just love to have some touches to make it seem like the PCs are exploring an exotic land. Sure they are kiling monsters and taking their stuff but it is fun to change the backdrop and costumes sometimes. I just bought Ars Magica Between Sand and Sea which is about Mythic North Africa and it is definitely interesting so if there was a DF Arabian Nights to go with that then I would be pretty happy...

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

Well, there could be a 'DF: Explorers', covering going off on adventures to far-off lands to find things to kill and loot. It's pretty much in theme for DF.

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

Quote:

Originally Posted by Turhan's Bey Company (Post 1955702)

It's not politics. It's fashion. The tropes of pop culture outside of clearly identifiable Western sources (kung fu movies, the Arabian Nights, Bollywood mythological epics, etc.) can fit well in the DF paradigm and are evocative in their own ways. They're a kind of fun which, one may argue, has so far been inadequately explored, but they provide ample grist for the mill, so why not? I have little interest in translating specific items from history and mythology into DF terms, but the underlying flavors are ones I happen to enjoy, so I'd be happy to see more DF which partakes of those tropes. More fake Asia to go with the fake Europe which informs a lot of DF! And some fake Africa! And some fake Americas! More everything! Too much is never enough!

That said, I think DF points in that direction more than one might suspect, or at least fails to point away: most templates are fairly culture-neutral (I don't see how one would have to change the thief template to make it conform to pop-culture tropes of feudal Japan or ancient Egypt; the decorative motifs and techniques in DF8 are essentially global) or can be trivially used to adapt them to specific cultures (a samurai is just a knight using a katana; take the axe away from the faux-Viking barbarian, give him a spear and a large shield, and he's a Zulu), a number of bits and pieces are more loudly evocative of non-western tropes than others (shamans, for example), and Mirror of the Fire Demon is in emphatically not-European geography.

Well, just to start with, Zulus fought in regimentalized impis and Vikings did not. Vikings never had to run over hot coals and Zulus never tried to found colonies between New England and Russia. So there was a lot of difference in style.

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

DF1: Adventurers pretty explicitly states that DF takes place in a non-culture, and removes any and all cultural traits from the templates.

Any cultures applied to the templates or the feel are the reader's own biases, not the writer's.

Martial Arts and Low-Tech provide a list of weapons and indicate what culture they come from. Quite a few of these weapons are Universal - Axe, Spear, Knife, Knobbed Club, Mace, Shield, Crossbow, Regular Bow. Others give counterparts: You want a kama? Use the stats for a Sickle. A Mongolian or Persian scimitar? Cavalry Saber has your back. A Chinese halberd and a European halberd may look different, both both use the Halberd stats.

Mechanically, it's the choices of weapons, armor, and deities that give DF its flavor, and DF7: Clerics is pretty explicit about not giving names or cultural bias to their gods. DF9: Summoners gives tips for making Chinese, Indian, and Japanese elementalists who use elements that are not necessarily the four Classical Greek elements: Metal, Wood, and Void/Ether.

If you want it distinctly non-european, remove blatantly European weapons and armor. No full plate, no brigandine, no greataxe. Encourage PC and NPC names - which DF itself does not provide - in the flavor you want.

The only thing I could possibly think of would be replacing the "classic fantasy" racial templates (Elf, Dwarf, Minotaur, Centaur) from DF3: The Next Level with templates from other cultures: Rakshasa, Tengu, Scorpion-taur. (I'd keep some form of Halfling, as they seem universal, though I might change the template a bit.)

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

Quote:

Originally Posted by jason taylor (Post 1955722)

Yeah, I think you're missing the point of DF here. We're not talking about real Vikings or real Zulus here any more than DF knights are real knights who have to deal with the strictures of manorialism or DF clerics are worried about homoiousion vs. homoousion. These are fictional archetypes, the Vikings and Zulus of pulpy adventure stories. The political sophistication of the historical Zulu kingdom and extensive trade networks of the Vikings don't enter into it.

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

Quote:

Originally Posted by Anthony (Post 1955718)

Well, there could be a 'DF: Explorers', covering going off on adventures to far-off lands to find things to kill and loot. It's pretty much in theme for DF.

DF 16: Wilderness already covers hieing off into unknown wildernesses.

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

Quote:

Originally Posted by evileeyore (Post 1955749)

DF 16: Wilderness already covers hieing off into unknown wildernesses.

Not actually what I was talking about, though, except incidentally (Wilderness would be important to Explorers, but it's not the same thing). Explorers is about hieing off to find unknown civilizations (in general, think the Age of Exploration, only in a DF style).

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

The mythos-specific monsters alone would probably justify doing culture-specific DF supplements, but as someone who once ran a bit of d20 Nyambe, I think there's a bit more to this than that. The unarmoured warrior with the completely iron spear, the wizard who had to worry about not being mistaken for a sorceror, and the priest who could transform into a baobab tree, gave the thing a distinct flavour.

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

Yeah I'd argue DF is just a filter that is added on top of a setting/culture (since it is setting agnostic).

Some DR character troupes might be a better fit for some cultural settings than others, but I willing to bet most cultures are actually broad enough encompass them with a little thought.

I.e I reckon I could do Vedic swash bucklers, Vietnamese barbarians and Viking martial artists if I tried.

Re: I wonder when DF will do non-European fantasy

I think DF went to the level to have its own official setting. Maybe testing it with a Recap of Banestorm, calling it Yrth-DF or something like that with a 24-pages PDF to "adjust" the level of Banestorm with DF style and after that, create an entirely setting "à la Forgotten Realms" or something similar based entirely on DF materials - keeping the Dungeon Crawling materials but involving politics, storys, adventures, and so on...

I know it's "one kind of thing that Sci-Fi player don't use" but I think DF is a great and popular line. The next step of evolution of DF could be a setting of it's own.