Dungeon Fantasy needs a bare-bones setting

[Fish]

I don't think that Dungeon Fantasy needs to be nailed to any one specific setting. It would be very nice, however, to have some well-established generalities in a wide-open setting that players could become familiar with.

Why?

Fiction (and RPGs) usually take place on the boundaries of the "rules." Some players simply love having rules to bend, or to break, or to dance around. For instance: you're the dwarf who hates working with metal, or you're the dark elf who isn't really evil, or the long-lost king who doesn't really want the crown, or the quiet unadventuresome little fellow who gets dragged off into a battle against armies and dragons. You're the werewolf who's a vegetarian, you're the last in an ancient race of druids, you're the only one who knows where the valley of the long-lost secrets lies. You're the wizard who isn't very good at magic, you're the barbarian who isn't very handy with a sword, or you're the only person ever to survive the death and destruction of your village. You're the only alien of your race to serve in Starfleet; you're the youngest starship captain; you're the only known member of your race.

On the frontier where the rules break down, that's where stories happen. Gamers like having archetypes and rules, because that's how you make interesting characters. Why would a gamer want to be an uninspiring interchangeable Elf with a capital E, when he could be the Elf Who Doesn't Want To Be Immortal?

There's two ways to go with any setting. First, you can make all characters of a given type more or less identical. Star Trek is a setting of this type, where almost all Klingons (or Ferengi, or Romulans, or Cardassians) are virtually indistinguishable. A setting gives the player a basis, a foundation on which to build. It gives the world definition and direction.

But who were the most interesting characters in Trek? Spock, Data, Worf, Garek the tailor, Odo. They were unique. They defied their archetypes (or as in the case of Odo, he had no archetype, at least at first).

That's why, I think, a bare-bones setting is of some use. It gives players ideas, both in things they can be, but also ways they can be different.

Will SJ Games create such a bare-bones setting for GURPS Fantasy? No, because I doubt it'd sell... settings and rules and archetypes are desired by players, not necessarily by the GMs who want to run games. I like GURPS because I can run any setting I want, at any time. I don't like it, because every new setting is a buttload of work to create (but ever so satisfying to get it running).

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Gavynn

I completely do not understand this. Why would the GM be required to tell the players all the hidden lore specialties of the game before they encounter them? Why would they know something hidden before discovering it? Sounds meta-game to me.

The term "metagame" is inapplicable to events that take place prior to game start.


Also, the general problem is one of ability usefulness, and how finely areas of expertise and communications are divided.

If the setting only has a single ancient language, then my Scholar template character with Language Talent gets screwed, because the Wizard also knows Latin (and even the Bard might have it at Broken).

Likewise, if the setting has a dozen equally important ancient languages and three dozen less important ones, I'm forced to spend an unreasonable amount of CPs to make my Scholar capable of that which Scholar is entitled to be capable of. On top of the unrealism of there not being one or two ancient languages that can be said to be "primary" in that area.

An inexperienced GM is dangerously likely to commit excess, when making such decisions, regardless of whether he makes them consciously and proactively, or (more or less consciously) and reactively (i.e. when a player demands to be given basic information about the setting so that he can create his character), or unconsciosly.

Same with Hidden Lore. DF already has something like half a dozen mandatory Hidden Lore specialties (and a few more in DF5), and therefore already delineates some things. For instance, there is one Hidden Lore to cover all Undead, rather than a single Hidden Lore to cover all supernatural creature, or separate Hidden Lores to cover Liches, Southern Vampires, Northern Vampires and Western Lesbian Vampires.

Dividing too finely, when it comes to languages or mandatory skill specialties, is bad and will hurt some character concepts, even though those character concepts are perfectly legitimate - and inarguably legitimate because they are from Kromm's own hand!

Likewise, not dividing finely enough will also hurt some legitimate character concepts.

The GM has to hit the sweet range (not a spot because it isn't that exact), and avoid extremes. And the best way to do that is to do it before gamestart, and to do it with guidance (i.e. from DF6: The Setting) if you're an inexperienced GM.

And note that an experienced player can't easily compensate for an inexperienced GM. Not out here, in the real world.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Lupo

Simply buy GURPS Banestorm!

It's not for me. I know how to create a medieval European fantasy setting.

It's for inexperienced GMs. So that scholarly characters can be fun to play, the way Kromm intends them to be (since if he didn't intend them to be fun, he wouldn't have put their templates into the PDF).

The reason I suggested pseudo-European is simplicity. Everybody is vaguely familiar with Europe and its history, so that would be a very good place to start, especially with regards to the linguistic emerging from the "fallen empire" situation. Latin (assuming Western Europe) serving both as a scholarly language (ancient documents) and a Lingua Franca among the learned class, with Greek and Arabic being important if you want to be able to read old documents, and about half a dozen lesser scholarly languages that it would be nifty to be able to read if you find books or scrolls as treasure.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by mlangsdorf

Below is the entirety of the world background I'm using for my DF game, which has had 12 experienced (and inexperienced) players game in it to date. No one has complained about the lack of information or needed to know more about ancient languages.

You forgot to explain whether or not languages plays as big a role in the campaign as Kromm intended them to. Also, how many of your players created Scholars? How many created characters with Langauge Talent?

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

I think this is the issue. DF isn't a setting, it's a method or style.

Yes, and one component of that style is that languages are of some importance. That's why they are in some of the templates in DF1. That's why Language Talent is on the list of allowed Advantages.

Part of the style, part of the style which Kromm intends, is for languages to be of non-zero importance. Kromm intends the style to be such that playing a Scholar will be fun. Such that utilizing scholarly skills will be fun and contribute to the party's progress towards their collective goal.


And keep in mind, I'm not making this up. Nor am I reading Kromm's mind. I'm simply pointing to what he wrote: The templates in DF1.

(Notice how the species templates in DF3 don't say anything about aging. That's because Kromm intends Longevity and Extended Lifespan and Early Maturation to have no relevance whatsoever during a DF campaign. If Kromm had intended languages to have no relevance whatsoever, he'd have omitted them from the templates, and removed Langauge Talent from the list of allowed Advantages. But he didn't.)

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Þorkell

Hidden Lore specialties? Give me a good reason why your character should have some.

Too bad DF isn't out in hardcover, so the player, to whom you ask this utterly stupid question, can't beat you repeatedly over the head with the book, after having shown you the various templates in DF1 and DF4, many of which empower players to give their characters several specialties of the Hidden Lore skill.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

Not at all. I'm surprised that you of all people don't see this. Calling for a limiting list of languages, particular cultural backstory, which you did in your first post, makes it specific. Not a lot of detail, which is fine, since settings need room for the GM to customize to taste (even Banestorm, which is pretty darn specific, has lots of room for GMs to play, as it should).

It's not about limiting. It's about me as a player being able to "cover the bases" when I select languages for my Scholar template character. I don't want the GM able to improvise important ancient/scholarly languages during the campaign.

Same goes for Hidden Lore specialties, and so forth.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Gavynn

Nah. There are tons of places to draw from, including, as I pointed out Wikipedia if you are looking for Europe with different names.

What will promot an inexperienced GM to realize that he needs to think about languages before gamestart?

Wikipedia doesn't tell him to. No DF supplment tells him to.

I don't need help as a GM. I'm not an inexperienced GM. I'm just pointing to the fact that inexperienced GMs exist, and that a subset of these will try out DF, and that a subset of this subset will make disastrous decisions, due to the lack of official guidance, if one of their players opts for a Scholar template character and/or a character with the Language Talent Advantage.

[Fish]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

It's not about limiting. It's about me as a player being able to "cover the bases" when I select languages for my Scholar template character. I don't want the GM able to improvise important ancient/scholarly languages during the campaign.

Sounds like limiting to me — limiting the GM.

You want to be able to create a character who already knows everything, for whom there are no surprises, who never grows. Fun for you — but it sucks the mystery right out of everything.

If you're designing characters with an adversarial relationship toward the GM, frankly, I wouldn't want you in my campaign. I'm not out to get you, I'm out to tell a story.

[ericbsmith]

Originally Posted by Fish

If you're designing characters with an adversarial relationship toward the GM...

Peter Knutsen has long described the Player/GM relationship as an adversarial one. He doesn't seem to believe that it can exist any other way, and trying to convince him that it isn't, or shouldn't be, is a waste of time.