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Meat Shield
2009-08-05, 10:42 AM
My home game has some of the best RPing ever on the planet, but a recent intra party conflict has got me thinking about how other players handle general sensibilities.

I play characters that fall all around the moral curve, but they are always from a modern perspective - my characters would be analogous to someone being born and raised with modern parenting and morality teaching but in a medieval world. A friend in my group is trying to play characters that are completely born, raised, and native to the Middle Ages.

Usually this is not an issue - it generally flavors actions rather than defining them. But it recently came to a head because the flavoring took our two characters in dynamically different directions because the areas where differences occur - religion, royalty, mysticism, bloodline, and innocence vs guilt by blood - all sprang up at once in one session. Normally these characters are good, close friends, if definitely an odd couple - grown up together, but now maybe something insurmountable.

How do you and your groups handle RPing medieval vs. modern sensibilities?

Tengu_temp
2009-08-05, 10:54 AM
I've yet to encounter a character with Middle Ages sensibilities who wasn't a travesty. Not to mention that a typical DND world differs greatly from medieval times, and so will the mentality of most of its inhabitants - for starters, such a world is much more egalitarian and tolerant.

mistformsquirrl
2009-08-05, 11:03 AM
This depends enormously on the overall tone of the campaign honestly... you can't try to use a genuine Medieval perspective in a typical D&D campaign, because the game is pretty explicitly designed with a more modern set of values.

In an atypical game - one designed more around a historical mindset - you can bring in a genuine medieval perspective; but doing so is going to require the consent of the entire group; because otherwise someone is going to get pretty annoyed unless it's an evil campaign >.>

So pretty much, unless it's explicitly a campaign dealing with a more historically slanted world; you should probably default to a modern perspective.

Your friend I'm afraid is essentially playing an anomaly >< and makes no sense for the typical D&D settings. Now if the character behaves that way because that's what they genuinely believe is right - that's still doable; though the character will look like an arse to most people. However if he's trying to do it out of a misplaced sense of authenticity... well it's an easy mistake to make, but it is most definitely a mistake I think.

Artanis
2009-08-05, 11:03 AM
Honestly? Play the characters, don't let the characters play you. The two of you don't have to make a big deal out of this stuff if you don't want to. At the very least, there's nothing keeping the characters from agreeing to disagree and moving on with their friendship.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 11:08 AM
"Husband, doth this tunic make my arse look fat."

hamlet
2009-08-05, 11:52 AM
"Husband, doth this tunic make my arse look fat."

No, Wife, the tunic verily has naught to do with it . . .

PairO'Dice Lost
2009-08-05, 11:53 AM
As noted, medieval sensibilities don't really work in D&D. My group all RPs modern morality, so this hasn't come up for me.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 11:55 AM
Medieval sensibilities make for better stories than they do for roleplay, imo.

Altima
2009-08-05, 12:00 PM
By the very nature of D&D, it almost has to be at least semi-modern sensibilities.

After all, in medieval (western Europe), you were expected to work on a fieflord's land, pay your taxes, go to church, pay your tithes, seed children, and die, passing on your ever-growing debt to your children who then grew up to do the same thing.

And by 'you', I mean a male of appropriate age. Women were expected to be quiet, sit down, and shut up. Cook, clean, raise children, and try not to die of depression when plague wipes out ten out of thirteen children.

D&D differs in several ways. For one, the clerics. There's gods, real ones, who have mortal representatives walking around performing, for lack of a better word, miracles. Healing life threatening wounds, curing diseases, and so on. To the point where in some high magic settings like FR, your average (human) commoner has a life expectancy of 80, which is pretty damn good even by modern standards.

Women are just as capable of men. Unless you're one of those people who want to penalize women statistically :P. Anyway, while far less known (apparently the boys don't like hearing about the heroic paladin saving her squishy mage-boy from an army of goblins), there are female adventurers every bit as tough as their male counterparts.

Oh, and there's the fact that there are other races, and cultural contact with them tends to degrade some things.

On the other hand, some things from the medieval ages cross over very well into D&D (mostly because they cross over well to modern times, too). Nobility able to play fast and loose with the law? Check. Areas with the churches replacing government to the point where they can start rebellions? Check. Screw the rules, I have money? Check.

Honestly, if someone wants to play with a medieval mindset, it's a simple matter of having that person's backstory being in an (extremely) isolated hamlet, where men are men, women are brood mares, and the local nobles drill their superiority into your brain at birth.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 12:07 PM
Honestly, if someone wants to play with a medieval mindset, it's a simple matter of having that person's backstory being in an (extremely) isolated hamlet, where men are men, women are brood mares, and the local nobles drill their superiority into your brain at birth.

My look into medieval Europe has generally left me with the impression that people who were quite so backwater with regards to gender relations were more common than they are today, but were never exactly... liked. There were gender roles and gender superiority, but it was supposed to be congenial and to some extent communal. Social change tends to be more the result of evolution - a slow and exacting process - than of revolution, after all.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 12:16 PM
How is that different from now?

That was her point. She was saying some things do, indeed, transcend time.

Pharaoh's Fist
2009-08-05, 12:17 PM
My mistake.

Skorj
2009-08-05, 12:21 PM
"Husband, doth this tunic make my arse look fat."

Hamster was joking of course, but it really annoys me when people trying to roleplay 12-14th century characters think it somehow helps to use 16th century English. Of course, this is mainly a problem in "roleplaying" MMOs and PbP, people tend to realize how silly they sound in face-to-face games. One more reason PnP RPGs rock.

Altima
2009-08-05, 12:22 PM
My look into medieval Europe has generally left me with the impression that people who were quite so backwater with regards to gender relations were more common than they are today, but were never exactly... liked. There were gender roles and gender superiority, but it was supposed to be congenial and to some extent communal. Social change tends to be more the result of evolution - a slow and exacting process - than of revolution, after all.

Well, there's generally two reasons for that. One, men wrote history at the time. Or, at least, everything that wasn't destroyed in book barbeques.

Second is that, while yes, there were codes of conduct, and if you publically abused your wife, or something like that, it was a good way to get lynched or hanged.

However, that doesn't change the fact that women were, more or less, property at the time. There were politeness and such, but it doesn't change the fact that it was forced, there was no other choice, and, in the end, it was still men who were in charge. Whether they were nice about it or not is largely irrelevant in the context of this discussion.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 12:27 PM
Another issue is just what the heck is "Medieval mindset". That's kind of like the "modern mindset". We know what it means, but it does not mean that every person in the modern world has the same attitudes even though they no doubt share, at least in part, the modern mindset.

So for ex, take attitudes towards women and nobility. The general "Medieval mindset" is women are inferior to men and nobles are superior to peasants.

Yet this does not mean you could not have two peasant characters in the village with widely differing attitudes though still sharing the same "Medeival mindset". One peasant adheres strictly to the the mindset and yet is henpecked by his wife and cheats his lord of taxes. The other, loves and respects his wife's opinion, hates nobles and would like nothing better than to beat one up if he could get away with.

Still each is shaped by the "Medieval mindset". The henpecked husbands dreams of an ideal woman who would be the "good wife". And though he acknowledges the priveleges of his lord, he still thinks that he has some entitlement to preserve as much of his labor as he can for himself.

The other, though respectful of his wife, does not necessarily think of women as equals to men, at least not in the "modern" sense. Similarly, although he may have a desire for the over throw of the nobility, it is not a fully "modern" sensibility with full fledged ideas of republican government or class struggle and such.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 12:35 PM
Well, there's generally two reasons for that. One, men wrote history at the time. Or, at least, everything that wasn't destroyed in book barbeques.

Second is that, while yes, there were codes of conduct, and if you publically abused your wife, or something like that, it was a good way to get lynched or hanged.

However, that doesn't change the fact that women were, more or less, property at the time. There were politeness and such, but it doesn't change the fact that it was forced, there was no other choice, and, in the end, it was still men who were in charge. Whether they were nice about it or not is largely irrelevant in the context of this discussion.

I think that when you get down to it, most things are a matter of 'degrees', much as our modern society is still not perfect with regard to how people are viewed. And I'm an optimistic humanist when dealing with societies in abstract; so I tend to prefer to focus on the good in those things than the bad. That need for politeness, congeniality, and I suspect respect for parentage (honor thy father and mother is pretty old) are all major contributing factors to modern views on the issue.

EDIT: Also, Hamster's post above me. Good post.

Mr.Moron
2009-08-05, 12:35 PM
I wouldn't touch RPing "Medieval Sensibilities" with a 10ft 20ft 30ft 40ft 50ft a pole of any length. I might do it for a villain, a "Evil Empire" type of presence but never for anything else. Gross ignorance just leaves a bad taste in mouth.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 12:37 PM
I wouldn't touch RPing "Medieval Sensibilities" with a 10ft 20ft 30ft 40ft 50ft a pole of any length. I might do it for a villain, or sort of "Evil Empire" type of presence but never for anything else. Gross ignorance just leaves a bad taste in mouth.

As I said, I think it makes for better storytelling than it does roleplaying.

While I'd do racial xenophobia ('shyness' or 'unfamiliarity') RP in WoW, I never cared for roleplaying public racism or sexism. I've known people who did, and I know they were very tolerant people OoC, but speaking as a transgender and a multiracial person (black-asian living in a white society), the entire thing makes me uncomfortable.

charl
2009-08-05, 12:52 PM
The role of women varied from place to place. Medieval Europe was a large place, and morals weren't the same everywhere, quite obviously. The Vikings for example only allowed women to be the leaders of a household, symbolically holding all the keys (literally). It was the matriarch's role in each family to act as administrator, taking care of resource management and planning everything. By contrast the men could only expect to do heavy manual labour, become priests or merchants, and travel to exotic places to beat up the local population and steal their stuff... stuff they brought home to the matriarch. The men did control the Tings and courts and inter-family disputes though.

This changed when Christianity came to the North, but it can't have been the only place and time where women ultimately held more power in some regards than men.

Telonius
2009-08-05, 12:53 PM
What part of the Middle Ages are we talking about, and in what place? It would be very different in north Italy c. 600 than in Britain c.1200, which would also be very different from the Holy Roman Empire in 975. Religion might be organized in many different ways, and have various levels of legitimacy, depending on when and where he's basing it from. There might be toleration, or not, depending on the political needs of the time and place. (PM me if you want to discuss any specific info). Politically, the local duke might be descended from famous relatives, or a recently-promoted Knight, or powerful only by virtue of having the biggest army on the block but lacking in "blue-blood" legitimacy (think Visigoths etc). The ruler might employ men of "science," or artists, or think that all of it is a waste of time and concentrate on war.

Basically, there's possibility for a wide range of experience and opinion even within the relatively strict confines of the Middle Ages. True, most people would look at you funny if you ever suggested anything like peasants' rights or voting. But the Middle Ages aren't as much of an RP straitjacket as many people might think.

Kaiyanwang
2009-08-05, 12:55 PM
The role of women varied from place to place. Medieval Europe was a large place, and morals weren't the same everywhere, quite obviously.

This can vary even more than one can think. Is not a medievale age example, but just think about the difference in women role in Sparta and Athens during the Persian Invasion of Greece age.

And they were all greeks, and quite near geographically speaking.

DeathQuaker
2009-08-05, 01:02 PM
Is the campaign a "Middle Ages" campaign? Otherwise...

As others state, D&D doesn't really reflect a medieval society. At all. It's a semi-modern world with magic instead of technology. Because weapons and armor can be magically enhanced, they have not been made obsolete by explosive or ballistic technology, so it has an "old world" appearance to it. But society is quite advanced in some ways. Furthermore it's really its own paradigm; not something that truly mimics one of our own time periods.

If your friend wants to play a Medieval game, he should look at Ars Magica or Chivalry and Sorcery (both fine games; the latter is very crunchy, mind). But while playing D&D, he needs to roleplay the gameworld's sensibilities as laid out by the books and the GM, not by what he personally thinks it should be.

It certainly is possible to create a medieval-like world and play in it using D&D rules, but that isn't the default assumption.

ETA: Roles of women vary widely in medieval times. And there were always exceptions to the rule, even where women's rights were restricted. Rich widows could get very powerful, a la Chaucer's Wife of Bath. Women high up in the church and/or with holy abilities, or claiming holy abilities, could get some leeway (or just plow their way through, like Margery Kempe).

charl
2009-08-05, 01:04 PM
This thread just made me wonder if I could make a gnome crossdresser for my next game and get away with it.

Modern sensibilities and all.

Terraoblivion
2009-08-05, 01:05 PM
Unless everyone agrees to do otherwise, i believe that fundamentally modern attitudes is to be expected as the basis for a game. First and foremost it is much easier to do while preserving a varied and interesting culture, rather than keeping yourself tied to a narrow view of how a medieval farmer or a Roman legionnaire or whatever would obviously think.

Secondly and quite important as well is that most people don't actually know much about medieval attitudes. Altima unintentionally gives some perfect examples of popular misconceptions about the middle ages, that would be slightly more accurate about the dark ages but still mostly inaccurate. Women were not expected to be housewives, indeed that would be considered an enormous waste of resources. Your average farmer simply couldn't afford to not involve his wife in the labor around the farm, he would need all the labor he could get. Similarly it is fairly well-documented that the wives of lords were expected to not only manage the household, but to take part in managing the greater holdings and politics of their husband. As such Eric of Pomerania, the king of Denmark, Sweden and Norway in the early 15th century, left his queen Christina as regent of his vast kingdom while he went on pilgrimage for years.

Similarly study of the European trade network of the middle ages show that the idea that people lived in isolated hamlets is flat-out wrong. By the late 14th century Britain, the Netherlands and parts of France could not supply themselves with grain, instead importing it from the Russian steppes. Similarly throughout the middle ages there were the great horse and cattle fairs west on the western shore of the Elb and substantial evidence exists that people as far away Hungary and Sweden went to these fairs regularly.

I could go on and turn this into a history lesson, but suffice to say that most people don't know enough about material life in the middle ages to accurately portray a medieval mindset. Portraying a proper mindset for a member of a culture far divided in time from your own is hard and i certainly wouldn't presume to know enough about the middle ages to accurately portray a medieval mindset without significant research.

Altima
2009-08-05, 01:09 PM
This can vary even more than one can think. Is not a medievale age example, but just think about the difference in women role in Sparta and Athens during the Persian Invasion of Greece age.

And they were all greeks, and quite near geographically speaking.

Well, when people refer to the medieval ages, it's almost consistantly thought of western Europe after the fall of the (western) roman empire (for the last time). The Age Formerly Known as Dark!

But, really, the dark/medieval/middle/whatever ages were only really bad for western europe. Eastern Europe and Mesopotamia, under the remnants of the Eastern Roman Empire, actually faired pretty well. Up until the point where they got conquered (as they so often do).

Of course, once the Crusades were starting up, things improved vastly for western europe.

Ack, cat in lap, have to cut comment short.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 01:10 PM
This thread just made me wonder if I could make a gnome crossdresser for my next game and get away with it.

Modern sensibilities and all.

My changeling was asexual. Like. Not just devoid of sexual activity, but a sexual identity.

That was fun.

For some reason most of the players decided it was really female.

derfenrirwolv
2009-08-05, 01:14 PM
This thread just made me wonder if I could make a gnome crossdresser for my next game and get away with it.

Its a gnome.. who can tell? The males can be punted just as far as the females...

Terraoblivion
2009-08-05, 01:19 PM
Except that the former Mesopotamia, more properly known as eastern Iraq, was never a part of the Eastern Roman Empire, just like most of Eastern Europe wasn't. Also the middle ages and the Dark Ages are not synonymous, the Dark Ages is a subset of the middle ages specifically relating to the first centuries after the fall of Rome, most notably marked by us knowing much less about them than the high middle ages and late middle ages. However, the period that vaguely medieval stuff usually refers to is roughly from the crusades to around the end of the Hundred Years War, both of which came after the Dark Ages.

However, even the Dark Ages have substantial evidence of trade. The most notable of those features we do know about them is that they were a period of constant migration mixing and displacing the populations of Europe.

charl
2009-08-05, 01:29 PM
Its a gnome.. who can tell? The males can be punted just as far as the females...

Sort of the point, in some campaigns anyway. No one can tell if the dwarf with the mighty beard is a male or female, but all other dwarves will react in horror at the man dressed up as a woman. Gnomes could also count, as could giths, orcs, elves (V, anyone? Though I still hold that V is a hermaphrodite), kobolds, gnolls and many, many other fantasy stock races.

And then there's the races that don't actually have genders, like Mind Flayers or Beholders. Things get even more confusing when you consider shapechangers (Dragons must have a LOT of fun considering the amount of half-dragons and sorcs floating around. As must Celestials and Fiends, and doppelgangers who apparently don't have a gender unless they want to have one at the moment).

DnD settings really should have really liberal attitudes and laws concerning LGBT-ism (is that a word? Non-heterosexual sexualities in any case). Otherwise things get pretty... weird.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 01:35 PM
At the risk of defending the ignorant and sexist...

The maligned Medieval man is getting unfairly put upon here. Yes, we have a right to judge him. And, yes, he was ignorant and sexist. But even the most ignorant Medieval peasant had a multiple of skills with which to eke out his existence, skills which most modern people do not have. Medieval society had it's technology and it's intellectual pursuits.

The question is not whether the "medieval mindset" is good or likeable. You just can't get there from here. You can't act without using your own mindset as a filter or you own view of the external mindset as a filter.

That is, for ex, you could play an ignorant and sexist Medieval peasant if that it your view of the character. However, you can't "be" the character without also working your own modern conceptions about the modern world and the Medieval world. Similarly, you could play an ignorant and sexist modern character.

And you can have fun with the ignorant and sexist character though not everyone will. That seems to be the crux of the OP's problem. Not modern mindset vs Medieval mindset but what one person wants and expects versus what another person wants and expects.

The only way to solve this is to sit down and talk about it...or you could try the Medieval way and just smack each other around until you come to an "understanding".

Altima
2009-08-05, 01:36 PM
snip

Ignorant and sexist aren't the sole providence of the medieval man.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 01:37 PM
DnD settings really should have really liberal attitudes and laws concerning LGBT-ism.
Yeah cause, you know, the Medieval world had no LGBT's...

charl
2009-08-05, 01:43 PM
Yeah cause, you know, the Medieval world had no LGBT's...

Of course it did. It usually led to death upon discovery, at least in Christian Europe. But of course there's always been LGBTs. Doesn't mean it was tolerated or accepted, however.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 01:51 PM
Of course it did. It usually led to death upon discovery, at least in Christian Europe. But of course there's always been LGBTs. Doesn't mean it was tolerated or accepted, however.

Yes and no. Edward the II was "tolerated"...to some extent. Of course, he was the Prince and King.

Dixieboy
2009-08-05, 01:53 PM
Of course it did. It usually led to death upon discovery, at least in Christian Europe. But of course there's always been LGBTs. Doesn't mean it was tolerated or accepted, however.
*buzzer*
Wrong

Depends on what period of medieval time and what area.

Europe is not one culture, and it has never been so, and what is "accepted" changes from generation to generation anyway.

hamishspence
2009-08-05, 02:03 PM
The maligned Medieval man is getting unfairly put upon here. Yes, we have a right to judge him. And, yes, he was ignorant and sexist. But even the most ignorant Medieval peasant had a multiple of skills with which to eke out his existence, skills which most modern people do not have. Medieval society had it's technology and it's intellectual pursuits.


While a little later than Medieval, George MacDonald Fraser's The Pyrates had some interesting things to say about Charles II England:

That was England, then long before interfering social historians and such carles had spoiled it by discovering that its sanitation was primitive and its social-services non-existent, that London's atmosphere was so poisonous as to be unbreathable by all but the strongest lungs, that King Charles and his courtiers probably didn't change their underwear above once a fortnight, that the cities stank fit to wake the dead and the countryside was either wilderness or rural slum, that bigotry, dental decay, political corruption, fleas, cruelty, poverty, disease, injustice, public hangings, malnutrition, and bear-baiting were rife, and there was hardly an economist or environmentalist or town planner or sociologist or anything progressive worth a damn. (There wasn't even a London School of Economics, which is quite remarkable when you consider Locke and Hobbes were about the place.)

Happily, the stout justices and wenches and gallants and peasants and fine ladies - and even elegant Charles himself, who was nobody's fool - never realized how backward and insanitary and generally awful they might look to the cold and all-too-selective eye of modern research, and if they had, it is doubtful that they would have felt any pang of guilt or shame, happy conscienceless rabble that they were. Indeed, his majesty would most likely have raised a politely sceptical eyebrow, the justices scowled resentfully, and the wenches, gallants, and peasants, being vulgar, gone into hoots of derisive mirth.

Hindsight is always tricky.

charl
2009-08-05, 02:03 PM
*buzzer*
Wrong

Depends on what period of medieval time and what area.

Europe is not one culture, and it has never been so, and what is "accepted" changes from generation to generation anyway.

I dare you to find a source that mentions a Christian culture between let's say 1250 and 1500 ("The Middle Ages") anywhere in Europe where homosexuality was generally tolerated and accepted.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 02:05 PM
I dare you to not for fear of squiggly bracket red text.

charl
2009-08-05, 02:07 PM
I dare you to not for fear of squiggly bracket red text.

Why would the moderators stop that discussion? It's not about politics or religion, not directly anyway. It's about finding an historical source for a claim.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 02:10 PM
that King Charles and his courtiers probably didn't change their underwear above once a fortnight
I'm telling you that's a skill in and of itself!

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 02:12 PM
Why would the moderators stop that discussion? It's not about politics or religion, not directly anyway. It's about finding an historical source for a claim.

It's on the slippery slope. But if you keep it to "Medieval", then it's less slippery...kind of like when you wear the same underwear for a fortnight.

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 02:12 PM
You just won the 'squick' award for today.

-sidles away very slowly. then not-so-slowly.-

Dixieboy
2009-08-05, 02:13 PM
I dare you to find a source that mentions a Christian culture between let's say 1250 and 1500 ("The Middle Ages") anywhere in Europe where homosexuality was generally tolerated and accepted.
Firstly off:
Do i get a prize?

Secondly:
When one says "The middle ages" one usually means from the fall of the roman empire (5th century) to the early modern age (16th century).

But okay
The ottoman empire. (And if you say "They weren't Christian" I will slap you through the internet, because i can do that)

The culture might not have been Christian, but a large chunks of the inhabitants where Christians.
You limited the era, i had to get creative.

hamishspence
2009-08-05, 02:14 PM
was quoting from the book.

in general though, there is such a thing as being too condescending toward the cultures of the past.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 02:14 PM
in general though, there is such a thing as being too condescending toward the cultures of the past.
Agreed....

charl
2009-08-05, 02:17 PM
Firstly off:
Do i get a prize?

Secondly:
When one says "The middle ages" one usually means from the fall of the roman empire (5th century) to the early modern age (16th century).

But okay
The ottoman empire. (And if you say "They weren't Christian" I will slap you through the internet, because i can do that)

1) Not really, no. Such is the nature of debate.

2) The way I learned it the Dark Ages range from the fall of the Wester Roman Empire to around the mid-13th century or so when the Middle Age or the Medieval Age begins, and ends at the renaissance in Italy in the mid 16th-century.

3) I asked for a source, not another claim. And to my knowledge they were mostly with a huge majority not Christian, but I don't dispute that the Ottomans had Christian subjects in their empire.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 02:29 PM
The way I learned it the Dark Ages range from the fall of the Wester Roman Empire to around the mid-13th century or so when the Middle Age or the Medieval Age begins, and ends at the renaissance in Italy in the mid 16th-century.

Dark ages? Dark as compared to what the "light" or Roman civilization? And Middle Ages? In the middle what the greatness of the ancients and the new found wealth and power of the Rennaissance, the "new birth"? These are just words put down by The Man to put down...er The Man.

I'm being tongue in cheek here. The Dark Ages were indeed dark and I'm sure no one from that time would have disputed that life pretty much sucked for everyone. But even Dark Age Europe was not monolithic or static. By your own count, you are taking about 600 years on a relatively large land mass and population with myriads of cultures coming and going.

And you will find that in that tangles and rotting mass of history, yes, a lot of things happened. So although you can paint it with a broad, black brush, you will often be surprised as to what actually happened along the way...

Dixieboy
2009-08-05, 02:29 PM
1) Not really, no. Such is the nature of debate.

2) The way I learned it the Dark Ages range from the fall of the Wester Roman Empire to around the mid-13th century or so when the Middle Age or the Medieval Age begins, and ends at the renaissance in Italy in the mid 16th-century.

3) I asked for a source, not another claim. And to my knowledge they were mostly with a huge majority not Christian, but I don't dispute that the Ottomans had Christian subjects in their empire.
2: I'm afraid that is not so, the dark ages also counts as the middle ages. :smalltongue:

3: A source you say, well, let's take a look at this here thing. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kocek)
You halved the era I could use, which upped the difficulty a bit.

(Sorry for using wiki as my only source, didn't really care to find more)

AstralFire
2009-08-05, 02:33 PM
Doesn't the term Dark Ages arise from the lack of information on the era, and didn't it actually result in many technological innovations?

hamishspence
2009-08-05, 02:36 PM
The Dark Ages were indeed dark and I'm sure no one from that time would have disputed that life pretty much sucked for everyone.

Don't know about that. I've seen books saying that was a great deal of interesting things, not all negative, happening in the Dark Ages.

The "everything went down the tubes after the Romans left" theory is not the only one. Some suggest the "barbarians" were more enlightened in many ways than their predecessors.

charl
2009-08-05, 02:38 PM
2: I'm afraid that is not so, the dark ages also counts as the middle ages. :smalltongue:

3: A source you say, well, let's take a look at this here thing. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kocek)
You halved the era I could use, which upped the difficulty a bit.

(Sorry for using wiki as my only source, didn't really care to find more)

Well, that has to count. LGBTs weren't loathed everywhere at all times (which I don't think I said in the first place, but whatever).

hamishspence
2009-08-05, 02:40 PM
for the "Not so Dark" Ages, Terry Jones's Barbarians, and Terry Jones's Medieval Lives, were interesting documentaries on the subject.

Dixieboy
2009-08-05, 02:40 PM
Well, that has to count. LGBTs weren't loathed everywhere at all times (which I don't think I said in the first place, but whatever).

No, you said in christian Europe, in the middle ages.

The ottoman empire conquered a good bit of christian Europe, in the middle ages.

Homosexuality, and transgenderism (Is that a word?) seemed to be accepted there.

If you would let me use the entirety of the middle ages i could give you atleast two more examples. :smallsmile:

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 03:27 PM
Doesn't the term Dark Ages arise from the lack of information on the era, and didn't it actually result in many technological innovations?

I think it arose cause parts of it were really bleak and it might have actually been used during those times. You can hardly blame someone for thinking the world is indeed about to end after enduring famine, plague and barbarian invasions all within a few years of each other.

But over the entire period, there was tremendous change in thought, culture and technology. Indeed, Middle Age Europe had a many home-grown technological improvements. Not everything was copied or adapted from the outside.


Don't know about that. I've seen books saying that was a great deal of interesting things, not all negative, happening in the Dark Ages.

The "everything went down the tubes after the Romans left" theory is not the only one. Some suggest the "barbarians" were more enlightened in many ways than their predecessors.

I don't think were saying different things. I have been pointing out that Dark Age and Middle Age Europe actually encompasses quite a long historical period and a large landmass and population and that a lot of things happened. Talking about a the Middle Ages as though it were monolithic and static is not good for a historical understanding. And, although, from our vantage point there is much that can and should be criticized, one can go too far and be unfair to the people who lived in those times.

Talking about a the Middle Ages as though it were monolithic and static is not necessarily bad for a game. A game is after all an imitation of life not life itself. So in a game, we represent some aspects of a pseudo-historical society, not all. In fact, we change those aspects that we want to change. There were no dragons but if we want the game world to have dragons, then there be dragons.

Similarly, one might want a more or less "realistic" mindset in a game and for the characters to act more or less like one supposes Medieval characters would act in the game world. This is not bad in and of itself. Of course, not everyone wants this.

The OP's problem was that one player expected one thing from the game experience and another expected something completely different.

Shademan
2009-08-05, 03:35 PM
well the vikingsscandinavians didnt mind much.
until christianity arrived.

Susano-wo
2009-08-05, 03:39 PM
I htink its very important to define play assumptions before or while characters are created. Though I would stress that it is everyone's reponsibility.
First off, though D&D [3.5 at least--havn't looked too much at the alignments, etc section in the 4E PHB] assumes a more modern mindset, it doesn't do a whole lot of specifying of such, and certainly not in the character creation section. You kind of have to pick it up, most specifically, what things are considered good and evil, and the lack of mentioning of gender roles, etc., so you can't expect everyone to have a clear idea on what the moral standards are [pop quiz: ok to kill eeevil creatures just because they are eeevil? Y/N?]
Secondly, if I create Knightly McLawfulJackass, and expect for him to be supported within society (though of course not necessarily liked--just that society will be nominally compatible with his ideas), but society doesn't work in such a way, then both the GM and the player have messed up, because neither of us figured out if a character would work before introducing him. It pretty much the same as designing a character who is, say, a Ranger Pirate wtih a shark companion and all his feats, etc geared toward being on a ship, and the GM planning a landlocked desert campaign. Somewhere along the line, both of them should have talked with the other before play started.
As a side note, I would like to thank the three posters [or four, or however many of you there were ^ ^]who have lent their expertise on historical Europe, etc. The clarifications and education (I consider myself not a historical dumbass, but I could hardly give the details the three of you did) wre much appreciated.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 03:39 PM
well the vikingsscandinavians didnt mind much.
until christianity arrived.

Er...assuming you mean LGBT...and your point is debatable...a debate that might call the Mods to settle this...much like a lord might settle a "debate" between to serfs wrestling in the mire...

Deepblue706
2009-08-05, 03:42 PM
Despite D&D worlds seldom modelling the Middle Ages specifically, I very much dislike seeing an abundance of things would still seem anarchonistic in worlds where I tend to have things run by Feudal Lords, and where Religion and Festivals are the only things the common folk really have. There, "Might Makes Right" would be seen very often, as would slavery and poor social development. There would be witch hunts, hangings, get-thrown-into-the-dungeon-and-tortured-stuff, feed-them-to-the-dragon-stuff...you get the picture.

While I don't mind PCs having uncommon philosophies and being a bit "ahead" of the curve, I tend to throw books at people who are confused by the fact that nobody knows what the principles of Kantism are when I've established we're playing in a world that is akin to the european High Medieval period.

Dixieboy
2009-08-05, 03:44 PM
well the vikingsscandinavians didnt mind much.
until christianity arrived.

Well if you mean the stereotypical "I R VIKING! HAIL THOR! RAWR!" VikingScandinavian, then that is debatable.

The vanir practiced homosexuality, the other Aesir certainly did not. (Odin wasn't above joking a bit about it though, if i remember correctly)

The goddess of love was a Vanir.

HamsterOfTheGod
2009-08-05, 03:48 PM
Well if you mean the stereotypical "I R VIKING! HAIL THOR! RAWR!" VikingScandinavian, then that is debatable.

The vanir practiced homosexuality, the other Aesir certainly did not. (Odin wasn't above joking a bit about it though, if i remember correctly)

The goddess of love was a Vanir.

More to the point, the historical debate about X cannot happen outside of a wider debate about what X is and what X is not. And there have been at least couple of X's mentioned in this thread alread that are in the set of Things-Which-Should-Not-Be-Talked-About-In-The-GiantITP-Forums.

Dixieboy
2009-08-05, 03:54 PM
More to the point, the historical debate about X cannot happen outside of a wider debate about what X is and what X is not. And there have been at least couple of X's mentioned in this thread alread that are in the set of Things-Which-Should-Not-Be-Talked-About-In-The-GiantITP-Forums.

I keep forgetting that you can't discuss real world stuff on this forum.

I hope the mods forgive me. :smallfrown:

SirKazum
2009-08-05, 07:57 PM
There's a book I love, a collection of medieval tales by Swiss author Herman Hesse (don't remember the exact name, but it can't be hard to find given that description) that's very enlightening on the medieval mindset. One thing that really stands out is how deeply seriously (and literally) those guys took religion, as well as some things we'd call "superstition" today (e.g. hexes, fairies, bad-luck taboos etc.). One extreme point is a story about a guy who suddenly shows up out of the blue and claims to be an angel (I noticed no hard evidence was given for that, which is intriguing, since those stories tend to have lots of supernatural stuff), and goes about doing several "extremist" things, the worst of which is killing a guy's firstborn son (the father being the same guy who gladly gave lodging to the 'angel' and his buddy) because that father cared so much about the kid that he started going to church less.

But it's also interesting to see how some misconceptions may miss the mark by far - namely, the idea that everyone in the Middle Ages (and, well, anytime before 1960) was extremely hung-up and prudish about sexuality. That couldn't be further from the truth. Sure, female virginity was seen as a bonus (though not necessarily the be-all-end-all), premarital sex was frowned upon by the church (but... well, you know teenagers), and cheating on your spouse was generally seen as bad, much like today, but also widely done (much like today). LGBT is probably where the attitude (in most places and ages in Christian medieval Europe) was really different from today, and even then, not as much when you realize that the difference is mostly that prejudice today got outlawed, not erased.

And the whole "chivalric honor" thing? Feh. People (especially people with power) were every bit as rotten then as today, and knights were no better at all. Go read the story of Meier Helmbrecht - him and his knight buddies made modern gangsters look like Boy Scouts. And they were quite overt about their rampant crime too. (BTW, Helmbrecht was a peasant who became a knight, so even the rigid social order wasn't quite as absolute or without exceptions.)

Terraoblivion
2009-08-05, 09:33 PM
To further elaborate on Sir Kazum's excellent points about the middle ages i would like to point out that medieval court records indicate that actual executions for homosexuality, or sodomy as they called it, was a practice that didn't start until the renaissance. Sure the church railed against it calling it the depth of depravity and talked fire and brimstone about God's punishment, but people were not actually executed for it in the middle ages.

Similarly one of the most iconic features of the middle ages didn't actually happen in that period. The witch hunts are pretty much exclusively a phenomenon of the second half of the 16th century and the first half of the 17th. While belief in witches did exist before, it didn't spill over into widespread panic and persecution the way it did in the confusing years following the reformation. It was also mostly a protestant thing, with the greatest witch hunts taking place in places like Prussia and Sweden.

Finally there is the whole question about feudalism. While i don't have the space or the expertise to do a full investigation in the topic, it is a much more complex field than it is generally portrayed as. One thing that is fairly general, however, is that the traditional portrayal of it as being serfs toiling away at the behest of feudal lords does not predominantly apply to the middle ages. While this model is loose enough to accommodate a variety of different systems of social organization, it gets the closest to is the social organization of Europe east of the Elb following the thirty years war. Which of course is to say well beyond the middle ages and past the renaissance as well.

Further the typical idea of medieval feudalism ignores the way serfdom was one of the most controversial issue of medieval politics. Throughout the centuries of the middle ages the lords and the various knights, other, earlier warrior elites, subordinate lords and the church struggled over whether the peasants should be kept independent, and paying taxes to the lord, or they should be inducted as serfs and not pay taxes, but instead perform a variety of services for the one they were inducted as serfs for. However, just what these services were differed greatly. At varying times and places throughout the middle ages it was everything from labor to produce to cash, with the latter being more common in richer areas and later periods.

Finally the very classes of the middle ages were far from as rigid as they are commonly portrayed. First and foremost they were not universal to Western Europe. Scandinavia didn't have subordinate feudal landholders beneath the kings, merely knights who owned land as property rather than as fiefs, whereas France and Britain, in periods, had the great elaborate hierarchies commonly connected with feudalism. One telling example of how unclear the classes were is Kosseleck's famous study of Franconia in the late 15th century where he studied the development of the concept of the nobility, as a common term for knights and lords. The numerous examples of people who went from being poor knights to rich peasants depending on the economic conditions at the time and whether they could afford a horse and armor, further indicate the looseness of medieval classes. And hopefully the existence of the cities as independent institutions where people could go to make their fortune, but also that they could leave to return to farming if that served their purposes, should indicate the degree of messiness inherent in medieval classes. And this is even talking about the late middle ages where the tendency was towards greater distinctions and clearer designations, a tendency that grew over the renaissance to crystallize into the estates following the thirty years war.

Yahzi
2009-08-05, 11:00 PM
While I don't mind PCs having uncommon philosophies and being a bit "ahead" of the curve, I tend to throw books at people who are confused by the fact that nobody knows what the principles of Kantism are when I've established we're playing in a world that is akin to the european High Medieval period.
One of my players is trying to spark a capitalistic-socialist revolution. I keep telling him the peasants like bowing and scrapping to royalty, because when the monsters show up, they can hide while the royalty does the fighting. :smallbiggrin:

magellan
2009-08-06, 06:13 AM
I think it's safe to say that what most people think is a "medivial mindset" is actually a more or less highly distorted collection of facts & fiction, and while the ratio of fact to fiction and distortion might be influenced by what the topic of your masters thesis was, even your professor, going back in time to have a chat with medivial person would at some point run into medivial person saying "What? I never said that!"

MickJay
2009-08-06, 07:49 AM
Law and penalties for crimes were, in general, quite different. There was no police, so local authorities had to deal with criminals on their own. There were no prisons (dungeons and such were few and far between, and almost never held "normal" criminals for long) and people were locked up in makeshift cells only until the trial - the verdict, whether for theft, assault, murder or rape, was often a fine (amount depended on the victim's position in society), unless a lower class person assaulted someone of higher standing; other penalties (mutilation, execution, banishment) would often apply only if the criminal was unable to pay the (often quite high) fine. Different laws applied to different social groups, peasant wounding a free townsman would be executed, another townsman would pay a fine, while a nobleman would either pay a smaller fine, or could just ignore the ruling of the local court. In some cases, victim of a rape would be entitled to a much higher compensation than if, e.g., her father was killed. In some of the traditional systems the court procedure would look different, too: for example, only one side would get to present the evidence, and the judges would make decision based on that. Should, for example, a drunk man drown in a pond, the pond's owner could be prosecuted for causing the death. Finally, the court's verdict had often to be executed by the prosecuting party.

hewhosaysfish
2009-08-06, 08:37 AM
I hestitate to open this can of forum worms but....

Alignment.

Could this be part of the reason why people dress their DnD settings up with (what the consider to be) medieval politics and architeture and weaponry and clothing and warfare and religious practice (e.g. all Clerics must be celibate because they're priests), etc, etc, etc. but they balk at the idea of reproducing (what they consider to be) the matching social and ethical beliefs?

The game includes the assumption of an objective and testable system of morality and players (including GMs) will inevitably try to interpret that system in a way that lines up with their own RL beliefs about morality.

If they want to play in a setting that uses the "Middle Ages mind-set" then they have to label the opinions of that mind-set according to DnD's alignment system.
And while the Middles Ages may not necessarily have been the endless cavalcade of witch-burnings, wife-beating and plague that pop-culture makes it out to be, there will still be elements there which the players are distinctly uncomfortable about labelling as "Good" (or possibly, as anything other than "Evil").

But if they do label it as "Evil" then that results in a change in the style and tone of the game, away from the whole "good and peaceful kingdom saved by heroic adventurers from threat evil empire/barbarian hordes/demonic cult" vibe to a much more morally grey situation.

That could be what you want, of course. Exploring those sort themes could be precisely you cup of culturally-significant-beverage and you might want to introduce some historically-inspired morality precisely to instigate that.
But if you want to play a Big Damn Hero saving the kingdom from a Horrible Monster then introducing a touch of the "Middle Ages mind-set" to the setting in the hope of adding authenticity could ruin the game as you find yourself playing a character you don't sympathise with, risking his life to save a bunch of bigoted peasants that, frankly, you'd be happy to see eaten by the dragon.

Kaiyanwang
2009-08-06, 08:48 AM
Can I add one simple thing?

Other races + other planes. The centrisms typical of middle age, seeing these things, disappears or is at least very weakened.

We can say that most setting has at best the same technology, barring magic, and some of the "style". Fullstop.

hamishspence
2009-08-06, 12:22 PM
BoED made it clear that D&D alignment morality and medieval morality differ by quite a way- and D&D one takes precedence.

If you're going with "Roughly 1/3 of the world human population are Evil" as per "Humans tend toward no alignment, not even Neutral" in PHB, this high proportion makes sense in a semi-medieval world.