Worldbuilding, melanin and appropriation

[Quixotic1]

So I've got a new setting I'm working on.
There will be five sentient species players can choose from at character creation. Each species will have some common physical characteristics and behaviors.
There will be three primary geographical areas their characters can be from --the north (frigid), the south (tropical) and the temperate zone in the middle. Things like level of technology, clothing and cultural practices are largely dictated by the geographical area a person lives in.
Members of all five species can be found in all three geographical areas.

I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).

I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.

I really want to avoid saying anything like, "skin color doesn't matter" or "this species = this real-world culture" or anything insensitive like that.
Anyone know of any resources I could access, like a sensitivity reader/editor or something of that nature, or any good articles on the subject?

[KorvinStarmast]

I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.
1. Your friends are wise.
2. The sun need not work that way in a fantasy world. Or it might. But it doesn't have to.

Beyond that, I suggest that rather than wasting time talking about this on an internet forum, you engage with your friends/players and discuss with them what appeals to them, and what does not appeal to them, about the themes that you are emphasizing. They are who you will be playing with, not the strangers from the internet. And you are wise to solicit their input (which you have already done). Good idea.

[Quertus]

So I've got a new setting I'm working on.
There will be five sentient species players can choose from at character creation. Each species will have some common physical characteristics and behaviors.
There will be three primary geographical areas their characters can be from --the north (frigid), the south (tropical) and the temperate zone in the middle. Things like level of technology, clothing and cultural practices are largely dictated by the geographical area a person lives in.
Members of all five species can be found in all three geographical areas.

I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).

I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.

I really want to avoid saying anything like, "skin color doesn't matter" or "this species = this real-world culture" or anything insensitive like that.
Anyone know of any resources I could access, like a sensitivity reader/editor or something of that nature, or any good articles on the subject?

Aw, come on - at least make the inhabited land mass such that the south is cold and the north is hot! :smallwink:

Unless your world is supposed to secretly actually be earth (and the play area in the norther hemisphere thereof), and thus that detail isn't on the table to be changed.

But, if it is secretly Earth, I think you've answered your own question regarding how chromitization works.

OTOH, if it's not Earth... Drow kept their dark skin despite moving underground, so you've got some freedom to make your own rules about how things work.

Really (unless you're trying to publish this), I agree that your target audience is your players. And I, personally, would care less about which answer they gave, as I would their reasons for giving that particular answer.

Of course, I'd throw out all the players who gave dumb reasons, and those who cannot work with anyone from the opposite camp. If you have anyone left at that point, build a game for them, that takes all of their "why" responses into account.

[Quixotic1]

The sun need not work that way in a fantasy world. Or it might. But it doesn't have to...I suggest that rather than wasting time talking about this on an internet forum, you engage with your friends/players...They are who you will be playing with, not the strangers from the internet.I am a GM-for-hire, so actually, the people I will be playing with are indeed "strangers from the internet".

I def get what you're saying about the sun and all that, but I don't like to make changes just for the sake of making changes. This setting will be like the real world in most ways.
I don't plan on discussing racial issues or anything like that with this game; if I go with this idea, it'll be a single sentence in the bit about the different regions, and then I'll move on to other things. I hope that, by sort of making any combination of human race/ethnicity and playable species possible, I'll be able to avoid issues of apparent racial coding (where a species that's aggressive or violent seems to be a stand-in for a real-world race or culture, or what have you).

[Mastikator]

Slight nitpicking but melanin correlates with closeness to the equator. If you put the continent on the southern hemisphere you'd find darker skin in the north. You could even stretch the continent from the north pole to the south pole, such that it goes from pale to dark to pale again.

[False God]

I think generally, that if you avoid making negative associations simply on the basis of skin-color, you're not going to have a problem. You can also head things off by throwing in exceptions, groups of people who don't fit the pattern, and of course fantasy races don't have to follow the normal rules either.

In my setting for example, elves tan in reverse, more sun exposure makes their skin lighter.

I would generally avoid connecting fantasy cultures with real world cultures, unless you're running some kind of explicit alt-earth.(I run this a lot)

And no, there's no reason your world needs to follow our world, and it will depend on the expectations you set for your players.

[Quertus]

This setting will be like the real world in most ways.

Why not make... racial modifiers? So "Arctic", "Desert", "Dessert" (for races that are sweet), "Plains", "Forest", "Swamp", "Aquatic", etc.

Among numerous other minor bonuses and penalties, there can be some coloration differences. For example, for most races, "Arctic" would involve some color differences (most races get lighter, to blend into the snow (+2 Hide bonus in arctic terrain); Arctic elves are grey or silver or something) alongside their bonuses to resist cold (and, for most races, penalties to resist heat).

And these modifiers need not be modal - one could be an Arctic Forest Gnome, for example, who takes on all the traits of their race and each modifier.

Best of all, a Dessert Mountain Dwarf can be known as a "sweet child of mine". :smallbiggrin:

(I'll see myself out.)

EDIT: One need not take the modifier simply for living in an area - one could be a Swamp Elf (or just a plain Elf) living in a Forest, for example. The racial modifiers are based on your bloodline (thus the benefits being based on biology, not training), and happen to give benefits to those living in a complimentary area, such that an Arctic Dwarf living in an equatorial desert would, all things being equal, struggle much more than a Equatorial Desert Human, even at things Dwarves are normally better suited for than Humans are.

[Quixotic1]

Slight nitpicking but melanin correlates with closeness to the equator.Not a nitpick at all. The setting will have an arctic region in the north, a tropical one in the south near the world's equator and a temperate climate between them.

[Quixotic1]

I think generally, that if you avoid making negative associations simply on the basis of skin-color, you're not going to have a problem...I would generally avoid connecting fantasy cultures with real world cultures, unless you're running some kind of explicit alt-earth. I think the second point shows that the first isn't really true. It's very easy to be offensive or wrong, even damaging, without blatantly saying "skin color like this is bad".
Portraying any real-world culture that isn't my own, regardless of what kind of a setting it's in, just feels like a doomed endeavor. Cultures are complex and subtle things. It's almost guaranteed that I'll leave something out or misrepresent something. And that's where things get problematic for me. More and more it feels like the best bet I have is to avoid any 1-to-1 representations of real-world peoples.

[Quixotic1]

Why not make... racial modifiers? ...Among numerous other minor bonuses and penalties, there can be some coloration differences...One need not take the modifier simply for living in an area - one could be a Swamp Elf (or just a plain Elf) living in a Forest, for example. The racial modifiers are based on your bloodline (thus the benefits being based on biology, not training)... Yeah that feels like a pretty common trope in D&D.
And while I'll be handling tlany mechanical traits related to a PC's species a lot differently than that, I think it's implied that individiuals of a species that hail from the arctic regions are. Well. Arctic examples of that species. The ones who's ancestors are from there, anyway; of course there will be examples of individuals who moved to an area, etc.

[False God]

I think the second point shows that the first isn't really true. It's very easy to be offensive or wrong, even damaging, without blatantly saying "skin color like this is bad".
Portraying any real-world culture that isn't my own, regardless of what kind of a setting it's in, just feels like a doomed endeavor. Cultures are complex and subtle things. It's almost guaranteed that I'll leave something out or misrepresent something. And that's where things get problematic for me. More and more it feels like the best bet I have is to avoid any 1-to-1 representations of real-world peoples.

That's certainly your decision, but personally I think this is a cop-out. Yes, it requires a lot of work to present a fair presentation of another culture and then add fantastical elements without screwing it up, but it is far from impossible. And yes, you probably will make mistakes, and that is okay, you just have to be capable of learning and adapting.

[Anymage]

I wonder how many people here have seen NPCs referred to simply as "innkeeper" or "bandit" without any physical description whatsoever. Players will picture whatever they like and more detail is often unnecessary. Representation is relevant when commissioning art for books, less so at the actual table.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Personal opinion, and this is pure taste:

If, in a fictional world that isn't Earth, you have a culture that is a dead ringer for a real world culture, especially a modern one, you better have a darn good reason why it should be like that. Not for offensiveness, but for consistency.

Cultures are very path dependent. And in a world with a very different path, it's a huge coincidence that it ends up just like a modern real world one. I mean, some similarities are given, assuming close enough environment. Two tropical jungle civilizations at about the same tech level will share some similarities in agriculture, architecture, and clothing (assuming similar natural resources). But not near-identity in things like naming conventions, government, attitudes toward certain behaviors, and customs.

Skin color? Meh. Don't care one bit. Especially if the world has things like gods or magic directly creating/altering groups of people.

[icefractal]

That's certainly your decision, but personally I think this is a cop-out. Yes, it requires a lot of work to present a fair presentation of another culture and then add fantastical elements without screwing it up, but it is far from impossible. And yes, you probably will make mistakes, and that is okay, you just have to be capable of learning and adapting.Eh, I would call it "realistic" rather than a cop-out if you're making something you plan to publish, rather than just for your home group (and I'd say professional GMing is closer to the former).

Based on reactions to published material, people get this wrong a lot more often than they do right, and these are not seen as harmless mistakes, but rather significant sources of harm. There's no "learning and adapting" your way out of the huge reputation-hole you can end up in with a bad portrayal, even aside from that harm.

So IMO, either be prepared to do a lot of research and get some co-authors (or consultants, at least) from the cultures in question, or stay far away from any RL cultures / groups.

[False God]

Eh, I would call it "realistic" rather than a cop-out if you're making something you plan to publish, rather than just for your home group (and I'd say professional GMing is closer to the former).

Based on reactions to published material, people get this wrong a lot more often than they do right, and these are not seen as harmless mistakes, but rather significant sources of harm. There's no "learning and adapting" your way out of the huge reputation-hole you can end up in with a bad portrayal, even aside from that harm.

So IMO, either be prepared to do a lot of research and get some co-authors (or consultants, at least) from the cultures in question, or stay far away from any RL cultures / groups.

The problem is, even "completely original" fantasy cultures are going to be drawing on real life because ya know, we're humans, and there are just as many examples of "totally made up" fantasy cultures that are perceived as highly offensive in the same manner.

For published materials I absolutely would advise getting it reviewed by others. Heck, I'd suggest playtesting it with people from the socio-cultural groups you're working with.

Even then, you'll find disagreement on how to best represent their culture, that can't be helped, but it certainly isn't an excuse not to make an effort to do whatever representation you go with well. Even if you make a "completely original" culture, that's also not an excuse to make sure said culture doesn't come off as offensive.

[Vahnavoi]

Having varied pigmentation of game characters due to geographical reason is entirely unremarkable and has nothing to do with cultural appropriation on its own. Also, all major works of genre fantasy are based on cultural appropriation from the get-go, unless people complaining about it can actually show your specific work as causing harm, they are simply being negative nellies. And in order for that determination to be made, you have to first put your specific work out there.

I say this as a convention game master whose backdrop setting involves a close look at the human evolutionary tree, and the handouts I give to my players line out the non-scientific BS mythological just-so story that is how the people in that setting think varied skin colors came about.

Exactly 0 people of over a hundred players across nine years have complained. Also, if I forget to tell what color the people in my setting are, invariably some player will ask about. It's easily one of the most common setting questions asked, right there with "so which real life culture does this place most resemble, roughly?", "so what technological era are we in?" and "what kinds of names would be culturally appropriate for this setting?". These things get asked, because without them, it's hard to imagine the world with enough detail to interact it. People who think they can escape taking inspiration from and comparison to the real world are wrong.

[Mechalich]

One thing about melanin content is that while it varies due to latitude it also varies due to amount of time spent in the sun, often to the point of swamping latitudinal variations across a wide zone when considering agrarian cultures wherein most people spent the majority of their time outside and exposed. So, if you're working purely on melanin content as opposed to facial structure variation or hair structure or some of the other characters that represent visible ethnic variation in Homo sapiens, how pale/dark people are is more an indicator of socioeconomic status than anything else.

[gatorized]

It's your world and you should create it in whatever way you prefer. The only opinions you should care about, if any, are those of your players.

[paladinofshojo]

If you want to go down this route I suggest doing the opposite of ignoring cultural and racial differences… and make sure that the prejudices of each group are highlighted.

For example, in A Song of Ice and Fire, those who live beyond the Wall call themselves “the Free Folk” those who live South of the Wall are subjects of the Seven Kingdoms…. These two groups don’t refer to each other by these names, instead the Free Folk are referred to as “Wildlings” and in turn they refer to the Northmen as “Kneelers”…. This alone speaks VOLUMES on how they view each other and the differences in culture to the point that they are almost incompatible with one another.

I’d also not limit yourself to modern interpretation on race/ethnicity…. A good way to do so would be to look at how ancient civilizations categorized people, look at Roman and Greek sources, since they had VERY outlandish ways to “prove” their superiority and would categorize the “barbarians” that lived beyond “civilization”.

[Millstone85]

Members of all five species can be found in all three geographical areas.

I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).
Drow kept their dark skin despite moving underground, so you've got some freedom to make your own rules about how things work.These days, I envision drow as being every shade of grey, from charcoal black to bone white, due to variations in some unspecified aspect of the underdark.

Surface elves, on the other hand, could be on a similar brown-pink spectrum as humans depending on current and past insolation.

With maybe a touch of purple on the drow and some blue and green on surface elves.

[Slipjig]

If you are planning on doing this for money with strangers, I'd just say something like "all skin tones found on Earth humans are available". While I would expect players to be fine with "skin tone generally corresponds to latitude", it's just not worth the risk of getting review-bombed the first time you get somebody who doesn't like that. Wizards is de-emphasizing Drow and Half-Elves for a reason.

You mentioned technology as varying by regions, I think that could actually be a touchy subject as well, ESPECIALLY if the darker skinned people from the tropics are less advanced than their northern counterparts.

My thoughts would be different if you were doing this at home with people you know. But if you are doing it for money with strangers, I just wouldn't touch the subject.

[Quixotic1]

...I'd just say something like "all skin tones found on Earth humans are available"...You mentioned technology as varying by regions, I think that could actually be a touchy subject as well, ESPECIALLY if the darker skinned people from the tropics are less advanced than their northern counterparts...I'm feeling more and more like this is the way to go, yeah. I don't mention that the planet is round or how gravity works or that people need to eat and drink to fuel their body's processes--I don't think I need to specifically outline that people come in different colors or how/why.
The biology is such a complicated thing to try and lay out, and for what? I'm not trying to tell a story about race--I just don't want to cause any hurt or damage by ignoring it. But it's too big and sensitive a subject to mention in passing, I think.

With the technology thing, I've thought about that. But...okay. So the setting is a sort of high-seas adventure where hunting sea monsters for their ivory, oil, etc. is a huge business across the world.
In the south, there's a huge network of small islands. Which gives those peoples less resources to work with, prohibits the use of large ships and encourages the formation of smaller settlements.
In the north, the partially frozen sea offers very similar issues. Less resources, smaller communities and smaller boats.
In the more centralized area, the mainland is much bigger and the climate is milder, so there are more people, who all have access to more resources. And the open waters means larger ships that can go after larger monsters, which means more money. Which all means more advanced technology and a more diverse population.

--I read this article about cultural appropriation that was pretty helpful, if bleak. One of the things it suggested was to focus on *why* a culture did X or Y.
But...the problem I've found is that, if you have a small population of people who live in an arctic climate, wear lots of animal furs, live in houses made of ice, hunt with ivory-tipped harpoons and eat mostly animal protein...it doesn't matter that all of those things *make sense for a people who live in that climate*, people will take one look and go, "oh, Eskimos. Got it," and it can very easily be supposed that you're just ripping off a real-world culture, even if you go out of your way to avoid doing just that.

I really admire Patrick Rothfuss for this; his fictional cultures are so fresh and unique, there's no way to point to a real-world equivalent. A matriarchal society of pale, blonde-haired, grey-eyed martial artists who consider facial expressions and emotional inflection to be rude for polite society--I mean. I've certainly never heard of a people that even vaguely resemble this.
But that's besides the point, I guess. My setting is about people from all over the world, coming together and traveling all over the world to fight titanic monsters of nightmare and legend, all in the name of a buck.
If there's any kind of society conflict, it'll be based on class--how these people risk their lives make nothing while the company owners and boards sit safe on the shore and rake in fortunes.

Thank you, everyone, for your feedback. This has been helpful.

[Quertus]

--I read this article about cultural appropriation that was pretty helpful, if bleak. One of the things it suggested was to focus on *why* a culture did X or Y.
But...the problem I've found is that, if you have a small population of people who live in an arctic climate, wear lots of animal furs, live in houses made of ice, hunt with ivory-tipped harpoons and eat mostly animal protein...it doesn't matter that all of those things *make sense for a people who live in that climate*, people will take one look and go, "oh, Eskimos. Got it," and it can very easily be supposed that you're just ripping off a real-world culture, even if you go out of your way to avoid doing just that.

So, to play the ignoramus / Devil’s advocate, why not build cold-climate houses out of wood, or rock, or animal parts, or mud?

[Anymage]

--I read this article about cultural appropriation that was pretty helpful, if bleak. One of the things it suggested was to focus on *why* a culture did X or Y.
But...the problem I've found is that, if you have a small population of people who live in an arctic climate, wear lots of animal furs, live in houses made of ice, hunt with ivory-tipped harpoons and eat mostly animal protein...it doesn't matter that all of those things *make sense for a people who live in that climate*, people will take one look and go, "oh, Eskimos. Got it," and it can very easily be supposed that you're just ripping off a real-world culture, even if you go out of your way to avoid doing just that.

Two thoughts on this.

First, sometimes the best way to avoid being a direct rip of one culture is to sprinkle in elements from other cultures as well. If your arctic society who wears animal furs, eats primarily animal proteins and will make ice dwellings when on the move also happens to be excellent horsemen (or whatever local animal equivalent) and follows a mongol social structure, it's harder to say it's a direct rip of any one group.

Second, while there will be people who make a big stink if you happen to make use of anything from a culture you don't happen to descend from, most people are more than happy if you're willing to put in the effort to learn about their culture. I strongly recommend doing some serious research and then asking for readers from that culture who'll be willing to give your work a quick look-over. (You can ask in both gaming spaces and culture relevant spaces.) It's quite possible for either general tropes to have some unfortunate implications, or for a bit of mythology to have been badly warped by translation to pop culture. A reader familiar with the culture can point out where you slip up. But if your "yeah, it's basically mythic India" culture has the due diligence put in I don't think you'll find many people who get upset about that.



I really admire Patrick Rothfuss for this; his fictional cultures are so fresh and unique, there's no way to point to a real-world equivalent. A matriarchal society of pale, blonde-haired, grey-eyed martial artists who consider facial expressions and emotional inflection to be rude for polite society--I mean. I've certainly never heard of a people that even vaguely resemble this.
But that's besides the point, I guess. My setting is about people from all over the world, coming together and traveling all over the world to fight titanic monsters of nightmare and legend, all in the name of a buck.
If there's any kind of society conflict, it'll be based on class--how these people risk their lives make nothing while the company owners and boards sit safe on the shore and rake in fortunes.

Martial artists who see any public display of emotion as impolite feels like a trope about asian/chinese people. The window dressing (matriarchal, physical characteristics, etc.) are less relevant than the core.

Again, do your due diligence. But realize how hard it is to create a culture whole cloth with no inspiration from any real world source, and don't beat yourself up for taking inspiration from places you don't personally descend from.

Edit to add: After a bit more thought, trying to create new cultures whole cloth, if anything, makes it more likely for you to make a misstep. Gringotts's goblins being the archetypal case; I don't think that Rowling was basing her ideas in the first book on anything other than fantasy tropes about bankers and other greedy types. Starting from a real life base so she could've known the history of those tropes could have helped her round out her goblin portrayals instead of accidentally falling face first into nasty stereotypes.

[Satinavian]

I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).
While that is something that happened to real world humans, it might be appropriate to fictional humans as well.

But at least 4 of your species are not humans. And you would be hard pressed to find any other real world species that gets paler in the north and darker in the south. There are some species that have white fur for slow camouflage, but that's is about it and this is not an intra-species variation.


And even if you have humans it doesn't have to be this way, especially if you have lots of migration history.

[gbaji]

I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.

I'm kinda leaning in this direction. It should not harm anything if you (the setting writer) have an idea of how skin tones may differ based on geography, but I woudn't make a point of that as part of the description. It's one thing to have some sort of consistent rules. That's great. But what you choose to go out of your way to describe/explain suggests how much import this should have. If melanin in your setting works the same as it does here on Earth, there's no specific need to explain that (or the resulting effects on populations from various regions) any more than you need to explain why water flows downhill, or the color of the sky, or anything else that "works via the same rules as here on Earth". They just are. Focus on describing things that are different from Earth and/or unique to your setting instead.

Unless skin tone has any actual game mechanic effect, then there's no reason to make a deal out of it. But yeah, if a player asks about it, you have an answer ready. But other than purely cosmetic effects, this should not matter. What should presumably matter more are things like "which people from which lands/kingdoms like or dislike eachother" (and why), or what trade is like, or what resources are where, etc. Those things are going to actually matter and affect the backdrop of the adventures the PCs embark on, and may influence decisions they make along the way.

I've always preferred to focus on cultural, economic, and political/historical factors as the causes of relationships between different groups of people in worlds I create. Skin color just isn't relevant. In the setting I'm running now, we do have some general rules in terms of skin tone in different regions, but it's never been anywhere close to a focus (and we generally allow folks to describe their own characters as they wish). There is a general assumption that folks from different areas will have some physical feature differences, perhaps enough to recognize that "that person looks like they come from <some part of the world>" (with the appropriate lore skill), but no player or GM in this setting has ever bothered (or cared even) to define what those differences actually are. It's just not important.


If, in a fictional world that isn't Earth, you have a culture that is a dead ringer for a real world culture, especially a modern one, you better have a darn good reason why it should be like that. Not for offensiveness, but for consistency.

If it's an actual dead ringer? Sure. That's just lack of creativity (unless you are actually playing on an alt-earth, of course). However, I do think that you can use references to real world things as a shorhand when describing some aspects of a culture. You could spend the time explaining a fantasy culture with a political structure like Fuedal Japan, or just say "they have a political structure like Fuedal Japan". And then we all move on.


Two tropical jungle civilizations at about the same tech level will share some similarities in agriculture, architecture, and clothing (assuming similar natural resources).

That's clearly because of some common ancient culture they all shared, probably involving alien intervention of some kind.



First, sometimes the best way to avoid being a direct rip of one culture is to sprinkle in elements from other cultures as well. If your arctic society who wears animal furs, eats primarily animal proteins and will make ice dwellings when on the move also happens to be excellent horsemen (or whatever local animal equivalent) and follows a mongol social structure, it's harder to say it's a direct rip of any one group.

Yup. Ties into what I mentioned above. You can (and probably should) take elements of culture, dress, economics, architecture, etc from "things we know about". But should avoid just carbon copying stuff. The former just saves on description time at the table. The latter is just lazy, and could even completely unintentionally lead to a perception that you are associating the events/behavior of those things in game, with stereotypes in the real world.


Again, do your due diligence. But realize how hard it is to create a culture whole cloth with no inspiration from any real world source, and don't beat yourself up for taking inspiration from places you don't personally descend from.

Yeah. I'd argue it's almost impossible to create a culture from scratch that is both believable and wholly unique. There's just only so many different ways for people to do things (well, that make sense and are workable), and there's a good bet that at some time and place on earth some group of people has whatever cultural feature you think you just invented. We are human, and tend to think in human ways, and so anything we create is going to reflect our own experiences and understanding.

Most importantly, your game audience is also human, so there's actually a lot of value in presenting at least the elements of things in the game that they can understand and relate to. But there's a decent gap between just having those elements versus creating an in-game culture that your entire table associates with a real world culture/people. Doing the latter runs the risk that if *any* action/aspect of that culture has a negative connotation, your players might think you're making that connotation in reference to the real world culture/people they associate the in-game one with. Which could be problematic, even if completely unintentional/accidental.

[PhoenixPhyre]

If it's an actual dead ringer? Sure. That's just lack of creativity (unless you are actually playing on an alt-earth, of course). However, I do think that you can use references to real world things as a shorhand when describing some aspects of a culture. You could spend the time explaining a fantasy culture with a political structure like Fuedal Japan, or just say "they have a political structure like Fuedal Japan". And then we all move on.


I probably wasn't clear. I'm totally ok with having cultural/political/religious elements that are similar enough to real world ones that, as a shorthand, you can say "think Feudal Japan, politically" and be close enough, especially for game purposes. I'd like to see things (even if just in notes/non-game stuff) more fleshed out with some suitable differences, but at game time, NBD.

What I find lazy is when a culture is "X, but fantasy" in all material respects. Politics (especially if they're localized to one particular specific time, with expies of matching historical figures), cultural norms (especially where those are modern ones embedded in a very different mileu), architecture, religion, etc.

I've got an ancient empire that
* takes naming conventions from Latin (sort of)
* superficially looks like the Roman Empire politically (has Senators and an Emperor and regional Governors), but under the hood it's much more feudal, with "Senator" basically being a "high ranking landed noble" and Governor basically being "client king".
* but without the highly patriarchal bit (with basically equal male/female roles)
* very ecumenical, without even a state religion, but with strong incentives to worship something. Even the "worship the emperors as gods" cult is just a cult, and one kinda looked down on.
* wasn't very military-oriented (it consolidated very early, with it and its stable client states occupying roughly half a continent, separated from the other big empire by a serious natural barrier
* was much more late medieval + magitech.

For game purposes, I can say "think romans, but magitech" in a lot of ways when precision doesn't matter, but there are subtle (and not so subtle) differences that come up in certain circumstances.

[King of Nowhere]

So I've got a new setting I'm working on.
There will be five sentient species players can choose from at character creation. Each species will have some common physical characteristics and behaviors.
There will be three primary geographical areas their characters can be from --the north (frigid), the south (tropical) and the temperate zone in the middle. Things like level of technology, clothing and cultural practices are largely dictated by the geographical area a person lives in.
Members of all five species can be found in all three geographical areas.

I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).

looks extremely reasonable.


I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.

I really want to avoid saying anything like, "skin color doesn't matter" or "this species = this real-world culture" or anything insensitive like that.
Anyone know of any resources I could access, like a sensitivity reader/editor or something of that nature, or any good articles on the subject?
mentioning skin tone should not be insensitive, no more than mentioning hair or eye color. people have them. it's part of flavor.
personally i never describe people physically at all, but that's a failing of mine. mentioning skin color is not insensitive.

as for what actually counts as insensitive, it depends on your players, and how you present it. I got away with making actual caricatures of actual nations for a couple of evil empires, but it worked because it was clearly not intended to represent the real nation, but all the negative traites were intentionally pumped up to comical levels.

[False God]

That's clearly because of some common ancient culture they all shared, probably involving alien intervention of some kind.

As blue as this text may be intended to be read, this is the D&D-verse we're talking about. "Cultures influenced by space aliens" is 100% on the table, and frankly, is a great explanation as to why the average D&D-world is the way it is far better than IMO what we would regard as "natural factors".

Oh yeah aliens just plopped a bunch of different beings down to be their servitor races/part of a grant experiment/a reality TV show and nobody in the world (save a few "crazy" people) know about it for "reasons".

[PhoenixPhyre]

As blue as this text may be intended to be read, this is the D&D-verse we're talking about. "Cultures influenced by space aliens" is 100% on the table, and frankly, is a great explanation as to why the average D&D-world is the way it is far better than IMO what we would regard as "natural factors".

Oh yeah aliens just plopped a bunch of different beings down to be their servitor races/part of a grant experiment/a reality TV show and nobody in the world (save a few "crazy" people) know about it for "reasons".

Agreed. Or even just an earlier powerful race, not necessarily an alien one.

I have a group of people who are technically two lineages (depending on how much elven heritage they show) who all have particular "snake-like" characteristics (eg. mottled patches on their skin that kinda look like scales), have a deep and inexplicable (until you know their heritage) reverence for snakes and the color blue. Blue is a "royal" or "noble" color across this area, and even children too young to talk treat blue (and snakes) with respect. Why?

Well, they're the descendants of a group of people whose ancestors were servitors to a bunch of elven bio-mages. Who liked snakes and bred in "snake-like" physical traits to their servants (as well as interbreeding themselves, hence the frequent half-elven "sports" popping up after nearly a millenium of absence). They also needed a way to distinguish the "good" servants (ie the ones you could talk to without becoming ritually unclean, the overseers/priests/etc) from the "scum/peasant" class visually, since one of the elven children complained. So they bred in/mass hypnotized (and made it hereditary) an irrational reverence for the color blue, and assigned the overseers to wear blue clothes. That's fading over time, especially as they intermarry with other, non-altered peoples, but...

"Aliens/gods/mages/etc did it" is a fairly decent explanation IMO in a fantasy world. Even more so than natural evolution in a lot of cases.

[Willie the Duck]

I’d also not limit yourself to modern interpretation on race/ethnicity…. A good way to do so would be to look at how ancient civilizations categorized people, look at Roman and Greek sources, since they had VERY outlandish ways to “prove” their superiority and would categorize the “barbarians” that lived beyond “civilization”.

Well, there's another idea. One could simply say, "certainly phenotypical variation in character appearance (in the manner we might consider race) exists in this world, and you might not be able to pass yourself off as the _____-ian ambassador because everyone will know you don't have the right skin tone. However it's just not how the typical us-vs-them lines are drawn in this world full of dragons and doppelgangers and magic users and whatnot."

[Millstone85]

As blue as this text may be intended to be read, this is the D&D-verse we're talking about. "Cultures influenced by space aliens" is 100% on the table, and frankly, is a great explanation as to why the average D&D-world is the way it is far better than IMO what we would regard as "natural factors".

Oh yeah aliens just plopped a bunch of different beings down to be their servitor races/part of a grant experiment/a reality TV show and nobody in the world (save a few "crazy" people) know about it for "reasons".
Agreed. [...] "Aliens/gods/mages/etc did it" is a fairly decent explanation IMO in a fantasy world. Even more so than natural evolution in a lot of cases.The gods would be the most likely suspects, and take credit regardless. Yes, everybody knows that, in the beginning, the gods brought forth the five sapient species and taught them masonry, sewing, etc.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Satinavian
And you would be hard pressed to find any other real world species that gets paler in the north and darker in the south.

On the contrary, many species show this pattern, especially in birds and mammals. It’s called Gloger’s Rule, in which darker pigmentation is correlated with greater humidity and lower latitude. The details and mechanisms can be complex, but it’s well-known to ecologists and vertebrate biologists.

[MonochromeTiger]

So I've got a new setting I'm working on.
There will be five sentient species players can choose from at character creation. Each species will have some common physical characteristics and behaviors.
There will be three primary geographical areas their characters can be from --the north (frigid), the south (tropical) and the temperate zone in the middle. Things like level of technology, clothing and cultural practices are largely dictated by the geographical area a person lives in.
Members of all five species can be found in all three geographical areas.

Okay, it's your setting, do whatever you're planning to do.


I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).

If your goal is a realistic approach to this kind of thing then more direct and long term exposure to the sun would cause that adaptation and thus the "south" would need to be closer to the equator, but as others have pointed out fantasy doesn't typically go for that kind of thing with some characters like the Drow being anywhere from a dark grey to purple-ish to pitch black in pigmentation depending on the setting despite all living underground. Realistically they'd be hilariously pale and probably sun burn in moments above ground during the day. Fantasy doesn't care the slightest bit about the reasons we biologically adapt to our environments so really if "it's from many generations of prolonged exposure or lack of exposure to the sun" even comes up or not is entirely a personal choice based off what you want to show.


I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.

That is generally the "safe" answer yes. I'm not going to say anything stupid like "people will just get offended over anything" but the reasons people do read something offensive into this kind of thing are varied and personal and successfully avoiding one doesn't mean you're going to escape others. Some are reactions to unfair biases a person has experienced themselves, others are their own personal internalized biases, and yes some are a person being so hyper-vigilant about this kind of thing that they will find it even if you go out of your way to avoid it.

Avoiding mentioning things like skin color entirely doesn't actually prevent people from reading into it and making their own conclusions about whether or not you're trying to do something offensive, what it does is give you a defense of "but I never said what they look like that's on you." Bringing things like skin color up with regularity does somewhat open the door to either personal biases we aren't even conscious of ourselves influencing things or people who are looking for this kind of thing fixating and assuming ill intent.

All of that goes to why not mentioning skin color is "safe." You may not have some unfair or mean bias behind mentioning skin color, you may even be going out of your way to avoid upsetting anyone, but intentions don't survive the jump from your mind to others' minds. This is such a charged topic that even big companies like WotC and Paizo have moved away from using the nebulous and vague term of "Race" to describe things as distinctly different as Humans and Tabaxi or Lizardfolk and Dwarves because the term itself was deemed as having too much negative baggage despite being so vague it could be used to mean almost anything. That said they didn't stop using things associated with certain real life cultures, they didn't leave all the details of skin color vague and cut out all art portraying specific characters to avoid any offense from that, they picked what they would cut out and it was the use of a nebulous term with so many different possible meaning and uses it becomes self contradictory at points, and they then just moved to other vague nebulous terms; the reasoning is simple, they deemed the term itself to be a risk because enough people have used it with bigoted intentions that there are people who now associate it with those bigots and it's easier to just use a different term than it is to separate the term from those using it as a weapon.


I really want to avoid saying anything like, "skin color doesn't matter" or "this species = this real-world culture" or anything insensitive like that.
Anyone know of any resources I could access, like a sensitivity reader/editor or something of that nature, or any good articles on the subject?

Nope. Every solution I've seen has still left room for people to be offended, heck people who have gone out of their way to avoid any implication of real life parallels still have enough that people can and have been offended. There's only so much variation we can make while writing from a Human perspective, little similarities slip in and even when they don't people have their own mental image and reading/interpretation of the words used that will inevitably find something distressing regardless of intent. That isn't even necessarily a problem of "reading too much into it", some of these responses are due to past trauma or mistreatment or other perfectly valid reasons to shy away from certain terms or parallels.

You aren't going to successfully avoid any and all feelings of bias, the best that can be accomplished is avoiding as much of it as possible and determining personally what you are and aren't willing to risk. Understanding that you're writing a fantasy setting means you can take this farther and just say "oh well these are literal aliens, those are eldritch abominations from beyond our universe, this is literal magic and I don't have to explain why they're born in sets of exactly three and one of the three is always born with rainbow pigmentation and neon pink spots." No matter how fantastical and strange you make it you'll never truly avoid all bias, whether yours or others, causing potential for offense in your work, you're just picking how much you're willing to risk.

[False God]

Agreed. Or even just an earlier powerful race, not necessarily an alien one.

I have a group of people who are technically two lineages (depending on how much elven heritage they show) who all have particular "snake-like" characteristics (eg. mottled patches on their skin that kinda look like scales), have a deep and inexplicable (until you know their heritage) reverence for snakes and the color blue. Blue is a "royal" or "noble" color across this area, and even children too young to talk treat blue (and snakes) with respect. Why?

Well, they're the descendants of a group of people whose ancestors were servitors to a bunch of elven bio-mages. Who liked snakes and bred in "snake-like" physical traits to their servants (as well as interbreeding themselves, hence the frequent half-elven "sports" popping up after nearly a millenium of absence). They also needed a way to distinguish the "good" servants (ie the ones you could talk to without becoming ritually unclean, the overseers/priests/etc) from the "scum/peasant" class visually, since one of the elven children complained. So they bred in/mass hypnotized (and made it hereditary) an irrational reverence for the color blue, and assigned the overseers to wear blue clothes. That's fading over time, especially as they intermarry with other, non-altered peoples, but...

"Aliens/gods/mages/etc did it" is a fairly decent explanation IMO in a fantasy world. Even more so than natural evolution in a lot of cases.

Oh yeah elves and snakes! After reading the lore on Sthien from an old 3rd party Races of Renown book I've always loved the combo of elves and snakes.

Anyway, especially if we're working with a IRL-like world that is potentially billions of years old, there's absolutely room for ancient civilizations, I mean, who else put all those dungeons and ancient ruins all over the place?


The gods would be the most likely suspects, and take credit regardless. Yes, everybody knows that, in the beginning, the gods brought forth the five sapient species and taught them masonry, sewing, etc.

But then who brought forth the gods? /I'll take deep questions that don't need answers for 100 Alex.

[gbaji]

Eh. My solution for players who go out of their way to find things to be offended by is to not play with them. Problem solved!

But... I'll play my own devil's advocate here, and point out that people are a heck of a lot more sensitive (including folks who are ridiculously oversensiitive) to these sorts of things these days (some people can literally connect a "dotted line" between any two dots, no matter how distant from eachother). So it can be more difficult to find a gaming group without such people in them. And honestly? You just have to weigh your desire to play the game against the annoyance of sometimes having to deal with stuff like this.

But yeah. Anything you can do to avoid it, or at least mitigate it, is probably going to be a good idea.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Oh yeah elves and snakes! After reading the lore on Sthien from an old 3rd party Races of Renown book I've always loved the combo of elves and snakes.

Anyway, especially if we're working with a IRL-like world that is potentially billions of years old, there's absolutely room for ancient civilizations, I mean, who else put all those dungeons and ancient ruins all over the place?


Absolutely. D&D works best, IMO, with a backdrop of many ancient civilizations, some great, some small, that fell into ruin in many different cycles.



But then who brought forth the gods? /I'll take deep questions that don't need answers for 100 Alex.


My setting answers that...but inverts it. The gods are young. Both these particular set of gods and the concept of "gods" as something you can get power from via faith and that actually care about being worshipped in any cosmological sense. The first "gods"[1] came about ~4k years ago, after humans (and some other races, including elves, orcs, etc.) were losing an existential war (which in the grand scheme of things only affected one continent, but...) against orcs (and some other races, including humans, elves, etc.) who had gotten hopped up on demon power (blood magic).

So the "good guys" (very big scare quotes there) set off on an epic quest to find the Cosmic Forge, a pen that could (with substantial sacrifice) rewrite reality in the form of a Wish[2]. Effectively rewrite the universe's operating system and insert a new imperative. They found it, and one of their number used it (and ceased to have ever existed in the process, because that's the cost) to wish that "Faith brings power". Several of his comrades apotheosized as the first deities; the rest went and used this power of faith to banish the head orc-demon, killing his sister in the process, who also apotheosized as the "goddess of evil". After that, the link between worship and power was established. Ascendants[3] use worship to maintain themselves after death; they can also give that power to mortals who worship them. But worship also changes the Ascendant, making them more like what they're worshipped for.

~3.5k years later (~250 years ago), people did a bad thing and nearly broke the universe. The universe then basically called in the loaned power to the Ascendants of the time, depowering and (mostly) killing them. Later, it decided to make things more regular and forcibly ascended 16 dead people to the rank of Congregant (true god). They're basically the universe's PR/complaint department, handling prayers. They are independent of worship, but are limited in how they can interact with mortals (lest they be dethroned). There are still a crap-ton of Ascendants, because anyone who has a big enough, fanatic enough following can (in principle) transcend death and become a Power. But only the true gods can make clerics; the rest basically have to make warlock-style pacts.

[1] as opposed to demon princes, angelic legion commanders, elemental princes, Lucian dons (basically mafia "devils"), etc. Those would make deals, but they were quid pro quo, warlock style, with no take-back provisions possible.

[2] Hey, I never said I was very creative. You might notice shades of both Warcraft (the whole orc + demon thing) and the Wizardry series of games. I'm a magpie, stealing ideas and re-using them.

[3] the general name for any post-mortal being who has transcended death and replaced their soul with a True Name, whether elemental or astral. Includes the true gods as well as a bunch of ancestor spirits, people worshiped as heroes, a fair number of con-men who found themselves with a cult following (literally), etc.

[Quixotic1]

...sometimes the best way to avoid being a direct rip of one culture is to sprinkle in elements from other cultures as well...I strongly recommend doing some serious research and then asking for readers from that culture...After a bit more thought, trying to create new cultures whole cloth, if anything, makes it more likely for you to make a misstep...I tended to think the same thing about adding elements from other cultures, but the article I read gave some very solid evidence for why that is specifically a bad idea.
Research, yes. Absolutely. The problem I've run into is that "researching a culture" is a pretty massive task, and it's just one part of GMing, or even world-building. I don't have the time to do it well enough to comfortably portray that culture in any real depth.

And...eh. I don't know. I see Rowling's and Lucas' major missteps with cultural/racial stereotypes and its like...I mean, as you said: research. Looking into those tropes, even for just a few minutes on Google, turns up some...significant results. Especially with the really blatant, offensive ones like the goblins and gungans.

[Quixotic1]

...But at least 4 of your species are not humans..
And even if you have humans it doesn't have to be this way, especially if you have lots of migration history.Eh...yeah, sure. But one thing I'm pretty determined to keep in place is the idea that the different species have different races within each of them, so players who want to run a character that presents with a certain racial heritage can pick whatever species they want.

And yeah, there will be plenty of diversity and integration. I was just talking about ancestry; people come from places, etc.
But again, I'm confident that just skipping over the specifics will be best.

[Anymage]

I tended to think the same thing about adding elements from other cultures, but the article I read gave some very solid evidence for why that is specifically a bad idea.
Research, yes. Absolutely. The problem I've run into is that "researching a culture" is a pretty massive task, and it's just one part of GMing, or even world-building. I don't have the time to do it well enough to comfortably portray that culture in any real depth.

Mind linking the article? There are a lot of internet think pieces where a person claims to speak for a group, while actually talking to a wide enough swath of people in the group shows no such consensus.

Also, most people will understand if you put in effort at all and are willing to accept and act on criticism if you misstep. You don't need to get it perfect, and anyone who tells you otherwise is saying more about their personal axe to grind than any reality.

[False God]

Absolutely. D&D works best, IMO, with a backdrop of many ancient civilizations, some great, some small, that fell into ruin in many different cycles.




My setting answers that...but inverts it. The gods are young. Both these particular set of gods and the concept of "gods" as something you can get power from via faith and that actually care about being worshipped in any cosmological sense. The first "gods"[1] came about ~4k years ago, after humans (and some other races, including elves, orcs, etc.) were losing an existential war (which in the grand scheme of things only affected one continent, but...) against orcs (and some other races, including humans, elves, etc.) who had gotten hopped up on demon power (blood magic).

So the "good guys" (very big scare quotes there) set off on an epic quest to find the Cosmic Forge, a pen that could (with substantial sacrifice) rewrite reality in the form of a Wish[2]. Effectively rewrite the universe's operating system and insert a new imperative. They found it, and one of their number used it (and ceased to have ever existed in the process, because that's the cost) to wish that "Faith brings power". Several of his comrades apotheosized as the first deities; the rest went and used this power of faith to banish the head orc-demon, killing his sister in the process, who also apotheosized as the "goddess of evil". After that, the link between worship and power was established. Ascendants[3] use worship to maintain themselves after death; they can also give that power to mortals who worship them. But worship also changes the Ascendant, making them more like what they're worshipped for.

~3.5k years later (~250 years ago), people did a bad thing and nearly broke the universe. The universe then basically called in the loaned power to the Ascendants of the time, depowering and (mostly) killing them. Later, it decided to make things more regular and forcibly ascended 16 dead people to the rank of Congregant (true god). They're basically the universe's PR/complaint department, handling prayers. They are independent of worship, but are limited in how they can interact with mortals (lest they be dethroned). There are still a crap-ton of Ascendants, because anyone who has a big enough, fanatic enough following can (in principle) transcend death and become a Power. But only the true gods can make clerics; the rest basically have to make warlock-style pacts.

[1] as opposed to demon princes, angelic legion commanders, elemental princes, Lucian dons (basically mafia "devils"), etc. Those would make deals, but they were quid pro quo, warlock style, with no take-back provisions possible.

[2] Hey, I never said I was very creative. You might notice shades of both Warcraft (the whole orc + demon thing) and the Wizardry series of games. I'm a magpie, stealing ideas and re-using them.

[3] the general name for any post-mortal being who has transcended death and replaced their soul with a True Name, whether elemental or astral. Includes the true gods as well as a bunch of ancestor spirits, people worshiped as heroes, a fair number of con-men who found themselves with a cult following (literally), etc.



I took the cycles approach.
"Civilization" as most people regard it can only exist in interglacial periods, roughly every 250 thousand years, for about 50k years. The world is too dry, too cold, too barren to support all but the smallest or toughest life(enough to sustain this living world), civilizations rise and fall during the interglacial periods when the world experiences extreme warming and frees trapped moisture. The "gods" of today are the Ascended(it works just like how it does in Stargate) from the last period, and their gods the ones before that. These beings often assume the mantle of a previously-named "god" when they Ascend, which just makes the record confusing.

The Ascended don't die, but their immortality makes them grow distant from mortal affairs over time, especially in the hundreds of thousands of years between civilizations, over time many simply disperse into the aether of the universe. Watching over mortal affairs, having worshippers, that's a "young god's fancy".

And the cycle continues, gods drift away from mortals, new gods rise to take their place or fill their shoes. Civilizations continue to rise and fall with enough time and disruption between them to make the previous ones little more than legend, and the ones before that little more than fantasy. No civilization has made it to what we could consider "modern" for millions of years. Even the "gods" lack the ability to comprehend the concept, any that did have long since drifted off into the void, or become something incomprehensible themselves.

Everything that is is some remnant of what was. At some point in the ancient past, there was a world of only one kind of humanoids, and then two, and then three, and now dozens, be it magic, technology, evolution, de-evolution, failed ascension, decension. Almost nothing and noone remembers, save things too terrifying to even comprehend(the Old Ones). What you and I would regard as "IRL cultures" continue to pop up over and over again, as fragments of the past and the Ascended guide mortals on the same well-trod paths.

Note: Time travel magic is exceedingly difficult, highly variable and alternate timelines, as well as fixed points, are a thing.
Note: Millions of years ago, some civilizations did travel to the stars, but they have forgotten (or hidden) their homeworld, and a million years of living in space or other worlds means they bear little resemblance to their original species.

I heavily bury this information in game though, it can be depressing. But just because you and everything you know or do will be forgotten in a million years doesn't mean what you do now has no meaning.

On the subject of this thread though, particularly running a game on an alt-earth, future-earth, past-earth, the players often lack a full picture, and what can sometimes appear as a "poor misrepresentation" of an IRL culture is in fact the result of thousands of years of lost history, people picking up the pieces and building along similar lines. Though it is helpful to make some element of this clear in the introduction "This is an alt-earth setting, so you'll likely see some similarities."

[paladinofshojo]

You mentioned technology as varying by regions, I think that could actually be a touchy subject as well, ESPECIALLY if the darker skinned people from the tropics are less advanced than their northern counterparts.



Technically if we are going with actual history, it should be the other way around… with advanced complex “civilized” cultures usually sprouting upon temperate regions instead with northern regions being seen as rural backwaters who can scarcely feed themselves…

Though, if there is a hegemony in this world…. It could stand to reason that there might be a sort of de jure or de facto form of caste here based on some physical or non physical attributes…. It doesn’t have to be skin color, it can easily just be the clothes you wear and the language you speak.

[Telok]

But...the problem I've found is that, if you have a small population of people who live in an arctic climate, wear lots of animal furs, live in houses made of ice, hunt with ivory-tipped harpoons and eat mostly animal protein...it doesn't matter that all of those things *make sense for a people who live in that climate*, people will take one look and go, "oh, Eskimos. Got it," and it can very easily be supposed that you're just ripping off a real-world culture, even if you go out of your way to avoid doing just that.


So, to play the ignoramus / Devil’s advocate, why not build cold-climate houses out of wood, or rock, or animal parts, or mud?

As someone living in that climate with that history I'd like to make a couple points.

First, there are multiple cultures that get lumped under "Eskimo" that are georgaphically, linguistically, and culturally as dissimilar as Britan and Italy. There are in my zone no less than five distinct coastal & island culture/language groups that get the "Eskimo" treatment and there are activities that are expected in one which will get you ostracized (at best) in another.

Second, there was never a 'mostly animal protein & ice houses' culture. The igloos were temporary hunting shelters and everyone preserves fruits & veg to get through the winter. During specific seasons after specific communal hunts there was more animal protein in the diets for a time, but not continually.

Last, for Quertus, it was wood + earth. Most of the cultures in question at least partly bury homes, and wood is the common building material. You see hide used more where the winter wind isn't lethal, mostly temporary summer camps. The only reason to use packed snow (not ice, bad material, heavy, slippery, absorbs much more heat than alternatives) is if you literally don't have anything else that will stand up to the local conditions.

Sorry. Minor rant. Carry on.

[King of Nowhere]

Oh yeah aliens just plopped a bunch of different beings down to be their servitor races/part of a grant experiment/a reality TV show and nobody in the world (save a few "crazy" people) know about it for "reasons".

"aliens created this world as an elaborated simulation on a carbon-based processor for an entertainment purpose"
that's actually true

[Vahnavoi]

I tended to think the same thing about adding elements from other cultures, but the article I read gave some very solid evidence for why that is specifically a bad idea.

You really want to recap in more detail what exactly was given as evidence. There's a pretty good chance the evidence given was proving the wrong thing.


Research, yes. Absolutely. The problem I've run into is that "researching a culture" is a pretty massive task, and it's just one part of GMing, or even world-building. I don't have the time to do it well enough to comfortably portray that culture in any real depth.

Ever heard "perfect is the enemy of good"? That's what you're falling afoul of. Fantasy traffics in cliches, stereotypes and popular misconceptions because researching other cultures is hard. They are shortcuts towards the stories people want to tell. Vast majority of attempts are both well-intentioned and harmless, with inaccuracies stemming from everyday limitations of finding correct knowledge. The moment you start thinking or saying that's not enough, you might as well give up on having anything resembling a foreign culture in fantasy. Give up on historical fiction too, because obviously you as a layman will never do it enough justice.

The alternative is to hold that giving it your best shot is enough, because non-experts have right to make fiction too, and genre fantasy isn't representational in the manner some people think it is to begin with.


And...eh. I don't know. I see Rowling's and Lucas' major missteps with cultural/racial stereotypes and its like...I mean, as you said: research. Looking into those tropes, even for just a few minutes on Google, turns up some...significant results. Especially with the really blatant, offensive ones like the goblins and gungans.

And here we go back to proving the wrong thing. Shortly: proving genealogy isn't the same as proving harm. It's trivial to show that, say, goblins in Harry Potter movies resemble past negative stereotypes of jews. But in order for this to cause any stereotype threat, two other things must hold:

1) the respective minority (in this case, jews) has to recognize the symbol (in this case, fictional goblins) as referring to them and must've internalized this to some degree.
2) the majority audience (everyone else) has to recognize the symbol as referring to the respective minority and they have to actually hold the negative beliefs to some extent.

When these don't hold, there is no causal mechanism for stereotype threat to occur. For this specific case, we know this, because a lot of people watched them as children who had no idea of past jewish stereotypes and thus had no clue goblins had anything to do with them. For all of those people, goblins were just goblins and the portrayal had zero impact on their relationships with real people. Some of those people are throwing a fit over it now, as adults, because they've become more aware of history and, ironically, because they took home the series' explicit anti-discrimination and anti-bullying message (https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/the-athletes-way/201505/does-reading-harry-potter-books-reduce-prejudice) when they actually saw the movies or read the books as children.

It isn't always this clear cut. In truth, it's somewhat hard to predict actual cultural impact of a work and the evaluation has to be done on case-by-case basis. Which gets to what I already said: if you want to know how your specific work will make people react, you will have to get your specific work out there.

[Quixotic1]

...That's what you're falling afoul of.I have to say, I really have a hard time with this tone. Maybe it's just me, but it comes across as very condescending.

I would never suggest that perfection should be expected. I expect people to do their best and learn from their mistakes. And for others to accept that. Anything else will only lead to bitterness and frustration.

I disagree with the premise of your argument. But I don't think it's necessary to get into the weeds over it. That whole conversation is tangential to the main topic.
But since the main topic has already been dealt with and I've come to the conclusion that my original plan was not going to work, I feel like I can comfortably withdraw.

Thank you all again.

[Quixotic1]

As someone living in that climate with that history I'd like to make a couple points...First, there are multiple cultures that get lumped under "Eskimo" that are georgaphically, linguistically, and culturally as dissimilar as Britan and Italy...Second, there was never a 'mostly animal protein & ice houses' culture. Just to clarify, I wasn't trying to claim that any of those traits were true or anything; just that people would perceive those things and draw that conclusion.
I was familiar with the term "Eskimo" being inaccurate. For a while I thought "Inuit" was better, but then I learned that's still off the mark.
I didn't draw those conclusions about diet from the research I did, but that really does make sense. But to be fair, my research only amounted to a few hours; enough to become familiar enough to misrepresent specifics, but that's probably about it. Thank you for the clarification. I've always had a fascination with the peoples who live in what seem to be such hostile places.

[KorvinStarmast]

I am a GM-for-hire, so actually, the people I will be playing with are indeed "strangers from the internet".
Wrong.
Your players will become people that you get to know, and you will all form a relationship through play.
They won't be strangers like the forumites here.

Engage with them, they will give you the feedback that you need to tweak it so that it's "just right". :smallsmile:

[Telok]

Just to clarify, I wasn't trying to claim that any of those traits were true or anything; just that people would perceive those things and draw that conclusion.


Oh for sure, I wasn't try to accuse anyone of anything and you're right about the perceptions. It was just my usual pendantry coming out.

[Perch]

So I've got a new setting I'm working on.
There will be five sentient species players can choose from at character creation. Each species will have some common physical characteristics and behaviors.
There will be three primary geographical areas their characters can be from --the north (frigid), the south (tropical) and the temperate zone in the middle. Things like level of technology, clothing and cultural practices are largely dictated by the geographical area a person lives in.
Members of all five species can be found in all three geographical areas.

I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).

I've fielded this concept with a few different people, and the opinions are divided. Some people suggest that I avoid mentioning skin color all together and just let players dig into that on their own, if they want to.

I really want to avoid saying anything like, "skin color doesn't matter" or "this species = this real-world culture" or anything insensitive like that.
Anyone know of any resources I could access, like a sensitivity reader/editor or something of that nature, or any good articles on the subject?

{Scrubbed} their melanin levels is all that we know of these peoples.

If the kingdoms of the south are complex and interesting as the kingdoms of the north I would see no issue.

If the kingdoms of the south are savage tribals with bones in their noses, now THAT would be an issue. Because those stereotypes are harmful and based on lies.

So to you stays the questions, how are the nations of the North and south?

[paladinofshojo]

If the kingdoms of the south are savage tribals with bones in their noses, now THAT would be an issue. Because those stereotypes are harmful and based on lies.

What if it’s a very archaic setting? Something like Conan the barbarian… with the northern kingdoms being a bunch of loincloth wearing savages who paint their bodies blue and rush into battle naked… and the only real difference to an outside observer between the two culturally is the geography they live in?

Perhaps the only “civilized” regions are the ones that are in temperate regions with a water source that can sustain reliable farming. Said civilizations are also primarily brown or at the very least swarthy complexion. Sure they don’t have to live in huts or wear loincloths but they do have problems of their own such as say…. Massive exploitation of slaves, physical/mental deformities due to inbreeding amongst the royals/nobles, worshipping outright evil gods who demand human sacrifices, etc.

As you can see, context of the setting here is important, in this type of setting, savage tribals in the south don’t look so bad.

[Perch]

What if it’s a very archaic setting? Something like Conan the barbarian…

Conan is infamous for it's very bad portrait of African coded civilizations and the use racial insensitive language and harmful false stereotypes, bad exemple.


with the northern kingdoms being a bunch of loincloth wearing savages who paint their bodies blue and rush into battle naked… and the only real difference to an outside observer between the two culturally is the geography they live in?

Issue is that even when all places of the setting are barbaric, not all barbaric peoples are portrayed equally, the point of Conan is how his civilization despite being "Barbaric" is more "civilized" than the "civilized" cultures. Meanwhile compared to the noble and heroic barbarian people of Conan, other civilizations are portrayed as more depraved savages, not cool.


Perhaps the only “civilized” regions are the ones that are in temperate regions with a water source that can sustain reliable farming. Said civilizations are also primarily brown or at the very least swarthy complexion. Sure they don’t have to live in huts or wear loincloths but they do have problems of their own such as say…. Massive exploitation of slaves, physical/mental deformities due to inbreeding amongst the royals/nobles, worshipping outright evil gods who demand human sacrifices, etc.

{Scrubbed}this are precisely that the type of horrible tropes that I would advise OP not to use. Besides why can't the south has a prosperous civilization? Countless of desert dwelling civilizations have existed irl.


swarthy
{Scrubbed}



As you can see, context of the setting here is important, in this type of setting, savage tribals in the south don’t look so bad.
Your post only reinforced my point that portrays of desert or African inspired civilizations as barbaric and tribalistic are terrible, ugly, disgusting and false, inform yourself on African culture first, this is so passé it's high time we moved away form this, if op wants his work to stand out, avoiding such lazy tropes would do him a great favor.

[False God]

{Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

Huh, never knew that. My mental associations are with pirates(who come in all colors in my head), not a skin color. Some of the same connotations apply, rough-sexy, seductive, dangerous, but that's not a skin color. I've certainly never heard it used as a pejorative (though my Google fu certainly is bringing up lots of discussion that it was used for exactly that in the past). Of course, I've rarely heard anyone use it IRL at all either, not sure if I've used it at the table, don't run a lot of pirate games.

[Millstone85]

Huh, never knew that. My mental associations are with pirates(who come in all colors in my head), not a skin color. Some of the same connotations apply, rough-sexy, seductive, dangerous, but that's not a skin color.Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/swarthy) lists "weathered, rough" as a nonstandard meaning, which may be what your pirate stories used.

Otherwise, the site says it comes from Old English "sweart", meaning "black", and refers to dark colors, especially skin tones.


I've certainly never heard it used as a pejorativeI wasn't aware of this either. I am starting to wonder if all words meaning "black", like the Spanish word for the color, have been or will be pejorative at some point. The fault falls on those who used such words with disdain, but then it is like racism henceforth owns the words, which is more than a bit sad.

[MonochromeTiger]

Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/swarthy) lists "weathered, rough" as a nonstandard meaning, which may be what your pirate stories used.

Otherwise, the site says it comes from Old English "sweart", meaning "black", and refers to dark colors, especially skin tones.

I wasn't aware of this either. I am starting to wonder if all words meaning "black", like the Spanish word for the color, have been or will be pejorative at some point. The fault falls on those who used such words with disdain, but then it is like racism henceforth owns the words, which is more than a bit sad.

Some writers have gotten into the habit of using it as a catch all term for referring to people from specific regions, usually while portraying those people in the most monolithic "designated bad guy" way they can. As a result there is a bit of negative baggage associated with the word in some communities.

That said, yes, there is kind of a trend of "bad person used it, now it's bad forever" in language and art. While I can't fault the people who have had words and images weaponized against them in associating those things with their aggressors it is still a shame that the default approach is to just let the people abusing something dictate what it's for rather than contest it.

[Quertus]

Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/swarthy) lists "weathered, rough" as a nonstandard meaning, which may be what your pirate stories used.

Otherwise, the site says it comes from Old English "sweart", meaning "black", and refers to dark colors, especially skin tones.

I wasn't aware of this either. I am starting to wonder if all words meaning "black", like the Spanish word for the color, have been or will be pejorative at some point. The fault falls on those who used such words with disdain, but then it is like racism henceforth owns the words, which is more than a bit sad.

Huh. In my parlance, "swarthy" is not only not a pejorative, it's generally a compliment. Like calling someone "tough". It's not a word one would use to describe their enemy, or someone they want to belittle - especially for their appearance.

Language is weird.

[paladinofshojo]

Conan is infamous for it's very bad portrait of African coded civilizations and the use racial insensitive language and harmful false stereotypes, bad exemple.

I am confused.... what exactly are you referring to here? If you are referring to Stygia, then that would be more of an Egyptian code then anything, ironically their slave class is considered to be of lighter skin due to being a mixture of Cimmerians and the people of Shem (Palestine) .... Anything south of their would be the "Black Kingdoms" which are characteristic of sub-Saharan Africa are largely ignored in the main book series....

Furthermore, Stygian decadence and corruption isn't even the MOST egregious example of an evil civilization with Acheron (the "ancient Rome founded by demons and blood magic") being easily worse than Stygia in regards to crimes against nature and outright sadism in my opinion




Issue is that even when all places of the setting are barbaric, not all barbaric peoples are portrayed equally, the point of Conan is how his civilization despite being "Barbaric" is more "civilized" than the "civilized" cultures. Meanwhile compared to the noble and heroic barbarian people of Conan, other civilizations are portrayed as more depraved savages, not cool.

Where exactly in the reading of any of Howard's books are the Cimmerians depicted as "civilized"? They have little to no art, science, or philosophy and are primarily hunter-gatherers living in primitive wooden villages with no central governments... The only advantage they have over their northern neighbors the Picts (who are portrayed very negatively to the point where they are basically Tolkien esque Orcs btw) is that they can work iron.

The only way they are seen as "moral" is due to their society (and I don't use the word "civilization" because they have little to no sense of the word) having a strong sense of "justice", and I use that in air quotes seeing as even though they have a tribal concept of honor. They are not above raiding and sacking the "civilized" lands of Aquilonia, especially when they are driven out of their lands by the brutal Vanir from the north.

A lot of them have no scruples serving as mercenaries, pirates, thieves, etc. Conan is an example of that as during the war between Ahgrapur and Makkalet and was only at the tower of the white elephant to steal the gem for himself.

The whole point of Conan the Barbarian is to signify how the "civilizations" are usually much more "uncivilized" than the barbarians... Seeing as even though Conan's people are barely above cavemen, they don't have any concept of slaves or master, peasants or nobles, etc. This is why he rarely fights any tribals (other than the Picts and the Vanir)



{Scrub the post, scrub the quote} this are precisely that the type of horrible tropes that I would advise OP not to use. Besides why can't the south has a prosperous civilization? Countless of desert dwelling civilizations have existed irl.

Technically, that depends on what you consider a civilization. Historically, almost all desert dwelling civilizations are usually a network of nomadic clans or closely related kin groups whose primary mode of making a living is through trade.

And before you ask, Ancient Egypt was not a desert dwelling civilization.



{Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

I am confused, is that term actually racist? Or did a small group {Scrubbed} in academia decided that the term is "offensive" and are telling the rest of society that it is?

I am not trying to be facetious, but as a South African of Indian descent whose family emigrated to the United States in the mid 2000's.... I like to think I have a good understanding on what sort of slurs exist towards "brown people". I don't think I have ever considered the term "swarthy" to be anymore racist than a descriptor...like say "brown" or "dark skinned" or "light skinned", it has always been something that sounds neutral to me. Then again, you may be from a country where said term is considered racist.


Your post only reinforced my point that portrays of desert or African inspired civilizations as barbaric and tribalistic are terrible, ugly, disgusting and false, inform yourself on African culture first, this is so passé it's high time we moved away form this, if op wants his work to stand out, avoiding such lazy tropes would do him a great favor.

What if I portray societies like the war hungry and expansionist Zulu Empire.... or the use of Azande hexes and curses and other African folk magic.... I don't really understand this narrative of Africa being an idealized inherently peaceful place before Western forces had corrupted it. For thousands of years, hundreds of kingdoms, tribes, and warbands have been fighting over resources just like everywhere else in the world. Historical African civilizations shouldn't be portrayed as either idealized or demonic... they should be portrayed as realistic.

[KorvinStarmast]

I am confused.... what exactly are you referring to here? If you are referring to Stygia, then that would be more of an Egyptian code then anything, ironically their slave class is considered to be of lighter skin due to being a mixture of Cimmerians and the people of Shem (Palestine) .... Anything south of their would be the "Black Kingdoms" which are characteristic of sub-Saharan Africa are largely ignored in the main book series....

Furthermore, Stygian decadence and corruption isn't even the MOST egregious example of an evil civilization with Acheron (the "ancient Rome founded by demons and blood magic") being easily worse than Stygia in regards to crimes against nature and outright sadism in my opinion

Where exactly in the reading of any of Howard's books are the Cimmerians depicted as "civilized"? They have little to no art, science, or philosophy and are primarily hunter-gatherers living in primitive wooden villages with no central governments... The only advantage they have over their northern neighbors the Picts (who are portrayed very negatively to the point where they are basically Tolkien esque Orcs btw) is that they can work iron.

The only way they are seen as "moral" is due to their society (and I don't use the word "civilization" because they have little to no sense of the word) having a strong sense of "justice", and I use that in air quotes seeing as even though they have a tribal concept of honor. They are not above raiding and sacking the "civilized" lands of Aquilonia, especially when they are driven out of their lands by the brutal Vanir from the north.

A lot of them have no scruples serving as mercenaries, pirates, thieves, etc. Conan is an example of that as during the war between Ahgrapur and Makkalet and was only at the tower of the white elephant to steal the gem for himself.

The whole point of Conan the Barbarian is to signify how the "civilizations" are usually much more "uncivilized" than the barbarians... Seeing as even though Conan's people are barely above cavemen, they don't have any concept of slaves or master, peasants or nobles, etc. This is why he rarely fights any tribals (other than the Picts and the Vanir)

Technically, that depends on what you consider a civilization. Historically, almost all desert dwelling civilizations are usually a network of nomadic clans or closely related kin groups whose primary mode of making a living is through trade.

And before you ask, Ancient Egypt was not a desert dwelling civilization.


I am confused, is that term actually racist? Or did a small group of progressives in academia decided that the term is "offensive" and are telling the rest of society that it is?

I am not trying to be facetious, but as a South African of Indian descent whose family emigrated to the United States in the mid 2000's.... I like to think I have a good understanding on what sort of slurs exist towards "brown people". I don't think I have ever considered the term "swarthy" to be anymore racist than a descriptor...like say "brown" or "dark skinned" or "light skinned", it has always been something that sounds neutral to me. Then again, you may be from a country where said term is considered racist.

What if I portray societies like the war hungry and expansionist Zulu Empire.... or the use of Azande hexes and curses and other African folk magic.... I don't really understand this narrative of Africa being an idealized inherently peaceful place before Western forces had corrupted it. For thousands of years, hundreds of kingdoms, tribes, and warbands have been fighting over resources just like everywhere else in the world. Historical African civilizations shouldn't be portrayed as either idealized or demonic... they should be portrayed as realistic.

And before you ask, Ancient Egypt was not a desert dwelling civilization. It was one of the great human civilizations... but as with any human civilization, the legend and the day to day reality doubtless had mismatches.

I would like to follow up on Ancient Egypt: agricultural excellence, conquest, vainglory (considering the pyramids and various superb building sites up and down the Nile valley) and of course the "treasures" rumored to be in various tomb and fallen/old palaces. (Bronze Age collapse can be modeled as a magical calamity, something like the Rain of Colorless Fire from Greyhawk, a volcano like Krakatoa going off...). Being inspired by Ancient Egypt can provide a great backdrop for any D&D (or RPG) campaign where ancient learning and splendor are lost, lost secrets are to be sought out, ancient deities and mysteries may be encountered, the players characters are seeking a few secrets or famous treasures. All a great framework for a campaign if one doesn't want to rely on the fallen Roman civilization trope/archetype for a Dark Ages type of campaign. (Which is where the original came from).

I just got finished reading Cornwell's Warlord trilogy - a unique take on the King Arthur legends - which is very much a post-Roman empire / Dark Ages setting in the British Isles.

[paladinofshojo]

It was one of the great human civilizations... but as with any human civilization, the legend and the day to day reality doubtless had mismatches.

I would like to follow up on Ancient Egypt: agricultural excellence, conquest, vainglory (considering the pyramids and various superb building sites up and down the Nile valley) and of course the "treasures" rumored to be in various tomb and fallen/old palaces. (Bronze Age collapse can be modeled as a magical calamity, something like the Rain of Colorless Fire from Greyhawk, a volcano like Krakatoa going off...). Being inspired by Ancient Egypt can provide a great backdrop for any D&D (or RPG) campaign where ancient learning and splendor are lost, lost secrets are to be sought out, ancient deities and mysteries may be encountered, the players characters are seeking a few secrets or famous treasures. All a great framework for a campaign if one doesn't want to rely on the fallen Roman civilization trope/archetype for a Dark Ages type of campaign. (Which is where the original came from).

I just got finished reading Cornwell's Warlord trilogy - a unique take on the King Arthur legends - which is very much a post-Roman empire / Dark Ages setting in the British Isles.


I don’t think we are arguing here… My point is that Ancient Egypt was not a desert civilization… The majority of the civilization was concentrated in the delta and the Nile valley… here’s a map of it https://historicaleve.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Ancient-Egypt-Map-nile-delta-empire-Nubia.png

Ancient Egypt was a river valley civilization, same with all the precursor civilizations such as the Mesopotamians and the Indus River civilizations….

To call them a “desert” civilization implies that they had limited or no access to water or vegetation… which is untrue.

[KorvinStarmast]

I don’t think we are arguing here… correct. One is not required to argue in a discussion. :smallsmile:

My point is that Ancient Egypt was not a desert civilization… And I used that point as a follow up. The overarching point of this thread is how the DM is establishing the setting, so I made points about a setting ...

Ancient Egypt was a river valley civilization I am in violent agreement. So too were Sumer, Ur, etc, in the land between two rivers. :smallsmile:

[Satinavian]

What if it’s a very archaic setting? Something like Conan the barbarian… with the northern kingdoms being a bunch of loincloth wearing savages who paint their bodies blue and rush into battle naked… and the only real difference to an outside observer between the two culturally is the geography they live in?
The setting of Conan has lots of issues.

Now it is not that bad considering the time this stuff was written. But nowadays such a setting would be seen as really controversial and invite various unflattering speculations about the authors worldview. It is a good example of exactly the issues that the OP would rather avoid and thus what not to do.

[gbaji]

Conan is infamous for it's very bad portrait of African coded civilizations and the use racial insensitive language and harmful false stereotypes, bad exemple.

If you are cherry picking portrayals, and insisting that only certain groups of people are allowed to be portrayed badly. Let's not forget that those stories are set in a late bronze to early iron age setting, when, historically, a whole lot of cultures/civilizations/city-states were absolutely horrible if we judged them based on today's standards.


Issue is that even when all places of the setting are barbaric, not all barbaric peoples are portrayed equally, the point of Conan is how his civilization despite being "Barbaric" is more "civilized" than the "civilized" cultures. Meanwhile compared to the noble and heroic barbarian people of Conan, other civilizations are portrayed as more depraved savages, not cool.

Eh. I think that's in the eye of the beholder. Is it possible that you are defining "noble" and "depraved" based on your own stereotypes?

But yeah. I suppose your post is a great example of why GMs need to be cautious about defining/describing skin tone at all. Because you just never known when someone is going to combine skin tone and cultural definition and make a negative correlation to some assumed steretotype. I does come across like you can't abide any setting in which any culture in which people have dark skin area may be portrayed in any sort of negative light at all. I mean, if my setting includes a ton of different evil nations of different types, including people of different skin tones, you would be offended if one of them was of dark skin?

I'm not going to (nor are we allowed) ask about what specific traits you seem to think are negative stereotypes versus positive within the suset of "primitive/tribal/barbarian cultures" here. But maybe ask yourself if it's reasonable that if a setting is in an ancient time, that there should realistically be a ton of such cultures within it, and unless your argument is that we simple exclude all darker skinned people from our game settings, then yes, some of those folks are going to inevitably have traits that, if projected on a modern person today, we would find offensive. Um... But that's the setting.

IMO, as long as someone isn't portraying all of the people of one skin color as good and pure and civilized and all people of another skin color as evil and corrupt and savage, I'm not really seeing a problem. That's not to say that it *wont* create a problem at a table, but if I have a player who is that insistent on really really looking to find offense at my setting, the easier solution is to just not have them at my table.



{Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

All terms that refer to skin color are not innately racist.

I have never in my life heard this term used in a derogotary way. So... Not getting it?

The only thing I can think of is that the original term may have referred to people having darker skin, but not as a racial characteristic but because the simply spent more time in the sun. Which, I suppose, could be a connotation of people "working in the sun" as well. But typically just means "tanned". But yeah, I suppose you could marry the "works in the sun" bit, with an assumption of "low level laborer", and then attach that to people with darker skin (due to genetics) and make something out of that?

Again though, I've literally never heard this word used that way. Ever. So... super stretch.


Huh. In my parlance, "swarthy" is not only not a pejorative, it's generally a compliment. Like calling someone "tough". It's not a word one would use to describe their enemy, or someone they want to belittle - especially for their appearance.

Yeah. It can refer to "tanned" (with an implication of being "healthy" and "getting sun", as opposed to being "pasty" or "pale/sickly" or something).

I've also seen it used as "handy" or "capable". So yeah. Not seeng the perjorative here.

[Mechalich]

Yeah. It can refer to "tanned" (with an implication of being "healthy" and "getting sun", as opposed to being "pasty" or "pale/sickly" or something).

That is something of a modern usage though, dependent upon our understanding of things like vitamin D and the corresponding shift in aesthetics. Through most of human history paleness, especially in females, was seen as highly desirable because it was a marker of an upper class lifestyle that did not involve laboring out in the sun all day. A pro-light-skinned prejudice was, historically, extremely common within cultures not just across cultural boundaries. 'Swarthy,' often used at least in literature to refer to sailors, builds off of this, as sailors were generally lower-class (in many cases functionally or literally enslaved) and tanned up extremely dark due because on the water you get the sun from above and below.

In most cases of a historical or fantasy setting this class and labor-type based variation in skin is going to absolutely swamp ethnically-based variation in skin tone, because the level of ethnic variation in a large region simply isn't that high. That changes if there's some sort of massive discontinuity in the geography, like the Sahara Desert or the Himalayas, but that is uncommon.

[PhoenixPhyre]

'Swarthy,' often used at least in literature to refer to sailors, builds off of this, as sailors were generally lower-class (in many cases functionally or literally enslaved) and tanned up extremely dark due because on the water you get the sun from above and below.


Yeah. My mental connections to the word 'swarthy' all revolve around sailors, especially pirates. Nothing about race, particularly--in fact, my mental image of a pirate is mostly a European/Caucasian (dominantly dominant) or Northern African/Arab (secondary, and one that would have lighter skin without the solar influence) person.

[gbaji]

That is something of a modern usage though, dependent upon our understanding of things like vitamin D and the corresponding shift in aesthetics. Through most of human history paleness, especially in females, was seen as highly desirable because it was a marker of an upper class lifestyle that did not involve laboring out in the sun all day. A pro-light-skinned prejudice was, historically, extremely common within cultures not just across cultural boundaries. 'Swarthy,' often used at least in literature to refer to sailors, builds off of this, as sailors were generally lower-class (in many cases functionally or literally enslaved) and tanned up extremely dark due because on the water you get the sun from above and below.

Right. Which is exactly what I talked about in the section just above the one you quoted. That was just one additional possible (and you are correct, more modern) meaning for the term.

Um... But even the older use is more about class than race (really not about race at all, unless you mix and match meanings across times and locations). And one can also argue that while such things may have mattered to some nobility (as a sign of being a "common laborer"), there's also a connotation (which I mentioned previously as well) that being swarthy also meant "healty" and "strong", since folks who did such work tended to be healthier and stronger. Well, barring being afflicted by some disease due to living in less sanitary conditions as a result of their lower standard of living, but then we'd not refer to such people as "swarthy" either, so...

The term was pretty universally used to describe people who, yeah, worked hard (salt of the earth/sea types), but were hale and hearty and whatnot. It was overwhelmingly a positive term. I've never heard it used in a way that implied any sort of negative personality attributes to the person so described (unless someone actually does consider "working class" to be a negative personality trait?). And certainly have never heard it used in any form of racial reference at all, let alone a perjorative one.

It's almost like someone looked up the dictionary definition, which speaks of having dark skin, and just assumed that meant "because of race", and not "because of profession/activities". Which, again, speaks more to the person making that asociation than to the term itself.

[Perch]

I am confused.... what exactly are you referring to here?

Oh, are you are familiar with the works of Robert Ervin Howard? Well, that makes it a lot easier, I don't have my notes here with me but when I get home I'll check my library with all the texts, pages and chapters, I may return home tomorrow so I hope I'll remember to do it.


If you are referring to Stygia, then that would be more of an Egyptian code then anything

Last time I checked Egypt was... Well, in Africa so I don't understand what your point was in here. :smallconfused:


Where exactly in the reading of any of Howard's books are the Cimmerians depicted as "civilized"? They have little to no art, science, or philosophy and are primarily hunter-gatherers living in primitive wooden villages with no central governments...

That's the point! At least to me and I believe it's also the consensus, how those things are not real indicators of "civilization" and that Conan's people despite being a warrior society has more honor and are more noble than the more "advanced" and sedentary civilizations.


The only way they are seen as "moral" is due to their society (and I don't use the word "civilization" because they have little to no sense of the word) having a strong sense of "justice", and I use that in air quotes seeing as even though they have a tribal concept of honor.

That's the point, they are "Barbaric savages" but they are "barbaric savages" with a noble sense of honor and that not only redeems them, but also elevates them, the same courtesy is not extended to other civilizations.


The whole point of Conan the Barbarian is to signify how the "civilizations" are usually much more "uncivilized" than the barbarians... Seeing as even though Conan's people are barely above cavemen, they don't have any concept of slaves or master, peasants or nobles, etc. This is why he rarely fights any tribals (other than the Picts and the Vanir)

{Scrubbed} I said "The point of Conan was that Conan's people was more civilized than the so called civilized people"

And you said "The point of Conan is that the So called civilized people was more barbaric than Conan's so called Barbaric people"

{Scrubbed} For all effects we said the same thing.



Technically, that depends on what you consider a civilization. Historically, almost all desert dwelling civilizations are usually a network of nomadic clans or closely related kin groups whose primary mode of making a living is through trade.

Most but not all, and even so, a merchant people is a far cry from the violent blood thirsty desert savages tropes we are discussing here. But there are many exemples of desert kingdoms that were not in fact like that and were able to build great things. Why not focus on that? Specially if you are trying to avoid racist tropes?


And before you ask, Ancient Egypt was not a desert dwelling civilization.

Wasn't going to :smallconfused: I was actually thinking of Nabataean Kingdom since I'm a huge fan of Petra. But I would argue with you that the fact the Nile gave Egypt huge benefits that would make their civilization grow better than other places, it's still in a desert, even if it's has a river, it's in a desert biome so it's arguable a desert civilization. There is a reason their main God was the Sun and not lightning like most of their contemporaries.



I am confused, is that term actually racist? Or did a small group of progressives in academia decided that the term is "offensive" and are telling the rest of society that it is?

I mean you only have to look up in a dictionary and you will see, many words related to dark skin ended up gaining pejorative meanings, go figure, this is one of such cases, if the dictionary is not enough I suggest you seek the etymology of the word "sordid" perhaps that will ease your confusion.



What if I portray societies like the war hungry and expansionist Zulu Empire.... or the use of Azande hexes and curses and other African folk magic....

I mean you are more than allowed to do it, who am I to tell you what you are allowed to do or not, the thing is such things and portrays have been done in the past, and have been done badly, so they are not well received anymore because they carry a lot of symbolic weight, and OP wanted advice on how to deal and avoid these issues, so as per it was requested I provided my point of view, I think everything I said so far is valid but I thank you for you questions, I was perhaps allowed to clarify some points, I just hope the inquiries where made out of curiosity and not with the intent of antagonizing me.


I don't really understand this narrative of Africa being an idealized inherently peaceful place before Western forces had corrupted it. For thousands of years, hundreds of kingdoms, tribes, and warbands have been fighting over resources just like everywhere else in the world. Historical African civilizations shouldn't be portrayed as either idealized or demonic... they should be portrayed as realistic.
That was never the point, all those things can be done, it's just that they are ALL that has been done, for years, by people with not so noble intentions, so it comes to no surprise that it's frowned upon and other alternatives and different explorations are encouraged.

[False God]

In any case, it's not like we can't learn from historical missteps, both in reality and in fiction, to create better settings. Even settings full of terrible people around the world. The point, again, fundamentally is that the author/DM making this attempt is gonna have to work for it.

[paladinofshojo]

Oh, are you are familiar with the works of Robert Ervin Howard? Well, that makes it a lot easier, I don't have my notes here with me but when I get home I'll check my library with all the texts, pages and chapters, I may return home tomorrow so I hope I'll remember to do it.

I have read a few of the books namely the Coming of Conan and Conan the Barbarian, but most of my understanding of the franchise comes from the wiki and Youtube because the Lore for the Hyborean Age is way too massive to get into if you're just reading it. Howard may have come up with Conan, but because of his death and due to the massive popularity of the character, other writers have been adding to the mythos or re-adapting Conan's stories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conan_(books)

That's also not including the comics, the videogames, and the movies which seem to deviate from the books.

Furthermore, did you really read through his work just to come up with notes on why it is problematic? :smallconfused: Or are you just be sarcastic?

Side note, if you have read his works, why do you need to go back and look at your notes to tell me what exactly Howard wrote that is considered racist? :smallconfused:




Last time I checked Egypt was... Well, in Africa so I don't understand what your point was in here. :smallconfused:

Putting aside the Netflix lawsuit controversy...

You don't see anything culturally insensitive about painting an entire continent with such a broad stroke? This is literally the equivalent of saying that Aztecs, Iroquois, and Hopi Indians are "all the same"....

When you and I were starting this conversation, it was very clear that the unfortunate implications were targeted towards black people, i.e. sub-saharan Africans, whom I can tell you from my personal experience from living almost 15 years in South Africa, are divided amongst themselves based on tribal and ethnic lines, but that is besides the point.

The fact that you're trying to lump them all together {Scrubbed}



That's the point! At least to me and I believe it's also the consensus, how those things are not real indicators of "civilization" and that Conan's people despite being a warrior society has more honor and are more noble than the more "advanced" and sedentary civilizations.

Their sense of "honor" isn't even that moral though... They are not above stealing and raiding villages to survive. Their sense of justice is largely reliant on might makes right, it's not surprising since their chief god Crom is also very apathetic to the problems of mortals, in that he only cares for battle and calling his name is something he considers "weakness", so Cimmerians don't even bother praying to him, as he is not really worshipped but rather feared and even Conan had said "it is best not to draw his ire".

The only reason Crom isn't as bad as Set is because he isn't actively trying to destroy the world due to lack of interest in such things, not because he is a morally better deity to serve.

Their society is no more "moral" than say, the Imperium of Mankind in the Warhammer 40K series... Which is an apt comparison because unlike Warhammer 40K, the Conan universe's grimdark nature actually makes sense since it is a barbaric age ruled by sorcery and the swords of warlords.... and not an over the top satire of space fascism. The point I am making here is that both settings are grimdark as such, you aren't really getting "good" guys, just different shades of grey.



That's the point, they are "Barbaric savages" but they are "barbaric savages" with a noble sense of honor and that not only redeems them, but also elevates them, the same courtesy is not extended to other civilizations.

Question, which Cimmerians get elevated here? Conan sure, but he's literally the protagonist of this epic story so yeah, him becoming the Barbarian King of Aquilonia is a foregone conclusion.

But he isn't the entire Cimmerian people... despite the fact that for the majority of his stories, he is literally the only Cimmerian present.

Come to think of it, how many other Cimmerians show up in the stories anyways?




{Scrub the post, scrub the quote} I said "The point of Conan was that Conan's people was more civilized than the so called civilized people"

And you said "The point of Conan is that the So called civilized people was more barbaric than Conan's so called Barbaric people"

{Scrub the post, scrub the quote} For all effects we said the same thing.

There's a very big difference here though, what you are saying is that the point is that Conan's people are "innately better" than the Aquilonians, the Stygians, and assorted city-states by virtue of being presented as more moral...despite the fact that in most of the stories we only get a sum total of "one" Cimmerian, and what little we do know of them doesn't really present them as paragons of any civilization that can be considered "better" than another.

What I am saying is that the Aquilonians, Stygians, etc. despite having massive advanced cities, along with technology, sorcery, and the literal aid of gods/enslaved demons, are still just as savage, cruel, and barbaric as the caveman from the North and in their own ways even worse. Conan is literally a subtle critique of civilization itself, not saying that one group or way of life is better than another.




Most but not all, and even so, a merchant people is a far cry from the violent blood thirsty desert savages tropes we are discussing here. But there are many exemples of desert kingdoms that were not in fact like that and were able to build great things. Why not focus on that? Specially if you are trying to avoid racist tropes?

When were we discussing "desert tribes"? I thought we were discussing Sub-Saharan Africans.... Furthermore, you don't see anything wrong with the stereotype of creating kingdoms of nomadic Bedouins ruled by Sultans/ Caliphs which are based on trade?



Wasn't going to :smallconfused: I was actually thinking of Nabataean Kingdom since I'm a huge fan of Petra. But I would argue with you that the fact the Nile gave Egypt huge benefits that would make their civilization grow better than other places, it's still in a desert, even if it's has a river, it's in a desert biome so it's arguable a desert civilization. There is a reason their main God was the Sun and not lightning like most of their contemporaries.

The Nabataeans were not an exception to the rule, their civilization largely revolved around trading as they started out as largely nomadic pastoralists, Petra itself was founded because it overlapped many trading routes, which is why anyone was able to live there at all seeing as it was almost impossible to grow anything there.

This is a common trend in desert civilizations, they are much more reliant on importing necessities and thus their survival depends on generating wealth via facilitating trade and monopolizing the most effective means of said trade.

This is why Egypt is not a desert civilization, since they had a very stable and very fertile land which allowed them to grow and produce whatever they needed without relying too heavily on trade.

A map of ancient Egypt would quickly disprove the Western stereotype of it being a "desert biome". https://smarthistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Egypt-map.jpg

The overwhelming majority of what one would consider "Ancient Egypt" was situated in either the Nile Delta or the Nile River, in other words, the green lush areas surrounding the banks of the Nile. The deserts flanking their East and West weren't considered as part of their kingdom but rather the boarders, said deserts were also coincidently, the reason "Ancient Egypt" had survived for so long, as with natural barriers signifying their boarders their civilization was much more insular than its contemporaries, like the Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians, Myceneans, Hellenistic Greeks, Romans, etc. (and yes, Ancient Egypt was so ancient and so long lasting, that its "contemporaries" included Bronze Age civilizations and Classical Antiquity)




I mean you only have to look up in a dictionary and you will see, many words related to dark skin ended up gaining pejorative meanings, go figure, this is one of such cases, if the dictionary is not enough I suggest you seek the etymology of the word "sordid" perhaps that will ease your confusion.

Again, this is dodging the question, is the term "swarthy" actually racist? You are literally the only one here who made this insinuation, and I, a literal member of the group who should be taking offense to the term, have never seen any negative connotation with the word other than it being a descriptor at best.

Honestly, I felt that the term "brown" is slightly more offensive than "swarthy" but that is mostly because the word itself sounds kind of ugly.




I mean you are more than allowed to do it, who am I to tell you what you are allowed to do or not, the thing is such things and portrays have been done in the past, and have been done badly, so they are not well received anymore because they carry a lot of symbolic weight, and OP wanted advice on how to deal and avoid these issues, so as per it was requested I provided my point of view, I think everything I said so far is valid but I thank you for you questions, I was perhaps allowed to clarify some points, I just hope the inquiries where made out of curiosity and not with the intent of antagonizing me.

Again, the point I am making here is to explain that African civilizations are not morally better or worse than non-African ones. African countries, specifically South Africa from my experience, have plenty of problems, what with bigotry between ethnic lines, religious fundamentalism, and a lot of misogyny. Do these problems take away from how beautiful the cultures and traditions of these places are? No, but at the same time you can't pretend that these issues don't exist.



That was never the point, all those things can be done, it's just that they are ALL that has been done, for years, by people with not so noble intentions, so it comes to no surprise that it's frowned upon and other alternatives and different explorations are encouraged.

What exactly are the "other alternatives" and "different explorations" you are speaking of?

From what I notice, it seems that this means historical revision to either idealize African nations as being "pure" from the "taint" of Western imperialism, such as the Woman King in which the Dahomey are shown to be having qualms of participating in the slave trade, or involves race-swapping famous figures of antiquity to fit a narrative that sub-saharan Africans had a "proud and imperious legacy stolen from them", such as the Cleopatra documentary.

Neither of which look good in any optics to an outside observer.

[KorvinStarmast]

It would appear that the avian roost has been well and truly PWNed.

As to Conan: I've read them all, if by all you mean "the 12 paperback books with all of the R.E. Howard Conan stories in them (and a few by Lin Carter and L Sprague Decamp, IIRC) and which are still up in a box in my basement. (More or less reprints of the various pulp stories that Howard published). As best as I can recall, they were released in the 1970's due to the genre becoming popular again.
Following Howard's death, the copyright of the Conan stories passed through several hands. Eventually L. Sprague de Camp was entrusted with management of the fiction line and, beginning with 1967's Conan released by Lancer Books, oversaw a paperback series collecting all of Howard's stories (Lancer folded in 1973 and Ace Books picked up the line, reprinting the older volumes with new trade dress and continuing to release new ones). Howard's original stories received additional edits by de Camp, and de Camp also decided to create additional Conan stories to publish alongside the originals, working with Björn Nyberg and especially Lin Carter. These new stories were created from a mixture of already-complete Howard stories with different settings and characters that were altered to feature Conan and the Hyborian setting instead, incomplete fragments and outlines for Conan stories that were never completed by Howard, and all-new pastiches. Lastly, de Camp created prefaces for each story, fitting them into a timeline of Conan's life that he created.
I think that Poul Anderson's "On Thud and Blunder" was in part a send up of the Conan stories.

FWIW, I also read a number of the Conan comic books that came out in the 70's - the ones with Conan and with Red Sonya.
A lot of those books (if not all of them) had Frank Frazetta art on the covers.
A friend of mine was an avid comic book collector. While I had I tended toward Sergeant Rock and The Haunted Tank, and Sergeant Fury, he tended towards super heroes and things like Conan and Thor). He also had all of the E.R. Burroughs Mars books.

Conan was IIRC the only Cimmerian to show up in the books. For those of us reasonably well versed in the Conan storkes, the Conan movie, with Arnold as Conan, was a bit jarring since it was both similar to, and different from, the pulps.

[Cikomyr2]

Skin tone variety is not a bad thing to have in isolation, but here are a few trapfalls I'd recommend you pay attention to avoid:

- societies are not monolithic. The same family of people can have explicitly lighter or darker skins under the same genetic distribution. Its a fact that happens. Also, people migrate and travel (unless there's a good reason why not*), so you should still encounter significant number of minority ethnicities outside of their geographical points of origin. Have enclaves that migrates from one land to others, then back, etc.. the more complex and intermingled you make your societies the healthier the output will be.

- skin tone should not be correlated with specific talents, development level, etc. Dont have the dark people be advanced while whites are backward tribals, for example. You can emphasize that a culture may have speciality (ex: the eastern tropical kingdom is really into magic) but associate this more to a local geographical features rather than tie it with climate and skin tone. And don't have whatever "specialized" institution be ethnically exclusive unless its a deliberate choice you want to have in your game.

*For example, the biggest reason subsaharan people IRL did not have a history of being involved with the roman Empire or the Hellenistic world is the Sahara desert prevented most of this migration or trade.

[Perch]

If you are cherry picking portrayals, and insisting that only certain groups of people are allowed to be portrayed badly. Let's not forget that those stories are set in a late bronze to early iron age setting, when, historically, a whole lot of cultures/civilizations/city-states were absolutely horrible if we judged them based on today's standards.

In my views portrays of any culture as savages and evil is an issue, those were literal tools of colonization and racists so our fantastical literature can grow past it, more nuanced civilizations that are neutral, not inherently evil or good are way more interesting anyway.


Eh. I think that's in the eye of the beholder. Is it possible that you are defining "noble" and "depraved" based on your own stereotypes?

Nope, it's literally in the words he used, I think Howard was a product of his time and not nearly as bad as Lovecraft but he made his point clear:

"Aram Baksh is a demon! Nay, in this accursed city which Stygians built and which Hyrkanians rule—where white, brown and black folk mingle together to produce hybrids of all unholy hues and breeds—who can tell who is a man, and who a demon in disguise?"

"But they attempted no reprisal, nor did they accept Conan's urgent invitation to approach within reach of the bloody chain in his hand. Presently, grunting in their ape-like speech, they lifted the senseless black and bore him out like a sack of wheat, arms and legs dangling. They used his key to lock the door behind them, but did not remove it from the gold chain that fastened it to his girdle. They took the torch with them, and as they moved up the corridor the darkness slunk behind them like an animate thing. Their soft padding footsteps died away, with the glimmer of their torch, and darkness and silence remained unchallenged."

"The hut door opened, and a black woman entered—a lithe pantherish creature, whose supple body gleamed like polished ebony, adorned only by a wisp of silk twisted about her strutting loins. The whites of her eyeballs reflected the firelight outside, as she rolled them with wicked meaning."

“Those black pigs will never again touch your white skin”

"T eyes of those dark men, creatures full of cruelty and nothing else."


It's clear the words used to describe those peoples were a lot less than flattering, and these are only the things I'm allowed to post here without too much controversy, but either way if you compare the dehumanizing words and elements used to describe those civilizations with the sense of awe and admiration used to describe the barbaric beauty of Conan's people and you can get an ideia. If you don't I could continue on in your DM's if you want.

That's not to say anything about Robert's other novels specially the ones that are clearly more white supremacist leaning such as Black Canaan, or even his contemporaries such as Edgar Rice Burroughs. Either way all these should be exemples of the type of language OP should focus on avoiding.



But yeah. I suppose your post is a great example of why GMs need to be cautious about defining/describing skin tone at all. Because you just never known when someone is going to combine skin tone and cultural definition and make a negative correlation to some assumed steretotype.

Excuse me? Are you implying that I'm the issue?


I does come across like you can't abide any setting in which any culture in which people have dark skin area may be portrayed in any sort of negative light at all. I mean, if my setting includes a ton of different evil nations of different types, including people of different skin tones, you would be offended if one of them was of dark skin?

It's sure is possible, but I have never seen it done well, so I would rather avoid it. Even in settings where everyone is supposed to be "Barbaric" some are ALWAYS more barbaric than others. Besides as I said above, this is such a unrealistic and boring way to portray civilizations with some really questionable real life influences, why not just make the civilizations complex and interesting? With negatives and positves, like you know... Real people?


I'm not going to (nor are we allowed) ask about what specific traits you seem to think are negative stereotypes versus positive within the suset of "primitive/tribal/barbarian cultures" here.

There are many things, but to me the dehumanization, the focus on stereotypes and the disgraceful comparison to animalistic characteristics.


But maybe ask yourself if it's reasonable that if a setting is in an ancient time, that there should realistically be a ton of such cultures within it, and unless your argument is that we simple exclude all darker skinned people from our game settings, then yes, some of those folks are going to inevitably have traits that, if projected on a modern person today, we would find offensive. Um... But that's the setting.

That's has nothing to do with what I said. Is this a straw man? To be able to portray civilizations as complex and interesting instead of barbaric, savage and evil has nothing to do with... Excluding black folk from your setting? Which seems to be your point. Are you under the impression that is Black people as cannibals and caricatures or nothing at all? Are really incapable of considering any other portrait for an African inspired civilization?


All terms that refer to skin color are not innately racist.

Interesting, funny you would say that, since there is a phenomenon observed by linguists that terms used to refer to dark skin often with time gain pejorative undertones, I wonder why. :smallannoyed:

[gbaji]

In my views portrays of any culture as savages and evil is an issue, those were literal tools of colonization and racists so our fantastical literature can grow past it, more nuanced civilizations that are neutral, not inherently evil or good are way more interesting anyway.


Excuse me? Are you implying that I'm the issue?

Yes (not you personally, but the opinion/demands you are making). The statement above highlights the reason. You can't seem to be able to view ancient civilizations though an actual realistic (and historically accurate) lens, but only via your own modern perception and biases (seriouslly? "Colonialism"? When discussing ancient cultures and civilizations? You're just dropping modern rhetoric here). That's a huge problem. You're demanding something that is absolutely realistically (and certainly historically) an impossible standard. I'm not going to turn my mixed bronze/iron age fantasy setting into a modern freaking "safe space". There will be evil empires. There will be places where human sacrifice occurs. There will be evil wizards, and rulers, and worship of evil deities and demons and other nasty things. I'm not playing candyland here.

What I will not do is make any correlation at all between the physical/racial/whatever descriptions the various people I've populated this fantasy setting with and those things. But, apparently, even that isn't good enough for you.

So yeah. When faced with an impossible standard to meet, my response is to reject the impossible standard.

[Mechalich]

*For example, the biggest reason subsaharan people IRL did not have a history of being involved with the roman Empire or the Hellenistic world is the Sahara desert prevented most of this migration or trade.

This is important. The Sahara Desert, and a few thousand kilometers to the east the Himalayas, create a discontinuity in ethnic distributions that produce a correspondingly stark level of variation in melanin levels and other features that is not mirrored in places like East Asia or the Americas where such a barrier is broadly absent (there are other contributing factors too, of course). The Americas, in particular, show a distinctly reduced level of variation on this score overall because the source population was very small and comparatively recent which minimizes the amount of overall diversity. That example might be closer to a typical fantasy world in which the initial populations are either specially created by the gods or derived from small colonizer populations due to spelljamming/planar travel/other magic.

[Xervous]

I’m generally with gbaji on this matter. The expectation that the setting writer(s , editors, publishers, basically everything not on the user side) is the sole party responsible for mitigating harms derived from perception, those accurate or otherwise, is unreasonable.

It asks for a rubber stamp denial of topics regardless of context or intent. It protects the users from actual objectionable content, and denies them a chance to yield false positives stemming from errors in their own judgment. It values the safety of the least reliable user more than any potential value exploration of the topic might yield, and strives to keep such users safe not by educating them, but by dumbing down everything they might encounter.

[Perch]

Yes (not you personally, but the opinion/demands you are making). The statement above highlights the reason. You can't seem to be able to view ancient civilizations though an actual realistic

Maybe YOUR views are not realistic and full of historical bias? Ever considered that?

What's realistic about certain civilizations being evil? You do know that EVIL is not a real thing in real life right? :smallannoyed:

[False God]

Maybe YOUR views are not realistic and full of historical bias? Ever considered that?

What's realistic about certain civilizations being evil? You do know that EVIL is not a real thing in real life right? :smallannoyed:

You're the only one that is asking for a "realistic" portrayal of mankind in a fantasy setting with dragons, magic, elves and quite literally real evil gods.

[Perch]

You're the only one that is asking for a "realistic" portrayal of mankind in a fantasy setting with dragons, magic, elves and quite literally real evil gods.

No, I'm not.

I'm asking for nuance and verisimilitude, gbaji was the one claiming what I was saying was not realistic that it was creating a "safe space" or whatever.

[False God]

No, I'm not.

I'm asking for nuance and verisimilitude, gbaji was the one claiming what I was saying was not realistic that it was creating a "safe space" or whatever.

The literal definition of "verisimilitude" is "the appearance of being true or real". So yes you are asking for it to be "realistic".

[Perch]

The literal definition of "verisimilitude" is "the appearance of being true or real". So yes you are asking for it to be "realistic".

It's not the same thing.

Like shooting fire out of your hands may not be REALISTIC but if the setting has a magic system and in the magic system it described shooting fire out of your hands is possible then it has verisimilitude.

Now if the setting magic system says you can't create fire, but a character creates fire anyway that breaks the verisimilitude.

A lot of people who want to complain about verisimilitude in fantasy end up using the term realistic only the get the response "It's a world with Dragon and magic it doesn't have to be realistic" but what they wanted to say was verisimilitude, they wanted the rules of the setting, even a fantastic one, to make sense, to have an internal logic.

[False God]

It's not the same thing.

Like shooting fire out of your hands may not be REALISTIC but if the setting has a magic system and in the magic system it described shooting fire out of your hands is possible then it has verisimilitude.

Now if the setting magic system says you can't create fire, but a character creates fire anyway that breaks the verisimilitude.

A lot of people who want to complain about verisimilitude in fantasy end up using the term realistic only the get the response "It's a world with Dragon and magic it doesn't have to be realistic" but what they wanted to say was verisimilitude, they wanted the rules of the setting, even a fantastic one, to make sense, to have an internal logic.

Correction, it breaks your verisimilitude. That's exactly why I take issue with the phrase, people parrot it around like there is some universal definition of what is "believable" and there's not. All you're telling me is "I don't find this believable!" which doesn't mean much of anything. Great, you can't believe that some fantasy world can have a fantastical evil empire full of evil people. That's a you problem.

But nooooo, you gotta get this big word to hit people over the head with, "It lacks verisimilitude!" no, it doesn't. You just have a different opinion on what is or isn't believable.

See here's the thing, we can all agree on something being "realistic". We can look at the world and go "Yeah, that lines up!", but if you're saying that verisimilitude actually means "believability" well heck man, that bar is all over the place! If "verisimilitude" just means "believable within the context of the world", then coming full circle, YOUR opinion on the "verisimilitude" of something is entirely irrelevant! Has the world established itself to be internally consistent? Yes? Then it doesn't matter what it includes.

TLDR: "verisimilitude" holds no water for me. It's just a term for fantasy elitists to knock other people around with when they don't like the material someone else has created.

[PhoenixPhyre]

What's realistic about certain civilizations being evil? You do know that EVIL is not a real thing in real life right? :smallannoyed:

You're asking for realism right here. And in a world (as 99% of the D&D worlds are) where EVIL is literally a cosmic force of the universe and you can literally have creatures made out of pure physical evil...

Yeah. As to that second sentence...I'll refrain due to forum rules. Other than to say that I disagree wholeheartedly.
-----

While I, personally, prefer to have civilizations that have a mix of redeeming and, well, not so redeeming features, I can see the attraction of having an Evil Empire. NOTE this does not mean that everyone in that empire is EVIL. Just that the culture pushes toward evil and rewards those that do so.

[Mechalich]

While I, personally, prefer to have civilizations that have a mix of redeeming and, well, not so redeeming features, I can see the attraction of having an Evil Empire. NOTE this does not mean that everyone in that empire is EVIL. Just that the culture pushes toward evil and rewards those that do so.

Many fantasy settings (including most iterations of D&D) are functionally superhero settings and it is entirely possible for the culture of a state to be wholly determined by the ideology of a single individual in a way that simply isn't possible in the real world. This makes 'evil empires' easier to justify since their origins and maintenance can be placed at the feet of a single figure or small group. Similarly, it also facilitates 'enlightened dictatorships' since the would-be virtuous overlord can bypass limitations that normally prevent scaling of the tyranny of the just.

[MonochromeTiger]

Many fantasy settings (including most iterations of D&D) are functionally superhero settings and it is entirely possible for the culture of a state to be wholly determined by the ideology of a single individual in a way that simply isn't possible in the real world. This makes 'evil empires' easier to justify since their origins and maintenance can be placed at the feet of a single figure or small group. Similarly, it also facilitates 'enlightened dictatorships' since the would-be virtuous overlord can bypass limitations that normally prevent scaling of the tyranny of the just.

Also makes it much easier to have "the people are opposed to this act of cruelty/lack of compassion but they can't do anything about it" when the people in charge literally have the ability to wipe out people who complain too loudly en masse.

[Anymage]

Many fantasy settings (including most iterations of D&D) are functionally superhero settings and it is entirely possible for the culture of a state to be wholly determined by the ideology of a single individual in a way that simply isn't possible in the real world. This makes 'evil empires' easier to justify since their origins and maintenance can be placed at the feet of a single figure or small group. Similarly, it also facilitates 'enlightened dictatorships' since the would-be virtuous overlord can bypass limitations that normally prevent scaling of the tyranny of the just.

Even in such settings, it's better if the person/group in charge considers themselves in the right and tries to justify why what they're doing is in fact good. Real world history has no shortage of people trying to paint things like genocide or slavery in a positive light, so they can be used as inspiration.

Still, that's kind of tangential to the topic at hand. Thay exists as an evil empire. And while I'm sure someone somewhere has gotten upset over it, I haven't seen any traction on the topic equivalent to other hot button topics. Meanwhile the question of if various humanoid groups (usually orcs) carry troublesome colonial baggage has spawned countless threads and locked a good number of those. What real-world baggage a given idea carries, and how the DM (if doing for their own table) or authors (if wanting to publish) want to handle those issues, is its own long and involved topic for discussion and I have little interest in relitigating it. Except to say that I can see the appeal of a cosmopolitan fantasy melting pot on several levels. I totally understand why authors would want to go for that, and it's also sensible that a hired DM would want the most flexible world possible if they want to easily slot in any group they happen to come across.

[Perch]

I have read a few of the books namely the Coming of Conan and Conan the Barbarian, but most of my understanding of the franchise comes from the wiki and Youtube

Oh, I see. Pity.


Howard may have come up with Conan, but because of his death and due to the massive popularity of the character, other writers have been adding to the mythos or re-adapting Conan's stories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conan_(books)

That's also not including the comics, the videogames, and the movies which seem to deviate from the books.

I'm well aware, many of his peers liked sharing their universes and making cameos or references, Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith (Oh look a member of the group who wasn't a massive racist even for the time) did the same, you don't have to go on Conanxplaining on me again.


Furthermore, did you really read through his work just to come up with notes on why it is problematic? :smallconfused: Or are you just be sarcastic?

Not at all! Sword and sorcery (specifically Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser and the Elric Saga) was what got me in fantasy and RPG in the frist place! I love this type of setting much more than heroic fantasy, I re-read those books as an adult and made notes (as I do for everything I read) and since as an adult I have much more racial counsious among my notes were exemples of racism, sexism and other stuff that didn't age well.


Side note, if you have read his works, why do you need to go back and look at your notes to tell me what exactly Howard wrote that is considered racist? :smallconfused:

Because, it's not the type of thing I can recall from the top of my head.


Putting aside the Netflix lawsuit controversy...

I'm unfamiliar with this and fail to see how it's relevant to the topic at hand.


You don't see anything culturally insensitive about painting an entire continent with such a broad stroke?

{Scrubbed}I said those stories used a lot of African coded civilizations, you counter argued with one civilization that you claimed to be Egyptian coded as if that would debunk my argument, I demonstrated confusion since the civilization you used as an exemple of not being African was in fact African... So I have literally no ideia of what you are going about with this.


This is literally the equivalent of saying that Aztecs, Iroquois, and Hopi Indians are "all the same"....

Not it's not... Those civilizations are not in the same continent. My inicial claim was that African cultures were being demonized in those works, you said they weren't and counter argued using an African civilization as an exemple, I pointed out that such argument was not a good counter argument since it actually proved my point.


When you and I were starting this conversation, it was very clear that the unfortunate implications were targeted towards black people, i.e. sub-saharan Africans

Nope, we were talking about black people in general in the start and then we went to Africa as a whole.


The fact that you're trying to lump them all together {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

I'm not, my point is precisely the opposite how those peoples are diverse and complex and portraying all civilizations with one note is what the OP should avoid, you and the other are the ones harping on about the importance of Evil tribal empires full of cannibals who worship demons, a one sided, racist, shallow and honestly corny view on worldbuilding.


Their sense of "honor" isn't even that moral though...
That's just your opinion. It's quite clear not only to me but to most Conan specialists that the central point of the narrative in those short stories was that there is greater nobility in barbariasm compared to the sedentery and civilized who are the true vipers.


Question, which Cimmerians get elevated here? Conan sure, but he's literally the protagonist of this epic story so yeah, him becoming the Barbarian King of Aquilonia is a foregone conclusion.

But he isn't the entire Cimmerian people... despite the fact that for the majority of his stories, he is literally the only Cimmerian present.

Maybe not, but he is an stand in for his people, not everything in a story needs to be literal you can infer things and themes using your reading comprehension skills. Not everything needs to be spelled out... Or maybe it does... :smallconfused:


What I am saying is that the Aquilonians, Stygians, etc. despite having massive advanced cities, along with technology, sorcery, and the literal aid of gods/enslaved demons, are still just as savage, cruel, and barbaric as the caveman from the North and in their own ways even worse. Conan is literally a subtle critique of civilization itself, not saying that one group or way of life is better than another.

Yes, that's the point, but if pay attention of the qualities of Conan that are highlighted by the language and symbolism contrasted by the animalistic comparison and claims of corruption other civilizations get you can form in you can understand the point the author is trying to come across.

Is the thing I said in the start, even when all civilizations are full barbaric and savages not all barbarians an savages are equal, some are better than others.


When were we discussing "desert tribes"? I thought we were discussing Sub-Saharan Africans...
{Scrubbed}I was clearly was talking about African societies and desert dwelling societies, if you read that and pictured "Sub-Saharan Africans" I'm not much to blame.


Furthermore, you don't see anything wrong with the stereotype of creating kingdoms of nomadic Bedouins ruled by Sultans/ Caliphs which are based on trade?

Errr... Nothing? As I have said before? I'm just repeating myself at this point.



The Nabataeans were not an exception to the rule, their civilization largely revolved around trading as they started out as largely nomadic pastoralists, Petra itself was founded because it overlapped many trading routes, which is why anyone was able to live there at all seeing as it was almost impossible to grow anything there.

Which is far different from your point implying that desert dwelling civilizations were unable to build anything great.


This is why Egypt is not a desert civilization, since they had a very stable and very fertile land which allowed them to grow and produce whatever they needed without relying too heavily on trade.

It's a desert civilization that had a very big and fertile river, allowing them to have luxuries unavailable for many other places. Still they were a desert civilization who lived in a desert sounded by sand, you can have a big delata and be in the middle of jungle or whatever, the fact they were in a delta and had a big river doesn't change the fact they were also in a desert, those things are not interchangeable.


A map of ancient Egypt would quickly disprove the Western stereotype of it being a "desert biome". https://smarthistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Egypt-map.jpg

That maps clearly shows a desert dude LOL.


The overwhelming majority of what one would consider "Ancient Egypt" was situated in either the Nile Delta or the Nile River, in other words, the green lush areas surrounding the banks of the Nile. The deserts flanking their East and West weren't considered as part of their kingdom but rather the boarders, said deserts were also coincidently, the reason "Ancient Egypt" had survived for so long, as with natural barriers signifying their boarders their civilization was much more insular than its contemporaries, like the Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians, Myceneans, Hellenistic Greeks, Romans, etc. (and yes, Ancient Egypt was so ancient and so long lasting, that its "contemporaries" included Bronze Age civilizations and Classical Antiquity)

None of that Egyptxplaining will change the fact that they lived in a fertile region of a desert. So therefore they can be honestly called a Desert civilization.



Again, this is dodging the question, is the term "swarthy" actually racist?
I'm no authority on what's racist or not, the term has negative roots and has negative meanings, I have provided the evidence for that to you, if you still want to use it go for it by all means, i have literally no way to stop you. I only made a recommendation.

Queer used to be a slur for a very long time, now it has been reclaimed so some people even use it to self identify, still some people hate it and have bad experiences with it, who am I to say what words are good or not, I just warned you that this specific word has racist connotations, you can do with that knowledge what you will.


Again, the point I am making here is to explain that African civilizations are not morally better or worse than non-African ones.

That's not your point at all, that's my point, that those civilizations are complex and have been victims of stereotypes and media used to demonize them and mock them, such things should be avoided going forward for a coherent portrait of a civilization that is not BETTER but also not WORST.

Your point as far as I understand is that such portraits are not bad and negative at all and authors should not be concerned with reproducing racist tropes and patterns that have symbolic meaning because of their history of being used as propaganda and oppression. Authors can do anything and everything they want with their works, all while commenting on a thread of someone asking for advice on how to AVOID this kind of issues.


What exactly are the "other alternatives" and "different explorations" you are speaking of?

The use of empires with interesting cultures, architecture, religions and fashion is a start.


From what I notice, it seems that this means historical revision to either idealize African nations as being "pure" from the "taint" of Western imperialism, such as the Woman King in which the Dahomey are shown to be having qualms of participating in the slave trade, or involves race-swapping famous figures of antiquity to fit a narrative that sub-saharan Africans had a "proud and imperious legacy stolen from them", such as the Cleopatra documentary.

I think the issue is that you are not arguing with my comments but some imaginary cultural battle in your head. None of that you wrote has anything to do with what I said.

[flat_footed]

The Fullmetal Mod: Thread closed for review.

[Pirate ninja]

Modly Roger:

The thread has been reviewed and reopened.

Please be careful to be respectful to one another, and keep to the forum rules.

[KorvinStarmast]

Many fantasy settings (including most iterations of D&D) are functionally superhero settings and it is entirely possible for the culture of a state to be wholly determined by the ideology of a single individual in a way that simply isn't possible in the real world.
Evil Overlord Trope comes to mind. :smallbiggrin:

This makes 'evil empires' easier to justify since their origins and maintenance can be placed at the feet of a single figure or small group. Similarly, it also facilitates 'enlightened dictatorships' since the would-be virtuous overlord can bypass limitations that normally prevent scaling of the tyranny of the just. Fiction also includes quite a bit of wish fulfillment and wishful thinking by various authors. This can also hold true for DM's.

Also makes it much easier to have "the people are opposed to this act of cruelty/lack of compassion but they can't do anything about it" when the people in charge literally have the ability to wipe out people who complain too loudly en masse. Ain't Magic Grand? :smalleek: Bavmorda (Willow's BBEG) would turn people into pigs if they pissed her off.

[False God]

Still, that's kind of tangential to the topic at hand. Thay exists as an evil empire. And while I'm sure someone somewhere has gotten upset over it, I haven't seen any traction on the topic equivalent to other hot button topics. Meanwhile the question of if various humanoid groups (usually orcs) carry troublesome colonial baggage has spawned countless threads and locked a good number of those. What real-world baggage a given idea carries, and how the DM (if doing for their own table) or authors (if wanting to publish) want to handle those issues, is its own long and involved topic for discussion and I have little interest in relitigating it. Except to say that I can see the appeal of a cosmopolitan fantasy melting pot on several levels. I totally understand why authors would want to go for that, and it's also sensible that a hired DM would want the most flexible world possible if they want to easily slot in any group they happen to come across.

I have noticed that explicitly magical nations seem to get a pass no matter what. They can be good nations, they can be bad nations, they can be totally normative nations. But generally when the subject of "proper presentation of a culture"(even a fantasy one comes up) nations and cultures such as these straight up get a pass. The Sith and the Jedi are often given much the same treatment. Noone really cares that the Sith are largely made up of (in all likelyhood) non-evil normies and it is totally accepted that they're an magical evil empire ruled by totally evil magic people and an magic evil overlord. The same holds true for the Jedi, noone really complains when the Jedi are by-and-large presented as a bunch of holier-than-thou do-gooders. Those that aren't are treated as exceptions not fair presentations that there are differences in opinion and personality within the culture-group.

Everyone simply accepts that this is either "just how it is" or that it's totally unrealistic but we should suspend our disbelief for the sake of the story, since "presenting the nation/culture of the evil empire" is just not relevant. The point is to tell the story of the young chosen one going against impossible odds and a whole bunch of baddies because of destiny or whatever.

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Which, I think, is quite unfair to people who earnestly want to present nations that aren't cardboard cutouts of good or evil, which is substantially more work and runs much higher risk of failure.

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I personally find the "magic melting pot" to be almost as trite and cardboard as the wholly evil empire. Given a world where fear of what lurks in the shadows isn't just some paranoid fantasy, but actual reality. Given a world where the technology level (even with magic) is much lower, where disease, poverty and death are much more likely, it stands out in almost ridiculous contrast. And it's not surprising that these locations are almost always high-magic, once again seemingly giving them a pass on how glaringly strange they feel in the face of the world in which they exist. That the people with all the power are somehow not corrupt, that they have gathered here for the benefit of all species, that they have built a city of magical street-lights, crystal towers and magical works of art and somehow this has resulted in some kind of magical utopia where people hold hands and fight the forces of darkness with the power of friendship.

----
I'm down for giving "fair" presentations of fantastical cultures, but that hardly calls for a neutral approach. Cultures can and historically have been made of bad people. Perhaps not villainously evil, and perhaps many of the day-to-day folks were simply afraid to speak up because their Evil Overlord can literally dust them, maybe they even find it easy and preferably to be "diet evil" in order to not find themselves on the chopping block. Maybe simply living in this empire incentivizes evil in order to be successful. In a normal world, this might not be stable in the long term, but it's fantasy, and over time a society that finds this approach to be successful will continue to do so. Which, after a while, may mean we really do end up with a society where everyone is on the dark side of the spectrum.

I think that is an absolutely fair presentation of a possible fantasy evil society. We don't need to give equal spotlight to the rebels simply because they have an alternate point of view that probably includes blue jeans, apple pie and good-goodyness. We don't need to suggest that there are lots of different viewpoints, or ways of life, the fact that there aren't is kinda the POINT.

And there are plenty of real historical cultures that really did lack internal diversity (not just racial), but ones where by-and-large, variation within the people was low. They subscribed to the same or very similar set of beliefs, they all behaved and thought in a very similar manner, and yes, they didn't always agree, but from the outside perspective especially (the only perspective characters in a game/story may get until they actually visit this place) it can be very difficult to see any difference at all.

I think it's important to remember that for most settings, the PCs will be the outsiders. That they will only have piecemeal information on even their own nation, and this won't change until further down the road. So it is not unsurprising that initial descriptions of totally new cultures may seem almost cartoonish. Initial reactions should be to dig deeper, before criticizing.

[gbaji]

I'm asking for nuance and verisimilitude, gbaji was the one claiming what I was saying was not realistic that it was creating a "safe space" or whatever.

Not going to get into a discsussion about the menaing of verisimilitude, or whatever. And several folks have discussed and examined the whole "these are fantasy settings", bits. And I do think it is important to recognize that we are building "fantasy settings" here.

Having said that, we are also going to tend to take bits and pieces of what we know and put them into those settings (I think I posted about this earlier, about not just dropping whole historical cultures into place, but certainly taking elements here and there and sprinkling them around, applying fantasy changes to them, etc). And yes, this does mean that some elements of social, economic, political, or whatever factors are going to "make sense" and "fit together", due to our own understandings of how those thing work and fit together historically. Which is what I was referring to when I spoke of things being "realistic". It's not literally "this is some real thing that really exists(ed) in our own world", but "this is something that makes sense to exist in the fantasy world because the elements contained within follow similar rules and interactions that we know existed in our own world". Like a large Island nation is probably going to have a lot of ships and engage in maritime trade. That makes sense. That is "realistic". A nation with large amounts of fields and grasslands, could be full of nomadic folks, or could have a lot of farmers, kinda depending on other factors. Both "make sense" and are "realistic".

And yeah, as to social stuff, it's also realistic to realize that some of these cultures (most if we're set in an earlier/ancient age) are not going to come close to meeting the ethical/moral standards that we apply to ourselves. Now, we can certainly build worlds and societies in those worlds that follow our more modern views on these things. And I actually think most of us do tend at least a bit in that direction anyway. Certainly, I doubt many players are going to enjoy playing in a game where they are actively engaged in or employed in industries and activities that we as modern folks find morally reprehensible. But it's also "realistic" that those things may exist in the game setting itself, possibly as something the PCs may have to deal with (and can create moral quandaries for the players to work through, if the folks at the table are so inclined). So we do kinda already automatically place some modifications on such things anyway. But I don't think that "eliminate them entirely" is a great answer either.

The "reality" is that what we modern folks view as moral/ethical is historically the exception and not the rule. Now, we can certainly imagine a fantasy setting where magic is used in place of industry and these things allow for greater prosperity across the board, or the gods have decrees about behavior, and these sorts of things thus allow for the sorts of social standards we expect today. But that's not going to be the case most of the time in most settings (and frankly, opens up a whole set of additional "how do we make this work" problems that are too numerous to discuss here). But if I'm just creating a generic kingdom in a fantasy settings, it's going to have to exist at least somewhat within the "rules" of how such hierachical power structures somewhat have to exist. And yeah, as a consequence, that's going to have to include elements in that society that we today would almost certainly find to be "wrong". I'm not putting those things in to be capricious, or to force something unpleasant on my players, but simply because "in order to have a king, and a rank of nobility, and descending hierachy in here, I also have to have all of the things that support and maintain that type of power structure". I can certainly downplay these things as it relates to day to day play at the table (and whatever adventure type stuff I'm putting in there). But it's still going to exist, somewhere in the setting.

That's all I was talking about here, when I talked about being "realistic". That pretty much all societies in such a setting are going to include elements that some modern players might find questionable and/or objectionable. That's the nature of such a time period, so if we're simulating such in our settings, they are going to exist. And yeah, as I said earlier, I'm not at all going to correlate any of that with any specific physical characteristics (including skin tone) of the people I've populated my world with. But I'm also not going to bend over backwards to avoid any such "questionable" actions or behaviors existing based on those physical characteristics either. Because that would also be "wrong" in my opinion.

I just think that's a perfectly acceptable set of rules for creating such settings. And, if those rules are followed, and a player is still finding offense somewhere in there, either I've missed something (which is certainly possible), or the player is injecting some external biases into their own perception of the setting. And yeah. Then adjustments have to be made. But I'm going to lean towards not making my entire setting nonsensical just to avoid offending a really easily offended person (if I find that is the case). What's the old saying? You can please all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you can't please all the people all of the time. At a certain point, you may just be running into this and have to make a decision as to whether to keep the setting or the player. I'm not running a modern ethics/morality workshop here. I'm running a fantasy game in a fantasy settting. So I'm going to focus on that objective.

[Telok]

The same holds true for the Jedi, noone really complains when the Jedi are by-and-large presented as a bunch of holier-than-thou do-gooders. Those that aren't are treated as exceptions not fair presentations that there are differences in opinion and personality within the culture-group.

The jedi aren't a culture-group though. They're a cult that takes little kids from their families and indoctrinates them into a "us-vs-them holier-than-thou" mind set. Heck 5-6 year old kids are "too old" because they already have enough independence to make their own decisions. Drop or look past the whole morally good/bad whitewashing distraction stuff and most of your magical societies suddenly get really uncomfortably creepy, especially jedi.

[Perch]

I personally find the "magic melting pot" to be almost as trite and cardboard as the wholly evil empire.

But I don't think that was the point, no one, at least in my perception were arguing in favor of a "magic melting pot" setting. You can have other options is not either evil cartoonist empire or Saturday morning cartoon. The nuance is lost in those and nuance is what, at least I, was arguing for.


The "reality" is that what we modern folks view as moral/ethical is historically the exception and not the rule.

Again, I don't think anyone here was advocating for Wakanda, just the avoidance of using certain tropes that perpetuates issues.

The avoidance of certain tropes in my views, is not the same as a fabrication and lie full of rainbows and everyone dancing while holding hands.


The jedi aren't a culture-group though. They're a cult that takes little kids from their families and indoctrinates them into a "us-vs-them holier-than-thou" mind set. Heck 5-6 year old kids are "too old" because they already have enough independence to make their own decisions. Drop or look past the whole morally good/bad whitewashing distraction stuff and most of your magical societies suddenly get really uncomfortably creepy, especially jedi.

Agreed, it is very creepy when you start to think about it, the quasi religious themes make it even creepier. But I mean... It kind of make sense, Jedi are celibate right? They have no other option to fill their ranks, this was my head canon as a kid on why Hags and witches in fairy tales abduct kids, sure to eat but besides that also to turn into the next generation of Witches.

[Mechalich]

The jedi aren't a culture-group though. They're a cult that takes little kids from their families and indoctrinates them into a "us-vs-them holier-than-thou" mind set. Heck 5-6 year old kids are "too old" because they already have enough independence to make their own decisions. Drop or look past the whole morally good/bad whitewashing distraction stuff and most of your magical societies suddenly get really uncomfortably creepy, especially jedi.

Cult is unfair. The Jedi are a monastic order. There are numerous real-world examples of monastic orders that take in apprentices at very young ages in this way, including the one the Jedi Order was deliberately and directly based upon (I believe forum rules don't allow me to say which one, but it's not difficult to figure out). Monastic orders practice both selective recruitment - they control who gets to join - and ideological policing - an initiate who won't affirm the required beliefs gets booted - and are therefore quite homogenous in beliefs, practices, and behaviors, and monasticism, while not universal to human cultures, is an extremely common practice that has originated many times in different faiths.

The thing about fantasy compared to reality is that in many fantasy settings contemplating esoteric mysteries gives you superpowers (though for much of human history most humans believed this to be fundamentally true, which somewhat complicates things). In Star Wars this is basically the only way to get superpowers, which obviously has a rather profound impact on the setting compared to D&D, in which monastic devotion is something like one of a dozen ways to get superpowers and not even close to the best one.


Having said that, we are also going to tend to take bits and pieces of what we know and put them into those settings (I think I posted about this earlier, about not just dropping whole historical cultures into place, but certainly taking elements here and there and sprinkling them around, applying fantasy changes to them, etc). And yes, this does mean that some elements of social, economic, political, or whatever factors are going to "make sense" and "fit together", due to our own understandings of how those thing work and fit together historically. Which is what I was referring to when I spoke of things being "realistic". It's not literally "this is some real thing that really exists(ed) in our own world", but "this is something that makes sense to exist in the fantasy world because the elements contained within follow similar rules and interactions that we know existed in our own world". Like a large Island nation is probably going to have a lot of ships and engage in maritime trade. That makes sense. That is "realistic". A nation with large amounts of fields and grasslands, could be full of nomadic folks, or could have a lot of farmers, kinda depending on other factors. Both "make sense" and are "realistic".

The tricky part here is that often you can't just 'apply fantasy changes' to some real-world phenomenon because the fantasy elements completely overwhelm that element. For example, using the skin color example of the OP, we can look at D&D elves and note that while most elves do appear to display some level of melanistic variation based on latitude (Arctic Elves being notably pale), the Drow completely violate environmental expectations. In that case we even know the reason: direct divine intervention in the form of an extremely potent curse. This is one reason why it's very important, in world-building to evaluate elements in terms of how they are impacted by the presence of whatever fantastical elements have been added to the setting. This is also why establishing verisimilitude is significant easier the fewer such elements there are.

[Perch]

In Star Wars this is basically the only way to get superpowers, which obviously has a rather profound impact on the setting compared to D&D, in which monastic devotion is something like one of a dozen ways to get superpowers and not even close to the best one..

This is a great quote! I find it both brilliant and somehow hilarious.

And yeah monastic order is more accurate, now that I come to think of it, Wizards used to have a lot of monk characteristics.

[KorvinStarmast]

Which, I think, is quite unfair to people who earnestly want to present nations that aren't cardboard cutouts of good or evil, which is substantially more work and runs much higher risk of failure. QFT


I personally find the "magic melting pot" to be almost as trite and cardboard as the wholly evil empire.
An interesting take on the magical culture was in Ursula K. Leguinn's A Wizard of Earthsea, but, as much as I loved the original trilogy, one of the things that I didn't care for was the whole you have to go to magic school to become a wizard although Ged's quest takes him well away from that school ... but I'll not get into spoilers)
The cliche/trope that I find more useful for a game is the origin as an apprentice to an accomplished or private master / mage / adept / what have you - FWIW, this is how the Grey Mouser started before he became a thief and an adventurer. He was a magician's apprentice.
And then, **something happens** and the character grows from being an apprentice into A Character.
I find that this approach fits with a PC full caster far better than "you came from Magic U and off you go"because that presumes a far more cosmopolitan, modern, anachronistic culture than where the genre comes from.
(Yes, I am not a Harry Potter fan; and the world building implications of the casters-versus-muggles is another case of creepy that I can do without).
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I think it's important to remember that for most settings, the PCs will be the outsiders. Or at least misfits of some kind. They are unusual / unique for reason x, y, or z.

The nuance is lost in those and nuance is what, at least I, was arguing for. Then be prepared to do a great deal more work. (It may pay off and it may also snowball into even more work).

The Jedi are a monastic order. Well put.
We had an interesting thread a few years ago on the 5e forum about how to create a Jedi (with of course a heavy nod towards optimization and multiclassing) which unfortunately ignored that thematic element.

[Cikomyr2]

Thing is, people often associate a government/their agent to the people and culture they have arisen from.

Evil Empire can exist, just maybe acknowledge that just because the Empire of Thay's armies are pillaging and conquering, it doesnt mean all Thayan support these conquests. Sure, the soldiers may or may not be willing participants in the horrors, but thinking the entire culture is reduced to the ***soldiers*** or their corrupt leader would be if native pacific islanders believe that all americans live a highly regimented lifestyle and wear blue camo patterns because they only interacted with US Navy personel.

"My experience represents the totality of what you can experience" is the usual problematic assumption

[False God]

The jedi aren't a culture-group though. They're a cult that takes little kids from their families and indoctrinates them into a "us-vs-them holier-than-thou" mind set. Heck 5-6 year old kids are "too old" because they already have enough independence to make their own decisions. Drop or look past the whole morally good/bad whitewashing distraction stuff and most of your magical societies suddenly get really uncomfortably creepy, especially jedi.

Only in the context of the Original Trilogy/PT/ST, accounting for the Jedi in the past they are yes, primarily a monastic order as pointed out below, but they are also a culture group, with their own architecture, art, clothing and cultural norms; and they are quite distinct from the world around them even when they leave their little enclaves.

But my main point was more than magical societies seem to get an inherent pass on believability. Regardless of how good or evil or well or poorly written they are.


But I don't think that was the point, no one, at least in my perception were arguing in favor of a "magic melting pot" setting. You can have other options is not either evil cartoonist empire or Saturday morning cartoon. The nuance is lost in those and nuance is what, at least I, was arguing for.
No, I brought it up because there is a lot of talk in this thread about societies that are "just one thing", good, evil, purple, whatever. I wanted to point out that the "magical melting pot" which you aren't arguing for, but is often used as an example of idealized society since it holds to many of our modern values, is just as bad because it makes no sense within the world.

And yes obviously you can have options beyond cartoonishly good or evil, that should be obvious. And fundamentally, there should always be some assumption that nuance exists, even if it isn't addressed. There's probably a couple folks within the evil kingdom who don't like it being evil, and some folks in the Good Kingdom who want it to be more aggressive. But monolithic cultures are not historically unusual, and it doesn't create "neutrality" or "nuance" to show that there is a minor faction that disagrees with the national culture. Cultures do not have be presented as "balanced" between the various ideologies within them, and more often than not, aren't. Not having a diversity of internal opinions, not having some kind of balance does not make them not nuanced. That's not where nuance comes from anyway.


An interesting take on the magical culture was in Ursula K. Leguinn's A Wizard of Earthsea, but, as much as I loved the original trilogy, one of the things that I didn't care for was the whole you have to go to magic school to become a wizard although Ged's quest takes him well away from that school ... but I'll not get into spoilers)
The cliche/trope that I find more useful for a game is the origin as an apprentice to an accomplished or private master / mage / adept / what have you - FWIW, this is how the Grey Mouser started before he became a thief and an adventurer. He was a magician's apprentice.
And then, **something happens** and the character grows from being an apprentice into A Character.
I find that this approach fits with a PC full caster far better than "you came from Magic U and off you go"because that presumes a far more cosmopolitan, modern, anachronistic culture than where the genre comes from.
(Yes, I am not a Harry Potter fan; and the world building implications of the casters-versus-muggles is another case of creepy that I can do without).
I'm not a Potter fan, but mostly because I was too old for the target demographic when the books/movies started hitting. I've now seen all the movies, but I've no interest in reading the books.

As someone who didn't really enjoy highschool or college (I liked learning, I just didn't like the experience) I really have no love for the idealization of the structured education experience in media. A time for "growing up" a time for "experiencing new things" a time for "all that dumb kid stuff" before becoming an adult. It just doesn't resonate with me. So I like my fantasy educational institutions to be just that, educational institutions and in that context, they should be contextually appropriate to education of the times.

I enjoy the "Magic U" setup when it is appropriately framed in the context of the world in which it exists: usually a place for rich kids. With the occasional exception of the MC, whose magic is just too magical to leave on the streets. Potter does this to some extent early on, but the contrast between his oppressive mundane life and his freeing magical life gets dropped somewhere (about movie/book? 3 I think?) and turns into a generic "lets have adventures at school!" Scooby-Doo sort of thing.


Or at least misfits of some kind. They are unusual / unique for reason x, y, or z.
I meant in the context that the PCs exist within the world, but they are being played by people outside the world. Everything their characters "know" is something the DM has to tell them. Beforehand, during play, as it comes up, whatever. The end-of-the-day issue is that the players themselves don't exist within the world and can only know what they are told. Nuance, going back to Perch's point, may exist, but the players haven't encountered it yet, even if reasonably speaking their characters may have. Which is just to call on the viewer to be patient with the presentation. The GM put a lot of work into it, the least you can do is give him some time to show it all to you!

[Satinavian]

As someone who didn't really enjoy highschool or college (I liked learning, I just didn't like the experience) I really have no love for the idealization of the structured education experience in media. A time for "growing up" a time for "experiencing new things" a time for "all that dumb kid stuff" before becoming an adult. It just doesn't resonate with me. So I like my fantasy educational institutions to be just that, educational institutions and in that context, they should be contextually appropriate to education of the times.
I like the magic school setup. But... it has to be a magic school. Not some magic boot camp or a magic gladiatorial arena for minors. It should be generally safe enough for people to actually want to send their kids to. And beneficial.
Also it would be nice, if at least a third of the tought topics were general knowledge : math, history, ancient languages etc. And i want a magic school setup to show and explore the magic theory of the world, the magic system as seen through an In-World academic lens.

[BRC]

No, I brought it up because there is a lot of talk in this thread about societies that are "just one thing", good, evil, purple, whatever. I wanted to point out that the "magical melting pot" which you aren't arguing for, but is often used as an example of idealized society since it holds to many of our modern values, is just as bad because it makes no sense within the world.

And yes obviously you can have options beyond cartoonishly good or evil, that should be obvious. And fundamentally, there should always be some assumption that nuance exists, even if it isn't addressed. There's probably a couple folks within the evil kingdom who don't like it being evil, and some folks in the Good Kingdom who want it to be more aggressive. But monolithic cultures are not historically unusual, and it doesn't create "neutrality" or "nuance" to show that there is a minor faction that disagrees with the national culture. Cultures do not have be presented as "balanced" between the various ideologies within them, and more often than not, aren't. Not having a diversity of internal opinions, not having some kind of balance does not make them not nuanced. That's not where nuance comes from anyway.


I want to talk about "magical melting pots" for a moment.

A lot of the lack of nuance in fantasy settings comes from the fact that we're experiencing the setting as a tool for storytelling, which means that all details of the setting, cultures and peoples included, are tools of that storytelling.

Historically, 99% of people spend their lives involved with the production of food or basic goods. Every full-time soldier needs something like ten farmers, three weavers, a miner, six cart-drivers, and a tenth of a highly specialized blacksmith. But, Fantasy Worlds rarely have time to do a deep-dive on every culture, because cultures tend to serve a role in a story.

But in fantasy stories, everything serves a narrative function, and extraneous detail just takes up space and ruins pacing. So, The Scalgathar Peoples are boiled down to one-note raiders from across the sea, because that's the function the story needs them to serve, and we don't have space to establish the 10 farmers, three weavers, miners, cart drivers, and 10% of a blacksmith just going about their ordinary, complex lives behind each raider our heroic protagonists cuts down.

If our story takes place far from Scalgathar lands, it's not unrealistic for every Scalgathar the protagonists meet to be a raider. There may be peace loving Scalgathar merchants and travelers, but, for very good reasons, they don't go to the same place Raiders go. If we approach the setting with, as you say, the assumption of Nuance, we can assume that there's nothing inherently evil about the Scalgathar, we just happen to only meet evil ones, or even that, historically speaking, "Going and raiding some other people for material gain" doesn't make a culture unusually evil. Some groups raid, some conquer and enslave, and some just stick to brutally oppressing their peasants here at home. Or maybe, the Scalgathar culture is just cool with raiding and pillaging, as some cultures are, and this isn't supposed to be a statement that some groups of people are inherently evil and should be destroyed.


However, stories exist within a context, and there's plenty of sci fi and fantasy stories that deliberately boil away that nuance. You meet some Scalgathar raiders, and it's canon that Scalgathar society revolves entirely around raiding and murdering, and that this is because the Scalgathar are inherently evil and love to raid and pillage and murder. Because "Our protagonists are in a situation where it is correct to fight and kill these people" requires a touch of nuance and complexity compared to "Oh yeah, those people are just evil, it's always correct to fight and kill them".

So, I can't really blame people for abandoning the assumption of Nuance, because so many fantasy settings like to take the role a group plays in a story, and go out of their way to make that central to that group's identity. Countering that usually means doing a lot of work to build the nuance into the setting, you can't just have Scalgathar Raiders, because even if you don't go out of your way to canonize their entire culture as being based around Raiding, people have been trained to assume that unless you specifically point out otherwise.


The "Magical Melting Pot" setting (at least as I understand it) may be less "Realistic" historically speaking, but it is a convenient shortcut to help free the setting of that context, and bring back the assumption of Nuance. "This is a Magical Melting Pot, people from everywhere live everywhere and do everything" is a big label that stops people from making the assumptions that other fantasy and sci-fi works have drilled into them, without having to go out of your way to counter those assumptions with every new culture and group you introduce.

[False God]

I like the magic school setup. But... it has to be a magic school. Not some magic boot camp or a magic gladiatorial arena for minors. It should be generally safe enough for people to actually want to send their kids to. And beneficial.
Also it would be nice, if at least a third of the tought topics were general knowledge : math, history, ancient languages etc. And i want a magic school setup to show and explore the magic theory of the world, the magic system as seen through an In-World academic lens.

Yes exactly.

It's a big drawback to a lot of anime for me, where "kids with guns"(be it magic, giant robots, or w/e) are just running around the halls assaulting each other. It's one thing to embrace the Japanese cultural norm of trusting children to run the system, it's another when said children are clearly not.

The disconnect, the isolation from the world around them seems to promote the more "children gladiatorial playpen" approach to "schools". It is the connection to the world at large, the consequences, real and implied of quacking around and finding out that make a [magic] school work. Disconnected presentations only seem to demonstrate the author hasn't put much thought into the implications for the wider world.

[Telok]

So, I can't really blame people for abandoning the assumption of Nuance, because so many fantasy settings like to take the role a group plays in a story, and go out of their way to make that central to that group's identity. Countering that usually means doing a lot of work to build the nuance into the setting, you can't just have Scalgathar Raiders, because even if you don't go out of your way to canonize their entire culture as being based around Raiding, people have been trained to assume that unless you specifically point out otherwise.

That's one thing I'm trying to do in my current bit of worldbuilding. Everyone has been a horrible bad guy at some point, everyone has mistakes & hubris in the history, and everyone is doing something good. Are there factions that are currently better or worse? Yeah, but its never total. So I've got vegan mind flayers, evil empire celestials, elf tech-priests, ork peace protesters, Nurgle hospice, and shining holy defender of the downtrodden paladins of Khorne. Not all over everything, but they're there. Plus working on full killing the species=identity thing.

I don't agree on the Jedi being a distinct culture thing, but I suspect that's likely due to the imprecision of English and the nature of things that get labeled 'culture'. But the nature of tribal identity and practices that make up culture and how the fictional Jedi are portrayed in contrast to that are , I think, likely too political/religious/ethnicity/etc. to dissect here. So I'm dropping that one.

[Mechalich]

The disconnect, the isolation from the world around them seems to promote the more "children gladiatorial playpen" approach to "schools". It is the connection to the world at large, the consequences, real and implied of quacking around and finding out that make a [magic] school work. Disconnected presentations only seem to demonstrate the author hasn't put much thought into the implications for the wider world.

Well, it depends on what the magical school story is attempting to do. If the entire point of the story is to be an allegory for the problems of a given education system or of the struggles of puberty or winner take all cultural structures or something similar, then there doesn't need to be a connection to the wider world because the purpose of the story doesn't extend to that setup. The problem is that keeping a story within a discrete alternative academic space is very challenging, especially when dealing with long-running serial works, or anything successful enough to prompt a sequel. Magical school stories often work fine in book one/season one because the characters never even leave the school grounds, but quickly collapse when they attempt to go further/deeper because there really isn't anything there to explore since the original intent wasn't to go that far.

[False God]

Well, it depends on what the magical school story is attempting to do. If the entire point of the story is to be an allegory for the problems of a given education system or of the struggles of puberty or winner take all cultural structures or something similar, then there doesn't need to be a connection to the wider world because the purpose of the story doesn't extend to that setup. The problem is that keeping a story within a discrete alternative academic space is very challenging, especially when dealing with long-running serial works, or anything successful enough to prompt a sequel. Magical school stories often work fine in book one/season one because the characters never even leave the school grounds, but quickly collapse when they attempt to go further/deeper because there really isn't anything there to explore since the original intent wasn't to go that far.

I suppose then I haven't been exposed to any "one shot" style presentations. At least not any I can recollect. Every single one that comes to mind is serialized and they almost universally fail at applying their logic to the rest of the world.

[Satinavian]

Well, it depends on what the magical school story is attempting to do. If the entire point of the story is to be an allegory for the problems of a given education system or of the struggles of puberty or winner take all cultural structures or something similar, then there doesn't need to be a connection to the wider world because the purpose of the story doesn't extend to that setup. The problem is that keeping a story within a discrete alternative academic space is very challenging, especially when dealing with long-running serial works, or anything successful enough to prompt a sequel. Magical school stories often work fine in book one/season one because the characters never even leave the school grounds, but quickly collapse when they attempt to go further/deeper because there really isn't anything there to explore since the original intent wasn't to go that far.
That sounds like "A story does not need proper worldbuilding if versimilitude is not a focus".

That might be technically true, but i am certainly not the audience for such stories. Bad worldbuilding is still bad worldbuilding if it is claimed to be unimportent.
I don't care about allegories.
There are very very few "magic school settings" that don't make sense and that i can tolerate. And all of them are basically parodies that manage to nail my sense of humor. Which is also rare.



An Example of magic school setup i actually like outside of parodies is the one from Ascendance of a Bookworm. But that comes in Book 4 and 5 after the first three books focussing on other parts of the setting.

[paladinofshojo]

I apologize for replying so late, as I was busy with work for the majority of this week!


I'm well aware, many of his peers liked sharing their universes and making cameos or references, Lovecraft and Clark Ashton Smith (Oh look a member of the group who wasn't a massive racist even for the time) did the same, you don't have to go on Conanxplaining on me again.

I never really understood this need to demonize art or media based on the political views of its creator. Yes, Lovecraft had some rather... interesting views... but that doesn't diminish the impact he made on fiction and fantasy with his work. Concepts such as cosmic horror or eldritch abomination owe a lot to him, which is something that especially we D&D gamers cannot dispute.

Racists are still people, they are capable of having talents and fostering hobbies outside of being racist. Not every piece of literature written by someone with bigoted views reads like Mein Kampf. If someone is capable of producing quality entertainment that I enjoy then I am not going to stop liking said entertainment just because of the creator's viewpoints.



Not at all! Sword and sorcery (specifically Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser and the Elric Saga) was what got me in fantasy and RPG in the frist place! I love this type of setting much more than heroic fantasy, I re-read those books as an adult and made notes (as I do for everything I read) and since as an adult I have much more racial counsious among my notes were exemples of racism, sexism and other stuff that didn't age well.

Why though? Do you legitimately enjoy cataloging everything problematic with the stuff you like?

I know I only speak for myself, but as a minority, I don't care if I am watching a movie and the entire cast is all white. I don't need a brown person on screen to feel "represented". Hell, I am even willing to let subtle racism slide if the movie itself is legitimately entertaining, like with Deadpool and Deadpool II. I am also pretty sure a lot of other people feel the same way too. There's a very apparent line between a throwaway stereotype and outright racist propaganda. Some of my favorite movies include School Dance and Tropic Thunder, yes, they poke fun at African Americans, but it's not exactly the same as say, 19th century minstrel shows or Birth of a Nation, is it?

Hell, sometimes I enjoy playing as outright racist genocidal characters too. I once played in a homebrew D&D campaign set during a fantasy version of the American Civil War reality where elves were the ruling class with humans being the chattel slaves. My character was a chaotic-evil half-elven sorcerer/gunslinger who fought for the equivalent of the Confederacy. I committed A LOT of war crimes in that campaign and some rather heinous acts and the justification was that, "humans are slaves, and thus they're not people". Does that make me, the South African born person of Indian descent a Confederate sympathizer? Is 5e D&D or my GM inherently racist for enabling me to be able to facilitate me playing such a way? No! I am literally playing a roleplaying game which gives me the freedom to do whatever I want, and I just happened to want to play as a racist sociopath because I thought it would be fun. Hell, Warhammer 40K's popularity shows that there are a lot of people who feel that way too!

But I am getting carried away, my point is that in media, especially literature or movies, you're allowed to ignore stereotypes if you legitimately enjoy the content and the overall message resonates with you.



Because, it's not the type of thing I can recall from the top of my head.

You don't find it odd that when someone asks you "why are you calling a body of work as racist/problematic?" your answer is basically, "hold on, I need to check my notes."?

I am just saying, in my experience, the usual reason why someone would find something/someone to be racist/sexist/problematic is usually one glaring example which they circle in on. Granted, said example might be taken out of context or may even not be as bad as the accuser made it out to be, but there usually is one main point that is instantly brought up.



I'm unfamiliar with this and fail to see how it's relevant to the topic at hand.

I was alluding to how the entire state of Egypt is apparently threatening Netflix with a lawsuit over how they portrayed Cleopatra in a documentary.

Said documentary in itself is portraying a very inaccurate depiction of historical events, seeing as both Cleopatra was part of a Macedonian Greek dynasty and thus it was very unlikely she was of sub-Saharan African descent, and the fact that the overwhelming majority of people in northern regions of Africa were not either....

TLDR: No, neither Cleopatra or the Ancient Egyptians were black.



{Scrubbed}I said those stories used a lot of African coded civilizations, you counter argued with one civilization that you claimed to be Egyptian coded as if that would debunk my argument, I demonstrated confusion since the civilization you used as an exemple of not being African was in fact African... So I have literally no ideia of what you are going about with this.

I may be remembering incorrectly, but I was under the impression that you were alluding to black people, and as such, the only depictions that would show of that demographic in the Hyborian Age (a fantasy bronze age setting with sorcery and grimdark bloodshed) would be sub-Saharan Africans. My point is that Stygia wouldn't count as that.



Not it's not... Those civilizations are not in the same continent.

Are you saying that the Hopi, Aztecs, and Iroquois Indians are not all indigenous people of North America?


My inicial claim was that African cultures were being demonized in those works, you said they weren't and counter argued using an African civilization as an exemple, I pointed out that such argument was not a good counter argument since it actually proved my point.

So, your initial claim was that it portrayed Egyptians in a bad light? And not black people? Because that's the only way you can argue about Stygia.


Nope, we were talking about black people in general in the start and then we went to Africa as a whole.

I am confused, are we initially talking about black people or Egyptians?

If it's the former then Stygia is a moot point, if we are talking about the latter then I don't really understand why you are worried about anyone portraying them with a bone through their nostril. :smallconfused:



I'm not, my point is precisely the opposite how those peoples are diverse and complex and portraying all civilizations with one note is what the OP should avoid, you and the other are the ones harping on about the importance of Evil tribal empires full of cannibals who worship demons, a one sided, racist, shallow and honestly corny view on worldbuilding.

My argument to that is it depends on the tone of the setting, the reason why I don't see a problem with "evil tribal empires full of demon worshipping cannibals" is because the Hyborian Age is a universally terrible place for everyone. This wasn't the fault of the evil tribals, it was literally the fact that there was some massive cataclysm involving demon gods and eldritch horrors.....

In this kind of grimdark setting, I feel like the racism is kind of outweighed by the existential pessimism no? Don't you think it's kind of ridiculous if things like Nyarlethotep, the Outer Dark Demons, and Dark Gods running around prior to the Elder Night that harmful stereotypes is where we should draw the line in this world?


That's just your opinion. It's quite clear not only to me but to most Conan specialists that the central point of the narrative in those short stories was that there is greater nobility in barbariasm compared to the sedentery and civilized who are the true vipers.

I just have three questions in regards to this.

1) How exactly is my interpretation of the Cimmerians as a whole just an "opinion" whereas yours is not and more legitimate? Furthermore, what exactly is a "Conan specialist"?

2) What exactly is problematic with the central point of the "greater nobility in barbarism compared to the sedentary and civilized" in itself? Especially when a good number of the "true vipers" are coded as Caucasians? Such as the Aquilonians?

3) This still doesn't change the fact that as presented, the Cimmerians are just a bunch of iron aged tribals living in cold mud hutted villages who have to resort to banditry, thieving, and piracy to survive, all under the distant gaze of a callous and uncaring god. They are just as much a product of this grimdark world as any other group here.



Maybe not, but he is an stand in for his people, not everything in a story needs to be literal you can infer things and themes using your reading comprehension skills. Not everything needs to be spelled out... Or maybe it does... :smallconfused:

Okay, but is he though? He's canonically the biggest and strongest warrior in all of his adventures, and he's been through a lot of places in his world through his stories.

He's usually a mercenary or a thief, and doesn't seem to have any useful skills besides fighting and killing as well as speaking multiple languages. We know that some of them actually contributed positively to their community, seeing as Conan's dad was a blacksmith.

Furthermore, he seems to be motivated by two things, his own survival or personal gain. He seems more of an adventurer/soldier of fortune than an "example" of his people.

The only thing you can make an argument about his "Cimmerian moral superiority" for is how he's always blunt and truthful and how he will rescue women/never hit them.

Which seems like kind of a very low bar don't you think?



[QUOTE=Perch;25846926] Yes, that's the point, but if pay attention of the qualities of Conan that are highlighted by the language and symbolism contrasted by the animalistic comparison and claims of corruption other civilizations get you can form in you can understand the point the author is trying to come across.

Is the thing I said in the start, even when all civilizations are full barbaric and savages not all barbarians an savages are equal, some are better than others.

But we only ever see one Cimmerian, and said Cimmerian doesn't even live in Cimmeria but rather wanders around the earth before taking over the Fantasy equivalent of Roman-France after strangling their last king....

Just because Conan is a literal demigod doesn't mean the rest of his (mostly absent) race is as well, does it not?



{Scrubbed}I was clearly was talking about African societies and desert dwelling societies, if you read that and pictured "Sub-Saharan Africans" I'm not much to blame.

Forgive me for misremembering, but I was under the assumption you were speaking of Subsaharan African stereotypes (namely the bone through the nostril).

Which is why I am confused how Egyptians, and desert dwelling societies (which I am assuming means Arabic/Middle Easterners) got roped into this?




Errr... Nothing? As I have said before? I'm just repeating myself at this point.

So this isn't about desert dwelling civilizations?



Which is far different from your point implying that desert dwelling civilizations were unable to build anything great.

When have I said that?

The main point I was alluding to was that the foundation of all civilizations requires a surplus model of food, if you are unable to feed your own people then how exactly are you going to be able to grow your culture, develop weapons, arts, architecture, etc.?

Historical desert civilizations skip this problem via buying food with gold or other precious commodities they've acquired through monopolizing trade routes. This however only works so long as they have the most efficient and reliable routes of trade, this is why the city of Petra itself declined heavily during the Byzantine era when sea based trade routes overtook it.

Pretty buildings don't make a civilization, otherwise Göbekli Tepe would have a lot of explaining.



It's a desert civilization that had a very big and fertile river, allowing them to have luxuries unavailable for many other places. Still they were a desert civilization who lived in a desert sounded by sand, you can have a big delata and be in the middle of jungle or whatever, the fact they were in a delta and had a big river doesn't change the fact they were also in a desert, those things are not interchangeable.

I am confused? Are you admitting that "delta and big fertile river" are not interchangeable with "desert"?

Because from my understanding, without the Nile River, there wouldn't have been an Egyptian civilization, period.



That maps clearly shows a desert dude LOL.

Every city labelled on that map is located on a green part at the bank of the valley or within the Delta... Can you really say they were a desert civilization if 99% of them live nowhere near the barren, inhospitable parts?



None of that Egyptxplaining will change the fact that they lived in a fertile region of a desert. So therefore they can be honestly called a Desert civilization.

You don't see anything contradictory with that statement?

Also, why do you say terms like "Egyptxplaining" and "Conanxplaining"?

I am merely just adding context, most of the Ancient Egyptians never stepped foot in the deserts that flanked their kingdom's boarders, except when they were building a pharaoh's tomb or marching off to war in the Levant. So calling them a desert civilization is like calling Los Angeles a desert civilization...


I'm no authority on what's racist or not, the term has negative roots and has negative meanings, I have provided the evidence for that to you, if you still want to use it go for it by all means, i have literally no way to stop you. I only made a recommendation.

I am confused, what is the "negative root and negative meaning" here? From what I recalled, your explanation was that

I mean you only have to look up in a dictionary and you will see, many words related to dark skin ended up gaining pejorative meanings, go figure, this is one of such cases.

Are you implying that every word that is used to describe dark skin is automatically a slur?


Queer used to be a slur for a very long time, now it has been reclaimed so some people even use it to self identify, still some people hate it and have bad experiences with it, who am I to say what words are good or not, I just warned you that this specific word has racist connotations, you can do with that knowledge what you will.

Okay, but when have you ever heard of the term "swarthy" being used as a slur?



That's not your point at all, that's my point, that those civilizations are complex and have been victims of stereotypes and media used to demonize them and mock them, such things should be avoided going forward for a coherent portrait of a civilization that is not BETTER but also not WORST.

You don't think this is infantilizing and condescending towards said civilizations? Instead of seeing them as having actual agency in the narrative you're telling you can only view them in the lens of a poor victim?

As a South African, I can tell you that Shaka Zulu was a very controversial person in history, in the West, he seems to be seen as something of a freedom fighter whereas historically, he was seen as a bloodthirsty warlord. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle, but whitewashing him as the first Nelson Mandela is just as bad as only highlighting his atrocities.



Your point as far as I understand is that such portraits are not bad and negative at all and authors should not be concerned with reproducing racist tropes and patterns that have symbolic meaning because of their history of being used as propaganda and oppression.Authors can do anything and everything they want with their works, all while commenting on a thread of someone asking for advice on how to AVOID this kind of issues.

I mean, yes? The goal of authors should be to tell an entertaining story, not to have to worry about the pre-existing connotations of the tropes they wish to use.

And like I said before, I feel like most people will tolerate plenty of negative portrayals and harmful stereotypes so long as the overall message of the literature resonates with them and they are entertained.



The use of empires with interesting cultures, architecture, religions and fashion is a start.

Can you give me a concrete example?


I think the issue is that you are not arguing with my comments but some imaginary cultural battle in your head. None of that you wrote has anything to do with what I said.

I am just pointing out observations for how we are portraying African cultures lately, feel free to give me an example that breaks my point.

[KorvinStarmast]

Magical school stories often work fine in book one/season one because the characters never even leave the school grounds, but quickly collapse when they attempt to go further/deeper because there really isn't anything there to explore since the original intent wasn't to go that far. Having read a few 'boarding school stories' back when I was younger, the pattern you cite fits them as well. (And that's why The Paper Chase (original) TV series had to end when law school year ended ... it only really worked as "a law school story" when it worked. ) (I just discovered that they resurrected it on Showtime; never saw that iteration).

Every single one that comes to mind is serialized and they almost universally fail at applying their logic to the rest of the world. School and Real Life do have some differences, do they not? :smallbiggrin:

I never really understood this need to demonize art or media based on the political views of its creator. It's a current fashion, won't comment further.


I was alluding to how the entire state of Egypt is apparently threatening Netflix with a lawsuit over how they portrayed Cleopatra in a documentary. Said documentary in itself is portraying a very inaccurate depiction of historical events, seeing as both Cleopatra was part of a Macedonian Greek dynasty and thus it was very unlikely she was of sub-Saharan African descent, and the fact that the overwhelming majority of people in northern regions of Africa were not either....
TLDR: No, neither Cleopatra or the Ancient Egyptians were black. I have tried to teach people to view the Roman World as centered on Rome, but then draw a big circle around it. Rome's commercial highways were on the water initially. They built the roads later. I have had to use a similar model to explain how commerce in the Pacific region works...


... the reason why I don't see a problem with "evil tribal empires full of demon worshipping cannibals" is because the Hyborian Age is a universally terrible place for everyone. This wasn't the fault of the evil tribals, it was literally the fact that there was some massive cataclysm involving demon gods and eldritch horrors..... The point of the stories was in part grim dark and horror, just as the point of Stephen King's stories is to scare you.
Not every middle aged woman who reads novels is an obsessive neurotic. (Misery reference there).

1) How exactly is my interpretation of the Cimmerians as a whole just an "opinion" whereas yours is not and more legitimate? Furthermore, what exactly is a "Conan specialist"?
That was an attempt to be dismissive, as seen by this audience member.

2) What exactly is problematic with the central point of the "greater nobility in barbarism compared to the sedentary and civilized" in itself? Especially when a good number of the "true vipers" are coded as Caucasians? Such as the Aquilonians? aka the French. :smallyuk:

3) ... the Cimmerians are just a bunch of iron aged tribals living in cold mud hutted villages who have to resort to banditry, thieving, and piracy to survive, all under the distant gaze of a callous and uncaring god. They are just as much a product of this grimdark world as any other group here. I think Howard was channeling a bit of Hobb's "...nasty, brutish, and short" with his setting.


He's usually a mercenary or a thief, and doesn't seem to have any useful skills besides fighting and killing as well as speaking multiple languages. We know that some of them actually contributed positively to their community, seeing as Conan's dad was a blacksmith. Furthermore, he seems to be motivated by two things, his own survival or personal gain. He seems more of an adventurer/soldier of fortune than an "example" of his people.
Or even An Adventurer. Cue the "and a prototype for a D&D character" at about this time. (I recall one of my Conan collectins being called "Conan the Freebooter" but I can't tell which of the stories were in it. Frazetta art on the cover).

The only thing you can make an argument about his "Cimmerian moral superiority" for is how he's always blunt and truthful and how he will rescue women/never hit them. Which seems like kind of a very low bar don't you think?

But we only ever see one Cimmerian, and said Cimmerian doesn't even live in Cimmeria but rather wanders around the earth before taking over the Fantasy equivalent of Roman-France after strangling their last king.... What's not to like about that? :biggrin:


Because from my understanding, without the Nile River, there wouldn't have been an Egyptian civilization, period. Or it would have taken a different form.

Another of the great River civilizations (not in Mesopotamia) was on the Mekong, but rather than being surrounded by desert, it was situated in an area with a lot of trees/jungles. Almost the opposite to a desert.

[False God]

So, I can't really blame people for abandoning the assumption of Nuance, because so many fantasy settings like to take the role a group plays in a story, and go out of their way to make that central to that group's identity. Countering that usually means doing a lot of work to build the nuance into the setting, you can't just have Scalgathar Raiders, because even if you don't go out of your way to canonize their entire culture as being based around Raiding, people have been trained to assume that unless you specifically point out otherwise.


The "Magical Melting Pot" setting (at least as I understand it) may be less "Realistic" historically speaking, but it is a convenient shortcut to help free the setting of that context, and bring back the assumption of Nuance. "This is a Magical Melting Pot, people from everywhere live everywhere and do everything" is a big label that stops people from making the assumptions that other fantasy and sci-fi works have drilled into them, without having to go out of your way to counter those assumptions with every new culture and group you introduce.

I keep meaning to get back to this and I keep having trouble forumlating a response, so lets see.

In short, I get what you're saying about the point of taking the Magical Melting Pot approach, and I get intentions, but I don't feel like that's what it does.

If people are numbed to nuance, I feel like the Magical Melting Pot approach reinforces that, by doubling down on the lack of nuance, but in a direction that people won't complain about. Instead of people hyper-vigilantly reacting to lack of nuance (real or perceived), the Magical Melting Pot instead causes people to be hyper-relaxed about the lack of nuance. The lack of nuance this time is instead positive. Dwarves are hard workers. Elves care for the trees. Humans are inventive. Gnomes are playful. Etc... These Magical Melting Pot portrayals still lack nuance, they still generalize entire species or cultures as "one thing", but they are positive stereotypes. Things that even if a particular member of the populace is not inclined towards, could be framed as something desirable to achieve.

Yes, this causes people to relax from a hyper-vigilant state, but it doesn't put them in a state where they are more inclined to accept a nuanced portrayal, but it puts them in a hyper-relaxed state where they are unconcerned about the still prevalent lack of nuance, simply because this new nuance is positive.

---
Like Perch, I like nuance. I don't need to to be everywhere, but I find the Magical Melting Pot to be almost offensive to my senses, since it seems to want to encourage me to not care about their nuance-less portrayals because the portrayals are all positive. Worse, it seems to encourage the idea that people who are exceptions can be "fixed" by setting up the nuance-less cultural portrayal as a desirable achievement. "Everyone wants to have friends, why don't you be more friendly?" is the sort of passive-aggressive things I see in these Magical Melting Pot approached, that people who aren't interested in being part of the Melting Pot are portrayed as bad. That people who don't want to change as shown as unwilling to improve themselves.

It's also used as an excuse not to have to deal with all that troublesome "differences" people have. IMO, working to overcome those cultural differences, those negative perceptions, for both sides to see each other as equals is what makes stories interesting. Skipping past that into the world of "everyone gets along because sunshine and rainbows" misses a great deal of character and story development. It's one thing to set two characters up as friends because they have a shared background the story hasn't told yet, it's another thing to just state that these two get along because they come from the Magical Melting Pot where all the bad things don't apply. This later approach IMO is good when paired with the "Real World" twist, where they leave the Magical Melting Pot, completely unaware of the bad stereotypes out there, only to have to work hard to overcome them when encountered. But IME, most of the time it never does this. It's cleared up "the Canadian way", that is when people ask "Are you an American?" the response is "No I'm from Canada." and suddenly the person asking overcomes all their fear an anxiety. The characters who the story is about never have to work to overcome the challenges before them, because they're from Magical Melting Pot Land and everyone understands the people from there are totally awesome.

Which isn't to say Canada doesn't exist. But Canada doesn't exist because of an authorial trope. Stories can still portray Magical Melting Pots, but they need to give them reasonably believable backstories. How did this society, against all odds, achieve such success?

Circling back around, that's why I was making the point that I generally find the "Magical Melting Pot" civilization no less one-dimensional than the "Evil Empire" or "Good Kingdom". It's used as an excuse to bypass all that nuance stuff that's difficult to write well, except it's often thrown in your face instead of used as a McGuffin to drive the plot. Challenges are overcome not by the benefit of trials of the characters, but simply by name-dropping their homeland, conflicts are resolved by showing others the enlightenment of Magical Melting Pot, not by coming to understand the views of others.

A lot of "friendship is magic" stories make this mistake. It is upon others to change in the revealing light of Magical Melting Pot Land, not upon the characters to change and grow in response to others.(I'm here to see MC-kun grow and change! Not see the shopkeep become friendlier because MC-kun turned out to be a swell guy thanks to his upbringing in Magical Melting Pot Land!)

[icefractal]

Which isn't to say Canada doesn't exist. But Canada doesn't exist because of an authorial trope. Stories can still portray Magical Melting Pots, but they need to give them reasonably believable backstories. How did this society, against all odds, achieve such success?I mean sure, if that's a thing you're covering in the story/campaign. But lots of societies / empires / etc in fiction don't really get their existence justified. An empire that lasts 10k years relatively unchanged is massively unusual by RL standards, but those kind of things show up in settings with no particular explanation.


A lot of "friendship is magic" stories make this mistake. It is upon others to change in the revealing light of Magical Melting Pot Land, not upon the characters to change and grow in response to others.(I'm here to see MC-kun grow and change! Not see the shopkeep become friendlier because MC-kun turned out to be a swell guy thanks to his upbringing in Magical Melting Pot Land!)I guess I'd wonder what this means in practice?

Because like, if I'm an elf, in my travels I go to stay at a inn and the innkeeper is like:
"GTFO! The only good elf is a dead elf!"
It's not on me to meet him half-way (half-dead?) there. I don't need to "grow" to accept that "it's fine if people want me dead and I should respect that", because I'm not here to play Doormat: The All-Accepting. Maybe if I stay in the area, the innkeeper changes his opinion based on my actions, or maybe he doesn't. But either way, it's on him - "you are bad for existing" is not a position that deserves any respect.

[awa]

I guess I'd wonder what this means in practice?

.

I recently read part of a story that kind of had that. The melting pot did that thing where they are both secret and hidden but also super diverse. While major states outside the secret utopia were depicted as both uniformly bad and incredibly incompetent, the utopia had massive advantages in basically every regard as well as perfectly fitting a modern liberal secular utopia. While the incompetent outsiders were either a fairly extreme caste system and a group of murderous religious fanatics respectively.

the utopia is put on such a pedestal that their can be no meeting of minds because only the utopia has anything of value. The dummies dont have any skills, technology or knowledge that the utopia is not wildly more advanced at. It a situation where one culture is simply correct and all other cultures are just wrong.

On the other hand I am currently reading a novel about dwarves, the dwarves are the heroes and very good at a lot of things, but they are close minded and stubborn, and their dislike of the elves is shown to be actively detrimental to their long term success. Victory is achieved by a meeting of the minds because the elves and to a lesser extent humans have something to offer. The dwarves need to change and grow in order to solve their problems.

[BRC]

I keep meaning to get back to this and I keep having trouble forumlating a response, so lets see.

In short, I get what you're saying about the point of taking the Magical Melting Pot approach, and I get intentions, but I don't feel like that's what it does.

If people are numbed to nuance, I feel like the Magical Melting Pot approach reinforces that, by doubling down on the lack of nuance, but in a direction that people won't complain about. Instead of people hyper-vigilantly reacting to lack of nuance (real or perceived), the Magical Melting Pot instead causes people to be hyper-relaxed about the lack of nuance. The lack of nuance this time is instead positive. Dwarves are hard workers. Elves care for the trees. Humans are inventive. Gnomes are playful. Etc... These Magical Melting Pot portrayals still lack nuance, they still generalize entire species or cultures as "one thing", but they are positive stereotypes. Things that even if a particular member of the populace is not inclined towards, could be framed as something desirable to achieve.


MMP doesn't introduce Nuance (Not inheriently anyway, you can certainly HAVE nuance in an MMP setting, but it doesn't bring any on it's own). What it does is counter the cultural context of reductive, one-note fantasy worldbuilding. You can't shortcut your way to a nuanced, living setting without putting in the work to do so.

What MMP usually does is bring back the assumption of Nuance. If the first goblin we meet is a bandit in a normal setting, then people have been trained to read that as "All Goblins are Bandits".

The MMP setting (At least as I think the term means, we may be talking about different things) does a lot of work by itself to counter that by showing "Oh, all sorts of fantasy races do all sorts of stuff", so even if we never meet another goblin besides this bandit, there's less chance of people assuming "In this world, all Goblins are Bandits"

Note that this doesn't mean the setting has a nuanced take on Goblins. But it means the author is able to include something like, a goblin bandit, as flavor without needing to put in the work to build a nuanced take on Goblins (because there is no shortcut for that), instead the nuance (Not All Goblins Are Bandits) is kind of assumed by the background radiation of the setting. No points gained, but you avoid having your players assume that All Goblins are inheriently Bandits for some reason.

And if you want a whole monster manuals worth of sentient species running around, that's kind of what you have to do.

(Personally, I'd prefer a handful of Cultures, each with the work done to make them properly nuanced)

[MonochromeTiger]

I recently read part of a story that kind of had that. The melting pot did that thing where they are both secret and hidden but also super diverse. While major states outside the secret utopia were depicted as both uniformly bad and incredibly incompetent, the utopia had massive advantages in basically every regard as well as perfectly fitting a modern liberal secular utopia. While the incompetent outsiders were either a fairly extreme caste system and a group of murderous religious fanatics respectively.

the utopia is put on such a pedestal that their can be no meeting of minds because only the utopia has anything of value. The dummies dont have any skills, technology or knowledge that the utopia is not wildly more advanced at. It a situation where one culture is simply correct and all other cultures are just wrong.

Which puts it pretty squarely in the realm of "this is the author's personal pet civilization and anything that so much as questions the author's views must inevitably be objectively wrong." It's an abandonment of the fact that there isn't any such thing as a shining perfect civilization with universal acceptance and understanding where all of life's problems are easily dealt with, that kind of thing is pure wish fulfillment and is usually done in such a way that they're just a slightly obfuscated rant on how "if we did things the way I want we'd never have these problems."

And it inevitably loops around to the issue of negative and biased portrayals. If this one group is being shown as flawless and perfect because they adopted whatever "I win" button the author believes will fix everything then inevitably everyone who didn't is forced into the insulting role of an unenlightened outsider who just hasn't seen whatever (insert magic answer here) can offer them or refuses to accept it because they're stuck in their ways or hungry for power in a way that (insert author's pet civilization here) somehow completely avoids because reasons. The portrayal of those other groups having absolutely nothing to offer then just deepens the idea that there's something wrong with them and that there's some actual inferiority and any bias against them is justified when what's actually happening is they're being used as a shameless caricature of whatever ideals or form of government the author doesn't like and said author can't allow them to have any points no matter how small or, gasp, their own perfect civilization might not get to show off how much better it is.

Eventually that mentality just works its way into the very gross idea of "we owe it to them to uplift them and bring them into our way of doing things" which I can't even go into how messed up it is or the things it might be used to justify without stepping into discussing politics and history.


On the other hand I am currently reading a novel about dwarves, the dwarves are the heroes and very good at a lot of things, but they are close minded and stubborn, and their dislike of the elves is shown to be actively detrimental to their long term success. Victory is achieved by a meeting of the minds because the elves and to a lesser extent humans have something to offer. The dwarves need to change and grow in order to solve their problems.

A much more reasonable portrayal depending on how it was done. There are no shining flawless cultures or civilizations, inevitably everyone has some things they don't like to talk about or some openly accepted or ignored flaws, often right alongside or in support of the things they're proud of. Everything saying otherwise reeks of personal biases saying "nuh uh we're flawless and everyone else is jealous" which also inevitably pops up in some parts of a country's population.

The only way there's ever going to be universal agreement on "the right way to do things" is if there's one person left and odds are pretty good the thing they'll be thinking is "I wish there were more people" which will go right back to dissenting opinions and biases again.

[Mechalich]

I have tried to teach people to view the Roman World as centered on Rome, but then draw a big circle around it. Rome's commercial highways were on the water initially. They built the roads later. I have had to use a similar model to explain how commerce in the Pacific region works...

I think this is mostly just a lack of understanding of historical context on the part of most modern people (including many published authors, who then perpetuate the issue). On water transport was the dominant form of long-distance transport for both goods and people until at least the mid-19th century, when railroads come in, and didn't achieve total dominance until the mid-20th century with the combination of extremely advanced roadways (ex. the US interstate highway system) and commercial air travel. It is often forgotten, in the modern day, that there were places on Earth where the bulk of trade was still conducted by camel caravan up through WWII. As such, ethnic mixing and state boundaries flow easily over water in the pre-industrial world but are broadly blocked by deserts, mountains, and jungle.

Now, there are lots of ways that fantasy can violate this, even at relatively low levels of magic. For example, the existence of flying beasts capable of carrying a single rider (which is within the range of capability of perfectly natural, just very extinct, giant pterosaurs) would allow an empire to potentially project power across such barriers in a manner no historical regime ever could.

[False God]

I guess I'd wonder what this means in practice?

Because like, if I'm an elf, in my travels I go to stay at a inn and the innkeeper is like:
"GTFO! The only good elf is a dead elf!"
It's not on me to meet him half-way (half-dead?) there. I don't need to "grow" to accept that "it's fine if people want me dead and I should respect that", because I'm not here to play Doormat: The All-Accepting. Maybe if I stay in the area, the innkeeper changes his opinion based on my actions, or maybe he doesn't. But either way, it's on him - "you are bad for existing" is not a position that deserves any respect.

In the context of what I want to see:
How does the MC react to this sudden racism?
Do they internalize it after extreme exposure?
Do they lean on the negative stereotypes to get their way?
Do they attempt to change people's minds?
Do they develop their own prejudices and stereotypes based on the people they interact with?

Again, I'm reading the story to see how MC grows and changes as a result of exposure to new things. I don't really care about the Shopkeep, I don't care if the MC changes his mind or even tries. I'm interested in MCs journey, his choices, successes, failures, and struggles. I only care about the Shopkeep if the MC cares about the shopkeeps attitude enough to do something about it. Befriend him, kill him, ignore him, but ultimately it's the MC's choices and actions I'm interested in, whatever they are.

[gbaji]

I'm not 100% adverse to the MMP method (when used reasonably). For many game settings, it can act as a justification for why an adventuring party can actually have elves, and dwarves, and halflings, and whatnot in them. If there's no common areas where these different groups all live together (at least somewhat peacefully), then it's a lot harder to justify a mixed party. So yeah. Don't have a problem with that.

I tend to focus my game settings on more political/economic conflicts than merely racial/ethnic anyway. And while there are some melting pot areas, not all are. In a stereoptyical fantasy setting, there may be elven forests, and dwarven underground strongholds, and Trolls living up in the mountains (and hey, why not have halflings living in some green rolling hills kind of areas, if we're just going with the tropes, right?). And yeah, there may even be some historical animosity between these different groups, for various setting reasons.

But here's the funny thing. And I think it's something we've almost lost somewhere along the line. Those divisions, even historically, were rarely applied individually. I think a good example of this is in LotR between Legolas and Gimli. In theory, historically, the dwarves and elves didn't get along. But that did not mean that an individual dwarf and individual elf had to hate eachother. As groups? Conflicts. As individuals? Tended to get along just fine. And I've found that this is a common parallel in our own history as well. Merchants and others tended to be able to travel all over the place, without a whole lot of fear that they would just be imprisoned or killed just for being a member of a different culture/civilization.

Um... There's also this sort of mistaken assumption that the more "other" someone is, the more they're going to be feared/hated. That's also generally not true. We tend to fear/hate the most, not that which is most unknown, but that which we know well. I know. Seems contradictory. But the known tribe "over there", that your own tribe has been fighting with for generations over some common resource is going to be far more likely to generate a fear/hate response than "some stranger from a distant land we've never heard of". Which can absolutely dovetail into "person with significantly different racial/ethnic features will be seen as an oddity, but not an enemy". Which, when applied to a fantasy setting with Elves and Dwarves and whatnot, allows us to integrate them into the setting without too much difficulty. Said character might get a response of "I've heard of <whatever> but never met one before" (and possibly questions as well), and then we move on.

I just think it's possible to over think this. And yeah, we all hear the horror story of the GM who creates obvious offensive stereotypes and plays them out in their games. I also wonder how much of that is just fictionalized acounts of GMs doing things we all know are horrible verus how often that has actually really happened. We all hear the story about this guy, who knew a guy, who played with a guy who did this. But how many people have actually directly experienced this? IMO, it's something talked about and railed against far more often than it actually happens. And maybe we shouldn't spend too much time getting too upset about something that "might happen" somewhere, at some table, by someone else, maybe.

Doesn't mean we can't be aware of and avoid doing such things. But I do think it's a bit unhealthy to be actively seeking out anything that might be a clue that something untoward might be happening. Let's not read too much into the tea leaves here. And to be honest, there are a large number of other problems that can crop up with a game and setting as well. And IME, those other problems are far more common and more likely to result in games failing than that the GM has created cultures and peoples who align with some earth stereotypes. I don't think I've ever played in a game where the GM applied a just straight up offensive stereotype to a culture. I've played in a number where the GM played favorites with the players, or where the GM thought it was "fun" to go out of his way to harm PCs and ruin their lives ("if it's not painful, then you aren't playing"), or where the GM applied such harsh rules of "game balance" that he would arbitrarily remove abilities/items/levels from characters if he felt they were "too powerful" (yes, I had a GM do that once).

Those things are real things that really happen, and that can destroy the "fun" playing a game. So yeah, I'm far more concerned about those than hypothetical world/setting building problems.

[awa]

Eventually that mentality just works its way into the very gross idea of "we owe it to them to uplift them and bring them into our way of doing things" which I can't even go into how messed up it is or the things it might be used to justify without stepping into discussing politics and history.


I don't actually see that very often, this one was the utopia is a hidden secret isolationist society and when the stupid inept outsiders intrude they are all effortlessly incapacitated and removed from the utopias territory unharmed which causes the stupids to declare war on the obviously overwhelmingly Superior force.

Now I stopped reading soon after but the way this trope usually goes is the stupids manage to bring so many men to bear that the "heroes" are justified in using increasingly massive retaliation to stop the relentless hordes of inept racists.

[gbaji]

Is this where I interject with my stock "All Utopias are Dystopias" observation?

[Perch]

I never really understood this need to demonize art or media based on the political views of its creator.
That was not my intention, I also don't think I have done it. Again, I fear you are not arguing with me and my arguments but some ideal in your head, maybe based on previous experiences? I don't know.



Yes, Lovecraft had some rather... interesting views...

Interesting?


but that doesn't diminish the impact he made on fiction and fantasy with his work. Concepts such as cosmic horror or eldritch abomination owe a lot to him, which is something that especially we D&D gamers cannot dispute.

Never said he didn't...


Why though? Do you legitimately enjoy cataloging everything problematic with the stuff you like?

I make tons of notes, stuff I can use in my games, names I should try to keep in mind, ideas I like and among them I also make notes on stuff that didn't age well, why? I fail to see why that's so weird.


You don't find it odd that when someone asks you "why are you calling a body of work as racist/problematic?" your answer is basically, "hold on, I need to check my notes."?

Not really.

On your other points, I'm a firm believer on the ideia that you can enjoy problematic stuff and be critical of it at the same time. It's not only possible but to me necessary.


I was alluding to how the entire state of Egypt is apparently threatening Netflix with a lawsuit over how they portrayed Cleopatra in a documentary. TLDR: No, neither Cleopatra or the Ancient Egyptians were black.

My point was that Egypt was an African nation, I said "African coded nations" you said "This nation is Egyptcoded" I said "Egypt is in Africa".

At no point I said anything about Cleopatra being black.


I may be remembering incorrectly, but I was under the impression that you were alluding to black people

That must be the case, I was talking about Africa as a whole, the entire continent and all it's civilizations.


So, your initial claim was that it portrayed Egyptians in a bad light?

Is the portrayal of a civilization as crazy, decadent, and full of vile sorcery evil people who worship a snake demon god and make human sacrifices a good, fair and accurate portrayal? I don't think so.



I am confused, are we initially talking about black people or Egyptians?

We were talking about African Civilizations, so both?


what exactly is a "Conan specialist"?

Someone who spend a long time studying the works and published papers ont eh subject, the type of people who will write the preface of newer editions or collections.


2) What exactly is problematic with the central point of the "greater nobility in barbarism compared to the sedentary and civilized" in itself? Especially when a good number of the "true vipers" are coded as Caucasians? Such as the Aquilonians?

Nothing, never said that were any issues, my issues were in the form, way and words used to describe African coded civilizations in those stories.


3) This still doesn't change the fact that as presented, the Cimmerians are just a bunch of iron aged tribals living in cold mud hutted villages who have to resort to banditry, thieving, and piracy to survive, all under the distant gaze of a callous and uncaring god. They are just as much a product of this grimdark world as any other group here.

As I said, it's a different shade of bad, a different taste.



My argument to that is it depends on the tone of the setting, the reason why I don't see a problem with "evil tribal empires full of demon worshipping cannibals"

I guess we will have to agree to disagree. If you don't see issues with that our conversation won't get anywhere, so I guess I will refrain from continuing this discussion with you. Thanks for the responses have a good day.


-----------------------------------------------------------


Is this where I interject with my stock "All Utopias are Dystopias" observation?


I can think of a few I would totally live, Oz comes to mind, The Blazing-World as well.

[SpyOne]

... I was thinking that, as a general rule, the further south and the warmer it gets, the darker the native people's skin tends to get, and the further north and the colder it gets, the paler they tend to be (although people from all over can be found in most areas, with the more centralized areas being more diverse than the more isolated ones with extreme climates).

... So the setting is a sort of high-seas adventure where hunting sea monsters for their ivory, oil, etc. is a huge business across the world.
In the south, there's a huge network of small islands. Which gives those peoples less resources to work with, prohibits the use of large ships and encourages the formation of smaller settlements.
In the north, the partially frozen sea offers very similar issues. Less resources, smaller communities and smaller boats.
In the more centralized area, the mainland is much bigger and the climate is milder, so there are more people, who all have access to more resources. And the open waters means larger ships that can go after larger monsters, which means more money. Which all means more advanced technology and a more diverse population.
You have a logical, even realistic, explanation for the distribution of skin tones in your world.
You have a logical, well thought out reason for the distribution of wealth and technology in your world, too.

... And entirely by accident you've made all the brown people from a part of the world that is poor and backwards. (The pale people, too, but ....)
I can't believe that I am the first person to notice that.

I can think of a couple of ways to change that, but they all mess with your world to some degree.

Like, you could move the archipelago. Have there be continents in the frozen north and the tropics, with the archipelago sandwiched between them.
Now the brown people are from the richest and most advanced area.

Or you could create a large island, well away from the others, in the tropics. It has trees that make good ship and excellent harbors and all the stuff that the rest of the islands don't, so it is home to a wealthy nation among the otherwise poor tropics.

Or, ... you could ditch realism and make the brown people from the west or something.

But I am pretty sure that if you don't change something, some of the players will notice.

[KorvinStarmast]

Is this where I interject with my stock "All Utopias are Dystopias" observation? Yes. :smallsmile: Or you could offer that "one person's Utopia is another person's Dystopia" with similar effect.

You have a logical, even realistic, explanation for the distribution of skin tones in your world.
You have a logical, well thought out reason for the distribution of wealth and technology in your world, too.
{snip}
But I am pretty sure that if you don't change something, some of the players will notice. Ya think? And if our OP is as stated "a DM for hire" some players will find that set up appealing and others won't, which reduces the pool of players willing to pay, which will have an impact on income.

[False God]

I'm not 100% adverse to the MMP method (when used reasonably). For many game settings, it can act as a justification for why an adventuring party can actually have elves, and dwarves, and halflings, and whatnot in them. If there's no common areas where these different groups all live together (at least somewhat peacefully), then it's a lot harder to justify a mixed party. So yeah. Don't have a problem with that.

I tend to focus my game settings on more political/economic conflicts than merely racial/ethnic anyway. And while there are some melting pot areas, not all are. In a stereoptyical fantasy setting, there may be elven forests, and dwarven underground strongholds, and Trolls living up in the mountains (and hey, why not have halflings living in some green rolling hills kind of areas, if we're just going with the tropes, right?). And yeah, there may even be some historical animosity between these different groups, for various setting reasons.

But here's the funny thing. And I think it's something we've almost lost somewhere along the line. Those divisions, even historically, were rarely applied individually. I think a good example of this is in LotR between Legolas and Gimli. In theory, historically, the dwarves and elves didn't get along. But that did not mean that an individual dwarf and individual elf had to hate eachother. As groups? Conflicts. As individuals? Tended to get along just fine. And I've found that this is a common parallel in our own history as well. Merchants and others tended to be able to travel all over the place, without a whole lot of fear that they would just be imprisoned or killed just for being a member of a different culture/civilization.
Well, importantly, Legolas and Gimli didn't get along at first. Their transition from being distrustful and racist to "competitive companions" to "true friends" is well shown over the course of the LOTR trilogy. And yes, Groupthink can play a heavy role in the application of prejudice, and when someone is removed from the group, they now have to make their own decisions, which often gives them the opportunity to think outside the group's otherwise hateful norms.

Personally, I think the MMP approach is a lazy way to justify why this group gets along.
There are simpler solutions with fewer world implications:
A: These people don't have those prejudices, they are the exceptions.
B: These people DO have those prejudices, but feel the others of the party are "exceptions".
C: These people do have those prejudices, but agree working together towards defeating the Demon Lord is more important.
D: These people come from allied nations who, while not a melting pot, have mellowed thanks to shared economic/social/military success.

You end up with fewer world implications and no need to explain how the MMP seems to be working when noone else gets it. The latter approach is IMO, the best when you're actually relying on true nation-states and not tropey fantasy monocultures. There can be LOTS of dwarves and LOTS of elves just like there always seem to be lots of humans, all with different opinions and connections to each other.

But as always, more work.


Is this where I interject with my stock "All Utopias are Dystopias" observation?

Maybe, but this tends to be for the exception. Anarchists revel in objectively collapsed societies while they suffer in functional ones. I don't think that's enough to say that a utopia that functions for 99% of its members is a dystopia. It's not always a matter of perspective and even if it is, not all perspectives are inherently equal.

[Anymage]

Radiant Citadel is a melting pot setting that's so blandly utopian that pretty much everyone has forgotten about it already. If everybody gets along there's no conflict, and that makes for incredibly boring stories.

Eberron and Sigil are both melting pot settings where you still have groups with distinct identities and the potential for conflict, but you also have an understanding that plenty of creatures exist to be interacted with when in other settings the most reasonable move would be attacking them on sight. Both are rather popular. So while it's easy to do magical melting pot wrong by making it an author tract on their pet utopia, that isn't intrinsically the case.


My point was that Egypt was an African nation, I said "African coded nations" you said "This nation is Egyptcoded" I said "Egypt is in Africa".

If you were to ask someone to describe an African setting, vanishingly few would include pyramids and mummies. Egypt the country may be on the African continent, but the tropes aren't as close in concept space.

[False God]

Radiant Citadel is a melting pot setting that's so blandly utopian that pretty much everyone has forgotten about it already. If everybody gets along there's no conflict, and that makes for incredibly boring stories.

Eberron and Sigil are both melting pot settings where you still have groups with distinct identities and the potential for conflict, but you also have an understanding that plenty of creatures exist to be interacted with when in other settings the most reasonable move would be attacking them on sight. Both are rather popular. So while it's easy to do magical melting pot wrong by making it an author tract on their pet utopia, that isn't intrinsically the case.

I think it's important to call into question the MMP trope if the people live in the same area but still don't get along.

Ravnica from MTG(and D&D book) does this, yes, everyone lives together in this giant plane-wide city, but each group still has their own little section and there is often conflict between the groups, many outrightly just don't get along at all, but there is also blurring at the edges where they do.

I'm not sure that by merit of everyone occupying the same city, that necessarily makes it a MMP.

[Mechalich]

I think it's important to call into question the MMP trope if the people live in the same area but still don't get along.

Ravnica from MTG(and D&D book) does this, yes, everyone lives together in this giant plane-wide city, but each group still has their own little section and there is often conflict between the groups, many outrightly just don't get along at all, but there is also blurring at the edges where they do.

I'm not sure that by merit of everyone occupying the same city, that necessarily makes it a MMP.

Everyone in the same place definitely does not imply a melting pot, instead it presents a 'salad bowl (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salad_bowl_(cultural_idea))' scenario of different groups that are mixed together without being blended. Historically, such situations were common in large and significant cities, often to the point that the divisions were politically and legally explicit. For example, in the medieval Islamic world non-Muslims were quite common in major cities such as Istanbul or Baghdad, but they lived in their own districts, worshipped at their own religious shrines, and paid special taxes to the state the Muslims didn't pay. Similarly, noted historical traveler Marco Polo conducted a massive survey of China on behalf of Kublai Khan without speaking a word of Chinese because he interacted only with the primarily Turkic and Mongol administration the Yuan Dynasty imposed on top of traditional Chinese governmental and social structures.

Historically such multicultural systems are only stable when a specific cultural group holds a position of established dominance over all the others. That group by no means needs to be the majority - the aforementioned Mongol Yuan Dynasty was puny compared to its many millions of Han Chinese subjects - but it does need to enforce a hierarchy. Of course, changes in circumstances in such scenarios tend to unlike violent internal conflicts as the hierarchy adjusts.

It's interesting to consider whether or not fantasy would promote a society to move towards a melting pot or salad bowl concept compared to historical factors. Certain fantasy elements like common language - whether due to translation magic or some sort of legacy of the ancients - and broad physiological differences - two humans of basically any ethnicity can live in the same house without trouble, the same it not true of a troll and a halfling - would clearly have a rather substantial impact.

[awa]

It's interesting to consider whether or not fantasy would promote a society to move towards a melting pot or salad bowl concept compared to historical factors. Certain fantasy elements like common language - whether due to translation magic or some sort of legacy of the ancients - and broad physiological differences - two humans of basically any ethnicity can live in the same house without trouble, the same it not true of a troll and a halfling - would clearly have a rather substantial impact.


Worse then the complications of size like a troll and hafling is the complexity of life span.

Think how annoying it would be to be a short lived species mixed in with long lived species, some versions of the game elves can live for a thousand years or more. Every position of power would eventually end up in their hands by the simple fact that a opening for a promotion might take centuries to appear, and when it does whose going to get the job you or the guy with 400 years of on the job training and that assumes doing a thing for centuries doesn't actually just make him objectively better at that job. The modern game likes to gloss over how hard it would be to actually create a fair society with the staggering degree of differences between these species.

On the other hand while the modern game is vehemently opposed to the concept if we go to the archetypal races or to a lesser extent older versions of the game, a society that was very good at utilizing the varies species advantages could be very successful. dwarven smiths and elven horticulturists and orc soldiers would have a significant competitive advantage against a mono species society provided it could keep from ripping itself apart. Ironically off the top of my head the easiest way i could think for that to happen would be for the whole thing to be run from the top down by a dragon or something. A being that is even longer lived than the elves and powerful enough to stomp all individual threats thus granting the long-term stability for people to get used to this state of being.

[PhoenixPhyre]

On the other hand while the modern game is vehemently opposed to the concept if we go to the archetypal races or to a lesser extent older versions of the game, a society that was very good at utilizing the varies species advantages could be very successful. dwarven smiths and elven horticulturists and orc soldiers would have a significant competitive advantage against a mono species society provided it could keep from ripping itself apart. Ironically off the top of my head the easiest way i could think for that to happen would be for the whole thing to be run from the top down by a dragon or something. A being that is even longer lived than the elves and powerful enough to stomp all individual threats thus granting the long-term stability for people to get used to this state of being.

Very much so to the age stuff you mentioned. It's one reason I chopped back the lifespans of my races--the high elves hit ~200 max, dwarves at ~150, wood elves at ~120, and most others max out around 100. Goblins at the low end at ~60-70-ish. Still a gap, but not thousands of years.


I have a number of civilizations that attempt to do this--

You've got the dragonborn + orcs + goblins "military industrial complex" nation--not because those groups are natively warlike, but because they banded together ~140 years ago due to an external threat. The dragonborn provide a stable directing hand + arcane power, the orcs provide muscle + primal power, and the goblins are mad scientists/tech innovators. But the goblins' native hyper-ADD/"squirrel" tendencies are held in check by the other two groups. The dragonborn are nominally in charge, but only nominally.

I've also got a much more "melting pot" civilization that aspires to be the "shining light on the hill". Has most of the remaining high elf-equivalents (but only ~200 year lifespan), humans, halflings, some dwarves, and a bunch of everyone else (it's a trade center). Ruled by a time-skipped (due to stasis shenanigans) ancient-times elf wizard, who just so happens to be an idealist. It's by far not perfect. But the mixing of the groups provides a certain vigor that doesn't happen in more mono-cultural groups.

It's said that if you want the absolute best items made, you want something
a) dreamed up by a Wyrmhold goblin
b) designed and iterated on by an Uulani dwarf
c) and finished by a Crisial high elf.

The Wyrmhold[1] goblins have amazing ideas, but really poor follow-through due to their tribe-mind ADD (basically they're constantly getting distracted by things other goblins in their tribe find fascinating due to shared memories). So purely goblin-made items have a distressing tendency to be unfinished or to explode unexpectedly. Uulani[2] dwarves are great at making things work and perfecting the function of items, but are so tradition-bound that they struggle to do more than iterative improvements on the patterns of the past unless shown something from the outside. The high elves of Crisial[3] are known for making everything very attractive...but definitely prefer form over function. Think high-end runway fashion.

I definitely try for the Salad Bowl, mostly. Groups are mixed in and around each other (where it makes sense), but they retain their individuality. And none of the cultures are anywhere near perfect--Wyrmhold is trying to figure out what to do with itself now that the war is over and the external threat is gone; Crisial has tensions both between the races but mainly between the forces that want to centralize and those that want individual determination; the merchant class is also fighting for more power at the expense of the aristocracy, and the poor are getting trampled (to some degree) by both. Neither has great foreign relations either--Wyrmhold is seen as expansionist and militaristic (for good reason) and Crisial is seen as being annoying (in a self-righteous way) and is resented for having a stranglehold on trade due to its position.

On the other hand, you have the nearly-monocultural Uulani (there are a few humans and halflings on the outskirts, but they have no political power at all and are basically outsiders), for whom Group Think is literally a way of life. And are isolationist, somewhat xenophobic, and so hide-bound that it hurts. All dwarves aren't like that, necessarily--the nation of Shinevog was founded by a group of Uulani dwarves who said "screw tradition" and left to form a techno-magical research state. And then befriended some goliaths and wood elves. It's a weird, somewhat anarchistic place.

There was a very "melting pot" nation of a bunch of races all held together by a dragon and a near-immortal (ageless, but not unkillable, and not particularly powerful magically) half-elven bard, but not by force--more by blackmail, tradition, history (a shared legacy of fleeing a cataclysmic event), and a lot of stories. It fell apart as it grew enough and became "safe". And when someone tried to (and almost succeeded) assassinate the dragon and the bard.

[1] The dragonborn+orc+goblin nation mentioned.
[2] The high-elf/human/halfling nation mentioned.
[3] a nearly mono-cultural dwarven nation.

[King of Nowhere]

I personally find the "magic melting pot" to be almost as trite and cardboard as the wholly evil empire.



But in fantasy stories, everything serves a narrative function, and extraneous detail just takes up space and ruins pacing. So, The Scalgathar Peoples are boiled down to one-note raiders from across the sea, because that's the function the story needs them to serve, and we don't have space to establish the 10 farmers, three weavers, miners, cart drivers, and 10% of a blacksmith just going about their ordinary, complex lives behind each raider our heroic protagonists cuts down.

If our story takes place far from Scalgathar lands, it's not unrealistic for every Scalgathar the protagonists meet to be a raider. There may be peace loving Scalgathar merchants and travelers,



Evil Empire can exist, just maybe acknowledge that just because the Empire of Thay's armies are pillaging and conquering, it doesnt mean all Thayan support these conquests.

This idea of the evil empire as an evil place of evil people frothing from their mouth and eager for violence is quite hard to swallow. No, adding a few civilians that may disagree with their government doesn't make it any better. I don't think such a place ever exhisted; people are people.
But you can have evil empires. In that they are normal places filled with normal, perfectly reasonable people, most of them reasonably happy with their lives. that just so happen to have some moral value that you find abhorrent.

Take pretty much any ancient empire - not going into names because forum rules, but they all pretty much fit the bill. Filled with normal workers. Produced important art and culture. Had advanced legislation system for its time. You talk to someone, you get along just fine. Until you come across a few issues. For example chattel slavery. Yes, we practice slavery, what's the problem? we conquered those people in war, then we made them slaves. that's how it works. rampant slavery, draconian justice system, no freedom of speech, religious discrimination, human sacrifice, all that kind of stuff.
the thing is, people in the evil empire do not do those things because "muahaha we are so evil and we like it!". no they do those things because "that's how things are done and there's nothing wrong with it".
The trick to make a good evil empire is to create a culture where some form of evil is justified, even glorified. Make that evil bad enough that you can't just accept it as a different culture thing. Make sure that the culture is consistent and has a point. people living in that culture must buy into it without being idiots. make also sure the culture has some good things going for it, that the people uses to justify the evil.

Despotonia applies a ruthless social darwinism. Helping the weak is considered to weaken society. Private property is more valuable than human life. But the place is ferociously meritocratic, people can improve their lot in life; it's also economically prosperous, because all that ruthlessness does pay off. If you're not the guy who has to sell himself into slavery to eat, you're probably ok.
Nerullia practices wholesale human sacrifices. And they actually have to: they live in a desert, and with the power coming from the sacrifices their god nerull makes their crops grow regardless of the unfavorable environment, so the nerullites actually need hundreds of sacrifices daily just to eat - plus they also get a few extra boons. People accepts that necessity. Most sacrifices are actually volunteers. The others are drafted from the elderly, the infirm, the socially undesirable. Once more, if you are an average citizen, you're generally fine. Except, they got so used to sacrificing to make their land farmable, they started to see sacrifices as the solution to everything. Natural disaster? let's sacrifice some people and ask nerull to stop it. Widespread economic downturn? let's sacrifice some people and ask nerull to help. Epidemics? Human sacrifices. A new bbeg has shown up? human sacrifices. the national football team is losing? human sacrifices (ok, they don't have national football teams in my setting, yet. But if they had one, nerullia would definitely do it. And they'd get plenty of volunteers. Actually, I'm pretty sure even in our world, if we went to the stadium and asked the more fanatic followers if they'd be willing to get sacrificed to give their team a small boost, some would volunteer).

Then, within those coltures, there is nuance. but (besides a minority of people who don't buy into the culture's premise, generally concentrated in cosmopolitan large cities) most people will be good or bad within the culture. For example, in despotonia a good person does not give a handout to a homeless. In fact, under despotonian law someone asking charity can be killed in self-defence, because he was trying to take your money, which is more important than life. No, a good person will take the homeless dude and give him a job. A good person will try to create a positive working environment. A good person will volunteer to perform work that favors the community - himself included. A good nobleman will train hard in combat, to be a stronger asset to the imperial army.
A good nerullite will volunteer for sacrifice when one is needed. A good nerullite will do all the things that good people do in normal places, he'll just be ok with people all around him, including loved ones, being taken for sacrifice. He'll be happy they're going to become one with nerull.

An evil empire does not have to be a charicature. If it is a charicature, it can be a well-made one. the best outcome you can have when building an evil empire is having your players clearly revulsed by the stuff that happens there, but still wondering if actually destroying the empire is really the right thing to do.

P.S. You can also have an empire with a militaristic upper class launching wars of conquests and keeping the population in check through repression and propaganda, but that's not an evil empire; that's an empire ruled by evil. Until the population starts to buy into the propaganda, thinking those wars are right and conquering their neighboors is a holy duty, then it becomes an evil empire.

P.P.S. Same goes for the good kingdom.

[awa]

one thing to be careful with there is people can sometimes be dense when it comes to seeing the sins.

For instance you might make a group that is very sexist but also militarily and industrially powerfully. That are opposed to a group that is more liberal but also less organized and effective, some people are going to come along and ah ha you think liberalism makes you weak. They don't see it as, okay this society has some bad some good, but rather that you are advocating this bad thing is actually good.

Now I'm not saying don't make your forces nuanced but just be aware.

I recall a super hero supplement for the American civil war that tried to go to hard into nuisance and ended up being pro confederacy. I suspect that wasn't the creators intent they just tried to make some of the confederate supers good people and some of the union supers bad people but they ended up with a greater percent of the confederates being heroes than the union (if memory serves) implying the union were the real villains.

[paladinofshojo]

For instance you might make a group that is very sexist but also militarily and industrially powerfully. That are opposed to a group that is more liberal but also less organized and effective, some people are going to come along and ah ha you think liberalism makes you weak. They don't see it as, okay this society has some bad some good, but rather that you are advocating this bad thing is actually good.

So like the Empire in Star Wars vs the Rebel Alliance?

I am pretty sure that what you’re describing isn’t so much as advocating that fascism is a good thing, but rather admitting that the aesthetics of fascism are very appealing.

I mean, I hate Nazis in real life as much as the next guy, but I have to admit that their uniforms and cinematography was on point….

Though, in real life, most of that “superior German efficiency” was just self aggrandizing propaganda seeing as they were quickly reduced to resorting to wooden carts and horses after their initial blitzkrieg strategy proved to be unable to cow a country as big as Russia…. Turns out that investing in fancy guns and tanks isn’t a good idea if you don’t have the raw resources to afford to lose them in protracted warfare….

Actually, now that I think about it, it would actually be an interesting topic to discuss, perhaps the group that presents itself as militarily and industrially powerful may actually be relying on propaganda and disinformation to justify itself, the militarists are literally living in squalor compared to the “decadent” and “corrupt” liberals with their “deregulated economy” and “innovations”….

And rather than do “weak” and “degenerate” things like “trade for resources” and “allow people to diversify the economy instead of just killing those who are unfit/unworthy of military service”….. they simply keep on declaring war on everyone else for the stuff they need to maintain their military complex….


I recall a super hero supplement for the American civil war that tried to go too hard into nuisance and ended up being pro confederacy. I suspect that wasn't the creators intent they just tried to make some of the confederate supers good people and some of the union supers bad people but they ended up with a greater percent of the confederates being heroes than the union (if memory serves) implying the union were the real villains.

I am confused how one can justify the Confederacy and objectively “good”? Did it try to argue the “State’s Right’s” argument? Or were said characters just unwilling to fight against their home states more than their distaste for owning other human beings?

[KorvinStarmast]

On the other hand while the modern game is vehemently opposed to the concept if we go to the archetypal races or to a lesser extent older versions of the game, a society that was very good at utilizing the varies species advantages could be very successful. dwarven smiths and elven horticulturists and orc soldiers would have a significant competitive advantage against a mono species society provided it could keep from ripping itself apart. Ironically off the top of my head the easiest way i could think for that to happen would be for the whole thing to be run from the top down by a dragon or something. A being that is even longer lived than the elves and powerful enough to stomp all individual threats thus granting the long-term stability for people to get used to this state of being. Either a dragon lord or someone like Iuz from the World of Greyhawk. He raises/raised armies from various surrounding regions (to include the orcish / giant-class folk) as well as humans, though I am not sure how many elves or dwarves he has in his ranks. That depends on the GM who is running the campaign. He's also eying a westward expansion into Ket ...

In my case (I use the WoG as the baseline for my Saltmarsh campaign) he's got agents all over the world (the vendor in Salt Marsh was his agent, though she met her demise during the adventure) and is making his move (off screen, I use dice to determine some of the world events, like the civil war going in in and around the Great Kingdom way to the east). For sure he's got some elves working for him. (Not anyone that the party has met, but the losers of the dynastic rivalries in the elven kingdoms further to his south).

[QUOTE]I am pretty sure that what you’re describing isn’t so much as advocating that fascism is a good thing, but rather admitting that the aesthetics of fascism are very appealing.

I mean, I hate Nazis in real life as much as the next guy, but I have to admit that their uniforms and cinematography was on point….
As an old Army friend once observed (tongue in cheek)
Well, at least the Gestapo were snappy dressers! :smallyuk:

Speaking of snappy dressers, General Patton was somewhat legendary in his focus on spit-and-polish. He believed that "if you look like a soldier you'll feel like a soldier" (or words to that effect). And this brings us to how this applies to role playing: If you are going to get into the role, embrace it and go all in is a pretty good suggestion.

[awa]

So like the Empire in Star Wars vs the Rebel Alliance?



I am confused how one can justify the Confederacy and objectively “good”? Did it try to argue the “State’s Right’s” argument? Or were said characters just unwilling to fight against their home states more than their distaste for owning other human beings?

1) not quite the empire is not a very good example of this because the empire loses repeatedly to a small band of rebels. They are not presented as a group that has some good enviable traits and some bad traits opposed by a group that is also flawed in different ways but just as bad guys. Storm troopers are faceless mooks we are not supposed to feel bad for them when they die.

2) when you are interacting with a setting you are primarily going to be doing it through the named characters or in a super setting through the various capped heroes. In that particular setting the most front and center confederate super was a good person (non raciest) just fighting for his home and if my memory serves me the most front and center union cape was a bad guy. Since these are the individuals a pc is going to be interacting with that is going to set the tone of how they see the groups. I will freely admit the supplement did not particularly interest me so I only skimmed it (many years ago to boot) but I do not recall it going much into the details of the war I mostly remember the misguided effort to humanize the confederates which leads to a suggestion that neither side was the bad guy and war is terrible in a kind of vague bothsidesy way.

[False God]

This idea of the evil empire as an evil place of evil people frothing from their mouth and eager for violence is quite hard to swallow. No, adding a few civilians that may disagree with their government doesn't make it any better. I don't think such a place ever exhisted; people are people.
But you can have evil empires. In that they are normal places filled with normal, perfectly reasonable people, most of them reasonably happy with their lives. that just so happen to have some moral value that you find abhorrent.

Take pretty much any ancient empire - not going into names because forum rules, but they all pretty much fit the bill. Filled with normal workers. Produced important art and culture. Had advanced legislation system for its time. You talk to someone, you get along just fine. Until you come across a few issues. For example chattel slavery. Yes, we practice slavery, what's the problem? we conquered those people in war, then we made them slaves. that's how it works. rampant slavery, draconian justice system, no freedom of speech, religious discrimination, human sacrifice, all that kind of stuff.
the thing is, people in the evil empire do not do those things because "muahaha we are so evil and we like it!". no they do those things because "that's how things are done and there's nothing wrong with it".
The trick to make a good evil empire is to create a culture where some form of evil is justified, even glorified. Make that evil bad enough that you can't just accept it as a different culture thing. Make sure that the culture is consistent and has a point. people living in that culture must buy into it without being idiots. make also sure the culture has some good things going for it, that the people uses to justify the evil.

Despotonia applies a ruthless social darwinism. Helping the weak is considered to weaken society. Private property is more valuable than human life. But the place is ferociously meritocratic, people can improve their lot in life; it's also economically prosperous, because all that ruthlessness does pay off. If you're not the guy who has to sell himself into slavery to eat, you're probably ok.
Nerullia practices wholesale human sacrifices. And they actually have to: they live in a desert, and with the power coming from the sacrifices their god nerull makes their crops grow regardless of the unfavorable environment, so the nerullites actually need hundreds of sacrifices daily just to eat - plus they also get a few extra boons. People accepts that necessity. Most sacrifices are actually volunteers. The others are drafted from the elderly, the infirm, the socially undesirable. Once more, if you are an average citizen, you're generally fine. Except, they got so used to sacrificing to make their land farmable, they started to see sacrifices as the solution to everything. Natural disaster? let's sacrifice some people and ask nerull to stop it. Widespread economic downturn? let's sacrifice some people and ask nerull to help. Epidemics? Human sacrifices. A new bbeg has shown up? human sacrifices. the national football team is losing? human sacrifices (ok, they don't have national football teams in my setting, yet. But if they had one, nerullia would definitely do it. And they'd get plenty of volunteers. Actually, I'm pretty sure even in our world, if we went to the stadium and asked the more fanatic followers if they'd be willing to get sacrificed to give their team a small boost, some would volunteer).

Then, within those coltures, there is nuance. but (besides a minority of people who don't buy into the culture's premise, generally concentrated in cosmopolitan large cities) most people will be good or bad within the culture. For example, in despotonia a good person does not give a handout to a homeless. In fact, under despotonian law someone asking charity can be killed in self-defence, because he was trying to take your money, which is more important than life. No, a good person will take the homeless dude and give him a job. A good person will try to create a positive working environment. A good person will volunteer to perform work that favors the community - himself included. A good nobleman will train hard in combat, to be a stronger asset to the imperial army.
A good nerullite will volunteer for sacrifice when one is needed. A good nerullite will do all the things that good people do in normal places, he'll just be ok with people all around him, including loved ones, being taken for sacrifice. He'll be happy they're going to become one with nerull.

An evil empire does not have to be a charicature. If it is a charicature, it can be a well-made one. the best outcome you can have when building an evil empire is having your players clearly revulsed by the stuff that happens there, but still wondering if actually destroying the empire is really the right thing to do.

P.S. You can also have an empire with a militaristic upper class launching wars of conquests and keeping the population in check through repression and propaganda, but that's not an evil empire; that's an empire ruled by evil. Until the population starts to buy into the propaganda, thinking those wars are right and conquering their neighboors is a holy duty, then it becomes an evil empire.

P.P.S. Same goes for the good kingdom.

I agree. When I complain about Evil Empires or Good Kingdoms of even Magical Melting Pots, I'm referring to ones that are written like they should only be a backdrop, but are regularly brought into the foreground.

Like, we never get much detail about Mordor in the LOTR trilogy, we don't get details about their economics, how they're feeing troops, their diplomacy(they recruited the Haradrim somehow?), or their internal power structures. It's just "evil guy at top, some notable evil minions, lots of evil troops all in a big evil land". Even when Frodo finally gets there Mordor doesn't ever come to the front, it's still just window dressing.

And that's totally fine. Frodo wasn't engaging in economic sabotage of the Mordor Military-Industrial Complex, so the economics, production or food supplies aren't issues the story needs to talk about.

The Empire in Star Wars on the other hand is right up in your face from the beginning, we get to see power structures that don't make sense, a "battle station" that defies production logic, numbers of troops that demand answers about food supply, and "fleets" made up of only 1 type of unit. Oh and blowing up a planet without any regard to the gravitational, social, or economic impact. It's all written like it should be set dressing, but we're slapped across the face with it every time we turn around.

That's where I complain about writing. And oh I love me some Star Wars, but boy even today the in-world logic is sketchy!

[KorvinStarmast]

And that's totally fine. Frodo wasn't engaging in economic sabotage of the Mordor Military-Industrial Complex, so the economics, production or food supplies aren't issues the story needs to talk about.

The Empire in Star Wars on the other hand is right up in your face from the beginning, we get to see power structures that don't make sense, a "battle station" that defies production logic, numbers of troops that demand answers about food supply, and "fleets" made up of only 1 type of unit. Oh and blowing up a planet without any regard to the gravitational, social, or economic impact. It's all written like it should be set dressing, but we're slapped across the face with it every time we turn around.

That's where I complain about writing. And oh I love me some Star Wars, but boy even today the in-world logic is sketchy! Yep. The "science" in Star Wars is not good SF, it's more along the lines of magic.

[Satinavian]

And that's totally fine. Frodo wasn't engaging in economic sabotage of the Mordor Military-Industrial Complex, so the economics, production or food supplies aren't issues the story needs to talk about.

The Empire in Star Wars on the other hand is right up in your face from the beginning, we get to see power structures that don't make sense, a "battle station" that defies production logic, numbers of troops that demand answers about food supply, and "fleets" made up of only 1 type of unit. Oh and blowing up a planet without any regard to the gravitational, social, or economic impact. It's all written like it should be set dressing, but we're slapped across the face with it every time we turn around.
We actually do get some details about that in LotR and even more in supporting works. It is clearly not the focus of the story and most viewpoint characters don't know the details and it is still a fairy tale stole about good vs evil, but Tolkien did put more effort into those parts of his worldbuilding than many other, more modern works do.

[King of Nowhere]

We actually do get some details about that in LotR and even more in supporting works. It is clearly not the focus of the story and most viewpoint characters don't know the details and it is still a fairy tale stole about good vs evil, but Tolkien did put more effort into those parts of his worldbuilding than many other, more modern works do.

I remember a line where frodo wonders where the orcs get food, and an omniacent narrator mentioning farms in south or east mordor.
Which is good. Knowing where the food comes from is a basic component for my suspension of disbelief. I can handwave most everything else, but a big population in the middle of wasteland begs the question of what they eat

[gbaji]

Well, importantly, Legolas and Gimli didn't get along at first. Their transition from being distrustful and racist to "competitive companions" to "true friends" is well shown over the course of the LOTR trilogy. And yes, Groupthink can play a heavy role in the application of prejudice, and when someone is removed from the group, they now have to make their own decisions, which often gives them the opportunity to think outside the group's otherwise hateful norms.

Right. Because the absence of a lot of interaction meant that pretty much all they knew of the other was the racial stereotypes. I guess what I was going at was that it's far more common for individuals to get along across such divides than most media (of all types) might have one think.


Personally, I think the MMP approach is a lazy way to justify why this group gets along.
There are simpler solutions with fewer world implications:
A: These people don't have those prejudices, they are the exceptions.
B: These people DO have those prejudices, but feel the others of the party are "exceptions".
C: These people do have those prejudices, but agree working together towards defeating the Demon Lord is more important.
D: These people come from allied nations who, while not a melting pot, have mellowed thanks to shared economic/social/military success.

Eh... It may be lazy (though, I suppose the salad bowl model might be more appropriate), but it's a "useful" lazyness. If I"m running a game, and my players have selected a diverse set of PC races to play, it's going to be a heck of a lot easier to start off the game if we have a means for all of them to start in the same place.

I also tend towards settings where super strong racial/cultural biases are quite rare. And when they do exist, it's usually quite geographical in nature. Which, also lends itself towards the melting pot or salad bowl approach. So there may be some isolationist civilizations out there, and many that are more mixed. If a group of dwarves (or well, just about anyone) wanders into an elven forest, they're going to be treated with distrust. Similarly, if a group of elves go wandering in a dwarven area. But a member of the same two societies, find themselves in a mixed civilization area, aren't going to carry their mistrusts with them. Elf from forestA and Dwarf from strongholdB meet in a bar in "open CityC", and have no problems.

Why? Because the mistrusts aren't because groupA just hates all members of groupB, but because each group is mistrustful of the other ppotentially harming their lands/mines/whatever. Once members of those groups are outside their own areas, they don't really care much.

I just find that model works well. It allows for adventuring groups to encounter these enclaves of more isolationist peoples (and could potentially have a member of the party that may be able to act on the groups behalf), but otherwise can interact together and with most places they go, without having to worry about things much.

And sure, we could call that "lazy". But I find that trying to micromanage too many different groups and areas and keeping track of who is ok where is just a bit too far on the other side of the effort scale. That's not to say that I don't put some regional information in each area, detailing what is there, or known, or unknown. Which means that it's possible that some members of an adventuring party may find themselves getting some "odd" attention due to being super rare or unknown in the area. But that's something that may be fun to play out while actually adventuring, but is just a pain in the butt to deal with before we've even started the first session.


You end up with fewer world implications and no need to explain how the MMP seems to be working when noone else gets it. The latter approach is IMO, the best when you're actually relying on true nation-states and not tropey fantasy monocultures. There can be LOTS of dwarves and LOTS of elves just like there always seem to be lots of humans, all with different opinions and connections to each other.

Again. I just go in the other direction, and make areas that are actually full on isolationist (by choice or not) pretty darn rare. I suppose this is setting dependent, but if the assumption is that the PCs can be an assortment of different races, then it stands to reason that different races must have a decent amount of interaction (else, how did these people join up in the first place?), and if we also assume this adventuring party is going to travel to different places, then we have to assume that other people also travel around. So most places in the setting will have interaction with the various people and races of most other place in the setting.

To me. The trick is justifying why someone in a given area *hasn't* encountered a Dwarf or Elf before. Not the other way around.


Oh. I'll also second (third?) the notion that just because there is an "evil empire" doesn't mean that everyone in it is evil. And even if they engage in practices we might consider "evil" or "immoral", it's unlikely that they sit around twirling their moustaches thinking 'I'm just so evil" or something. They think of what they do as "normal" or "necessary". In all likelihood they may not even understand why other people might think their cannibalism, or human sacrifice, or slavery, or whatever, is actually bad.

Heck. Even actual bad guys rarely think of themselves as evil. They often think what they are doing is "good". Just mabe not so good to the eggs they're using to make their omelet.


Maybe, but this tends to be for the exception. Anarchists revel in objectively collapsed societies while they suffer in functional ones. I don't think that's enough to say that a utopia that functions for 99% of its members is a dystopia. It's not always a matter of perspective and even if it is, not all perspectives are inherently equal.

Well. Anarchists, by intention, do not "build systems". So they cannot build either a Utipia or a Distopia. It's just anarchy. The innate problem with any Utopia, is that it requires the opposite of anarchy. Someone has a "design" that they are following to make the "perfect society". But to do this, it requires massive authoritariansim. You must force all memberes to comply with whatever rules are needed to make the Utipia "perfect". And well before you approach that perfection, you will achieve pretty much absurd levels of Distopia.

Thomas More was writing a political satire, and making fun of people who thought that if you just tried hard enough, and created enough rules, you could build a perfect society and everyone would be happy and prosperous. He wrote about just how absurd and ridiculous this would be if you actually tried to do it. And he called the resulting disaster "Utopia". That's what a utopia is: a terrible society that results when you try too hard to make it perfect. The term "distopia" is an oxymoron. It should not exist, because the thing you are taking the opposite of is already "bad". It's like the term "devolution". Doesn't exist (well, has the same meaning as the term it's supposed to oppose).

All Utopias are Distopias, because all Utopias are "bad". Just that a lot of the people More was making fun of didn't get the message and actually adopted the term "Utopia" to refer to the pefect societies they still thought they should try to build.

[False God]

Right. Because the absence of a lot of interaction meant that pretty much all they knew of the other was the racial stereotypes. I guess what I was going at was that it's far more common for individuals to get along across such divides than most media (of all types) might have one think.
Yes on that I agree.


Eh... It may be lazy (though, I suppose the salad bowl model might be more appropriate), but it's a "useful" lazyness. If I"m running a game, and my players have selected a diverse set of PC races to play, it's going to be a heck of a lot easier to start off the game if we have a means for all of them to start in the same place.
I'm fine with laziness when the game has no intention of getting into the thick of things. If it does, you've already invested the time to create the thick things into which the players might find themselves, so it should not be difficult to come up with world-fitting reasons why the party is together.

In more lay terms: for a one-shot or quick PUG laziness is fine. For a detailed world, do better.


I also tend towards settings where super strong racial/cultural biases are quite rare. And when they do exist, it's usually quite geographical in nature. Which, also lends itself towards the melting pot or salad bowl approach. So there may be some isolationist civilizations out there, and many that are more mixed. If a group of dwarves (or well, just about anyone) wanders into an elven forest, they're going to be treated with distrust. Similarly, if a group of elves go wandering in a dwarven area. But a member of the same two societies, find themselves in a mixed civilization area, aren't going to carry their mistrusts with them. Elf from forestA and Dwarf from strongholdB meet in a bar in "open CityC", and have no problems.

Why? Because the mistrusts aren't because groupA just hates all members of groupB, but because each group is mistrustful of the other ppotentially harming their lands/mines/whatever. Once members of those groups are outside their own areas, they don't really care much.

I just find that model works well. It allows for adventuring groups to encounter these enclaves of more isolationist peoples (and could potentially have a member of the party that may be able to act on the groups behalf), but otherwise can interact together and with most places they go, without having to worry about things much.

And sure, we could call that "lazy". But I find that trying to micromanage too many different groups and areas and keeping track of who is ok where is just a bit too far on the other side of the effort scale. That's not to say that I don't put some regional information in each area, detailing what is there, or known, or unknown. Which means that it's possible that some members of an adventuring party may find themselves getting some "odd" attention due to being super rare or unknown in the area. But that's something that may be fun to play out while actually adventuring, but is just a pain in the butt to deal with before we've even started the first session.
So, one thing to note is that when I write a world, there's almost no way to be "isolated". Think 1500-1700 Eurasia. The world is fairly strongly connected, people in the East are aware of the West, and the reverse is also true, numerous nation-states exist in any given locale along with just as many if not more culture groups.

My world is primarily founded on economic overlaps which have led to social interaction which then plays out in the form of alliances or aggression (and sometimes neutrality). There are many nations of dwarves and many nations of elves and many nations that have one or more races (who usually have some shared cultural/historical background). So players aren't just choosing to be a Dwarf from Dwarfland, they're picking a specific nation and specific culture to be a part of.


Again. I just go in the other direction, and make areas that are actually full on isolationist (by choice or not) pretty darn rare. I suppose this is setting dependent, but if the assumption is that the PCs can be an assortment of different races, then it stands to reason that different races must have a decent amount of interaction (else, how did these people join up in the first place?), and if we also assume this adventuring party is going to travel to different places, then we have to assume that other people also travel around. So most places in the setting will have interaction with the various people and races of most other place in the setting.

To me. The trick is justifying why someone in a given area *hasn't* encountered a Dwarf or Elf before. Not the other way around.
I'm with you. Most nations have encountered other races and nations that have never seen *this race* are rare, but there are equally few melting pots. Racial, historical, cultural and social traditions generally prevent it.


Well. Anarchists, by intention, do not "build systems". So they cannot build either a Utipia or a Distopia. It's just anarchy.
*sigh* Anarchists are not the Joker. Anarchists object to large scale governmental systems, but they understand the function of social interaction and the necessity for multiple people to work together. They just view these things are inherently fleeting, and that every member has the right to basically leave them at any time.


The innate problem with any Utopia, is that it requires the opposite of anarchy. Someone has a "design" that they are following to make the "perfect society". But to do this, it requires massive authoritariansim. You must force all memberes to comply with whatever rules are needed to make the Utipia "perfect". And well before you approach that perfection, you will achieve pretty much absurd levels of Distopia.
This is flat out poppycock. We've never built a dystopia, so we have no idea what it would actually require to make one. Any projection based on "lots of rules to control people" or "singing songs and holding hands" is pure speculation. Yes, we can make general guesses on the grounds that when people get along, stuff seems to go well right? So what can we do to get more people to get along? Or when rules make people behave, stuff seems to work better, so what rules can we implement to get people to behave more? But we've absolutely never actually built one, so any assumptions on what it would take to actually establish one are just guesses. Utopias, since they are make-believe, particularly in fiction, can be founded on any number of faulty premises that somehow magically worked in Fantasy Land, but clearly would never work IRL.


Thomas More was writing a political satire, and making fun of people who thought that if you just tried hard enough, and created enough rules, you could build a perfect society and everyone would be happy and prosperous. He wrote about just how absurd and ridiculous this would be if you actually tried to do it. And he called the resulting disaster "Utopia". That's what a utopia is: a terrible society that results when you try too hard to make it perfect. The term "distopia" is an oxymoron. It should not exist, because the thing you are taking the opposite of is already "bad". It's like the term "devolution". Doesn't exist (well, has the same meaning as the term it's supposed to oppose).
Thomas More may have coined the term, but the concept of a perfect place where everyone is happy predates him by thousands of years and is found in societies around the globe. I really don't give two flying flumphfs what More wrote, More is not the last word on what a Utopia is, and certainly not the guy in charge of defining how it must work. More, like a lot of writers takes a dim view on people being able to work together, and thus saw any attempt at a better society as inherently flawed. We simply cannot accept a fantastical tale of a perfect society that really wasn't as the be-all, end-all analysis of what may or may not be a utopia.


All Utopias are Distopias, because all Utopias are "bad". Just that a lot of the people More was making fun of didn't get the message and actually adopted the term "Utopia" to refer to the pefect societies they still thought they should try to build.
Because everyone dreams of the perfect society. Be it Xanadu, Heaven, Valhalla, you name it, the concept of a place where everyone can live life to their fullest, be their best selves, and everyone can work together in harmony is inherently something that the whole of humanity has commonly dreamed of since we first came out of the trees. And frankly, even social animals strive to make more functional groups, because stronger and more functional and happier groups mean better lives for everyone. Utopias, regardless of what More may have been poking at, are an ideal for a very sound reason.

I would highly advise against hanging your hat on More's singular definition of a utopia. He did not invent the concept, and it remains nothing more than fantasy and therefore without any foundational basis in functioning in reality.

[Mechalich]

All Utopias are Distopias, because all Utopias are "bad". Just that a lot of the people More was making fun of didn't get the message and actually adopted the term "Utopia" to refer to the pefect societies they still thought they should try to build.

Thomas More doesn't have ownership of the term 'utopia,' as language has evolved over the course of 500 years. Small-u utopia is used in modern English to refer to an idealized place or state, and is also often used comparatively as 'utopian' versus 'dystopian' representing societies ranked on a scale that is generally something along the lines of 'best for the greatest number of people living there' versus 'worst for the greatest number of people living there.' Similarly, while a perfect society is probably impossible to imagine since someone, somewhere, will reject anything, gradations are decidedly clear. Iain M. Banks Culture Universe is decidedly utopian in outlook, taking advantage of functionally limitless resources and benevolent super-intelligent AIs to offer up basically whatever flavor of paradise its various citizens desire. By contrast, the universe of Warhammer 40K is so mind-bogglingly dystopian it got to be the trope-namer for the entire grimdark subgenre.

[KorvinStarmast]

I would highly advise against hanging your hat on More's singular definition of a utopia. He did not invent the concept, and it remains nothing more than fantasy and therefore without any foundational basis in functioning in reality. As one of the chief advisors to the King of England during the Reformation, he was very familiar with how badly people got along, and what impact "rules and more rules" could have. hence the satire that he wrote.

Thomas More doesn't have ownership of the term 'utopia,' Yeah, people have appropriated it for their own purposes, which makes this a topic related to the thread, right? :smallbiggrin:

[gbaji]

I would highly advise against hanging your hat on More's singular definition of a utopia. He did not invent the concept, and it remains nothing more than fantasy and therefore without any foundational basis in functioning in reality.

He did, invent the term though. And it's a literal play on words meaning "no place" (as in, "this is a silly iimaginary ideal that can't work and can't exist"). And no, I'm not opposed at all to the idea of working to make the societies we live in better, and even striving towards an ideal.

I just find the actual use of the lable "Utopia" to be ironic as heck. If someone tells me "I want to build a better society", that's a conversation starter, where we can discuss different aspects of society and whatnot. If someone tells me "I want to live in Utopia", I kind of look at them askance, and say "Do you really?". It's a label, right? But it might mean very different things to different people (more or less how aware we are of the source of the term). And it certainly means something very different to me than it likely does to the person rattling off the term. Which IMO, is at least useful in terms of recognizing that general labels, while great for putting on bumper stickers, do not actually make great social policy.


Oh. As to the game setting stuff. I don't think you and I are very far off at all. In fact, I think we're very much aligned here. I was merely talking about the assumption of innate racial hatreds/mistrust in a setting. My setting has lots of mistrust (and sometimes even hatred), but it's generally social/cultural/political. KingdomA is at war with KingdomB kind of stuff. Empire of <whatever> practies horrible things, so we don't like them. The conflicts between different groups are rarely about race, but about various other historical issues, often involving resources or religion or social practices.

There are very very few areas in my setting where you are at risk of being killed on sight just because of what race you are. Now, if they find out where you are from? That may be a whole different issue...

[KorvinStarmast]

And it's a literal play on words meaning "no place" (as in, "this is a silly iimaginary ideal that can't work and can't exist"). If someone tells me "I want to live in Utopia",
If you want to live in Utopia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopia,_Texas), you can. Tell them to fly to San Antonio, get on US 90 west, and turn north a little before getting to the city of Uvalde.
I've been there, had the pie at the diner which advertises home made pie, we enjoyed Fourth of July fireworks also.

[Palanan]

Wait, there’s something near Uvalde?

[MonochromeTiger]

He did, invent the term though. And it's a literal play on words meaning "no place" (as in, "this is a silly iimaginary ideal that can't work and can't exist"). And no, I'm not opposed at all to the idea of working to make the societies we live in better, and even striving towards an ideal.

I just find the actual use of the lable "Utopia" to be ironic as heck. If someone tells me "I want to build a better society", that's a conversation starter, where we can discuss different aspects of society and whatnot. If someone tells me "I want to live in Utopia", I kind of look at them askance, and say "Do you really?". It's a label, right? But it might mean very different things to different people (more or less how aware we are of the source of the term). And it certainly means something very different to me than it likely does to the person rattling off the term. Which IMO, is at least useful in terms of recognizing that general labels, while great for putting on bumper stickers, do not actually make great social policy.

Except you know they don't mean the same thing as you do. You know they aren't using the same source for their meaning. You know common use of the word has moved in a different direction than More intended it, which was in its simplest form a way for him to go "no, your ideas are stupid and so are you."

All you're accomplishing by using your method is dismissing any actual conversation because of a word choice then saying you're justified because they use it differently than you. A living language doesn't stay the same over time no matter how much we may want it to. Spellings, definitions, connotations, and even the emotion and spirit behind using a word for a particular use change, it's part of why it's so easy for things to fall into the nebulous well of being hurtful language and never picked back up because enough people used them for an insult that no one really wants to touch them to correct it for fear of being interpreted as furthering that insult.

Meanwhile all it takes to move "utopia" from your arbitrary dismissal to the same conversational space you reserve for "I want to build a better society" is acknowledging that that's the version of utopia they mean and not the strawman More made to troll people he disagreed with.

[KorvinStarmast]

Wait, there’s something near Uvalde? That entire area has an appeal as an outdoorsy place, tubing and kayaking on the rivers (Frio features in many brochures), hiking and such. Leakey and Concan are also popular destinations, as is Garner State Park.

[gbaji]

Except you know they don't mean the same thing as you do. You know they aren't using the same source for their meaning. You know common use of the word has moved in a different direction than More intended it, which was in its simplest form a way for him to go "no, your ideas are stupid and so are you."

All you're accomplishing by using your method is dismissing any actual conversation because of a word choice then saying you're justified because they use it differently than you.

Not at all. It's usually just the warm up to me telling them "no, your ideas are stupid and so are you."

I merely start out by pointing out that their use of the term itself shows they don't actually understand the concepts that they are talking about. Then we go from there, to the actual specific dumb ideas they have... :smallwink:


Meanwhile all it takes to move "utopia" from your arbitrary dismissal to the same conversational space you reserve for "I want to build a better society" is acknowledging that that's the version of utopia they mean and not the strawman More made to troll people he disagreed with.

Sure. Just IME, anyone who starts out using the term "Utopia" probably has at best a surface level set of ideas about what might actually make a society better. I certainly give them the opportunity to prove me wrong though. Rarely happens.

[False God]

Not at all. It's usually just the warm up to me telling them "no, your ideas are stupid and so are you."

I merely start out by pointing out that their use of the term itself shows they don't actually understand the concepts that they are talking about. Then we go from there, to the actual specific dumb ideas they have... :smallwink:
Ah, so they respond to your "You're dumb!"
With, "No u!"

Gee, I can only wonder why you're not having good conversations.

[Willie the Duck]

Not at all. It's usually just the warm up to me telling them "no, your ideas are stupid and so are you."

I merely start out by pointing out that their use of the term itself shows they don't actually understand the concepts that they are talking about. Then we go from there, to the actual specific dumb ideas they have... :smallwink:

Sure. Just IME, anyone who starts out using the term "Utopia" probably has at best a surface level set of ideas about what might actually make a society better. I certainly give them the opportunity to prove me wrong though. Rarely happens.

What is being communicated is someone who thinks they are intellectually superior and that others must not actually understand what they are talking about based on a self-declared rule and purity check of someone else's jargon use. I think most of us* had that one individual in our circle of friends and acquaintances growing up that thought that they were the brightest mind in whatever conversation they entered, and the rest of the group was absolutely unclear why they thought so. The above situation seems like a pattern of behavior that individual invoked a lot.
*under the assumption that most of the board populace is 'nerds' who had some awkward teen years.

It really is a disservice to oneself to enter into a conversation looking for ways (especially one as uninformative as 'uses a term in a colloquially understood way to which we disagree --based on some arbitrary criteria of coiner's original intent') to preemptively dismiss the likelihood that they have something useful to contribute (or, heaven forfend, actually know more than oneself about a subject, giving one the opportunity to grow in knowledge and understanding).

[KorvinStarmast]

It really is a disservice to oneself to enter into a conversation looking for ways (especially one as uninformative as 'uses a term in a colloquially understood way to which we disagree --based on some arbitrary criteria of coiner's original intent') to preemptively dismiss the likelihood that they have something useful to contribute (or, heaven forfend, actually know more than oneself about a subject, giving one the opportunity to grow in knowledge and understanding).
The winner of this week's Run On Sentence Award goes to Willie the Duck. (It was a close race)
(I often do the same thing, TBH).^^^^^^

Your coupon for a free doughnut may or may not arrive in the mail soon.

[Willie the Duck]

The winner of this week's Run On Sentence Award goes to Willie the Duck. (It was a close race)
(I often do the same thing, TBH).^^^^^^

Your coupon for a free doughnut may or may not arrive in the mail soon.

Some people have said that my typical faux footnotes* are hard to read on phones or with old eyes. I'm now a little self-conscious about using them. Not sure that massive amounts of parentheticals is any better, but I'm giving it a try.
*like this

[KorvinStarmast]

Some people have said that my typical faux footnotes* are hard to read on phones or with old eyes.
This is true. I have old eyes. I also use reading glasses since I am far sighted.
(At this point The Who sings
"I can see for miles and miles ...")

Not sure that massive amounts of parentheticals is any better, but I'm giving it a try.
*like this Parentheses are handy.

[gbaji]

Ah, so they respond to your "You're dumb!"
With, "No u!"

Gee, I can only wonder why you're not having good conversations.

Lol. Some of the best conversations start out like that. Usually after a pint or two of good beer, and with good friends, where we're not all taking ourselves too seriously.


What is being communicated is someone who thinks they are intellectually superior and that others must not actually understand what they are talking about based on a self-declared rule and purity check of someone else's jargon use. I think most of us* had that one individual in our circle of friends and acquaintances growing up that thought that they were the brightest mind in whatever conversation they entered, and the rest of the group was absolutely unclear why they thought so. The above situation seems like a pattern of behavior that individual invoked a lot.
*under the assumption that most of the board populace is 'nerds' who had some awkward teen years.

Well. That's a heck of a lot of words to say "You're being pedantic". Fair enough. But in the context of the situation at hand, it seemed appropriate.


It really is a disservice to oneself to enter into a conversation looking for ways (especially one as uninformative as 'uses a term in a colloquially understood way to which we disagree --based on some arbitrary criteria of coiner's original intent') to preemptively dismiss the likelihood that they have something useful to contribute (or, heaven forfend, actually know more than oneself about a subject, giving one the opportunity to grow in knowledge and understanding).

Let's recall that I tossed out my "all utopias are distopias" comment in response to this (and some follow ups):


I recently read part of a story that kind of had that. The melting pot did that thing where they are both secret and hidden but also super diverse. While major states outside the secret utopia were depicted as both uniformly bad and incredibly incompetent, the utopia had massive advantages in basically every regard as well as perfectly fitting a modern liberal secular utopia. While the incompetent outsiders were either a fairly extreme caste system and a group of murderous religious fanatics respectively.

the utopia is put on such a pedestal that their can be no meeting of minds because only the utopia has anything of value. The dummies dont have any skills, technology or knowledge that the utopia is not wildly more advanced at. It a situation where one culture is simply correct and all other cultures are just wrong.

Does anyone actually think that the society talked about would actually be a "utopia" (as taken by common use of the term)? No, right?

That was the point.

[awa]

Does anyone actually think that the society talked about would actually be a "utopia" (as taken by common use of the term)? No, right?

That was the point.
I wasn't going to get in on this whole utopian thing but than you had to bring me up in such a dismissive way. I was using the word as a descriptor for the authors pet society, a short hand to describe the type of society being presented, one without flaws. I suspect everyone reading the statement in the manner it was intended understood what I was saying. The problem with the utopia in question wasn't the utopia itself but its relation to the societies around it, I largely agree with the values being presented in the utopia that wasn't what turned me of the idea that dark skinned people are not subhuman animals and that you would need to burn any possessions they touched because their presence is unclean fit only to handle dung. I generally prefer my leaders not to make decisions not based on priests taking drugs and deciding to provoke a war with two separate countries to acquire human sacrifices in preparation for a war with a superior force while you are currently losing a war with a fourth unrelated. The problem really wasn't the utopia it was the rest of the setting, utopia is just the easy way to describe the tone and feel with the least effort. To get across that all these other societies are dumb dummies doing dumb things while the smart people doing smart things largely hold to modern beliefs.


I Find your tone very insulting, sufficiently so that I am disinclined to have further conversations with you.

[paladinofshojo]

I think that the main problem with the concept of utopias is that an idea of a “society that has no societal problems” is in itself, an oxymoron.

This is because, societies are made up of individuals, and individuals have a habit of disagreeing with one another over superficial issues such as, say, race, religion, economic doctrine, etc.

As such, sure you can have a society which fits a good chunk of individuals idea of utopia, but you’ll still be excluding another sizable chunk who disagree with the first group.

As such, the “best” system most people (at least in the West) seem to agree with is a system with very slow action is taken after countless arguments of opposite ideologies with said system being exploited by loopholes and general corruption. I.e. a democracy or a republic.

Note, this isn’t so much as endorsing a liberal democratic republic, but rather just “settling” for it after agreeing that any other form of government are even worse.

[Mechalich]

I think that the main problem with the concept of utopias is that an idea of a “society that has no societal problems” is in itself, an oxymoron.

Nah, the biggest problem with utopias is the standard problem of all societies: resource scarcity. So long as society doesn't have enough to give everyone everything they want, disagreements are inevitable as everyone fights over distribution. Group disagreement problems are primarily a manifestation of this that simply fractures across kinship (or apparent kinship when it comes to things like skin color) lines due to evolutionary imperatives embedded in psychology. Partial or total post-scarcity societies are in a much better position to take a stab at the 'perfect society' because they are not constrained by resource limitations.

This is important for fantasy worldbuilding because fantasy settings can deliver various forms of selective post-scarcity (for example, golempunk or necropunk settings can be post-scarcity for physical labor) or they can impose artificial scarcity in other resources needed to produce individual achievement (cultivator settings are often structured such that the resources of entire worlds may be devoted to increasing the advancement of a single person's cultivation). This can include exotic resources too; a literal god-king may have perfect information regarding their domain, which unlocks a variety of governance options no real-world ruler could ever even dream of possessing.

[King of Nowhere]

I generally prefer my leaders not to make decisions not based on priests taking drugs

wait, there's a double negation there. so you are basically stating that you prefer your leaders to make decisions based on priests taking drugs? :smallbiggrin:


Nah, the biggest problem with utopias is the standard problem of all societies: resource scarcity. So long as society doesn't have enough to give everyone everything they want, disagreements are inevitable as everyone fights over distribution.

This is important for fantasy worldbuilding because fantasy settings can deliver various forms of selective post-scarcity

The problem is that it doesn't matter how much people have, most of them will always want more, and will not be happy.
our modern society would be considered utopic by most everyone in the past. a society where everyone has food and basic needs, including needs that the past didn't even understand - like modern sanitation. almost nobody dies pematurely, and we are much healtier even in our late age. we have to work a lot less than in the past, to the point that entertainment is one of the major industries.
and yet, people complain. people are unhappy. people think they are poor, despite having a lot more that mildly rich people in the past.
people readjusted their concept of what is normal, then they went on as before.
even post-scarcity is something that already happened, for basic commodities and for digital entertainment, but it didn't have the desired effect. we have more water than we can possibly drink, but we started to take more showers until we're lacking again. we have more clothes than we can possibly wear, but we started looking for variety. we have more books than we can read, more music than we can listen, more movies than we can watch, more games than we can play, all for free, but we want new ones. most of us do not feel happier.
heck, we went post-scarcity on food itself thousands of years ago already, when we invented agriculture. then we made more children until we starved again.

this argument is actually used in my campaign world by evil cultures to justify them not even trying to improve living standards.
despotonians point out the part about economical and social welfare failing at making people happy. they argue that what actually makes people rich is not having stuff, but having a neighboor with less stuff than they have. so by creating a hypercompetitive society where everyone has someone else to look down, or have some goal to improve his lot in life, they are making the best possible society.
barbarian tribes (barbarian as people living a primitive lifestile in the wilderness, not the class) point out the part about food to claim there's no point in trying to build up a civilization, as civilized people still are full of problems.
from a logical perspective, those arguments can be seen as a form of nirvana fallacy, or perfect solution fallacy. but there is enough of an argument there that in my bad days I wonder if they are right. and there is definitely enough of an argument to use as ideology for a fictional society

[KorvinStarmast]

Let's recall that I tossed out my "all utopias are distopias" Nah, they all end up as dystopias. :smallyuk:


Does anyone actually think that the society talked about would actually be a "utopia" (as taken by common use of the term)? One man's trash is another man's treasure, one man's perfect society is another man's hell on earth.
Tastes differ.
And so it goes.

[awa]

wait, there's a double negation there. so you are basically stating that you prefer your leaders to make decisions based on priests taking drugs? :smallbiggrin:



The problem is that it doesn't matter how much people have, most of them will always want more, and will not be happy.
our modern society would be considered utopic by most everyone in the past. a society where everyone has food and basic needs, including needs that the past didn't even understand - like modern sanitation. almost nobody dies pematurely, and we are much healtier even in our late age. we have to work a lot less than in the past, to the point that entertainment is one of the major industries.
and yet, people complain. people are unhappy. people think they are poor, despite having a lot more that mildly rich people in the past.
people readjusted their concept of what is normal, then they went on as before.
even post-scarcity is something that already happened, for basic commodities and for digital entertainment, but it didn't have the desired effect. we have more water than we can possibly drink, but we started to take more showers until we're lacking again. we have more clothes than we can possibly wear, but we started looking for variety. we have more books than we can read, more music than we can listen, more movies than we can watch, more games than we can play, all for free, but we want new ones. most of us do not feel happier.
heck, we went post-scarcity on food itself thousands of years ago already, when we invented agriculture. then we made more children until we starved again.

this argument is actually used in my campaign world by evil cultures to justify them not even trying to improve living standards.
despotonians point out the part about economical and social welfare failing at making people happy. they argue that what actually makes people rich is not having stuff, but having a neighboor with less stuff than they have. so by creating a hypercompetitive society where everyone has someone else to look down, or have some goal to improve his lot in life, they are making the best possible society.
barbarian tribes (barbarian as people living a primitive lifestile in the wilderness, not the class) point out the part about food to claim there's no point in trying to build up a civilization, as civilized people still are full of problems.
from a logical perspective, those arguments can be seen as a form of nirvana fallacy, or perfect solution fallacy. but there is enough of an argument there that in my bad days I wonder if they are right. and there is definitely enough of an argument to use as ideology for a fictional society

well it is relative, if we had two societies next to each other say one of the nordic countries with a high happiness index and stuck them next to a primitive society that is rife with disease, internal strife, every kind of ism on top of being technologically and militarily inferior an outside observer/reader might rightly say this one is the utopia even if the society is not literally perfect.

[gbaji]

I Find your tone very insulting, sufficiently so that I am disinclined to have further conversations with you.

Well, I appologize if that's how you took my posts. I did not intend it that way, and "tone" is hard to convey in written format. I was initially just tossing out what I thought was an amusing little side comment, maybe with the idea of sparking a little conversation (which, yeah, it did). Didn't expect anyone to be offended. I'm just a natural cynic and when someone starts talking about perfect societies, I immediately start counting my fingers and toes to make sure they're all there. There's a certain "used car salesman" feel to the whole thing IMO. I will appologize for upsetting/insulting you. I will not appologize for having an innate distrust/rejection of anything someone labels a "utopia" though.

That's not at all to say that we can't judge some socieites to be "better" than others based on any of a number of criteria. But the devils in the details. I'm actually a somewhat fan of Iain Bank's Culture novels (some are quite a bit dry/slow though), which is specifically about a post scarcity society, where we could imagine actually approaching the common concept of utopia. Er... But even then, the cynical part of my brain keeps going back to the idea that the Minds in that society basically keep all the human(s/oids) as the equivalent of house pets if you really stop and think about it. So yeah, the people are all fed and clothed and housed, and provided pretty much any entertainment they want (lots of green ribbons and toys, just like my cats), but there's not much actual point to their lives, maybe? Of course, the stories tend to revolve around people who are bored with just living lives and sign up to do dangerous/important/necessary stuff instead, so...


I just happen to think that using the term (or concepts related to it) are often just shorthand used to avoid addressing those devilish details. And that's problematic. I've also played out a lot of different fantasy type societies over time, and found that if you actually do dig into them, and run them "straight", it's pretty much impossible to actually make one in which everyone living in it will actually be happy. It's easy to just say "it's a utopia!", but the moment you start asking any questions about how it actually operates, you start running into hordes of questions that can't easily be answered.. But then, I'm also the guy who asks the question: "Who cleans the toilets in Asgard?", after watching the Thor films and seeing this highly advanced civilization where everyone we see is hanging out in mead halls enjoying themselves or doing an assortment of fun/exciting things. That's just me though. I'm always looking for the Morlocks when the surface looks too good to be true.


Nah, they all end up as dystopias. :smallyuk:

One man's trash is another man's treasure, one man's perfect society is another man's hell on earth.
Tastes differ.
And so it goes.

Yeah. Fair point. IMO, they also trend heavily (and honestly, at best) towards "good intentions" too.

Again. Let me be clear. You can certainly make "good" societies in game settings without too much difficulty. And, of course, we can always contrast those to the obviously "bad" ones. But as a couple of people have pointed out, about the only way you're going to make everyone in a society happy, is if you literally "make them happy" (like mind control or something). So yeah, when I introduce some sort of perfect seeming society into a game setting, you can pretty much bet that there's a whopper of a horrific secret badness hiding beneath the surface somewhere. And not just because that's a common trope, but because at least within human experience, it's kinda the only way those sorts of things can work. And even if we can imagine alien beings who could live in perfect peace and harmony with each other, we're all still humans playing the characters in our games.

eh. And to be honest, it would make for a pretty horrible game. Can you imagine:

GM. Ok. You're all living in a perfect utopian society.

Players: Ok. Let's go look for something to do.

GM: There's nothing to do. Everything you need is available. No one is having any problems. There are no bad guys to fight. We'll just RP hanging out and having peaceful and harmonious conversations with eachother for a few hours this game sesssin.

Players: What? that's crazy. I'm going to start a barfight.

GM: Nope. You can't. The very concept of fighting just doesn't exist in your mind.

Players: What kind of ridiculous player agency destroying mind control garbage is this! We're going to start a revolution. Tear the establishment down! Power to the people!

GM: But... Um... It's a utopia. You can't do that. Wait. Where are you all going?

[KorvinStarmast]

Yeah. Fair point. IMO, they also trend heavily (and honestly, at best) towards "good intentions" too. Insert well worn quote about the road to hell being paved with those ... :smallbiggrin:


Let me be clear. You can certainly make "good" societies in game settings without too much difficulty. And, of course, we can always contrast those to the obviously "bad" ones. But as a couple of people have pointed out, about the only way you're going to make everyone in a society happy, is if you literally "make them happy" (like mind control or something). So yeah, when I introduce some sort of perfect seeming society into a game setting, you can pretty much bet that there's a whopper of a horrific secret badness hiding beneath the surface somewhere.

The Potemkin dungeon, if you will, or the Stepford dungeon, etc.

GM. Ok. You're all living in a perfect utopian society.
Players: Ok. Let's go look for something to do.
GM: There's nothing to do. Everything you need is available. No one is having any problems. There are no bad guys to fight. We'll just RP hanging out and having peaceful and harmonious conversations with eachother for a few hours this game sesssin.
Players: What? that's crazy. I'm going to start a barfight.
GM: Nope. You can't. The very concept of fighting just doesn't exist in your mind.
Players: What kind of ridiculous player agency destroying mind control garbage is this! We're going to start a revolution. Tear the establishment down! Power to the people!
GM: But... Um... It's a utopia. You can't do that. Wait. Where are you all going?
The Operative from Firefly/Serenity: "I believe in a better world."

"I believe in something greater than myself. A better world. A world without sin."
―The Operative

[False God]

eh. And to be honest, it would make for a pretty horrible game. Can you imagine:

GM. Ok. You're all living in a perfect utopian society.

Players: Ok. Let's go look for something to do.

GM: There's nothing to do. Everything you need is available. No one is having any problems. There are no bad guys to fight. We'll just RP hanging out and having peaceful and harmonious conversations with eachother for a few hours this game sesssin.

Players: What? that's crazy. I'm going to start a barfight.

GM: Nope. You can't. The very concept of fighting just doesn't exist in your mind.

Players: What kind of ridiculous player agency destroying mind control garbage is this! We're going to start a revolution. Tear the establishment down! Power to the people!

GM: But... Um... It's a utopia. You can't do that. Wait. Where are you all going?

Only if you run a combat-centric game.

How about exploring? Inventing something new? Socializing? Starting a business?

Frankly, this screams lack of imagination.

[Mechalich]

Only if you run a combat-centric game.

How about exploring? Inventing something new? Socializing? Starting a business?

Frankly, this screams lack of imagination.

If the society is truly utopian these things either already exist in sufficient quantities that there can't be any scarcity or are frictionlessly easy to accomplish to the point that there's no need for an adventure. Instead, the focus needs to be on something external to the society. The Culture novels, notably, are mostly about the Culture's exceedingly complicated, deviously underhanded, and plausibly deniable efforts to raise other societies throughout the galaxy up to its combination of blithely post-scarcity abundance and extraordinary moral tolerance and personal freedom. More straightforwardly horrific is Eclipse Phase, in which portions of the setting (the Outer System, some of the gate worlds) are micro-utopias, but the galaxy is full of monsters that wish to eat everyone's souls and proactive defense is necessary.

[gbaji]

Only if you run a combat-centric game.

How about exploring? Inventing something new? Socializing? Starting a business?

Frankly, this screams lack of imagination.

Well. I was trying to be tounge in cheek there, but Ok.

Utopia, right? There's no where to explore, since everything is known and safe. You're probably sealed up in a dome or something, and it would never occur to you to even think about leaving or going outside. Heck. You don't even know that "outside" exists.

But you're free to walk around the well manicured gardens and plazas as much as you like.

Business? There's no personal possessions and no money. Everything you need or want is already available. So what exactly would you provide that people don't already have?

Invention? Maybe. Guess it depends on how far we're going with the utopian idea. I suppose we could roleplay characters working on the latest generation of fusion power generation or the latest entertainment activity or something.

Socializing could work (and I mentiond it above). But remember, this is a utopia, so there's no conflict. No one ever disagrees, and everyone gets along. So you can certainly roleplay out having boring bland conversations about the lack of weather ever changing or something.


That's the key problem here. The very concept of a utopia (if we are playing straight with the common use of the term), is that it's perfect. There is no conflict. If there is, then you don't have utopia. So everyone sits around all day contemplating their navels and never have to work or do anything at all if they don't want to. Or everyone happily fills in their slot in the hive mind performing their specificlly chosen task or something and never thinks there's anything wrong with this. There's just not a whole lot to actually RP out here. Take away even the possiblity of conflict, and we're left with... what? Not a terribly interesting game (well, unless the whole point is to have the PCs realize the actual distopian nature of the "perfect society" they are living in that is).

And the moment we allow conflict, or even the capacity for conflict, then we have to question why this never results in violence or people taking advantage of other people, or greed, or whatever negative traits we may think of. Furthermore, if we assume that the people do have the capacity for these things, but something is preventing them from engaging in them, then we're in super authoritarian power structure territory. Which is why I said earlier that once you actually start examining "how could this work?", you find very quickly the answer: "It can't". At least not with any sort of sentient life form that we would be comfortable (and enjoy) roleplaying.

It's an easy term to toss around, but if you actually try to follow the rabbit hole of how this could work, you find that hole just keeps going and going and going.

[False God]

Well. I was trying to be tounge in cheek there, but Ok.

***snip***

It's an easy term to toss around, but if you actually try to follow the rabbit hole of how this could work, you find that hole just keeps going and going and going.

{Scrubbed}

[KorvinStarmast]

Utopia, right? There's no where to explore, since everything is known and safe. You're probably sealed up in a dome or something, and it would never occur to you to even think about leaving or going outside. Heck. You don't even know that "outside" exists. It's not a far step from there to "I have no mouth and I must scream"

It's an easy term to toss around, but if you actually try to follow the rabbit hole of how this could work, you find that hole just keeps going and going and going. Which makes it a "great" internet topic. :smallyuk:


{Scrub the post, scrub the quote} *removed*

[icefractal]

I don't think being literally perfect is required to be "a utopian society" as the term is generally used. Any more than being perfectly terrible is required to be a dystopian one.

Like, I think most people would consider the WH40K world dystopian, even though it isn't literally the worst world possible. Heck, even 1984, the classic go-to dystopia, could be worse. And in the same way, I think you could reasonably call the Culture or the Federation "utopian" without them being perfect.

Now this raises a point - are utopia and dystopia relative? Yeah, probably. But still, that doesn't mean they're pointless concepts.



I'm actually a somewhat fan of Iain Bank's Culture novels (some are quite a bit dry/slow though), which is specifically about a post scarcity society, where we could imagine actually approaching the common concept of utopia. Er... But even then, the cynical part of my brain keeps going back to the idea that the Minds in that society basically keep all the human(s/oids) as the equivalent of house pets if you really stop and think about it. So yeah, the people are all fed and clothed and housed, and provided pretty much any entertainment they want (lots of green ribbons and toys, just like my cats), but there's not much actual point to their lives, maybe? Of course, the stories tend to revolve around people who are bored with just living lives and sign up to do dangerous/important/necessary stuff instead, so...This is a point I've thought about and still don't have a firm answer on - how important is self-destiny, and how much self-destiny do we really have in our current world?

Like, the classic response is "harsh and difficult freedom is inherently better than being a pet, regardless how well treated". But then I think ... if that's the case, why don't I (or most people) do things that would maximize our freedom at the expense of our living conditions and/or safety?

Like, say, move to a country with a lot of political instability, very little force of law, and try to become a powerful figure there? I would be less restricted, have the chance for "greatness" beyond what I do now ... and probably be dead, because I don't have particularly good skill in the relevant areas. But I'd be dead by my own actions, doing much more "adventurer worthy" things than I'm likely to do in my current path. However, this idea doesn't appeal the slightest bit.

Or more plausibly, why work for a company instead of trying to become a billionaire entrepreneur? Just because the odds are substantially against me, and it'd be a hell of lot more stressful? That's just choosing security over freedom, isn't it? Yes it is, and I make that choice all the time. So do most people. Perhaps absolute freedom is a bit over-hyped.

And if you're not doing that, but instead living a relatively "normal" life - working at a job because it pays decently, living how you can afford, and being very unlikely to do anything significant on a global scale - then are you really any more free than someone in the Culture? You could say that "Humans", as a whole, are more free, but 99.9%+ of specific humans aren't, and many are less free.

[Anymage]

well it is relative, if we had two societies next to each other say one of the nordic countries with a high happiness index and stuck them next to a primitive society that is rife with disease, internal strife, every kind of ism on top of being technologically and militarily inferior an outside observer/reader might rightly say this one is the utopia even if the society is not literally perfect.

The big question is why you have such distinctly different groups sitting right next to each other, and why the backwards folks are so backwards.

If it's an author tract about how their ideal society is perfect and their political opponents are crass dummies (usually by having thinly veiled representations of opposing politicians/pundits in their work), that sounds about as interesting as any other heavy handed political screed. They're utopian only as an informed attribute, and would fall apart at the slightest questioning.

If there's an actual reason for the difference, that's usually due to some interference by the "utopian" society. And if they're actively engaged in keeping others miserable, I don't know that they could be realistically called a utopia. Omelas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ones_Who_Walk_Away_from_Omelas) happens to look perfect with the exception of one inhabitant, and I don't know many people who call it a work of utopian fiction.


Only if you run a combat-centric game.

How about exploring? Inventing something new? Socializing? Starting a business?

Frankly, this screams lack of imagination.

Trying to do any of those in a TTRPG is dependent on both the GM's personal knowledge and the granularity of the resolution mechanic. And all of the above are things I can do just as effectively in real life. Even sitting there socializing with my friends, I'd rather just do that than pretend to be citizens in a perfect society socializing about how wonderful everything is. If I'm going to be pretending to be someone else as part of the process of socializing, it might as well be someone who can do cool things that I personally can't do.

Plus, a setting without conflict sounds really boring. Conflict gives impetus to act, and being someone who makes things better involves there being something problematic in the first place. It may not be the sort of society I'd want to live in, but given that nobody really lives in campaign worlds I'm okay with them prioritizing being interesting over comfortable.

[King of Nowhere]

The very concept of fighting just doesn't exist in your mind.


You're probably sealed up in a dome or something, and it would never occur to you to even think about leaving or going outside. Heck. You don't even know that "outside" exists.

....
you have a very weird concept of utopia. a place that brainwashes you into thinking you are happy is not an utopia. nor is it the only way to create a good society.
your idea of utopias being equal to distopias only works if you apply your extremely screwy definition.


The big question is why you have such distinctly different groups sitting right next to each other, and why the backwards folks are so backwards.

If there's an actual reason for the difference, that's usually due to some interference by the "utopian" society. And if they're actively engaged in keeping others miserable, I don't know that they could be realistically called a utopia.

those differences are not irrealistic at all. even today, in our modern technological world, deep into equatorial jungles or in small remote islands there are several people still living in the stone age - without any negative interference. Some of them never saw any "modern" person. Some are aware of the world outside but just prefer to live that way. Look up "uncontacted peoples". I can't say more without violating forum rules.

but speaking more generally, as a rule of thumb societies can be very different depending on their land. a society can be rich and technologically advanced as it lives in a fertile place full of resources. another culture may live in barren steppe, and be nomad herders; and with the climate not supporting agriculture, they can never make large settlements, and therefore can never advance scientifically. those cultures will remain backwards, until someone else will give them technology - even then, unless this technology allows them to farm, they are still limited to a small population of herders.

in my world, the barbarian tribes (generally orcs, though there are some human and even dwarf ones) live in the cold tundra; basically the climate of siberia. it's too cold to farm, so they are nomadic hunter gatherers. they never had the numbers to produce much science, so they fell backwards in technology - including magic. some of them try to leave their land for the comfort of civilization - they often have barbarian class levels and work as mercenaries, lack of schooling prevents them from seeking intellectual jobs. some of them are trying to build up a civilization in some of the milder areas of the tundra. some of them like their life and keep living as nomafic hunter gatherers.
goblins live in caves under a desert, feeding on magic-eating plants. they are the only ones living there because goblins can survive on very little food. they actually built a decently advanced civilization, but their food is strictly limited, while their birth rate is explosive. so they regularly kick out young goblins to die in the desert because they don't have enough food for all. those castaways take up raiding to try to survive, which explains why some trade routes are infested by pesky goblin raiders that apparently charge against overwhelming odds and get slaughtered. but don't be fooled by those puny low level mooks, the actual goblin nation packs a decent military punch.
dragons are a weird case. they had no civilization or technology, because they have zero need for it. they were basically gods. until the other races overtook them, reached a point where magitek made them more powerful than dragons. and since civilizations expand into what they see as empty land, they started encroaching on the dragons. dragons have been scrambling to adapt ever since. at the moment, they are not trying to make their own civilization - they are too few, because they need to feed on background magic, and this limits their number more than any need for food. rather, they are seeking to integrate in humanoid societies. widespread of magic in modern cities keeps them healty, and their natural advantages push them to the top of society. it may well be that dragons will rule the world one again, as presidents and CEOs in human societies.

nerullites live in a large steppe. outside of a few river valleys, it's too dry to farm (no, no decanter of endless water or anything endless in my world). except that nerull makes their crops partly undead, so they can grow with little water. but to do so, he needs human sacrifices. nerullia is actually a pretty strong and advanced empire, currently ruled by one of the major magic prodigy of the time. but they do need a few hundred human sacrifices daily just for their crops to keep growing. they are actually grateful to nerull for giving them the means to survive, and what else could they do? furthermore, sacrifices - especially volunteers - get a good treatment in the afterlife.
in turn, this shaped their society; forget emancipation, women are needed to provide new children for sacrificing. and since they need the constant sacrifices anyway, may as well sacrifice those people that will not be missed much, leading to a stratified society - where people are ranked by importance, and therefore likelyhood that they will not be drafted next. on the plus side, extreme poverty is virtually nonexistant, crime is very limited, social strife is almost unheard of. you can fix a lot of social issues by sacrificing outcasts and malcontents.

so, you can have such distinctly different groups sitting right next to each other, and the general reason why the backwards folks are so backwards is that their land didn't provide enough food for them to grow enough to establish a major civilization.

i also have bananagua, a place ruled by the mafia; it is covered by some kind of natural magic interference that makes scrying harder, and therefore it became a natural refuge for wanted criminals. until the place was so filled with criminals, that they took over. just to make another example on how the characteristics of a land can shape a population.

[awa]

The big question is why you have such distinctly different groups sitting right next to each other, and why the backwards folks are so backwards.

If it's an author tract about how their ideal society is perfect and their political opponents are crass dummies (usually by having thinly veiled representations of opposing politicians/pundits in their work), that sounds about as interesting as any other heavy handed political screed. They're utopian only as an informed attribute, and would fall apart at the slightest questioning.


the argument was made that utopia is impossible because people want different things and I was giving an example of how by the power of relative prosperity a "happy" utopia could exist. I never claimed it was good story telling, because my goal was merely to describe a utopia that people can be happy in that could plausibly exist.

So just as an exercise I will create such a scenario, let say we start with two groups who are roughly equal than one group gets hit by a meteor containing a zombie virus. Group A is a self sufficient island and sets up strict quarantines managing to stop the virus from reaching their shores. Group B loses most of its government and then is wracked by a series of civil wars as various warlord use the opportunity to take over one after another. By the time a zombie cure is created group B is just a bunch of small hateful kingdoms constantly at each others throats squatting on the ruins of their civilization, and group A has been continuing to advance the outside threat providing a unifying force that helps unify and stabilize their society.

[KorvinStarmast]

This is a point I've thought about and still don't have a firm answer on - how important is self-destiny, and how much self-destiny do we really have in our current world? You play TTRPG's and you ask how important self destiny-is? :smallconfused:


Like, the classic response is "harsh and difficult freedom is inherently better than being a pet, regardless how well treated". But then I think ... if that's the case, why don't I (or most people) do things that would maximize our freedom at the expense of our living conditions and/or safety? There is a little bit of a false dichotomy lurking in there.

Or more plausibly, why work for a company instead of trying to become a billionaire entrepreneur? Those are not mutually exclusive, and the former often comes before the latter as a matter of building the capital and experience necessary to achieve the latter goal.

It isn't "what you are" so much as "what you become" that is your life's story.

[Boci]

....
you have a very weird concept of utopia. a place that brainwashes you into thinking you are happy is not an utopia. nor is it the only way to create a good society.
your idea of utopias being equal to distopias only works if you apply your extremely screwy definition.

Utopias aren't just "good", they're perfect, by definition. A perfect society would not have any crime, if there is crime, that's causing unhappiness, so the society isn't perfect. But how do you have a society without any crime?

[Satinavian]

Utopias aren't just "good", they're perfect, by definition. A perfect society would not have any crime, if there is crime, that's causing unhappiness, so the society isn't perfect. But how do you have a society without any crime?
What definition that would be ?

Wikipedia e.g. says

A utopia typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members.

Most other definitions contain good, idealized, dreamlike, unrealistic etc, but they rarely go to the superlative or call it perfect. It is enough to be significantly better than all the other options existing or imagined to be called utopia. It does not have to be devoid of any kind of unhappiness, nor does it have to be perfect. Near perfect is good enough.

[Boci]

What definition that would be ?

Both Websters and the Oxford dictionaries include "perfect" or "perfection" in their definition:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/utopia

https://www.oed.com/search/dictionary/?scope=Entries&q=utopia

[King of Nowhere]

Both Websters and the Oxford dictionaries include "perfect" or "perfection" in their definition:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/utopia

https://www.oed.com/search/dictionary/?scope=Entries&q=utopia

well, nothing is perfectly perfect in reality.
so, since a word to describe an imaginary impossible concept would be pretty useless, I'm happy to accept utopias as merely pretty good.

[KorvinStarmast]

... since a word to describe an imaginary impossible concept would be pretty useless, Not really, I think the point has already been made that the word implies that in the first place (in its original formulation) which fits your point about nothing being perfect in reality.

A number of small groups traveled from the Old World to the New World and tried to establish something like that - a Utopia - as communities, with well known results. Similarly, in the 60's and 70, a variety of folks established communes with a similar goal. Any such attempt will run into problems of scale, at some point, as well as the point you make regarding the impossibilty of perfection.

Which leaves utopias solely in the province of the writer, or the story teller, or the dreamer.

[Vahnavoi]

If there's an actual reason for the difference, that's usually due to some interference by the "utopian" society. And if they're actively engaged in keeping others miserable, I don't know that they could be realistically called a utopia. Omelas happens to look perfect with the exception of one inhabitant, and I don't know many people who call it a work of utopian fiction.

I'm sorry, what? Did you read Those Who Walk Away From Omelas? At least you read the Wikipedia link you yourself gave, yes? Because the short story is one of, if not the most famous take on utopia with a dark secret, written in such a way that it is almost a parody of earlier stories in the genre. The narrator reveals the secret of the suffering child because the narrator doesn't believe the reader would buy the story otherwise. The story literally asks you whether Omelas is more believable as a result of the twist.

[Anymage]

I'm sorry, what? Did you read Those Who Walk Away From Omelas? At least you read the Wikipedia link you yourself gave, yes? Because the short story is one of, if not the most famous take on utopia with a dark secret, written in such a way that it is almost a parody of earlier stories in the genre. The narrator reveals the secret of the suffering child because the narrator doesn't believe the reader would buy the story otherwise. The story literally asks you whether Omelas is more believable as a result of the twist.

Yes? My point was that a utopia whose utopian-ness is predicated on the suffering of others, even if that's narrowed down to just the suffering of one person, isn't a perfect society that should be emulated as fits most common definitions of "utopia". That was in response to awa's mention of two neighboring societies where the second one was in all possible ways worse off than the first. Which would lead me to wonder if the first society was in any way responsible for said inequality, and how much of a dark underbelly to a seeming utopia that would imply.

[Vahnavoi]

The short story under discussion itself deconstructs that notion. I can give a simpler deconstruction right here: if a society that is perfect save for suffering of a single person is believable to you, but a perfect society isn't, then the near-perfect version is in fact your realist utopia, and calling Omelas anything else is the dimmest moving of goal posts there ever was.

[KorvinStarmast]

The short story under discussion itself deconstructs that notion. I can give a simpler deconstruction right here: if a society that is perfect save for suffering of a single person is believable to you, but a perfect society isn't, then the near-perfect version is in fact your realist utopia, and calling Omelas anything else is the dimmest moving of goal posts there ever was. I'd not read that in years. So I downloaded the pdf and as I read it I saw the core allusion, and of course I can't discuss that here.
I think she may have once admitted to cribbing some of the concept from Dostoyevsky.
As an aside; a great writer.

[Boci]

well, nothing is perfectly perfect in reality.
so, since a word to describe an imaginary impossible concept would be pretty useless, I'm happy to accept utopias as merely pretty good.

Sure you can use that definition if you want, but it does mean someone defining utopias as requiring perfection isn't really using their own "extremely screwy definition".

Also I'm not sure why an imaginary impossible concept would be a useless term. We have lots of terms for things that don't and cannot exist.

[gbaji]

I don't think being literally perfect is required to be "a utopian society" as the term is generally used. Any more than being perfectly terrible is required to be a dystopian one.

Like, I think most people would consider the WH40K world dystopian, even though it isn't literally the worst world possible. Heck, even 1984, the classic go-to dystopia, could be worse. And in the same way, I think you could reasonably call the Culture or the Federation "utopian" without them being perfect.

Now this raises a point - are utopia and dystopia relative? Yeah, probably. But still, that doesn't mean they're pointless concepts.

Sure. We could place relative values on these things, maybe some kind of scale even. I still do tend to think that unless we actually assume some kind of change in the nature of the people living in a society, we have a hard time with this, and the closer we get to a "utopia", the more we will find elements of "distopia" present. Assuming we have people, and those people "want things", or even just want to "improve their lives" in some way, then the base wants/needs still exist and will present themselves in various ways. Someone mentioned above the idea of inventing things, right? But to what purpose? Making things "better", right? But if the people actually desire to make their lives better, then they have within them the same desire that will drive them to compete and conflict with each other.

I actually do find the ST Federation to be a good example of a "good society", with a fairly well thought out structure as well. But even then, there are odd corners that are somewhat missing. We're told there's no money or concept of money, but then also that people recieve living quarters and replicator/transporter allowances based on some valuation of what they do. Which is really just currently using energy and not dollars. And some authority somewhere is presumably making these valuation determinations (but we're never really told the details of how this works). We're shown some elements of this in Voyager, when Kim experiences an alternate timeline where he never joined the crew. In DS9, Cisco's father runs a restaurant. Presumably he didn't just build it by hand by himself and start cooking and serving food, right? Presumably he presented his idea of running a restaurant to some authority in charge of such things, got approval, and the resources to construct and operate his restaurant were allocated to it (he's providing social valuie to the community, one would assume). This also assumes that some other people are involved in growing the fresh food (as opposed to replicated) that he uses in his restaurant, and that it gets delivererd to him. It also assumes that he, and those wokring in the restaurant are just willing to choose to work there rather than do something else (but again, we're not told why, other than it's just what they want to do).

So ok. Each person contributes based on what they do. Does he get larger quarters and more energy allowance because what he's doing is judged to be of greater value than someone who just sits around doing nothing? Presumably (but again this is just never discussed). How is that not still an economic exchange? Except that we have some unnamed authorithy making all the payment decisions off screen. This generally results in a society that is "good" though, so we're happy with this. But the elements of this society are more or less one step away from catastrophy. What happens if the same people in authority decide to manipulate things to benefit themselves instead of being altruistic in the application of said authoirty? Would anyone even notice at first? We're just told that people in the Federation don't think this way anymore though, so it's not a problem, despite a boatload of examples that this isn't actually the case, and frankly can't be because if people really did think that way they'd likely be too ailen to the audience to be appealing as characters anyway.

Point is that I'm willing to overlook stuff like that for the sake of a story, and the sake of needing to make the characters appeal to us. But we should not mistake this for actually being a true representation of what people in the Federation would have to be like. To be honest, I doubt many of us could even concieve of what it would actually be like for people who no longer have greed. But that's pretty much what would be required for that system to actually work. Otherwise, inevitably, the most greedy people will gravitate to the conveniently created positions of almost absolute authority and run things for their own benefit.

And that's where I'm kinda going with this. The closer we get to something we might think to call "utopia", the more we have to introduce elements that require either completely alien people *or* some kind of authoritarian power that is hard to imagine isn't being abused if we actually populate this society with "people like us". That's not to say that this doesn't create absolutely fantastic settings for playing RPGs in though. It does. But that's the point. The more perfect a society may present itself or appear to be from the outside, the more likelihood for great adventures involving discovering and exploring all the deep dark hidden problems said society actually has.

My statement about utopias being distopias was not meant to be universally dismissive, but to provide insight into how to actually create interesting and compelling stories within a setting using these concepts.


Like, the classic response is "harsh and difficult freedom is inherently better than being a pet, regardless how well treated". But then I think ... if that's the case, why don't I (or most people) do things that would maximize our freedom at the expense of our living conditions and/or safety?

Like, say, move to a country with a lot of political instability, very little force of law, and try to become a powerful figure there? I would be less restricted, have the chance for "greatness" beyond what I do now ... and probably be dead, because I don't have particularly good skill in the relevant areas. But I'd be dead by my own actions, doing much more "adventurer worthy" things than I'm likely to do in my current path. However, this idea doesn't appeal the slightest bit.

Or more plausibly, why work for a company instead of trying to become a billionaire entrepreneur? Just because the odds are substantially against me, and it'd be a hell of lot more stressful? That's just choosing security over freedom, isn't it? Yes it is, and I make that choice all the time. So do most people. Perhaps absolute freedom is a bit over-hyped.

And if you're not doing that, but instead living a relatively "normal" life - working at a job because it pays decently, living how you can afford, and being very unlikely to do anything significant on a global scale - then are you really any more free than someone in the Culture? You could say that "Humans", as a whole, are more free, but 99.9%+ of specific humans aren't, and many are less free.

Sure. I don't think we need to necessarily go into the details of "personal freedom vs personal safety" here. That's certainly an element of any society you may be building in a game setting though. How does that powerful wealthy nation feed its people, and build/maintain its armies, and build big cities and walls and advanced tech/magic/whatever? And how do the people living within it feel about this? And sure, they could be happy "going along" with things because the benefits are worth it. And we can certainly imagine (and create) settings where that's aboslutely going to be the case. Most people would choose to live in a wealthy kingdom where there's plenty of food, and a military that protects you, and lots of opportunities to make a good living, even if the cost is that you have the same powerful ruler who runs the military that protects you, also enforcing laws within, and maybe you can't just do whatever you want, but have to do things that help contribute, and maybe you have to pay taxes on your labors that you wouldn't if you were all on your own running a farm/whatever out in the wilderness.

Lots of people would choose to live there rather than out in said wilderness where they are subject to raids by bandits, wild animal attacks, random unlucky weather events, whatever, right? Nothing wrong with that at all. In fact, that's good worldbuilding IMO. I'd just never call the wealthy powerful nation a "utopia" despite maybe objectively living better lives than the barbarian tribal folks living in the wilderness around them. And, of course, depending on setting there may be cultural reasons for the differences as well. Again, this is all good fodder for good settings.




....
you have a very weird concept of utopia. a place that brainwashes you into thinking you are happy is not an utopia. nor is it the only way to create a good society.
your idea of utopias being equal to distopias only works if you apply your extremely screwy definition.

Doesn't require brainwashing. But to actually achieve the kinds of things that are really the hallmarks of utopia, you kinda have to assume people who have given up on the desire for worldly "stuff". And sure, we could imagine a group of Stargate ascended (or nearly ascended) folks living somewhere contemplating the nature of the universe or something, with no actual wants or needs, but that's pretty alien to the people playing the game (and will not make for a great game except as a backdrop somewhere maybe). In the absense of actually assuming some kind of evolved beings that are beyond these sorts of ideas, you're left with some authority/power that makes them behave that way.

I'm reminded of that scene in StarGirl in season one, where they're reading the manifesto of the villains. It contains stuff like "end poverty, violence, enviornmental damage, etc...", and they're like "Are we fighting on the wrong side?". Then they realize this is all going to happen as the result of a massive mind control device, and oh yeah, 10% of the people exposed to it will die. But hey! Perfect society if they succeed in their plan, right?

So yeah. You either have to assume people who are not remotely "like us" *or* something that forces people "like us" to behave in a way that will make this sort of thing actually work. Or, I suppose just some hidden thing that the people aren't aware of.

And we can (and should) consider a whole range of "less than perfect" societies. But that's kinda the point. Let's start with "nothing's perfect" and move from there. I think that a lot of GMs don't always consider the logistics of the game settings they are running. And sure, none of us want to get bogged down in too much detail, but at least recognizing basic things that have to be present for something to work is a good start. I once ran in a shared setting, where we had drawn up a map of a kingdom and surrounding areas, detailing some roads, a river, mountains, hills, and some large towns and a few cities as points of interest. I was running a scenario, and had the party traveling along a few days out from one of the main cities and came into a village. One of my co-GMs was like "what's this village? It's not on the map.". And I was like, "yeah, it's just a small village a few days out from the city". What was odd is that he and I had very different ideas about why this village would be there. I assumed that any largish town or city would require a fair number of smaller towns and villages around it to act as a mini trade network, to provide food for the folks living in the city, if nothing else. He had this idea that each large town and city on the map were like isolated things, and there was no one else living in between them at all. As a result, he actually started runnning scenarios where he assumed that since I had introduced the concept of people living outside the towns and cities drawn on the map, that these people must be some kind of dissidents who just didn't like living under the thumb of the various rulers of these cities or something.


It was just an interesting back and forth on that one issue of setting building. And it took me actually walking through a series of questions like "where does the food come from", and "Ok. If everyone lives in the city, how far away can the farms and fields be", and "if every farm has to be that close, how much food can they produce relative to the population inside the city walls", and then "ok, so if the farmers have to live farther afield, and are often gong to be too far away to just walk back and forth each day, do they just evenly distrubute their homes, or do population centers within these areas grow up? And if that's the case, would they not just walk their food to the closest such settlement and sell it there, rather than walking all the way to the city every few days. And wouldn't a village or small town form in those areas that are basically food/good distribution hubs?". And at the end of the process, he realized why there would have to be smaller towns and villages dotting the surrounding countryside, despite every single one not being drawn on the map (and yeah, they don't have to be outsiders to be there). It just took a few steps to get there.


These are the kinds of things you need to consider when building a setting. And yeah, some details can absolutely be washed over, but at least the basics should be covered and make some degree of sense. And, of course, once we add in magic/tech to this, things can change as well. But it's a good idea to at least have some basic idea of "where does the food come from" and "how do they build stuff". If you put something into the setting you have to at least have an idea somewhere how it got to be there and why. And I find that this same kind of thinking lends itself to building larger cultures and interactions between them. Why does the island nation raid the coastal settlements and kingdowms? Why is there a large empire 500 milies to the north, but just some small kingdoms down here? Why are there Elves living here, or Dwarves living there? How do they interact? What kinds of goods are traded on ships over the sea? From where? To where? You don't have to be super detailed here (though you can be), but at least having a vague idea of what kinds of things exist in different geographical areas can help a lot here.

And yeah. There need be nothing in that setting we label "utopia" at all. And if there is, yeah, odds are it's actually hidding some terrible secret and there will be an adventure about it at somepoint. That's just how I do things though. Because the same set of logical "why/how" questions just leads to those kinds of answers.

[KorvinStarmast]

Doesn't require brainwashing.
I have a Mr Aldous Huxley on line 1. He'd like a word. :smallcool:

[zzzzzzzz414]

These are the kinds of things you need to consider when building a setting. And yeah, some details can absolutely be washed over, but at least the basics should be covered and make some degree of sense. And, of course, once we add in magic/tech to this, things can change as well. But it's a good idea to at least have some basic idea of "where does the food come from" and "how do they build stuff".

yeah, the problem i notice with a good number of dnd settings is that they tend to feel like...theme park attractions, rather than places anyone actually *lives*. You've got The Pirate Port and The Barbarian Village and The Jungle Tribe and the Vaguely Racist Aladdin City and Rome But Like Everyone Lives In A Mini Parthenon For Some Reason, and they all feel very shallow because they're clearly designed to be...well, exactly that, theme park attractions essentially, places meant to be in the background during the 2-3 session Jungle Temple Arc and then go away. And if you try to interact with them on a deeper level than that or as like, a few token lines in a character's backstory, it becomes very clear that nobody really thought about how exactly the society functions when fully 50% of your population are scowling axe-wielding viking expies, or where exactly the food for the big shiny paladin city high in the mountains comes from. magic can handwave this, yeah, but ime its just that: handwaves, with no real thought into *why* it exists like this, just *that* it exists like this, and magic of some sort is presumed to be filling in the gaps.

and maybe that works for some situations and campaigns yeah, like not everything has to have 10 pages of backstory, stuff can just exist to Be Cool, but it's also where you tend to run into problems because when a society exists first and foremost as wallpaper for Special Episodes, people tend to reach for the shallowest, tropiest, most obvious, most problematic stereotypes to fill it out. Which is obviously bad, and also boring to me. I want these places to feel actually lived in, i want to be able to turn and poke my nose in and hit more than drywall.

An old review i read for the Tomb of Annihilation 5e module a few years back pointed out that Chult really only existed as a backdrop for the adventure hook; the actual substance of the place was too shallow to ever serve as, say, the basis for an actual full campaign. It's not treated as a full-fledged place where people *live* and have societal and economic complexities to deal with outside the scope of that one shot. And i honestly think of that as a pretty good baseline to at least think about when trying to put together setting ideas: if i were to use this place as a main campaign setting, and not just a pit stop, how much depth would i need? Would this or that element still make sense?

[KorvinStarmast]

Point is that I'm willing to overlook stuff like that for the sake of a story, and the sake of needing to make the characters appeal to us. But we should not mistake this for actually being a true representation of what people in the Federation would have to be like. {snip} Roddenberry was a bit of a wishful thinker, yes.
Otherwise, inevitably, the most greedy people will gravitate to the conveniently created positions of almost absolute authority and run things for their own benefit. That was only the "other" characters in the ST episodes.


The more perfect a society may present itself or appear to be from the outside, the more likelihood for great adventures involving discovering and exploring all the deep dark hidden problems said society actually has. Plenty of stories, short and long, written on that theme.


How does that powerful wealthy nation feed its people, and build/maintain its armies, and build big cities and walls and advanced tech/magic/whatever? And how do the people living within it feel about this? The more cogent question is how does this society/empire/nation/kingdom build and maintain its roads/transportation networks. There's a book called "The Pursuit of Glory" which takes a look at Europe from 1648 to 1815, and the author beats the "roads yield prosperity" drum pretty hard. Interestingly, canals and roads were a huge boost to the economy in the New World during a similar time period. (He also discussed canal building in the British Isles, and its effects on trade).
I raise this as a world building point.


Lots of people would choose to live there rather than out in said wilderness where they are subject to raids by bandits, wild animal attacks, random unlucky weather events, whatever, right?

And yet elves live in the wilderness and somehow get buy in the standard fantasy setting. Hmm, what do they know that everyone else doesn't?


And we can (and should) consider a whole range of "less than perfect" societies. But that's kinda the point. Let's start with "nothing's perfect" and move from there. I think that a lot of GMs don't always consider the logistics of the game settings they are running.

See my point about roads further up. (And for that matter, sea lanes/trade routes).

[awa]

And yet elves live in the wilderness and somehow get buy in the standard fantasy setting. Hmm, what do they know that everyone else doesn't?



To be fair the elves are in the woods but not the wilderness. Generally elves (forest) are depicted with impressive tree top villages, that are often heavily patrolled. I mean the logistics of all that might be dubious but lucky for the elves they tend to be depicted as more magically powerful/ technologically advanced than the average human society.

Logical it does make sense though, if the number of elves is small with minimal replacement but they are extremely long lived it makes sense that you would want to get the most utility out of any given elf. So you gain more bang for your buck with education and such.

[kyoryu]

yeah, the problem i notice with a good number of dnd settings is that they tend to feel like...theme park attractions, rather than places anyone actually *lives*. You've got The Pirate Port and The Barbarian Village and The Jungle Tribe and the Vaguely Racist Aladdin City and Rome But Like Everyone Lives In A Mini Parthenon For Some Reason, and they all feel very shallow because they're clearly designed to be...well, exactly that, theme park attractions essentially, places meant to be in the background during the 2-3 session Jungle Temple Arc and then go away. And if you try to interact with them on a deeper level than that or as like, a few token lines in a character's backstory, it becomes very clear that nobody really thought about how exactly the society functions when fully 50% of your population are scowling axe-wielding viking expies, or where exactly the food for the big shiny paladin city high in the mountains comes from. magic can handwave this, yeah, but ime its just that: handwaves, with no real thought into *why* it exists like this, just *that* it exists like this, and magic of some sort is presumed to be filling in the gaps.

Part of the issue with that is that, really, to make things feel "unique" at first you need to make something obvious to grab the attention of people. So, sure, have your pirate port or your Rome-like-analogue or whatever. But then think a bit further than that and peel the next level down. Not everything has to be specced out, but at least get to the point where there aren't obvious logical contradictions that make you go why.

So you want a pirate nation (and I'm picking on this one because "marauders" is usually one of the poorly thought out ideas). Great! Who do they plunder? Kinda hard for an entire nation of marauders to survive, right? Okay, so maybe scale it back so it does make sense.... it's one port. Why aren't they blown out of the water? How is there any kind of order there? How do the shopkeepers live, especially without getting ganked? These are at least the first level of questions, and a lot of them can open up others as well (if you're a shopkeeper, what happens when you meet someone and start a family?). Imagining these things from the perspective of an individual that's required to exist by the society can help, too.

Even Big Authors aren't immune to this - the Dothraki make no sense whatsoever. They kill multiple of themselves at a wedding? Where do they get food? There's too many of them to really work as a pure marauder culture, and the rate at which they seem to kill their people (see Khal Drogo's wedding) makes you wonder how they continue as a society - if each wedding ends up killing multiple of your people, that's hard on the population!

[King of Nowhere]

To be fair the elves are in the woods but not the wilderness. Generally elves (forest) are depicted with impressive tree top villages, that are often heavily patrolled. I mean the logistics of all that might be dubious but lucky for the elves they tend to be depicted as more magically powerful/ technologically advanced than the average human society.

Logical it does make sense though, if the number of elves is small with minimal replacement but they are extremely long lived it makes sense that you would want to get the most utility out of any given elf. So you gain more bang for your buck with education and such.

it depends on having the right trees, but a treetop village may be sustainable. i mean, you have to carry goods up to treetop level, but no special difficulty besides that. you need to build roads on the trees too, while in a city roads are just packed dirt, but on the plus side you don't need a city wall.

in my world, elves started building treetop villages for defence, because their forests didn't have much access to the amounts of stone needed for a city wall. still, it's quite uncomfortable in the long run, with the occasional tree falling and forcing the rebuilding of several houses. the elven grand cathedral is made entirely of interlocking wooden panels, to be disassembled and moved to different trees. so, in modern times when war was less of a concern, the elves started building on land again. now building on trees is an extravagance for the rich. the one city that retained a large treetop area was a major tourist attraction, though. i described it as "take venice, drain the channels, and put the islands on trees". Most importantly, railings WERE included
I did point out how impractical it is to maintain a major city like that, but it was an important cultural heritage at that point.

[Boci]

Dwarves too I feel. What do they eat, living underground? Hill farms are a thing, so maybe that works, but mountains? No way. Stray mountain goats will only get you so far, and you can forget the alcohol.

[gbaji]

I have a Mr Aldous Huxley on line 1. He'd like a word. :smallcool:

Lol. Yeah. I was actually thinking about that. Combination of pre-genetic manipulation (DNA didn't exist when he wrote it, by like 20 years, so close enough), and massive social engineering/pressuring to build their society. And yeah, it was on paper a utopia, but underneath? Pretty darn distopian.


{snip} Roddenberry was a bit of a wishful thinker, yes. That was only the "other" characters in the ST episodes.

Yup. Again, a great idea on paper, but becomes increasingly problematic the more you actually look closely at it. They explored some aspects of this in DS9, but still kinda left some core bits left out IMO.


The more cogent question is how does this society/empire/nation/kingdom build and maintain its roads/transportation networks. There's a book called "The Pursuit of Glory" which takes a look at Europe from 1648 to 1815, and the author beats the "roads yield prosperity" drum pretty hard. Interestingly, canals and roads were a huge boost to the economy in the New World during a similar time period. (He also discussed canal building in the British Isles, and its effects on trade).
I raise this as a world building point.

Yeah. Absolutely. Don't need to go into detail drawing every bit of this on a map, or something. But at least realizing that this sort of infrastructure and logistics must exist, and allow for it. It's just always been amusing to me how often settings will just have some city sitting somewhere, and absolutely zero infrastructure around it to actually support it in any realistic way. And yeah, this gets even more relevant when you have whole kingdoms/empires/whatever, covering an area.

Which, as an aside, is where I kinda toss sideways glances at games in which a group of adventurers walking down the main road from cityA to cityB inside some kingdom/territory/whatever, magically still have X level appropriate encounters per day (cause that's what the rules call for, right?). Um... How on earth do normal people, who should literally be crowding along those roadways, actually survive to transport stuff around?

When I run encounters along such routes, it's usually fun/interesting (hopefully) RP stuff with the other folks also traveling along those same roads/canals/etc. You're just not going to run into a pack of wild beasts in that situation. But you can introduce RP opporunities by having them run into "Joe the merchant", and notice that some of the crates on his wagons seem to contain illegal merchandise (drugs, weapons, whatever). Or unsavory types seeking to get the party to assist them in some scheme. Stuff like that works far better, and can create a feel for a region as well (and just makes a lot more sense). And I think that players actually appreciate a break from just grinding meaningless random encounters.



And yet elves live in the wilderness and somehow get buy in the standard fantasy setting. Hmm, what do they know that everyone else doesn't?

Yeah. Depends on how elves are run in the setting. I tend to go towards "they have magic that makes the plantlife itself provide for them". So trees over time grow into the structures they want need. And plants just yield up the food and materials they need. Apply some sort of "bender" style magic and they can manipulate the natural stuff into whatever they want. Um... Things like metal armor and weapons do become a bit harder to justify though. Er... Maybe they have special plants that extract minerals from the earth and process them, producing workable metal of exactly whatever type they desire? Dunno.... Kinda depends on how alien you want your elves to actually be. Similar bits can apply to other non-human races and how they interact with their "natural environment".

So yeah. There are ways to do this in a fantasy environment, but it doesn't hurt to have spent a little bit of time asking the "how does this work" question, and then coming up with some sort of answer.



So you want a pirate nation (and I'm picking on this one because "marauders" is usually one of the poorly thought out ideas). Great! Who do they plunder? Kinda hard for an entire nation of marauders to survive, right? Okay, so maybe scale it back so it does make sense.... it's one port. Why aren't they blown out of the water? How is there any kind of order there? How do the shopkeepers live, especially without getting ganked? These are at least the first level of questions, and a lot of them can open up others as well (if you're a shopkeeper, what happens when you meet someone and start a family?). Imagining these things from the perspective of an individual that's required to exist by the society can help, too.

Yup. Funny you mention this. We had the concept of a "pirate king" introduced into our game setting, and (me being me) I had to come up with rules to justify how this band of pirates actually worked logistically. The result turned into a semi-coastal sized operation, including some "legit" shipping businesses, and some psuedo-legit ones, in order to manage the inflow and outflow of stolen goods they were accumulating (and hiding it from interested parties looking to figure out who the pirates were and how they were operating). It turned out to work well, because the pirates would actually attack "their own ships" from time to time, just to keep suspicion off of their legit businesses (largely used for laundering their goods), but also served to ensure that they could provide specific goods needed to maintain their operation without having to rely on more or less pot-luck from what they could get via piracy. Turns out that the trickiest part of operating a secret pirate island isn't the piracy, but actually selling the stuff you steal that you don't need, and buying the supplies that you do, all without leaving a trail leading straight to you.

It was a fun excersise in logistics though. But then, that's the kind of stuff I do find to be fun.

[King of Nowhere]

Dwarves too I feel. What do they eat, living underground? Hill farms are a thing, so maybe that works, but mountains? No way. Stray mountain goats will only get you so far, and you can forget the alcohol.

I solved the whole underground thing with plants that feed on background magic (and I don't see other way to solve it, you need an external energy source and you need a primary producer. fungi won't do, they feed on decaying matter that itself has to come from somewhere). this allows a subterranean ecosystem.
trade would be possible, in principle; dwarves mine ores and sell them for food. but having 100% of your food supply coming from trade makes you extremely vulnerable, both to war and to any kind of trade interruption. especially before modern railways, carrying that much food long distances would be very difficult even in the best circumstances.

incidentally, most dwarven cities are dwarf-sized. any taller creature is advised to keep to the cosmopolitan sections - whose ceiling was raised specifically to accomodate visitors - and to wear a helmet to visit the other areas.


We had the concept of a "pirate king" introduced into our game setting, and (me being me) I had to come up with rules to justify how this band of pirates actually worked logistically. The result turned into a semi-coastal sized operation, including some "legit" shipping businesses, and some psuedo-legit ones, in order to manage the inflow and outflow of stolen goods they were accumulating (and hiding it from interested parties looking to figure out who the pirates were and how they were operating). It turned out to work well, because the pirates would actually attack "their own ships" from time to time, just to keep suspicion off of their legit businesses (largely used for laundering their goods), but also served to ensure that they could provide specific goods needed to maintain their operation without having to rely on more or less pot-luck from what they could get via piracy. Turns out that the trickiest part of operating a secret pirate island isn't the piracy, but actually selling the stuff you steal that you don't need, and buying the supplies that you do, all without leaving a trail leading straight to you.

It was a fun excersise in logistics though. But then, that's the kind of stuff I do find to be fun.

and sometimes, some players pick up the trail and follow the logistics. when it happens, it can be very satisfying; gives the feeling of having a real world instead of, as somebody called it, a theme park attraction.

[paladinofshojo]

well it is relative, if we had two societies next to each other say one of the nordic countries with a high happiness index and stuck them next to a primitive society that is rife with disease, internal strife, every kind of ism on top of being technologically and militarily inferior an outside observer/reader might rightly say this one is the utopia even if the society is not literally perfect.

You don’t see anything problematic with this scenario at all without any sort of context?

It’d be one thing if you offer up some sort of explanation as to why one society is much more ideal than the other, but in the context of your example…. the only logical explanation is that the Nordics are “just inherently better”….

[King of Nowhere]

You don’t see anything problematic with this scenario at all without any sort of context?

It’d be one thing if you offer up some sort of explanation as to why one society is much more ideal than the other, but in the context of your example…. the only logical explanation is that the Nordics are “just inherently better”….

I don't see any problem whatsoever. because your "only logical explanation" is actually one in dozens of possible explanations.
the first step is to understand that the better society is just more advanced. societies develop technology, that makes life better, that makes possible to develop more technology. this generally also reflects on social development; when you live in a tribe of hunter gatherers where most children die of disease or malnutrition and most adults die in fights with other tribes to secure food resources, it's kinda hard to develop the idea that people have rights. actually, they don't, because that society doesn't have the capability to grant rights to anyone. things that we consider essential to a civilized society, like public schooling, welfare, emancipation, can only exhist when the society has enough resources to provide those things.
and the advanced society is better in the same way that a smartphone is better than smoke signals. a smartphone is a much better form of communication. it also does many other things. however, it can only exhist in a certain environment.

once established that the "nordics" are simply ahead of the other guys, plenty of explanations exhist.
it could be a matter of land
- the nordics had land more suitable to agriculture, they got greater numbers from the stone age, so they developed faster.
- the nordics had a geography more suitable for trade, so they gathered innovations from many other cultures and developed faster.
- the nordic had resources that allowed them to kickstart an industrial revolution earlier.
- the primitives had a lush land that never encouraged them to develop technology, because they had no needs
or, it could be an accident of history
- the nordics united into a cohesive society that could develop, while the primitives spent their energy warring among fractured tribes
- the primitives came under the joke of a tyrant, that thoroughly destroied their culture to stay in power and promoted evil values
- the primitives were long dominated by another nation, that treated them as b-class citizens at best. this hampered both their scientific progress (they had no access to higher education) and their moral progress (they saw society as a mean to dominate them, and didn't develop a civic conscience)
or, since we're positing a fantasy world, it could be the result of magic
- all of the previous reasons, except justified by magic instead of geography
- the primitives live under emanations from the negative plane, that makes them more prone to evil - and less prone to seeking long term advantage for all society.
- the nordics live under emanations from the positive plane
- the primitives had some kind of disadvantage when it comes to develop magic
- the primitives had innate magic, and this prevented them from developing a technology

I could expand a lot on this if discussing real life wasn't forbidden. because, really, a lot of the arguments I used were real history for some populations, or they were theorized for some populations.

the only thing I see as "problematic" in this whole business is that we seem unable to say "this is better" without drawing all kinds of nasty implications.

[awa]

You don’t see anything problematic with this scenario at all without any sort of context?

It’d be one thing if you offer up some sort of explanation as to why one society is much more ideal than the other, but in the context of your example…. the only logical explanation is that the Nordics are “just inherently better”….

I mean yes If you choose to ignore context of the conversation it could look bad, but in that case the problem is you ignoring the context, primitive is a relative descriptive term in this context. I was talking about the viability of calling something a utopia if it was relatively better that the other options even if it was not absolutely perfect. I actually did give an example of how this could come about in a latter post more context that one could acknowledge or ignore.


the argument was made that utopia is impossible because people want different things and I was giving an example of how by the power of relative prosperity a "happy" utopia could exist. I never claimed it was good story telling, because my goal was merely to describe a utopia that people can be happy in that could plausibly exist.

So just as an exercise I will create such a scenario, let say we start with two groups who are roughly equal than one group gets hit by a meteor containing a zombie virus. Group A is a self sufficient island and sets up strict quarantines managing to stop the virus from reaching their shores. Group B loses most of its government and then is wracked by a series of civil wars as various warlord use the opportunity to take over one after another. By the time a zombie cure is created group B is just a bunch of small hateful kingdoms constantly at each others throats squatting on the ruins of their civilization, and group A has been continuing to advance the outside threat providing a unifying force that helps unify and stabilize their society.

So I dont think your comment is a fair assessment of my post.

[KorvinStarmast]

And yeah, it was on paper a utopia, but underneath? Pretty darn distopian Aren't they all?

It's just always been amusing to me how often settings will just have some city sitting somewhere, and absolutely zero infrastructure around it to actually support it in any realistic way. And yeah, this gets even more relevant when you have whole kingdoms/empires/whatever, covering an area. This is one of the shortcomings of Game of Thrones/ASoIaF in the books as well as the TV show. The connective tissue between cities/castles is lacking.


...a group of adventurers walking down the main road from cityA to cityB inside some kingdom/territory/whatever, magically still have X level appropriate encounters per day (cause that's what the rules call for, right?). Um... How on earth do normal people, who should literally be crowding along those roadways, actually survive to transport stuff around? That's a problem with the game forgetting its roots. The game originally had a bit of a tabula rasa for a map, and you discovered what was in each hex. The world wasn't pre-built, you went out from civilization's edge to carve out a bit of the chaos/wilderness to add to civilization's spread. But there are often vestiges of an older culture that had fallen, so some roads, ruins, etc.

We ran into the challenge of "What does an encounter along the road look like?" along the Sakbe Roads when I ran Empire of the Petal Throne, and I made sure that encounters on the roads were more social than monster.
For the monsters, you had to go to ruins or the non-developed areas (Of which there were plenty) of the wilderness.

I tend to go towards "they have magic that makes the plant life itself provide for them". Well, Melian and Galadriel did set a certain example ... :smallyuk:

Apply some sort of "bender" style magic and they can manipulate the natural stuff into whatever they want. Um... Things like metal armor and weapons do become a bit harder to justify though.
Trade with those who make them. Elves who live in mountains that are forested. Lots of options.

As to the last bit and the two different societies: mountain ranges can be daunting barriers. (See the Andes of South America as but one example). Mountains can also be barriers to trade and transportation.

As but one example, expansion west from the Mid Atlantic states in the Colonial America's, and early America's, east coast was a huge challenge.
Road building (corduroy roads) was hard and eventually waterways and canals provided the first transportation networks west. (As did places like the Cumberland Gap). Waterways were far more important commercial arteries in the initial move into the midwest. Roads and then railroads came later.

I tend to lean into rivers as highways but that's based on a class I took in college called Economic Geography. Water is a necessary resource, that's an embedded assumption worth keeping.

This leads me to the "high happiness" society next to "bloody miserable society" illustration.

If the mountain range is big enough and rough enough, that acts as a substantial barrier to movement and contact between societies. Further that point, it will inform dialect development as various areas have small amounts of contact with one another over the years. Again, the FR is an egregious case of importing the anachronism of 20th century living on a pseudo medieval setting.

Keeping the roads in good repair is the kind of thing taxes (and for that matter forced labor) at the macro level (empires, kingdoms) invest in (see the Roman model as one fine example). With most D&D being "after the empire fell" as a base presumption (and for sure 4e) the more apt setting for a D&D world is a Dark Ages feudal period, before the Renaissance.

This isn't a digression, this is a world building point that I see far to often missed. (Worlds without Number does a decent job of capturing this).

[Satinavian]

Honestly, i don't think it is that much of an issue in most of the more recent official fantasy RPG settings. Cities usually have settled surroundings, extensive road networks are not only deacribes but tend to actually connect different trade regions and commercial centers. Food production is described and plenty enough. Wilderness areas are sparsely settled. Really dangerous monsters are either rare or remote.
Single GM homebrew settings are often way worse.

As for D&D in particular : It is a game that classically did not care much for worldbuilding because it assumed that the DM would do their own thing. And most of the official ones read like the afterthought they actually were. Some esceptions exist, but all of those are not standard D&D. And what is worse are several books full of monsters that would actually impact settings a lot if they existed but are treated as optional background element everywhere.

But there is more than D&D.

As for ASoIaF, well, it is known that the author is really bad with numbers. While he certainly knows the importance of logistics and commerce etc, he is just not very good at making them work in his fictional world.

[KorvinStarmast]

As for ASoIaF, well, it is known that the author is really bad with numbers. While he certainly knows the importance of logistics and commerce etc, he is just not very good at making them work in his fictional world.
FWIW:
1. Monsters of certain kinds, like an ancient dragon, will dominate a region and it won't be near a city in most cases. I give adult dragons about a 50 mile radius around their lair, and an ancient dragon about an 80 to 100 mile radius around their lair. (But it could be larger depending on whether or not their cult is large, medium, or small in number). You could argue that the radius would be larger. Dragons in particular are apex predators and very intelligent: they 'll treat their region as their own private hunting preserve, at the least, and poachers will become an hors d'ouvre. :smallbiggrin:
- A variety of other major monsters have similar "regions" that are something like "The Desolation of Smaug" from Tolkien's The Hobbit.

2. Martin and his numbers: yeah, he stinks at that. In his defense, though, I think he was leaning into the kind of numbers in battles from the War of the Roses (which inspired the work in the first place).
For example, at the battle of Towton tens of thousands of troops were involved. (Granted that was one of the largest battles).

3. For a better approximation of gritty battles, Bernard Cornwell has battles with well less than a thousand per side as the standard fight in his Arthurian based (dark ages, after Rome, before Alfred) trilogy (The Winter King, Enemy of God, Excalibur) with Badon Hill being one of the few battle scenes with over a thousand on a side.
That sized battle, is IMO almost doable in D&D 5e but you need to already have some wargaming experience to fit that into a D&D game.
There are other games which handle this better.

[GloatingSwine]

Dwarves too I feel. What do they eat, living underground? Hill farms are a thing, so maybe that works, but mountains? No way. Stray mountain goats will only get you so far, and you can forget the alcohol.

The answer is not to make them live underground in the classical Moria fashion, but make them Hardcore Hobbits.

They carve their cities in tiered galleries out of the mountainsides, so their buildings are still burrowed into the rock, the material they remove is used for their fortifications, and they use the valleys and foothills for farming and hunting.



2. Martin and his numbers: yeah, he stinks at that. In his defense, though, I think he was leaning into the kind of numbers in battles from the War of the Roses (which inspired the work in the first place).
For example, at the battle of Towton tens of thousands of troops were involved. (Granted that was one of the largest battles).


Yeah, the problem is that he transposed those into a setting with much much vaster distances and didn't really think about how that might affect matters. Westeros is the size of South America, that means that moving large armies about it is very very different to moving them around England & Wales.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by GloatingSwine
…but make them Hardcore Hobbits.

Hobbitcore, I dig it.

:smalltongue:


Originally Posted by GloatingSwine
...the material they remove is used for their fortifications, and they use the valleys and foothills for farming and hunting.

Beyond this, the material they remove can be used to create terraces on adjacent slopes for farming and aquaculture. These slopes would be too steep and rocky for ordinary plowing of the sort humans know, but dwarven stonemasons can craft terraces suited for any crops that can handle the mountain climate.



And speaking of Bernard Cornwell, his Uhtred novels give outstanding descriptions of both the tactics and the visceral experience of fighting in Saxon and Danish shieldwalls, usually involving a few dozen or a few hundred men.

.

[hamishspence]

The answer is not to make them live underground in the classical Moria fashion, but make them Hardcore Hobbits.

They carve their cities in tiered galleries out of the mountainsides, so their buildings are still burrowed into the rock, the material they remove is used for their fortifications, and they use the valleys and foothills for farming and hunting.


As I recall 4E did exactly this (as well as removing their Darkvision).

[KorvinStarmast]

The answer is not to make them live underground in the classical Moria fashion, but make them Hardcore Hobbits.

They carve their cities in tiered galleries out of the mountainsides, so their buildings are still burrowed into the rock, the material they remove is used for their fortifications, and they use the valleys and foothills for farming and hunting. Heck yes. I have dwarfs in my original world living like that: a better version of Mesa Verde/Cliff dwellers of the American Southwest.

Yeah, the problem is that he transposed those into a setting with much much vaster distances and didn't really think about how that might affect matters. Westeros is the size of South America, that means that moving large armies about it is very, very different to moving them around England & Wales. I could go on about some of the novels' shortcomings that I found to detract from what started out as a ripping good tale.

[gbaji]

Aren't they all?

Hah. Yeah. Clever you... :smallamused:



This isn't a digression, this is a world building point that I see far to often missed. (Worlds without Number does a decent job of capturing this).

Yup. Again, I don't expect detailed math being involved, but at least a decent eyeball estimate of "things that would need to exist for this to work". And yeah, this doesn't necessarily detract from my enjoyment of a typical RPG game. As long as the direct action/adventure bits are good, I don't really care how stuff is made. But if this is a setting I'm going to run or play in for any length of time? That's where I kinda want at least some thought given to this sort of stuff.

Someone mentioned the size of military's in ASoIaF. Yeah. Martin is pretty terrible about some of this stuff. Unfortunately, lots of fantasy writers are, so I can kinda give that a pass. I think most modern audiences would be amused (and a little underwhelmed) if they were to see a film of an actual typical medieval battle. They'd be like "where's the army?". There are historical accounts of massive battles with 10s of thousands of soldiers on each side, but we focus on them historically precisely because of how rare they actually were. Most battles at most involved a few hundred people on each side and I think most people would be shocked at just how small an area that actually takes up.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Someone mentioned the size of military's in ASoIaF. Yeah. Martin is pretty terrible about some of this stuff. Unfortunately, lots of fantasy writers are, so I can kinda give that a pass. I think most modern audiences would be amused (and a little underwhelmed) if they were to see a film of an actual typical medieval battle. They'd be like "where's the army?". There are historical accounts of massive battles with 10s of thousands of soldiers on each side, but we focus on them historically precisely because of how rare they actually were. Most battles at most involved a few hundred people on each side and I think most people would be shocked at just how small an area that actually takes up.

I can't say I'm very good at the rest of the issue here (my kingdoms tend to be way too big and empty for historical standards and I don't have enough farms), but this makes me feel a little better. I've always tended toward much smaller armies. A recent invasion had a battle with 200-500 horse-nomad raiders throwing themselves at ~50-100 defenders. And this was intentionally suicidal on the nomads' (leaders') part--they intended for basically total casualties on both sides (for blood magic purposes). And that was one of the larger confrontations in recent history. Mostly skirmishes numbering in the high 2 digits per side at most.

Even the "apocalyptic" Cataclysm War's final battle, between the Forces of Order and the Forces of Chaos, supposedly all gathered in one spot (minus the stragglers who didn't make it) only had a few thousand combatants on each side. Because most of the forces just couldn't get there in time--they were busy elsewhere (a continent is a darn large place) or in transit when the two main forces met.

[MonochromeTiger]

One issue with the "that army's too big to make sense" and "how can they live in that environment" points is that they are, inevitably, based on real life limitations and a fantasy or science fiction or science fantasy setting can easily give an answer that resolves them.

George "I really want to be the next Tolkien" Martin screwed up in that regard because he went for large scale on everything while trying to keep a "grim and gritty realistic fantasy setting" and promptly forgot how distances and logistics work so that months of travel get rounded down to a few days and everyone gets where they need to be for the next step of the story purely by plot convenience. That doesn't mean having massive armies on continents of that scale is impossible to do with a medieval aesthetic but it does mean the fantasy elements of a setting would need to do way more heavy lifting than he was willing to let them.

"How do Dwarves have sprawling underground Kingdoms when there's no obvious way to farm down there?" Congratulations, it's fantasy, for the same reason that Drow don't wander out of the Underdark and get instant sun burn there's an entire convenient ecosystem down there abundant with edible fungi and moss and animals that consist on those going all the way up to strange subterranean megafauna with meat that could feed a few hundred for weeks as long as it's preserved right. Or there's plentiful farmland in the neighboring countries and Dwarves are actually skilled traders putting the riches of their underground Kingdom to use through diplomacy and mercantilism to supply their people with food that their allies have in excess.

"How do armies of thousands or hundreds of thousands get to battles?" Aside from time and really good supply chains? Again, it's fantasy, for all we know your setting has some ready access to mass teleportation reserved for government and emergency (read: there's a metric ton of dragons coming or a literal army of thousands of Demons or Devils who have the luxury of just stepping out of a portal near their target) use. Maybe airships are a thing and you can cram a bunch of people into those, maybe the area they're from has gotten really good at travel along its extensive rivers and a convoy of ships can get them there in a fraction of the time, and thus a fraction of the resources needed to feed them, that they would take up marching.

Point is, it's fantasy. Something sounding impossible by the standards we had historically shouldn't be the thing that breaks immersion or interest, the author or DM not bothering to even make a reason is.

[Mechalich]

Someone mentioned the size of military's in ASoIaF. Yeah. Martin is pretty terrible about some of this stuff. Unfortunately, lots of fantasy writers are, so I can kinda give that a pass. I think most modern audiences would be amused (and a little underwhelmed) if they were to see a film of an actual typical medieval battle. They'd be like "where's the army?". There are historical accounts of massive battles with 10s of thousands of soldiers on each side, but we focus on them historically precisely because of how rare they actually were. Most battles at most involved a few hundred people on each side and I think most people would be shocked at just how small an area that actually takes up.

Well, the population and political organization of Western Europe were unusually low during the Medieval Period compared to much of the rest of the world. For example, the Battle of Crecy - a major battle in the Hundred Years' War - involved maybe 40,000 combatants in 1346. Meanwhile, just a few thousand miles to the east and a few decades later Timur was marauding around the medieval Islamic world with armies of 100,000+ and routinely massacring whole cities.

A lot of this is dependent upon agricultural base. The medieval Ottoman Empire, for example, was not much better organized, as a state, than a feudal European court, but the comparatively mild climate of the Balkans, Greece, and Anatolia allowed for more people and much larger populations, which meant larger armies. Similarly, Feudal Japan crammed huge numbers of people in narrow rice-producing coastal plains which allowed for more numerous and larger battles than found in Western Europe even as most of the country remained very wild.

So there's potentially a lot of variability, but it's important to match the military outputs to the population and political structure.

[PhoenixPhyre]

One issue with the "that army's too big to make sense" and "how can they live in that environment" points is that they are, inevitably, based on real life limitations and a fantasy or science fiction or science fantasy setting can easily give an answer that resolves them.

George "I really want to be the next Tolkien" Martin screwed up in that regard because he went for large scale on everything while trying to keep a "grim and gritty realistic fantasy setting" and promptly forgot how distances and logistics work so that months of travel get rounded down to a few days and everyone gets where they need to be for the next step of the story purely by plot convenience. That doesn't mean having massive armies on continents of that scale is impossible to do with a medieval aesthetic but it does mean the fantasy elements of a setting would need to do way more heavy lifting than he was willing to let them.

"How do Dwarves have sprawling underground Kingdoms when there's no obvious way to farm down there?" Congratulations, it's fantasy, for the same reason that Drow don't wander out of the Underdark and get instant sun burn there's an entire convenient ecosystem down there abundant with edible fungi and moss and animals that consist on those going all the way up to strange subterranean megafauna with meat that could feed a few hundred for weeks as long as it's preserved right. Or there's plentiful farmland in the neighboring countries and Dwarves are actually skilled traders putting the riches of their underground Kingdom to use through diplomacy and mercantilism to supply their people with food that their allies have in excess.

"How do armies of thousands or hundreds of thousands get to battles?" Aside from time and really good supply chains? Again, it's fantasy, for all we know your setting has some ready access to mass teleportation reserved for government and emergency (read: there's a metric ton of dragons coming or a literal army of thousands of Demons or Devils who have the luxury of just stepping out of a portal near their target) use. Maybe airships are a thing and you can cram a bunch of people into those, maybe the area they're from has gotten really good at travel along its extensive rivers and a convoy of ships can get them there in a fraction of the time, and thus a fraction of the resources needed to feed them, that they would take up marching.

Point is, it's fantasy. Something sounding impossible by the standards we had historically shouldn't be the thing that breaks immersion or interest, the author or DM not bothering to even make a reason is.

I don't necessarily need the DM to say the reasons (I think that it often makes the setting/game/fiction quite turgid and bloated if you feel like you need to explicitly explain every deviation from "Holy Reality" (scare quotes intentional (and so are the nested parentheses :smalltongue:)). But they should at least have a reason/explanation.

My dwarves, for instance, are much more like what you said--in my setting plants don't photosynthesize. They need energy inputs, sure. But since it's all elemental anyway, sources such as concentrations of elemental fire or other such energies can feed underground life in new and fantastic ways. Of course, underground life is harsher (resource-wise) than surface life--such underground life is sparser and more monotonous. Lots of lichens and other fungi, relatively restricted diets. So you get a bifurcation in "subtypes"--the deep mountain dwarves (those who rarely see the sun) are smaller and thinner, with fewer "unnecessary" expenditures of energy. And their diet is quite bland and monotonous. And not particularly tasty, as far as surfacers go. The surfacers are farmers, traders, etc. And while their Holds are often built inside mountains...they're built right at the edge so they have access to farm lands in valleys.

But the armies are kept small for a lot of reasons. In largest part because the setting is currently mostly at peace (at least in the area I'm mostly writing in). There are issues, but they're handled by adventuring squads, not armies. Most nations either don't have a standing army or "feudal levy" (relying on militias locally where necessary) or only a very small one. There's really only one nation that keeps a larger army on hand, and that's a relic of the past[1] that they're struggling to figure out what to do with.

[1] A time when that nation spent every winter under existential threat down a particular mountain pass for most of a century and so mobilized basically their entire economy and culture around the army. But that ended ~40 years ago...and now the military-industrial complex is having to justify its own existence.

[gbaji]

Sure. Fantasy elements or tech can totally change things. And again, while I'm not going to get too bogged down in detail, at least having an eyeball "they use <some magic/tech/whatever> to do that, should be a minimum here. So, for example, if you're assuming that your D&D game, has an army that travels long distances because they have clerics that use create food and water to feed the troops, you should at least have some approximate idea of how many clerics of which level(s) are required for the number of troops they're feeding. If you're transporting folks via magic, then some ballbark figure of how many people you can teleport at what rate of speed, via which sorts of spells (based on what exists in the game), is something you should take into account.

Even those special elements have rules, and we should at least look at them to see what large scale effect they may have. Now, of course, there are some examples of spells that just "break" settings if you apply them straight though. So that's maybe something you should consider fixing or at least having some explanation for how things don't break (D&D is just rife with this, with various spells that create things). Eh. Or you just let the setting break in some ways (which can be interesting as well).